The local council has produced a largely, brightly-coloured sticker reading ‘SLOW DOWN IN OUR VILLAGE’ for all residents to stick on their wheelie-bins. Almost all of them have, so that once week anyone driving in the area will have this bossy imperative nagging at them from every doorstep. Is this what the Tories are calling… Continue reading The Big (Whingeing) Society
Read moreThese days, I awake thinking of the strangest things: sheikhs, fat women, primitive men, sad old bastards with guitars. In less than two weeks’ time, on Sunday 18th April, I return to the King’s Head Theatre, Islington, in the company of the finger-picking guitarist Derek Hewitson and the funny, brilliant Victoria Hart. Our show Taboo-Be-Do!… Continue reading If it’s politically incorrect and musical, I’m interested
Read moreThe door to the children’s room, to be found on the home page of this site, can now be opened. It leads to pages relating to my children’s books – pages which have been so superlatively designed by Joyce Serrano, under the project managership of my son Xan, that I now worry whether the books… Continue reading Beware of Herbert the Rat
Read moreFollowing the great debate about the deployment of the word “retard” by Vinnie Jones on Celebrity Big Brother, more words seem about to appear on the list of words which must not be used in respectable company. In this week’s Time Out, the columnist Michael Hodges has been to task for using the word “loony”… Continue reading Another triumph for the language police
Read moreIt seems that I am in trouble with that estimable organization Mencap. We have fallen out over the tricky question of offensive language on TV after I had written in the Independent in support of an Ofcom ruling which had ruled in favour of Channel 4 and Celebrity Big Brother. There had been a row… Continue reading Glee, Ricky Gervais and Vinnie Jones – the offensiveness debate gets confusing
Read moreThe phrase “community consultation” has a warm and friendly feel to it. Politicians of all parties agree that local communities represent all that is good, noble and unsung about modern Britain. As for consultation, it is of course an essential part of a caring, 21st century democracy. But not always. Having just been on the… Continue reading How to put the ‘con’ into consultation: a five-point lesson from a wind energy firm (and its PR agency)
Read moreThis week I spent a day in prison, thanks to the good offices of the writers’ organization, English PEN. I was part of an ongoing programme aimed to get prisoners talking about their own writing and reading with professional authors. In a sense, the conversations I had with the men of HMP Downview and, in… Continue reading A day in prison
Read moreOn Radio Two’s Jeremy Vine Show today, there was, according to the Eastern Daily Press online report, a “heated debate” about Tesco, whose plan to bring a store to the centre of Sheringham was being discussed this morning by North Norfolk planning committee. As part of that discussion – the only one opposing the Tesco… Continue reading The Tesco juggernaut hits a bump
Read moreA rare moment of prescience. In Friday’s Independent, I released a brief but heartfelt cry of anguish about the narcissistic doings of Martin Amis, Christopher Hitchens, Anna Ford, Clive James and any other ageing literati who belonged to an informal dining club back in the 1970s. I mentioned at some point that the on-stage conversation… Continue reading Hitch, Mart and their “inexhaustible conversation about womanhood in all its forms”
Read moreThe beautiful and ever-surprising cit of Norwich has always been good for a joke for the rest of the country. When a council behaves with lunatic officiousness – banning conkers or declaring hanging flower-baskets a health hazard – the story invariably comes from Norwich. The Turnip Taliban, a group of Conservatives who briefly dared to… Continue reading Alan Partridge or Norwich, City of Culture? No contest
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