Scholar's Blog

What's Up Doc?

2010-04-16T10:14:00.004+01:00

I've no idea if anyone will be interested since I've badly neglected this blog for so long (writing fiction took precedence over reviewing it), but I'm actually not writing fanfiction any more. Since February I've been writing and researching (more the latter than the former at the moment) a genre-crossing novel (Science Fiction and Crime/Detection fiction) - ie. original fiction, with characters I've - well, I was going to say created, but that'd be an exaggeration because I don't feel like I've created them, it feels more like they've sprung, fully-formed, from my head, like Athena.

I'm world-building in a serious way - working out details about religion, politics, and society, as well as the geography of the main planet (so far there are four planets in my universe). There'll be elements of various genres in there besides SF and crime - the two main characters are police detectives, and the story's set in the 25th century.

The first third of the story must be completed by mid-July as I'm writing it for the scifibigbang over on Live Journal.

If anyone would be interested in reading it, let me know and I'll post a link once the story goes 'live'.

The Story of Martha - Dan Abnett et al

2008-12-27T16:15:00.000Z

I managed to pick up a copy of The Story of Martha this morning, and since I've been waiting eagerly to read the book since it was announced, I've raced through it.

The novel's divided into 9 parts: 5 are linking chapters (more than one per part) written by Dan Abnett, the other 4 parts are stories of Martha's and Ten's adventures, as follows:

"The Weeping" by David Roden
"Breathing Space" by Steve Lockley & Paul Lewis
"The Frozen Wastes" By Robert Shearmen
"Star-Crossed" by Simon Jowett

Each of these four stories is told by Martha to one or more refugees during her trek around the world, and each of them is an interesting and thought-provoking morsel of adventure in which Martha and Ten do their stuff; "The Frozen Wastes" is my favourite of the mini adventures, closely followed by "Star-Crossed".

Dan Abnett's linking story begins with Martha arriving back in England at the end of her year long trek, before going back to her departure from the Valiant with the aid of Jack's vortex manipulator. We are shown how, initially, Martha's pretty clueless about what she needs to do in order to survive (in the lead up to Roden's story, Martha's spotted by a small girl because of her earrings, and a few pages later she realises running in her heels is going to give her away.

The book only covers the first half of Martha's year-long journey, which she spends being chased by a man named Griffin who's a member of the Master's "Unified Containment Forces" (UCF); the Master's determined to hunt Martha down and one of his ADC's selects Griffin to head up a "kill squad" to go after her.

As a whole, the book's not bad. But it doesn't make my personal canon because Abnett has Martha captured in Japan when her perception filter key fails as the result of some technology being used by a group of bioluminescent aliens called the Drast. They are attempting to get back home, having been on Earth for a decade attempting to manipulate Earth's economic infrastructure in order to take over the planet. The arrival of the Master has rendered their takeover attempt impossible so they're trying to withdraw and have shielded their centre of operations from him using their own advanced technology, which renders Earth technology useless. This leads Martha's key to fail, so she's captured and made to work (although the UCF in Japan show no interest in her per se since the Drast only care about getting home). The Drast, however, find out about Martha when she volunteers to go to the Koban plant to work, which is where the Drast centre of operations is based. They want Martha to tell them how to get rid of the Master so they can take over the world instead. Once she refuses to cooperate, they go back to concentrating on trying to get their means of escape - a Relativistic Segue, which has torn a hole in time and space, creating a doorway through which they can disappear from Earth. Unfortunately, using it will also mean the destruction of Earth.

Griffin, who was captured not long after Martha was, and who also volunteered to go to the Koban camp, threatens to shoot the Segue - which would not only destroy it, but also the Drast themselves. In order to stop him, the Drast shut down the power across Japan, which leads to escape attempts and rioting in the camps - and it's in retaliation for this that the Master burns Japan: Griffin having contacted the ADC who sent him out after Martha once the Drast technology no longer interferes with human technology, and told her all about the Drast).

While I've no objection to the idea of the Drast per se, I can't buy the idea of them being on Earth at the time of the Master's rule, and I definitely don't buy the idea of Martha being imprisoned during her year-long trek. It's not that I think she was too good or perfect to be captured, it's just that I can't see her ever wanting to have anything to do with the Doctor again, or her joining UNIT, if she'd had to endure weeks of imprisonment as part of her year of hardship. Plus which, it's hard enough to believe that she managed to travel the entire Earth in one year; accepting that she spent weeks locked up tests my suspension of disbelief to breaking point.

Poetry Friday - 32

2008-12-12T06:45:00.000Z

Robert Fuller Murray was born on 26 December 1863, in Roxbury, Massachusetts, the son of John and Emmeline Murray. In 1869, his parents separated, and John took his young son to Kelso, England, and then to York. Robert was educated at grammar schools first in Ilminster, and later in Crewkerne. He attended the University of St. Andrews, where he received a BA in 1881. Owing to a lack of other opportunities, Murray became a research assistant to Professor John M. D. Meiklejohn in 1886, and published poetry in several popular journals. He had a brief career in journalism in Edinburgh in mid 1889, and in 1890 returned to St. Andrews. By this time, he was dealing with consumption. In 1891, he paid a brief visit to Egypt, and saw publication of The Scarlet Gown. Murray's health continued to deteriorate and he died in 1894 in St. Andrews. His second volume of poems, Robert F. Murray: his Poems, was published later that year, through his friend Andrew Lang.

A December Day

Blue, blue is the sea to-day,
Warmly the light
Sleeps on St. Andrews Bay --
Blue, fringed with white.

That's no December sky!
Surely 'tis June
Holds now her state on high,
Queen of the noon.

Only the tree-tops bare
Crowning the hill,
Clear-cut in perfect air,
Warn us that still

Winter, the aged chief,
Mighty in power,
Exiles the tender leaf,
Exiles the flower.

Is there a heart to-day,
A heart that grieves
For flowers that fade away,
For fallen leaves ?

Oh, not in leaves or flowers
Endures the charm
That clothes those naked towers
With love-light warm.

O dear St. Andrews Bay,
Winter or Spring
Gives not nor takes away
Memories that cling

All round thy girdling reefs,
That walk thy shore,
Memories of joys and griefs
Ours evermore.

This week's Poetry Friday round-up is at Wild Rose Reader.

Poetry Friday - 31

2008-12-05T10:15:00.000Z

Oh look, it's Friday and I'm posting poetry! I've been AWOL again the last few weeks - no excuse except tiredness and extreme busyness. Anyway, this week I've got a short Keats poem for you (said to be his last).

59 Bright star! would I were steadfast as thou art

BRIGHT star! would I were steadfast as thou art—
Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night,
And watching, with eternal lids apart,
Like Nature’s patient sleepless Eremite,
The moving waters at their priestlike task
Of pure ablution round earth's human shores,
Or gazing on the new soft fallen mask
Of snow upon the mountains and the moors—
No—yet still steadfast, still unchangeable,
Pillow'd upon my fair love's ripening breast,
To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,
Awake for ever in a sweet unrest,
Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,
And so live ever—or else swoon to death.

This week's Poetry Friday round-up is over at Mommy's Favorite Children's Books.

90th Anniversary of the Armistice

2008-11-11T08:55:00.001Z

90 years ago today they signed the Armistice to signal the end of the War to end all Wars. Of course, it wasn't by any means the end of war. This poem wasn't written for the Armistice but it is appropriate for the day, I feel.

Everyone Sang

Everyone suddenly burst out singing;
And I was filled with such delight
As prisoned birds must find in freedom,
Winging wildly across the white
Orchards and dark-green fields; on - on - and out of sight.

Everyone's voice was suddenly lifted;
And beauty came like the setting sun:
My heart was shaken with tears; and horror
Drifted away ... O, but Everyone
Was a bird; and the song was wordless; the singing will never be done.

(c) Siegfried Sassoon

Personal Stuff - Emails

2008-10-30T20:30:00.001Z

If you received an email (or two) purporting to come from me about an electronics firm, I apologise. Sometime between midday and 1.15pm today my Gmail account was hacked and hundreds of spam messages were sent out. Although I can access my email account still, the hack took my account up to its daily limit with the result I cannot send emails from Gmail (although I can still receive).

To say I'm mad as hell would be an understatement!

Poetry Friday - 30

2008-10-24T08:00:00.000+01:00

This week I bring you another poet named William, William Wordsworth, and part of his poem The Nightingale, a Conversational Poem:

The Nightingale, a Conversational Poem

No cloud, no relique of the sunken day
Distinguishes the West, no long thin slip
Of sullen Light, no obscure trembling hues.
Come, we will rest on this old mossy Bridge!
You see the glimmer of the stream beneath,
But hear no murmuring: it flows silently
O'er its soft bed of verdure. All is still,
A balmy night! and tho' the stars be dim,
Yet let us think upon the vernal showers
That gladden the green earth, and we shall find
A pleasure in the dimness of the stars.
And hark! the Nightingale begins its song,
"Most musical, most melancholy" [1] Bird!
A melancholy Bird? O idle thought!
In nature there is nothing melancholy.
--But some night-wandering Man, whose heart was pierc'd
With the remembrance of a grievous wrong,
Or slow distemper or neglected love,
(And so, poor Wretch! fill'd all things with himself
And made all gentle sounds tell back the tale
Of his own sorrows) he and such as he
First nam'd these notes a melancholy strain;
And many a poet echoes the conceit,
Poet, who hath been building up the rhyme
When he had better far have stretch'd his limbs
Beside a brook in mossy forest-dell
By sun or moonlight, to the influxes
Of shapes and sounds and shifting elements
Surrendering his whole spirit, of his song
And of his fame forgetful!

You can find the full poem here, and this week's Poetry Friday round-up is hosted by Kelly over at Big A, little a.

Poetry Friday - 29

2008-10-17T08:35:00.001+01:00

I don't know about anywhere else, but after a burst of unseasonable warmth last weekend (that saw me wearing t-shirt and shorts), it's been perishing cold here the last two mornings, so I thought I'd bring you an appropriate sonnet by Shakespeare:

126. Spring and Winter ii

When icicles hang by the wall,
And Dick the shepherd blows his nail,
And Tom bears logs into the hall,
And milk comes frozen home in pail,
When blood is nipp'd, and ways be foul,
Then nightly sings the staring owl,
To-whit!
To-who!—a merry note,
While greasy Joan doth keel the pot.

When all aloud the wind doe blow,
And coughing drowns the parson's saw,
And birds sit brooding in the snow,
And Marian's nose looks red and raw,
When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl,
Then nightly sings the staring owl,
To-whit!
To-who!—a merry note,
While greasy Joan doth keel the pot.

This week's Poetry Friday round-up will be over at Becky's Book Reviews.

Personal Stuff

2008-10-14T09:00:00.000+01:00

Apologies to anyone who cares for being MiA the last couple of Fridays for Poetry Friday. I was seriously stressing out about having to move next week.

Except now I don't.

Long story short - my (now ex-)boss at my proofing job kept messing up my wages in the summer and I got seriously behind on my rent because I literally didn't have the funds to pay it (it took 2 months to get the mistakes straightened out!). So about 2 months ago I got a letter from the letting agents to say the landlord wasn't going to renew my lease. I spent weeks trawling room-for-rent ads and trudging to look at places, and then yesterday I got a personal visit from one of the guys at the letting agency to ask if I'd found somewhere new to live. Well I hadn't because finding the money for a deposit (average £350) and a month's rent in advance (another £350) was proving impossible. Anyway he said he'd talk to the landlord and see if he'd agree to me staying here after all. I surmised that the agents hadn't been able to find anyone else prepared to live in this tiny, awkwardly shaped attic room, 'cos the landlord agreed to me staying on after all.

Cue me wilting like a 3 day old lettuce!

I really didn't want the hassle of moving, and while this room's not much, it has been my home for the past 6.5 years!

So that's that - and I'll be back with PF on Friday as usual.

TV that's not Doctor Who

2008-09-26T20:30:00.004+01:00

I daresay the world will implode at my admission that I've watched some TV that's not Doctor Who. I've just finished watching ITV's self-insert fanfiction for Austen fans Lost in Austen.

Amanda Price (Jemima Rooper), an ardent fan of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, lives in present day London with her boyfriend Michael, until she finds a portal in her bathroom that allows her to swap places with Austen's fictional Elizabeth Bennet (Gemma Arterton). Suddenly 21st century Price is face-to-face with the 18th century in all its costumed, mannered glory, and is faced with the problem of how to ensure everyone ends up with the partner they're "supposed" to end up with, despite the fact that Lizzie Bennett's happily living in 21st century Hampstead, working as a nanny and mastering 21st century technology.

Mr Bennet (Hugh Bonneville) and Jane (Morven Christie) seem to accept Amanda as Lizzie's friend with considerable aplomb, despite never having seen her before. Mrs Bennet (Alex Kingston) however, is not so quick to accept Amanda's presence in her home, particularly since she arrives looking rather unlike a proper young lady in her modern clothes!

Christina Cole as Caroline Bingley and Guy Henry as Mr Collins are both superbly obnoxious in their own way. Tom Riley plays a remarkably decent George Wickham (who's the total opposite of Austen's Mr Wickham). Elliot Cowan can't quite match Colin Firth's Darcy for this BBC P&P fan, but he does a pretty good job all the same.

To my enormous delight, the DVD is out from Amazon UK next week - it's already on my wish list! If you get the chance to see this, do - it's not absolutely necessary to know P&P in detail in order to enjoy it, but you'll definitely get even more out of the show if you do know P&P well. It's seriously daft at times, but thoroughly enjoyable.

Poetry Friday - 28

2008-09-26T06:30:00.000+01:00

For this week's Poetry Friday offering, I bring you a small part of Samuel Taylor Coleridge's The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (it's far too long to quote it all):

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

PART TWO

THE Sun now rose upon the right:
Out of the sea came he,
Still hid in mist, and on the left
Went down into the sea.

And the good south wind still blew behind,
But no sweet bird did follow,
Nor any day for food or play
Came to the mariners' hollo!

And I had done a hellish thing,
And it would work 'em woe:
For all averred, I had killed the bird
That made the breeze to blow.
Ah wretch! said they, the bird to slay,
That made the breeze to blow!

Nor dim nor red like God's own head,
The glorious Sun uprist:
Then all averred, I had killed the bird
That brought the fog and mist.
'Twas right, said they, such birds to slay,
That bring the fog and mist.

The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew,
The furrow followed free;
We were the first that ever burst
Into that silent sea.

Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt down,
'Twas sad as sad could be;
And we did speak only to break
The silence of the sea!

All in a hot and copper sky,
The bloody Sun, at noon,
Right up above the mast did stand,
No bigger than the Moon.

Day after day, day after day,
We stuck, nor breath nor motion;
As idle as a painted ship
Upon a painted ocean.

Water, water, every where,
And all the boards did shrink;
Water, water, every where,
Nor any drop to drink.

The very deep did rot: O Christ!
That ever this should be!
Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs
Upon the slimy sea.

About, about, in reel and rout
The death-fires danced at night;
The water, like a witch's oils,
Burnt green, and blue and white.

And some in dreams assur'ed were
Of the Spirit that plagued us so;
Nine fathom deep he had followed us
From the land of mist and snow.

And every tongue, through utter drought,
Was withered at the root;
We could not speak, no more than if
We had been choked with soot.

Ah! well a-day! what evil looks
Had I from old and young!
Instead of the cross, the Albatross
About my neck was hung.

I picked this particular section of the poem for this verse:

The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew,
The furrow followed free;
We were the first that ever burst
Into that silent sea.

I adore the way that rolls off the tongue when you read it aloud, the alliteration and the imagery are perfect and beautiful.

You can find the whole poem here.

This week's Poetry Friday round up is at The Miss Rumphius Effect.

Tenth Doctor and Donna Noble novels

2008-09-22T09:00:00.000+01:00

Be warned, spoilers abound!

Ghosts of India - Mark Morris

Mark Morris' Ghosts of India is set in India in 1947 at a time when the country is in the grip of chaos, as it's torn apart by internal strife. When the Doctor and Donna arrive in Calcutta, they are instantly caught up in a riot and parted from each other. Barely escaping with their lives, they soon discover that the city is rife with tales of 'half-made men' who roam the streets at night and steal people away. It is said that these creatures are as white as salt and have only shadows where their eyes should be. With help from India's great spiritual leader, Mohandas 'Mahatma' Gandhi, the Doctor and Donna set out to investigate these rumours. What is the real truth behind the 'half-made men'? Why is Gandhi's role in history under threat? And has an ancient, all-powerful god of destruction really come back to wreak his vengeance upon the Earth?

Well no. It's actually an alien who's capturing India's poor and using them to create its half-made men - but it takes 5 human beings to create one half-made man. To make matters worse, the alien's spaceship is leaking radiation and infecting the populace, causing horrible growths on man and beast alike, and turning any living creature that's affected by the radiation into a psychotic killer.

This story's quite interesting - not least for using Ghandi as a secondary character, but Morris really hasn't captured Donna or her relationship with the Doctor very well. And most of the other minor characters are only sketched in, relying on the reader's knowledge of the "British family in India" stereotypes.

