Poem of the Week: 'Spellbound'

A winter's poem for a winter's weekend, this was written by Emily Bronte, the most enigmatic of the Bronte sisters (and author of the extraordinary Wuthering Heights). Living in Haworth, on the edge of the Yorkshire Moors, Bronte spent many a day wandering the barren wilderness on her doorstep, whatever the season.

This is a poem about the power of nature; but it is also about the way she is attracted by nature at its most wild and dangerous. A wintry night on the moors should, by rights, send her back home to a nice warm fire; but, instead, she is mesmerised by the magic and beauty of the moors in winter. So powerful is the scene in which she finds herself, in fact, that she is almost in a trance:

Spellbound by Emily Brontë

The night is darkening round me,
The wild winds coldly blow;
But a tyrant spell has bound me
And I cannot, cannot go.

The giant trees are bending
Their bare boughs weighed with snow.
And the storm is fast descending,
And yet I cannot go.

Clouds beyond clouds above me,
Wastes beyond wastes below;
But nothing drear can move me;
I will not, cannot go.

Recommended Reading: The Virgin Suicides

Sofia Coppola (director of Lost in Translation and Marie Antoinette, and daughter of The Godfather's Francis Ford Coppola) first came to Hollywood fame with her movie version of The Virgin Suicides by Christopher Eugenides. It is a hypnotic, beautiful book which tells the story of the tragic lives of the Lisbon sisters, each of whom kills herself as a way out of the torment of adolescence.

Haunting and tender, with brilliant flashes of humour, The Virgin Suicides is the story of the disintegration of a captivating American family in 1970s suburban Michigan. The five Lisbon sisters are embalmed in the memories of the boys who worshipped them and who, twenty years on, recall their adolescence: the sisters' gauche but breathtaking appearance on the night of the homecoming dance; the brassière belonging to the beautiful, promiscuous Lux, draped over a crucifix on the wall; the records the boys played down the phone, trying desperately to penetrate the sisters' isolation; and the sultry, sleepy street across which they watched fragile lives disappear...

Here is a brief extract from the novel:

On the morning the last Lisbon daughter took her turn at suicide - it was Mary this time, and sleeping pills, like Therese - the two paramedics arrived at the house knowing exactly where the knife drawer was, and the gas oven, and the beam in the basement from which it was possible to tie a rope. They got out of the EMS truck, as usual moving much too slowly in our opinion, and the fat one said under his breath, "This ain't TV, folks, this is how fast we go." He was carrying the heavy respirator and cardiac unit past the bushes that had grown monstrous and over the erupting lawn, tame and immaculate thirteen months earlier when the trouble began.

Cecilia, the youngest, only thirteen, had gone first, slitting her wrists like a Stoic while taking a bath, and when they found her, afloat in her pink pool, with the yellow eyes of someone possessed and her small body giving off the odor of a mature woman, the paramedics had been so frightened by her tranquillity that they had stood mesmerized.

But then Mrs. Lisbon lunged in, screaming, and the reality of the room reasserted itself: blood on the bath mat; Mr. Lisbon's razor sunk in the toilet bowl, marbling the water. The paramedics fetched Cecilia out of the warm water because it quickened the bleeding, and put a tourniquet on her arm. Her wet hair hung down her back and already her extremities were blue. She didn't say a word, but when they parted her hands they found the laminated picture of the Virgin Mary she held against her budding chest.

Recommended Reading: The Cement Garden

In The Cement Garden, the father of four children dies. His death is followed by the death of the children's mother. In order to avoid being taken into custody, the children hide their mother's death from the outside world by encasing her corpse in cement in their basement. Two of the siblings, a teenage boy and girl, descend into an incestuous relationship, while the younger son starts to experiment with transvestism.

Little wonder, therefore, that Ian McEwan's first novel caused such a stir when it was published in 1978. Back then, maybe British society was still clinging on to the idea that adolescence was a tidy and simple thing; nowadays, we know that it is anything but - but I would still defy you not to be a little unsettled by the events which unfurl in the pages of this novel. There is also an excellent (but equally unsettling) 1993 movie of the book. Here is a brief extract from the book itself:

I did not kill my father, but I sometimes felt I had helped him on his way. And but for the fact that it coincided with a landmark in my own physical growth, his death seemed insignificant compared to what followed. My sisters and I talked about him the week after he died, and Sue certainly cried when the ambulance men tucked him up in a bright red blanket and carried him away. He was a frail, irascible, obsessive man with yellowish hands and face. I am only including the little story of his death to explain how my sisters and I came to have such a large quantity of cement at our disposal.

In the early summer of my fourteenth year a lorry pulled up outside our house. I was sitting on the front step rereading a comic. The driver and another man came toward me. They were covered in a fine, pale dust which gave their faces a ghostly look. They were both whistling shrilly completely different tunes. I stood up and held the comic out of sight. I wished I had been reading the racing page of my father’s paper or the football results.

“Cement?” one of them said.

Poem of the Week: 'The Way Things Are'

Friend of The Beatles back in the 1960s; recent regular on the Stephen Fry panel show 'QI'; and writer of some of the most accessible and yet profound poetry of the past 30 years - liverpudlian Roger McGough wrote this poem in 1999, and it stands as a collection of advice to a child about the strange world in which we all grow up...

The Way Things Are
by Roger McGough

No, the candle is not crying, it cannot feel pain.
Even telescopes, like the rest of us, grow bored.
Bubblegum will not make the hair soft and shiny.
The duller the imagination, the faster the car,
I am your father and this is the way things are.

When the sky is looking the other way,
do not enter the forest. No, the wind
is not caused by the rushing of clouds.
An excuse is as good a reason as any.
A lighthouse, launched, will not go far,
I am your father and this is the way things are.

No, old people do not walk slowly
because they have plenty of time.
Gardening books when buried will not flower.
Though lightly worn, a crown may leave a scar,
I am your father and this is the way things are.

No, the red woolly hat has not been
put on the railing to keep it warm.
When one glove is missing, both are lost.
Today's craft fair is tomorrow's car boot sale.
The guitarist gently weeps, not the guitar,
I am your father and this is the way things are.

Pebbles work best without batteries.
The deckchair will fail as a unit of currency.
Even though your shadow is shortening
it does not mean you are growing smaller.
Moonbeams sadly, will not survive in a jar,
I am your father and this is the way things are.

For centuries the bullet remained quietly confident
that the gun would be invented.
A drowning surrealist will not appreciate
the concrete lifebelt.
No guarantee my last goodbye is au revoir,
I am your father and this is the way things are.

Do not become a prison-officer unless you know
what you're letting someone else in for.
The thrill of being a shower curtain will soon pall.
No trusting hand awaits the falling star.
I am your father, and I am sorry,
but this is the way things are.

Books for Christmas!

Don't know what to put in your letter to Santa? Tired of your parents asking you what they should spend all their money on for your Christmas present this year? Stuck for what to suggest to all your friends who desperately want to buy you lots of presents too? Look no further...

Click below and have a look at some of these lists of essential reads, and see if there is anything here that might capture your imagination.

