May day has always seemed to me to be a day in the calendar that cries out to be celebrated. It is about this time of year that the evenings become light for long enough to enjoy. If we are lucky we can pack away our winter coats and jumpers for the year. A bank
The folk boom of the sixties carried on into the seventies, but became a lot more commercial in the process. The three big female folk stars in the UK were Sandy Denny, Maddy Prior and June Tabor. Of the three I think most people would agree that the one with the best voice was June
Ulster, Texas, Algeria, Crimea are all examples of one of the things that empires do. A good way of expanding your authority is to move populations around. Ideally you move people who are reliably on your side and get them to live where people who don’t recognise your authority are currently living. It’s just
Tolkien’s Letters Reveal a Cantankerous Conservative at Odds with His Own Work
Tolkien’s correspondence shows an erudite but misanthropic author who was perpetually behind on commitments and harsh toward translators, publishers, and fellow humans. Politically, he favored hereditary monarchy over democracy and supported Franco’s regime in Spain. His reactionary views clash ironically with readers who found progressive themes in Middle-earth, revealing the gap between author and interpretation.
The Dilbert Future is Scott Adams predictions of what the future holds, made at the dawn of the Internet era. It is a dystopian prediction. Advances in technology simply give rise to new opportunities for stupidity. Voice operated computers allow evil coworkers to delete your files over your shoulder. New software to run air
With some things you just need to read the label. As its name suggests, this is a book about monarchs presented in the form of heroic rhyming couplets. Specifically it is about the kings of England. I don’t make a habit of reviewing books when I haven’t completely read them, but I have to confess