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1 What has been lost “It’s hard not to feel utterly despondent at the current plight of public libraries. Along with the NHS and the BBC, our libraries are some of the few truly remarkable British institutions left. So often…
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Cardiff libraries: a Council dispossesses its people
Cardiff is a thriving place. Big new developments are announced almost monthly. Recent ones include the new BBC Cymru Wales building near the station, the electrification of the Valleys railway lines and the massive Embankment complex. But while the Council…
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Jimi Hendrix and Ludwig Wittgenstein in Swansea
That Jimi Hendrix came to Swansea was news to me until yesterday. It seemed almost as unlikely as the fact that Ludwig Wittgenstein used to stay here on his holidays. Gary Gregor, in his excellent South Wales Evening Post column…
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Selling body parts in Little Hintock
After a visit to Dorchester we stayed on New Year’s Eve in a B&B high above Bradford on Avon. At midnight all the guests stood outside as fireworks blazed in distant towns and villages. The house, several centuries old, was…
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Falling water and Coleridge
‘The mad water rushes thro’ its sinuous Bed, or rather prison of Rock with such rapid Curves, as if it turned the Corners not from mechanic force, but with foreknowledge, like a fierce & skilful Driver; great Masses of Water,…
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Tranc sebon
Allech chi ddim dweud bod diffyg sebon, yn ei ystyr fetafforaidd. Er bod rhai yn dadlau bod ein cymdeithas wedi colli pob arwydd o ymostyngiad, mae seboni yn weithgaredd poblogaidd o hyd, yn arbennig yn y byd gwaith. Ac wrth…
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The religion of inequality
The other day, for no apparent reason, I pulled off the shelf my old second-hand copy of R.H. Tawney’s book Equality. It still has a ragged and discoloured dust jacket, with a tea stain on the front, and it was…
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A brief history of austerity
John Naughton observed the other day that neoliberal economists and their current weapon, austerity, have gained an unassailable intellectual hegemony. To claim that austerity is self-defeating and should be stopped is to be regarded as either foolish or mad. Ed…
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Wales Coast Path, day 20: Burry Port to Kidwelly
A cold, still morning in Burry Port. The sun, they say, will shine all day. The four of us are the only people in the car park without dogs to share our walk. Feeling inadequate, we hurry on to the…
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Wales Coast Path, day 19: Loughor to Burry Port
Loughor is a frontier town. Now just an extension of ‘greater Gorseinon’, it was once a place of more importance. The Romans planted an auxiliary fort on its headland, commanding the mouth of the river. The Normans built a small…