Christopher Fowler's Blog, page 257

Let’s Get Digital

When I meet readerswho won’t touch digital books I usually say ‘It’s not an Either/Or thing – you’ll still love physical books just as much.’ But not all electronic devices are created equal. The Kindle dominates because it’s cheap and easy to use and offers the widest range of books, although I’ve never worked out […]

E-Readers Set To Beat Books

Every morning I’m locked in a cell and forced to extend my social reach for a couple of hours, twimbling about on this website and on other media nets, and have long used Facebook as a sort of silliness catchall – largely for the shop windows I have a habit of snapping on my travels. […]

That’s Twentertainment!

Demographically speaking, childhood now ends at around the age of nine. The transference of what were once called children’s shows into teen dramas is complete. The BBC has long wanted to ditch that peculiar band of little people’s entertainment, and with good reason. Every few years there’s a demographic shuffle, and the closure of ‘children’s […]

Does An ‘English Look’ Still Exist?

When I’m describing a character, it’s tempting to fall into easy categorisation. If the person I’m writing about is ‘typically English’, it suggests a Golden Age detective novel description that was once ubiquitous. Ladies in floral frocks, gents in waistcoats and suits – now the idea seems ridiculous. But then I read Dan Brown’s description […]

A Career In Cool

I’ve always loved animated films,and remember the shockwaves caused by Ralph Bakshi’s ‘Fritz The Cat’ when it first appeared. The dope-smoking criminal sex-pest cat first created by Robert Crumb wouldn’t cut it in today’s world (he was very much of his time), but Bakshi wasn’t just out to shock. He animated a version of ‘Lord […]

Let’s Go Out, Darling!

I promise this is positively the last bonkers UKIP story of the year… Apparently I was wrong. UKIP do have another key plank to their manifesto, apart from ‘Aren’t foreigners ghastly?’ In their 2010 manifesto edition they felt it should be made compulsory for people to wear evening dress to the theatre. The Daily Telegraph’s […]

England Plays It By The Book

The new booklist drawn up for the GCSE syllabus is under fire as never before. Journalists and writers across the country have expressed dismay thatlist of set texts for English GCSE has cut out international authors to concentrate on British books, and by doing so has ‘plumbed new depths of cultural incoherence’. The AQA, the […]

When An Adaptation Adds Something New

I recently saw two theatrical adaptations of books that were also made into films. The first, ‘Let The Right One In’, added nothing at all to the original – if anything, it reduced the ambiguities to one simple reading. The other added immensely to its former incarnations. The latter was the Headlong production of ’1984′, […]

Shopped No.2

Watching everyone board a very late plane the other night, I noticed that about one in five people had untied laces, but they were too laden with luggage and kids to be able to do anything about it. While we’re waiting for Nike to develop self-lacing trainers like the ones in ‘Back To The Future […]

Great London Pubs No. 5

The Commercial Tavern in the East End’s Commercial Street is typical of the type of corner pub that once existed everywhere in this area. It would have been filled with effing and blinding locals banging back dimple-pints, and to be fair there are still one or two who look in. The pub doesn’t do food. […]