Top 10 books about the darker side of Adolescence...
Top 10 Adult books for Teenagers...
Top 10 characters from children's historical fiction...
Top 10 books for Teens...
Top 10 books to feed the imagination...
Michael Morpurgo's Top 10 favourite books... (Michael Morpurgo is the Children's Laureate)
Eoin Colfer's Top 10 children's books...

And, once you've read any of these, please feel free to recommend the best ones to the other readers of this blog. :)

Poem of the Week: 'I'm nobody! Who are you?'

Emily Dickinson was an American poet writing in the 1800s. She felt like a pariah from the religious, conservative society in which she lived, and rebelled against it through the poetry she wrote - poetry which was only published posthumously (i.e. after her death). She wrote it in order to 'survive' and make sense of the strange, cruel, pointless world she often saw before her.

In this poem, she explores the pressure society puts on all of us to fit in and be like everybody else - but, unsurprisingly, she is unwilling to do so. There is an excellent webpage explaining this whole poem in detail and depth here. Click here to find out more about Dickinson's life and to read some more of her poetry. Here is the poem:

I'm nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there's a pair of us — don't tell!
They'd banish us, you know.

How dreary to be somebody!
How public, like a frog
To tell your name the livelong day
To an admiring bog!

Recommended Reading: Dracula

Dracula by Bram Stoker

You all know the myth; maybe some of you have seen the films; but do you dare read the book that started it all???

When I was a student at Oxford University, I spent my first year living in my college, and I had a very old room right in the corner beside the spooky, gothic chapel. I read Dracula as part of the Victorian Literature module of my degree, and I could not put the book down. One warm night, I slept with all my windows wide open, and, in the middle of the night, a quick, haunting howl of wind shot in throw one window and out the other, and I woke instantly at the noise of the wind and then the simultaneous crash as the windows slammed shut. I was absolutely terrified, and I blame this book.

Here is an extract. I am considering reading the whole book with the BOOK GROUP in the near future:

Last night the Count left me early, and locked himself into his own room. As soon as I dared, I ran up the winding stair, and looked out of the window, which opened South. I thought I would watch for the Count, for there is something going on. The Szgany are quartered somewhere in the castle and are doing work of some kind. I know it, for now and then, I hear a far-away muffled sound as of mattock and spade, and, whatever it is, it must be the end of some ruthless villainy.

I had been at the window somewhat less than half an hour, when I saw something coming out of the Count's window. I drew back and watched carefully, and saw the whole man emerge. It was a new shock to me to find that he had on the suit of clothes which I had worn whilst travelling here, and slung over his shoulder the terrible bag which I had seen the women take away. There could be no doubt as to his quest, and in my garb, too! This, then, is his new scheme of evil, that he will allow others to see me, as they think, so that he may both leave evidence that I have been seen in the towns or villages posting my own letters, and that any wickedness which he may do shall by the local people be attributed to me.

It makes me rage to think that this can go on, and whilst I am shut up here, a veritable prisoner, but without that protection of the law which is even a criminal's right and consolation.

I thought I would watch for the Count's return, and for a long time sat doggedly at the window. Then I began to notice that there were some quaint little specks floating in the rays of the moonlight. They were like the tiniest grains of dust, and they whirled round and gathered in clusters in a nebulous sort of way. I watched them with a sense of soothing, and a sort of calm stole over me. I leaned back in the embrasure in a more comfortable position, so that I could enjoy more fully the aerial gambolling.

Something made me start up, a low, piteous howling of dogs somewhere far below in the valley, which was hidden from my sight. Louder it seemed to ring in my ears, and the floating moats of dust to take new shapes to the sound as they danced in the moonlight. I felt myself struggling to awake to some call of my instincts. Nay, my very soul was struggling, and my half-remembered sensibilities were striving to answer the call. I was becoming hypnotised!

Quicker and quicker danced the dust. The moonbeams seemed to quiver as they went by me into the mass of gloom beyond. More and more they gathered till they seemed to take dim phantom shapes. And then I started, broad awake and in full possession of my senses, and ran screaming from the place.

The phantom shapes, which were becoming gradually materialised from the moonbeams, were those three ghostly women to whom I was doomed.

I fled, and felt somewhat safer in my own room, where there was no moonlight, and where the lamp was burning brightly.

When a couple of hours had passed I heard something stirring in the Count's room, something like a sharp wail quickly suppressed. And then there was silence, deep, awful silence, which chilled me. With a beating heart, I tried the door, but I was locked in my prison, and could do nothing. I sat down and simply cried.

As I sat I heard a sound in the courtyard without, the agonised cry of a woman. I rushed to the window, and throwing it up, peered between the bars.

There, indeed, was a woman with dishevelled hair, holding her hands over her heart as one distressed with running. She was leaning against the corner of the gateway. When she saw my face at the window she threw herself forward, and shouted in a voice laden with menace, "Monster, give me my child!"

She threw herself on her knees, and raising up her hands, cried the same words in tones which wrung my heart. Then she tore her hair and beat her breast, and abandoned herself to all the violences of extravagant emotion. Finally, she threw herself forward, and though I could not see her, I could hear the beating of her naked hands against the door.

Somewhere high overhead, probably on the tower, I heard the voice of the Count calling in his harsh, metallic whisper. His call seemed to be answered from far and wide by the howling of wolves. Before many minutes had passed a pack of them poured, like a pent-up dam when liberated, through the wide entrance into the courtyard.

There was no cry from the woman, and the howling of the wolves was but short. Before long they streamed away singly, licking their lips.

I could not pity her, for I knew now what had become of her child, and she was better dead.

What shall I do? What can I do? How can I escape from this dreadful thing of night, gloom, and fear?

Riddle 2

The only Riddles I'll put up are from the Redwall Series. Here's an easy one:

My first is third, like the sound of the sea,
My second's the centre of you, not me,
My third is the end of him but not you,
My fourth starts a picture, not a view,
My fifth is in bean though not in been,
My sixth and seventh starts seldom seen.
Sunrise and sunset, warmth and cold,
Put them together and a sign will unfold.

It's easy, right?

Poem of the Week: 'Mad Girl's Love Song'

Few writers have fascinated the teenage mind as much as Sylvia Plath. For more information on her sad and angry life, click here. For more of her poetry, click here. To hear Plath read one of her most famous poems, click here. In the meantime, here is one of her earliest poems:

Mad Girl's Love Song

by Sylvia Plath

"I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead;
I lift my lids and all is born again.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

The stars go waltzing out in blue and red,
And arbitrary blackness gallops in:
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.

I dreamed that you bewitched me into bed
And sung me moon-struck, kissed me quite insane.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

God topples from the sky, hell's fires fade:
Exit seraphim and Satan's men:
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.

