How often does one pick up a book that grips you from the very first page and simply won’t let you go until reluctantly you reach the end? I have just finished reading such a one. To hell with your ‘Da Vinci Codes,’ this is a real thriller, brilliant in fact, and it is all about… a book. Yes, that’s it. A rare, beautiful and very special book but a book nevertheless. I have to thank our guest from Tasmania, Ray Bluett for leaving this book here as I had never heard of the Australian author, Geraldine Brooks. What a discovery! I’m not surprised she is a Pulitzer Prize winner. Her writing is beautiful and what a story! I know in the postscript she gives thanks to a lot of people for their assistance but even so her erudition is something to wonder at. How come not very good writing (no names) can fly off the shelves by the millions and genuine writing like this, as far as I am aware, doesn’t seem to be such a big seller when it damn well ought to be. I know it says on the cover ‘the international best seller’ but publishers tend to put that anyway. I hope it has and will continue to have a really terrific readership. My word, I am so envious, in then nicest possible way.
It would seem the Indian summer is over: howling gales, torrential rain, thunder and lightning, hail, sleet and a distinct drop in temperature – we’ve had them all in the last forty-eight hours, even a smattering of snow, not enough to talk about really. It’s a few years since we last saw snow but it really has got very cold. The animals lie around the wood stove and move only to eat or use their box. Poor Merrill has to go outside but she’s back in a flash. Naturally with thunder and lightning virtually over the rooftops just before going to bed there was a power cut that lasted till the early morning. Power came back on about six o’clock and until then it was blackout and use a torch time when necessary.
What does one make of the student riots in London protesting the rise in university fees? The Labour government has a lot to answer for and you can add this to the list. They’re the ones who made out it is everybody’s right to have a university education when it so obviously is not so. In the first place, despite the upgrading of technical colleges etcetera to university status there simply aren’t enough places and especially, in order to garner higher fees, the universities encourage foreign students to apply for places. Secondly not everyone is material for higher education and indeed there evidently appears to be many a drop-out. I have personal experience of that from teaching in America where at least two if not more in my classes were simply not up to it and were only there so the university could fill its ethnic quota. Unfair on those students really. I’m a good one to talk considering I flunked exams two years running.
Of course there’s nothing new about student demonstrations turning into riots: they’ve done it in Paris, in Athens of course, I am sure in other cities and now in London. The fact that the demonstration is going to turn into a riot goes without saying. Student leaders simply cannot ban or control the vandals, the hooligans, the thugs for taking the opportunity of joining in. Is it possible that an ordinary student, no matter how strongly he or she feels would launch an attack on the Prince of Wales and his wife in their car? I don’t think so. At least I would like to give them the benefit of the doubt. Just how stupid can you get?

There being not very much worth watching on Greek TV recently we’ve been resurrecting some of our oldies. Watched ‘Topsy Turvy’, a few nights ago, the film on Gilbert and Sullivan and ever since the songs from the Mikado have been going round and around in my head so think we had better play another musical to get rid of them. Well they were displaced briefly by Prokofief’s ‘Peter and the Wolf’ but they now seem to be vieing with each other. ‘How potent cheap music is’, Noel Coward is reputed to have said but how potent good music is as well. And siesta time a couple of days ago I had the most amazing dream: I wrote a complete musical specifically for David Harwell and went over to the states to play it for him, there having been a recording already made, words and music. He sat there drinking a cup of tea and nodding approval with each number. I remember they were all pretty upbeat but that’s all I remember. When is some mad scientist going to invent a sort of decoder that fits to your head whilst you’re asleep and that will faithfully record your dreams for playback? Too late for me obviously but I had a hit musical there for a short while.
‘Fawlty Towers’ has also come out of mothballs, one episode anyway, and just as funny as it originally was. We also watched a twenty minute ballet from the Nederland’s Dans Theater called ‘The submerged Cathedral’ which did absolutely nothing for me I’m afraid and once again we watched the film ‘Fairy Tale’, based on the little girls in Yorkshire who took photographs of fairies at the bottom of the garden: a quite entrancing movie with two beautiful little girls which was quite delightful. Peter O’Toole played Sir Arthur Conan Doyle who was a great one evidently for spiritualism and quite prepared to believe in fairies. Paul McGann, who I directed at RADA all those years go, and told the staff they underestimated his talent and he would definitely make it big, played the girls’ father.
