Gillian Polack's Blog, page 318

gillpolack @ 2010-03-27T17:27:00

I've slowly been ticking things off my long list of to-dos today. I need to work faster, but today is not a fast day. In fact, I've only finished with six of the twenty things that must be done before midnight lest I explode into dark grey dust.

One thing that's been holding me back is that my brain was twitching. I kept thinking of Philip Jose Farmer's Riverboat series (which I haven't read in twenty-five years) and the voice he gives Mark Twain (as a character). Farmer obviously heard Cl...

Short courses - the Middle Ages and food history

This post is really for Canberra and region (unless you have a travel bug).

In theory, I have two courses running that start in April, Medieval Women and the food history one. Both of them have been much loved by many people. Both of them are under-enrolled. If you know anyone who was intending to take either of them, a reminder might be in order. If they don't get enough enrolments quickly (by Monday afternoon, in fact, for Medieval Women) then they will be cancelled.

The low enrolments ...

gillpolack @ 2010-03-26T10:51:00

My next three days is all about lists and completing essentials and moving on. It's the Passover cleaning and the health stuff and a bunch of small deadlines. Most of the deadlines are technically moveable. They're self-imposed because I honestly don't know if life's going to get suddenly easier from next week, or if an extra 30-40 hours work is going to be added. I'd rather prepare for the latter, if I can, given I'm through medical appointments for the time being and I have no teaching ...

gillpolack @ 2010-03-25T17:20:00

A new review of Life Through Cellophane. A really nice one, too.

What I love about all the reviews is that each reviewer has found something different to like (and occasionally dislike) in the novel. One of the things I read for is a dialogue between me and the book in question. What the reviews (and the amazing number of readers who contact me and let me know what they got out of it and ask how Liz is going - my estimate is that about 40% of readers are contacting me and talking to me abou...

gillpolack @ 2010-03-24T22:49:00

I want to be wise and witty today. Just one of those feelings. Something I'd like to be. Either that, or sleep a great deal.

White Tiger - Kylie Chan

Last night I saw Elektra. I have a giant weakness for superhero films. I accept in congruencies and plot holes and even bad acting from them to a level I would not accept from most other films.

I find it very hard to admit though, that I tend to judge female superhero films more harshly than male. I want Elektra and Storm to be more three-dimensional and complex and have greater depth in their private lives than Daredevil and Wolverine. This is because somewhere, the little girl in me want...

Great Australian Booklist

Something so new that if you've heard it elsewhere your name is probably either Chuck or Nyssa.

So you're after a book that's published in the US or UK, but which is unavailable to purchase in Australia due to parallel importation restrictions? Maybe your local bookseller isn't stocking the desired range of exciting Aussie small press publications? Or perhaps that novel you've been looking for is long out of print? What can you, as an Australian reader, do to get your hands on the books you wa...

gillpolack @ 2010-03-21T13:23:00

If you want to read more by Jenny go straight to her book... but you could also go straight to her blog, where she has a post up right now on Ancient Greek food. She wrote it for my series on writers and food, ages ago, but my life got in the way of that series, so instead she's kindly written me a post for Women's History Month. This kills umpteen birds with one stone - you get one of the missing posts and I get something for Women's History Month and Jenny doesn't have to wait round for me...

Writing ancient women: The Priestess and the Slave (guest post from Jenny Blackford)

I've always found the ancient world far more interesting than the modern world – but not the wars, the revolutions, the kings and generals (or even the occasional queen). Instead, I'm fascinated by the tiny details of the daily life of ancient people – what they ate and drank, what they wore, who they worshipped, and how, and why.

One of my favourite university subject was Greek Daily Life, in which one of my assessable assignments was making a long strip of woven cloth. This was more...

gillpolack @ 2010-03-20T20:02:00

Tonight is a Mystery Dinner night. Most nights this week will be Mystery Dinners.

A Mystery Dinner is when I take a container from my freezer, unfreeze it, look at it dubiously, match it with rice/pasta/couscous and hope I'm not doing something very stupid. Tonight's Mystery Dinner looks as if it's the last of the Osso Bucco/Bean casserole (sans tomato) cross. Last night's was one of the "How many soy ingredients and strange noodles can I fit into a dish mainly intended to use up the last...