Apparently this has some continuity with The Dimension Riders by the same author, but I’m afraid I had forgotten the key details. I did enjoy the Doctor and Bernice skipping between time zones (1997 and 2387, and the far future), actually rather reminiscent of the previous novel in this series, Set Piece but perhaps slightly better executed, the 1997 scenes being particularly vivid. However the telepathic gestalt alien is not terribly exciting by Who standards.
October Books 10) Combat Rock, by Mick Lewis
This is an exceptionally violent Who book, taking the Second Doctor, Jamie and Victoria and dropping them into a vicious colonial conflict which is pretty clearly based on the Indonesian conquest of West Papua. This amount of sex and gore isn’t really my thing (and seems wel out of place for a Who novel of the black and white era), but I found it a compelling read none the less – clearly the author is passionate about the setting (one of the more miserably botched decolonisations of the 1960s) and the story is tightly plotted and well told with compelling guest characters. Not yer typical Who novel, and not necessarily in a bad way.
Northern Ireland’s ghost constituencies
- Ballymena gets joined to Antrim town in South Antrim rather than to Larne and Carrickfergus, which stay with Newtownabbey in an enlarged East Antrim;
- Carnlough stays in East Antrim rather than moving to North Antrim;
- North Antrim gets renamed "Coleraine and North Antrim";
- the six Omagh wards which were to be added to Fermanagh and South Tyrone stay with Omagh Town in the new Mid Tyrone;
- the six Dungannon wards of the Torrent DEA get put back into Fermanagh and South Tyrone as they were until 1996;
- Upper Braniel goes into South-East Belfast rather than Strangford.
There's a gratifying amount of agreement with my own submission, in that they adopted the first four of my six initial proposals (and two others from my subsequent list), even giving me named credit at 6.19 (page 22) for their proposed reconfiguration of the Antrim seats. I think the Commission is completely wrong on its restrictive reading of its own room for manœuvre (pages 5-7) but I can understand why it is convenient to take the approach that they have done.
I have crunched the numbers on the new proposals, give that they remain in play and there is therefore a vanishingly small chance that they will make it to the statute book. The figures below are based on the latest revised proposals; they also reflect a new methodology that I have developed which links the parties' performance at local elections more strongly to the distribution of their votes at Assembly and Westminster elections. This has given me what look like more credible figures. Of course, these numbers reflect only the result of past elections if the same votes had been cast on the new boundaries, and are not in any way a prediction of future voting behaviour, especially since these constituencies are not likely to be used.
North Belfast
| DUP | UUP | TUV | Oth U | Alliance | Green | Oth | SDLP | SF | |
| w 2010 | 42.2% | 8.5% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 4.7% | 0.0% | 1.0% | 11.6% | 31.9% |
| a 2011 | 39.5% | 9.4% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 5.8% | 0.0% | 4.9% | 11.1% | 29.3% |
| lg 2011 | 38.2% | 8.4% | 0.0% | 1.7% | 6.9% | 0.0% | 5.5% | 11.7% | 27.6% |
Same boundaries as in original proposal, but my new methodology concentrates support for DUP and SF, Alliance being the big loser. (My original figures looked a little off anyway.) DUP hold at Westminster, DUP hold three and SF two for the Assembly, last seat probably but not certainly SDLP.
South-East Belfast
| DUP | UUP | TUV | Oth U | Alliance | Green | Oth | SDLP | SF | |
| w 2010 | 27.8% | 20.5% | 3.8% | 0.0% | 30.9% | 1.2% | 0.0% | 13.9% | 1.9% |
| a 2011 | 35.2% | 11.2% | 1.6% | 7.9% | 25.3% | 2.1% | 1.8% | 7.8% | 7.0% |
| lg 2011 | 32.4% | 12.9% | 1.5% | 6.1% | 27.5% | 2.7% | 2.1% | 8.6% | 6.1% |
Westminster figure has Alliance still ahead; Assembly and local govt put DUP in front but give Alliance squeeze potential. For the Assembly, clearly two DUP and two Alliance, and one UUP; last seat should be SDLP if they get decent SF transfers. (NB Westminster figure skewed by SF withdrawal in South Belfast.)
South-West Belfast
| DUP | UUP | TUV | Oth U | Alliance | Green | Oth | SDLP | SF | |
| w 2010 | 6.4% | 6.9% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 5.0% | 1.0% | 0.0% | 24.2% | 56.6% |
| a 2011 | 6.1% | 6.0% | 0.0% | 0.2% | 5.3% | 0.7% | 6.5% | 16.9% | 58.4% |
| lg 2011 | 6.2% | 4.2% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 4.8% | 0.9% | 7.4% | 18.1% | 58.5% |
Unchanged from previous recommendations. Very safe SF seat at Westminster. For the Assembly I see four SF, one SDLP and one Unionist (probably DUP) with SDLP second candidate as runner-up. Various people tried to persuade me that the fourth SF seat is not definite, or that Alliance has a better chance than the Unionists, but I am not convinced.
Coleraine and North Antrim
| DUP | UUP | TUV | Oth U | Alliance | Green | Oth | SDLP | SF | |
| w 2010 | 42.8% | 15.5% | 12.3% | 0.0% | 4.9% | 0.0% | 0.9% | 9.9% | 13.8% |
| a 2011 | 44.1% | 10.9% | 7.9% | 5.5% | 5.7% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 9.4% | 16.4% |
| lg 2011 | 38.1% | 16.3% | 5.8% | 0.2% | 3.7% | 0.0% | 13.1% | 9.5% | 13.3% |
I can claim some credit for the name change here, and for the removal of Carnlough from the proposed boundaries. The latter of course makes it more solidly Unionist, safe DUP for Westminster and three DUP, one UUP and one SF for the Assembly. Last seat probably still goes to TUV, though a strong SDLP or (less likely) Alliance candidate in a good year might have a chance.
