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Monday reading

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Current
Seychelles: The Saga of a Small Nation Navigating the Cross-Currents of a Big World, by Sir James Mancham
Words of Radiance, by Brandon Sanderson
Sodom and Gomorrah, by Marcel Proust

Last books finished
Here’s My Card, by Bob Popyk
Ringworld, by Larry Niven
Doctor Who: The Women Who Lived – Tales for Future Time Lords, by Christel Dee and Simon Guerrier

Next books
The Sound of his Horn, by Sarban
Larque on the Wing, by Nancy Springer
The Vampire’s Curse, by Mags Halliday

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Wedding anniversary weekend

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Today is our 25th wedding anniversary!

We celebrated last weekend by going to Riga.

I think Latvia was the EU country about which I knew least before we went there. Riga is a pretty city on the Baltic, with some lovely old architecture dating from the time when it was the biggest city in the Swedish empire.

The opera house, where Wagner worked and where the Flying Dutchman was on. We didn't go inside.

The cityscape views were taken from the impressive spire of St Peter's Church:

Inside, there is a spacious nave and also art in the aisles.

This includes a rather impressive Resurrection of Christ by Imants Lancmanis:

The other big church in Riga is the Cathedral, which has some gorgeous baroque twiddly bits (organ and pulpit) and a twelfth-century font (lower left).

The unspectacular outside masks some lovely cloisters.

We didn't make it across the river to the National Library, where in fact there was a conference on where I knew several of the attendees.

The grand covered market was orignally constructed as Zeppelin hangars. Looks impressive from the outside:

But practical inside.

Saturday happened to be the day of the annual Michaelmas market outside the cathedral: cue lots of amusingly shaped vegetable displays.

And a choir of little girls singing.

It was raining miserably but these honey-sellers were gamely sticking to their festive headgear.

Latvia has parliamentary elections this coming Saturday; there were posters up everywhere for the different parties, and we spotted this campaigning stall. They offered us literature but we said we were tourists.

The Latvian language is Indo-European, and closely related to Lithuanian. From the warning poster in St Peter's Church, I checked the origin of the word "bērns", meaning child, and it is indeed related to the Scots word "bairn".

Most public signage is just in Latvian, but English and Russian are also used. It was not always thus – for centuries, the German-speaking community was dominant. A plaque in St Peter's Church commemorates two visits from Kings of Sweden in different centuries and different languages.

There are a number of historical and art museums in Riga; we went only to the National History Museum, which had a very interesting display about Latvia's century since its first declaration of independence, representing a lot of the conflicting narratives about the early years, the Ulmanis dictatorship, and the Soviet regime including also the Nazi occupation. We learned a lot, but the only picture I thought to take was this poster for the first ever Latvian feature film, "I'm Leaving for the War" (1920):

As always, there is lots of public art. This head is on display in the cathedral cloisters, but is reckoned to be pre-Christian (which is rather later in Latvia than in other parts of Europe).

It inspired this imitation in a nearby square.

This is a memorial to the Riga-born photographer Philippe Halsmann, who famously got his subjects (including Richard Nixon and the Duke and Duchess of Windsor) to jump.

This is a memorial to the barricades of 1991.

The most iconic structure in Riga is the Latvian Freedom Monument, which I photographed against a tremendously stormy sky. The inscription at the bottom is Tēvzemei un Brīvībai, For Fatherland and Freedom. Little did we know that as we enjoyed ourselves in Latvia, the UK's Foreign Secretary, Jeremy Hunt, was about to make himself look really stupid by comparing the European Union to the Soviet Union. In Latvia, they can tell the difference, as the Latvian ambassador to the UK pointed out.

