Thoughts about things I’ve written or read or heard or seen. An attempt to stay positive in a turbulent world.
Recent Articles
Ukraine: & how we can help #StandWithUkraine
Click on the images below for links about where and how to donate money or supplies and how to support people directly.Continue reading→
Valentine’s Day Traditions
There are at least three different saints who answer to the name Valentine or Valentinus. One legend of St Valentine tells how, when in prison, he sent a letter to a young girl—possibly his jailor’s daughter. He signed it: ‘From your Valentine’. Some countries dislike or actively ban Valentine’s Day celebrations, some countries celebrate a...Continue reading→
Worldwide Ways of Welcoming New Year
Different peoples in different countries do different things to welcome a new year. In SIBERIA, in Lake Baikal, the largest freshwater lake in the world, and in the River Lena nearby, a Christmas Tree is taken to the bottom on new year’s eve. It’s usually freezing. I’m not sure why they do this … ....Continue reading→
Buy Black for Christmas (and beyond)
If you’re white, like me, perhaps you haven’t consciously thought about seeking out Black-owned businesses and shops to buy from. My own seeking-out was prompted by the marvellous Nova Reid (whose antiracism course has taught me so much about my own racism and how to unearth, interrogate and set about dismantling it). Here are some...Continue reading→
The Eleven, no, Twelve Days of COP26
When the Queen addressed world leaders at the beginning of COP26 she said: Act for our children and our children’s children. COP26, the 26th UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties, follows The Paris Agreement, a 2015 international agreement on climate change. The aim of COP26 is to secure commitments from the world’s nations to...Continue reading→
Betty Campbell taught Black British history every month
On September 29, 2021, in Cardiff, a statue was unveiled to Betty Campbell, the first Black British headteacher in Wales, and the first to teach Black British History all the time (not just in Black History Month – which began in October 1987 in the UK, and is celebrated, in the UK, every October.) This...Continue reading→
White Allies Network, and Black British History
On 2 September, I joined the White Allies Network. They are, as they say on their website: A network of people that are committed to learn and do what it takes to be counted true allies against racism. It consists of white people who aspire to be true allies and people of colour that are willing...Continue reading→
Reading as a writer. Writing as a reader. And the Women’s Prize for Fiction 2021
Last week a friend of mine and I talked about the six books shortlisted for this year’s Women’s Prize for Fiction. We’ve done it before and it’s always illuminating (and fun) but because we both write fiction, our conversations are often also about the nature of reading fiction as a writer. Neither of us read –...Continue reading→
Black Minds Matter (BMM) : donations #BMMUK21K
I’ve been in therapy, but the reasons for my therapy have never included the trauma of racism, of living inside a black or brown skin in a white-supremacist society. Nor have I been misinterpreted because the colour of my therapist’s skin was different from my own. Which is why Black Minds Matter (BMM) is so necessary,...Continue reading→
Women’s Prize for Fiction 2021
This week is the week of the Women’s Prize Virtual Shortlist Festival. For the (almost invisible) amount of £12 you’ll have access to three evenings of readings by the shortlisted writers: there are some wonderful works to hear extracts from on Monday 14th, Tuesday 15th and Wednesday 16th. I have loved Piranesi by Susanna Clarke: she...Continue reading→
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