As a last hurrah of being on Merseyside before moving, I decided to revisit a place just down the road from where I’d lived on The Wirral; armed with a desire to dig up some of its surprising past glories. I’ve been going to the seaside resort of New Brighton for as long as I can remember, often as a place to sit off and … Continue reading Wanders: The Magnet and The Last Resort (New Brighton).
“The contours of the Sizewell power plant, its Magnox block a glowering mausoleum, begin to loom upon an island far out in the pallid waters where one believes the Dogger Bank to be, where once shoals of herring spawned and earlier still, a long, long time ago, the delta of the Rhine flowed out into the sea and where green forests grew from silting sands.” … Continue reading A Last Glimpse of the Land
Dear Joe, I’d like to walk with you From Clapton Pond to Stamford Hill And on… – Harold Pinter Harold Pinter liked walking around London. It is easily forgotten how vital walking around the capital was for him when considering how claustrophobic much of his theatre work is. Yet there is still a sense of place in his work, often highlighting many of his characters’ … Continue reading Walking On and On with Harold Pinter
‘When I was not confined to the house, I would spend my days and my nights on the Edge.’ – Alan Garner On a frosty but sunny January morning, I was steadily making my way along the M56 towards Macclesfield. I was on my way to Alderley Edge in Cheshire, the stalking ground of writer Alan Garner. In 2015 I had made this journey in … Continue reading Alan Garner’s Edge
Somewhere in this nexus of concrete and structural steel, this elaborately signalled landscape of traffic indicators and feeder roads, status and consumer goods, Vaughan moved like a messenger in his car… – Crash (1973), J.G. Ballard In the dead space before Christmas 2015, I found myself meandering back towards my old secondary school on The Wirral peninsula, one of only two things that I still … Continue reading Wanders: The M53 Cavern (A Northern Concrete Island)
Celluloid Wicker Man 