East Antrim
| DUP | UUP | TUV | Oth U | Alliance | Green | Oth | SDLP | SF | |
| w 2010 | 46.6% | 27.8% | 6.1% | 0.0% | 11.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 4.2% | 4.4% |
| a 2011 | 48.3% | 18.7% | 4.4% | 1.8% | 16.5% | 1.8% | 0.0% | 3.1% | 5.3% |
| lg 2011 | 39.7% | 20.2% | 2.2% | 2.7% | 19.4% | 1.1% | 8.9% | 2.8% | 3.1% |
Losing the Glens and extending further into the heart of County Antrim makes this a more firmly Unionist seat, safe for the DUP at Westminster. Three safe DUP for the Assembly and one each for UUP and Alliance, the last seat probably being between DUP and UUP (with UUP possibly having the edge).
Fermanagh and South Tyrone
| DUP | UUP | TUV | Oth U | Alliance | Green | Oth | SDLP | SF | |
| w 2010 | 0.6% | 1.3% | 0.1% | 40.3% | 1.0% | 0.0% | 0.4% | 8.5% | 47.9% |
| a 2011 | 22.3% | 18.3% | 2.4% | 0.0% | 1.6% | 0.0% | 2.3% | 10.3% | 42.9% |
| lg 2011 | 19.3% | 21.7% | 1.3% | 0.0% | 0.6% | 0.1% | 8.2% | 13.2% | 35.6% |
Bringing in the Dungannon wards rather than the originally proposed Omagh wards further consolidates SF's hold on the Westminster seat, and also opens the possibility that the SDLP might regain their seat not from the Shinners but from the DUP – the Unionist parties combined are a hair below, rather than above, three quotas and while the DUP are slightly ahead from the Assembly election, accidents can happen. However, from the Assembly election, DUP would keep two and UUP one. (NB joint Unionist candidate at last Westminster election.)
Foyle
| DUP | UUP | TUV | Oth U | Alliance | Green | Oth | SDLP | SF | |
| w 2010 | 14.9% | 3.9% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.6% | 0.0% | 7.2% | 41.8% | 31.5% |
| a 2011 | 21.6% | 0.7% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.9% | 0.0% | 10.8% | 32.7% | 33.4% |
| lg 2011 | 17.4% | 4.4% | 0.0% | 0.5% | 0.9% | 0.0% | 7.7% | 35.6% | 33.5% |
The SDLP remain secure here for Westminster and the Assembly balance looks undisturbed at SDLP three, SF two and DUP one. But SF are not all that far behind, and the SDLP edge depends on Unionist transfers and tactical votes.
Glenshane
| DUP | UUP | TUV | Oth U | Alliance | Green | Oth | SDLP | SF | |
| w 2010 | 23.6% | 11.5% | 7.4% | 0.0% | 1.7% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 16.2% | 39.5% |
| a 2011 | 25.8% | 8.3% | 4.9% | 1.8% | 1.6% | 0.0% | 1.7% | 16.1% | 39.7% |
| lg 2011 | 22.6% | 12.5% | 5.2% | 0.0% | 1.4% | 0.0% | 3.1% | 16.8% | 38.4% |
Again my new methodology concentrates support for the DUP and SF, and the latter should easily win the Westminster seat. For the Assembly it looks like three SF, one SDLP, and two Unionists with the DUP having a fair chance of winning both seats. Possible third Unionist instead of third Shinner.
Lagan Valley
| DUP | UUP | TUV | Oth U | Alliance | Green | Oth | SDLP | SF | |
| w 2010 | 48.8% | 20.9% | 8.4% | 0.0% | 11.2% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 5.7% | 5.0% |
| a 2011 | 52.0% | 19.8% | 2.8% | 0.0% | 12.4% | 1.6% | 0.0% | 6.9% | 4.4% |
| lg 2011 | 50.2% | 21.6% | 1.4% | 0.6% | 12.5% | 1.0% | 0.8% | 6.1% | 5.9% |
Remains safe DUP for Westminster. For the Assembly, my new methodology pulls more Nationalist votes out of here and into the Poleglass/Twinbrook area which goes into South-West Belfast. But I still think the SDLP should scrape a seat here, along with Alliance, the UUP and three DUP. If not, it will be a fifth Unionist, probably from the DUP.
Mid Tyrone
| DUP | UUP | TUV | Oth U | Alliance | Green | Oth | SDLP | SF | |
| w 2010 | 16.4% | 14.3% | 2.3% | 0.0% | 2.0% | 0.0% | 1.0% | 14.7% | 49.2% |
| a 2011 | 19.2% | 11.2% | 1.5% | 0.0% | 2.1% | 0.0% | 5.2% | 10.7% | 50.0% |
| lg 2011 | 16.2% | 14.8% | 1.7% | 0.0% | 0.9% | 0.0% | 8.7% | 13.6% | 44.2% |
Remains safe for SF at Westminsster. The inclusion of Omagh rather than Dungannon wards puts the Unionists collectively safely over two quotas and the UUP safely within reach of the second of those seats. SF should win three and SDLP one, though SDLP look a bit shaky.
Newry and Armagh
| DUP | UUP | TUV | Oth U | Alliance | Green | Oth | SDLP | SF | |
| w 2010 | 12.4% | 18.3% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 1.2% | 0.0% | 1.4% | 23.8% | 42.9% |
| a 2011 | 12.7% | 18.0% | 1.7% | 0.2% | 1.6% | 0.0% | 0.2% | 23.9% | 41.7% |
| lg 2011 | 11.5% | 18.1% | 0.6% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 5.9% | 23.2% | 40.6% |
Almost no change from current arrangements and no change from first proposal. SF safe at Westminster, Assembly remains three SF, one each of SDLP, DUP and UUP.