The Doctor Trap - Simon Massingham

In The Doctor Trap, Simon Messingham does a better job of capturing Donna's voice, but this story has a desperately complicated plot that includes a surgically altered double of the Doctor with whom he keeps switching places, a hell of a lot of robots, and a group of 12 hunters known as the Endangered Dangerous Species Society: they make it their business to hunt down the last examples of any species that's about to become extinct in order to make sure the species is wiped out. And now they're on Planet 1 hunting the Last of the Time Lords.

Planet 1 is the creation of Sebastiene, who may look like a 19th century nobleman but most assuredly is not. He is determined to add the Doctor to the collection in his Trophy Room, but the Doctor is equally determined not to be added.

Shining Darkness - Mark Michalowski

Mark Michalowski was responsible for one of my favourite Ten & Martha novels (Wetworld), and it turns out he's also written my favourite Ten & Donna novel: Shining Darkness. Michalowski has Donna's voice down perfectly, and he also captures their relationship beautifully.

For Donna Noble, the Andromeda galaxy is a long, long way from home. But even two and a half million light years from Earth, there's danger lurking around every corner, and a visit to an art gallery turns into a mad race across space to uncover the secret behind a shadowy organisation known as The Cult of Shining Darkness. From the desert world of Karris to the interplanetary scrapyard of Junk, the Doctor and Donna discover that appearances can be deceiving, that enemies are lurking around every corner - and that the centuries-long peace between humans and machines may be about to come to an end.

It's clear to me that Mark Michalowski really likes Donna - at one point she takes on the mantle of The Ginger Goddess to a race of aliens who hold an artefact that the people she's with want to get back - just as he really liked Martha, and that really added to my enjoyment of the book. He captures Donna's willingness to learn from her travels and her ability to change her mind beautifully - this is the Donna who begged the Doctor to save just one family in Fires of Pompeii and didn't hesitate to join him in pulling the lever that would destroy Pompeii but save the world. I recommend this story.

NB - make sure you read the novels in the order above because there are some brief references to The Doctor Trap in Shining Darkness (you can read the last two the wrong way round, 'cos I did, but I wished I hadn't!)

For those who wish for more Ten & Donna stories (there's only one more Ten & Donna novel scheduled for release in January), there is another audio novel coming out in October: The Forever Trap by Dan Abnett (author of the Torchwood novel Border Princes). Like Pest Control, this story will only be available in audio format.

Review x-posted to my LJ.

Poetry Friday - 27

2008-09-19T08:45:00.000+01:00

It was on September 19, 1819 that John Keats wrote the last of his odes, "To Autumn":

SEASON of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss’d cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o’er-brimm’d their clammy cells.

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap’d furrow sound asleep,
Drows’d with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,—
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

I woke up this morning to the realisation that it's no longer warm enough to sit around in t-shirt and shorts as I've been doing - autumn's bite is definitely in the air here!

This week's Poetry Friday round-up is over at Author Amok so feel free to run amok over there!

Poetry Friday - 26

2008-09-12T08:30:00.000+01:00

They started up experiments with the Large Hadron Collider at CERN this week (deep under the Swiss/French border in the Alps). Radio 4 commemorated this amazing experiment with a day of radio programmes, including a one-off radio episode of Torchwood - the more "adult" Doctor Who spin-off, Lost Souls written by Joseph Lidster. It was a mixture of pseudo-science (this IS the Whoniverse after all!) and philosophical musings on life-after-death, but the story ended with two of the characters quoting lines from a poem by Alfred Tennyson (this is what I love about the Whoniverse - the wild mixture of serious and silly, and of "low" and "high" culture).

All Things Will Die

Clearly the blue river chimes in its flowing

Under my eye;
Warmly and broadly the south winds are blowing

Over the sky.
One after another the white clouds are fleeting;
Every heart this May morning in joyance is beating

Full merrily;
Yet all things must die.
The stream will cease to flow;
The wind will cease to blow;
The clouds will cease to fleet;
The heart will cease to beat;
For all things must die.
All things must die.
Spring will come never more.
O, vanity!
Death waits at the door.
See! our friends are all forsaking
The wine and the merrymaking.
We are call’d—we must go.
Laid low, very low,
In the dark we must lie.
The merry glees are still;
The voice of the bird
Shall no more be heard,
Nor the wind on the hill.
O, misery!
Hark! death is calling
While I speak to ye,
The jaw is falling,
The red cheek paling,
The strong limbs failing;
Ice with the warm blood mixing;
The eyeballs fixing.
Nine times goes the passing bell:
Ye merry souls, farewell.
The old earth
Had a birth,
As all men know,
Long ago.
And the old earth must die.
So let the warm winds range,
And the blue wave beat the shore;
For even and morn
Ye will never see
Thro’ eternity.
All things were born.
Ye will come never more,
For all things must die.

The lines used were worked into the play in a very natural manner, rather than being shoe-horned in, and were a genuinely moving conclusion to the story.

This week's Poetry Friday round-up is over at Biblio File.

(Somehow it doesn't seem like a week since I was sitting at Oxford station, waiting to get the train to Stratford and the most memorable evening of my life so far!)

Hamlet RSC 2008 - a reaction

2008-09-06T15:00:00.003+01:00

(I missed yesterday's Poetry Friday - which is rounded up here at Wild Rose Reader - owing to being out of town, so this is a Shakespeare Saturday post instead!)

In which your reviewer attempts to stay coherent and calm, but may flail on occasion!

OK. First things first - I've never seen "Hamlet" live before (I've read it about 6 times (including 3 times while I was doing it for my English degree a few years ago), I've seen the Gibson film (yeah, I know, but I couldn't get hold of the Brannagh version), and I've no real idea about how to talk about directing decisions, so please bear with me!

So. Having never seen "Hamlet" live before, I picked a performance with two of my favourite actors in the lead roles - David Tennant and Patrick Stewart, I'm looking at you. And boy was that a GOOD choice. These two men are bloody brilliant as Hamlet and Claudius - I don't tend to use the word "genius" of living people because it's a hard word to live up to, but these two men are genius actors. The play had me spellbound and I barely noticed the 3.5 hours passing by.

The stage and the back wall behind it are both mirrored (I don't know if that's the norm for the Courtyard Theatre - this was also my first production at the RSC in Stratford - talk about a whole heap of firsts!) – and the director (Greg Doran) makes excellent use of it in the opening scenes with the watchmen on the tower seeing old Hamlet's ghost – they carried torches which they occasionally shone onto the floor, reflecting the light and making the whole scene incredibly spooky – just what you need to introduce a ghost!

David's first scene is when everyone arrives on stage following the wedding of Hamlet's uncle Claudius to his brother's wife/Hamlet's mother Gertrude. He came on and stood in a corner of the stage (actually about 6 – 8 feet from where I was sitting in the stalls). He had his hair slicked back and was wearing a dark suit (this is a modern dress performance), and I was immediately reminded of David's role as Barty Crouch Jr – there was the same stillness about him, plus a slight air of menace and controlled purpose. (I'm not saying he was recreating Barty Jr – just that the look and the stillness reminded me of the HP character. Yes, I am going to reference other roles I've seen him in, just so you know!)

Hamlet's stillness and dark clothes are in strong contrast to the rest of the wedding party, so he drew my eye and I found myself keeping half an eye on him even as I watched the other characters interacting.

Patrick Stewart, as Claudius, wore a 3-piece suit throughout (I think – bear with me – I had about 2 hours sleep last night and I'm feeling a bit fuzzy-headed now!), and wire-framed glasses which give him a wise and respectable air (which is, of course, completely at odds with him being old Hamlet's murderer).

This was a great ensemble cast. The descent of Ophelia (Mariah Gale) into madness was beautifully acted and quite unnerving. Rosencrantz (Sam Alexander) and Guildernstern (Tom Davey) were really rather stupid. Laertes (Edward Bennett) didn't really work for me in the latter part of the play: when he's threatening Claudius, he was unconvincing – like a teenager, who'd been watching too many gangster movies, and his death didn't really bother me.

Gertrude (Penny Downie) was excellent – particularly during the dumbshow (which was very OTT and funny) which precedes the play-within-the-play – I saw her fidgeting uneasily throughout and her hands were never still – and during the closet scene in which she confronts Hamlet about his behaviour and he accuses her of incest, he says:

You cannot call it love; for at your age
The hey-day in the blood is tame, it's humble,
And waits upon the judgment: and what judgment
Would step from this to this?

And I noticed (and I'm slightly embarrassed to admit this!) that her nipples were very visible, and I thought "Yeah, she's not so old as all that, Hamlet, for all you're 30!"

Horatio (Peter de Jersey) was very good as Hamlet's friend – trying to inject some sanity and wisdom into Hamlet's mad proceedings. Interestingly, David played Hamlet as less mad than knowing/calculating – and oh so witty and funny! I've never had so much of a sense of the comedy in the play as I did when seeing this production: David has amazing comic timing – which Patrick Stewart freely acknowledged during the after-show talk with (most of) the cast. The exchanges between Hamlet and Polonius (Oliver Ford Davies) were brilliantly witty and clever, showing up Polonius for the old windbag that he is. Oliver Ford Davies does a brilliant job actually – going off into mumbled asides, or losing the thread of what he's saying.

Things that particularly stood out: the quiet intensity of the graveyard scene where Hamlet's discussing old Yorick, whom he once knew well; the closet scene with Gertrude where David leaps up onto the bed to stand arguing with her; the sword fight with Laertes; the hauntings by the Ghost of old Hamlet; Ophelia's scenes wherein she's mad; Gertrude's reaction to the dumbshow before the play-within-the-play; this exchange between Hamlet and Ophelia:

Hamlet: Lady, shall I lie in your lap?
[Spinning a small footstool by one foot in his right hand]
Ophelia: No, my lord.
Hamlet: I mean, my head upon your lap?
Ophelia: Ay, my lord.
Hamlet: Do you think I meant country matters?
Ophelia: I think nothing, my lord.
Hamlet: That's a fair thought to lie between maids' legs.

- David's Hamlet puts great emphasis on the first syllable of "country" all the while squatting in front of her on hands and heels and thrusting his crotch at her (how any of us in the audience who fancy DT managed to restrain ourselves at that point, I really don't know!); Horatio's final lines to Hamlet: Now cracks a noble heart. Good night sweet prince: / And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest! (which I'm not ashamed to say reduced me to tears).

All in all, this was a fantastic performance from the whole cast and I'm very grateful to have had the chance to see the show live and with my two favourite actors in the lead roles (hooray for early 40th birthday presents!).

It was also great to see the show with three of my LJ friends!!

X-Posted to LJ.

Poetry Friday - 25

2008-08-29T19:20:00.001+01:00

This time next week I shall, all being well, be sitting in the Courtyard Theatre at Stratford upon Avon, listening to the immortal words of the Bard and watching a barefoot David Tennant thrill the audience.

Hamlet: Act II, Scene ii

I have of late -- but
wherefore I know not -- lost all my mirth, forgone all
custom of exercises; and indeed it goes so heavily
with my disposition that this goodly frame, the
earth, seems to me a sterile promontory, this most
excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave
o'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted
with golden fire, why, it appears no other thing to
me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours.
What a piece of work is a man! how noble in reason!
how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how
express and admirable! in action how like an angel!
in apprehension how like a god! the beauty of the
world! the paragon of animals! And yet, to me,
what is this quintessence of dust? man delights not
me: no, nor woman neither, though by your smiling
you seem to say so.

I'm still not very excited as yet. I simply can't believe it's going to happen, but hopefully it will!

This week's Poetry Friday round-up is over at Charlotte's Library.

Dalek I Loved You: A Memoir - Nick Griffiths

2008-08-29T14:30:00.001+01:00

Another book review! It'll surely snow!! Mind you, this one's Doctor Who related, so maybe it'll only be a light snowfall rather than a full out blizzard?

I decided, before plunging into a re-read of Hamlet in preparation for seeing it live next week, to read Nick Griffiths' Dalek I Loved You: A Memoir.

I found this book laugh out loud funny, in places, which will doubtless please Nick Griffiths, who likes the idea of making people laugh. I found it warm, witty and wry. Sometimes it was even genuinely moving: he talks of interviewing Jon Pertwee for the Radio Times 16-page Doctor Who supplement in honour of the TV Movie only a short while before Pertwee's death at the age of 76 had me choking back tears (the Third Doctor was Griffiths' first Doctor), even though it's described in a very understated (ie typically British) way.

I suspect this book will appeal most to British readers between the ages of 35 and 45 who grew up watching Doctor Who at the same time that Griffiths did, and who will therefore understand the many pop culture references scattered throughout the book. It was definitely a nostalgia trip for me, and one I enjoyed taking.

He talks mostly of the classic series (New Who was part way through its second season as he was finishing writing the book), giving handy little summaries of particular episodes he's talking about (prefaced with the episode's title and "for the unfamiliar").

He lists his Top Ten Doctor Who Episodes Ever (The Deadly Assassin, The Talons of Weng-Chiang, Pyramids of Mars, The Robots of Death, The Daemons, Horror of Fang Rock, Terror of the Autons, Genesis of the Daleks, The Android Invasion, The Mind Robber with honourable mentions to The Sea Devils and State of Decay - if you were wondering). Actually, he likes lists quite a lot - listing favourite music, things he loves, things he hates, some things that have embarrassed him, etc. (He hates Adric, loves making people laugh, adores David Bowie).

I recommend the book, with the proviso that it might not appeal if you're not a Brit of a certain age.

Clearly the book's proved popular, because there's a sequel coming out in late October: Who Goes There, which is (according to Amazon's blurb) a travel book with "Doctor Who" at its core. Nick travels England and Wales, seeking locations used in the show, both Classic and New. Being an odd kind of show, its locations too are odd. This is no glamorous trip. Dungeness Nuclear Power Station, anyone? A flooded china clay pit in Cornwall? As he travels, so Nick discovers another side to our well-trodden country, which is no less evocative. Then he goes to the pub. As in "Dalek I Loved You", the travel writing is backed up by Nick's childhood reminiscences and contemporary musings."Who Goes There" isn't just for Who fans - it's for anyone who fancies a trip off the beaten path. And a very funny book.

X-posted to my Live Journal.

The Princess Bride - William Goldman

2008-08-28T20:30:00.000+01:00

Here's a thing. Oh, it's called a book review, isn't it?

I know! It's OK, I'll just wait and give you all time to recover from the shock of me posting an actual book review (and it's not even a Doctor Who book!)...

Are you recovered now, or do you need a bit more time? (I'm sorry, I should have given you some warning, shouldn't I?)

Right.

Book review. So about 500 years after the rest of the world, I finally got around to reading William Goldman's The Princess Bride (What can I say? Bandwagons generally pass me by as they're careering madly downhill while I plod upwards!)

Someone mentioned the book somewhere (I suspect it was a less-Doctor-Who-obsessed Live Journal friend of mine), and I thought "Huh, I've heard a lot about that, never read it. Wonder if they library's got it?" And they did have it - though it's so wildly popular I had to wait two weeks to get hold of it! - and I rather enjoyed it.

I'm sure everyone else is already familiar with the fact that this book is a rather tongue-in-cheek fairytale of love, life, death, action, and life again. Featuring the obligatory handsome Prince (Westley - I kept calling him Wesley, too much Buffy, methinks!) and a incredibly beautiful princess (improbably named Buttercup). It also boasts a Spanish sword wizard ("Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die."); a terrifying Zoo of Death; an immense, chocolate-coated resurrection pill, and a whole lot of villains, who run the gamut from evil, through even more evil, to (blimey!) most evil.

And then there's Fezzik, the gentle giant who's addicted to rhyming but too afraid to tell most people.

William Goldman - who's twice won an Oscar for his screenwriting (Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and All the President's Men if you're interested) - has always claimed he merely abridged this text, extracting the "good parts" from an inventive yet wordy and political satire by Florinese literary superstar, S Morgenstern.

Whether or not that's the case, doesn't really matter. This is a fun book. Also gripping, with edge-of-the-seat suspense by the bucketload.

If by any chance I'm NOT the last person in the English-speaking world to read this book, do grab a copy and be prepared for a tale of "true love and high adventure".

Poetry Friday - 24

2008-08-22T14:00:00.000+01:00

I recently read Laura Lippman's In A Strange City, a murder mystery novel in which a strange little man attempts to hire PI Tess Monaghan in order to unmask the Visitor (also known as the Poe Toaster), who has been visiting the Baltimore grave of Edgar Allan Poe every year on 19 January for the past fifty years. On each visit s/he leaves three red roses and a half-empty bottle of cognac. Since the Visitor is committing no crime Tess refuses the assignment, but she worries that a less scrupulous PI may take it on, so she goes to the 19 January vigil as an observer. She watches as two cloaked figures approach the grave, appear to embrace and then part, but as they walk off in different directions, there's a gunshot and one of them is killed. Tess quickly learns that the dead man is not the regular Visitor. So who is he? And why was he there? When it turns out that Tess's would-be client had given her a fake name, she knows she must try to find him. And when an old friend from her past surfaces, claiming that the shooting was a homophobic hate crime, things only get more complicated...

