30 Thursday Sep 2021
Posted in Scribbling, Stories
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I’m sure you know how it goes.
You are working on a project. A long term one. Longer than you planned at first, perhaps – but sometimes things have their own way of stretching into something else, and… and… oh, you do know how it goes. Continue reading
02 Thursday Sep 2021
Posted in Scribbling, Stories
They come to you, and say that they have a story, a really good story that you should really write.
In time you learn to recognize this, a certain gleam in their eyes from the very first moment someone mentions that you write. Then they sit on it, they observe you, sometimes they ask questions, trying to determine whether you might be the right person… Continue reading
14 Thursday Jan 2021
Posted in Scribbling
A new year begins, and everything – and I belong to the list-making sort, if only marginally. So, with a lovely new notebook to start, what was more natural than making a list of writing projects for the new year?
It is, of course, one of those hopeful lists, with way more items than I can reasonably expect to tackle – although you never can tell – and written down in full awareness of the nature of the best laid plans. Continue reading
20 Thursday Aug 2020
Posted in Lostintranslation, Scribbling, Stories
Yes, yes – in the end I found it.
We talked about that quote of Bernard Malamud, didn’t we? The one about stories, stories, stories, the one I was sure I’d jotted down and never found again – not in old notebooks, not in the Web… That one.
Well, as was bound to happen, I found it in the end. Continue reading
23 Thursday Apr 2020
Posted in Eccentricities, Things
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Apart from or the Erasmus Year in Cardiff, my University years were spent in one of the smaller colleges in Pavia, the good old Gandini, housed in a wonderful 15th century palace right in the town centre. It was a pleasant place to stay, and I made a number of good friends there – and I played cards more than I ever had before or have since.
Now please don’t go imagining things: we didn’t gamble or anything… the place was, after all, run by nuns. The College’s game of choice was, for some reason, Pinochle, and we could spend whole evenings at it, playing in two, three or two pairs… Continue reading
09 Thursday Apr 2020
Posted in Eccentricities
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I confess: I’ve never read anything by Bernard Malamud. It’s very possible that I’ll correct this state of things in a near future – but let me tell you a story first.
Years ago – possibly a dozen – I wrote down a quote that said “Stories, stories, stories – to me there is nothing else but stories.” Or something to that effect. I’m quoting from memory, and I’m not sure about the details – but you get the gist. I like the notion very much, and rather share it, and more than once, through the years, I’ve tried to locate the source – but, believe it or not, even the all-encompassing Web was no help… Continue reading
31 Thursday Oct 2019
Posted in Scribbling, Things
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Until a few years ago – say a decade or so – in a village not far from here, the old, old tradition of Meeting March was still very much alive: on the last night of February, young and old armed themselves with pans, and ran around making all the din they could, to scare away Old Winter.
It was good fun, older than the hills, quite pagan – and nobody found it a particular reason for scandal… Continue reading
22 Thursday Mar 2018
Posted in Eccentricities
So I was asked to read a manuscript, with an eye to a possible stage adaptation. It happened in that roundabout way that entails friends and friends of mutual friends… I’m sure you know how it is. And because of some initial insistence that I should meet the author first, or I could not really understand, I went in with a certain amount of wariness… Continue reading
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