Authors Electric

As a child in the 1970s, I remember that those cheap hardback editions “for children”, of classics like The Three Musketeers, The Prince and the Pauper, or Oliver Twist, were in circulation, so that this was how I first came across those wonderful stories. At the same time, remakes of these stories were being made for British cinema and, perhaps because, as he later said of himself, he was born too late and would have been happier in an earlier time, it was Oliver Reed that UK directors turned to when they wanted to cast a powerful character in these films: Athos in The Three Musketeers, Bill Sykes in Oliver Twist, Miles Hendon in The Prince and the Pauper… As a child watching these films on a black-and-white portable TV, I noticed Reed right away. His energy seemed different from other “actors”. This is probably because he was doing less “acting”. And yet, there can be sensed within him a fierce, but sensitive, commitment to whichever part he is playing at any given time. ...

A jug of wine, a loaf of bread and a damn good book to read ... Early yesterday morning TH White dropped in to share his overwhelming grief at the loss of his beloved dog Brownie: after pouring out his sorrow he lingered a little longer to help with a bit of research on dogs for a book I'm currently working on. With a bit of work done, I felt justified in taking a little time off to enjoy a picnic lunch with Ray Bradbury, who was joined halfway through by Isaac Asimov; regretfully I had to send them away far sooner than I would have wished in order to get back to work. In the evening my dinner guest was John Wyndham, who cared not at all that the grub was on a tray rather than the dining room table (which is too covered with reference materials at the moment for formal dining). He kept me up rather later than intended, but when I finally got to bed, I shared a mug of cocoa with Terry Pratchett before drifting off to sleep. Yes, you're never alone when you've got a ...