Chris Lines
@chrislines.bsky.social
Interested in family, Wales, public relations, communications, language, politics, change, sustainability, football (Swansea City and Cymru), cricket, hiking...most things really.
The author Robert Harris described himself as a "social hermit" when speaking about his new book, Agrippa, in Penarth tonight. The former Observer political editor left a highly social career to become the "hermit-like" writer of 16, soon-to-be 17, best-selling books!
A rare good story to come out of #Lebanon. Its parliament has voted for it to become the 114th country in the world to abolish the death penalty for all crimes. In 1977 that number was just 16. Keep up the good work @amnestyuk.bsky.social
The latest in this year's summer's reading - as with every year - is Wisden, Cricketers' Almanack. Not that I read every one of the 1,522 pages in this, the 163rd edition.
A Pakistani man's monologue, The Reluctant Fundamentalist, gives his account of a conversation he's having with an unnamed American in a Pakistani city. The story covers the period before and after 9/11.
James tells the story an enslaved man on the run with the young Huck Finn. They travel down the Mississippi, meeting challenges at every turn in a fast-moving story which made me both laugh and wince.
I'm not capable of running 200km through the Dolomites - I can barely understand what that means - so this is my small contribution in support for Sanj, who is. If you can, please give your support to him too. www.justgiving.com/page/s-kaush...
Sanj's 200km Dolomites Challenge for TRIBE Freedom Foundation
Help Sanj Kaushal raise money to support TRIBE Freedom Foundation
justgiving.com
Over 200 editions in, The Week in Polls is still doing one thing: telling you what the polling numbers really mean, not just what the headlines claim. Start this Sunday by signing up here: buff.ly/5lTfRF5
We missed out on the glasses so Clare held up a giant colander so we could view the eclipse on the back of our house.
A tourist's day in London exploring Japanese, Sri Lankan and US culture. Starting with a mooch along Portobello Road, we walked to see the Fukishima and Kyoto Gardens in Holland Park - both donated by Japanese cities with considerable corporate donations.
A joyful and highly emotional day! Justin has married Ayesha at Chelsea Old Town Hall.
Viewing the violent and turbulant history of a country through the lives of people working and staying in a hotel is an original idea. And Lyse Doucet, or LyseDoucet as she is known by many in Afghanistan, makes it work.
A train ride to #ChurchStretton with a day's walking in perfect conditions on #LongMynd before a train home. A pretty good way to spend a day.
The Odyssey is pure Holywood. Brilliant screenplay and cinematography but with actors who couldn't get beyond their own star status. They whispered a lot in dark places and shouted loudly in big battles.
We only met two other walkers on the Offa's Dyke Path despite great sign-posting, perfect weather and the start of the school holiday. It's farming country and, apart from a couple of combine harvesters, we didn't really see any human life. Even Presteigne afterwards was open but without people.
The biggest disappointment of devolution has been the Welsh Government's running down of the arts. So said Andrew Green, the author and former head of the National Library of Wales, in tonight's Conversation at the Chapel with Peter Wakelin.
An interview about interviews with one talking too much and the other too little - a Conversation in the Chapel with Peter Wakelin interviewing Francine Stock. Questions from the audience weren't too good either, including mine.
Even with bifocals I can't read close-up with my glasses on. So, I've rested them on my head until I stand up, forgetting about them. They then fall off. Or, I walk around sensing them on my head when in fact I've forgotten that I've already put them back on.
The author of We should more interesting than the book itself. Yevgeny Zamyatin was a Bokshevik exiled to Siberia by the Tsarist regime. He supported the revolution in Russia but, while remaining a Marxist, he was quickly disillusioned by the Communists and the ways they limited creative freedom.
Three Hours is a real page turner, a thriller of a book about a seige in a school. The tension in the police command room gripped me in particular. The book's perspectives on life as a refugee and the radicalisation of young men felt raw and real but I found the ending almost laughable.
Slowing sanctions on Russian oil products so that British residents can have our summer holidays is an appalling decision. Can you imagine how it sounds to Ukrainians?
Yet again, the wrong calls when under pressure. I so wanted this Government to work.
Jonathan Portes@jdportes.bsky.social · 4mo ago- Subsidising consumption in the face of a supply shock - reducing incentives to drive less/switch to EVs - using up limited fiscal space to help better-off drivers rather than the most vulnerable. Hard to think of a worse policy right now.
A good circular walk, starting at #Arthur'sStone, up to #MerbachHill then back via #Bredwardine, much of it following a Drovers' route. Quite a lot of chat along the way.
An enjoyable, interesting and well-attended Conversation in the Chapel with Dai Smith talking to Peter Wakelin about Raymond Williams and his biography of him, A Warrior's Tale. Abergavenny doesn't do enough to celebate Raymond Williams. Until tomorrow...
A gripping and fast-moving story, well directed and produced and with an excellent performance by Tony Turner as George Smiley. Disappointingly, however, the central performances in 'The Spy Who Came in from the Cold' lacked conviction.
Of the 40,000 UK slave owners who sought compensation for their loss of income following the abolition of the slave trade, 14 were from Monmouthshire and three from Abergavenny. Facts from another fascinating lecture courtesy of Abergavenny Local History Society. The lecturer was Roger Evans.
Rembrandt's house provided great incite into his life and character - a difficult man at best. The audio commentary was perfectly judged and the interpretative material explaining how Rembrandt painted was fascinating. Even the member of staff in the shop was great fan!