I fancied you'd return the way you said,
But I grow old and I forget your name.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

I should have loved a thunderbird instead;
At least when spring comes they roar back again.
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)"

Recommended Reading: Junk

Every now and then, a piece of teenage fiction is published which causes almost universal controversy; this is not a new phenomenon, happened as long ago as The Catcher in the Rye back in 1951. However, few teenage books have caused as much outrage in the UK as JUNK by Melvin Burgess. Written in 1996, it tells the story of a group of teenagers who fall into heroin addiction and anarchism on the streets of Bristol. But, like most books that are the subject of protest, the novel itself is simply a fantastic work of fiction; and one which, rather than patronising its teen audience, actually treats them with respect, and credits them with the ability to cope with difficult, adult themes. JUNK won the Carnegie award in 1996, and has become one of the most important teenage novels ever written.

This is how it starts:

A boy and a girl were spending the night together in the back seat of a Volvo estate car. The car was in a garage. It was pitch black.

"I'm hungry," complained the girl.

The boy turned on a torch and peered inside a grey canvas rucksack behind him. "There's an apple."

"Nah. Any crisps left?"

"Nope."

Gemma sighed and leaned back in the car. She pulled a blanket over herself. "It's cold," she said.

"Barry'll be here soon," Tar said. He watched her closely in the torchlight, frowning anxiously. "Sorry you came?" he asked.

Gemma looked over and smiled. "Nah."

Tar snuggled up against her. Gemma stroked his head. "You better save the batteries," she said in a minute.

Tar turned off the torch. At once it was so black you couldn't see your own hand. Surrounded by the smell of damp concrete, oil and petrol, they carried on their conversation cuddling in the dark.

Tar said, "Come with me."

"What?" She was amazed, surprised. It had never occurred to her...He could feel her staring at him even though it was too dark to see anything. In the darkness, Tar blushed deeply.

"You must be crazy," said Gemma. "Why?"

"What have I got to run away from?"

"Wait till you get home." The two laughed. Gemma had been banned a week before from seeing Tar. Her parents had no idea where she was that night, but they had a pretty good idea whom she was with.

"It'd be something to do," said Tar in a minute. "You're always saying how bored you are."

"That's true." Gemma was the most bored person she knew. Sitting in class sometimes she felt dizzy with it, that she'd pop or faint or something if it didn't stop. She felt she'd do anything just to have a life.

Still...

"What about school and that?"

"You can go to school any time."

"I can run away any time in my life."

Gemma would have liked to. She wanted to. But...What for? She didn't love Tar, she only liked him. Her parents, and her father in particular, were totally ghastly but he didn't knock her around. Not yet anyhow.

Was being bored a reason for running away to the city at fourteen years old?

Gemma said, "I don't think so, Tar."

Tar lay still in her lap. She knew what he must be feeling because she'd seen it on his face so many times. Tar's heart was painted on his face.

Gemma bent down close. "I'm sorry," she whispered.

Tar had a reason, plenty of reasons. The latest were painted on his face, too. His upper lip swelled over his teeth like a fat plum. His left eye was black, blue, yellow and red. Gemma had to be careful not to touch his wounds when she stroked his face.

There was a noise at a small door behind them. Tar and Gemma ducked down out of sight behind the seats.

"'It's only me."

"Bloody hell -- you nearly killed me," hissed Gemma angrily.

"Sorry. Here, put that torch on so's I can see where I'm going."

Tar shone the beam over to a plump blond boy carrying a plastic bag. He grinned and came over.

"I suppose we ought to have a secret knock or something," he said. "Here." He handed over the bag. Gemma poked inside.

"It's only rolls and cheese. They'd have missed anything else," apologised Barry.

"Didn't you get any butter?" complained Gemma.

"No. But I got some pickle." Barry handed over a pot from his coat pocket.

"Branston. Brilliant!" Gemma began tearing up the rolls and chunks of cheese. Barry had forgotten a knife; she had to spread the pickle with her finger.

Barry watched Tar's face by the torchlight. "Christ! He really laid into you this time, didn't he?"

"Looks like a bowl of rotten fruit, doesn't it?" said Gemma. "Not that you'd want to eat it."

They laughed.

"You haven't been turning the light on, by the way, have you?" asked Barry anxiously. "Only..."

"We said we wouldn't, didn't we?" demanded Gemma.

". . . only they might see it through the cracks in the garage door."

"I told you"

"All right."

Gemma stuffed a roll leaking pickle into her mouth. "Wan won?" she asked Tar thickly.

"Yeah, please." He beamed.

There was a pause while Gemma pulled another roll in half.

"When are you going?" Barry wanted to know.

"Tomorrow," said Tar.

"Got everything?"

Tar leaned over the front seat and patted his rucksack. It wasn't that full.

Barry nodded. He watched Tar eating for a second and then he blurted out, "But what about your mum?"

Tar looked stricken.

Gemma glared. "His mum's gonna be all right. She'll probably clear off herself once Tar's gone. She's only been staying because of him anyway; she's said that thousands of times, hasn't she?"

Tar nodded slowly, like a tormented tortoise. Gemma glared at Barry and mouthed, "Shut up!"

"Right." Barry nodded energetically. "Best thing you could do for her, clear off. She won't have anything to tie her to the old bastard then."

"That's what I'm hoping," said Tar.

It got very cold in the garage later on. Gemma and Tar snuggled up together and wrapped the blankets around them. They kissed. Gemma didn't stop him when his hand glided under her top, but when she felt his hand sliding down her tummy she slapped his fingers lightly.

"Naughty," she said.

"Why not?" asked Tar in surprise.

"Not here..."

She didn't mind him touching her there. But she was worried about spending the night together...

"I just don't want it to go any further."

"You might never see me again after tonight," said Tar cunningly.

Gemma shook her head.

"It won't go any further, then."

"All right."

Riddle

Here's a riddle I liked when I was reading Redwall. You must read it VERY carefully to figure it out:

There is a warrior,
Where is a sword?
Peace did he bring,
The fighting Lord.
Shed for him is my fifth tear.
Find it in the title here,
Written in but a single word,
An eye is an eye, until it is heard.

Lines:
One of one.
Eight of two.
One of three.
Three of four.
One of five.
Six of six.
Two of seven.
Four of eight.

Good luck! You'll need it ;D

Panic Button

I can hear to noise around me,
A pair of married beings, unloved by each other.
Screaming, raging, red in one corner of the arena,
Blue in the other.
I can only hear anger, fire pain and misery.
Oh how I wish to press the panic button.

It goes on and on,
A gap in time waiting to be closed by the time traveller once returned.
But it carries on, a life-long disease,
Fighting it's way into my head, driving me insane,
I cannot press it yet.

Waiting and waiting,
A young butterfly waiting to spread it's beautiful wings.
I can't take it any longer .
The two dung beetles fighting over a pile of vile doings,
That pile of vile doings is I.
The screaming the shouting has found it's way in,
Dug into my skin, killing me.
I run and hide,
I force myself to fall asleep.
I hit the panic button.

And now I am here,
There's quiet, no noise, just silence.
Free, at last...


This is one of the poem's that I've written in my free time. I would have put one of the others that I wrote, but I thought that this one has the most meaning for me.
You don't have to like it, I just want to know what you think of it.. XD
Thanks Exquisite for convincing me to put this on the blog...

Poem of the Week: 'The Magic Box'

The Magic Box

I will put in the box

the swish of a silk sari on a summer night,
fire from the nostrils of a Chinese dragon,
the tip of a tongue touching a tooth.