North Down
| DUP | UUP | TUV | Oth U | Alliance | Green | Oth | SDLP | SF | |
| w 2010 | 6.4% | 20.1% | 4.6% | 53.7% | 6.6% | 2.8% | 0.0% | 4.4% | 1.3% |
| a 2011 | 43.8% | 10.8% | 0.1% | 2.1% | 18.7% | 6.5% | 10.7% | 5.9% | 1.3% |
| lg 2011 | 38.3% | 13.9% | 0.4% | 3.4% | 18.3% | 5.6% | 14.7% | 5.3% | 0.0% |
No change from provisional recommendations. Lady Hermon remains way ahead at Westminster; without her, DUP are much the biggest party. No change at Assembly level – 3 DUP, 1 UUP, 1 Alliance, 1 Green, with Greens the most vulnerable to a good independent or a well-balanced Alliance ticket.
South Antrim
| DUP | UUP | TUV | Oth U | Alliance | Green | Oth | SDLP | SF | |
| w 2010 | 37.8% | 21.1% | 11.4% | 0.0% | 6.2% | 0.0% | 0.7% | 9.9% | 12.9% |
| a 2011 | 40.9% | 14.6% | 8.1% | 0.7% | 10.3% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 11.4% | 14.0% |
| lg 2011 | 38.2% | 18.4% | 6.4% | 0.3% | 8.4% | 0.0% | 3.9% | 12.3% | 12.1% |
Major rearrangements here but the DUP remain dominant at Westminster, and should win three Assembly seats with the UUP and SF winning one each. The last is tough to call but I think Alliance is likely to overtake SDLP on spare Unionist transfers.
South Down
| DUP | UUP | TUV | Oth U | Alliance | Green | Oth | SDLP | SF | |
| w 2010 | 9.0% | 8.2% | 3.4% | 0.0% | 1.3% | 2.1% | 0.0% | 47.6% | 28.4% |
| a 2011 | 12.7% | 11.4% | 0.1% | 5.4% | 2.1% | 2.6% | 0.0% | 35.2% | 30.5% |
| lg 2011 | 9.5% | 14.0% | 1.1% | 4.5% | 2.2% | 3.2% | 2.1% | 35.2% | 28.1% |
No change from the first proposals, and no change from SDLP holding the Westminster seat; my new methodology makes things even tighter for the Unionists to keep two seats but my gut feeling is that they would do so, the SDLP and SF also winning two each.
Strangford
| DUP | UUP | TUV | Oth U | Alliance | Green | Oth | SDLP | SF | |
| w 2010 | 42.4% | 24.2% | 4.4% | 0.0% | 13.2% | 1.5% | 0.0% | 12.1% | 2.1% |
| a 2011 | 46.4% | 17.2% | 2.3% | 2.8% | 16.0% | 0.9% | 0.6% | 9.5% | 4.4% |
| lg 2011 | 43.3% | 16.8% | 1.8% | 1.0% | 17.8% | 2.0% | 4.2% | 9.5% | 3.6% |
Still safe for DUP at Westminster. My new methodology gives more Nationalist votes coming in from Carryduff, so should be enough to secure an SDLP seat (NB Westminster vote skewed by SF not standing). Alliance and UUP win one each, and DUP three.
Upper Bann
| DUP | UUP | TUV | Oth U | Alliance | Green | Oth | SDLP | SF | |
| w 2010 | 33.9% | 26.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 3.0% | 0.0% | 0.1% | 12.5% | 24.5% |
| a 2011 | 27.4% | 24.9% | 2.4% | 0.6% | 6.5% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 11.2% | 26.9% |
| lg 2011 | 29.5% | 24.0% | 2.4% | 0.3% | 3.8% | 0.0% | 3.4% | 12.4% | 24.1% |
On paper the UUP's best chance at Westminster, though still some way behind DUP. Removing Aghagallon takes away potential for a third Nationalist Assembly seat; a well-balanced SF ticket could defeat the SDLP but their vote management here has not been a strong point. Otherwise two DUP and two UUP for the Assembly.
As before, I give the DUP 7 Westminster seats (down 1), SF 5, the SDLP 2 (down 1), Lady Hermon 1 and Alliance 1 (just).
At Assembly level, I put the DUP on about 34 seats (down 4, but up one from my previous calculations), SF on 25 (down 4, and two less than my previous calculations), the UUP on 14 (down 2), SDLP 14 (no change, rather than down one as in my previous calculations), Alliance 7 (down 1) and Greens and TUV keeping their single seats. The reasons for the changes are that my new methodology gives the SDLP rather than SF the Nationalist seat in Lagan Valley, and the rearrangement of the East Antrim/South Antrim borders gives only one nationalist seat between the two constituencies, the DUP effectively gaining what is now SF’s seat in East Antrim.
This is all pretty theoretical of course, but today is a public holiday here!
October Books 9) Adventures on the High Teas, by Stuart Maconie
Another delightful look at part of England by the author of Pies and Prejudice, this time looking at southern England as a partial outsider. Though he spends a lot of time on the usual quirks of local populace and history, his most powerful chapters are on great English literature and also humour. Strongly recommended for anyone with an interest in England.
Links I found interesting for 01-11-2012
- Drinking: How to lie about wine | The Economist
Failing to detect the real expert.
- More Product, Less Process for Born-Digital Collections
Thoughts on digital archiving.
- HC 643 The foreign policy implications of and for a separate Scotland
A sane note by the very sane Graham Avery.
- The Long, Winding, and Shapeshifting Trail to Episodes VII, VIII & IX
The history of the future of the franchise.
- The Astonishingly Non-Nonsensical Plot of The Rocky Horror Picture Show
@use_theforce_em finds hidden depths.
- The EU Budget: The Truth « Jonathan Fryer
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Where New York’s public transport is (and isn’t) running on Thursday.(PDF)
- Her Smoke Rose Up Forever, by James Tiptree, Jr.
Chris Beckett explores Alice Sheldon.
Links I found interesting for 31-10-2012
- Airport Reviews | The Guide to Sleeping in Airports
Important information for the weary traveller!
- Sorting the Real Sandy Photos From the Fakes
That stunning image might be PhotoShopped. But it could be real too!
