Random Jottings

Random in London

I am just back from a couple of days in London, lovely and totally exhausting and so glad to be home. I love London and the hotel I was staying in a Tavistock Square is slap bang in the middle of the area where I lived and went to school in my years in the city and it was so nostalgic to be there.  I was meeting a friend for lunch the first day - she was over from Australia to watch the cricket so she was a happy bunny - and we had a catch up on all the gossip and chat.

I had a walk through St James Park and up the Mall. The park was full of flowers and is such a beautiful place slap bang in the middle of London. 

The next day I was attending a study day at Buckingham Palce the subject being Queen Victoria's Buckingham Palace and the current exhibition of the same name.  Victoria loved living there as a young Queen and then as a wife and we heard how she and Albert reorganised and transformed the palace to suit a growing family.

All this took place in a gorgeous room overlooking the palace gardens. When we arrived there was tea and coffe, sparkling and still mineral water and lots of lovely biscuits. We had to go through security and be checked and lurking outside the Palace, as I found when asking directions to a restaurant where I was meeting friends for lunch, were very large burly men in uniform with machine guns strapped across their chest. All a bit daunting but they were very friendly and sweet though I am under no illusion that they would have had me on the ground and handcuffed in a trice if I had made a wrong move.

Lucy Peter who had curated the exhibition (and in this case curated is the correct word and not just the current usage that fashion houses etc employ) spoke to us about the changes and building made by the Royal Couple. Originally built for a royal family with no provision for children, this had to be altered to accomodate the growing family of V & A.

Helen Rappaport, who has written a wonderful book on Victoria and Albert, as well as her glorious Romanov trilogy, then gave a talk about the marriage and how the Queen coped after Albert's death which I found rather moving. As Helen was also the historical consultant on the first series of Queen Victoria we had some rather amusing insights into that as well.

Then followed a tour of the State Rooms and the exhibiton itself which was beautifully organised, as is everything to do with Royalty. I have not been around Buck House for some years and had forgotten just how gorgeous it is and oh the gallery! Van Dyck, Rembrandt, Canaletto - stunning paintings all the length and breadth and just so breathtaking to see them in their glory.

Then back to our room for another talk by Lucy in which she told us of the research needed and the work done to set the exhibiton up. By the time the day had finished the Palace was closed to the public and we were escorted in groups across the inner courtyard which made me feel very grand. When we emerged at the front of the Palace underneath the balcony, spectators were obviously wondering who we were so I gave a regal wave or two....

In the morning I had caught a bus to Trafalgar Square and then wandered up the Mall and through St James Park on my way to the Palace. I had forgotten just how much I loved London's parks which are always an oasis in the city. And the bonus of seeing the guards riding up the Mall to the palace as well put the icing on the cake.  When I left it was almost dusk and all the lamps along the Mall were lighting up. So beautiful and I strolled slowly towards Admiralty Arch. By this time reality had kicked in as I realised I had spent most of the day walking and on my feet and my shoes, which had fitted me last year and no longer do due to my weight loss, were slipping off my feet and they were aching like mad. I made it to Trafalgar Square where I thought I would catch a bus but was so tired I thought sod it and hailed a cab and went back to my hotel where I duly collapsed on my bed and discovered I had a wopping great blister on my right foot.

A simply gorgeous day and as I had had a good lunch I relaxed in my room with a sandwich and a cup of tea and had a good shower and relaxed. I was asleep by 10 o'clock.

I love London. It has a buzz about it and in the sunshine which I had all my stay it was even better. But it was equally lovely to get home and just be on my own in peace and quiet in my little flat.

As Dorothy said “there’s no place like home”.....

Random catch up

I have had a pretty lazy week watching cricket and reading and now time to catch up on same. I am off to London tomorrow for a day or two so thought I had best get this done as time goes so quick and I realise it is a week since I ranted about Sanditon. Which I have now given up on. It has just got so dire it is unwatchable.

In the last ten days I have read new books in the thriller/detective category by authors I have followed or read before with mixed feelings.