I will put in the box

a snowman with a rumbling belly
a sip of the bluest water from Lake Lucerene,
a leaping spark from an electric fish.

I will put into the box

three violet wishes spoken in Gujarati,
the last joke of an ancient uncle,
and the first smile of a baby.

I will put into the box

a fifth season and a black sun,
a cowboy on a broomstick
and a witch on a white horse.

My box is fashioned from ice and gold and steel,
with stars on the lid and secrets in the corners.
Its hinges are the toe joints of dinosaurs.

I shall surf in my box
on the great high-rolling breakers of the wild Atlantic,
then wash ashore on a yellow beach
the colour of the sun.

by Kit Wright

Recommended Reading: Haroun and the Sea of Stories

Issued with a fatwa (or death sentence) by Ruhollah Khomeini in 1988, after the publication of The Satanic Verses (a book far less controversial than all the protestors, most of whom have never read it, would have us believe!), Salman Rushdie went into hiding, during which time he wrote Haroun and the Sea of Stories. An extraordinary book, ostensibly for children, it was written as an allegory to explain his own predicament to his son. However, it also operates on a far simpler level, simply as a magical and mesmerising narrative which sweeps the reader up into its world from the outset. Rushdie's most famous novel, Midnight's Children, remains my favourite book EVER; but Haroun and the Sea of Stories remains a pretty special introduction to the work of someone who has to be one of the most important and talented writers ever to put pen to paper. Here is an extract from Haroun and the Sea of Stories, a book which, unsurprisingly, I HIGHLY recommend:

'So pick a bird,' the Water Genie commanded. 'Any bird.' This was puzzling. 'The only bird around here is a wooden peacock,' Haroun pointed out, reasonably enough. Iff gave a snort of disgust. 'A person may choose what he cannot see,' he said, as if explaining something very obvious to a very foolish individual. 'A person may mention a bird's name even if the creature is not present and correct: crow, quail, hummingbird, bulbul, mynah, parrot, kite. A person may even select a flying creature of his own invention, for example winged horse, flying turtle, airborne whale, space serpent or aeromouse. To give a thing a name, a label, a handle; to rescue it from anonymity, to pluck it out of the Place of Namelessness, in short to identify it -- well, that's a way of bringing the said thing into being. Or, in this case, the said bird or Imaginary Flying Organism.'

'That may be true where you come from,' Haroun argued. 'But in these parts, stricter rules apply.'

'In these parts,' rejoined blue-bearded Iff, 'I am having time time wasted by a Disconnector Thief who will not trust in what he can't see. How much have seen, eh, theiflet? Africa, have you seen it? No? Then is it truly there? And submarines? Huh? Also, hailstones, baseballs, pagodas? goldmines? kangaroos, Mount Fujiyama, the North Pole? And the past, did it happen? And the future, will it come? Believe in your own eyes and you'll get into a lot of trouble, hot water, a mess.'

With that, he plunged his hand into a pocket of his auberginey pajamas, and when he brought it forth again it was bunched into a fist. 'so take a look, or i should say a gander, at the enclosed.' He opened his hand, and Haroun's eyes almost fell out of his head.

Tiny birds were walking about on the Water Genie's palm; and pecking at it, and flapping their miniature wings to hover just above it. And as well as birds there were fabulous winged creatures out of legends: an assyrian lion with the head of a bearded man and a pair of large hairy wings growing out of its flanks; and winged monkeys, flying saucers, tiny angels, levitating (and apparently air-breathing) fish. 'What's your pleasure, select, choose,' Iff urged. And although it seemed obvious to Haroun that these magical creatures were so small that they couldn't possibly have carried so much as a bitten-off fingernail, he decided not to argue and pointed at a tiny created bird that was giving him a sidelong look through one highly intelligent eye.

'So it's the Hoopoe for us,' the Water Genie said, sounding almost impressed. 'Perhaps you know, Disconnector Thief, that in the old stories the Hoopoe is the bird that leads all other birds through many dangerous places to their ultimate goal. Well, well. Who knows, young theiflet, who you may turn out to be. But no time for speculation now,' he concluded, and with that rushed to the window and hurled the tiny hoopoe out into the night.

'What did you do that for?' hissed Haroun, not wishing to wake his father; at which Iff gave his wicked grin. 'A foolish notion,' he said innocently. 'A fancy, a passing whim. Certainly not because I know more about such matters than you, dear me, no.'

Haroun ran to the window, and saw the Hoopoe floating on the Dull Lake, grown large, as large as a double bed, easily large enough for a Water Genie and a boy to ride upon its back. 'And off we go,' carolled Iff, much too loud for Haroun's liking; and then the Water Genie skipped up on to the window sill and thence to the Hoopoe's back--and Haroun, with scarcely a moment to reflect on the wisdom of what he was doing, and still wearing his long red nightshirt with the purple patches, and clutching the Disconnecting Tool firmly in his left hand, followed. as he settled down behind the Water Genie, the Hoopoe turned its head to inspect him with a critical but (Haroun hoped) friendly eye.

Guardian Angel

What do you think now, angel up in heaven?
The tears just keep on coming at night
Do you know how many stars I see in the sky? Seven
I guess the gods have given up tonight.
Why didnt you tell me it was all a lie?
You're ment to see everything from the big blue sky.
Maybe you're just a lie too, you're not real
Or maybe you dont know how I truly feel
Do you, like them, think this smile is real?
Well, let me explain to you then, maybe it will help me heal

When your heart is ripped apart and your dreams are shattered,
When your pride is bruized and your dignity, battered,
When your smile is fake and your laugh, broken,
When you die every night because your lonesome,
When your falling forever into a black abyss
And the only thing that can save you is his kiss
You know you need an angel, you even start to pray
But his face haunts you. Even when in your bed you lay

I pray for a guardian angel, even when I know things like that dont exist
But theres nothing more to do, as you cross things of your neverending list

Poem of the Week: 'Does It Matter?'

To complement my recommended reading this Remembrance Sunday, I thought I would show you a poem overflowing with sarcasm and revulsion at the senseless destruction of war:

'Does It Matter?' by Siegfried Sassoon

DOES it matter?—losing your legs?...
For people will always be kind,
And you need not show that you mind
When the others come in after hunting
To gobble their muffins and eggs.	5
Does it matter?—losing your sight?...
There’s such splendid work for the blind;
And people will always be kind,
As you sit on the terrace remembering
And turning your face to the light.	10
Do they matter?—those dreams from the pit?...
You can drink and forget and be glad,
And people won’t say that you’re mad;
For they’ll know you’ve fought for your country
And no one will worry a bit.

Recommended Reading: Regeneration

Regeneration by Pat Barker

The First World War has inspired some of the most powerful, emotive and unforgettable literature ever written. Those of you in my Y9-11 classes have, for example, read some of the World War One poems from the Opening Lines anthology. This week, I am recommending you all try reading Regeneration by Pat Barker. Written a few years ago, it tells the story of Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon (two of the WW1 poets) whilst they are being treated at Craiglockhart hospital in Scotland for the psychiatric damage the war has done them. Through a number of flashbacks, together with the story of their 'exploits' whilst in hospital, this book floods the mind of the reader with the brutal horrors of war, and the takes us face to face with the shocking reality of combat. On 'Remembrance Sunday', it seems fitting to introduce you to a book which, for once, tells the truth of war as the inhuman and cruel nightmare it really is.

