Tag Archives: storytelling

Film Review: Backtrack Boys

Framing delinquent youth as hopeless cases is a common narrative ploy by a ruthless and shallow media. There’s the assumption that youths are going to gather together in gangs, commit crimes and cause havoc. Director Catherine Scott has thrown a fresh bucket of water on an old stereotype. Just as she did in her otherContinue reading “Film Review: Backtrack Boys”

Mind-expanding books that opened up the world to me as a teenager #Booktag

Some books help you as a teenager to move beyond the claustrophobic and limited world you were born into. We can’t help where we were born or who our family is. However, when we are young, if we read the right books, we may just be able to transcend challenging beginnings and see the worldContinue reading “Mind-expanding books that opened up the world to me as a teenager #Booktag”

Film Review: Corpus Christi (Boże Ciało)

*Contains no plot spoilers 4.5 stars Readers of this blog will know that I do love Polish culture and Polish films. Here’s another great Polish film that has come out recently and is currently nominated for an Oscar for best international feature film. Corpus Christi, or Boże Ciało as it’s known in Polish, is a blackContinue reading “Film Review: Corpus Christi (Boże Ciało)”

Strange Victorian Journeys Into the Fourth Dimension

The last gasp of Victorian spirituality infused cutting-edge science with old-school mysticism. Theosophy was all the rage; Many weird and and wonderful ideas being developed at the turn of the century around death, ghosts, the fourth dimension filled the Victorians with a palpable sense of possibility.

Book Review: The Ice Master by Jennifer Niven

This is the ultimate Arctic voyage novel, based on real events. The 1913 Canadian voyage on the Karluk was the worst planned arctic mission in history. The captain declared the boat unsuitable on seeing it and the crew consisted of a rag-tag bunch of wannabes with no experience in Arctic weather. The scientists on the voyage had never stepped out of a classroom.

The Enlightenment of Everyday Objects

In ancient Japanese tradition, when a treasured household item reaches the end of usefulness, it is given the proper funerary send off that it deserves. This unusual ritual harks back to two ancient philosophies. The Shinto Animist philosophy that all things alive or otherwise have a soul. And the Nichiren Buddhist philosophy that when aContinue reading “The Enlightenment of Everyday Objects”

The Summer 2020 Film Tag: My Film Recommendations

Here are some films that have held my imagination captive for a long time after seeing them this summer. Along with a few other films that I regret seeing and wish I could have the time back. * Contains no spoilers

Ancient Word of the Day: Grimmelings

Although similar to the gloaming, grimmelings is a slightly different natural phenomenon at both ends of the rotating sun’s traverse across the sky. Grimmelings – The first or last gleams of the day (Scots, esp. Orkney). From the Norwegian “grimla”, to glimmer before the eyes, to twinkle or blink. Also “grimlins”. Or “the harlot’s hour”:Continue reading “Ancient Word of the Day: Grimmelings”

Ancient Word of the Day: Hibernal

Hibernal From Latin hībernālis (“wintry”), from hiems (“winter”), hibernal is term for something that refers to winter. On this, the long, long night of Winter Solistice of the southern hemisphere, the dawns and the gloamings grow ever deeper and more thickly velveteen black. Although this point in time marks the darkest, longest night and from this kernel grows the essence ofContinue reading “Ancient Word of the Day: Hibernal”