First up Anne Cleeves - The Long Call, a new series. There will be no more books set in Shetland which is a real shame. When asked why the author said she felt she could not keep on killing off the limited population of the Shetland Isles.   I tweeted her and said that Midsomer seemed to be thriving....

The TV series continues however, which is a blessing, and so do her Vera books.

This is the first to introduce us to Matthew Venn.  In true fashion, he is riddled with angst and feels inadequate.  Brought up by a religious sect (think Plymouth brethren) he has left the fold and been exiled by his parents and former friends who now want nothing to do with him. On top of that he is gay which merely makes the situation worse.  He is married to Jonathan who is handsome, charming and delightful and cooks beautifully and is, in short, a paragon.  

He run an art/community centre which is also a day care house for mentally ill patients and we have two Down Syndrome women who attend, though it turns out that one of them has been taken away by her parents for a reason which I guessed straight away.

A body is found on the beach, a seemingly homeless man who appears not to be all he appears.

Right no more because I shall start giving the plot away though if, like me, you have read a lot of thrillers you will guess it straight away and also who did it and why.

While I enjoyed this book on one level, the writing is good as always with Anne Cleeve, and characteristion spot on, as I got further and further into it I began to feel that the story had been written with a checklist to hand to show tolerance and diversity.  Or, as the current word is, "woke".  I admit to being slightly disappointed but look forward to the next in this series and see if it gets in its stride.

Benefits of Hindsight - Susan Hill.  I had thought that there would be no more Simon books as the author had said so, but she has obviously changed her mind and I am glad about that as I have always enjoyed this series.   Simon is recovering from the events of two books ago when he was undercover and his identity discovered. He has lost an arm and has taken time to deal with the pain and the fall out. He finds, alarmingly, that he is suffering from panic attacks and flashbacks and refuses to do anything about it even though he is told he is suffering from PTSD.

It takes the shock of witnessing a stabbing in front of him to shake him out of it

I am not sure that I like SImon very much, he strikes me as being a rather distant cold person, but I do enjoy Susan Hill's writing and read this through in one sitting.

Elevator Pitch - Linwood Barclay.  This is a very silly but very enjoyable thriller. Somebody is hacking into the elevator system in prestigious skyscrapers in New York and death and mayhem send the city into a panic. We have the usual stock characters - a Mayor who is venal and intend on re-election, a son he treats badly, a hard bitten women reporter who constantly writes to expose his father, said reporter has a daughter from whom she is estranged. It is all there. 

When the battered body of an elevator technician is found in the city it is pretty clear that this murder is linked to the elevator attacks - the detective in charge of the murder is suffering from, yes you have guessed it, PTSD after accidentally causing the death of a civilian in a shooting.   All builds up to a big denoument when the said detective is cured of his PTSD by a shocking incident....yep just the same as the book I had just finished.

The finale is mayhem with a finish at the top of a skyscraper with gaping lift shafts and a bomb and is pure theatre. I can see it on the screen and would not be surprised if that is where it ends up.

Fun and mindless.

How the Dead Speak - Val McDermid.   The latest Carol Jordan and Tony Hill thriller. I cannot got into too much detail regarding this book as it follows on from a clilff hanging ending in the previous one in the series, and if you are reading them, then I do not want to give anything away.   Love the author's writing and it is full of twists and turns as per. I will just say that bones are discovered at a closed and derelict convent by the developers who are knocking itt down. That is all you need to know. 

I have to mention that when the book opens Carol is seeking help from a counsellor because she is suffering from, yes you have guessed it, PTSD only this time there is no easy solution which makes it more true and realilstic.  By the time I had reached the end of these three titles I began to wonder if they had been emailing each other "Hey I gotta great idea. Let's make our detective suffer from PTSD".

It was all a bit weird.

Sanditon by Andrew Davies

Rant alert.

Where do I start? Just where do I begin to write about this morass of utter awfulness which is the adaptation of Sanditon?  So much to say.

First up, somebody tweeted last night "I am enjoying Sanditon but I expect the Janeites are clutching their pearls". I took exception at this and tweeted an irate answer saying that I was more likely to be clutching a gin and tonic.

