This is excellent. Bit slow and scholarly to start, but soon kicks off. I prefer the author's non-fiction to his fiction.
Reading Coming up for air now, very good. Thanks for the recommend. I prefer Orwell's fiction to his non-fiction.
I read that along with all Orwell’s other non-fiction and essays about 30 years ago. Imagine what else he would have produced if he’d not died so young.
I read a lot of Orwell at college, about a billion years ago. Enjoying the reread. The chapters concerning the main character’s youth/boyhood are just brilliant and so relatable.
Very much enjoyed reading Lone Rider by Elspeth Beard. It puts my many ‘long distance’ rides into perspective as timid little adventures.
Getting stuck into this now. Fascinating book, it does take some bandwidth keeping up with the progeny's burning, pillaging and head lopping. Proper royals in those days...
It doesn’t help that nearly all the men are called Edward and the nearly all the women are called Matilda. As an aside; I once did a trial where every single person involved - that is the defendant, his employer (who he was accused of stealing from), a fellow employee and the employer’s accountant (both witnesses) - were all named Pratikumar Patel
That's true. Even the author has realised he should keep reminding the reader which Henry or Edward he is referring to.
Coincidentally a few hours ago I thought about reading Sacks again. Interestingly, not only was he a biker when he first went to the States (BMW boxer), he used amphetamine in vast quantities, a fair bit of LSD, and hung around with the Hells Angels.
I’ve just finished reading (in Spanish) ‘Plomo en los bolsillos’, (Lead in the pockets) a short history of the Tour de France. A highly enjoyable retelling of the tricks and stunts of the first few years up to the doping scandals of the Armstrong years and slightly beyond.
The Penguin Complete Sherlock Holmes. One imagines – or anyway hopes – these are spontaneous. One or two neurological conditions do cause that. Watson took a Jezail bullet in the shoulder in Afghanistan, but a couple of cases later it was in his leg. So maybe it ricocheted off his shoulder, travelled down and exited from his leg (then veered off and killed JFK 80 years later in Dallas), doing nerve damage on the way. And, as a medical man he conscientiously reports the consequences: “Not the Countess of Morcar’s blue carbuncle!” I ejaculated. “What on earth has that to do with it?” I ejaculated. “My dear Holmes!” I ejaculated. “What! With that?” I ejaculated. “Wonderful!” I ejaculated. “Simple!” I ejaculated. “What on earth does this mean?” I ejaculated after I had twice read over the extraordinary announcement.* *Well you buy it for the articles, don't you.
