Author Archives: James - Page 69
Twenty Years on the Internet
(Photo credit: Wikipedia) It's so long ago that I've forgotten the exact date, but I first used the internet in February 1995 when I was working as a local system administrator for the UK Energy Efficiency Office. I had a second-hand 386 laptop with a 9,600 baud modem in it and I mainly got usenet through a now long defunct CompuServe account (with the snappy and memorable as my email address). My primary use of the internet was for work, I was finding out about Novell NetWare admin and Groupwise as the mail client + server software. However there were no official internet accounts, and no way of getting sign off for one. That said, everything was done in-house, with the odd specialist contractor to add expertise. So I just got on with using one of the free CDs that…
Book Review – Silesian Station by David Downing
Silesian Station by David Downing My rating: 4 of 5 stars Second in the series, and it ends where I expected the first to end. It starts a few weeks on from where the previous book left off. In late July 1939 John Russell is returning to Germany from America by boat with his son. Definitely an interesting read, Downing has clearly done his research well. There is a fantastic period feel to it. Especially the embuggerance around the travelling to and from Poland. The places and the people are very well described, and the latter are well observed and seem real. The danger in the air from unguarded comments is real for these characters, and they are mainly circumspect with strangers. I was also pleased to see how Russell's film star girlfriend develops too. She starts the story with a…
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Book Review – Shakespeare on Toast by Ben Crystal
Shakespeare on Toast: Getting a Taste for the Bard by Ben Crystal My rating: 4 of 5 stars I really enjoyed this. It definitely lives up to the title and shows Shakespeare in context as something to be performed and watched rather than read in a classroom. The language is laid bare and clearly explained in a way that I found easy to absorb. I particularly like the explanation of how Shakespeare used metre to give stage directions and show emotion. It probably helps that I've only recently finished an undergraduate creative writing course a few months ago. So now I get poetry in a way I didn't a year ago. That said this book explains it much better than my dry academic texts did, which is really the whole premise. Ignore the academics, snobs and critics. Instead listen to…
Edinburgh’s Camera Obscura
I was in Edinburgh visiting family at the weekend and amongst other things we visited the Camera Obscura up at the top of the Royal Mile. Despite many visits to Edinburgh I'd never been there before. My expectations were of a panoramic view in a classic Camera Obscura. The attraction is so much more than this. The whole place is packed full of optical illusions, most of which you are invited to directly interact with. Two of my favourites, which unfortunately I don't have pictures of because I was too busy enjoying them, were the mirror maze and the vortex tunnel. The mirror maze was a series of mirrors mounted at 60 degree intervals as you looked at them. ( from above they'd be at 60 degrees from each other). Although quite a small space from outside it was very…
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Book Review – The Psychopath Test by Jon Ronson
The Psychopath Test by Jon Ronson My rating: 4 of 5 stars I picked this one up, in paperback, some time ago because I had enjoyed The Men Who Stare at Goats. It sat on the shelf for ages, a victim of the ease of the kindle. I started reading it as my at home book in late 2014 but only finished it earlier today. I'm not sure what to make of Jon Ronson. He's a sort of gonzo journalist, although perhaps a less extremist version. He seems to have a knack of making people tell him stuff that is ridiculous and that anyone sensible wouldn't say in front of another person, let alone a journalist who was going to publish it. Perhaps it's just my prejudice against journalists and media handling training coming out. It's car crash stuff. You…