This was a fascinating novel and I thoroughly enjoyed it. It also gave me a taste for reading Poe's poetry, so this week I'm sharing this poem:

Annabel Lee

It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of Annabel Lee;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.
I was a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea:
But we loved with a love that was more than love —
I and my Annabel Lee;
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
Coveted her and me.
And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her highborn kinsman came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.
The angels, not half so happy in heaven,
Went envying her and me —
Yes! — that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.
But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we —
Of many far wiser than we —
And neither the angels in heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee:
For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling — my darling — my life and my bride,
In her sepulchre there by the sea,
In her tomb by the sounding sea.

Today is the birthday of Virginia Eliza Clemm Poe, Edgar Allan Poe's first cousin whom he married in 1835 (despite being only 13 years old, and there being a 14 year age gap between them. Virginia contracted tuberculosis when she was 19, and when she died in 1847, Poe was devastated and started drinking heavily. It is possible that she was the inspiration for this poem.

This week's Poetry Friday round-up is over at Read. Imagine. Talk!.

Poetry Friday - 23

2008-08-15T08:45:00.005+01:00

In three weeks time, I shall be seeing this for myself:

(Photos Alistair Muir)

And my excitement levels are steadily rising. This means I'm in well into Shakespeare Mode right now, so this week I'm bringing you another of the Bard's Sonnets.

Sonnet 23

As an unperfect actor on the stage
Who with his fear is put besides his part,
Or some fierce thing replete with too much rage,
Whose strength's abundance weakens his own heart.
So I, for fear of trust, forget to say
The perfect ceremony of love's rite,
And in mine own love's strength seem to decay,
O'ercharged with burden of mine own love's might.
O, let my books be then the eloquence
And dumb presagers of my speaking breast,
Who plead for love and look for recompense
More than that tongue that more hath more express'd.
O, learn to read what silent love hath writ:
To hear with eyes belongs to love's fine wit.

I can hardly wait to see one of my favourite Shakespeare plays live - and with no less than two of my favourite actors (David Tennant and Patrick Stewart) in leading roles.

This week's Poetry Friday round up is over at Big A, little a

Poetry Friday - 22

2008-08-08T11:00:00.000+01:00

Given the weather we've been having this week, this poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley seems apt!

The Cloud

I bring fresh showers for the thirsting flowers,
From the seas and the streams;
I bear light shade for the leaves when laid
In their noonday dreams.
From my wings are shaken the dews that waken
The sweet buds every one,
When rocked to rest on their mother's breast,
As she dances about the sun.
I wield the flail of the lashing hail,
And whiten the green plains under,
And then again I dissolve it in rain,
And laugh as I pass in thunder.

I sift the snow on the mountains below,
And their great pines groan aghast;
And all the night 'tis my pillow white,
While I sleep in the arms of the blast.
Sublime on the towers of my skyey bowers,
Lightning, my pilot, sits;
In a cavern under is fettered the thunder,
It struggles and howls at fits;
Over earth and ocean, with gentle motion,
This pilot is guiding me,
Lured by the love of the genii that move
In the depths of the purple sea;
Over the rills, and the crags, and the hills,
Over the lakes and the plains,
Wherever he dream, under mountain or stream,
The Spirit he loves remains;
And I all the while bask in Heaven's blue smile,
Whilst he is dissolving in rains.

The sanguine Sunrise, with his meteor eyes,
And his burning plumes outspread,
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack,
When the morning star shines dead;
As on the jag of a mountain crag,
Which an earthquake rocks and swings,
An eagle alit one moment may sit
In the light of its golden wings.
And when Sunset may breathe, from the lit sea beneath,
Its ardors of rest and of love,
And the crimson pall of eve may fall
From the depth of Heaven above,
With wings folded I rest, on mine aery nest,
As still as a brooding dove.

That orbed maiden with white fire laden,
Whom mortals call the Moon,
Glides glimmering o'er my fleece-like floor,
By the midnight breezes strewn;
And wherever the beat of her unseen feet,
Which only the angels hear,
May have broken the woof of my tent's thin roof,
The stars peep behind her and peer;
And I laugh to see them whirl and flee,
Like a swarm of golden bees,
When I widen the rent in my wind-built tent,
Till the calm rivers, lakes, and seas,
Like strips of the sky fallen through me on high,
Are each paved with the moon and these.

I bind the Sun's throne with a burning zone,
And the Moon's with a girdle of pearl;
The volcanoes are dim, and the stars reel and swim
When the whirlwinds my banner unfurl.
From cape to cape, with a bridge-like shape,
Over a torrent sea,
Sunbeam-proof, I hang like a roof,--
The mountains its columns be.
The triumphal arch through which I march
With hurricane, fire, and snow,
When the Powers of the air are chained to my chair,
Is the million-colored bow;
The sphere-fire above its soft colors wove,
While the moist Earth was laughing below.

I am the daughter of Earth and Water,
And the nursling of the Sky;
I pass through the pores of the ocean and shores;
I change, but I cannot die.
For after the rain when with never a stain
The pavilion of Heaven is bare,
And the winds and sunbeams with their convex gleams
Build up the blue dome of air,
I silently laugh at my own cenotaph,
And out of the caverns of rain,
Like a child from the womb, like a ghost from the tomb,
I arise and unbuild it again.

A friend was bemoaning the typical British weather (ie. rain) yesterday and I offered her a snippet of this by way of distraction. I *think* she appreciated it!

This week's Poetry Friday round-up is over at Becky's Book Reviews.

Poetry Friday - 21

2008-08-01T07:00:00.000+01:00

Life has quietened back down again for me this week (and the weather's cooling down too, thank goodness) after last week's laptop crash, etc.

This week's poem is by W H Auden.

Musée Des Beaux Arts

About suffering they were never wrong,
The Old Masters: how well they understood
Its human position; how it takes place
While someone else is eating or opening a window or just walking
dully along;
How, when the aged are reverently, passionately waiting
For the miraculous birth, there always must be
Children who did not specially want it to happen, skating
On a pond at the edge of the wood:
They never forgot
That even the dreadful martyrdom must run its course
Anyhow in a corner, some untidy spot
Where the dogs go on with their doggy life and the torturer's horse
Scratches its innocent behind a tree.

In Breughel's Icarus, for instance: how everything turns away
Quite leisurely from the disaster; the ploughman may
Have heard the splash, the forsaken cry,
But for him it was not an important failure; the sun shone
As it had to on the white legs disappearing into the green
Water; and the expensive delicate ship that must have seen
Something amazing, a boy falling out of the sky,
Had somewhere to get to and sailed calmly on.

This week's Poetry Friday round-up is over at The Well-Read Child.

Doctor Who Prom Report

2008-07-27T20:00:00.001+01:00

So I went to the Prom today and managed NOT to explode from squee and glee (or melt in the heat!)

I met a couple of friends from LJ - although not until after the Prom was over.

I also spoke to Phil Collinson (outgoing Exec Producer) - poor bloke must have wondered who the hell the over-excited loony was who accosted him outside the RAH just after he and his party exited. I thanked him for his work on Who - because I know he's worked very hard on it. And he immediately diverted me into discussing the concert so I babbled like the fool I am and then wished him luck for the future.

I also saw Russell T Davies (Who's chief writer and producer) but he was up in a balcony seat (with Catherine Tate (Donna Noble) beside him) so I didn't speak to him. I did wave and shout at Catherine and she saw me and waved back!

Anywho, onto the concert proper:

It opened with a concert prologue sung by Melanie Pappenheim (she of the ethereal voice who does the Doomsday music).

Then they showed a short clip sequence featuring all the New Who companions (including Mickey and Jackie) but not Sarah Jane Smith (my first companion) which was followed by Aaron Copland's "Fanfare for the Common Man" - which I thought was a lovely choice (and I adore that piece of music anyway!)

Then Freema Agyeman (Martha Jones) came out to introduce it and we had "All the Strange, Strange Creatures" - and it was fantastic to hear it live! There were 2 Sontarans (one helmeted, one not), 2 Judoon (ditto) and 3 Cybermen milling around during this piece. The helmeted Judoon was at the end of my row of seats (I was about 6 - 8 seats in from the aisle) and I saw it scanning some of the kids.

This was followed by Mark-Anthony Turnage's "The Torino Scale" having its UK premiere. It was a very loud, dramatic piece with lots of odd noises from the orchestra (deliberately odd, I hasten to add!)

Then one of my long time favourites - Holst's "Jupiter" from "The Planets" - during which three Ood appeared in three of the aisles.

Next was "The Doctor Forever" - which sounded quite different live compared to the CD version I'm used to hearing. Then came music for Rose, followed by Martha vs The Master (with clips from "Sound of Drums" and "The Last of the Time Lords"). Freema came out afterwards and admitted to being biased and liking that!

Then we had the "TARDIS cutaway" scene "Music of the Spheres" with the Doctor and the Graske (again) - which was aimed squarely at the children, but rather amusing too. At one point the Doctor started talking to us directly, then he threw some music he'd written through the "spatial anomaly" (I can't remember what technobabble name RTD gave it) and suddenly sheets of paper flew out over the orchestra who then played what the Doctor had supposedly just written (a raucous noise!).

RTD says of this segment (in the programme notes) that the Tenth Doctor "hadn't yet shown any aptitude for music" (after listing the various musical interests of the previous nine incarnations) - which just goes to show how little notice he takes of his own show since Ten sang bits of "I could have danced all night" (from "My Fair Lady") in Girl in the Fireplace and he tries to take Rose to an Elvis concert in "The Idiot's Lantern" - he also mentions Ian Drury at one stage too...

We then had an interval and the second part started with Wagner's "The Ride of the Valkyrie" (without the cannons, alas!).

Then Noel (Mickey Smith) and Camille (Jackie Tyler) came out and introduced Murray's music for the Daleks and Davros - and a Dalek appeared on stage and Davros appeared in the Promming area and started telling us that he was going to make the Royal Albert Hall his "palace" and we would be his servants (there was quite a bit of jeering and hissing going on!). Three Cybermen also appeared in three of the aisles to gesture wildly at the Dalek and Davros.

Then we had an unexpected treat - Catherine Tate appeared on stage (she wasn't listed in the programme as presenting, unlike Freema, Noel and Camille)!! She got huge cheers before she introduced music for Donna, Reinette and Astrid.

Freema introduced Prokofiev's "Montagues and Capulets" theme from his ballet Romeo and Juliet and reminded us that Martha had met Shakespeare. Then we had This is Gallifrey (and clips with this piece included Derek Jacobi's Master regenerating into John Simm's Master) and "Doomsday" with Murray Gold letting rip on the piano.

Then Freema and an Ood introduced "The Doctor's Theme" and "Song of Freedom", the triumphant version of the "Ood Song" that we heard when the TARDIS crew were piloting the ship (and Earth) back home (Freema mentioned that day's filming was one of her absolute favourites!) - and it was nice to see some shots of the Ninth Doctor during "The Doctor's Theme".

Finally we had Tim Phillips singing "Song for Ten" and then the DW Theme from Season 4 before they encored Song of Freedom and encouraged everyone to clap along...

Oh! I forgot to mention that Freema came on stage at one point and said David had just rung her 'cos he was listening to it live in Stratford and we all cheered (and I bellowed "Hello David" like a fool!)

I had a fantastic time. I'm a bit disappointed I didn't get to see Freema or Catherine at the stage door afterwards, but there was a real screaming scrum when they appeared, and we were told to go home very quickly by the security guard, unfortunately. Still Freema was standing in the aisle just a few seats away twice and I could see how tiny and gorgeous she is!!

Poetry Friday - 20

2008-07-25T17:15:00.000+01:00

It's been a helluva week here... On Tuesday I picked up my reading glasses, and the arm fell off. But instead of the screw having fallen out, the arm had actually broken. A replacement pair will cost me £67!

On Wednesday morning I was checking my emails and what-not first thing and my laptop threw a major wobbly, crashing and refusing to reboot. I had to wait until yesterday to get hold of an XP disc to reinstall the OS - and in the process I lost all my data!

Yesterday morning, in the middle of our heatwave, my electric fan (an essential item in this well insulated attic room) died!

The only thing that's keeping me from having the screaming abdabs about all this is the knowledge that I'm seeing Freema Agyeman in person on Sunday at the Doctor Who Prom.

Since I'm so stressed, I've resorted to Shakespeare - my comfort reading poetry-wise...

Sonnet 19

Devouring Time, blunt thou the lion's paws,
And make the earth devour her own sweet brood;
Pluck the keen teeth from the fierce tiger's jaws,
And burn the long-liv'd phoenix, in her blood;
Make glad and sorry seasons as thou fleet'st,
And do whate'er thou wilt, swift-footed Time,

To the wide world and all her fading sweets;
But I forbid thee one most heinous crime:
O! carve not with thy hours my love's fair brow,
Nor draw no lines there with thine antique pen;
Him in thy course untainted do allow
For beauty's pattern to succeeding men.
Yet, do thy worst old Time: despite thy wrong,
My love shall in my verse ever live young.

This poem reminds me that "this too, shall pass"...

The Poetry Friday round up this week is over at A Year of Reading.

Reading 101

2008-07-22T21:10:00.000+01:00

Just thought I'd share this with you - it's written by a Live Journal friend of mine who's a very thoughtful, caring mom.

Poetry Friday - 19

2008-07-18T15:15:00.001+01:00

This week a friend in the Philippines introducted me to the poetry of the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda (how cosmopolitan is the WWW?!) - whose poetry I'd not previously encountered. I particularly like this poem. For some reason the line "I love you as certain dark things are to be loved" makes me think of Shakespeare:

XVII (I do not love you...)

I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way

than this: where I does not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.

Translated by Stephen Tapscott

This week the Poetry Friday round-up really IS with Kelly Fineman (I mistook the date last week, so I apologise if I caused any confusion...)

Poetry Friday - 18

2008-07-11T11:45:00.001+01:00

I came across this poem by Ogden Nash during the week, and it lodged itself quite firmly in my brain, so I thought I would share it with you.

Listen...

There is a knocking in the skull,
An endless silent shout
Of something beating on a wall,
And crying, "Let me out!"

That solitary prisoner
Will never hear reply.
No comrade in eternity
Can hear the frantic cry.

No heart can share the terror
That haunts his monstrous dark.
The light that filters through the chinks
No other eye can mark.

When flesh is linked with eager flesh,
And words run warm and full,
I think that he is loneliest then,
The captive in the skull.

Caught in a mesh of living veins,
In cell of padded bone,
He loneliest is when he pretends
That he is not alone.

We’d free the incarcerate race of man
That such a doom endures
Could only you unlock my skull,
Or I creep into yours.

The Poetry Friday round-up is over at Writing and Ruminating this week.

Poetry Friday - 17

2008-07-04T09:45:00.000+01:00

It's a lovely summer's day here - bright sunshine, but not too hot yet. I'm enjoying re-reading Garth Nix's Mister Monday as I work towards reading Superior Saturday (which I bought last week - oh the joy of having a little spare cash!), and I'm in a generally good mood (ie. I'm not thinking about what's going to happen in tomorrow's Doctor Who season finale!). Therefore, I thought I'd share this poem by Wordsworth, as it seems to suit my mood:

Upon Westminster Bridge

EARTH has not anything to show more fair:
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty:
This City now doth like a garment wear
The beauty of the morning; silent, bare,
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie
Open unto the fields, and to the sky;
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.
Never did sun more beautifully steep
In his first splendour valley, rock, or hill;
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!
The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still!

Just gorgeous!

The Poetry Friday round up is over at In Search of Giants.

And to those enjoying a holiday weekend - Happy July 4th!

Poetry Friday - 16

2008-06-27T08:45:00.000+01:00

Yesterday saw the birthday of the late Laurie Lee, one of the few people ever to become a legend in his own lifetime - and one of the few people to make my hometown of Stroud famous. He's probably best known for his autobiographical Cider With Rosie, but he also wrote poetry such as this:

April Rise

If ever I saw blessing in the air
I see it now in this still early day
Where lemon-green the vaporous morning drips
Wet sunlight on the powder of my eye.

[...]

Pure in the haze the emerald sun dilates,
The lips of sparrows milk the mossy stones,
While white as water by the lake a girl
Swims her green hand among the gathered swans.

Now, as the almond burns its smoking wick,
Dropping small flames to light the candled grass;
Now, as my low blood scales its second chance,
If ever world were blessed, now it is.

You can find the whole poem here.

This week's Poetry Friday round-up is over at Biblio File.

