Every age writes its own dialogues. Plato had Athens, with wine and philosophers reclining in the glow of Socratic irony. I have my own fireside, bottles scattered across an oak table, and a cast of minds whose shadows have shaped my own: Hardy, Wilde, Dostoevsky, Nietzsche, Jung, Scruton - and, for my own amusement, Hartley … Continue reading A Symposium of Souls
Category: Writing
Margorie McCall: Lived Once, Buried Twice
Photo courtesy of Morbidology (2024) There are many epitaphs in the world that make one pause. Keats had his “Here lies one whose name was writ in water,” and Shakespeare, ever the property lawyer, threatened to curse anyone who moved his bones. But Margorie McCall of Lurgan, County Armagh, went one better - or worse, … Continue reading Margorie McCall: Lived Once, Buried Twice
“Repent, Harlequin!” – A Meditation on Time, Tyranny, and the Tick of the Clock
If I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream is Ellison’s scream of despair, then “Repent, Harlequin!” Said the Ticktockman is his snarl of defiance. Where one story traps us in eternal torment beneath the circuits of a god-machine, this tale sets us against a more mundane, and in many ways more sinister tyrant: the … Continue reading “Repent, Harlequin!” – A Meditation on Time, Tyranny, and the Tick of the Clock
I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream
I remember the first time I read Harlan Ellison’s I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream. It wasn’t just a story; it was an assault. A literary thunderclap. Most science fiction of the Cold War era promised us rockets, aliens, perhaps a better tomorrow wrapped in chrome optimism. Ellison, instead, offered us a world … Continue reading I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream
The Tale of the Broken Flower Pot
A Story from the Settle Flowerpot Festival I’ve spent a fair bit of time in the Yorkshire Dales this year so far, so, I’ve crafted a little story inspired by Settle’s penchant for flamboyant flower pots. Enjoy. In the crook of an old dry-stone wall, on the edge of Settle’s bustling village square, there lived … Continue reading The Tale of the Broken Flower Pot
Wording 