A dramatic title, isn't it? Inspired by a wonderful post I came across this morning from Maria Popova's Brainpickings blog, entitled The Burning House: What People Would Take if the House Was on Fire, it wasn't so much the eye-catching title which caught my attention so much as the photographs: images of people's treasured possessions, … Continue reading Which Books Would You Take With You if the House Burnt Down?
Category: Orwell
Some of you may have noticed the blog header change. It is a photograph I took of W. H. Auden's desk and typewriter at his summer house in Kirchstetten, Austria, not so far from where I live. The previous header was an image of his bookshelves which are upstairs in his study. I visited Auden's summer house … Continue reading Writers and Their Creative Spaces
A good story is a good story no matter what the length. However, there is a trend these days that implies the bigger the better. Unless you’re trying to win a Hugo Award where a minimum of 40,000 words is a requirement, length does not actually matter to a story (although events like NaNoWriMo with … Continue reading Size Matters: On the Lost Art of Brevity
'Stop all the clocks' is one of many favourite poems, and I went to visit Auden's rented summer-house at Kirchstetten, in Austria, recently. It is where he penned many of his poems and the upstairs room where he wrote has been preserved as a museum, with his book shelves, kettles, empty vodka bottles, typewriter and … Continue reading W. H. Auden