Links I found interesting for 30-10-2012
- Phobos: Doomed Moon of Mars
Looking stressed…
- The progressive case against Obama
Linking / RTing is not endorsement, but this is an interesting read.
- Light Entertainment · LRB
If you are appalled about Jimmy Savile, read this brilliant piece by by Andrew O’Hagan.
- The All-Black Towns in Oklahoma – Hannibal B. Johnson
I never knew about this.
- HMS Bounty replica sunk by Hurricane Sandy
Relative of Fletcher Christian one of two fatalities.
Three new Doctor Who audiobooks
Well, new-ish, released in May, July and September – another is due out this week and there will be one more in December.
Day of the Cockroach, by Steve Lyons, is a classic base-under-siege story, the sub-genre that Lyons has made his own. It has the Doctor, Amy and Rory arriving in England in the immediate aftermath of a 1980s nuclear war, or so it seems; an idea used about the same time by Big Finish in Protect and Survive. It’s fairly obvious from an early stage how things will work out, but Lyons has a very competent style and Arthur Darvill does a decent effort at the other characters’ voices.
The Nu-Humans by Cavan Scott and Mark Wright is the most sfnally adventurous of these stories, set on a planet with very high gravity (why do sf writers so rarely do that?) and with the eponymous Nu-Humans having a very similar history to the Cybermen, only less boring. It’s a bit gory for younger fans but firmly recommended for older listeners, including those who are not really into Who. Read very well by Raquel Cassidy, who seems to have a real knock for this.
Raquel Cassidy also reads Simon Guerrier’s The Empty House, which is basically a ghost story with a Whovian/sfnal twist; it’s rare for me to feel this about a single-CD story lasting little more than an hour, but I felt it actually could have been shorter. Still, it would be suitable Halloween fare for Who fans of all ages.
Links I found interesting for 29-10-2012
- Eleven of the Best Movies You’ve Never Seen
Actually I’ve seen very few films anyway, but may look out for these.
- Time in Indiana – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- Newmarket sausages granted European protected status
Fiendish Brussels bureaucrats eroding British culture. Or not.
- The Digital Diplomat: Connected and on Twitter
Via @CarlBildt.
The Time Museum, The Masters of Luxor
It’s been a sad time for Who companions recently, with several untimely losses and rumours of illness for others. But meanwhile William Russell, who turns 88 next month, is still going strong, launching the new series of Companion Chronicles from Big Finish with The Time Museum from the ever-fertile imagination of James Goss (who is the only Who author on my buy-on-sight-even-in-hardback list). The story has a long-retired Ian Chesterton in a peculiar alien environment being challenged to remember details of his travels with the Doctor, so long ago; its tone is elegiac, sinister and affectionate all at the same time, which is an achievement. If you’re at all a fan of those first two seasons of Who, you’ll enjoy this.
I am not sure I can say the same for The Masters of Luxor, Anthony Coburn’s obscure script (which I read a while back) now brought to life by the rewriting skills of Nigel Robinson and the voices of William Russell as Ian and the Doctor, Carole Ann Ford as Susan and Barbara, and Joe Kloska as everyone else. I’m not at all a fan of Robinson’s other work but, presumably with input from Lisa Bowerman as director, he has done his best to make the original script sing – it is very slow, with the Tardis crew not meeting anyone else until the second episode of six, and the only significant guest part not showing up till episode 4. There are lots of blatant circle narratives – run away, get locked up, repeat. The entire story would barely fill a single episode of New Who. The cast give it their all but it’s not fantastic material in the first place.
If it had been made, this story could have gone either way. Given decent design and direction, it might have been remembered as a classic. But it’s a high risk piece; the special effects needed are challenging (giant pyramids, three types of robot, the Tardis flying through the air) and might have absorbed directorial time from preparing the actors; we could have been looking at a reputation more like the Sensorites.
Actually, of course, if the story had been shown as originally planned, there would have been no Daleks and probably a little later no more Doctor Who. So it’s just as well, really.
October Books 5) The Tartan Sell, by Jonathan Gash
My regular reader will be glad to know that I’m taking a break from Lovejoy at present, but I am well behind with book-blogging so here is one I finished a week or so ago. Actually it is rather a nice story, Lovejoy being much more like the lovable rogue played by Ian McShane on TV than the duplicitous psychopath of the earlier books. Here he falls in with a Scottish landed family who have fallen on hard times, via a spell working in a circus, and sorts out their financial problems and dark long-held secrets. He also of course gets lots of intimate but not very explicitly described female companionship. (I think the word “breast” is used at one point, which is almost shocking.) It’s a more pleasant read than many of the books, but also a bit less demanding.
October Books 4) The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man, by James Weldon Johnson
Despite the title, this is actually a novel whose unnamed narrator, a light-skinned African-American of the late 19th/ early 20th century, undergoes various travails including whether to abandon his career as a (black) musician and settle down for a dull life in the (white) middle class. I see Wikipedia suggesting that the author intended it as an ironic reflection on the first-person narratives of the day, so I guess I may not have the full context. It didn’t really work for me as a novel; too many incidents which though interesting in their own right didn’t really add up to a narrative structure. The anonymity of the narrator distanced me further from the story. Still, it’s short.
Top unread non-fiction:
Peleponnesian War | Innocents Abroad | Terre des Hommes | The Hero with a Thousand Faces | Race of a Lifetime / Game Change | Proust and the Squid | The Tipping Point | Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl | Elementary Forms of Religious Life | Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man | History of Christianity | History of the World in 100 Objects | A Room of One’s Own | Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? | The Last Mughal | Reading the Oxford English Dictionary | Jane Austen | Homage to Catalonia | The Road to Middle Earth | Essence of Christianity | The Strangest Man
Links I found interesting for 28-10-2012
- Lord Russell meet Lord Russell
But which is which?
- The one million tweet map #onemilliontweetmap
Saved to look at later.
- 585 – Poitiers All Over Again: Pastry, Islam and Isoglosses
The secret history of the pain au chocolat. (Or chocolatine?)