Poetry Friday - 15

2008-06-20T08:45:00.000+01:00

Last year Doctor Who gave me references to Shakespeare and Eliot (in "The Shakespeare Code" and "The Lazarus Experiment" respectively), this year (last week) it's given me Christina Rossetti, specifically the last four lines of this extract:

Goblin Market

Morning and evening
Maids heard the goblins cry:
"Come buy our orchard fruits,
Come buy, come buy:
Apples and quinces,
Lemons and oranges,
Plump unpecked cherries-
Melons and raspberries,
Bloom-down-cheeked peaches,
Swart-headed mulberries,
Wild free-born cranberries,
Crab-apples, dewberries,
Pine-apples, blackberries,
Apricots, strawberries--
All ripe together
In summer weather--
Morns that pass by,
Fair eves that fly;
Come buy, come buy;
Our grapes fresh from the vine,
Pomegranates full and fine,
Dates and sharp bullaces,
Rare pears and greengages,
Damsons and bilberries,
Taste them and try:
Currants and gooseberries,
Bright-fire-like barberries,
Figs to fill your mouth,
Citrons from the South,
Sweet to tongue and sound to eye,
Come buy, come buy."
Evening by evening
Among the brookside rushes,
Laura bowed her head to hear,
Lizzie veiled her blushes:
Crouching close together
In the cooling weather,
With clasping arms and cautioning lips,
With tingling cheeks and finger-tips.
"Lie close," Laura said,
Pricking up her golden head:
We must not look at goblin men,
We must not buy their fruits:
Who knows upon what soil they fed
Their hungry thirsty roots?"

"Midnight" was a brilliantly acted story: I consider David Tennant a genius (and I don't use that word lightly) but Lesley Sharp matched him in this episode. The plot was a bit meh, but the acting was fantastic, and the use of the lines from Rossetti was spot on.

Anyway, the poem can be read in its entirety here.

And this week's Poetry Friday round-up is at Semicolon.

Poetry Friday - 14

2008-06-13T09:15:00.001+01:00

It's been a slightly chaotic couple of weeks as I've recently started a second (part time) job (I need the cash, and this one let's me get out of the house !), so Poetry Friday slipped out of my schedule. However, I'm back this week to celebrate the birthday of one of Ireland's greatest poets, W B Yeats in 1865.

Yeats was Anglo-Irish, which means that his family belonged to the ruling minority class in Ireland, a Protestant upper class that still had strong ties to England, unlike the largely Catholic, and frequently disenfranchised, lower classes. But Yeats himself always felt a strong connection to Ireland and was particularly captivated by the landscape of County Sligo in NW Ireland, where his mother's relatives lived.

His father, John B Yeats, was a painter, and he moved the family to London when William was three. Yeats hated London and didn't do very well at school; he was half-blind in one eye and was generally far more interested in daydreaming than in learning to read. He always felt spiritually at home in Sligo and fortunately his family moved back to Ireland, to Howth on Dublin Bay, in 1880. In 1885 the Dublin University Review published Yeats' first two poems.

Yeats' first published volume of poetry, The Wanderings of Oisin and Other Poems (1889), brought to his door a young woman named Maud Gonne. His yearning for Maud and his inability to attain her haunted him for almost all his life. He proposed in 1891 and again in 1916, but was refused by Gonne on both occasions.

Yeats founded the National Literary Society and what would go on to become the Abbey Theatre in Dublin. J M Synge and Ezra Pound were close friends of Yeats, who received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1923.

Here are three of his poems that I love:

He wishes for the Cloths of Heaven

Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

I first fell in love with this poem when Anthony Hopkins' character recited it in the film version of 84 Charing Cross Road.

A Drinking Song

Wine comes in at the mouth
And love comes in at the eye;
That's all we shall know for truth
Before we grow old and die.
I lift the glass to my mouth,
I look at you, and I sigh.

Never give all the heart

Never give all the heart, for love
Will hardly seem worth thinking of
To passionate women if it seem
Certain, and they never dream
That it fades out from kiss to kiss;
For everything that's lovely is
But a brief, dreamy, kind delight.
O never give the heart outright,
For they, for all smooth lips can say,
Have given their hearts up to the play.
And who could play it well enough
If deaf and dumb and blind with love?
He that made this knows all the cost,
For he gave all his heart and lost.

Is it me, or are the last two lines just a little bit heart-breaking?

This week's Poetry Friday round-up is over at A Wrung Sponge

Poetry Friday - 12

2008-05-23T14:00:00.000+01:00

I've decided I hate Fridays! I got paid again today - and for the third fortnight in a row, my wages were incorrect (I'm nearly £200 short). I wouldn't have believed it was possible for someone to be so consistently incompetent if I hadn't experienced it first hand.

And not even the arrival of my ticket for the Doctor Who Prom (paid for by friends as a treat) has really cheered me up... (At least my bruises from that fall I took a couple of weeks ago have finally faded !)

* * * * * *

Putting that aside (otherwise the air'll be blue around here), I have the following poem from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow as my Poetry Friday contribution this week.

Night

Into the darkness and the hush of night
Slowly the landscape sinks, and fades away,
And with it fade the phantoms of the day,
The ghosts of men and things, that haunt the
light.
The crowd, the clamor, the pursuit, the flight,
The unprofitable splendor and display,
The agitations, and the cares that prey
Upon our hearts, all vanish out of sight.
The better life begins; the world no more
Molests us; all its records we erase
From the dull common-place book of our lives,
That like a palimpsest is written o'er
With trivial incidents of time and place,
And lo! the ideal, hidden beneath, revives.

This week's Poetry Friday round-up is over at Becky's Book Reviews...

Poetry Friday - 11

2008-05-16T07:25:00.002+01:00

We had our summer last weekend, now we're back to having Spring (by which I mean rain interspersed with sunshine), so this poem by Gerard Manley Hopkins sprang (ho, ho !) to mind:

Spring

Nothing is so beautiful as spring—
When weeds, in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush;
Thrush's eggs look little low heavens, and thrush
Through the echoing timber does so rinse and wring
The ear, it strikes like lightings to hear him sing;
The glassy peartree leaves and blooms, they brush
The descending blue; that blue is all in a rush
With richness; the racing lambs too have fair their fling.

What is all this juice and all this joy?
A strain of the earth's sweet being in the beginning
In Eden garden.-Have, get, before it cloy,
Before it cloud, Christ, lord, and sour with sinning,
Innocent mind and Mayday in girl and boy,
Most, O maid's child, thy choice and worthy the winning.

GMH's poetry always seems to soothe my ear as well as my mind - the rhythms and the word choices focus my mind beautifully...

This week's Poetry Friday round-up is over at Two Writing Teachers.

Poetry Friday - 10

2008-05-09T16:10:00.000+01:00

*sigh*

I'm beginning to wonder if my Fridays are jinxed ! I got paid today although it appears that my boss still didn't sort out the screw up of my wages from two weeks ago (waiting for my pay slip to arrive so I can cross check it with my pay claims and find out for sure). But since I had money - and an unexpected afternoon off (after working flat out all last weekend, despite it being a public holiday weekend), I went out to do some errands earlier, and I managed to twist my ankle on one of our dodgy local pavements. Trouble was, I didn't just twist my ankle, I lost my balance as well...

So now I have one bruised and swollen left knee, one bruised and swollen left wrist, and one bruised and swollen right arm from inside wrist to outer elbow...

Oh AND a sore right ankle.

The only thing I didn't HIT was my head - and that's probably only because everything else had already come into contact with the ground or the nearby bench (that my right arm hit) before my head could get there !

And of course, my dignity is bruised, but at least no one can see THAT !!

I was picked up by two lovely chaps who were sitting outside the cafe opposite which I took my tumble and one, the cafe owner, fetched me a large cup of cold water after checking I hadn't hit my head and didn't need an ambulance.

Life - why do you hate me so much?

Anyway, I've been meaning to share this poem by John Betjeman for a few weeks now, so here it is without further ado:

Diary of a Church Mouse

Here among long-discarded cassocks,
Damp stools, and half-split open hassocks,
Here where the Vicar never looks
I nibble through old service books.
Lean and alone I spend my days
Behind this Church of England baize.
I share my dark forgotten room
With two oil-lamps and half a broom.
The cleaner never bothers me,
So here I eat my frugal tea.
My bread is sawdust mixed with straw;
My jam is polish for the floor.
Christmas and Easter may be feasts
For congregations and for priests,
And so may Whitsun. All the same,
They do not fill my meagre frame. For me the only feast at all
Is Autumn's Harvest Festival,
When I can satisfy my want
With ears of corn around the font.
I climb the eagle's brazen head
To burrow through a loaf of bread.
I scramble up the pulpit stair
And gnaw the marrows hanging there.
It is enjoyable to taste
These items ere they go to waste,
But how annoying when one finds
That other mice with pagan minds
Come into church my food to share
Who have no proper business there.
Two field mice who have no desire
To be baptized, invade the choir.
A large and most unfriendly rat
Comes in to see what we are at.
He says he thinks there is no God
And yet he comes... it's rather odd.
This year he stole a sheaf of wheat
(It screened our special preacher's seat),
And prosperous mice from fields away
Come in to hear the organ play,
And under cover of its notes
Ate through the altar's sheaf of oats.
A Low Church mouse, who thinks that I
Am too papistical, and High,
Yet somehow doesn't think it wrong
To munch through Harvest Evensong,
While I, who starve the whole year through,
Must share my food with rodents who
Except at this time of the year
Not once inside the church appear.
Within the human world I know
Such goings-on could not be so,
For human beings only do
What their religion tells them to.
They read the Bible every day
And always, night and morning, pray,
And just like me, the good church mouse,
Worship each week in God's own house,
But all the same it's strange to me
How very full the church can be
With people I don't' see at all
Except at Harvest Festival.

This week's poetry round-up is over at Writer2be.

Poetry Friday - 9

2008-05-02T17:30:00.003+01:00

The past week has mostly left me cranky (mostly thanks to my boss screwing up my wages last week and then HR refusing to sort the matter out before I get paid next week), so I've been wallowing in some of my poetry "old favourites" to cheer myself up and I thought I'd share one of them with you for my Poetry Friday contribution:

To The Virgins, To Make Much Of Time

Gather ye Rose-buds while ye may,
Old Time is still a flying:
And this same flower that smiles today,
Tomorrow will be dying.

The glorious Lamp of Heaven, the Sun,
The higher he's a getting;
The sooner will his Race be run,
And nearer he's to Setting.

That Age is best, which is the first,
When Youth and Blood are warmer;
But being spent, the worse, and worst
Times, still succeed the former.

Then be not coy, but use your time;
And while ye may, goe marry:
For having lost but once your prime,
You may for ever tarry.

- Robert Herrick

This week's PF round-up is over at Big A, little a so hop on over and see what the Bloggers are sharing this week.

Poetry Friday - 8

2008-04-25T19:15:00.000+01:00

To celebrate Shakespeare's birthday again (because I can if I want to), I offer you

Sonnet 104

To me, fair friend, you never can be old,
For as you were when first your eye I eyed,
Such seems your beauty still. Three winters cold
Have from the forests shook three summers' pride,
Three beauteous springs to yellow autumn turned
In process of the seasons have I seen,
Three April pérfumes in three hot Junes burned,
Since first I saw you fresh, which yet are green.
Ah yet doth beauty, like a dial hand,
Steal from his figure, and no pace perceived;
So your sweet hue, which methinks still doth stand,
Hath motion, and mine eye may be deceived:
For fear of which, hear this, thou age unbred,
Ere you were born was beauty's summer dead.

This week's Poetry Friday round-up is over at The Miss Rumphius Effect

Happy Birthday Shakespeare!

2008-04-23T07:30:00.000+01:00

In order to celebrate Shakespeare's birthday, I give you one of my favourite speeches from the first Shakespeare play I saw live:

This royal throne of kings, this scepter'd isle,
This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,
This other Eden, demi-paradise,
This fortress built by Nature for herself
Against infection and the hand of war,
This happy breed of men, this little world,
This precious stone set in the silver sea,
Which serves it in the office of a wall,
Or as a moat defensive to a house,
Against the envy of less happier lands,
This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England,
This nurse, this teeming womb of royal kings,
Fear'd by their breed and famous by their birth,
Renowned for their deeds as far from home,
For Christian service and true chivalry,
As is the sepulchre in stubborn Jewry,
Of the world's ransom, blessed Mary's Son,
This land of such dear souls, this dear dear land,
Dear for her reputation through the world,
Is now leased out, I die pronouncing it,
Like to a tenement or pelting farm:
England, bound in with the triumphant sea
Whose rocky shore beats back the envious siege
Of watery Neptune, is now bound in with shame,
With inky blots and rotten parchment bonds:
That England, that was wont to conquer others,
Hath made a shameful conquest of itself.
Ah, would the scandal vanish with my life,
How happy then were my ensuing death!

(Richard II Act II, scene 1, Lines 40-68)

Poetry Friday - 7

2008-04-11T10:15:00.000+01:00

Canadian poet Mark Strand said, "Poetry is about slowing down. You sit and you read something, you read it again, and it reveals a little bit more, and things come to light you never could have predicted." This poem by Sarah Williams had that effect on me this week - not only slowing me down, but stopping me dead in my tracks, to read and re-read it:

The Old Astronomer to his Pupil

Reach me down my Tycho Brahe, I would know him when we meet,
When I share my later science, sitting humbly at his feet;
He may know the law of all things, yet be ignorant of how
We are working to completion, working on from then to now.

Pray remember that I leave you all my theory complete,
Lacking only certain data for your adding, as is meet,
And remember men will scorn it, 'tis original and true,
And the obliquy of newness may fall bitterly on you.

But, my pupil, as my pupil you have learned the worth of scorn,
You have laughed with me at pity, we have joyed to be forlorn,
What for us are all distractions of men's fellowship and smiles;
What for us the Goddess Pleasure with her meretricious smiles.

You may tell that German College that their honor comes too late,
But they must not waste repentance on the grizzly savant's fate.
Though my soul may set in darkness, it will rise in perfect light;
I have loved the stars too fondly to be fearful of the night.

What, my boy, you are not weeping? You should save your eyes for sight;
You will need them, mine observer, yet for many another night.
I leave none but you, my pupil, unto whom my plans are known.
You "have none but me," you murmur, and I "leave you quite alone"?

Well then, kiss me, -- since my mother left her blessing on my brow,
There has been a something wanting in my nature until now;
I can dimly comprehend it, -- that I might have been more kind,
Might have cherished you more wisely, as the one I leave behind.

I "have never failed in kindness"? No, we lived too high for strife, --
Calmest coldness was the error which has crept into our life;
But your spirit is untainted, I can dedicate you still
To the service of our science: you will further it? you will!

There are certain calculations I should like to make with you,
To be sure that your deductions will be logical and true;
And remember, "Patience, Patience," is the watchword of a sage,
Not to-day nor yet to-morrow can complete a perfect age.

I have sworn, like Tycho Brahe, that a greater man may reap;
But if none should do my reaping, 'twill disturb me in my sleep.
So be careful and be faithful, though, like me, you leave no name;
See, my boy, that nothing turn you to the mere pursuit of fame.

I must say Good-bye, my pupil, for I cannot longer speak;
Draw the curtain back for Venus, ere my vision grows too weak:
It is strange the pearly planet should look red as fiery Mars, --
God will mercifully guide me on my way amongst the stars.

You can hear the first four verses of the poem read aloud here.

This week's Poetry Friday round-up is at A Wrung Sponge.

Skulduggery Pleasant: Playing with Fire - Derek Landy

2008-04-04T19:45:00.000+01:00

(Don't everyone die of shock at the fact I'm posting a second time today, OK?)

I've just seen that the new Skulduggery Pleasant book (about the eponymous walking and talking skeleton) by Derek Landy: Skulduggery Pleasant: Playing with Fire is now out - and I'm a happy camper ! I loved the first book (Skulduggery Pleasant), which I first read last summer and then re-read for this year's Cybils (review here) - as it was full of humour, wit and a good plot.

Here's the synopsis for the second book:

Just when you think you've saved the world! "You will kill her?" the Torment asked. Skulduggery sagged. "Yes." He hesitated, then took his gun from his jacket. "I'm sorry, Valkyrie," he said softly. "Don't talk to me," Valkyrie said. "Just do what you have to do." Valkyrie parted her tunic, and Skulduggery pointed the gun at the vest beneath. "Please forgive me," Skulduggery said, then aimed the gun at the girl and pulled the trigger. With Serpine dead, the world is safe once more. At least, that's what Valkyrie and Skulduggery think, until the notorious Baron Vengeous makes a bloody escape from prison, and dead bodies and vampires start showing up all over Ireland. With Baron Vengeous after the deadly armour of Lord Vile, and pretty much everyone out to kill Valkyrie, the daring detective duo face their biggest challenge yet. But what if the greatest threat to Valkyrie is just a little closer to home!?

That's another new book on my Amazon wishlist then !

Poetry Friday - 6

2008-04-04T09:00:00.000+01:00

I'm in a bit of a melancholy mood today (not sure why) and this poem by Christina Rossetti seems to fit my mood.

Remember

Remember me when I am gone away,
Gone far away into the silent land;
When you can no more hold me by the hand,
Nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more day by day
You tell me of our future that you planned:
Only remember me; you understand
It will be late to counsel then or pray.
Yet if you should forget me for a while
And afterwards remember, do not grieve:
For if the darkness and corruption leave
A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,
Better by far you should forget and smile
Than that you should remember and be sad.

This week's Poetry Friday round up is over at Becky's Book Reviews.

