Admiring Dorothy L. Sayers

I listened to Stephen Fry yesterday talking about, amongst (many) other things, how he holds the act of admiring in high esteem. Well me too, and I admire Dorothy L. Sayers, the writer of detective fiction, creator of Lord Peter Wimsey, and also writer on theology and translator of Dante. I love her incisive use of language, her Oxford-trained logical mind, that I can appreciate but not quite match, due to slightly lesser training. Reading her detective novels I feel at home, with a peer, comfortable. Her letters have been published, by, if I remember rightly, Barbara Reynolds. The one volume of these that I have read so far shows many facets to her being and her life - the Molière plays she staged at school - much as George Sand did - the two years she cried over her lost love - her demand to be in control of her own fiction and not let some committee take over the writing of her book. Her energy of mind, will and action. Her imperfections, ridiculous emotional humanity, marriage that didn't succeed in forming a home for her son but did give her great insight into what a man gassed in the trenches could behave like. The necessity of dropping her writing work during the Second War as she couldn't get household help, so her days were filled with scrubbing floors and cooking meals for said husband and self: "and you can't cook a decent meal in under an hour and a half" (I paraphrase). Most of all, her successful combination of deep characterisation of real, complex, intelligent people and a murder mystery. She is one of my heroes. Teufel

And one more ...

Sat 29 May 5:10 pm And one more, just to confuse those from other parts - my first post appeared to be posted after my second - since I personally dated the first but not the second - back to local time. Teufel

Testing, Testing, simply a test to see what happens when there are two posts! Does Mr Google automatically archive and zealously guard all my posts, or do I have to activate that alarming "gadget" called "archive" in order so to do? Teufel

Cursed with Both Head and Heart

Saturday 29 May 2010 The Guardian Hay Festival has reignited my enthusiasm for digital communication with its "Most Beautiful Tweet" competition, being judged by Stephen Fry - poor lad, he'll be inundated - and they had the good taste to retweet one of my attempts. There followed, of course, some hours of roaming around twitter - particularly the Hay Festival tweets - wishing I were there, wishing I'd made the short trip there when I lived in Minstead, New Forest, wishing I gathered my energies up a little more often to get to that sort of thing when available here, where I am. I had toyed with the idea of calling this blog "How I Stopped Being Fat", as I intend to write quite a lot about that, but I have resisted allowing my life to be dominated and destroyed by being fat, so I decided not to allow it to dominate my blog either. Anyone tempted to put off your living until you're the perfect shape or weight - please don't! a) because you might not ever, and then you'd look silly, b) because most things are just as possible at any weight - in the last few years, while weighing close to, and then over, 100kg, I have had two children, passed two ballet exams with Merit (Grades 6 and 7 RAD), earned a PhD in French literature, home-schooled my children, appeared in Fiddler on the Roof as Yente, danced on TV (The Topp Twins), sung in a choir, written a novel, impressed Iggy McGovern with one of my poems. Do I think Big is Beautiful? No, not particularly. I don't think Big is Better, and my size is starting to restrict some of my physical activities - and I'm certainly not dancing as well as I would be 50kg lighter - but I'm still dancing - and I am often fatigued and my immunity is low. But that's only a part of who I am, and, like one of the authors of The Bitch in the House, I have got on and done the things I wanted to do, and generally done them rather well. 'Nuff said. In a future blog I will explain the "Head and Heart" reference from Dorothy L. Sayers, and I plan to write a weekly "column," rather formally, as well as odd jottings whenever I feel like it. Hopefully I'll also learn how to attach photos, links, and so forth. I leave you with an urging to watch Stephen Fry's "vimeo" on "Things I wish I'd Known at 18" on a website called something like (but don't quote me on this), "vimeo.com." Also, for the more frivolous among you, see his "Boos" - one for each episode of QI - find the link on his twitter site - they're up to number 11 at latest count - basically, you get a 30-second audio recording of the audience yelling an unusual word (for this series, all beginning with H), and you get to tweet the word you thought you heard to Stephen Fry. And if you're right, you win ... a sense of quiet satisfaction. The two I've heard so far were, if I remember rightly, "hamfutter" and "harquelbutt" - no, that second one's not right, but something like that. The current one is a word coined by Bosie, and to me it sounds like "horsellum." And to follow the Hay Festival and see what they come up with as "Most Beautiful Twitter." Adios, and, as we are increasingly learning to say in our Spanish studies, Hasta luego, hasta pronto, and also à bientôt, yours (often!) sincerely, Teufel.