Quick notes on where we stayed and ate.
Accommodation: Pullman Riga Old Town, Jēkaba iela 24, very comfortable, should have brought swimming costumes to enjoy the pool.
Friday tea: Golden Coffee, Kungu iela 7/9, beside St Peter's Church, standard Russian/western bistro, friendly service
Friday dinner: Zviedru Vārti, Aldaru iela 11, right next to the Swedish gate which gives it its name, good traditional fare.
Saturday lunch: We tried the Vertigo Bar, but it doesn't actually do food, and ended up in the sumptuous restaurant of the Metropole Hotel, Aspazijas Bulvaris 36/38.
Saturday dinner: Milda, Kungu iela 8, a bit further along from Golden Coffee, lovely traditional food.
Sunday morning: went looking for Cafe Osiris, recommended in the Guardian, but could not find it. Went back to Golden Coffee in the end.
Sunday lunch: Alaverdi, Grēcinieku iela 8, Georgian food which to be honest was a bit too heavy after the weekend we had had.

We also went to a concert in the VEF Concert Hall, featuring a Latvian choir and whirling dervishes. To be honest it was not all that exciting. But given Latvia's history, sometimes not being all that exciting is a good thing.

Not sure if I would rush back for tourism – two days is probably enough for Riga – but it was great to celebrate our 25 years of marriage, and we had a very good time over the whole weekend. 

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Monday reading

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Current
Ringworld, by Larry Niven
Seychelles: The Saga of a Small Nation Navigating the Cross-Currents of a Big World, by Sir James Mancham
Words of Radiance, by Brandon Sanderson
Sodom and Gomorrah, by Marcel Proust

Last books finished
Brewing Justice, by Daniel Jaffee
Missing Adventures, ed. Rebecca Levene
Putting Up Roots, by Charles Sheffield
Riga: Berlitz Pocket Guide

Next books
The Sound of his Horn, by Sarban
Larque on the Wing, by Nancy Springer
The Vampire’s Curse, by Mags Halliday

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September books

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Non-fiction: 5 (YTD 42)
Byzantium, by Judith Herrin
Who I Am, by Peter Townshend
About Time vol 8: 2007, Series 3, by Tat Wood and Dorothy Ail
Brewing Justice, by Daniel Jaffee
Riga: Berlitz Pocket Guide, by Martins Zaprauskis

Fiction (non-sf): 2 (YTD 24)
The Lost Weekend, by Charles L. Jackson
The Guermantes Way, by Marcel Proust

Poetry 1 (YTD 4)
Glory For Me, by MacKinlay Kantor

sf (non-Who): 9 (YTD 97)
Finn Family Moomintroll, by Tove Jansson
Moominland Midwinter, by Tove Jansson
Vurt, by Jeff Noon
Moominsummer Madness, by Tove Jansson
The Ginger Star, by Leigh Brackett
Moominpappa at Sea, by Tove Jansson
The Beast Master, by André Norton
Lord of Thunder, by André Norton
Putting Up Roots, by Charles Sheffield

Doctor Who, etc: 2 (YTD 29)
Doctor Who: The Visual Dictionary, by Neil Corry, Jacqueline Rayner, Andrew Darling, Kerrie Dougherty, David John and Simon Beecroft
Missing Adventures, ed. Rebecca Levene

Comics: 1 (YTD 22)
Dark Satanic Mills, by Marcus Sedgwick, Julian Sedgwick, John Higgins and Marc Olivent

~5,200 pages (YTD ~57,300)
11/20 (YTD 90/221) by non-male writers (Herrin, Ail, Jansson x 4, Brackett, Norton x 2, Rayner/Dougherty, Levene)
0/20 (YTD 23/221) by PoC
6/20 (YTD 18/221) reread (The Guermantes Way, four Moomin books, The Beast Master)

Reading now
Ringworld, by Larry Niven
Seychelles: The Saga of a Small Nation Navigating the Cross-Currents of a Big World, by Sir James Mancham
Words of Radiance, by Brandon Sanderson