Poetry Friday - 5

2008-03-28T19:00:00.001Z

I'm currently (belatedly) reading Audrey Niffenegger's The Time Traveler's Wife (Bandwagon? Which bandwagon?). I'm also in the midst of writing a timey-wimey (to borrow the Tenth Doctor's phrase) Doctor Who story, and two days ago it was Robert Frost's birthday, thus my offering this week is Frost's

I Could Give All To Time

To Time it never seems that he is brave
To set himself against the peaks of snow
To lay them level with the running wave,
Nor is he overjoyed when they lie low,
But only grave, contemplative and grave.

What now is inland shall be ocean isle,
Then eddies playing round a sunken reef
Like the curl at the corner of a smile;
And I could share Time's lack of joy or grief
At such a planetary change of style.

I could give all to Time except - except
What I myself have held. But why declare
The things forbidden that while the Customs slept
I have crossed to Safety with? For I am There,
And what I would not part with I have kept.

This week's round up is at Cuentesitos

(Currently I would give my right arm for a trip in the TARDIS so I can catch up on this week's missing sleep - apparently my body decided to get me ready for the clocks moving forward to BST this weekend by depriving me of sleep this week ! Bah, humbug !)

Poetry Friday - 4

2008-03-21T12:30:00.001Z

My long Easter weekend was going to be spent solely in writing a long-planned and lengthy story accompanied by Classic FM's annual "Hall of Fame" countdown, but alas work has intervened so I shall be working on another half-completed story. Nevertheless, I thought that I would share this poem by Howard Nemerov:

Writing

The cursive crawl, the squared-off characters
these by themselves delight, even without
a meaning, in a foreign language, in
Chinese, for instance, or when skaters curve
all day across the lake, scoring their white
records in ice. Being intelligible,
these winding ways with their audacities
and delicate hesitations, they become
miraculous, so intimately, out there
at the pen’s point or brush’s tip, do world
and spirit wed.

The full text of the poem is here.

When I write straight into a word processor, rather than longhand in a notebook, I find myself missing the physical act of writing and the way the words seem to flow through my hand and out of my pen. These lines of Nemerov's capture that fascination that I have with the physics of writing longhand, and I particularly like the comparison with skating.

This week's Poetry Friday round up is hosted over at Wild Rose Reader.

Match It for Pratchett Campaign

2008-03-16T14:30:00.000Z

I've just found out, via a friend, that Terry Pratchett fans worldwide are trying to raise enough money to match his donation of $1000000 to Alzheimer's Research.

If you're interested in making a donation, however small, click on the button below.

Please note, if you're outside the UK, you have to click the "Don't have a postal code" link and then you'll get an alternate box for putting in an address - and tick the non-UK radio button as well.

Please, if you can spare a couple of dollars or pounds or whatever your local currency is to make a donation in honour of a marvellously talented man, do so. Thank you.

Poetry Friday - 3

2008-03-14T14:15:00.000Z

My Poetry Friday offering this week is by Alfred Tennyson:

Ulysses

It little profits that an idle king,
By this still hearth, among these barren crags,
Match'd with an aged wife, I mete and dole
Unequal laws unto a savage race,
That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me.
I cannot rest from travel; I will drink
Life to the lees. All times I have enjoy'd
Greatly, have suffer'd greatly, both with those
That loved me, and alone; on shore, and when
Thro' scudding drifts the rainy Hyades
Vext the dim sea. I am become a name;
For always roaming with a hungry heart
Much have I seen and known,-- cities of men
And manners, climates, councils, governments,
Myself not least, but honor'd of them all,--
And drunk delight of battle with my peers,
Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.
I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'
Gleams that untravell'd world whose margin fades
For ever and for ever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use!
As tho' to breathe were life! Life piled on life
Were all too little, and of one to me
Little remains; but every hour is saved
From that eternal silence, something more,
A bringer of new things; and vile it were
For some three suns to store and hoard myself,
And this gray spirit yearning in desire
To follow knowledge like a sinking star,
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.

This is my son, mine own Telemachus,
to whom I leave the sceptre and the isle,--
Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfill
This labor, by slow prudence to make mild
A rugged people, and thro' soft degrees
Subdue them to the useful and the good.
Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere
Of common duties, decent not to fail
In offices of tenderness, and pay
Meet adoration to my household gods,
When I am gone. He works his work, I mine.

There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail;
There gloom the dark, broad seas. My mariners,
Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and thought with me,--
That ever with a frolic welcome took
The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed
Free hearts, free foreheads,-- you and I are old;
Old age hath yet his honor and his toil.
Death closes all; but something ere the end,
Some work of noble note, may yet be done,
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks;
The long day wanes; the slow moon climbs; the deep
Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends.
'T is not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down;
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho'
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are,--
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

The poem was first published in "Poems" in 1842 and was written in the first few weeks after Tennyson learned of the death of his friend Arthur Henry Hallam. The Victorians tended to read this poem in a pretty straight forward manner but later critics have viewed it differently. One of the most commonly held critical views is that the poem is a dramatic representation of a man who has no faith in either the gods or in the necessity of preserving order in his kingdom and his own life.

However you read it, though, it possesses a certain melancholic music that lingers in the mind after you're finished.

This week's PF round up is by Jama Rattigan.

Poetry Friday - 2

2008-03-07T08:45:00.000Z

It was the birthday this week of Edward Thomas, a quitessentially English poet. This is one of the many poems he wrote in the short period of poetic creativity that came upon him before he was killed in the First World War:

Lights Out

I have come to the borders of sleep,
The unfathomable deep
Forest where all must lose
Their way, however straight,
Or winding, soon or late;
They cannot choose.

Many a road and track
That, since the dawn's first crack,
Up to the forest brink,
Deceived the travellers,
Suddenly now blurs,
And in they sink.

Here love ends,
Despair, ambition ends,
All pleasure and all trouble,
Although most sweet or bitter,
Here ends in sleep that is sweeter
Than tasks most noble.

There is not any book
Or face of dearest look
That I would not turn from now
To go into the unknown
I must enter and leave alone
I know not how.

The tall forest towers;
Its cloudy foliage lowers
Ahead, shelf above shelf;
Its silence I hear and obey
That I may lose my way
And myself.

Thomas' was the first poetry by a FWW poet that I ever read, many many years ago: I was 16 and a friend recited from memory his poem But These Things Also Are Spring's, which impressed itself upon my brain that I sought out a copy of Thomas' poems later that same morning.

Today is the anniversary of the first publication in 1923 of Robert Frost's well-loved poem:

Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.
He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

Note that both men, who were very great friends for a few years before Thomas' death, wrote of woods and sleep.

The Poetry Friday round-up this week is over at The Simple and The Ordinary.

Poetry Friday - 1

2008-02-29T09:15:00.000Z

So after an extended hiatus during which life and fiction writing overtook my brain so often that I didn't know Friday from Tuesday or up from down, I am back with Poetry Friday. I will endeavour to make a post every week, but I don't guarantee it !

This week, I've chosen W H Auden's "As I Walked Out One Evening". Here's a snippet:

As I Walked Out One Evening

"The years shall run like rabbits,
For in my arms I hold
The Flower of the Ages,
And the first love of the world."

But all the clocks in the city
Began to whirr and chime:
"O let not Time deceive you
You cannot conquer Time."

In the burrows of the Nightmare
Where Justice naked is,
Time watches from the shadow
And coughs when you would kiss.

In headaches and in worry
Vaguely life leaks away,
And time will have his fancy
To-morrow or to-day.

Into many a green valley
Drifts the appalling snow
Time breaks the threaded dances
And the diver's brilliant bow.

The whole poem can be found here.

I've no clue who's on Poetry Friday round-up this week (haven't got that far !) but check Kelly H's Blog Big A, little a as she's usually got a list up there...

Earthquake !

2008-02-27T09:15:00.000Z

Just in case anyone out there hears the news from the UK and wonders - yes I did experience the earthquake at 1 am today, but I was only shaken not stirred. It woke me up but I assumed it was simply the wind gusting about - being in an attic room on a very windy road (it should really be called Wind Tunnel Road!), I am quite used to feeling every buffet when the wind picks up as it has been doing the last couple of days. I heard what I half thought was someone running down the roof above my head, and though I was mostly asleep I knew that was mad - it was probably some tiles falling off the roof...

Anyway I live to tell the tale - for what it's worth !

Still here, honestly

2008-01-08T09:00:00.000Z

Yes I am still alive and relatively well (winter colds aside), but writing Doctor Who fanfiction is *literally* my whole life outside of work (although I'm still reading - albeit fewer books - I'm even on this year's SF&F Judging Committee for the Cybils !)

So a belated Happy New Year (I'm hoping it'll be a case of new year, new job as mine still sucks like an industrial strength hoover)...

So yes, I'm not dead yet - just up to my neck in story ideas: um, 25 and counting - including a 14 story series that's an AU version of Season 3 of New Who in which Martha Jones will meet the Eighth Doctor (because Paul McGann's Eighth Doctor is my new love! David who...? *grins*)...

The madness continues...

Poetry Friday 73

2007-11-30T09:00:00.000Z

This week saw the 250th birthday of William Blake, who was born in London in 1757. When he was four he saw God's head appear in a window, later on he saw the prophet Ezekiel sitting in a field, and once came upon a tree full of angels. However, when he tried to tell his parents about these visions, his father threatened to beat him for lying, so he stopped mentioning such things and began drawing pictures instead. His work seemed so promising that his parents sent him to art school to become an engraver. Blake learnt how to engrave copper plates for printing illustrations in books, then went on to produce illustrations for books about botany, architecture and medicine. Since his work was so good he was commissioned to create his own illustrations for the work of Dante, Chaucer and selections from the Bible, which now are considered amongst the greatest works of engraving ever produced. Blake even invented a method of printing illustrations in colour, and art historians are still unsure how he did it.

Unfortunately, Blake's work as an illustrator grew more and more bizarre, until in the end he could only make a living by selling watercolours to a small group of private collectors.

However, Blake had also been writing poetry for most of his life, and since he had his own printing press, he decided to print it himself. He developed a process of writing his poems directly onto copper plates, then engraving illustrations around them. He would print a few dozen copies and stitch them into pamphlets, which he sold himself. His books got no attention in his lifetime and most critics dismissed him as a madman. He died in 1827, and it wasn't until 1863 that a biography about him persuaded people to read his poetry for the first time. Today, he's best known for the poems he wrote for children, Songs of Innocence (1789) and Songs of Experience (1794).

William Blake once wrote, "To see a world in a grain of sand, / And a heaven in a wild flower, / Hold infinity in the palm of your hand, / And eternity in an hour."

He also said, "Imagination is the real and eternal world of which this vegetable universe is but a faint shadow."

This is one of his poems from Songs of Experience:

London

I wander thro' each charter'd street,
Near where the charter'd Thames does flow,
And mark in every face I meet
Marks of weakness, marks of woe.

In every cry of every Man,
In every Infant's cry of fear,
In every voice, in every ban,
The mind-forg'd manacles I hear.

How the Chimney-sweeper's cry
Every blackning Church appalls,
And the hapless Soldier's sigh
Runs in blood down Palace walls.

But most thro' midnight streets I hear
How the youthful Harlot's curse
Blasts the new-born Infant's tear,
And blights with plagues the Marriage hearse.

This week's Poetry Friday round-up is over at Two Writing Teachers.

Poetry Friday 72

2007-11-23T07:00:00.000Z

The weather's been a lot colder here in the UK this week so these lines by Shakespeare from "As You Like It" (Act II, Scene vii) seem somewhat apt !

Blow, blow, thou winter wind,
Thou art not so unkind
As man's ingratitude;
Thy tooth is not so keen,
Because thou art not seen,
Although thy breath be rude.
Heigh-ho! sing, heigh-ho! unto the green holly:
Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly.
Then heigh-ho! the holly!
This life is most jolly.

Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky,
That dost not bite so nigh
As benefits forgot:
Though thou the waters warp,
Thy sting is not so sharp
As friend remember'd not.
Heigh-ho! sing, heigh-ho! unto the green holly:
Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly.
Then heigh-ho! the holly!
This life is most jolly.

This week's Poetry Friday round-up is over at Susan Taylor Brown's Blog.

My Blog's Reading Level

2007-11-20T07:30:00.000Z

I snagged this from Liz over at A Chair, A Fireplace and a Tea Cozy. Allegedly

I have NO idea how they work this out but it seems a little - unlikely, shall we say?!

Poetry Friday 71

2007-11-16T13:30:00.000Z

For this week's Poetry Friday offering, I have a poem of Matthew Arnold's:

Dover Beach

The sea is calm to-night.
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
Upon the straits; on the French coast the light
Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand;
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!
Only, from the long line of spray
Where the sea meets the moon-blanched land,
Listen! you hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
At their return, up the high strand,
Begin, and cease, and then again begin,
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.

Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the A gaean, and it brought
Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow
Of human misery; we
Find also in the sound a thought,
Hearing it by this distant northern sea.

The Sea of Faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.

Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.

I find this poem incredibly evocative of the sea at night and can easily see in my mind's eye the scene that Arnold describes.

This week's Poetry Friday round up is over at Big A, little a with Kelly H.

* * * * * *

In personal news, my mum's surgery went off OK yesterday and she's now back home with my dad and brother.

Poetry Friday 70

2007-11-09T10:30:00.000Z

This week, in honour of receiving lots of Doctor Who related goodies for my birthday yesterday, I have three of Shakespeare's Sonnets, as addressed to "The Dark Lady" (according to the second episode of Season 3 (The Shakespeare Code), the Doctor's Companion, Martha Jones, was Shakespeare's inspiration for what are known as the "Dark Lady Sonnets"):

Sonnet 127

In the old age black was not counted fair,
Or if it were, it bore not beauty's name;
But now is black beauty's successive heir,
And beauty slandered with a bastard shame:
For since each hand hath put on Nature's power,
Fairing the foul with Art's false borrowed face,
Sweet beauty hath no name, no holy bower,
But is profaned, if not lives in disgrace.
Therefore my mistress' eyes are raven black,
Her eyes so suited, and they mourners seem
At such who, not born fair, no beauty lack,
Sland'ring creation with a false esteem:
Yet so they mourn becoming of their woe,
That every tongue says beauty should look so.

Sonnet 128

How oft when thou, my music, music play'st,
Upon that blessed wood whose motion sounds
With thy sweet fingers when thou gently sway'st
The wiry concord that mine ear confounds,
Do I envy those jacks that nimble leap,
To kiss the tender inward of thy hand,
Whilst my poor lips which should that harvest reap,
At the wood's boldness by thee blushing stand!
To be so tickled, they would change their state
And situation with those dancing chips,
O'er whom thy fingers walk with gentle gait,
Making dead wood more bless'd than living lips.
Since saucy jacks so happy are in this,
Give them thy fingers, me thy lips to kiss.

Sonnet 132

Thine eyes I love, and they, as pitying me,
Knowing thy heart torments me with disdain,
Have put on black and loving mourners be,
Looking with pretty ruth upon my pain.
And truly not the morning sun of heaven
Better becomes the grey cheeks of the east,
Nor that full star that ushers in the even,
Doth half that glory to the sober west,
As those two mourning eyes become thy face:
O! let it then as well beseem thy heart
To mourn for me since mourning doth thee grace,
And suit thy pity like in every part.
Then will I swear beauty herself is black,
And all they foul that thy complexion lack.

* * * * * *

This week's Poetry Friday round up is hosted by A Wrung Sponge

Poetry Friday 69

2007-11-02T09:15:00.000Z

Shakespeare's Sonnets seem to be on my mind a lot again lately so I've got another one for you this week:

65

Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea,
But sad mortality o'ersways their power,
How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea,
Whose action is no stronger than a flower?
O! how shall summer's honey breath hold out
Against the wrackful siege of battering days,
When rocks impregnable are not so stout,
Nor gates of steel so strong, but Time decays?
O fearful meditation! where, alack,
Shall Time's best jewel from Time's chest lie hid?
Or what strong hand can hold his swift foot back?
Or who his spoil of beauty can forbid?
O! none, unless this miracle have might,
That in black ink my love may still shine bright.

Since I am continuing to write Doctor Who stories, this Sonnet about Time's power over everything has really been filling my thoughts this week.

This week's Poetry Friday round up is over at Mentor Texts and More.

Awards News

2007-11-01T09:21:00.000Z

Two lots of awards news to cheer me this morning:

From The Times online: A gothic tale about vampire hunters has become the perfect Hallowe'en winner of the Booktrust Teenage Prize 2007, it was announced yesterday. Marcus Sedgwick won the prize with his sinister story, My Swordhand is Singing, about a woodcutter and his son who fight the legendary undead in the forests of seventeenth-century Romania. (My review is here)

For more details about the prize visit Bookheads or Booked Up

* * * * * *

And in the non-Book Awards category David Tennant and Doctor Who both won awards in their categories in last night's National Television Awards ! Alas that Freema Agyeman couldn't make it a hat-trick.