Here is a brief extract:

Rivers watched the play of emotions on Prior's face as he fitted the recovered memory into his past. He was unprepared for what happened next.

"Is that all?" Prior said.

He seemed to be beside himself with rage. "I don't know about all," Rivers said. "I'd've thought that was a traumatic experience by any standards."

Prior almost spat at him. "It was nothing."

He put his head in his hands, at first, it seemed, in bewilderment, but then after a few moments he began to cry. Rivers waited a while, then walked round the desk and offered his handkerchief. Instead of taking it, Prior seized Rivers by the arms, and began butting him in the chest, hard enough to hurt. This was not an attack, Rivers realized, though it felt like one. It was the closest Prior could come to asking for physical contact. Rivers was reminded of a nanny goat on his brother's farm, being lifted almost off her feet by the suckling kid. Rivers held Prior's shoulders, and after while the butting stopped. Prior raised his blind and slobbery face. "Sorry about that."

"That's all right." He waited for Prior to wipe his face, then asked, "What did you think happened?"

"I didn't know."

"Yes, you did. You thought you knew."

"I knew two of my men had been killed. I thought." He stopped. "I think it must've been my fault. We were in the same trenches we'd been in when I first arrived. The line's terrible there. It winds in and out of brick stacks. A lot of the trenches face the wrong way. Even in daylight with a compass and a map you can get lost. At night.I'd been there about a week, I suppose, when a man took out patrol to see if a particular dugout was occupied at night. Compasses don't work, there's too much metal about. He'd been crawling round in circles for God knows how ling, when he came upon what he thought was a German wiring party. He ordered his men to open fire. Well, all hell was let loose. Then after a while somebody realized there were British voices shouting on both sides. Five men killed. Eleven injured. I looked at his face as he sat in the dugout and he was.You could have done that and he wouldn't've blinked. Before I'd always thought the worst thing would be if you were wounded and left out there, but when I saw his face I thought, no. This is the worst thing. And then when I couldn't remember anything except that two of my men had been killed, I thought it had to be something like that." He looked up. "I couldn't see what else I'd need to forget."

i wrote this poem so tell me what you think after reading it.

Misfit after death
Slowy kill me,
I'm lying lonely,
make me suffer,
its getting rougher,
crying faster,
you sick little elf.

Dreams are weak,
so am i,life's not over,
unless you need it to be,
I have the power to end it,
so why am i still here?

my happyness was an accident,
my heart fell asleep with darkness,
i could of been somthing but did not,
but I don't know and don't care,
I wish I could just die,
this way I'd be safe from reality.

My mind is a revolving on the other side of the door,
With both sides getting pushed on,
life is on the end of a bullet,
and I am the target,
when I find the meaning of life,
end I because then you'll know all.
Rejected from hell,buts thats just life and after,
when i need some one,you will turn and go before I ask,
I have nothing for a reason,
so i can sleep in on sunday morning.

Like the fang of baelin,
I'm going to hell
I'm the enemy of life,
the sender of a saddness,
which you will get,
but you can't change it your future has been decided.

Poem of the Week: 'Blackie, the Electric Rembrandt'

I am not sure how much this is a poem about a tattoo artist, or about a loss of innocence (or BOTH) - but I love it! Thom Gunn, who died in 2004, was one of America's most original, unique and powerful poetic voices, and this is him at his freshest and best. It was included in his very first anthology, published in 1962. If you want to find out more about Gunn, click HERE; to read his obituary, click HERE. In the meantime, this is the poem...

Blackie, the Electric Rembrandt

We watch through the shop-front while
Blackie draws stars - an equal

concentration on his and
the youngster's faces. The hand

is steady and accurate;
but the boy does not see it

for his eyes follow the point
that touches (quick, dark movement!)

a virginal arm beneath
his rolled sleeve: he holds his breath.

...Now that it is finished, he
hands a few bills to Blackie

and leaves with a bandage on
his arm, under which gleam ten

stars, hanging in a blue thick
cluster. Now he is starlike.

by Thom Gunn (1962)

Recommended Reading: A Room with a View

'A Room With A View' by E. M. Forster

In the summer of 1989, I first discovered my true love for English Literature. Prior to then, I had not really read very regularly; after this point, I devoured amazing literature insatiably. And it all started with my reading of this book - and the film that was made of it in the 1980s.

The book was written in the early 1900s, and is, essentially, a love story, so I guess this might put off many of the boys reading this blog (although it shouldn't!). Set amid the extraordinarily conventional world of Edwardian society, it tells the story of a love affair on which society frowns, but which blossoms in the end anyway. And, along the way, Forster reveals more about human nature and the meaning of life than you would learn in 100 other books.

You might not like it; it might not be your cup of tea. But I can't think of any better recommendation than to recommend the book which single-handedly switched me on to the subject I teach. It is NOT the best book I have ever read, but it must have had something pretty special about it to have such a powerful effect on me as a 15-year-old reluctant reader. If you like it, you could do a lot worse than to move on then to Forster's masterpiece: 'A Passage to India' - quite simply one of the most amazing and profound books you are ever likely to read, and, if you are even remotely interested in the Indian subcontinent, one of the most important ones too. But, as an introduction to Forster, there is no better place to start than the pages of 'A Room With A View'...

Click HERE to read an extract from the novel.

And click HERE to download some helpful FACTSHEETS on the novel.

Recommended Reading: Goodnight Mister Tom

Goodnight Mister Tom by Michelle Magorian

Looking for a book which has won dozens of AWARDS; a book which is loved by children and adults nationwide; and a book which, at different points, will make you beam with happiness, choke with tears or boil with anger? Well this book does all of that and more. It tells the touching tale of a poor, bedraggled, abused evacuee who is sent for safety to the countryside during World War Two, only to find his life transformed as a result. This comes highly recommended, and here is an extract from the first chapter:

