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Flightlines

Flightlines

...losing themselves wholly to a subject not likely to cause them harm, and so, however briefly, to stave off the world’s uncertainties. That was me at fifteen, manoeuvring even the...
Beyond The Mother Tongue

Beyond The Mother Tongue

...seen. Also, at a deeper level, there is a consideration of the component parts of the word: butter and fly. The Welsh word for butterfly is pili-pala and comes free...
Genre Knowledge

Genre Knowledge

...way that pilots fly what’s been designed and built by aeronautical engineers, so writers might take the view that they fly the language, but that they’re no more obliged to...
Writers In Lockdown, Part 3

Writers In Lockdown, part 3

...with their trolleys, all jammed together, and all I could see were vectors. We have two asthmatics in the family and it just seemed too risky. I couldn’t get a...
Are You Being Served?

Are You Being Served?

...professions as they wrote (Conan Doyle and Carlos Williams were both in medicine; Dostoevsky was an engineer), they seem to be in the minority. Manual jobs appear to be a...
Islands

Islands

I can’t hear what the stewardess is saying to me because the sound of the aeroplane propellers is a constant roar in the cabin. I’m in a Flybe twin-prop heading...
Chim Chim Cher-oo

Chim Chim Cher-oo

...occasionally tender magical nanny has appeared again out of the sky and is currently in residence at Number Seventeen, Cherry Tree Lane, right opposite the Park. The wind first blew...
Stitches In Time

Stitches In Time

...and put a name to it: L’Heure Bleue, by Guerlain, created in 1912, a strange, sensuous, dusky perfume, the very scent of the past. I couldn’t afford the dresses but...
Forgotten Hero

Forgotten Hero

...Bolshevik Revolution underway, the Tsar’s navy mutinied, murdering over 1,200 of its officers. Cromie’s skill as a mediator saved many naval and civilian lives. In 1918 Trotsky signed the Treaty...
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