Recently in Culture Category

Chatting to Patrick last night, we agreed that this extraordinary collection could easily be the Earth Room from the Doctor's Tardis museum. I do hope Jay Walker leaves it to the good people of Connecticut in his will. 

Last night, in the space of three hours, this blog received comments from two unlikely sources. 

Don't be. From the 9th of August, The Orwell Prize will be posting George Orwell's diary to this blog, each entry exactly seventy years after he wrote it. I've always loved his diaries and essays more than any aspect of his writing, so this is perfect.

Andy Nicoll, the Sun's bearded pard and former lumberjack, defies the stereotypes many have of tabloid journalists. It may be the case that he's had to rein in his desire to use long words in his day-job, but he's saved them all up for his new book.

For instance, the first page includes "capriciousness", "coalescing", "cartographers" and "commandeered", as well as some other long words that don't begin with the letter "c". A review copy of which fell into our hands via a charity shop, one day before the official release, you see.

Perhaps a reader of his column had expected something more tabloid.

Anyway, a fuller review will follow in due course. I told Andy I'd try to read it all over my lunchbreak, but I've only managed the first page. Sorry. You can buy it here from tomorrow.