Another tweet saying all Janeites are howling because of what has been done to Austen. Well, again I tweeted back that it is not Austen, it is Andrew Davies.

We all know that Jane died after writing a mere few chapters of Sanditon. In my previous post I have referenced this and mentioned the two recent editions which have been published.  I don't think that anybody views this is as a Jane Austen Novel and nobody should touch it. We understand that if we wish to know what happens next it has to be left to somebody else's imagination.

Andrew Davies was responsible, some 25 years ago now, for the most wonderful Pride and Prejudice which captured the nation's imagination and had huge viewing figures. And, yes, we all remember the Wet Shirt scene, but that was just a small part of the whole which was done so beautifully.   But since then Mr Davies seems to think that we cannot have any version of a classic novel unless it has sex in it. Now, we all know that underneath those tight breeches and demure high waisted dresses feelings abound, we know it, but blimey does Mr D make sure that we do.

After P and P he did a Sense and Sensibility which had Dan (Downton Abbey) Stevens chopping logs in a sweaty shirt while Eleonor palpitated in front of him.  All wrong.

In his version of War and Peace it was all heaving bosoms and hints of incest and long boring scenes of glamour and candlelight while characters yearned after each other. Only in the last two episodes did any kind of reality creep in and those two were the best of the entire dramatistion.

He also did a superb dramatisation of Bleak House. But that was then and this is now and we come to Sanditon. Oh gosh. Oh blimey. Oh dear. How shall I describe how bad it is - let me count the ways.

Ok so we have the following:

• Naked men running into the sea
• Naked man arising from the sea
• Feisty white heroine
• Feisty black heroine
• Old Bag (obviously modelled on Lady Catherine de Burgh)
• Brooding hero who seems to be an amalgam of Heathcliff and Darcy and Mr Rochester
• Scene of said brooding hero stripped to the waist in a wrestling match
• Scene of said hero in smoky tavern where nasty horrid men are slapping the local tart's backsides and making vulgar and salacious remarks - all reeking of atmosphere
• Feisty white heroine bonding with feisty black heroine who seems to want to throw herself off a cliff. They become great friends and I fully expect them to be engaged in a relationship by the end of episode three the way this is going
• Step sister and step brother who seem to have the hots for each other
• Step sister says her lines in a drawl which I assume is meant to be sexy. Other than that she does little except pose and smoulder
• Step brother an obvious cad

Ok I could go on and, as you know, I frequently do. It is not just the utter stupidity of it all, the poor GI, the bad acting and the godawful script, no it is just so bloody boring and slow.   No turn has been left unstoned to pile on the cliches.

The sight of Sydney arising from the waves last night and shocking Our Heroine was just risible and I burst out laughing..

It is Dire. Dire. Dire.

And yes I shall continue watching because of that. It is exerting a dreadful fascination and I cannot wait to see what depths are waiting to be plumbed.

PS the dark brooding hero is played by the same actor who died in Lady Mary's bed in Downton Abbey. Remember that? Wonder what will happen to him this time.   One can only hope....

Sanditon - Jane Austen

All Jane Austen fans will be eagerly looking forward to next Sunday when, in the UK anyway, a dramatisation of Sanditor is scheduled.  Any fragment by Jane that can be used in this way is seized upon with joy and I am very much looking forward to seeing what is going to be done with it.

Sanditon was left in manuscript at Jane Austen's death in July 1817 which ended at Chapter 12. So there is not much to deal with as with The Watsons (another fragment which will I am sure end up being dramatised at some stage).

In Sanditon, which was untitled when Jane died, she moves away from her usual setting of families in the countryside and writes, what Kathryn Sutherland in the OUP edition, calls "the first seaside novel".   In Emma we know that she longs to visit the seaside but has yet to do so, in Persuasion we have the famous fall by Louisa Musgrove at Lyme Regis.and in Mansfield Park there is an episode where Fanny visits her family in Portsmouth.  Jane visited the seaside and there have been theories that Sanditon is Sidmouth in Devon but she is very vague aboaut the topography so hard to prove one way or the other.