Coming soon (perhaps):
The Sound of his Horn, by Sarban
Larque on the Wing, by Nancy Springer
The Cloud Roads, by Martha Wells
Earth Girl, by Janet Edwards
Retour sur Aldébaran, tome 1, by Leo
Baptism in Blood, by Jane Haddam
Hybrid, by Shaun Hutson
Hardwired, by Walter Jon Williams
Burr, by Gore Vidal
51 Ways of Looking at a Poem, by Ruth Padel
The Stone Book Quartet, by Alan Garner
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, by Michael Chabon
The Name of This Book Is Secret, by Pseudonymous Bosch
A Cold Day in Hell, by Alan Grant
Factfulness, by Hans Rosling
Fanny Hill, by John Cleland
Sodom and Gomorrah, by Marcel Proust
“The Queen of Air and Darkness”, by Poul Anderson
Grimm Tales: For Young and Old, by Philip Pullman
And the Mountains Echoed, by Khaled Hosseini
Bernice Summerfield and the Vampire Curse, by Mags L Halliday

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My tweets

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  • Sat, 12:56: RT @PatricKielty: Dear @BorisJohnson, There is no better Brexit when it comes to the Good Friday Agreement and Northern Ireland. As you st…
  • Sat, 15:10: RT @BalkanInsight: From then to now: Since Macedonia gained independence from Yugoslavia in 1991, it has been a long road to tomorrow’s…
  • Sat, 16:05: The Banality of Brett Kavanaugh https://t.co/EfNfEuF2vt The arrogance of entitlement.
  • Sun, 08:32: Best of luck to all my friends in Macedonia today – hoping for a good result.
  • Sun, 10:45: RT @notesuponnotes: In honour of the 100th anniversary of the premiere of Holst’s Planets, I give you the moment the classical record indus…
  • Sun, 11:40: RT @MichaelDHiggins: I am asking for your support on October 26th. All my life I have campaigned, argued and fought for a real Republic. Th…
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Commemorating Jo Cox

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I did not know Jo Cox, the MP who was brutally assassinated by a right-wing activist shortly before the Brexit referendum. But we both moved to Belgium in 1999, and had a lot of mutual friends. She worked first in the office of Glenys Kinnock MEP and then for Oxfam, including as head of their Brussels office, before she moved back to the UK, and I am sure we were in the same room on numerous occasions.

Today, the city of Brussels named a square downtown after her, a block from the Bourse, two blocks from the Grand Place, and behind the Ancienne Belgique concert hall, as part of an initiative to name more streets and places in Brussels after women – if I understood correctly, this was the first such renaming to take place.

I attended with a colleague who also had social links with Jo Cox's friends, and it was a very moving ceremony, with speeches from the mayor of Brussels Philippe Close, the alderman for housing Mohamed Ouriaghli, Jo's sister Kim, Jeremy Corbyn and two MEPs, Richard Corbett and Udo Bullmann.

I am not Jeremy Corbyn’s biggest fan, but his short well-judged speech moved me to tears.

Labour’s Brexit spokesman, Sir Keir Starmer, was also there.

A choir sang two songs: the Balkan Roma song Ederlezi, which was also the name of the houseboat where Jo Cox lived with her husband and their two children:

and Nkosi Sikelel' iAfrika, that great song of freedom and looking forward to a better world.

And the new name plaque was successfully unveiled.

I heard on good authority that the city’s original plan was to name the square using her full name, “Helen Joanne Cox”, and the decision to just go for “Jo Cox” was taken as late as last night, requiring hasty repainting of the two signs. It was the right thing to do.

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  • Thu, 09:00: RT @Stone_SkyNews: Later today a square in Brussels will be renamed Jo Cox Square. The British MP was murdered by a far right extremist in…
  • Thu, 09:00: RT @Ouri_Mohamed: Le 27.09 à 13h, Helen Joanne Cox verra son nom attribué à la place située à l’arrière de l’Ancienne Belgique, lieu qu’ell…
  • Thu, 09:45: RT @EleanorRylance: The brutal political murder of Jo Cox MP is one of the reasons why I stepped into active politics. Because if average p…
  • Thu, 10:45: RT @LordRoyKennedy: I have written on the urgent need to update the law on elections in the UK to make them fit for purpose in the latest e…
  • Thu, 11:23: From Budapest to the Balkans, via Brussels @EURACTIV https://t.co/jDZjhCoVGL Great piece from @JordanIva.