On another subject completely; two cigarette manufacturers in India ceased production for a couple of days (resulting in millions of rupees lost in tax) when the Indian government wanted new warnings to appear on cigarette packets. This consisted mainly of an extremely ugly photograph of a mouth with cancer caused, it said, by smoking. The manufacturers said they didn’t know how to proceed hence the closing down! Now the government have back-pedalled and decided to leave the status quo for another year. Indians, like Greeks are evidently heavy smokers and it is estimated a million people a year die from the habit but, although the government has brought in a ban on smoking in indoor places, as with Greece it is evidently almost a total flop.

Ars Gratias Artis – art for art’s sake? What price art?
A painting of a nude by Amedeo Modigliani created around 1917 has sold for more than $68.9m (£42.7m) at an auction in New York - a record for the artist's work. The painting, part of a series of nudes was purchased by an anonymous buyer. Modigliani's previous auction record was 43.2m euros (£35.8m), set earlier this year in Paris. Another painting by the artist - Jeanne Hebuterne (au chapeau) - one of the first portraits he painted of his lover, sold for $19.1m (£11.8m), high above its estimate of $9-12m (£5.6-7.4m).The artist, who lived from 1884 to 1920, originally focused on sculpture but switched to painting in part because of health problems. Modigliani sold no paintings in his short lifetime, sometimes giving them away in exchange for meals, but the moment he died they went like hot cakes.
An ex-art student in Manchester who worked alongside artist Tracey Emin for two weeks admitted 10 counts of fraud and has been jailed for 16 months for forging Emin’s work. The artist said her art came from the heart (?) and she was "upset and distressed" that people had been conned. The fakes, valued at more than £25,000, included sketches on fabric and a pencil drawing on calico, sold on the eBay website. Well well well, I don’t know what all the fuss is about. Admittedly he has been a very naughty boy but the fakes were probably not too difficult to make and were every inch as good as any original and Miss Emin hasn’t done too badly out of her art that ‘Comes from the heart.’ He did not sell his own Emin collection because of his "acute" interest in her work and the "joy" it gave him.
A statement from Emin said: "My artwork is deeply personal and comes from my heart. It hurts and distresses me to see these fakes and forgeries that have no regard, respect or understanding of what I do.” Should I have regard, respect or understanding for a grotty unmade bed do you suppose?
A Damien Hirst artwork created entirely from thousands of butterfly wings has been auctioned in London for £2.2m.I am Become Death, Shatterer of Worlds - previously owned by the city's Gagosian Gallery - had been expected to fetch between £2.5m and £3.5m. A two-day auction of art by Damien Hirst set a new record for a sale dedicated to one artist in 2008.The sale, which featured more than 200 lots, fetched £111m at Sotheby's London branch. Poor destitute Modigliani should be alive to day, earning millions; though maybe his paintings still wouldn’t rate highly among the cognoscenti. I don’t think it’s talent that’s rewarded these days; I think it’s what you can get away with.
Big question – where did all those butterfly wings come from? And don’t say from butterflies! It’s a serious question.

Boots, boots, boots! These boots were meant for walking, well some of them anyway. Others looked highly dangerous, possibly resulting in sprained ankles, twisted knees or misaligned vertebrae. Last week after my monthly appointment with the pulmonologist in Souda I was waiting for Douglas who was in another office queuing up to get a refund for something else. It took all of two hours during which time I sat outside and watched the people coming and going, especially the women, ladies of all ages, all wearing boots. There were ankle length boots, calf length, thigh length. There were Cossack boots, cowboy boots, swashbuckling boots; boots in grey, beige, brown, red and black, leather boots and rubber boots, boots with zips, boots with thongs, boots that laced up: boots with six inch heels and boots with no heels at all. Is it the onset of winter or simply that boots are in fashion? I didn’t notice any jackboots.
There is a wailing and a gnashing of teeth in the land, England that is, lost out to Russia for the 2018 soccer world cup. The screams of agony are accompanied by cries of ‘It’s a stitch up!’ and ‘It’s not about football, it all about oil and money!’ or ‘They lied. They promised us votes and then didn’t come through!’