OUP Classics have produced a new edition of Sanditon edited by Kathryn Sutherland who I have already mentioned.  She is a professor of English literature and Senior Research Fellow at St Anne's Oxford, and here she has written an extremely interesting introduction to the text. 

Another edition, recently published, is issued by Fentum Press in a rather delightful hard back edition and has an introductory essay by Janet Todd. Janet is the General Editor of the Cambridge Works of Jane Austen and also edits the Cambridge Companion to Pride and Prejudice. Another fascinating essay on the novel with beautiful colour illustrations throughout.  

here is a list of continuations at the end of the book and some of these I know, some I do not.  It seems a two hour film using Marie Dobbs completion was proposed but nothing has been heard since.

And it is to Marie Dobbs that I now turn. I have a copy of her continuation which was published in 1975 and it has been on my book shelves for years. I worked at Camden Libraries during this period and was sorting through a pile of books which had been withdrawn and were going to be pulped. When I spotted Sanditon I knew I could not allow it go and came home with it.  I rather enjoyed this version. Janet Todd says "it resembles Georgette Heyer's sort of romantic comedy (which is a good thing as far as I am concerned!) and drops the broad satire on medicine and invalid tourism of the Austen original".

I also have to mention Set in the Silver Sea by Jane Austen and A Gentleman which I discovered by chance about a year ago. The author is one David Williams and seems to be self published. I have a copy awaiting my attention and the only reason I have yet to read it is that is enormous. Not a small paperback but the size of a coffee table book so not easy to hold and read.

The dramatisation coming up has been scripted by Andrew Davies who is famous for "sexing up" the classics as he puts it. While I am not decrying his use of the dive in the lake by Darcy in P & P, it can get a bit tiresome after a while as he does rather labour the point. About eighteen months ago Davies produced a dramatisation of War and Peace which was beautiful to look at, but oh so slow and dreary. He managed to introdue incest into it because he said that Tolstoy had hinted at it. Well, I was not about to re-read War and Peace to find out but it seemed to me to be stretching it a bit.

As Sanditon is set by the sea I am sure there will be plenty of Andrew Davies frolics on the shore and nude bathing, but no matter what I am looking forward to this immensely.

 

Lazy Random

Once again I have let time go by and not posted. I have been reading up a storm that is why and I also was in London last week for this wonderful exhibition so I hope you will forgive me.

Three R's - Received, Reading and Re-Reading

Time to sit down and get up to date on the blog again. I simply do not know where the time goes. I have a list of subjects to write about and they are niggling away at me. So first up a general catch up.

Anglican women Novelists - ed Judith Maltby and Alison Shell

Now this looks really interesting. Somebody, I do not know who but I am grateful, mentioned this on Twitter and I immediately checked it out as it sounded right up my reading alley. In the foreword I see that this book began as a chance conversation some years ago at an academic conference in the US when it was discovered that the two editors had been reading Charlotte M Yonge and Rose Macauley on their flights. The idea for these essays was hatched but took some years to produce - and here they are.

There are essays on Charlotte Bronte, Margaret Oliphant, Charlotte M Yonge, Dorothy L Sayers, Barbara Pym, P D James, Noel Streatfield and one of my all time loved authors, Elilzabeth Goudge. I have yet to start reading this book as I am savouring the joy I know awaits me and I want to ponder on this a bit longer. Sounds daft but it is so good to know I have a treat waiting me.

The Young Victoria - Deirdre Murphy

A beautifully produced book by Yale with that gorgeous smooth silky paper that academic publishers use. Stuffed with paintings and fascinating illustrations I am taking my time with this one as it is another to savour.  The author, Deidre Murphy, sadly died and it is due to the efforts of her colleagues at the Historic Palaces and Yale that this book was published.  Deidre takes the view that Queen Victoria had a somewhat jaundiced view of her childhood which was not as daunting or as unpleasant as she led us to believe and, indeed, some of her diaries and notes show that she was loved and adored and had a delightful childhood.   I think the main problems came later after the death of her father and when her mother came under the influence of John Conroy.  So many books out this year because of the 200th year anniversary of Queen Victoria's birth but this is sheer delight.