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Who I Am, by Peter Townshend

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Second paragraph of third chapter:

In July 1952 Mum came to collect me from Westgate on the train — not with Dad, but with Dennis Bowman and Jimpy, whom I was delighted to see. On the way hack on the train, though, it was clear my mother hadn’t prepared herself for having me back. My fidgeting irritated her, and so did my runny nose. Nothing I did seemed right. Dennis Bowman said quietly to her, ‘That’s a really dear little boy you’ve got there. Why don’t you leave him alone?’

I have to admit that I am not a fan of The Who at all and know very little of their music. But there is no harm in exploring celebrity culture, even of celebrities who I’m not all that familiar with. In fact, I found this a really interesting book; Townshend has clearly given his life and his art a lot of thought, and I was frankly impressed by his account of working up the electronic synthesis of The Who’s music recordings, and later his own. He is clear about his struggles with addiction and dependency on alcohol, drugs and sex, and explained both how he overcame those problems but also how he failed to do so. He is also clear about the burdens that come with earning and having stupidly large amounts of money, starting at a comparatively young age, and does not seek readers’ sympathy on this point. He is less clear on a couple of points that surprised me. There is no character sketch of any of the other three members of The Who, who sometimes seem just to be incidental to Townshend’s creative process (though he rates them strongly as performers). Also his mother is not named, even in the index; it’s clear that there is a lot going on there, including unspeakable abuse to which Townshend was subjected while in the care of his grandmother. This in turn motivated him to commendable social action, using his wealth to help other survivors.

What I found most interesting was the continuity of creativity that Townshend sees himself in. The Who’s music was of its time, and he respects other music and art that was of different times. He is thrilled at an early stage to receive a complimentary note from Sir William Walton (who was godfather to one of his associates) and has a blast collaborating with Ted Hughes on The Iron Giant. At the other end, he is encouraging of newer musicians, and writes enthusiastically of the next generation. (He also writes enthusiastically but less comprehensibly about his faith in the Indian guru Meher Baba.)

I enjoyed this more than I had expected. You can get it here.

This was my top unread book acquired in 2015 and my top unread non-fiction book. Next on those lists respectively are Fanny Hill by John Cleland and Factfulness by Hans Rosling.

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The Beast Master, and Lord of Thunder, by Andre Norton

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Long long ago, I think even when I was in primary school (so, more than forty years ago), I read The Beast Master, and it stuck with me. Not quite so long ago, I got it and its sequel, Lord of Thunder, in a single volume, Beast Master’s Planet. Both concern a future galaxy where Earth has been destroyed in the final act of a war with the alien Xik, and our protagonist, Hosteen Storm, is (as far as he knows) the only survivor of the Navajo. He is an ex-soldier, trained to have a psychic link with his animal conpanions – two meerkats, an eagle and a big tiger-like cat, and he is sent to the planet of Arzor to earn his living as a civilian.

Arzor turns out to be a sparsely settled planet whose main industry appears to be the ranching of the cattle-like frawns, carried out by human settlers in negotiation with the indigenous Norbies, who have a complex tribal structure and totem-based religion. Hosteen Storm becomes a horse wrangler. It’s basically the Old West in space, although nobody ever says that, with Storm set up as uniquely placed to bridge the communication gap between humans and natives. Basically he is a Magical Indian.

It’s also worth noting that there isn’t a single female speaking character in either book. Storm’s mother is mentioned in passing, but she is dead. The Norbies seem to be all male. Storm’s animals are female, which is interesting.

The Beast Master

Second paragraph of third chapter:

“Call in that eagle of yours,too, if you can, Storm. You’re makin’ a big impression and that can be good for us—”

Still, the first book reminded me of the magic it exerted on my mind in a Belfast classroom long ago. (I think I may have even written a book report on it.) I appreciated then the tragic burden carried by Storm as the last of his tribe, charged by his grandfather with maintaining a family vendetta (which drives a lot of the narrative) but then also caught up in both a Xik plot against the humans and the discovery of lost ancient alien tech under the mountains. The tone of the book is detached, measured and firm. The flaws are still there, but the fact is that this was an sf book featuring a Navajo protagonist at a time (1959) when the future was mainly seen as white.