- Cheaper by Eleven?
Mary, the missing Gilbreth sister.
Lovejoy and Coriolanus
Blogging has been very light round here for the last week or so – I have been travelling a lot, with some unexpected wrinkles and last-minute changes of plan, am behind in bookblogging and also in the middle of three very thick books.
But I will break my silence with notes on a couple of screen adaptations which I watched today of texts which I already knew in another form. They are colossally different in quality. The first of the two was the very first Lovejoy episode, The Firefly Cage (1986), based on the sixth Lovejoy book, The Firefly Gadroon (1981) – the first time I have watched one of the TV episodes since starting my sporadic read-through of the books. Well. One should be a little charitable because a lot of effort is exerted to set up the major recurring characters – Lovejoy himself, Tinker, Eric and Lady Jane Felsham – and the TV show is only starting to find its way in terms of tone, whereas by this stage the books were confident if not always on target. But even so, I think fans of the books tuning in hopefully back in 1986 would have been bitterly disappointed by this adaptation. It can’t quite decide how violent the show is going to be, it can’t decide how sexy it is going to be, and several crucial scenes from the novel are completely defused for the screen – Lovejoy prevents the burning of the firefly cages, there is no desperate struggle for survival on the sea fort, and the final explosive scene is played for laughs rather than allowing the bereaved donkey to exact her hideous revenge. Not very many of the TV episodes are based on the novels, and it’s probably just as well; the tone is completely different and it was better to let the two continuities find separate levels.
Ralph Fiennes’ Coriolanus (2011) is quite a different matter. I was strangely fascinated by this play when I listened to it three years ago, and commented then that “An inspired director and actor could no doubt make something memorable of it, but it’s tough material to work with.” Fiennes has done a brilliant job as director and lead actor, bringing the struggle between Romans and Volsci quite literally to the modern Balkans – the Rome scenes are filmed in Belgrade and Pančevo, the Volscian scenes in Montenegro, and Jon Snow does a terrific turn as TV news anchorman picking up the Shakespearean infodump characters to footage of the tanks rolling in. The show is almost stolen by Vanessa Redgrave as Coriolanus’ electrifying mother Volumnia, but all the others are pretty good too (shouts to Brian Cox as Coriolanus’ friend Menenius, Jessica Chastain as Coriolanus’ wife Virgilia, and especially Gerard Butler as the Volscian leader Aufidius, who clearly has an erotic fascination with his enemy-turned-ally). Coriolanus himself is a bit one-dimensional as a character, but Fiennes makes up for it with fantastic visual direction, and also by playing the pivotal dramatic points in the play so effectively that, although you pretty much know what must happen next, you are able to suspend your disbelief. Very strongly recommended. I’m really surprised that it is not a better known play.
Incidentally I note that Paul Jesson, who played the tribune Brutus in this version (in a double act with James Nesbitt as Sicinius), was Aufidius in the 2004 audio I listened to, and also played the First Citizen when the BBC did the Complete Shakespeare thirty years ago. He must be able to recite it in his sleep by now.
Henry VI, Part I | Henry VI, Part II | Henry VI, Part III | Richard III / Richard III | Comedy of Errors | Titus Andronicus | Taming of the Shrew | Two Gentlemen of Verona | Love’s Labour’s Lost | Romeo and Juliet | Richard II / Richard II | A Midsummer Night’s Dream | King John | The Merchant of Venice | Henry IV, Part 1 / Henry IV, Part I | Henry IV, Part II | Henry V | Julius Caesar | Much Ado About Nothing | As You Like It | Merry Wives of Windsor | Hamlet / Hamlet | Twelfth Night | Troilus and Cressida | All’s Well That Ends Well | Measure for Measure | Othello | King Lear | Macbeth | Antony and Cleopatra | Coriolanus / Coriolanus | Timon of Athens | Pericles | Cymbeline | The Winter’s Tale / The Winter’s Tale | The Tempest | Henry VIII | The Two Noble Kinsmen | Edward III | Sir Thomas More (fragment) | Double Falshood/Cardenio
Links I found interesting for 27-10-2012
- America Forgets the World by Jonathan Freedland
“At one point the two candidates had an animated conversation about small business in Massachusetts.”
- 16 Ways I Blew My Marriage
Sage advice.
- Age of Reason
Jacques Barzun died this week at 104. This is a 2007 interview with the great historian and writer.
- Exclusive: LiveJournal all but abandons U.S. presence
Headline exaggerates – still some staff in USA, but not many.
- The e-book business
The Economist elegantly summaries the ebook problem.
- Socialist Catalonian Party Vote – Woman Has Orgasm
“Voting is a Pleasure”, it says at the end. Indeed.
- Chris and Luke’s Open Adoption Story
My old friend Luke and his partner put their case.
- Hey Fandom: Any Room For An Opinion?
Richard Cooper tries to differentiate between criticism, snark and trolling.
Links I found interesting for 26-10-2012
- Texas threatens to arrest international monitors sent to watch US election — RT
Russia Today reports.
- Thomas Edison Audio: Recording From 1878 Unveiled
Tinfoil secrets revealed by digital scanning.
- FACEBOOK: I WANT MY FRIENDS BACK
How Facebook is screwing up the monetization of its users.
- Cameron threat to defy European court on prisoner votes ‘risks UK’s standing’
Tory attorney-general is right.
- It Stands to Reason, Skeptics Can Be Sexist Too
Rebecca Watson: “I spoke out, then came the rape threats.”
- Internet Win
Shereen’s success.
- Rosi Sexton says, ‘I’m out!’
My favourite cage fighter speaks out against drugs.
- Nick Clegg insists on speaking Dutch at Cabinet Office meeting – Telegraph
From @telegraph so it may not be true, but I hope it is!
Local election results
Because I know you are on the edge of your seats: our mayor lost his bid for a seventh six-year term in yesterday’s elections. His independent (but backed by the Liberals) bloc got only five seats, with the separatist New Flemish Alliance (N-VA) topping the poll as they did in much of Flanders and getting six seats. They will now control the council in alliance with the Christian Democrats (CD&V) and the Greens, who won five and three seats respectively. The Socialists (sp.a) won the other two.