Comments on this Blog

2007-10-26T15:45:00.000+01:00

I've just had to turn off the anonymous comments on my Blog after getting a spate of them that are basically just trolling. (An Internet troll, or simply troll in Internet slang, is someone who intentionally posts controversial or pointless messages with the sole intention of baiting users into an argumentative response.) Even though I moderate all comments, I quite frankly can't be bothered to waste my time even reading such comments, so if you're not a registered user of Blogger.com, you won't be able to comment on this Blog. I apologise for any inconvenience this may cause but I don't see why I should have to read insulting comments.

Poetry Friday 68

2007-10-26T06:15:00.000+01:00

Yesterday was St Crispin's Day, so here is the St Crispin's Day speech from Henry V by Shakespeare:

This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered-
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;
And gentlemen in England now-a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.

The Poetry Friday round up is over at Literary Safari

Poetry Friday 68

2007-10-19T07:15:00.000+01:00

I'm back with more Shakespeare this week (sorry about last week's no-show - personal stuff got in the way of everything last Friday). This week I've got "Under the Greenwood Tree":

Under the Greenwood Tree

Amiens sings:
UNDER the greenwood tree,
Who loves to lie with me,
And turn his merry note
Unto the sweet bird's throat,
Come hither, come hither, come hither:
Here shall he see
No enemy
But winter and rough weather.

Who doth ambition shun,
And loves to live i' the sun,
Seeking the food he eats,
And pleased with what he gets,
Come hither, come hither, come hither:
Here shall he see
No enemy
But winter and rough weather.

Jaques replies:
If it do come to pass
That any man turn ass,
Leaving his wealth and ease
A stubborn will to please,
Ducdamè, ducdamè, ducdamè:
Here shall he see
Gross fools as he,
An if he will come to me.

This week's Poetry Friday round-up will be hosted by Kelly Fineman.

Personal News

2007-10-17T19:30:00.001+01:00

October is Breast Cancer Awareness week, and today I found out that my mum (who had a brain tumour removed last year) has been diagnosed with DCIS (Ductal Carcinoma In Situ). She'll be going into hospital for an operation to remove it on November 15 - an overnight stay only.

Mirrorscape Competition

2007-10-04T21:00:00.000+01:00

Egmont Press have launched a competition in conjunction with The Telegraph newspaper to celebrate the publication of Mike Wilks' new novel Mirrorscape on October 1. If you go to Telegraph Promotions you will find a link to "Find the Snail for your chance to win £5,000".

Mike Wilks' trademark is to include a snail in all of his paintings and so to celebrate the publication of his stunning debut fantasy adventure, Mirrorscape, Mike has hidden a snail in an exclusive version of the Map of Vlam which illustrates the setting of the novel. Visitors who follow the Telegraph link will be taken to an online version of the map where you can use the zoom feature to navigate round the map to find the snail.

In Mirrorscape, Melkin Womper, son of a village weaver, fulfils the dream of a lifetime and is apprenticed to a master painter, Ambrosius Blenk. In keeping with the story Egmont Press is launching this competition to help a young person fulfil one of their dreams for the future. Those who find the snail will automatically be entered into the prize draw to win £5,000 to be spent on Premium Bonds in the name of a child (or split between children) of their choice, or in your own name if you are 17 or under. All entries must be received by 5th November 2007.

There's also a Mirrorscape website which features an utterly addictive game.

Poetry Thursday: National Poetry Day

2007-10-04T18:45:00.000+01:00

It's National Poetry Day here in the UK, so I'm doing Poetry Friday as Poetry Thursday. And this week I bring you Shakespeare (again) - and some lines from Henry V:

I am a king that find thee, and I know
'Tis not the balm, the sceptre and the ball,
The sword, the mace, the crown imperial,
The intertissued robe of gold and pearl,
The farced title running 'fore the king,
The throne he sits on, nor the tide of pomp
That beats upon the high shore of this world,
No, not all these, thrice-gorgeous ceremony,
Not all these, laid in bed majestical,
Can sleep so soundly as the wretched slave,
Who with a body fill'd and vacant mind
Gets him to rest, cramm'd with distressful bread;
Never sees horrid night, the child of hell,
But, like a lackey, from the rise to set
Sweats in the eye of Phoebus and all night
Sleeps in Elysium; next day after dawn,
Doth rise and help Hyperion to his horse,
And follows so the ever-running year,
With profitable labour, to his grave:
And, but for ceremony, such a wretch,
Winding up days with toil and nights with sleep,
Had the fore-hand and vantage of a king.
The slave, a member of the country's peace,
Enjoys it; but in gross brain little wots
What watch the king keeps to maintain the peace,
Whose hours the peasant best advantages.

William Shakespeare, Henry V Act IV, scene I

This week's round up will be at Whimsy Books tomorrow.

Doctor Who Quote of the Week

2007-09-28T12:45:00.000+01:00

The Doctor: Sonic blaster, 51st Century... Weapon factories at Villengard?
Capt. Jack: Yeah. You've been to the factories?
The Doctor: Once.
Capt. Jack: They're gone now. Reactor went critical. Vaporised the lot.
The Doctor: Like I said, once. There's a banana grove there now. I like bananas. Bananas are good.

("The Doctor Dances", Season 1 New Doctor Who)

Poetry Friday 67

2007-09-28T12:30:00.000+01:00

As you'll know if you're a regular reader, I'm obsessed with "Doctor Who". At the moment I'm particularly obsessed with the character of the Tenth Doctor's Companion, Martha Jones, so when I spotted this poem by Walter de la Mare this morning, I jumped on it (although the description of Martha here doesn't fit the lovely Freema Agyeman (pictured above) who plays Martha Jones):

Martha

"Once...Once upon a time..."
Over and over again,
Martha would tell us her stories,
In the hazel glen.

Hers were those clear gray eyes
You watch, and the story seems
Told by their beautifulness
Tranquil as dreams.

She'd sit with her two slim hands
Clasped round her bended knees;
While we on our elbows lolled,
And stared at ease.

Her voice and her narrow chin,
Her grave small lovely head,
Seemed half the meaning
Of the words she said.

"Once...Once upon a time..."
Like a dream you dream in the night,
Fairies and gnomes stole out
In the leaf-green light.

And her beauty far away
Would fade, as her voice ran on,
Till hazel and summer sun
And all were gone:--

All fordone and forgot;
And like clouds in the height of the sky,
Our hearts stood still in the hush
Of an age gone by.

This week's round up is hosted by AmoXcalli.

The Edge of the Forest Volume II - September Issue

2007-09-25T12:00:00.000+01:00

The September issue of The Edge of the Forest is now up. There are many exciting features for you, as well as the usual interviews, reviews, and more.

Here is what's in store this month:

An interview with Phil Bildner, by Camille Powell.
An appreciation of Patrick McDowell's picture books, by Adrienne Furness.
Kelly Herold discusses Anglo-American versions of Baba Yaga tales in Baba Yaga Heads West
Liz Burns reviews Barry Lyga's Fanboy and Boy Toy.
Kim Winters talks being on retreat in A Day in the Life
Betsy Bird (A Fuse #8 Production) tells us What's in their Backpacks?
Robin Brande is this month's Blogging Writer
Sounds from the Forest talks with Mary Anne Hoberman and Deborah Freedman (Brought to you by Just One More Book!!)
Reviews in all categories—from Picture book to Young Adult.

Don't forget to subscribe to The Edge of the Forest with the Subscribe feature. Just enter your name and e-mail address and you'll receive notification when each new issue is published.

Poetry Friday 66

2007-09-21T09:15:00.000+01:00

My poetry choice this week is by Alfred, Lord Tennyson:

Come Into the Garden, Maud

COME into the garden, Maud,
For the black bat, Night, has flown,
Come into the garden, Maud,
I am here at the gate alone;
And the woodbine spices are wafted abroad,
And the musk of the roses blown.
For a breeze of morning moves,
And the planet of Love is on high,
Beginning to faint in the light that she loves
On a bed of daffodil sky,
To faint in the light of the sun she loves,
To faint in his light, and to die.
All night have the roses heard
The flute, violin, bassoon;
All night has the casement jessamine stirr'd
To the dancers dancing in tune:
Till a silence fell with the waking bird,
And a hush with the setting moon.
I said to the lily, "There is but one
With whom she has heart to be gay.
When will the dancers leave her alone?
She is weary of dance and play."
Now half to the setting moon are gone,
And half to the rising day;
Low on the sand and loud on the stone
The last wheel echoes away.
I said to the rose, "The brief night goes
In babble and revel and wine.
O young lordlover, what sighs are those
For one that will never be thine?
But mine, but mine," so I sware to the rose,
"For ever and ever, mine."
And the soul of the rose went into my blood,
As the music clash'd in the hall;
And long by the garden lake I stood,
For I heard your rivulet fall
From the lake to the meadow and on to the wood,
Our wood, that is dearer than all;
From the meadow your walks have left so sweet
That whenever a March-wind sighs
He sets the jewelprint of your feet
In violets blue as your eyes,
To the woody hollows in which we meet
And the valleys of Paradise.
The slender acacia would not shake
One long milk-bloom on the tree;
The white lake-blossom fell into the lake,
As the pimpernel dozed on the lea;
But the rose was awake all night for your sake,
Knowing your promise to me;
The lilies and roses were all awake,
They sigh'd for the dawn and thee.
Queen rose of the rosebud garden of girls,
Come hither, the dances are done,
In gloss of satin and glimmer of pearls,
Queen lily and rose in one;
Shine out, little head, sunning over with curls,
To the flowers, and be their sun.
There has fallen a splendid tear
From the passion-flower at the gate.
She is coming, my dove, my dear;
She is coming, my life, my fate;
The red rose cries, "She is near, she is near;"
And the white rose weeps, "She is late;"
The larkspur listens, "I hear, I hear;"
And the lily whispers, "I wait."
She is coming, my own, my sweet;
Were it ever so airy a tread,
My heart would hear her and beat,
Were it earth in an earthy bed;
My dust would hear her and beat,
Had I lain for a century dead;
Would start and tremble under her feet,
And blossom in purple and red.

This week's Poetry Friday round-up is hosted by Sara Lewis Holmes at Read Write Believe.

Doctor Who Quote of the Week

2007-09-21T09:00:00.000+01:00

The Doctor: Funny little human brains. How do you get around in them?
Rose: When he gets stressed, he likes to insult species.

("The Doctor Dances", Season 1 New Doctor Who)

High Culture Meets Popular Culture Contest

2007-09-15T11:30:00.000+01:00

Proving that (a) "I aten't dead" yet and (b) that I am reading Blogs still, I'm linking to the latest contest by Nancy at Journey Woman - High Culture Meets Popular Culture.

Here's what Nancy says:

Here is your mission, if you want to play:

Submit your comments here with examples of TV shows, popular songs, or movies that used references or quotes from famous poets or authors in a way that may have caught people by surprise. Caught by surprise? I mean, don't include the movie Sense and Sensibility, where half of it was quotes from poetry because two of the characters sat around and read each other poetry throughout. Don't include Shakespeare in Love or Hamlet, where of course there will be a lot of, um, Shakespeare.

Give me movies like Porky's II, or songs like Dire Straits "Romeo and Juliet." Better yet, give me quotes from The Simpsons. Any extra explanation you can include, similar to mine above about Porky's II, will gain you extra points.

You also get extra points for posting about this contest on your blog.

Deadline: October 12
Prizes: Good. I'll randomly draw 4 winners and I'll send them gift cards worth real money ($10 to 25).

Enjoyment factor: 10

Oh, and I'll create a post of all the submissions. Please include links to videos, or pictures, if you can, because that will make the post more fun.

My own response (this will surprise no one who knows me) was as follows:

"Doctor Who": Season 1 - we had a meeting with Charles Dickens (doing his "A Christmas Carol" one-man show) in "The Unquiet Dead"; Season 3 - we had a meeting with Shakespeare (lots of quotations in "The Shakespeare Code", plus references to Dylan Thomas' "Do Not Go Gentle", Harry Potter and the "Back to the Future" fims - talk about giving me a Nerdgasm !), poetry quotations from T S Eliot in "The Lazarus Experiment", and part of Laurence Binyon's "For The Fallen" at the end of "The Family of Blood". In addition there were the episodes with historical themes (The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances, Tooth and Claw, The Girl in the Fireplace, The Idiot's Lantern, Evolution of the Daleks/Daleks in Manhattan, and Human Nature/Family of Blood).

And that doesn't include the many, many meetings with literary and/or historical characters that were scattered throughout the Classic Who series.

Plus which, David Tennant's going to be playing in "Hamlet" and "Love's Labour's Lost" next summer/autumn - that's bound to get at least a few non-Shakespeare fans into the theatre !

And yes, I AM going to see David in "Hamlet" - my family have agreed to fund a trip to Stratford as my 40th birthday present next year - and a friend who's an RSC member is hoping to get us both a ticket once the online booking opens this week - so hopefully I'll get the date I want (September 5) which is a matinee performance with a full-cast "talkback" session afterwards. And did I mention Patrick Stewart of Star Trek: The Next Generation and X-Men fame is also in "Hamlet"? That makes it major Nerdgasm territory for me !!

Poetry Friday 65

2007-09-14T07:30:00.000+01:00

It would have been Roald Dahl's 91st birthday yesterday - and as some of you know, my brain currently resides in the Whoniverse, so I thought this poem would be apt:

Television

The most important thing we've learned,
So far as children are concerned,
Is never, NEVER, NEVER let
Them near your television set –
Or better still, just don't install
The idiotic thing at all.

* * * * * *
IT ROTS THE SENSES IN THE HEAD!
IT KILLS IMAGINATION DEAD!
IT CLOGS AND CLUTTERS UP THE MIND!
IT MAKES A CHILD SO DULL AND BLIND
HE CAN NO LONGER UNDERSTAND
A FANTASY, A FAIRYLAND!
HIS BRAIN BECOMES AS SOFT AS CHEESE!
HIS POWERS OF THINKING RUST AND FREEZE!
HE CANNOT THINK – HE ONLY SEES!
"All right!" you'll cry. "All right!" you'll say,
"But if we take the set away,
What shall we do to entertain
Our darling children! Please explain!"
We'll answer this by asking you,
"What used the darling ones to do?
How used they keep themselves contented
Before this monster was invented?"
Have you forgotten? Don't you know?
We'll say it very loud and slow:
THEY... USED... TO... READ! They'd READ and READ,
AND READ and READ, and then proceed
TO READ some more.

You'll find the poem in full here.

Oh, and in case you're wondering - I AM still reading - I'm not spending all my spare time in watching Doctor Who, but I've just got very lax about posting reviews because all my writing energy is going into my Tenth Doctor/Martha Jones stories. I was slightly appalled to discover this week that I've completed 26 of them since mid-July, at a total of nearly 70, 000 words (that's actually the equivalent of a novel in three months!) But writing these stories is helping me to stay a bit saner whilst I'm working from home so I guess it's not that surprising that I've written so much !

Doctor Who Quote of the Week

2007-09-14T07:15:00.000+01:00

[The Doctor, Capt. Jack and Rose are cornered by the "Empty children".]

The Doctor: Go to your room. Go to your room! I mean it. I'm very, very angry with you. I'm very, very cross! Go to your room!
[The children lurch away.]
The Doctor: I'm really glad that worked. Those would have been terrible last words.

("The Doctor Dances", Season 1 New Doctor Who)

Poetry Friday 64

2007-09-07T08:50:00.000+01:00

Today's poetry offering is from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow:

My Lost Youth

Often I think of the beautiful town
That is seated by the sea;
Often in thought go up and down
The pleasant streets of that dear old town,
And my youth comes back to me.
And a verse of a Lapland song
Is haunting my memory still:
"A boy's will is the wind's will,
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."
I can see the shadowy lines of its trees,
And catch, in sudden gleams,
The sheen of the far-surrounding seas,
And islands that were the Hesperides
Of all my boyish dreams.
And the burden of that old song,
It murmurs and whispers still:
"A boy's will is the wind's will,
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

I remember the black wharves and the slips,
And the sea-tides tossing free;
And Spanish sailors with bearded lips,
And beauty and mystery of the ships,
And the magic of the sea.
And the voice of that wayward song
Is singing and saying still:
"A boy's will is the wind's will,
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

I remember the bulwarks by the shore,
And the fort upon the hill;
The sunrise gun, with its hollow roar,
The drum-beat repeated o'er and o'er,
And the bugle wild and shrill.
And the music of that old song
Throbs in my memory still:
"A boy's will is the wind's will,
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

I remember the sea-fight far away,
How it thundered o'er the tide!
And the dead captains, as they lay
In their graves, o'erlooking the tranquil bay
Where they in battle died.
And the sound of that mournful song
Goes through me with a thrill:
"A boy's will is the wind's will,
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

I can see the breezy dome of groves,
The shadows of Deering's Woods;
And the friendships old and the early loves
Come back with a Sabbath sound, as of doves
In quiet neighborhoods.
And the verse of that sweet old song,
It flutters and murmurs still:
"A boy's will is the wind's will,
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

I remember the gleams and glooms that dart
Across the schoolboy's brain;
The song and the silence in the heart,
That in part are prophecies, and in part
Are longings wild and vain.
And the voice of that fitful song
Sings on, and is never still:
"A boy's will is the wind's will,
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

There are things of which I may not speak;
There are dreams that cannot die;
There are thoughts that make the strong heart weak,
And bring a pallor into the cheek,
And a mist before the eye.
And the words of that fatal song
Come over me like a chill:
"A boy's will is the wind's will,
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

Strange to me now are the forms I meet
When I visit the dear old town;
But the native air is pure and sweet,
And the trees that o'ershadow each well-known street,
As they balance up and down
Are singing the beautiful song,
Are sighing and whispering still:
"A boy's will is the wind's will,
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

And Deering's Woods are fresh and fair,
And with joy that is almost pain
My heart goes back to wander there,
And among the dreams of the days that were,
I find my lost youth again.
And the strange and beautiful song,
The groves are repeating it still:
"A boy's will is the wind's will,
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

Doctor Who Quote of the Week

2007-09-07T08:45:00.000+01:00

[Captain Jack commenting on the Doctor's leather jacket and Rose's Union Jack top.]

