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Let’s have a little fun today considering the fate of the universe and all who sail in her. Let’s begin by reminding ourselves of what we understand the universe to […]

We met at La Piazza in St Paul’s Square, just a stone’s throw from the river, for coffee. The sun was shining. The crowds of people browsing for vegetables at […]

The first sign we were given that a torrid spring lay ahead of us was Brenda’s cry of dismay. “Get away,” we heard, “go on, let me through!” Which was […]

What’s the greatest barrier to good writing? Well, I suppose you could think of a great number of candidates. But how about complacency as one that should figure near the […]

What happened isn’t the story. Events don’t make stories. So the memoirist who protests that all she wants to write is “what actually happened” is missing the point. Indeed, the […]

Hilary Mantel was memorialised at a gathering in Southwark Cathedral last week. The great and the good were in attendance. Zadie Smith read an extract from one of her books; […]

Writing, we all agree, is a lonely business. We toil away in solitude, dreaming up our characters, and plotting our stories. We gnaw at our thumbnails waiting for inspiration to […]

Trolling through the internet, I came across something called “survivorship bias”. Have you heard of it? Wikipedia puts it very succinctly: “Survivorship bias or survival bias is the logical [...]

By now you might have realised that I’m a dreamer. I return to wakefulness most mornings with the shreds of dreams falling about me, like confetti on a groom barely […]

As a child my parents possessed a large radiogram. In the middle sat a turntable, below a radio, and on either side two narrow cupboards for long playing records. I don’t […]

I’m not sure where this is going to lead me today, but I’m going to take a chance and risk writing something that might end up going nowhere useful at […]

A friend recently sent me a link to the acceptance speech given by the winner of the 2018 Nobel Prize for Literature, Olga Tokarczuk. It takes the form of a […]