In 1929, Robert Graves needed a best-seller to fund his plan of cutting out of England, buying a house in Majorca, and never having to work again in his life (aside from pumping out 120 books). In eleven weeks, he…
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Recipe for a bestseller (says Robert Graves)
Tagged with: Bestseller, Good-bye to All That, memoir writing, Robert Graves, Travel, World War 1
Posted in WWWS
Posted in WWWS
Where’s that sabrage knife?
We had a chance to buy a very nice sabrage knife this summer, but even Maurizio with his mania for acquiring kitchen things his wife finds optional drew (or cut) the line at a $500 (circa) sabrage knife. The experience…
Spanish flying incense
This has no connection whatsoever with my next novel. Just a cool fact. Here is the world’s largest incense holder. It’s in the Cathedral of Santiago and weighs 119 lbs. More precisely, it’s a botafumeiro, to be swung into motion…
In Galicia, with miracles
We just went to Galicia, on the north-west coast of Spain, where the rain falls (mainly) and pilgrims have come for centuries to the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela. The draw is the body of St. James, which was being…
Hurricanes and Gingkos
Back when I was a child in Metuchen, New Jersey, hurricanes passed by with some regularity. One came just after my father had planted twin gingko trees in our front yard. While he was normally quite fastidious in tree-planting, for…
Rough Translation
Recently friends asked Maurizio to translate an email from a Sicilian bed & breakfast where they had wanted to stay. The oddity is that this email was in English, sort of. After explaining that there was no “bad” to be…
7 views of Cuba
We were in Cuba last year and here are some pictures. Since I can’t figure out how to arrange them artistically, scrapbook-like, here are the captions. The corresponding image should be easy to figure. There’s Maurizio on the Malecon in…
Cat in an Istanbul ER
Maurizio and I just got back from Istanbul. It was not the vacation we had in mind. I did get to see an ER facility in a local hospital in the capacity of patient, having collapsed because of what we…
10 Notes on the National Park of Abruzzo, etc.
My story begins in Opi (see photo, left) in the heart of what is now the Parco Nazionale d’Abruzzo, Lazio e Molise (National Park of Abruzzo, Lazio and Molise). It is a lovely place of gentle wildness, not well enough…
Valley of Lost Cauliflowers
Today in the snowy valley of Canaan (locally: ka-NAN), West Virginia, Maurizio cross-country skis the miles of groomed trails at White Grass resort and I’m in our apartment with a sprained wrist, writing slowly. Cross-country seems to be a sport…
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