Fasten your seat belts: let’s talk about censorship. In March, the Guardian reported that Agatha Christie’s publisher, Harper Collins, would be scrubbing some of the more problematic language out of her books in future reissues: “The updates follow edits made to books by Roald Dahl and Ian Fleming to remove offensive references to gender and race in … Continue reading “The most unkindest cut of all”: On Re-editing Christie
Life
KIDS, DON’T TRY THIS AT HOME! The Mini-Mega Hitchcock Draft, Home Edition
Screen Drafts is a podcast that helped me survive the pandemic and, along the way, captured my heart through the sense of camaraderie that permeated each conversation. Since I first wrote about it nearly seven months ago, I have caught up with all the publicly posted episodes, and I have joined the Patreon group and dabbled … Continue reading KIDS, DON’T TRY THIS AT HOME! The Mini-Mega Hitchcock Draft, Home Edition
THE PLAY’S . . . SORTA THE THING: Opening The Mousetrap
Today marks opening night for the production of The Mousetrap that I directed at the high school where I spent twenty-eight years teaching drama. I woke up all too early and checked my e-mail, only to find this missive, sent to the cast and crew from our play’s stage manager, a remarkable young woman named Kelania: "Hello, … Continue reading THE PLAY’S . . . SORTA THE THING: Opening The Mousetrap
THE BUTTERFLY EFFECT: My Tea with Agatha
My experiences meeting famous people have been few and far between – and they never turned out as I might have expected. I’m not an autograph (or, in these days, selfie) hound. I don’t want to bother someone who has just performed for me or who is on vacation in order, just so I can … Continue reading THE BUTTERFLY EFFECT: My Tea with Agatha
THE TWILIGHT ZONE, PART 10: The Final Signpost Up Ahead
The past ten weeks of studying The Twilight Zone has been a nostalgic experience for me, but the reason I took this course had as much to do with a feeling I’ve had that this nearly sixty-year-old series has never felt more prescient. As we have seen, Rod Serling performed a fabulous deceit on the network when … Continue reading THE TWILIGHT ZONE, PART 10: The Final Signpost Up Ahead
FOR MY DAD
Today I sit beside my father as he lies in hospice, and I think about baseball. In the spring of 1964, we lived in Phoenix where my dad was trying to earn a living on a real estate boom that didn’t really boom until after we had returned to California a year later. At school, … Continue reading FOR MY DAD
THE TWILIGHT ZONE, PART 2: “A Land of Things and Ideas”
Audiences could relate to The Twilight Zone because it was essentially about the search for happiness. Granted, these searches were highly unusual, and the results were mixed. TZ is a highly moral show, and those who achieve a happy ending are people who earn it, through their general decency and kindness. I argued last week that Mr. … Continue reading THE TWILIGHT ZONE, PART 2: “A Land of Things and Ideas”
“. . . a land of both shadow and substance . . . ” THE TWILIGHT ZONE
Art mirrors life. And, like many a Boomer, I have found my parallels in books, movies and TV. Take the last six year – please! (Bah dah BUMP!) I have felt trapped in a cross between a Stephen King thriller (both The Stand and The Dead Zone come to mind) and Game of Thrones. Overshadowing it all, there has been … Continue reading “. . . a land of both shadow and substance . . . ” THE TWILIGHT ZONE
AIM (NOT SO) STRAIGHT AND TRUE: My Resolutions for 2023
A few weeks ago, my pal (and Book Club Arch Nemesis!) the Puzzle Doctor reached his 2000th post on In Search of the Classic Mystery Novel. Not bad for a man who’s only been blogging since 1954. I hit my 500th post last August (it was a dreary review of a dreary book, Dorothy L. Sayers’ The Documents in … Continue reading AIM (NOT SO) STRAIGHT AND TRUE: My Resolutions for 2023
PAT ON THE BACK: Meeting (Some of) My 2022 Goals
“There is no Frigate like a Book to take us Lands away . . . “ These words by Emily Dickenson were emblazoned on the bookplates my grandparents gave me when, at an early age, I declared my love for reading. I pasted them into every volume I owned and used up my stock long ago. … Continue reading PAT ON THE BACK: Meeting (Some of) My 2022 Goals