The weather is (finally!) warming up, the days are lengthening as we approach the summer solstice, hay-fever sufferers are monitoring the daily pollen count and we are, of course, in the middle of exam season.
If you are the parent or grandparent of a teenager or can see teenagers in your church hard at it, you might have sympathy with the wise words of Ecclesiastes: ‘Of making many books there is no end, and much study wearies the body’ (Ecc.12:12).
At the end of October, the British Library suffered a paralysing cyber attack which affected their website and many online services.
Sir Roly Keating, the British Library’s Chief Executive, stated that: ‘The people responsible for this cyber attack stand against everything that libraries represent: openness, empowerment, and access to knowledge.’ Nonetheless, their physical sites have stayed open, and I was recently delighted to visit their Fantasy: Realms of Imagination exhibition.
‘When shall we three meet again?’ ‘Kiss me, Kate!’ ‘Et tu, Brute?’ ‘We are such stuff as dreams are made on and our little life is rounded with a sleep.’
Imagine a world without the Forest of Arden, Malvolio’s yellow stockings or the drama of Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor’s Antony and Cleopatra. Were it not for a small group of men in 1623, we wouldn’t have any of them.
Have you ever tried asking your Alexa, Cortana or even Chat GPT to ‘open the pod bay doors’?
Without exception they will reply: ‘I’m sorry, Dave. I can’t do that.’ [When proofreading, we tried this on Siri and the answer was ‘Oh, not again!’ (en subs)] This is, of course, a reference to HAL, the ship’s computer, from the film 2001: A Space Odyssey, which famously goes rogue, developing a personality and priorities of its own.
Like many others, our family has been hooked on the BBC series The Traitors. The runaway success story of pre-Christmas broadcasting (helped by its positioning alongside the football World Cup), The Traitors has enjoyed an even stronger afterlife thanks to word of mouth and BBC iPlayer.
Depending on when you read this, you may be planning on watching or have recently watched the King’s Christmas Broadcast on TV.
Or perhaps enjoyed some of the celebratory programming around the centenary of the BBC – the British Broadcasting Corporation – even if celebrities doing the tango to the Casualty theme tune on Strictly might have seemed a rather peculiar way of marking the occasion.
If you’d asked me a year ago what my opinion was of Formula One, I would have probably said that I didn’t really see the point and wasn’t it a massive waste of fuel to drive round and round in a circle for a couple of hours?
However, due to the combined influence of a keen teenage son and Netflix’s glorious soap opera, Drive to Survive, I have become an avid fan and now find myself making knowledgeable pronouncements like ‘Ferrari’s tyre strategy is all over the place this season’!
It’s a hot day. Troop after troop of heavily armoured soldiers march past carrying pikes, swords and the colours of their lords.
You pass tents selling bespoke weaponry, mead, and every kind of medieval clothing. A lady swishes past in long skirts with what looks like a miniature dragon on her shoulder until you realise it’s a very cleverly designed puppet and you hear the sound of the PA system announcing that the re-enactment is about to begin.
Over the past couple of months, I have enjoyed watching the Royal Shakespeare Company’s two-parter Henry VI: Rebellion and Wars of the Roses.
These less frequently performed plays about the late medieval period in our history, were very thought-provoking in a world where power-struggles, war and acts of violence are sadly still the norm. Perhaps one of the most enjoyable aspects of this story for the audience, was seeing the rise of Richard, Duke of Gloucester, soon to become the infamous Richard III.
There has been something of a furore over Pixar’s latest animated movie offering, Turning Red.
The film has provoked strong reactions, with audiences either loving or hating it. Its fans love the quirky animation style and accurate portrayal of teenage girls whilst its detractors have been horrified by references to puberty, labelling its Chinese-Canadian heroine Mei ‘unrelatable’.
March marks the 25th anniversary of World Book Day.
For parents there is the nightmare of having to come up with a last-minute costume, amusingly depicted by the BBC comedy Motherland and numerous internet memes. My favourite is the picture that went viral, of two confused-looking children in regular school uniform carrying a toaster and a hairdryer. The caption reads: ‘My children dressed as the Argos catalogue’.
Christmas is over. Oh no it isn’t! As December draws to a close and we look forward to 2022, we reach Twelfth Night or the eve of Epiphany.
In earlier times, the days after Christmas were often a time of celebration as opposed to the more solemn period of Advent – something which is hard to imagine now, when ‘Christmas’ seems to start in shops and TV adverts as soon as we hit November!
The toothbrush. The walrus. The pencil. The handlebar. The Dali.
The last two should have given the game away; I’m talking, of course, about moustache styles. November, or ‘Mo-vember’ as it is often renamed, is Men’s Health Awareness Month and you may have been aware of friends sporting various ’taches reminiscent of dodgy bandits or luxuriant WWI fighter aces.
September is one of my favourite times of year. Keats called it the season of ‘mists and mellow fruitfulness’.
It marks the start of the academic year – new school shoes and lots of enthusiasm from both teachers and students. If we’re lucky, there’s an Indian Summer beautifully balanced by that crispness in the air in the early mornings. Closer to home, it is the month of our wedding anniversary and my youngest son’s birthday; he has the distinction of being born on Hobbit Day. Hobbit Day is the 22nd September, a date chosen because it is Bilbo and Frodo Baggins’ joint birthday. In the last few decades, it has become an opportunity for Tolkien fans across the globe to share their appreciation and enjoyment of Tolkien’s work.
During lockdown I was sent the following meme: ‘The Science graduate asks: “Why does it work?” The Engineering graduate asks: “How does it work?” The Economist asks: “How much will it cost?” The Arts graduate asks: “Do you want fries with that?”’
As an Arts graduate and English teacher, I was, like Queen Victoria, not amused. The Arts, like many other sectors, have suffered hugely during the pandemic and for a long time were ignored for financial support. Yet how much harder would lockdown have been without books, music, films and TV?
Cassie Martin
From exams to everyday life - do we assume the worst?
The weather is (finally!) warming up, the days are lengthening as we approach the summer solstice, hay-fever sufferers are monitoring the daily pollen count and we are, of course, in the middle of exam season.
If you are the parent or grandparent of a teenager or can see teenagers in your church hard at it, you might have sympathy with the wise words of Ecclesiastes: ‘Of making many books there is no end, and much study wearies the body’ (Ecc.12:12).