Jack: The way you guys are blending in with the local color- I mean flag girl is bad enough, but U-Boat captain?

("The Empty Child", Season 1 New Doctor Who)

Doctor Who Quote of the Week

2007-08-31T20:45:00.000+01:00

The Doctor: You're very sick.
Doctor Constantine: Dying, I should think. I just haven't been able to find the time. Are you a doctor?
The Doctor: I have my moments.

("The Empty Child", Season 1 New Doctor Who)

Scholar's Blog Book Discussion Group Reminder

2007-08-27T09:15:00.000+01:00

This is just a quick reminder that the Scholar's Blog Spoiler Zone discussion of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Sheila of Wands and Worlds posted two lengthy comments overnight which are thoughtful and invite further discussion, so if you have the chance (and I realise most are busy with school about to or already starting up again for the new term), please stop by, and read and comment !

* * * * * *

And yes, I am still here - still reading others' Blogs, though not posting much on my own. Sorry - the fiction writing bug that gripped me mid-July (to write Tenth Doctor/Martha stories) simply hasn't let go of me yet, so I'm still busy writing lots of shorter stories for them. I presume the pair's death-grip on my brain will lessen eventually and then I'll actually get back to writing other things...

Poetry Friday 63

2007-08-24T19:00:00.000+01:00

*Phew* It's the start of a long weekend here in England and I've got Monday off work, yay ! So after an exhausting week that included a 3.45 fire alarm call (uh, thanks...), I'm feeling glad that it's Friday and in a little bit of a contemplative mood, so I chose a Gerard Manley Hopkins poem for you this week:

The Candle Indoors

SOME candle clear burns somewhere I come by.
I muse at how its being puts blissful back
With yellowy moisture mild night’s blear-all black,
Or to-fro tender trambeams truckle at the eye.
By that window what task what fingers ply,
I plod wondering, a-wanting, just for lack
Of answer the eagerer a-wanting Jessy or Jack
There God to aggrándise, God to glorify.—

Come you indoors, come home; your fading fire
Mend first and vital candle in close heart's vault:
You there are master, do your own desire;
What hinders? Are you beam-blind, yet to a fault
In a neighbour deft-handed? Are you that liar
And, cast by conscience out, spendsavour salt?

This week's round up is over at The Book Mine Set.

Doctor Who Quote of the Week

2007-08-24T18:45:00.000+01:00

The Doctor: And I'm looking for a blonde in a Union Jack. A specific one, mind you, I didn't just wake up this morning with a craving.

("The Empty Child", Season 1 New Doctor Who)

Poetry Friday 62

2007-08-17T07:15:00.000+01:00

It's been unofficially confirmed that the incomparable David Tennant will be doing Hamlet with the RSC in Stratford next year (and no, it's not certain whether that means he's leaving "Doctor Who" at the end of the fourth season, which is currently being filmed). Since I studied Hamlet as part of my degree but have loved the play for many, many years, I thought I would share some lines from what is one of my favourite plays.

The first section is Polonius' advice to Laertes (Act 1, Scene III):

Yet here, Laertes! Aboard, aboard for shame!
The wind sits in the shoulder of your sail,
And you are stay'd for.
There ... my blessing with thee!
And these few precepts in thy memory
Look thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue,
Nor any unproportion'd thought his act.
Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar.
Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,
Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel;
But do not dull thy palm with entertainment
Of each new-hatch'd, unfledg’d comrade. Beware
Of entrance to a quarrel but, being in,
Bear't that th' opposed may beware of thee.
Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice;
Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgement.
Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,
But not express'd in fancy; rich, not gaudy;
For the apparel oft proclaims the man;
And they in France of the best rank and station
Are of a most select and generous chief in that.
Neither a borrower, nor a lender be;
For loan oft loses both itself and friend,
And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.
This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
Farewell; my blessing season this in thee!

And how very wise is Shakespeare: "to thine own self be true"...

The second section is Hamlet's famous soliloquy which I memorised years and years ago and can still recite (Act III, Scene I):

To be, or not to be : that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action. -- Soft you now!
The fair Ophelia! Nymph, in thy orisons
Be all my sins remember'd.

Doctor Who Quote of the Week

2007-08-17T07:00:00.000+01:00

The Doctor: (To a stray kitten) One day, just one day, maybe, I'm going to meet somebody who gets the whole "don't wander off" thing. 900 years of phone box travel and it's the only thing left that surprises me. (The TARDIS phone rings and he looks around in surprise.)

("The Empty Child", Season 1 New Doctor Who)

Poetry Friday 61

2007-08-10T09:30:00.000+01:00

I missed Poetry Friday last week - I kept putting it off until later in the day bceause I'd been so busy during the week that I hadn't picked a poem beforehand, and the next thing I knew it was bedtime and too late... That's the first time I've missed it since Kelly instituted it - although I've occasionally done Poetry Thursday or Poetry Saturday posts, I'd never not posted a poem before. So I was determined not to miss it this week and fortunately the Writer's Almanac reminded me this week of John Keat's Endymion:

A THING of beauty is a joy for ever:
Its loveliness increases; it will never
Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.
Therefore, on every morrow, are we wreathing
A flowery band to bind us to the earth,
Spite of despondence, of the inhuman dearth
Of noble natures, of the gloomy days,
Of all the unhealthy and o’er-darkened ways
Made for our searching: yes, in spite of all,
Some shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits. Such the sun, the moon,
Trees old and young, sprouting a shady boon
For simple sheep; and such are daffodils
With the green world they live in; and clear rills
That for themselves a cooling covert make
’Gainst the hot season; the mid forest brake,
Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk-rose blooms:
And such too is the grandeur of the dooms
We have imagined for the mighty dead;
All lovely tales that we have heard or read:
An endless fountain of immortal drink,
Pouring unto us from the heaven’s brink.

Nor do we merely feel these essences
For one short hour; no, even as the trees
That whisper round a temple become soon
Dear as the temple’s self, so does the moon,
The passion poesy, glories infinite,
Haunt us till they become a cheering light
Unto our souls, and bound to us so fast,
That, whether there be shine, or gloom o’ercast,
They alway must be with us, or we die.

You can read the whole poem here. This week's Poetry Friday round-up is over at Big A, little a.

Doctor Who Quote of the Week

2007-08-07T11:15:00.000+01:00

The Doctor: I say 'spaceship', you're not interested, I say 'time machine'..."
Rose: I didn't plan it, I just saw it happening and thought I could stop it.
The Doctor: Ah, I did it again: I picked another stupid ape. I should have known. It's not about showing you the universe. It never is. It's about the universe doing something for you.
Rose: What's the problem? He's never gonna be famous, he's not gonna start World War Three or anything.
The Doctor: Rose, there's a man alive in the world who wasn't alive before. An ordinary man. That's the most important thing in creation! The whole world's different because he's alive!
Rose: So you'd have him dead?
The Doctor: I didn't say that...
Rose: No, I get it: for once, you're not the most important man in my life.
The Doctor: Rose, my whole planet was destroyed, my family - do you think it never occurred to me to go back and save them?

("Father's Day", Season 1 New Doctor Who)

Scholar's Blog Book Discussion Group

2007-08-07T11:00:00.000+01:00

This month (and next) we're discussing Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows so please head on over and add your tuppence or two cents' worth - that's assuming you're not already all talked-out about this one...

The Edge of the Forest Volume II - Summer issue

2007-08-06T16:15:00.000+01:00

The summer issue of The Edge of the Forest is finally up. It has many exciting features for you, as well as interviews, reviews, and much, much more. In short, here's what's in store this month:

An interview with Linda Buckley-Archer, by um, me.

Pam Coughlan interviews herself about the 48 Hour Book Challenge.

Allie (Little Willow) discusses Brotherhood 2.0 in Nerd Fighters, Unite! and profiles illustrator Peter Reynolds.

Kim Winters talks to Brenda Ferber and her blogging children, Faith and Sammy, in our rare Blogging Writer 2 column, and talks to Sammy and Faith about books and reading and What's in their Backpacks?

Kelly Fineman interviews Greg Fishbone in our Blogging Writer 1 feature.

Reviews in all categories—from Picture book to Young Adult. This month there are tons of reviews.

Don't forget to subscribe to The Edge of the Forest with our Subscribe feature. Just enter your name and e-mail address and you'll receive notification when each new issue is published.

We've added an interview archive for your convenience.

The Edge of the Forest will return September 10.

* * * * * *

Just before ye hasten away to read it, don't forget the very spoilerific discussion of Harry Potter 7 will start tomorrow over on the Scholar's Blog Spoiler Zone - everyone's welcome to join in, so see you there...

Now ye may hasten away to The Edge of the Forest !

Doctor Who Quote of the Week

2007-07-31T18:45:00.000+01:00

[While The Doctor and Rose are in mannacles]
The Editor: Now, there's an interesting point. Is a slave a slave if he doesn't know he's been enslaved?
The Doctor: Yes.
The Editor: Oh, I was hoping for a philosophical debate. Is that all I'm gonna get? "Yes"?
The Doctor: Yes.
The Editor: [chuckles] You're no fun.
The Doctor: Let me out of these mannacles. Then you'll find out how much fun I am.
The Editor: [To Rose] Oooh, he's tough, isn't he?

("The Long Game", Season 1 New Doctor Who)

Poetry Friday 60

2007-07-27T07:15:00.000+01:00

With large chunks of Oxfordshire (including the area around the station) and Gloucestershire (my parents' home county) under water this week, I thought this poem by John Clare was appropriate:

The Flood

On Lolham Brigs in wild and lonely mood
I've seen the winter floods their gambols play
Through each old arch that trembled while I stood
Bent o'er its wall to watch the dashing spray
As their old stations would be washed away
Crash came the ice against the jambs and then
A shudder jarred the arches - yet once more
It breasted raving waves and stood agen
To wait the shock as stubborn as before
- White foam brown crested with the russet soil
As washed from new plough lands would dart beneath
Then round and round a thousand eddies boil
On tother side - then pause as if for breath
One minute - and engulphed - like life in death

Whose wrecky stains dart on the floods away
More swift than shadows in a stormy day
Straws trail and turn and steady - all in vain
The engulfing arches shoot them quickly through
The feather dances flutters and again
Darts through the deepest dangers still afloat
Seeming as faireys whisked it from the view
And danced it o'er the waves as pleasures boat
Light hearted as a thought in May -
Trays - uptorn bushes - fence demolished rails
Loaded with weeds in sluggish motions stray
Like water monsters lost each winds and trails
Till near the arches - then as in affright
It plunges - reels - and shudders out of sight

Waves trough - rebound - and fury boil again
Like plunging monsters rising underneath
Who at the top curl up a shaggy main
A moment catching at a surer breath
Then plunging headlong down and down - and on
Each following boil the shadow of the last
And other monsters rise when those are gone
Crest their fringed waves - plunge onward and are past
- The chill air comes around me ocean blea
From bank to bank the waterstrife is spread
Strange birds like snow spots o'er the huzzing sea
Hang where the wild duck hurried past and fled
On roars the flood - all restless to be free
Like trouble wandering to eternity

So far I've been unaffected by the flooding, but my parents and brother are without mains water and have been for two days - although there's no flooding in their area - we believe, but haven't been able to find out for sure - that the water company, in its infinite wisdom, have diverted water from their area to one of the flood-affected areas - which makes perfect sense (or not!)

My annoyance over this is made greater by the fact that the Government, in its infinite wisdom, allows planning permission to be given for building on flood plains. They're called "flood plains" for a REASON you know !!

This week's Poetry Friday round up is hosted by Jone, aka Ms Mac, over at Check it Out so be sure to - check it out!

Doctor Who Quote of the Week

2007-07-25T07:00:00.000+01:00

Rose: I'll let the Doctor describe it.
The Doctor: The Fourth Great and Bountiful Human Empire. Planet Earth is at its height, covered with megacities, five moons, population 96 billion, the centre of a galactic domain that stretches across a million planets and species.
[Adam faints.]
The Doctor: He's your boyfriend.
Rose: Not any more.

("The Long Game", Season 1 New Doctor Who)

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - J K Rowling

2007-07-21T19:00:00.000+01:00

No, this is not a review - I'm saving that for the forthcoming HP7 discussion over on the Scholar's Blog Spoiler Zone in early August.

I have finished it though. It took me around seven hours in total - and I'm actually relieved to say I enjoyed it. I wasn't sure I would as I'd been resenting the prospect of reading it so much since rading it would be taking me out of the Whoniverse for several hours - the longest period I've spent *out* of the Whoniverse since I became immersed in it back in January. But once I started reading, the story tugged me along...

It was interesting reading this book from a fiction writer's point of view. This is the first HP book I've read since I began writing fiction myself and it was intriguing. I think I've mentioned here before that I have the facility to read on more than one level at the same time: I read as a child - wanting to get to the end of the story, hoping for a good ending, and I also read as a "critic" - looking at the structure, themes, language style, etc. And since I took up writing fiction I've been reading books at the level of someone who's also producing fiction - it's given me an extra awareness that I didn't possess when reading as a critic - sometimes that merely means thinking "Hmm, not sure I'd have written/structured that like that..." Sometimes it means a flare of admiring envy at the way something has been expressed and the desire to have that kind of mastery myself.

What it means for my reading of Harry Potter is that I've an extra appreciation of how bloody hard it is to tie up all the loose ends of a seven book series in a satisfying way that also gives readers at least a half-way decent story. And I think Rowling achieved that in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

Oh and I don't totally hate the children's cover any longer - I still prefer the adult one, though ! But seeing it on book it seemed a little less morbid than in the photos (go figure !) And now that I know to what the UK cover relates, I'm impressed that it actually *fits* the story so well !

Live Webchat with Anthony Horowitz

2007-07-20T16:00:00.000+01:00

Now this, in my view, is something worth getting excited about (certainly more than the publication of the last HP book - yes, I know, I'm hopeless - but the boy with glasses has been pushed out of my affections by the lanky Time Lord with glasses, what can I say ?)

From the Anthony Horowitz website:

Do you want to know what's in store for the five Gatekeepers following Nightrise?
Or how Alex Rider bites back in his next adventure, Snakehead?
Well, now's your chance to find out...

Anthony Horowitz will be hosting a live web chat from 14:00 - 15:00 (BST) on Tuesday 31 July 2007.

With Snakehead, Alex Rider's eagerly-awaited seventh mission, out on Wednesday 31 October we're sure you'll have masses of questions to ask Anthony.

All you have to do is log on to the link below at 14:00 GMT on Tuesday 31 July armed with your questions: Power of Five Chat.

Poetry Friday 59

2007-07-20T07:00:00.000+01:00

It's been many years since I saw a Kingfisher, but I like this poem about the Kingfisher by Gerard Manley Hopkins:

As Kingfishers Catch Fire

As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame;
As tumbled over rim in roundy wells
Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell's
Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name;
Each mortal thing does one thing and the same:
Deals out that being indoors each one dwells;
Selves - goes itself; myself it speaks and spells,
Crying What I do is me: for that I came.

I say more: the just man justices;
Keeps grace: that keeps all his goings graces;
Acts in God's eye what in God's eye he is?
Christ. For Christ plays in ten thousand places,
Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his
To the Father through the features of men's faces.

This is quite a complicated poem and you might find this lecture by poet Desmond Egan, delivered during the 2004 International Gerard Manley Hopkins Summer School, useful in illuminating it.

Doctor Who Book Reviews

2007-07-18T19:45:00.000+01:00

I've been spending so much time *writing* fiction of late (I began a series of Tenth Doctor/Martha Jones short stories last week - I didn't mean to, of course - a plot bunny came bounding into my head and wouldn't leave !), that I've not been writing any reviews of the fiction I read, and although I've just re-read Linda Buckley-Archer's Gideon the Cutpurse and The Tar Man (still brilliant on a third and second reading, respectively), I owe you reviews of about six other books. So I'm combining quick reviews of the latest three Doctor Who novels featuring the Tenth Doctor and Doctor-in-Training Martha Jones. All these books feature the Doctor and Martha Jones as played by David Tennant and Freema Agyeman in the acclaimed hit series from BBC Television.

