The Plashing Vole

Can you name a female composer other than Hildegard of Bingen? I bet most of us can't. I'm fairly knowledgeable about contemporary c...

Here's a historical curio for you. I'm writing an article (possibly a book) on creative writing by politicians. As background resear...

You might know that I'm a keen cyclist. You can catch me out on the roads at any time (as long as it's dry and the temperature is be...

I'm a member of the Labour Party. Being a member of any political party makes me a little bit weird - formal participation has been dec...

Tonight is Jeremy Paxman's last appearance as lead anchor for Newsnight , the BBC's premier long-form news broadcast. To many, Paxma...

Now that Mr Gove tells us that we're to look out for Extremists and Fundamentalists in schools, the kind of people who don't teach B...

I've been reading Steven Fielding 's fascinating book A State of Play: British Politics on Screen, Stage and Page from Anthony Troll...

According to Michael Gove, you need a former anti-terrorism spook to sort out the mess in Birmingham's schools. Homophobia is rife. Chi...

I'm away tomorrow at a UCAS recruitment day. I don't actually know what that involves because nobody has told me. All I know is that...

Oh dear. Here we go with another tedious Richard Dawkins controversy. I haven't read Richard Dawkins' scientific publications, nor...

Hi everybody. Apologies for the decline in blogging in case you miss my regular posts (tip: seek help). This is the busiest time of the year...

Long, long ago, an eternal winter had fallen upon The Hegemon. Ruled by a cruel Queen, the animals who lived there shivered under the lash, ...

Amongst other things over the long weekend, including breaking my vintage bike, seeing my mum and getting a sore throat, I read a book. More...

Yesterday, I went to see Antony and Cleopatra  at the Globe in London, the open-air theatre designed to recreate the Elizabethan/Jacobean or...

Here's 'Third Swan' by King Creosote and John Hopkins, from their collaboration Diamond Mine . I bought the album after hearing ...

The marking mountain isn't getting much lower, so obviously I'm looking for distraction and procrastination activities. One of those...