Lord of Thunder

Second paragraph of third chapter:

“What had he done?” Brad Quade asked.

The sequel has some string similarities to the first book (more alien tech under the mountains) but features an arrogant rich offworlder demanding that Storm penetrate dangerous Norbie territory in order to find his lost son. There’s a strong message that messing with the aliens is best left to the experts like Storm and his new family the Quades. The offworlder disregards Storm’s advice, with disastrous consequences all round which Storm has to try and put right, providing more exciting adventure. But I was not really satisfied with the end of the story, which introduced new hither-to unmentioned dangers, and then wrapped everything up rather quickly. I would not recommend it as strongly as the first volume.

Still, bearing in mind that both are books of their time, they are good reads. You can get the omnibus here.

This was my top unread book acquired in 2011. Next on that list is Baptism in Blood, by Jane Haddam.

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Monday reading

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Current
Missing Adventures, ed. Rebecca Levene
Putting Up Roots, by Charles Sheffield
Brewing Justice, by Daniel Jaffee

Last books finished
The Beast Master, by André Norton
Glory For Me, by MacKinlay Kantor
Lord of Thunder, by André Norton
Who I Am, by Peter Townshend
About Time vol 8: 2007, Series 3, by Tat Wood and Dorothy Ail

Next books
Ringworld, by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
Words of Radiance, by Brandon Sanderson
Seychelles: The Saga of a Small Nation Navigating the Cross-Currents of a Big World, by Sir James Mancham

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Asterix in Britain – the Rene Goscinny exhibition at London’s Jewish Museum

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Yesterday I went to the Asterix in Britain exhibition at the London Jewish Museum. Actually it's much more an exhibition about the life and work of René Goscinny, who created Asterix and also Lucky Luke and the scheming grand vizier Iznogoud. Goscinny was born in 1926, the son of Jewish parants who had moved to Paris from Poland; when he was two they moved to Buenos Aires, where he grew up. He comes across as a very humorous individual – in the many photographs, he is either clearly thinking of something funny to say, or has just said it. He always identified as French, but with a special place in his heart for Argentina, which he refers to as le mien – "mine" – in one of the TV interviews in the exhibition.

Goscinny spent most of the late 1940s in New York, so he must have spoken and written English well. Here is the CV he used to try and get drawing jobs in 1948 (I've checked, and the Brooklyn address where he was living is now a vacant yard):

While there he struck up a friendship and creative partnership with Will Elder, Harvey Kurtzman and Larry Siegel, the future creators of Mad Magazine, who wrote him into one of their Playboy strips (about American tourists in Paris) as a manic curly-haired waiter:

But in 1951 he went back to France and from 1959, together with Albert Uderzo, he wrote Asterix. At the same time he was an activist in and for comics, trying to raise the game of the Franco-Belgian culture to be more relevant to contemporary political issues. It's interesting that a lot of his work was for the Belgian Spirou and Tintin magazines, most notably the creation of Lucky Luke with Morris, who was a Belgian artist.

A couple of peculiar coincidences – he married his wife Gilberte on 26 April 1967, which oddly enough was the day I was born. He died suddenly aged 51, which is the age I am now. (I have outlived him – he did not make it to three months after his birthday, I am almost five months after mine.)

We are all familiar with the Anthea Bell translations of Asterix, but there were a couple of earlier not-really-authorised versions as well – one for Valiant in 1964 had Asterix and Obelix as Little Fred and Big Ed, and another for Ranger (later Look and Learn) moved the action to Ancient Britain rather than Gaul and rechristened Asterix as Beric the Bold.

And of course you can dress up as your favourite characters. I went with K and J, here wearing the appropriate helmets.

You can get a bit of a sense of the exhibition here from these two promotional videos featuring Charlie Adlard, creator of The Walking Dead and UK Comics Laureate:

The exhibition only runs for another two weeks, until 2 October, so get a move on if you want to see it. It is in the Jewish Museum of London, which itself has a rather fascinating permanent display about London’s Jewish history and about Jewish culture. I would certainly never have gone there if it had not been for René Goscinny, but I am glad that I did.

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