With all the talk of Wimbledon and grass (a very important subject if you’re a Wimbledon player, official, or fan), I thought I would post about a very different form of lawn.
If you think “The Camomile Lawn” is the title of a book by Mary Wesley, you’d be right. Out of her novels, it’s my [...]
Archive for the ‘life’ Category
Walk with Fragrance
Posted in Britain, Sharon Bidwell, life on June 29, 2009 | 10 Comments »
Grass!
Posted in Britain, Fiona Glass, History, life on June 23, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Talking of the green, green grass of Wimbledon, there’s a fascinating blog post about lawns, their history and their uses at Mark Easton’s blog on the BBC Website. It seemed too appropriate not to pass it on!
What’s in a name?
Posted in Society, language, life, writers, writing, tagged exit, Exit Pursued by a Bee, names, Nelder on March 7, 2009 | 1 Comment »
By Geoff Nelder
I laughed the other day because I received a request from a baby naming site to link with my writing one. Initially, I thought this was a curious variation of a Nigerian bank scam, but once my stomach subsided I realized there was some sense here.
When I started writing fiction, characters’ names appeared [...]
Public Lending Right
Posted in Erastes, life, writing on February 18, 2009 | 4 Comments »
‘PLR’s aim is to provide an excellent service to all our stakeholders making annual payments to writers and other creators whose works are freely available in libraries. We will achieve this by maintaining a highly skilled team and making efficient use of all our resources.’
Basically, if your books (or [...]
Apostrophes on street signs
Posted in Britain, Fiona Glass, language, life on February 4, 2009 | 4 Comments »
Birmingham City Council has been getting a lot of stick lately for its decision not to use apostrophes on street signs.
As a writer part of me does worry about this. It’s yet another erosion of the traditions of our language and grammar, and yet another blow to the trusty old apostrophe, the use of which [...]
Santa is coming to town…Really!
Posted in Sharon Bidwell, life on December 19, 2008 | 2 Comments »
‘Twas the night before Yesterday, when all through the house
We heard Christmas music, playing ever so loud;
We thought it was coming from the neighbours so near,
That they must have it blaring, dear, oh dear.
It got louder and louder, and made such a clatter
We jumped to our feet to see what was the matter.
Away to the [...]
Happy Halloween, and a blessed Samhain!
Posted in Alex Draven, Britain, Society, events, life on October 31, 2008 | 4 Comments »
This is one of my favourite times of year, and I’m posting today, talking about Whitby.
What do I mean, Whitby?
Whitby.
1) A small seaside town and fishing port on the north east coast of Yorkshire, famous for it’s jet.
2) An important medieval abbey. See also St Hilda (Abbess)
3) “a gathering of as many goths [...]
It’s official – Hobbiton is really… Birmingham?!
Posted in Britain, Fiona Glass, Scenery, life, writing, tagged Birmingham, Tolkien on September 6, 2008 | 6 Comments »
Fans of Lord of the Rings might not automatically associate the rural landscape of The Shire with Britain’s buzzing second city, but the fact is that Tolkien grew up in Birmingham, and when he came to write his books he peppered them with local settings. In particular, The Shire was heavily based on the south-eastern [...]
Lo, the Harvest Cometh!
Posted in Britain, Marc Nobbs, People of Britain, gardening, life on September 2, 2008 | 6 Comments »
You may (or indeed may not) remember my first post here on the Britwriters blog. It was all about my Allotment and how I was looking forward to the bounty it would bring.
Well, it’s harvest time down at Nobbs’ (mini-)Farm and the wonderfully wet August has meant that while some of my veg has under-performed, [...]
The English Imagination
Posted in Alex Beecroft, Britain, life, writing on August 26, 2008 | 8 Comments »
The English Imagination
This is by way of a musing on Peter Ackroyd’s book Albion: The Origins of the English imagination.
In which Peter Ackroyd attempts to discover whether there is a national character when it comes to the imagination of the inhabitants of the British Isles, and if so, what it is.
I’m not sure why he [...]