The answers to my question about train services came from, in order, 1) N-VA, 2) the outgoing mayor, 3) CD&V, 4) a smaller group who failed to win any seats, 5) the Greens and finally 6) sp.a. Despite their late reply, sp.a made the best impression on me and I voted for them; until then I had been inclined to support the outgoing mayor both on the basis of his answer and to decrease the likelihood of N-VA winning.
(I should say that I am actually pretty agnostic on the question of splitting up Belgium, but I don’t like parties who make it clear that they are not interested in representing me because I am not Flemish enough, and those parties tend to be on the separatist side of the debate.)
I am very unimpressed with the local Greens, who sent me the worst reply and are now in coalition with hardline separatists, but at provincial level I voted for their list; their candidate here in the last parliamentary elections got my support and has stuck to her principles as far as I can tell from Twitter.
The papers are of course full of the implications for Belgium. I hope the federal government serves out its full term – after all, it’s not the first time in history that mid-term second-order elections have favoured the opposition – but I hope also that people are already considering the likely lay of the land in the next Belgian parliament. (Whose Senate, incidentally, will be shorn of both hereditary and directly elected members.)
Links I found interesting for 14-10-2012
- Diary of a Benefit Scrounger: Open Letter to Mark Hoban
The inhumanity of British disability bureaucracy.
- Palestinian women look to Bethlehem to boost their role
In that a well-known feminist is running for mayor.
- Mauritania leader Abdelaziz ‘accidentally’ shot
“a military patrol mistakenly opened fire on the presidential convoy” – oops.
- First TV Interview with Nelson Mandela, 21st May 1961
Extraordinary.
The sixth party responds
An interesting development from my earlier post about the local political parties – the sixth has now written back to me, less than 24 hour before the elections, as follows:
Dear Nicholas, I’m quite convinced that our lives silently have crossed quite a hughe number of times . At the train from Oud-Heverlee to Leuven, and back (?). I suppose that you’re the guy who listens often to music with earplugs :=)
I’m “undergoing” also a few times a week, the problem you’ve described.
If I’m elected or not, I would do the same things: trying to promote and optimize (?) the public transport. I just do things where I believe in, for general purpose.
Excuse me that my poor English now switches to Dutch. I can answer you a lot in English about specific items concerning the environment and nature, but the details of public transport are quite lacking.
[my translation from the orginal Dutch]
1. I recognize the problem or rather, the facts concerning a non-optimal connection of trains between Brussels and Oud-Heverlee. I have been taking the train regularly from Oud-Heverlee to Brussels since 1991 (in the nineties also from Heverlee), and there’s always been an issue of non-optimal connections of trains.
2. For years people have called for more trains on weekdays between Leuven and St-Joris-Weert. After various actions and petitions from people living in Oud-Heverlee, St-Joris-Weert, Nethen, Pecrot, Florival, etc, we have managed to increase the frequency at peak times to 2 trains per hour. I assume that you too signed one or more of these petitions. In any case, the increased frequency at peak times has certainl made the possibilities for commuters betwen Oud-Heverlee and Brussels somewhat easier. Admittedly, the offer of 2 trains per hour stops after 19.23 (OH) or 19.28 (Leuven).
3. The problem of the increased frequency, however, is that there is now no waiting. The trains of 28 and 58 past the hour in Leuven going towards OH no longer wait, as they previously didm and leave on time.
4. I myself would tackle your (and my) problem with late trains from Leuven to OH in the first place by trying to get the train to wait up to five minuts for th connection, as it did before the introduction of the increased frequency. I myself have reported several times that the train of 19.28 left just as I reached it. So step 1: Everything starts, I think, if this problem is consistently reported. Everyone should do this. Step 2: joint petition of train passengers asking that connecting trains to Heverlee / OH / Waver / Ottignies after 19:00 shuld wait. I think, however, that in this petition several problems should be addressed.
For step 2, it is only the question of who takes the initiative. We could do this together.
5. Public transport also includes the bus. I would say that [my party] has long demanded that the #2 bus should have its route extended to Oud=Heverlee; you will find this in our manifesto. Precisely this week De Lijn [the bus company] have annouced that they will not adopt this proposal. However De Lijn is considering increasing the frequency of the #337 bus, and says that this is very likely to happen.
6. Frankly, I find the problem of the abolition of a number of trains (early morning and late evenin) from OH to Leuven (and vice versa) a bigger problem. I would like to do something about it, but so far have not had time.
Finally, I have learned to live with all these non=optimal train connections and so take an earlier evening train whose the connection is guaranteed. This does not mean that the solution already mentioned under item 4 would not be better.
Well, he definitely gets marks for detail and thinking things through; though I do wonder how he thinks he knows what I look like? (He is quite right about the earplugs, though usually I am listening to Big Finish plays!)
The Old Testament
My two annual reading projects this year have been War and Peace, which conveniently has 366 chapters, and the Bible, for which I generated a reading scheme of my own, based on reading roughly the same amount of it each day (though giving short books a day of their own).
This morning I finished the Old Testament (full Catholic version, thus including Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Sirach, Baruch, 1 and 2 Maccabees, and extra bits of Esther and Daniel) and I thought I should record my take on it before tackling the New Testament.
First off, I don’t think I actually would recommend reading the Old Testament (or indeed the Bible) through from start to finish as I did. It wasn’t written or compiled to be read in that way, and it doesn’t do the text any services to read as if it were a novel, a short story collection, or a book of essays and meditations. I chose this approach because I wanted to feel that I had control of what I was reading, and that I was not missing anything, but if you want to get a fair flavour of it, it’s probably better to follow one of the many reading guides available online and elsewhere, which are designed both to showcase the good bits and to keep the reader interested.