And then Re-reading.   I had the pleasure of meeting Jane Thynne at the Felixstowe Book Festival a few weeks ago when she gave a talk on her Clara Vine books, set in pre-war Berlin and this made me want to re-read them. So I have embarked on this and am really enjoying going back and refreshing my memory. When I first read them there was obviously a gap between each one and I find I had forgotten some of the details and it is good to go straight through them one after the other and follow the over arching narrative.

This link will enable you to click onto my reviews of two of her books:

https://randomjottings.typepad.com/random_jottings_of_an_ope/2015/04/a-war-of-flowers-jane-thynne.html

I mentioned Kate Rhodes recently and decided to do a re-read of the Alice Quintin books again and, once more, enjoyed them thoroughly.  It was good to be with her right from the start and to see how her relationship with DCI Burns slowly develops. 

After reading the latest it sounded as if they had come to and end (and the author has a new series set on the Scilly Isles) but after querying this with the author she tells me Alice may come back. I do hope so.

I have a very battered old copy of The Common Years by Jilly Cooper. The edition available at the moment is a "new" one, 1999. I think I have had mine since the eighties and it has delightful line drawings and has a lovely cover. I have it by my bedside table and am reading a chapter or two a night.

How I love Jilly! She writes beautifully with the most hilarious puns which I love (I know some don't) and I am finding myself enjoying this book all over again.

I am having a quiet week after a very busy time and am really enjoying the peace and quiet.  This goes for my reading too which is relaxed and easy.

I attended the van Gogh exhibition at Tate Britain this week and more of that anon. It was wonderful

 

 

 

A Baroque evening

Catching up on posts after lying around in a sweltering heap and I am currently in my bedroom with the curtain drawn so decided to get on with it.  Before the tennis season started and before I went to Queens and then spent two weeks yelling at the tv while watching Wimbledon, I had an evening of pure tranquility and delight.

I attended a concert of Baroque music at St Mary’s Church, Perivale. The concerts here are organised by Hugh, the father of my son in law James (wish there was a word to describe this relationship but there does not appear to be one) and though I have wanted to attend for some time this was the first occasion I actually managed to get there. It will not be the last.

The concerts at this church are on You tube video channels so do check them out and some of them are livestream so you can sit and home and watch in comfort if you so wish. Hugh has been running these concerts for years and he has a waiting list of performers who wish to come here. I hope to attend many more.

St Mary’s is small and beautiful. It is cheek by jowl to Ealing Golf Club which sounds an odd juxtoposition and I did wonder if any hard hit golf balls ever smashed a stained glass window.  It is tucked out of sight down a lane and I found it quite delightful. The night I attended it had been raining and then cleared and there was that gorgeous smell of wet earth and grass after a shower which I always find invigorating.

Now I have to own up here that I never used to like or appreciate baroque music. I am a fan of opera, Verdi and Wagner and I love a full orchestra going like the clappers and wallowing in Mahler etc.  But then I became involved in the Suffolk Villages Festival, music director Peter Holman, and my viewpoint changed. I originallly was drawn in as my then husband performed at the Festival and gradually I became interested. I joined the committee and ended up as Chairman. I viewed my role as Chairman as an organising one to ensure that the nuts and bolts of the Festival ran smoothly so that the musicians and performers had to worry about nothing but their music.   So I did not feel that my lack of knolwedge of this genre would stop me from fulfilling this role. I have to say that when I mentioned in passing to Peter Homan that I preferred Wagner to Vivaldi, he was giving me a lift at the time, he nearly put the car in the ditch...

But the longer I became involved the more I grew to love Arne, Purcell, Bach, Handel and other less well known composers. OK I will be honest. I had not heard of most of them.  There is a preciseness and cleanness in this kind of music, everything is pure and straight and uncluttered. It reminds me of reading a beautiful piece of prose or poetry with no fuss, no extra ornamentation (though quite a lot of that does turn up), it just feels right somehow. I am not expressing it very well. Let me just say that years ago after spending three years attending the English Ring Cycle at the ENO (nine performances of each four operas and then two complete cycles) I found I needed to listen to smaller music and I then turned to Mozart. Think of cleansing the palate after a huge meal.