‘Yes,’ said Tom bluntly, on opening the front door. ‘What do you want?’
A harassed middle-aged woman in a green coat and felt hat stood on his step. He glanced at the armband on her sleeve. She gave him an awkward smile.
‘I’m the Billeting Officer for this area,’ she began.
‘Oh yes, and what’s that got to do wi’me?’
She flushed slightly. ‘Well, Mr, Mr...’
‘Oakley. Thomas Oakley.’
‘Ah, thank you, Mr Oakley.’ She paused and took a deep breath.
‘Mr Oakley, with the declaration of war imminent...’
Tom waved his hand. ‘I knows all that. Get to the point. What d’you want?’
He noticed a small boy at her side.
‘It’s him I’ve come about,’ she said. ‘I’m on my way to your village hall with the others.’
‘What others?’
She stepped to one side. Behind the large iron gate which stood at the end of the graveyard were a small group of children. Many of them were filthy and very poorly clad. Only a handful had a blazer or coat.
They all looked bewildered and exhausted. One tiny dark-haired girl in the front was hanging firmly on to a new teddybear. The woman touched the boy at her side and pushed him forward.
‘There’s no need to tell me,’ said Tom. ‘It’s obligatory and it’s for the war effort.’
‘You are entitled to choose your child, I know,’ began the woman apologetically.
Tom gave a snort.
‘But,’ she continued, ‘his mother wants him to be with someone who’s religious or near a church. She was quite adamant. Said she would only let him be evacuated if he was.’
‘Was what?’ asked Tom impatiently.
‘Near a church.’
Tom took a second look at the child. The boy was thin and sickly-looking, pale with limp, sandy hair and dull grey eyes.
‘His name’s Willie,’ said the woman.
Willie, who had been staring at the ground, looked up. Round his neck, hanging from a piece of string, was a cardboard label. It read ‘William Beech’.
Tom was well into his sixties, a healthy, robust, stockily-built man with a head of thick white hair. Although he was of average height, in Willie’s eyes he was a towering giant with skin like coarse, wrinkled brown paper and a voice like thunder.
He glared at Willie. ‘You’d best come in,’ he said abruptly.
The woman gave a relieved smile.
‘Thank you so much,’ she said, and she backed quickly away and hurried down the tiny path towards the other children.
Willie watched her go.
‘Come on in,’ repeated Tom harshly. ‘I ent got all day.’

Poem of the Week: 'The Backslappers' by Jennifer Mitchell

I think it was in the early 1990s that a book of poetry called CITY LINES was published in London. The big difference with this book was that ALL the poems were written by schoolchildren - including this dark and shocking exploration of adolescence by a 15-year-old female poet. It's impressive and powerful stuff - but don't read it if you are easily shocked...

The Backslappers

What greater secrecy of love
than the cracked tiles of the
boys’ room where faucets drip
bored to tears with tales of
girls succumbing? Through the
smoke rings they gather, nodding
and jerking their heads as they
lie about the ease they had in
breaking down the barrier of
mother-tightened pant elastic.
The most graphic, his laugh
caught short, his fag suspended,
recalls her eyes bulging as he
led her to the haven of a darkened
garage, bulbs smashed to the oily floor,
past the gleam of elbow greased cars
reflecting her ill ease as he led
her to the tea-stained mattress
erected to the worship of debasing.
His doubts are chased away as
he fills his lungs, assured that
they both enjoyed it.

Another deals the cards on spittle
and in a reversal of the sight sees
his hand calloused and yellowed
with tobacco running through her hair,
diverting knots, smells the stench
of beer covering her face, regurgitated
later behind someone’s fence like the
words he tells them all.
He feels the slither of his lips
Smearing her sister’s lipstick,
inexperienced and unwilling to learn.
But as he deals a king he ignores
the memory of her after-fumble tears,
the way she grabbed up her clothes
and tripped as she ran.
Those sitting on sinks, in front of
various phone numbers simply smile
and count their belt loads
of broken hymens, doubtless.

Jennifer Mitchell (15)
SOUTH KILBURN HIGH SCHOOL

THE RECYCLER a short story

She didnt know it, but the owner of the chunky silhouette being projected onto the brick wall was going to be recycled in two minutes, fifteen seconds. She looked down at the decaying piece of chicken nestling in the grease-ridden cardboard box. God that's rank, she thought, as she slung it petulantly into the gutter.
'OI! Eat it.'
The girl turned round.
'What?' she said stroppily.
'Eat the damn chicken.'
'What? Are you mad?' She started swaggering away; kissing her teeth.
'I'd stay here if I was you.' She looked round to see three men in council uniforms ; their arms folded.
'It's people like you that mean that people like us,' he gestured to the men either side of him, 'have to be dirty and smell bad when we go home to our families. It's people like you that earn us the scorn of the whole community. And worst of all you dont even know it'.
The man chuckled as the girl made a second attempt at escape, which didn't last long because two heavy-set men grabbed her and thrust her on to a rusty metal surface. She made attempts to cry for help but was silenced by the whirring of the industrial machinery, her bones cracking like a piece of discarded chicken. As the girl's life was being slowly absorbed by the everafter her final thought read: Jesus, I'm being recycled.......

Recommended Reading: The Day of the Triffids

The Day Of The Triffids by John Wyndham

A novel about killer, giant plants should NOT be scary - but somehow this book manages to be not only BELIEVABLE but also absolutely TERRIFYING. I first read it in my English lessons when I was in Year 9, and I was totally gripped - so maybe some of you would be too. Here is an extract from the beginning of the book. Read the rest if you dare...

The End Begins

When a day that you happen to know is Wednesday starts off by sounding like Sunday, there is something seriously wrong somewhere.
I felt that from the moment I woke. And yet, when I started functioning a little more smartly, I became doubtful. After all, the odds were that it was I who was wrong, and not everyone else—though I did not see how that could be. I went on waiting, tinged with doubt. But presently I had my first bit of objective evidence—a distant clock struck what sounded to me just like eight. I listened hard and suspiciously. Soon another clock began, on a hard, decisive note. In a leisurely fashion it gave an indisputable eight. Then I knew things were awry.
The way I came to miss the end of the world—well, the end of the world I had known for close on thirty years—was sheer accident: like a lot of survival, when you come to think of it. In the nature of things a good many somebodies are always in hospital, and the law of averages had picked on me to be one of them a week or so before. It might just as easily have been the week before that—in which case I’d not be writing now: I’d not be here at all. But chance played it not only that I should be in hospital at that particular time, but that my eyes, and indeed my whole head, should be wreathed in bandages—and that’s why I have to be grateful to whoever orders these averages. At the time, however, I was only peevish, wondering what in thunder went on, for I had been in the place long enough to know that, next to the matron, the clock is the most sacred thing in a hospital.
Without a clock the place simply couldn’t work. Each second there’s someone consulting it on births, deaths, doses, meals, lights, talking, working, sleeping, resting, visiting, dressing, washing—and hitherto it had decreed that someone should begin to wash and tidy me up at exactly three minutes after 7 a.m. That was one of the best reasons I had for appreciating a private room. In a public ward the messy proceeding would have taken place a whole unnecessary hour earlier. But here, today, clocks of varying reliability were continuing to strike eight in all directions—and still nobody had shown up.
Much as I disliked the sponging process, and useless as it had been to suggest that the help of a guiding hand as far as the bathroom could eliminate it, its failure to occur was highly disconcerting. Besides, it was normally a close forerunner of breakfast, and I was feeling hungry.
Probably I would have been aggrieved about it any morning, but today, this Wednesday, May 8, was an occasion of particular personal importance. I was doubly anxious to get all the fuss and routine over because this was the day they were going to take off my bandages.
I groped around a bit to find the bell push and let them have a full five seconds’ clatter, just to show what I was thinking of them.
While I was waiting for the pretty short-tempered response that such a peal ought to bring, I went on listening.
The day outside, I realized now, was sounding even more wrong than I had thought. The noises it made, or failed to make, were more like Sunday than Sunday itself—and I’d come round again to being absolutely assured that it was Wednesday, whatever else had happened to it.
Why the founders of St. Merryn’s Hospital chose to erect their institution at a main-road crossing upon a valuable office site, and thus expose their patients’ nerves to constant laceration, is a foible that I never properly understood. But for those fortunate enough to be suffering from complaints unaffected by the wear and tear of continuous traffic, it did have the advantage that one could lie abed and still not be out of touch, so to speak, with the flow of life. Customarily the west-bound busses thundered along trying to beat the lights at the corner; as often as not a pig-squeal of brakes and a salvo of shots from the silencer would tell that they hadn’t. Then the released cross traffic would rev and roar as it started up the incline. And every now and then there would be an interlude: a good grinding bump, followed by a general stoppage—exceedingly tantalizing to one in my condition, where the extent of the contretemps had to be judged entirely by the degree of profanity resulting. Certainly, neither by day nor during most of the night, was there any chance of a St. Merryn patient being under the impression that the common round had stopped just because he, personally, was on the shelf for the moment.
But this morning was different. Disturbingly, because mysteriously, different. No wheels rumbled, no busses roared, no sound of a car of any kind, in fact, was to be heard; no brakes, no horns, not even the clopping of the few rare horses that still occasionally passed; nor, as there should be at such an hour, the composite tramp of work-bound feet.
The more I listened, the queerer it seemed—and the less I cared for it. In what I reckoned to be ten minutes of careful listening I heard five sets of shuffling, hesitating footsteps, three voices bawling unintelligibly in the distance, and the hysterical sobs of a woman. There was not the cooing of a pigeon, not the chirp of a sparrow. Nothing but the humming of wires in the wind. . . .