Second, a lot of it is pretty dull, actually. 2 Chronicles in particular comes close to Mark Twain’s description of the Book of Mormon, as “chloroform in print”. Large chunks of the Pentateuch are lists of laws and, even less exciting, census returns. The historical bits have an awful lot of tediously horrible ethnic cleansing and dynastic struggle, leavened by the occasional good bit (the Saul / David / Solomon succession in particular). The prophets are rather indistinguishable in tone of outrage. I recommend finding some way of skipping the dull bits.
Third, the good bits are indeed good. I’ve singled out the Book of Job in a previous post; I found the Psalms generally inspiring and uplifting, and I’ve always been a fan of Ecclesiastes. The narrative histories, which I thought I knew fairly well, still had some surprises for me – in Numbers 12, God smites Moses’ sister with leprosy for racism towards Moses’ black wife, for instance. There are some fun bits in the prophets – Jonah, and the deuterocanonical addenda to Daniel (Susanna, and Bel and the Dragon). I also rather liked Sirach, aka Ecclesiasticus, which again is deuterocanonical. And 2 Maccabees is a fairly lucid, if brutal, historical note to finish on.
Fourth, there were indeed a few themes running through the entire OT whose importance I hadn’t perhaps fully grasped: the importance of God’s endowing his people with the land, the importance of the cult of the Temple, and the trauma of the Babylonian exile (which of course shaped most of the text we have very directly). I’m not saying that these are the only or even the main main themes, but that these are the ones whose importance was enhanced for me by reading through the entire thing.
So, an interesting experiment so far, but not necessarily one that I would urge others to emulate.
Genesis 1-15 January
Exodus 16-27 January
Leviticus 28 January – 5 February
Numbers 6-18 February
Deuteronomy 19-28 February
Joshua 29 February – 6 March
Judges 7-13 March
Ruth 14 March
1 Samuel 15-23 March
2 Samuel 24-31 March
1 Kings 1-9 April
2 Kings 10-17 April
1 Chronicles 18-26 April
2 Chronicles 27 April – 6 May
Ezra 7-9 May
Nehemiah 10-13 May
Tobit 14-16 May
Judith 17-19 May
Esther 20-22 May
Job 23-31 May
Psalms 1-22 June
Proverbs 23-30 June
Ecclesiastes 1-2 July
Song of Solomon 3 July
Wisdom 4-7 July
Sirach 8-21 July
Isaiah 22 July – 4 August
Jeremiah 5-20 August
Lamentations 21 August
Baruch 22-23 August
Ezekiel 24 August – 7 September
Daniel 8-13 September
Hosea 14-15 September
Joel 16 September
Amos 17 September
Obadiah 18 September
Jonah 19 September
Micah 20 September
Nahum 21 September
Habakkuk 22 September
Zephaniah 23 September
Haggai 24 September
Zechariah 25-26 September
Malachi 27 September
1 Maccabees 28 September – 7 October
2 Maccabees 8-13 October
Links I found interesting for 13-10-2012
- Doctor Who: P.S. – Series 7 2012 – BBC One – YouTube
What happened to the Ponds…
- UK US Life and style Technology icon.Martha Raddatz and the faux objectivity of journalists
How neutrality between the two parties leads to a lack of objectivity on Iran, Social Security/Medicare, and the Catholic Church.
- Britain, perhaps it’s time to hold a referendum and to leave the EU | Jon Worth
Jon is exasperated.
- Cunning and Guile, Erica Wagner interviews Marina Warner and Hanan al-Shaykh – Guernica / A Magazine of Art & Politics
Great discussion of the 1001 Nights.
- The EU’s Nobel Prize | Jonathan Fryer
Sane and pithy as ever.
Election choices
We have municipal and provincial elections tomorrow, and I’ve found it very difficult to make up my mind who to vote for; everyone claims to love our little village in a very special way (and nobody seems to know what the provincial government is for). In an effort to distinguish between them, I emailed all six parties standing in the municipality with my well-chronicled complaints about the evening rail connection in Leuven, apologising for doing so in English. I post the replies from the six parties below in the order that I received them:
- We will try to get more citizens to use public transportation. When that happens we probably can point out to De Lijn/NMBS [De Lijn is the bus company, NMBS the train company] that they have to increase their frequency. This does not solve your problem entirely (you might still loose 30 minutes) but it is De Lijn/NMBS that decide on their time tables. They might have a good reason for their timetable: If that train is meant to connect with another train somewhere for example. Anyway as you can see there is not an easy solution. Good communcation between the city council and the people of De Lijn/NMBS is the only possibility to solve your problem.
Are there many people that fail to catch their connection? Maybe if we combine it into 1 big complaint/request they might listen to it…
- This is in response to your recent inquiry .
I can assure you that after the elections to be held very soon, I shall insist that the NMBS look into and fix the problems you encounter with the train connections concerning Oud Heverlee and St Joris Weert.
I believe that the present situation resulted from budgetary constraints and was done in order to save.
Please be assured that you are not the first and only one to complain about this situation!
I shall do what ever possible to intercede with the NMBS
- We’re trying to ask the NMBS (train company) to let the trains follow up to another.
I have send your request to them.
As soon that I will receive an answer, I will send you a message.
If you don’t hear something from me after one month, please react again.
- I will ask the NMBS for more information and I’ll try to ask them for a better connection between the train of Brussels and the train of Ottignies.
I know someone personally from the helpservice of the NMBS and I’ll try to tell them this problem and ask if it’s possible to let the train depart again at 33 minutes past the hour in stead of the 28 minutes past. I won’t even wait untill 14 october to ask this.
- Sorry for the late answer, but because of the elections next Sunday, we are all very busy.
I will take care of your question next week.
- [No reply]
I must say that I am impressed that the replies all came in English. These are candidates for office in a small village where Dutch is the only official language (though we are up against the linguistic frontier, bordering Wallonia). I also regret that I chose to write to them on an issue which isn’t actually one which they can do much about if elected. But anyway, I think the answers are revealing.