Evidently the English presentation was pretty terrific, spot on in every aspect; nevertheless they were knocked out in the first round with only two votes, one of which of course was their own. One theory goes that they were too full of jutzpah and it was a come-uppence for giving the appearance of certainty and arrogance.
In retaliation the mayor of London, Boris Johnson, has rescinded for members of FIFA the offer of free accommodation at the Dorchester during the Olympics. So jolly well sucks boo to you!
There was a time when people believed in something called “free will” but the deeper science delves into our natures the less likelihood it is that the theory carries any weight. It becomes less credible with every new discovery and scientists are always making new discoveries of course, particularly when it comes to genes. They will find a gene for this, that, and everything else, the latest being a gene that makes a man horny and behaving like a Bonobo monkey ie., sex sex sex, and yet more sex, infidelity and one night stands the norm. One in four are born to be unfaithful say the scientists. They claim that when a man or woman has what they have termed the ‘love rat gene’ having an affair or even a one-night stand creates a chemical rush like a gambler finding his luck has changed or an alcoholic savouring a drink. Evidently all down to the brain chemical called dopamine.
The great lovers of history, romance and myth tend to lose their magic when this sort of information is available.
And still on the subject of genes, looking at the latest photograph of Prince William it would seem he is losing his mother’s beautiful looks and the Windsor genes are kicking in. I wonder what it is about this family that the kids are always beautiful only to grow up as plain as all get out. Weird.

Who is Ricky Gervaise and from under what rock did the BBC discover him? Evidently when in London Douglas in conversation with our friend Philip Clive came out with the fact that he couldn’t stand Ricky Gervaise and Philip couldn’t understand his aversion because, in his words, this man has changed the whole style of the sit-com. So, in order to change Douglas’s mind he very generously sent us the complete ‘The Office’ on DVD and we started to watch it a couple of evenings ago. I say started because both Douglas and I lasted a full fifteen minutes; Chris lasted a bit longer. I am informed that this programme has been a universal hit and no doubt Philip meant it kindly but I am afraid he wasted his money. Mister Gervaise just has to be the most obnoxious unbearable person ever to appear on television anywhere and God knows there have been some pretty obnoxious persons before him. Maybe it wouldn’t have been so bad if it was humorous? Witty? Slightly amusing even, but as the fifteen minutes didn’t raise even a smile let alone a laugh I guess as a ‘sit-com’ in my opinion and despite its amazing popularity it is, oh, who cares what it is? I have read a number of complaints recently in letters to the paper about modern stand-up comedians who think repetitive use of the f-word and the c-word and the s-word or cruel jests (it’s only in fun innit?) are the height of wit which only shows the paucity of their humour, the way the world of entertainment has gone with the geeks all thinking they are hilarious. Fifty years ago and more Max Miller was considered the height of vulgarity but his jesting was as kindergarten stuff compared to today’s hi-tech crap. Like Dane Edna, I don’t care who calls me old-fashioned but I am simply not with it. Dame Edna was witty enough and so is something like ‘Yes, Minster/ Yes, Prime Minster, brilliant in every aspect, that has kept us laughing like drains the last few nights.
Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness… well fruitfulness anyway. Everywhere farmers and the owners of olive trees are thwacking away at the branches, their nets spread on the ground to catch the falling fruit. The mills are working probably twenty-four hours a day. After the rains of a couple of weeks ago the olives must have plumped out nicely and now the weather is perfect for reaping them. We’ve had no rain for days. Strange to think how warm and sunny it is, an Indian summer? When north of here Europe is thickly blanketed with snow and suffering freezing conditions. Apart from the olives the citrus trees are flourishing and Douglas has made fifty pounds of marmalade! with fruit from our trees, lemon, orange, mandarin.
The weather is so warm roses are blooming and oleander that flowers in the summer is having a second lease of life. All the way down the highway on either side it’s a blaze of pink and white. Has nature gone completely bananas?

Here we are into December, the first decade of the millennium almost over; what will 2011 bring I wonder. A couple of days ago we heard of the death of yet another friend of many many years, Andy Moore who we first met back in the sixties. I am beginning to lose count of the number of my peers, or younger, some much younger, who have passed on. It’s inevitable of course with the passing years but still sad when it happens. Andy was only 66. As they say in the obituaries he leaves a wife, two sons and a brace of grandchildren.