Poem of the Week: 'The Jaguar' by Ted Hughes

Very few poets have been as obsessed with the power of NATURE as Ted Hughes - one of the most famous and influential British poets of the 20th century. He believed passionately in nature's ascendancy over mankind, and this is just one of the poems in which he explores this immense power. It was written after watching a jaguar's cage in a zoo, and shows both awe and fear of this magnificent creature.

If you are interested, click here for a short essay on Hughes' animal poems in general - and see if there are any others you would like to read. (The essay also gives some excellent examples of how to EMBED quotations in your own essays, for those of you who want help with this.)

All that aside, however, enjoy the poem...

The apes yawn and adore their fleas in the sun.
The parrots shriek as if they were on fire, or strut
Like cheap tarts to attract the stroller with the nut.
Fatigued with indolence, tiger and lion

Lie still as the sun. The boa-constrictor’s coil
Is a fossil. Cage after cage seems empty, or
Stinks of sleepers from the breathing straw.
It might be painted on a nursery wall.

But who runs like the rest past these arrives
At a cage where the crowd stands, stares, mesmerized,
As a child at a dream, at a jaguar hurrying enraged
Through prison darkness after the drills of his eyes

On a short fierce fuse. Not in boredom—
The eye satisfied to be blind in fire,
By the bang of blood in the brain deaf the ear—
He spins from the bars, but there’s no cage to him

More than to the visionary his cell:
His stride is wildernesses of freedom:
The world rolls under the long thrust of his heel.
Over the cage floor the horizons come.

Recommended Reading: Lord of the Flies

The Lord of the Flies by William Golding

This is a tremendously dark vision of what happens to a group of schoolboys when they are stranded on a desert island without any adults to keep them in order. This new 'community' goes swiftly from order to chaos, as the boys show just how close all of us are to the more violent, vicious and animalistic urges deep within.

This book is often studied at GCSE, and never fails to mesmerise the reader. It's not for the faint-hearted, but if you can cope with being launched almost physically into a nightmare world whose evil is all too human, then I strongly suggest you give it a go. And if you're a fan of the C4 series, Lost, this book is an absolute MUST, because that programme could never have been made if this book hadn't been written first...

Instead of PRINTING an extract this week, I thought it would make a change for you to LISTEN to one instead. Click on this LINK, and then click on listen to an extract. Just make sure you have REALplayer on your system first. (You can download that for free HERE.)

Poems of the Week: 'Education for Leisure' by Carol Ann Duffy and 'The Hitcher' by Simon Armitage

These two poems were in the old AQA GCSE anthology which we don't study any more; but they are certainly worth having a look at anyway: two different reflections on the theme of VIOLENCE - and its cause and effect. Click HERE for a powerpoint presentation on the two poems, if you're interested.

Education for Leisure

Today I am going to kill something. Anything.
I have had enough of being ignored and today
I am going to play God. It is an ordinary day,
a sort of grey with boredom stirring in the streets.

I squash a fly against the window with my thumb.
We did that at school. Shakespeare. It was in
another language and now the fly is in another language.
I breathe out talent on the glass to write my name.

I am a genius. I could be anything at all, with half
the chance. But today I am going to change the world.
Something’s world. The cat avoids me. The cat
knows I am a genius, and has hidden itself.

I pour the goldfish down the bog. I pull the chain.
I see that it is good. The budgie is panicking.
Once a fortnight, I walk the two miles into town
for signing on. They don’t appreciate my autograph.

There is nothing left to kill. I dial the radio
and tell the man he’s talking to a superstar.
He cuts me off. I get our bread-knife and go out.
The pavements glitter suddenly. I touch your arm.

The Hitcher

I'd been tired, under
the weather, but the ansaphone kept screaming:
One more sick note, mister, and you're finished. Fired.
I thumbed a lift to where the car was parked.
A Vauxhall Astra. It was hired.

I picked him up in Leeds.
He was following the sun to west from east
with just a toothbrush and the good earth for a bed. The truth,
he said, was blowin' in the wind,
or round the next bend.

I let him have it
on the top road out of Harrogate-once
with the head, then six times with the krooklok
in the face-and didn't even swerve.
I dropped it into third

and leant across
to let him out, and saw him in the mirror
bouncing off the kerb, then disappearing down the verge.
We were the same age, give or take a week.
He said he like the breeze

to run it's fingers
through his hair. It was twelve noon.
The outlook for the day was moderate to fair.
Stitch that, I remember thinking,
you can walk from there.

Analyse/Review/Comment Writing - Exemplar 1

You'll be working on this in your lessons this week (if you're in Years 9-11), but I thought it would help if I posted it on the BLOG too. This is an exemplar response to an ARC question.

Exam Question: It has been suggested that having 169 TV channels and building motorways through the countryside is ‘progress’. Analyse this view of progress, commenting on why things are developing in this way and what reasons people might have to disagree.

PLAN
Intro: Evolution
• Dr. Robert Oppenheimer
• Medicine
• Computers
• Entertainment
• Industrialisation
Conclusion: Back to basics

Ever since Neanderthal man first rubbed dry sticks to make fire or figured out that wheels work better when round, mankind has sought progress. It’s just another form of evolution: Darwin should be proud. However, the greater our advances, the more controversial they can become; to the extent that many might question whether they are ‘progress’ at all. When progress ameliorates life, that is one thing; but when it simply improves lifestyle, that is something else entirely.