This concert ‘Baroque Heroes’ featured Handel, Purcell, Bach, Fischer and that well known composer Anon. The performance was  given by the Florisma Baroque Ensemble with the soprano Penelope Appleyard and I sat back and loved every single moment of it. We had a harpsichord, baroque cello and an astonishing display of recorders and they all performed with style and virtuosity.

Do check out their website http://florismabaroque.com/ to learn more about them

After the concert was over we all went back to Ealing, I was lucky enough to be staying with Hugh and his wife Felicity (AKA The Other Grandparents) and we ended up chilling out with a glass of wine.

It was a perfect evening.

Random Reading

OK I have written enough about the tennis and ranted so time to get back to the nitty gritty and let you know about current reading.

In the summer months I tend to read much lighter stuff and save What I Call Proper Reading until the winter.So a whole slew of light frothy, Regency romances.  Years ago Georgette Heyer would remark wearily "oh the plagiarist is at it again" when a certain author published a book.   All I can say is after reading about ten titles in the last couple of weeks I found a certain glee in spotting which plotline had been lifted. Cries of "oh it is An Infamous Army or Frederica or The Grand Sophy" were uttered by me on a regular basis and in the case of one of them, I even recognised the dialogue.  Incredible.  There is another writer who lifted a plotline, dialogue, the lot from a Heyer which was so blatant i was staggered. That writer is still alive and still writing rubbish...

And, natch, I have been reading loads of crime.  At the moment I am reading Kate Rhodes. She wrote a series of books featuring a profiler, Alice Quintin, which I really enjoyed.  She then produced a series of books with a new protagonist set on the Scilly Isles, the Ben Kitto series.. I am reading these and enjoying them very much but wishing she would do another Alice book when I suddenly spot she has, Fatal Harmony. So flick of the finger and it is now on my Kindle. She is an excellent writer, good plotting and great characters. I can recommend them.

Death of a Busybody - George Bellairs. Love this author's books. I discovered him a while back, thanks to the British Library, and have spent a lot of time downloading his books - there are plenty available for Kindle. His Inspector is Littlejohn and he is a kindly and doughty character who I like immensely.

Miss Tither, the busybody of the title, is a nasty piece of work seeking out scandal and bombarding the villagers with religious tracts. She is found face down in a septic tank, a suitable end one might think, and there are no shortage of suspects.   The vicar in this title has the incredible name of Ethelred Claplady. Wonderful!

Death in Dark Glasses - George Bellairs. I came across this title in a second hand bookshop in Cromer. I admit I found this one very convoluted and rambling and not as good as some of the others . As Bellairs wrote about a hundred I gather it is hardly surprising there is the odd dud.

Murder in the Mill Race - E C R Lorac.  Since the British Library published this author, I have tracked down quite a few titles, some are mind boggling they are so expensive, but I have managed to get hold of a few. I do hope that more of these are produced by the BL in the future. I am delighted to say that it was I who suggested this title last year as I purchased a battered old edition and enjoyed it.

Sister Monica, warden of the local children's home, is found floating in the mill-race.  She is loathed by most of the villagers as she hunts out their nasty little secrets (much like the Busybody above) and the locals are unwilling to tell what they know. Inspector Macdonald, another lovely character, arrives to sort it all out. Another excellent read.

I have also read two titles by Carol Carnac, the other name used by E C R Lorac. Inspector Rivers is in  in these and is a laconic rather elegant man, shades of Roderick Alleyn I think, but are written in a different less easy style than under her other name. More wordy and less action and can get bogged down. I enjoyed them though. One was Affair at Helen's Court and the other Death in Triplicate.

And, as I was feeling a bit overwhelmed by all the murders and detection, I read Mohawk Valley by Ronald Welch. I have this fantastic series of books about the Carey family from Slightly Foxed who republished them all a couple of years ago.  I loved reading these as a teenager and they tell the story of the Carey family starting with the Crusades and coming up to World War 1.  I have been saving the last two titles as I wanted to savour them and suddenly the time was right to read them.  They are so good and I am hoping that my two grandchildren might read them later.