Thornton King #5 is finished. It took six weeks. When I read of authors who have forty books or more to their credit I reckon that is the speed with which they must have written. Still haven’t come up with a title for it. Any ideas? I might have mentioned this before but I wanted to call it ‘Film Noir’ as it is all about murders in a film studio (and more of course) until Douglas had me look it up on the internet only to find dozens and dozens of books with that title. He suggested something like ‘The Movieland Murders’ which I absolutely hate.
Had the most amazing dream last night, a true reality programme dream and for once an actor’s dream that was not a nightmare. If you’re not au fait with the phenomenon known as actor’s nightmare and, it would seem virtually everyone, if not every performer in the theatre gets it at some time or other, it consists of standing in the wings about to go on stage and not knowing a line, sometimes not even knowing what play one is supposed to be in or standing on stage and drying in the middle of a song, any disaster that can happen in fact, enough to make your blood run cold. Well, in this dream I was approached by a television director who informed me he had a project coming up in the summer and I was dead right for one of the parts. (I think it must have been influenced by Rupert Everett’s book) and so the audition process began until he gleefully said it was down to the last three, then down to the last two of which naturally I was one. But he needed to hear me sing so in a huge open air arena I sat on the stage and sang a song called ‘Get In Touch With Him Now’ with a fantastic drawn out a capella ending until the final pp orchestral cord and the audience (of which there were thousands of course) went totally apeshit, screaming and yelling and applauding fit to bust. But then I turned the offer down because at eighty years of age I decided I was too old for it and would never last the course. Still it was nice to have been made the offer and to hear that audience’s applause.
I only wish I could remember the lyrics to that song.

I was right in my assumption some time back that the new anti-smoking laws in Greece wouldn’t add up to a can of beans and so it seems. I never thought the Greeks would give up their smoking easily and evidently hardly anyone is taking any notice. Tavernas, restaurants and clubs have on the whole ignored it and no one as yet has been charged with breaking the law. In interviews in The Athens News one café owner said he tried to implement it but, when trade started to diminish quite drastically as his patrons disappeared, he did a U turn. Another withdrew the ashtrays but told his customers to use wet paper napkins and if the police happened to call they could roll them, up, evidence hidden. Obviously no one had thought of how they intended to explain a room thick with smoke. I remember as a schoolboy smoking in an empty classroom and when the word ‘Cave!’ was heard desperately trying to wave the smoke out the open windows. I don’t recall if the ruse was successful or not. Must have been I suppose because I don't remember ever being punished.
The weather these last few days, and nights, has been unusually warm which is a good thing as there is still no sign of heating oil.
Bedtime reading at the moment is Ginger Rogers’ autobiography and breakfast room reading is Rupert Everett’s autobiography – chalk to cheese. The first is all sweetness, light and Christian Science, the second tells it as it was. Ginger’s book reveals no warts except for those she had on her hands as a child and which Christian Science got rid of overnight. Poof! She woke up and they had just disappeared. Just like that. She does tend to blow her trumpet somewhat as she maintains there was nothing she didn’t excel at from a very early age but then, being a film star, I suppose blowing one’s trumpet is a necessity of life. The book is so saccharine to begin with I didn’t think I would travel very far with it but it does get better further along, because of “show biz” interest and names! How’s this for some names in the pit band for the musical Girl Crazy in 1930? – Gene Krupa on drums, Roger Edens on piano, Benny Goodman on clarinet, Jimmy Dorsey on saxophone, Glenn Miller and Jack Teagarden both on trombone. Occasionally Gershwin himself was on piano.
Everett on the other hand tells it as it is, reveals warts from the very beginning and his book is fascinating not just for that, but because it reveals so much of the business of which I was totally ignorant despite being a part of it for fifty years. It is also beautifully written. He has made the closest observation to the experience as I have ever read. “It’s difficult to describe a theatrical production. It exists for the moment it is on the stage and, even then, it is different for everyone who sees it. As the curtain falls the final tableau dissolves into the ether. A few pictures might remain to jog the memory, but photographs are performances of their own. And so the magic of theatre is its life, also its death. Both are contained and celebrated in the moment of applause. The curtain goes up again. The actors take their bows. It’s over.”
My one and only small complaint: I got a bit tired of the adoration; I adored him, I adored her, I adored them, I adored it, we adored each other! No wonder the press sometimes refer to actors as luvvies!