Christopher Fowler's Blog, page 334

A Classy Day Out

I never thought I’d retweet something from the Daily Mail but this made me laugh out loud. People have been complaining that Ascot is not the elegant event in the British sporting calendar that it once was. They should take a look at the Melbourne Cup horse race, the grandest Australian sporting event, where Prince [...]

Re:View – ‘The Master’

America’s unending fascination with cults has no direct translation over here in Europe. That might explain the subject matter of ‘The Master’, ostensibly about the birth of Scientology, but it can’t explain why the film is so staggeringly, devastatingly boring. I’d go so far as to suggest that this is among the worst five films [...]

The Next Big Thing

It’s spreading like a virus, or possible a minor rash, but I’ve foolishly agreed to encourage an author round-robin that goes like this…

The Next Big Thing works by getting an author to answer these ten questions on his blog. He then tags five authors to do so the week after. Which presumes the author knows [...]

Where Is It? No. 1

Doctor John Dee was one of the most influential philosophers of the Elizabethan Age. A close confidant of Queen Elizabeth, he helped to introduce mathematics to England, promoted the idea of maths as the basis of science, anticipated the invention of the telescope, charted the New World and created one of the most magnificent libraries [...]

On Being A Professional Writer No. 6: Physical Work

The Physical Part

Why is it everyone asks ‘Where do you get your ideas?’ and nobody says ‘How do you stay fit when you’re sitting in a chair all day?’ Ideas are never the problems – that’s our job – but wellness is.

The short answer is; Well, you don’t. The downsides of this lifestyle include working [...]

Priests and Pagans In The English Countryside

The English may not be church attendees beyond the odd carol service at Christmas, but they love a good Pagan festival. The Obby Oss carnivals in Padstowe, Cornwall, and in Somerset are Celtic in origin and involve fertility rituals.

The Padstowe festival starts at midnight on May 1 with singing around the town starting at the [...]

My Favourite Movie Book

As I heard a six year-old toddler give his parents his Christmas present list – new apps for his iPhone – I wondered if anyone out there might actually be going retro and giving books this year. If you are, apart from forking out £40 for the astonishing ‘London’s Hidden Interiors’, worth every penny, you [...]

Blood On The Boards

As I sat in the bar of a pop-up theatre this week, waiting for the rehearsed reading of my new play to start, half a dozen doctors were ‘birthing’ patrons through a rather disturbing ten-foot vagina as a performance got underway. God knows what happened after that.

One of the best features of London is its [...]

Re:View – ‘The Woman In Black’

I realise I forgot to post this a while back. Better late than never, I say;

In recent months scary house stories have made a return. We’ve had ‘The Pact’, ‘The House At The End Of The Street’, ‘Sinister’, ‘The Innkeepers’, ‘Penumbra’, ‘Dream House’ and ‘Intruders’, to name just a few. I found Ti West’s much-touted [...]

When Writers Get Old

There are certain writers I can’t read now. They’ve got comfortable. They’re listened to. Their anecdotes calcify and they only hear themselves. They end up writing about writers because eventually that’s all they know. How do you avoid this happening?

Earlier in the year I made a conscious decision to avoid festivals and professional events for [...]