And today I read If I were you by PG Wodehouse. Not one of his funniest, it did not have me with tears pouring down my face or reducing me to hysterics like some of his other titles have done, but just sheer joy to read such elegant, pointed prose, falling into place and giving me a lovely mellow feeling. Re the butler "Slingsby loomed in the doorway like a dignified cloudbank"

Perfect.

Wimbledon 2019 - Random Rant

 

Breaking News.  Sir Andy Murray is BACK. He has had a HIP OPERATION. REMEMBER WHEN HE LIMPED OUT OF WIMBLEDON AGAINST SAM QUERRY? TRAGEDY.

Now he is back and it is:

1. A miracle
2. Lovely to see him smiling again and pain free
3. He looks so happy to be on the Court
4. Who would have thought we would see him again
5. Remember his tears at the Australian Open?
6. He just wants to play tennis (er YES)
7. He has no expectations
8. He is not worried if he wins or not (oh Yes he is)
9. Who would have thought...blah blah blah

Ok repeat 1-9 ad nauseam Don’t get me wrong I have missed Andy and yes it IS wonderful to have him back and the crowds are loving it too, but blimey, cannot the likes of Andrew Castle and John Lloyd and the other drones think of something else to say.

Now did you know that DAN EVANS HAD A DRUG BAN AND IS BACK?

So here he is and it is:

1. A joy to see
2. He has learned his lesson
3. Owes so much to those who stood by him
4. Particularly his lovely girlfriend
5. He has grown up at last
6. Now finally fulfilling his talent
7. He has gone on the road to redemption (yes really somebody said that)
8. Who would have thought blah blah blah

OK repeat 1-9 ad nauseam.

He came off court after a good match, sweat pouring down him and almost in tears and some Dopey Woman asks “Were you thinking of all those who supported you when you were out after your DRUGS BAN when you were playing?” He replied he was grateful to the crowd who got behind him though by the look on his face he just wanted to tell her to bugger off.

COCO GRAUFF HAS ELECTRIFIED WIMBLEDON

Did you know

1. She beat VENUS WILLIAMS in the first round? You didn’t? Where have you been?
2. She is only fifteen
3. She is a breath of fresh air
4. A STAR IS BORN
5. She is sooo composed on court
6. She will win this (McEnroe was the only sensible one who said he hoped it was not this year)
7. Gosh when was the last time somebody this young won Wimbledon (it was Martina Hingis actually)
8. She is the darling of the fans
9. She is the darling of the Press

OK repeat 1-9 ad nauseam

Leave her alone. The media attention she is going to get will be appalling and I guarantee when she hits a bad streak they will be in full What did I tell you mode. Seen it all before.

You get my drift.  The moronic commenting team lead by those Doughty Stalwarts John Lloyd and Andrew Castle leave no stone unturned in their use of every single cliche in the book (and I have just used one...) On and on they drone, non stop, thought the match in between each game, each stroke giving us the benefit of their piercing insights.  I do wonder what Castle and Lloyd do in between each Championship as the other majors, thankfully, do not make use of their services. (I did see Andrew Castle do an ad for life insurance or something on TV, awful and of course he was on Strictly Come Dancing a few years back. He was awful) John Lloyd lives in Florida I gather and I have no idea of what he does in the non tennis season.

Thankfully the BBC are starting to make use of Annabel Croft who is an excellent commentator and knows her stuff. She is on SKY a lot with Greg Rusedski who is also good but we cannot have him at Wimbledon as he is not really British you know.  Also he is a bit acerbic and tends to say what he thinks and that is McEnroe territory.

But apart from all the above there have been some great matches, exciting tennis and the sun has stayed out and the rain stayed away. We have the usual Women Shriekers who really are unbearable and makes watching their tennis pretty unpleasant and, in the interest of equality, I have to say that some of the men are pretty noisy too. The guy from Portugal who played Dan Evans last night (WHO IS BACK FROM A DRUGS BAN) was making a ghastly noise which was enhanced when the roof was closed.

