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Showing posts with the label Philip Pullman

Stuff and Things

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The mailman left me a package slip, and in the space where he was supposed to write down the name of the sender, he wrote "Poland." ...? Poland sent me a package? I'm guessing it's copies of Fire (see snazzy cover ---->) from my Polish publisher, Wydawnictwo Nasza Ksiegarnia. Can't think why he didn't just say so. :P

Philip Pullman is still fighting hard for libraries in England. "Philip Pullman has lambasted Brent council for its comment that closing half of its libraries would help it fulfil 'exciting plans to improve libraries', describing the statement as a 'masterpiece' which 'ought to be quoted in every anthology of political bullshit from here to eternity'." HA HA HA (Thanks, R)

As a freelance writer, I found this article about how to budget for an irregular income helpful... with the exception of the suggestion that one project one's cash flow based on one's minimum monthly income from the last 12 months. T…
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"And the Whole World Collapsed"

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In my last post, while (gracelessly) complaining about the way some nonprofit organizations try to drum up support in my neighborhood, I mentioned that before I contribute to a particular organization, I like to do research on it and seek outside opinions. At the end of this post, I explain *how* I do that, and give links to help you if you want to do the same thing.

But first, over at her blog There's a Botticelli Angel Inside, Snapping Beans, Rebecca Rabinowitz is trying to get some straight answers about the difference between the UK text of Philip Pullman's The Amber Spyglass and the American text. If you're knowledgeable on this subject, please head on over and enlighten us.

Trigger warning: the next three paragraphs are about a documentary I just saw on the subject of sexual abuse by Catholic priests and the spectacular denial of Church officials. I will be brief and non-explicit, but that is the topic at hand, up until the bold Researching Nonprofits title.

Deliver …
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Poor Old Wapping

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So, I've been reading Philip Pullman's Sally Lockhart mysteries (and loving them, especially The Shadow in the North.) However, this passage in The Ruby in the Smoke startled me:

Beyond the Tower of London, between St. Katharine’s Docks and Shadwell New Basin, lies the area known as Wapping: a district of docks and warehouses, of crumbling tenements and rat-haunted alleys, of narrow streets where the only doors are at second-floor level, surmounted by crude projecting beams and ropes and pulleys. The blind brick walls at pavement level and the brutal-looking apparatus above give the place the air of some hideous dungeon from a nightmare, while the light, filtered and dulled by the grime in the air, seems to come from a long way off – as if through a high window set with bars.
Oh, dearie me! I lived in Wapping for four months, and apparently I should be glad that the year was 2004 rather than Sally Lockhart's 1872! When I was there, it was the cutest place ever! I could, …
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