First Knight
Posted on October 30, 2006
My ten year old son is enamoured with everything medieval at the moment so we compromised on a DVD and watched The First Knight. He covered his eyes during the kissy bits - which I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed! Richard Gere was so wild and macho back then before he got all wise and grey.
I loved the way he flung about on a white stallion, belted anyone who looked sideways at Lady Gwen, dashed through the guantlet on the promise of a kiss and just looked yum the whole time. The only thing better than the young Richard Gere on a white stallion would be Johnny Depp on a white stallion.
By contrast we also watched Robin Hood - Prince of Thieves. Oh dear. Very eighties big hair and Kevin Costner’s mullet really impacted on his credibility as the prince of anything apart from maybe Prince of the Pub. I quite enjoyed it on the big screen at the time but on closer inspection the script and the acting are actually crap. Ten year old however pronounced it ‘cool’ and even ‘fully sick’. Particularly liked weapons manufacturing side of things, fletching arrows etc. Plus not too much kissing. It took a while for Maid Marion to warm to that mullet.
Filed Under Life, a writer's life | Leave a Comment
On Excavations
Posted on October 26, 2006
There was a really excellent interview with the Tasmanian writer Richard Flanagan (Gould’s Book of Fish) in last weeks Good Weekend magazine - by Catherine Keenan. The comments he made would have to strike a cord with any writer, I quote:
“Writing is always a risk if it’s worth anything, he says. He’s fond of quoting Kafka’s line that a book is an axe for the frozen sea inside us, and he talks of good writing as an excavation of the soul, a reaching down inside oneself to find something universal. ‘Of course, most days I reach down and don’t find anything at all,’ he says. ‘My wife reminds me that normally the middle year of a novel is a terrible thing. I get very, very bad depression. I have a great animating dream at the beginning and the dream is beautiful, and I chase it and chase it. Then I think my abilities are completely unequal to the dream. No matter where I go, I just see my own failure and my own mediocrity and everything I write tells me that. Then, at a certain point I just accept that I am hopeless and keep on writing.”
Filed Under Commentry, Life, a writer's life | Leave a Comment
P-Plate Protection
Posted on October 25, 2006
Another P-plate accident in the papers today. A 16 year old lost control and hit a power pole and has spinal injuries.
In a few days the deaths of the four young men in Bryon Bay will be old news but while it’s still on our minds and in our hearts, a good time to voice our concerns to NSW Premier, Morris Iemma thepremier@www.nsw.gov.au
Take a couple of minutes in memory of Mitchell, Bryce, Corey and Paul.
Filed Under Commentry, a writer's life | Leave a Comment
P-Platers
Posted on October 24, 2006
I think every parent in the country is in quiet mourning for the four teenagers killed in a car crash over the weekend. All 16 and 17 years old. I get a lump in my throat every time I hear something on the news about it. No alcohol or drugs, not even speeding, just some water on the road combined with inexperience.
Apparently the numbers of deaths of young people on Provisional plates is increasing year to year and it is definitely time that we seized hold of the problem with more training and higher entry age - apparently in the US you have to be 21 to get your full licence.
My youth was certainly littered with teenage accidents. Group of 6 kids from school died coming back from the beach one night, another friend lost his leg from the hip at 16 when a car nipped him on his motorbike. In New Zealand at that time you could get your licence - believe it or not - at 14 years old! And we were out in V8’s and V6’s hooning around the countryside, drinking usually.
There are many more cars on the roads now and too many kids in cars together. Time for us to wake up to the reality of teenage road fatalities and impose tough-love on our ‘invincible’ teens and protect them from themselves.
Filed Under Commentry, a writer's life | 1 Comment
On a Bright Note
Posted on October 23, 2006
Our future as seen by His Holiness the Dalai Lama, extract from an interview with Robert Thurman in Mother Jones magazine.
Thurman: How do you feel about the state of the world as we approach the 21st century?
The Dalai Lama: I am basically optimistic. And I see four reasons for this optimism.
First, at the beginning of this century, people never questioned the effectiveness of war, never thought there could be real peace. Now, people are tired of war and see it as ineffective in solving anything.
Second, not so long ago people believed in ideologies, systems, and institutions to save all societies. Today, they have given up such hopes and have returned to relying on the individual, on individual freedom, individual initiative, individual creativity.
Third, people once considered that religions were obsolete and that material science would solve all human problems. Now, they have become disillusioned with materialism and machinery and have realized that spiritual sciences are also indispensable for human welfare.
Finally, in the early part of this century people used up resources and dumped waste as if there were no end to anything, whereas today even the smallest children have genuine concern for the quality of the air and the water and the forests and animals. In these four respects there is a new consciousness in the world, a new sensitivity to reality.
Based on that, I am confident that the next century will be better than this one.
Filed Under Commentry, a writer's life | 2 Comments