I have managed quite easily to avoid watching St Roger of Federer who is greeted with a sycophantic lavishness by the entire team at the BBC which really turns the stomach. When his feet tread the Sacred Turf of the Centre Court they go into full gush mode, so much so that if the Pope had turned up to canonise him on the the spot it would not have surprised me....

And unless some of the NextGen as they are so wittily called step up to the plate (CLICHE ALERT) then we are doomed to an endless ever decreasing circle of finals with Rog, Raf and Djokovic.  So come on Tsitsipas, Zverev, Shapavalov, Auger Allisime, Thiem get your game going and start challenging these guys.

And finally, most people would say that if there was a prize for the biggest Dickhead in tennis then it would be a shoe-in for Nick Kyrgios.  Yeh, well watch this space. Medvedev is challenging for it. Petulant, stupid and down right rude to the umpire it is a mystery to me why these two are not slung off the court.

And the Prize for I cannot be Bothered is, naturally, given to Bernard Tomic (known as Tomic the Tank Engine) for an appalling display against Tsonga for which he has to forfeit his first round prize money of £45,000. He did not care. He has millions in the bank and says so.

So that is that. First week over. Gosh I forgot. WHY do we have Sue Barker on the Centre Court on the Saturday introducing all the sports stars in the Royal Box? WHY?  I see enough of that miserable git James Anderson throughout the year and I certainly have no desire to see Alastair Cook’s gormless face again either.

One year they had US movie star Bradley Cooper there. Now that is more like it.....

Felixstowe Book Festival

I have had a very busy week or two so apologies for the lack of posts. I am writing this in an attempt to bring a little bit of sanity to what I am watching on the tv. Kyrgios v Nadal.  If this manages to finish without an almighty row I shall be surprised.

Still, that is for another day.

The Felixstowe Book Festival has been going for several years now and gets better every year. I remember the first one which was such a stonking success and it has all grown from there. Now a highly organised event with a slick and efficient operation and this is due to the Director, Meg Reid and a fantastic bunch of volunteers who man the bookstall, steward, help with tickets, looking after authors etc. All simply wonderful.

I was introducing three events and attended three and had a busy time in between taking photos and Tweeting and Facebooking throughout the weekend which was great fun.  

the Festival opened with James Runcie, author of the Grantchester novels, and hw was brilliant. Witty and amusing and also spoke with great feeling about faith and love. An terrific opening.

The highlight for me were meeting Jane Thynne, author of the Clara Vine books which I love. We have been FB friends for a long time and it was delightful to meet her and have a chat. Her talk on the background to her books in pre-war Berlin was excellent.

(Left to right: the Bookshop run by Stillwater Books, Liz Trenow signing her books,Jane Thynne in her Clara Vine talk, second row: Duncan Barratt, Elizabeth Simchin, James Runcie and at the bottom Jane with Simon Heffer)

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She also chaired a talk with Simon Heffer about his book The Age of Decadence covering the late Victorian and Edwardian era. He had words to say about Queen VIctoria with which I strongly disagreed and did say so.

I introduced Duncan Barratt who has written a wonderful book about the Channel Island occupation which I have mentioned before. A sell out chat with a queue waiting for returns. None were forthcoming sadly.

Liz Trenow was a welcome return speaker and I would have loved to have gone to her talk but she clashed with Jane Thynne. I have known Liz for years and had a chat with her and she quite understood thank goodness.

Then later Elizabeth Semchin on a talk about Felixstowe Ferry which I, in my ignorance, thought was a boat. Turns out it is a place and one I have visited so I felt a bit of a dope when I looked it up. Fortunately, I did so before my intro!  Packed event as well.

And then in the afternoon Alison Weir came along to chat about her latest book on the wives of Henry VIII and we are up to Anne of Cleves who I have always found the most interesting of those he married. And unique in that she survived.

Sun shone all weekend, loads of attendees and I had lots of discussions and chats with attendees. It was simply great and I am already looking forward to next year.

So watch this space....