Interestingly, Dr Robert Oppenheimer must have understood this debate all too well. In the 1930s, he was the chief scientist in charge of the development of the USA’s nuclear technology. Only a few years later, the American government harnessed this very same technology to drop atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Oppenheimer spent the rest of his life campaigning against nuclear proliferation so much that the American government started to restrict his personal freedom. What would he have said if asked if any ‘progress’ had really been achieved?

Nonetheless, it is important for us to acknowledge the complexity of the issue, and few could argue that some progress is unequivocally good. In medicine, for example, advances in technology have led to the eradication of diseases which, as little as fifty years ago, claimed victims every day. Even AIDS, until recently thought invincible, may now have a cure or vaccination in sight.

Similarly, computer technology has totally transformed the way in which we live our lives today, and many of us rely on our trusty PC to organise everything from our finances to our daily routines. I defy anyone to argue that my iPod is not a good thing – six hours driving to the Lake District over the summer would have been toddler hell without the entire Horrid Henry back catalogue playing over the car stereo. And where would we be in schools, without computers to improve both teaching and learning?

However, it is not difficult to flip the coin of progress to the other, less shiny side. For example, how many channels do we really need on our TV sets? I have free access to dozens of channels now, and there is still, invariably, very little worth watching. Instead, television’s hold over our lives is becoming more and more intense, and, to the benefit of whom? In the words of Bruce Springsteen, there are “57 channels and nothing on”.

It is also hard to dispute that the increasing industrialisation of society is placing our planet in grave danger. A new motorway might cut the journey time from A to B in two; but it cuts the countryside in two too. Cheap plane travel might send thousands more people into the sky; but that sky is choking as a result. When progress is at the expense of the planet we inhabit, some would say that it is not progress at all. After all, what is the point of improving life on earth, if there will be no earth to host it?

When you think about it, it is easy to sympathise with those who favour a more ‘no-nonsense’, ‘back to basics’ approach to life. If you were to remove all technology from your life, would you really be worse off? I would miss my iPod, but I managed before I first bought it; and there are few ailments I fight off through a trip to Boots that a decent shaman couldn’t cure with a few crushed leaves and a nice hot poultice. And as for roads and interminable television, they may well spruce up my lifestyle – but my life could probably do perfectly well without them.

Poem of the Week: 'Who knows if the moon's a balloon?' by e. e. cummings

who knows if the moon's
a balloon, coming out of a keen city
in the sky--filled with pretty people?
(and if you and i should

get into it,if they
should take me and take you into their balloon,
why then
we'd go up higher with all the pretty people

than houses and steeples and clouds:
go sailing
away and away sailing into a keen
city which nobody's ever visited, where

always
it's
Spring)and everyone's
in love and flowers pick themselves

Recommended Reading: Waterland

The very best novels I have read have changed me: they have changed the way I think; they have changed the way I write; and they have changed the way I live. This might sound like an exaggeration, but it is not. One of the novels to have this profound effect on me was Waterland by Graham Swift. Written in 1983, I first read it in 1996, whilst I was travelling in South East Asia. I spent several weeks staying in a tiny guest house on stilts above the waters of the estuary of the Terrenganau river on the north-east of the Malay peninsula, and every waking (and sleeping) moment of mine was spent with the sounds and the smells and the sight of this vast waterway overwhelming my senses. It couldn't have been a more apt place, therefore, to read this novel, about a History teacher who grew up in the Norfolk fens, beside the river Ouse, and whose life was permeated by the 'spirit' of that river, ever since he discovered in it the dead body of one of his friends. It's part thriller - and part 'coming of age' novel, but the most extraordinary thing for me was the way in which the story was TOLD, with a narrative which lulled me and hypnotised me with its freshness, originality and almost musical command of the written word and, above all, the art of storytelling. There's always a danger recommending something THIS highly, for fear you might be disappointed. But I am recommending it nonetheless. These are the opening paragraphs:

"And don't forget," my father would say, as if he expected me at any moment to up and leave to seek my fortune in the wide world, "whatever you learn about people, however bad they turn out, each one of them has a heart, and each one of them was once a tiny baby sucking his mother's milk..."

Fairy-tale words; fairy-tale advice. But we lived in a fairy-tale place. In a lock-keeper's cottage, by a river, in the middle of the Fens. Far away from the wide world. And my father, who was a superstitious man, liked to do things in such a way as to make them seem magical and occult. So he would always set his eel traps at night. Not because eel traps cannot be set by day, but because the mystery of the darkness appealed to him. And one night, in midsummer, in 1937, we went with him, Dick and I, to set traps near Stott's Bridge. It was hot and windless. When the traps had been set we lay back on the riverbank. Dick was fourteen and I was ten. The pumps were tump-tumping, as they do, incessantly, so that you scarcely notice them, all over the Fens, and frogs were croaking in the ditches. Up above, the sky swarmed with stars which seemed to multiply as we looked at them. And as we lay, Dad said: "Do you know what the stars are? They are the silver dust of God's blessing. They are little broken-off bits of heaven. God cast them down to fall on us. But when he saw how wicked we were, he changed his mind and ordered the stars to stop. Which is why they hang in the sky but seem as though at any time they might drop...

Alices Adventures in Wonderland

If any of you arent reading a book at the moment then i strongly recommend you read Alices adventures in Wonderland. Its one of the best books i've ever read and even though it was written quite some time ago the language isnt at all difficult, if i could read it when i was in year 4 them i'm sure you can read it now. You'll enjoy it alot , its one of those books that you can't put down(in my opinion anyway).

Recommended Reading: The Catcher in the Rye

This is the opening of The Catcher in the Rye by J.D.Salinger. Written in 1951, it has turned out to be one of the most controversial American novels of the 20th Century. Even in the 1990s, it was the 13th most challenged book in American schools and libraries. Basically, it tells the story, from a first person narrative, of a teenage boys adventures in New York City, after running away from his Private School. It offers a captivating view of male adolescence and 'coming of age'.

Chapter 1

IF YOU REALLY WANT TO HEAR about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth. In the first place, that stuff bores me, and in the second place, my parents would have about two hemorrhages apiece if I told anything pretty personal about them. They're quite touchy about anything like that, especially my father. They're nice and all - I'm not saying that - but they're also touchy as hell. Besides, I'm not going to tell you my whole goddam autobiography or anything. I'll just tell you about this madman stuff that happened to me around last Christmas just before I got pretty run-down and had to come out here and take it easy. I mean that's all I told D.B. about, and he's my brother and all. He's in Hollywood. That isn't too far from this crumby place, and he comes over and visits me practically every week end. He's going to drive me home when I go home next month maybe. He just got a Jaguar. One of those lithe English jobs that can do around two hundred miles an hour. It cost him damn near four thousand bucks. He's got a lot of dough, now. He didn't use to. He used to be just a regular writer, when he was home. He wrote this terrific book of short stories, The Secret Goldfish, in case you never heard of him. The best one in it was "The Secret Goldfish." It was about this little kid that wouldn't let anybody look at his goldfish because he'd bought it with his own money. It killed me. Now he's out in Hollywood, D.B., being a prostitute. If there's one thing I hate, it's the movies. Don't even mention them to me.