The first of these is Stephen Cole's Sting of the Zygons which brings back Tenth Doctor actor David Tennant's favourite monster from the Classic Who series, the Zygons.

The TARDIS lands the Doctor and Martha in the Lake District in 1909 (although he'd been aiming for Russia), where a small village is being terrorised by a gigantic scaly monster. All the local huntsman are taking part in the search for the elusive "Beast of Westmorland" as it's been dubbed, and a number of explorers, naturalists and hunters from across the country are descending on the area. Even King Edward VII is on the way to join the search, offering a Knighthood for whoever can find the Beast. But there is a more sinister presence at work in the Lakes than a mere monster on the rampage, and the Doctor and Martha soon become embroiled in the plans of an old and terrifying enemy of the Doctor's. As the hunters find themselves becoming the hunted, a desperate battle of wits begins - with the future of the entire world at stake.

There is also an Audiobook available, read by Reggie Yates (who played Martha's younger brother Leo in the TV series).

* * * * * *

The second book is Jacqueline Rayner's The Last Dodo in which the Doctor and Martha set off in search of a real live dodo and find themselves transported by the TARDIS to the mysterious Museum of the Last Ones (MotLO). In the Earth section there they discover one specimen of every extinct creature up to the present day; there are billions of them, from the tiniest insect to the biggest dinosaur, all of them still alive, kept in suspended animation. The Museum's only job is to preserve each species by collecting the last surviving specimen of wach creature from all over the universe.

This book is particularly interesting in that Rayner does something that "Doctor Who" authors seldom dare to do - she writes sections of the story from Martha's perspective, in the past tense. Not only does this make a refreshing change, style-wise but it's also fascinating to experience first-hand Martha's thoughts about events, including an accidental genocide that she perpetrates (which, fortunately, the Doctor is able to reverse), as well her larger feelings about the Doctor and their travels together.

Unfortunately these passages have clearly been written with a younger audience in mind so they aren't as detailed as they might have been. Pleasingly whilst Martha's television story arc concentrates a lot on her unrequited feelings for the Doctor, Rayner makes only fleeting references to this in the story. The book also features the amusing device of the "I-Spyder Book of Earth Creatures Guide" which the Doctor gives to Martha before they arrive at the Museum, and which underpins the whole novel in a very humorous Hitch-hiker's Guide To The Galaxy manner.

There is also an Audiobook available, read by Freema Agyeman.

* * * * * *

Martin Day's Wooden Heart features the "Castor", a vast starship which is apparently deserted and has been left drifting slowly in the void of deep space. Martha and the Doctor explore the ship and discover that they may not be alone on board it after all. It appears that someone has survived the disaster that overcame the rest of the crew. The pair try to discover what continues to power the vessel - and why a stretch of wooded countryside has suddenly appeared in the middle of the ship. As they journey through the forest, the Doctor and Martha find a mysterious, fogbound village that is traumatised by some of its children going missin and by tales of its own destruction. The Doctor and Martha find themselves in separate races against time to save the village, Martha from with the forest and the Doctor from outside in the ship.

There is also an Audiobook available, read by Adjoa Andoh (who played Martha's mother Francine in the TV series)

Doctor Who Quote of the Week

2007-07-17T19:30:00.000+01:00

[The Doctor, encouraging Adam to explore the station]
The Doctor: The thing is, Adam, time travel is like visiting Paris. You can't just read the guidebook, you've got to throw yourself in. Eat the food, use the wrong verbs, get charged double and end up kissing complete strangers... or is that just me?

("The Long Game", Season 1 New Doctor Who)

From the Guardian Online

2007-07-17T10:30:00.000+01:00

There's an interesting article in today's Guardian by Sarah Crown, one of this year's Forward Poetry Prize Judges. She writes:

In the run up to the judging meeting for this year's Forward prizes shortlist, I read nothing but poetry for three weeks. No newspapers, no magazines, no reference books and, crucially, no novels. Nothing. But. Poetry. It was a mind-bending experience.
Don't get me wrong: I'm not complaining, quite the opposite. I'm a sucker for poetry. I'll happily read a collection from cover to cover, and usually get through four or five new ones every month - as well as dipping in and out of volumes and anthologies I've read before. But to consume so much - somewhere in the region of 120 collections, I think - in such a concentrated way, without the leavening effect of prose, effected a profound and - to me, at least - fascinating shift in the way I read.

It's an interesting article that's worth reading in full. I can't actually imagine reading nothing but poetry for three weeks - or even three days ! I love my narrative fixes - even when I'm reading a lot of non-fiction (as I am now for researching my story, "Improbable Journeys"), I still like to read some fiction in bed before I sleep to allow my brain to unwind towards sleep. But I confess I'm intrigued !

Poetry Friday 58

2007-07-13T11:00:00.000+01:00

Today is the birthday of the rural poet John Clare, of whose poetry Edmund Blunden was a champion.

Water-Lilies

The water-lilies on the meadow stream
Again spread out their leaves of glossy green;
And some, yet young, of a rich copper gleam,
Scarce open, in the sunny stream are seen,
Throwing a richness upon Leisure's eye,
That thither wanders in a vacant joy;
While on the sloping banks, luxuriantly,
Tending of horse and cow, the chubby boy,
In self-delighted whims, will often throw
Pebbles, to hit and splash their sunny leaves;
Yet quickly dry again, they shine and glow
Like some rich vision that his eye deceives;
Spreading above the water, day by day,
In dangerous deeps, yet out of danger's way.

Clare was born in Nottinghamshire on July 13, 1793 and may be the poorest person to ever become a major writer in English literature. His father was a peasant farmer and the family often had to live off the proceeds from a single apple tree in their yard. Clare went to the village school between the ages of five and eleven, and having learnt to read and write, he decided that he wanted to write poetry.

He was forced to support himself by working as a farm labourer. Malnutrition had stunted his growth and he was never more than 5 feet tall, so he couldn't do any heavy work. Most of the time he weeded, stacked hay bales and looked after the animals. Since he couldn't afford to buy paper, he made his own from birch bark; he also made his own ink. However some of his poems were written on old envelopes.

Whilst other romantic poets, such as Wordsworth and Keats, were writing nature poetry they wrote about nature as a metaphor for something else. Clare, however, always tried to write about nature as it was, the thing itself.

His first poetry book came out in 1820 and the fact that he was a peasant helped to make it a bestseller. However, there was a bank crash a few years later, and then a recession in England so his books sold fewer and fewer copies, and he eventually moved back to the farm.

John Clare wrote: "I live here among the ignorant like a lost man ... they hardly dare talk in my company for fear I should mention them in my writings." He began suffering from a psychiatric disorder and his behavior became more and more erratic. He began seeing things such as spirits and demons, and was committed to an asylum where he forgot who he was; at some points he thought he was Lord Byron, and wrote some poems in Byron's style. He escaped from the asylum at one point but was returned and lived there for the rest of his life.

In all Clare wrote about 3,500 poems of which only 400 were published in his lifetime, and his great importance as an English poet has only become clear in the last few decades, in part due to the work begun by Edmund Blunden, himself a Nature poet even in the midst of the First World War.

Today's Poetry Friday round up will be hosted by Susan at Chicken Spaghetti.

Doctor Who Quote of the Week

2007-07-10T18:45:00.000+01:00

Dalek: [appears on a monitor] I shall speak only to the Doctor.
The Doctor: [sees the fire sprinklers in action, raining water upon the Dalek] You're gonna get rusty.
Dalek: I fed off the DNA of Rose Tyler. Extrapolating the biomass of a time-traveller regenerated me.
The Doctor: What's your next trick?
Dalek: I have been searching for the Daleks.
The Doctor: Yeah, I saw. Downloading the internet. What did you find?
Dalek: I scanned your satellites and radio telescopes.
The Doctor: And?
Dalek: Nothing. [Beat] Where shall I get my orders now?!
The Doctor: You're just a soldier without commands.
Dalek: Then I shall follow the Primary Order: the Dalek instinct to destroy, to conquer!!
The Doctor: But what for? What's the point?! Don't you see? It's all gone. Everything you were, everything you stood for.
Dalek: ... Then what should I do?
The Doctor: All right, then. If you want orders, follow this one. Kill yourself.
Dalek: The Daleks must survive!
The Doctor: The Daleks have failed! Now why don't you finish the job, and make the Daleks extinct?! Rid the universe of your filth! Why don't you just DIE?!
Dalek: [Beat] You would make a good Dalek.

("Dalek", Season 1 New Doctor Who)

Campaign to Save the Potterverse

2007-07-10T09:45:00.000+01:00

I confidently predict this will cause uproar in some circles: Waterstone's has launched an online petition to Save Harry Potter. The site proclaims:

There has never been a place like Hogwarts. There has never been a writer like JK Rowling. And there has never, ever been a character like Harry Potter. Millions, perhaps billions of us love reading his adventures, and we never want them to end.

The professed aim of the site is "to get one million names by July 21st (the launch date for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows)" at which point the petition will be presented to J K Rowling, who during a recent interview on the UK chat-show Friday Night With Jonathan Ross apparently agreed that you should "never say 'never'" with regard to the possibility that she might write more fiction set in the Potterverse in future. (You can see something of the JKR interview with Jonathan Ross on YouTube.)

Book and Blog News

2007-07-09T19:15:00.000+01:00

I meant to post about this last week, but got bogged down in a post-weekend-off work slog; still it's not too late to be relevant. The Bath Festival of Children's Literature programme is now available and amongst the literally dozens of fab events they're holding are the following which made me squeak with pleasure, then moan with despair as I don't think I'll get to any of them. The second one is the one that got me most excited and despairing:

Wednesday 26th September
F1 5.30 – 6.30pm, The Forum, £5
A brilliant performer and one of the most popular writers for young people today, Anthony Horowitz will fire up the imagination with a sneak preview of his eagerly awaited new Alex Rider novel, Snakehead, discuss his bestselling series The Power of Five and deliver a quickfire question-and-answer session covering his writing for page and screen.

Friday 28th September
H2 7 – 8pm, Guildhall, £4.50
Accompanying the current Doctor Who BBC TV Series is a successful range of tie-in novels – brand new and original adventures featuring the Doctor and Martha written by some of the best writers around. This is a rare chance to hear many of these Doctor Who experts talk about how they write for the last of the Timelords. Join Mark Michalowski, Mark Morris, Paul Magrs, Justin Richards and Steve Cole in conversation with Michael Stevens, Doctor Who Range Editor at Bath-based BBC Audiobooks, for an evening of fascinating insight into everyone’s favourite time-traveller.

Sunday 23rd September
C5 11 – 12pm, Assembly Rooms, £5
You lucky people! Come and meet award-winning fantasy author Garth Nix in his first UK appearance for more than two years! Hear him talking about his current Keys to the Kingdom series, plus the legendary Old Kingdom trilogy and Shade's Children. Don't miss your chance to hear this master of storytelling explain all.

Sunday 30th September
K16 6 – 7pm, Guildhall, £4.50
A rare chance to catch together three great fantasy authors discussing their craft. Frank Beddor is a best-selling author who has written two bold fantasies inspired by Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland. Catherine Fisher's past work is popular and very highly acclaimed. Her new novel, Incarceron, is her hugely enjoyable yet terrifying vision of the future. David Clement-Davies unique brand of literary, anthropomorphic animal fantasy has won him rave reviews all over the world. His new novel, Fell, is a sequel to The Sight.

The chance to hear Justin Richards and Stephen Cole, whose Doctor Who novels I've really enjoyed, is fabulous, but 8 pm talk requires an overnight stay and as things stand, I can't afford it...

* * * * * *

Nancy, of the Journey Woman Blog, has just celebrated her Blogiversary (it was mine last week but did I remember? Nope ! That's two years in a row I've missed it!) and she's holding a Lives in Letters Contest during July.

She says:

The prizes:

I'll award 4 prizes, each a $25 gift card. Probably Starbucks gift cards, though I might shake it up a bit and go with Target gift cards too. Plus each winner will get one mystery prize of small monetary but huge sentimental value.

The deadline:

All entries must be in by July 31, midnight. I announce winners on August 2, which just happens to be my 39th birthday.

If you want to know more about how to participate, hightail it over to Journey Woman now !

Scholar's Blog Spoiler Zone Update

2007-07-08T19:15:00.000+01:00

I've just posted my review of Doctor Who season 3 episodes 12 and 13 "The Sound of Drums" and "The Last of the Time Lords" (the final two episodes) over on the Scholar's Blog Spoiler Zone.

Question for readers of Time Travel Tales

2007-07-06T10:15:00.000+01:00

I'm hoping (see previous post) to properly start work on my non-Who Time Travel tale next week and I've been thinking about it a good deal in the meantime. The one thing I've been wondering is whether or not to have an object that precipitates Danny's time-travelling. My original idea was that he would not have such an object - no mechanical or magical machine that causes him to time-travel, so no TARDIS ("Doctor Who"), no DeLorean ("Back to the Future"), no Art Deco radio (London Calling), no Rift ("Torchwood"/"Doctor Who"), no bags of Time (Johnny and the Bomb), etc.

But I remembered conversations about Susan Cooper's King of Shadows, in which young Nat Field travels back to 1599 without the use of a particular time-travel device and now I'm wondering which method readers prefer ? If I choose to go for the no device option, how much of an explanation would you want for how Danny manages to travel in time ? Personally I'm quite happy without a detailed explanation (I think part of the reason I love King of Shadows is the mystery that surrounds Nat's time-travelling, but I'm curious to know what others prefer.

Poetry Friday 57

2007-07-06T09:30:00.000+01:00

Time for some more Shakespeare this week. This Sonnet turned up in my inbox last week via the daily "The Writer's Almanac" email, so I thought I would share it with you.

Sonnet 55

Not marble nor the gilded monuments
Of princes shall outlive this powerful rhyme;
But you shall shine more bright in these contents
Than unswept stone, besmear'd with sluttish time.
When wasteful war shall statues overturn,
And broils root out the work of masonry,
Nor Mars his sword nor war's quick fire shall burn
The living record of your memory.
'Gainst death and all-oblivious enmity
Shall you pace forth; your praise shall still find room,
Even in the eyes of all posterity
That wear this world out to the ending doom.
So, till the judgment that yourself arise,
You live in this, and dwell in lovers' eyes.

It seemed particularly apt following my poems last week to commemorate the anniversary of the start of World War 1 and because I've been doing some WW1-related background reading for my non-Who Time Travel tale, which I hope to begin work on properly next week, work schedule permitting (I've taken to getting up at 5 am to write before breakfast since I can't seem to fit any writing into the day and I'm far too shattered most evenings).

This week's Poetry Friday round up is hosted by Farm School.

Doctor Who Quote of the Week

2007-07-03T12:45:00.000+01:00

Rose: [Approaches the damaged Dalek] ... Hello?
[no response] Are you in pain? My name's Rose Tyler. I've got a friend who can help, he's called the Doctor. What's your name?
Dalek: [weak] ... Yes...
Rose: What?
Dalek: [eyestalk lifts feebly] ... I... am... in pain... They... torture me... but still they fear me... Do you fear me?...
Rose: [soft] No.
[the Dalek's eyestalk lowers again, as if in despair]
Dalek: ... I... am... dying...
Rose: No, we can help --
Dalek: ... I... welcome death... But... I am glad... that before I die... I met a human... who was not afraid...
Rose: Isn't there anything I can do?
Dalek: ... My race... is dead... I... shall die... alone...
[Rose touches the Dalek's dome to comfort it]
Adam: Rose, no!
[Rose pulls her hand away in pain. And the Dalek is triumphant.]
Dalek: [Voice volume steadily increases] Genetic material extrapolated! Initiate cellular RECONSTRUCTION!!!

("Dalek", Season 1 New Doctor Who)

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My review of the season 3 two part finale will go up later this week as I've not yet had a chance to re-watch the 13th episode since it aired on Saturday.

Scholar's Blog Book Discussion Group

2007-07-03T12:30:00.000+01:00

Just a quick reminder that the discussion of Louis Sachar's The Boy Who Lost His Face has now started. Feel free to pop over and participate if you've read it.

Harry Potter tag

2007-06-30T07:30:00.000+01:00

Sheila of Wands and Worlds tagged me for this Harry Potter meme that's doing the rounds right now.

1. Butterbeer or pumpkin juice?
Since I don't drink alcohol and have a lactose intolerance, Pumpkin Juice...

2. What House would you most likely (or want to) be in in Hogwarts?
Without a doubt, Ravenclaw.

3. If you were an animagus, what animal would you turn into?
Like Sheila, I'd probably be a cat.

4. What character do you empathize with, or resemble best?
I most resemble Hermione (I was nicknamed Hermione by one friend whilst doing my degree; I most empathise with Harry though...

5. What position do you play at Quidditch?
None - can I be excused even watching it so I can spend more time in the library?

6. Which teacher is your favorite?
McGonagall and Lupin - I can't choose between them.

7. Any Harry Potter 7 predictions?
Sure - over on the Scholar's Blog Spoiler Zone.

I'm not sure who's been tagged for this and who hasn't, so if you want to pick it up, feel free.