What do you think?
Links I found interesting for 12-10-2012
- Busting Teenage Partying with a Fluksometer
Geek dad’s long distance intervention on New Year’s Eve.
- Dominique Strauss-Kahn: I was naive to think I could get away with orgies – Telegraph
Er, yes.
- Exclusive Excerpt: Nobel Winner Mo Yan’s ‘Sandalwood Death”
In case (like me) you never heard of him.
- Mystery eyeball washes up on Florida beach
Iä! Iä! Cthulhu fhtagn! (though possibly swimming in circles now.)
October Books 3) Conquest of the Amazon, by John Russell Fearn
I have no idea why I got this book. The cover art is quite remarkable in its own right and possibly caught my eye. (My wife wondered how the nipple shields might be attached; myself I wonder how much practical use they are in combat.) It turns out to be the cover for the wrong book; the heroine of Conquest of the Amazon is blonde and wears a white suit, whereas this lady is dark-haired and not wearing anything much at all. More critically, the cover suggests a sword-and-sorcery romp, when in fact the Amazon is a near-future woman using her super-powers to keep the space lanes clear from marauding Martians and treacherous if handsome men from Jupiter. I’m sure it sold well anyway – heck, I must have bought it (or perhaps someone else bought it for me) – but I wonder how many early readers suffered buyer’s remorse after realising that it wasn’t the Conan ripoff they were expecting?
I vaguely knew of John Russell Fearn, of course, but I don’t think I had read any of his works before. This turns out to be the seventh book in a series of twenty pulp adventures of the Amazon, who acquired super powers half a century ago at the age of three, and is exercising them in the cause of Good. It is, frankly, not a good book, yet I got through to the end after tossing Dagger Magic aside because it doesn’t take itself too seriously. At first I was tweeting particularly eye-catching samples of Fearn’s deathless prose –
“Book me a reservation on the next helicoliner following the Mount Everest route.”
“The end of the world is within sight. I thought you should know that.”
“This woman has always been a smooth talker. She can get out of any tight corner by using subtlety.” [Subtlety, eh? The fiendish minx!]
– but then I decided to just go with the flow, as the Amazon tries to simultaneously stop the Sun going out, hold back the glaciers, and resist the culture of the Great Red Spot. It’s all utterly implausible, but it’s a romantic portrayal of a future where a benevolent science rules and a superwoman saves the world. Short (126 pages) and rather sweet.
Links I found interesting for 11-10-2012
- The Biden Doctrine – By James Traub
How the Vice President is shaping President Obama’s foreign policy.
- In Defence of Politics
Quintin Oliver say the political situation in Northern Ireland is not so bad.
- In defence of NI politics/government
Ian Parsley agrees with Quintin Oliver.
- Charlie Jane Anders reviews “The Ambassadors of Death”
“At last you can see Doctor Who’s James Bond adventure the way it was meant to be seen!”
October Books 2) The Twilight Lords, by Richard Berleth
I had got this 1977 account of the Elizabethan wars in Ireland in the expectation that it might be a somewhat traditionalist approach to the period, to counterbalance the more revisionist accounts I had been reading over the last few years. In fact it’s more of a hobbyist’s labour of love, concentrating very much on the sequence of events in Munster and trying boldly if not completely successfully to tie England’s Irish policy to Queen Elizabeth’s state of mind. I actually found Berleth’s exposition of the detail of events pretty good, and enjoyed his chapter on literature, especially The Faerie Queene (which I have been reading at not quite a canto per day since July). But the internal chronology is a bit weird, jumping back and forth through decades (thus weakening the basic story which is of cycles of devastation and resettlement), and the entire Ulster war and Flight of the Earls is tacked on very hastily in a final chapter. He also combines a juicy eye for the personal detail with less convincing psychoanalysis of some of the key players, though I suppose that’s a game we can all play. The maps are disappointing as well.
Links I found interesting for 10-10-2012
- Mitt Romney’s Most Dishonest Speech
A strong claim, but the that foreign policy speech was pretty bad.
- Georgia: Netizens react to the Saakashvili-Ivanishvili Meeting
I think this will amuse even those who know little of Georgia!
- Georgia: Is Tbilisi Setting Political Benchmark for Azerbaijan, Armenia?
So, what do the neighbours think?
- Gillard labels Abbott a misogynist
Everyone has linked to this Australian parliamentary debate, and rightly so.
- Up then, brave women!
Micro-study of historical feminism in Manchester.
- Extreme Weather Photo Contest Winners
Brilliant pictures!
Links I found interesting for 09-10-2012
- Romney’s Evolving Security Policy: Unreality and Distinctions without a Difference – democracyarsenal.org
Identifying (some of) the challenger’s weaknesses.
- Top Seven Errors President Obama has made on the Middle East
Identifying (some of) the incumbent’s weaknesses.
Elgar: The Music Makers
I was interrupted by other events last week, so now I want to commemorate the centennial of one of my favourite underrated orchestral works, The Music Makers by Edward Elgar, first performed in Birmingham on 1 October 1912.
I was Third (or possibly Second) Percussionist in a deserted performance of this in the Ulster Hall, Belfast, in about 1985, and really fell in love with it. It's a 40 minute long setting of Arthur O'Shaughnessy's evocative Ode:
We are the music-makers,
And we are the dreamers of dreams,
Wandering by lone sea-breakers,
And sitting by desolate streams;
World-losers and world-forsakers,
On whom the pale moon gleams:
Yet we are the movers and shakers
Of the world for ever, it seems.
Normally people just quote the first three verses, but the whole thing goes on a bit longerEnigma variations) and stirring artistic exhortations. Unfortunately I can't link to any decent performance – none of the YouTube videos showing parts of it does it justice. But you might want to try a version on last.fm, or other resources (such as the score) should you feel so inclined. And if you're not sure, do give it a whirl.
In the entrance of the Berlaymont
One of those moments when you realise that the four guys behind you in the queue are the Dutch Minister for Finance and his entourage…