Authors Electric

                                    How I Became a Reader                    How I became a reader was all down to my school, the alma mater of Beatles, George Harrison and Paul McCartney, and often much maligned in my blogs. Deservedly so, I think, because if you weren't an Oxbridge candidate it didn't have a great deal to recommend itself, especially to the also-rans, with whom I must confess I belonged from the very first day when, black and green peaked cap in hand, I had stood abashed before its austere and forbidding iron gates. There were, however, some good teachers: among them Mr Toobe, whose head and neck poked between the lapels of his dusty black gown, and who was appropriately nicknamed ‘turtle’ as he stepped slowly along the school corridors, holding those lapels apart as if they were the opening curtains to some play. And this was a p...

 Image Credit: Images created in Book Brush using Pixabay photos. We all love stories. The best non-fiction books can read like novels so you could include those here too. But I must admit I have a soft soft for stories in songs and this time of year reminds me of that. Many of the Christmas carols tell the story of the Nativity, taking in different viewpoints. There are carols for the shepherds, the Magi, and even the donkey and the holly and the ivy after all. It was thinking of these that made me consider other songs which are stories. One of my favourites is Up the Junction from Squeeze which is a proper ballad and a heart-wrenching story. Well worth a listen if it’s not one you know. There is a great story structure throughout. And yes, I did guess the ending. I didn’t guess just how poignant it would be. Another favourite of mine is Hazard by Richard Marx. This tells the story of an oddball (his small town suspects him of “not being right”) who is suspected of the disappear...

 I have never been a particular Beatles fan. I like their music but  I am too young to have been aware of them in their heyday and too old to have rediscovered them as something extraordinary and inspirational as a younger generation have done. I did however watch 'Get Back' the eight hour documentary that showed them rehearsing for what became their final and very brief live concert on the roof of the 'Apple' building.      It was at once blindingly dull and totally gripping: watching creative people procrastinate, muck about, fail to organise themselves or make any real decisions was like watching my own head in action or rather inaction. Then there were the strange moments when mucking about suddenly transformed into the creation of something. Watching Paul McCartney noodling around on guitar and producing 'Get Back' was electrifying, like watching a familiar sculpture being chiselled into being from raw concrete.    It got me thinking about creati...

The Good the Bad and the Ugly The London Library The London Library stacks As the Beatles once crooned ‘there are places I’ll remember’ and for me, number 2 in the places I love in the world (the first being the Che Guevara Mausoleum in Santa Clara) is the London Library. This is what a library should be.  When I became a member you still had to have references to join – now they let anyone in who will pay.  It was, and still is to some degree I’m sure, like a gentleman’s club. But open not primarily to gentlemen but to bibliophiles.  It has large wooden desks, huge leather chairs, a cataloguing system which is unique, baffling and frankly inexplicable (that may have changed now as they may have digitised everything) but this in itself gave the place another charm AND meant that you had the excuse to hide in the stacks ‘browsing’ which is what I love to do. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a huge fan of the Dewey Decimal system and of knowing exactly what book you are ...