Category: this is london
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Originally posted on November 26, 2009. He that troubleth his own house shall inherit the wind: and the fool shall be servant to the wise of heart. — Proverbs 11:29 A play at the Old Vic — is there a…
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– Jerusalem, the Olivier- and Tony-award winning play written and directed by Jez Butterworth and Ian Rickson respectively, was arguably the best play I have seen in London: wickedly funny, timely and featuring a great performance by Mark Rylance as Johnny ‘Rooster’ Byron,…
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‘Honour of the cucumber’ ‘Cucumber sandwiches’ — often a simplistic avatar of the English upper class in literature. I have never had one, have you? ’[P]oems are worth all the cucumber-sandwiches in the world […] the perfect green circles —…
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From Harold Pinter’s Betrayal (1978): You’re lovely. I’m crazy about you. All these words I’m using, don’t you see, they’ve never been said before. Can’t you see? I’m crazy about you. It’s a whirlwind. Have you ever been to the Sahara Desert? Listen…
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Quote of the day 8 “You never seem to be waiting for me, but we kept meeting at every turn of the paths. Behind every bush, at the foot of each statue, near every pond. It is as if it had…
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This post was written on September 12, 2009 On Friday, we went to the Duke of York’s Theatre to watch Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia. It was the first time we had been to this theatre and it was an interesting experience. The theatre seemed…
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Last May, we went to the National Theatre for a revival of London Assurance, an early Victorian comedy by Dion Boucicault (1841). The play received consistently good notices and we can see why. Although far from a perfect play, the…
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Kyoko Mori answers in One Bird (1995): I raise my left arm and begin to wave as the birds disappear over the neighbor’s houses, and my eyes ache from staring into the sky. I know they will be back among the…
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. The title of Allan Hollinghurst’s Booker Prize-winning The Line of Beauty (2004) is a reference to William Hogarth’s The Analysis of Beauty (1801): . the wavering line, which is a line more productive of beauty […], as in flowers, and other…
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The partner bought me Carol Ann Duffy’s The World’s Wife in 2009. The collection features works ostensibly narrated by the wives of well-known historical and fictional men, famous men reimagined as women, or women who were well-known in their own right. Some…
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[Click image to enlarge] “Here we are in old Shanghai. But many of the buildings here have a kind of symbol stamped on them. This means simply one word — DEMOLISH.” DEMOLISH. DEMOLISH. DEMOLISH. DEMOLISH. And so on. “The massive rebuilding programme…
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‘If Bob Dylan from the 60s took a look at stand-up comedy today, I think it would be a little bit like this’ –the comedian Stewart Lee: There’s a bus that never comes, except in threes.There’s a train that never…
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A.S. Byatt in The Children’s Book (2009) answers: He felt unreal in London, as though his flesh and blood were in abeyance, as though he was a simulacrum of a boy, floating along Gower Street with its prim houses, dodging…
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Text by Melvyn Bragg. Images and [insertions] by yours truly. ‘Union Jack’ or ‘Union Flag’ – say ‘Union Flag’ if you want to sound upper class. I saw London en fete. Union Jacks, five abreast, went from Upper Regent Street,…
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[click image to enlarge] John Everett Millais’s Esther (1865) | Handmade oil painting The story might be that of a Jewish queen from the Old Testament, but it is the swathe of yellow silk that immediately strikes the viewers. Millais is…
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Originally written on March 30, 2009 –星期六那晚看了賈樟河的 <<三崍好人 Still Life>>. 一氣連續看了兩次. 電影淡淡的繪出兩個主角三明及沈红由山西往奉節縣尋親的故事, 背景為消失中的三崍. 一個尋十六年不見的妻子及女兒, 一個尋兩年沒見的丈夫. 故事有點相似, 但結局大不相同. 在這裡不詳細解讀電影, 但有少許感受想說. 很多人認為中國現代化了, 富了, 事實只是一細小部份的人先富起來. 政治領袖也許覺得一小部份人富好過人人都不富. 在光彩的背後有無數貧民的故事, 有多少是外人知曉的? 當中國人不易, 當中國窮人更不易. 話說回來, 當甚麼國的窮人都不易, 當甚麼人都不易. 電影結尾其中一個鏡頭是空中人在遠處江上走鋼絲, 賈樟柯解釋道: “最後走鋼絲, 雲中漫步, 我覺得雖然前路坎坷渺茫, 或者說雖然前路很危險, 但是不管什麼樣的人, 我們必須走下去, 我覺得雖然很危險, 但是要走下去, 所以同時也很浪漫.”…
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Let the Right One In is a vampire story set in the suburbs of Stockholm in the early 1980s. The film centres on Oskar, a 12-year-old loner from a dysfunctional family. Frail and androgynous, Oskar is unable to stand up…
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The British Art Show 7 The artist who created the pictured artwork: Juliette Blightman Lamp, net curtain (courtesy the artist and Hotel, London) From the exhibition guide: Juliette Blightman ‘has introduced an arrangement of objects, including a vase [which I…
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The poem alluded to in this post is now published in Quarterly Literary Review Singapore. There are two squirrels in a recent poem I wrote roaming in the garden outside the kitchen. I put them in the work not because…
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Paolo and Francesca da Rimini (1855) by Dante Gabriel Rossetti Yesterday, when I was reading the following description of watercolour by Laura Cumming in “New Review” (pp. 32-33), ‘love’ came to my mind, and I am still thinking about it: Watercolour has…
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Every now and then it is very nice to go to a quiet museum that is not swamped with visitors, especially one that does not oppress you with one thousand pieces of art or more to see. Today, as part…
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On Saturday, we went to Highgate Cemetery where we took a guided tour of the West side. Highgate Cemetery is divided into two sections: the West and East sides. Most visitors go to the East side to see the graves…
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– 0 The generous giver’s identity has been revealed. Thank you!
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On Tuesday I saw the excellent Blue Valentine in the West End. A lot has already been written about Derek Cianfrance’s film and its unconventional structure, which cuts between the beginning and the end of the central love story. I don’t…
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Last night, we went to watch The King’s Speech in the local cinema. The house was full, even for the ten-o’clock showing. I have liked Colin Firth since his charming turn as Darcy in Andrew Davies’s 1995 BBC adaptation of…
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