Archive for 2015
Wales Coast Path, day 15: Oxwich from Rhossili
Rhossili on a Wednesday morning in early September. The car park’s mostly empty. At the National Trust canopy no one’s around to give the hard sell on membership. A cool wind’s blowing from an unfamiliar angle, north-west, but there’s no rain in the forecast. We deviate slightly from the coast path to admire the Worm, […]
Shandy Hall and the Auxerre moment
Shandy Hall is a house almost as eccentric as the mind of its once owner, Laurence Sterne, vicar of Coxwold and author of The life and opinions of Tristram Shandy. One of the highlights of the summer was a tour of the inside of the building in the company of its curator, Patrick Wildgust. My […]
Horse, man, dog: two Nottingham paintings
In the Long Gallery of the Castle Museum and Art Gallery in Nottingham are two oil paintings that seem to speak to each other on the wall they share. They look similar – both use the formula horse-man-dog – but on inspection they seem very different in tone and implicit narrative. The earlier of the […]
Down among the artistocrats
Chatsworth, when I was an innocent boy, and later when an innocent parent, meant a fun day out. A chance to gawp at the baroque luxuries, scamper on the lawns and play games in the playground. At the time we absorbed the whole place on its own terms. One of the reasons was that Chatsworth […]
A day at the cricket
Friday morning. I get to St Helen’s at about ten past eleven. Play has already started: Glamorgan v Gloucestershire, County Championship, Division 2. Day two of a four day game. It’s £15 to get in. I say to the ticket man, ‘I don’t suppose there are concessions for older persons?’. He gives me a pitying […]
Wales Coast Path, day 17: Llangennith from Llanrhidian
In Llanrhidian we park the car and poke our noses into the Welcome to Town. It’s been overhauled and reopened since we were last here and presents itself as a ‘pub and dining rooms’. The brand advice must have consisted of one word, ‘purple!’ Electric urban purple storms its way across the facade and marches […]
August Kleinzahler v Google: knowledge in excess
For my money the liveliest American poet at the present is August Kleinzahler. I first came across him in his collection Sleeping it off in Rapid City (2008), a title that says a lot about his themes and his expression. He’s quite well known on this side of the Atlantic – Faber now publishes him, […]
Wales Coast Path, day 16: Rhossili to Llangennith
In summer the Worm, the Bay and its end-of-the-earth aura draw hundreds down Gower’s narrow roads to Rhossili – us included today. In the crowded car park we avoid eye contact with the National Trust’s recruitment agents and head north towards the Down, on one of our rare circular walks. The steep climb quickly separates […]
Iain Sinclair goes home
Urban is his element, and London his patch. But now, in his early seventies, Iain Sinclair has come home to his native Wales for his latest book, Black apples of Gower. For someone who’s followed the path of his wanderings and writings for years – I joined the trip late, with White Chappell, scarlet tracings […]
Ar y Mynydd Du
Golygfa ddu yw hi, o bob cyfeiriad, does dim dwywaith. O’r A48, er engraifft, wrth ichi yrru o Gaerfyrddin tua Cross Hands, mae’n anodd osgoi edrych draw, am eiliad o leiaf, i’r wal dywyll, fygythiol o fryniau sy’n ymestyn ar y gorwel yn y dwyrain – ymyl gorllewinol y Mynydd Du. ‘Du’ mewn ffordd arall […]
