Menu 2024 2023 2022 2021 2020 2019 2018 2017 2016 2015 Home Updates list Contents list Site search About Beginning Schubert Schubert collection Contents list 2024 2024-01-01 Article list for 2024 Scrapbook for September 2024-09-01 — 1 minute Twisted knickers, German style Scrapbook for August 2024-08-01 — 1 minute Crumpling Charlie Donald ducks 2024-07-21 — 8 minutes The assassin's bullet missed, but there are consequences. Scrapbook for July 2024-07-01 — 3 minutes Ukraine: Nigel was right Sticking it to a Kenyan climate denier 2024-06-18 | 2024-06-26 — 2 minutes The BBC's snooty put down attempt on a Kenyan farmer. The farmer will not be put down. The cynic's guide to Swiss peacemaking 2024-06-15 | 2024-06-16 — 3 minutes In the heart of Switzerland Germany cracking up 2024-06-13 — 8 minutes Was the reunification of Germany misguided? Scrapbook for June 2024-06-01 — 6 minutes After that debate | Not so obvious, Rod | Mad dogs and Englishmen Scrapbook for May 2024-05-01 — 2 minutes Swiss roadmending | Swiss bridge building Heloise – The family years 2024-04-12 Life in Nuits, Dijon and Vienna The 'family card' of birthdays and name days 2024-04-12 Heloise's notes about her family, written for her husband. Engagement to Alexander Costinescu 2024-04-12 Engagement, a family farewell and the long journey eastwards. Marriage to Alexander Costinescu 2024-04-12 Speechless at her Greek-Orthodox wedding in Jassy. The first children 2024-04-12 Death, illness and misery. Marie and Emil 2024-04-12 A daughter and another son. Alexander dies 2024-04-12 Too weak to survive. Postscript 2024-04-12 Living a double life. Postscript 2024-04-12 A page of speculation Postscript 2024-04-12 A page of speculation Scrapbook for April 2024-04-01 — 5 minutes St. George's day | Even more site changes | Donald Trump vs. Father Time | Paradise lost | Thought for the Day Something you will not read in the MSM 2024-03-13 — 2 minutes Germany: the peaceniks of the 'far right' AfD take on the hippy-dippy Green warriors. Scrapbook for March 2024-03-01 — 11 minutes Vote Reform UK, get Labour | Princess Imperfect | The sublime and the ridiculous | Playing with fire in the Ukraine Immigration and the lost world 2024-02-23 | 2024-02-26 — 29 minutes Immigration: the great unforced error which transformed Britain — and sealed tongues. All pals together 2024-01-28 — 5 minutes Can modern Britain ever have a citizens' army again? More site changes 2024-01-28 — 1 minute More system changes to the Figures of Speech website. It beats thinking of things to write about. The Horizon scandal 2024-01-12 | 2024-03-28 — 18 minutes Modern Britain looks in the mirror: How did it come to this? Here's how. Site changes 2024-01-01 — 1 minute System changes to the Figures of Speech website 2023 2023-01-01 Article list for 2023 Schubert on tour 2023-07-10 — 3 minutes A review of Oliver Woog's book Franz Schubert in Graz, der Steiermark, Niederösterreich und dem Burgendland. Shuffling to disaster 2023-06-01 — 11 minutes Rule by wally, UK style. Useless Members of Parliament become useless government ministers and, having achieved peak uselessness, are richly rewarded. Down the currency plughole 2023-05-01 — 9 minutes Is the value of a nation reflected in the value of its currency? A look at the decline of the pound sterling in the reign of Elizabeth II, 1953-2023. Bring back Global Warming 2023-04-01 — 10 minutes At least the term Global Warming means something, whereas 'climate change' is just nonsensical. Hubert Lamb and the journey down the rabbit hole of climate science. Cheerleading for Hell 2023-03-01 — 7 minutes No quiet on the eastern front. Why are Western nations taking sides in the Russia-Ukraine conflict? The National Health Service at 75 2023-02-01 — 26 minutes Still crazy after all these years. Do not resuscitate. 2022 2022-01-01 Article list for 2022 Coda… 2022-12-10 — 1 minute …probably Scrapbook for August 2022-08-01 — 2 minutes Little Switzerland The sleep deprivation of the woke 2022-07-31 — 15 minutes Dr Nietzsche will see you now. Boris Notgodunov 2022-07-20 | 2022-07-20 — 5 minutes Will this dreary opera never end? Yes, but not the way you think. Broadening the mind 2022-05-02 — 12 minutes Some reflections on Franz Schubert's travels in Austria and his path to the inner exile. Scrapbook for May 2022-05-01 — 2 minutes Gentian | The social media censors Schubert on tour 2022-04-30 — 7 minutes A review of Oliver Woog's book Franz Schuberts Aufenthalte in Oberösterreich, Salzburg und Umgebung. Igl laresch / The larch 2022-01-14 — 6 minutes Dipping a toe into the reflective, melodious waters of romontsch Surmiran. Ascending Mount Churchill 2022-01-01 — 6 minutes A review of Werner Vogt's new Churchill book, Winston Churchill, Witz und Weisheit. Scrapbook for January 2022-01-01 — 1 minute No entries yet 2021 2021-01-01 Article list for 2021 Bradgate's ancient ones 2021-11-21 — 5 minutes The residents of Bradgate's medieval deer park, ageing gracefully. Three against COP26 2021-11-03 — 15 minutes Three polemic-free arguments against COP26 hysteria. Scrapbook for November 2021-11-01 — 1 minute Cometh the hour, cometh the man The Trick 2021-10-26 | 2021-10-26 — 6 minutes Dirty tricks in The Trick, the BBC's climate change 'conspiracy thriller' for COP26. The larch ascending 2021-10-24 | 2021-10-29 — 5 minutes The magic mountain moment in golden October. Quote and images of the month for October 2021-10-22 — 5 minutes Albert Anker's night in the slammer. The gentle art of painting rocks 2021-10-12 — 2 minutes Keeping the Swiss walker on course. Erinnerung an die Marie A. 2021-10-07 — 28 minutes One more notch on the plum tree: Bertolt Brecht's selective memory. Scrapbook for October 2021-10-01 — 9 minutes T-Rex | How Do You Solve a Problem Like Joe Biden? | Good breeding | Website changes | German Federal Election 2021 | Foraging for fungi 2020 2020-01-01 Article list for 2020 Do not disturb 2020-12-27 — 1 minute This website is sleeping. Scrapbook for December 2020-12-01 — 1 minute [no entries yet] Scrapbook for November 2020-11-01 — 8 minutes Pricks R Us | Captain Foresight | Election eve | Nigel Farage in search of a cause | Deniers Cynthia's shade 2020-11-10 — 36 minutes Hades hath no fury like a poet scorned. A Considerable Speck 2020-11-05 — 1 minute A sentient creature exercising good judgement. Quote and image of the month for November 2020-11-01 — 8 minutes Quote: Hermann Hesse, Im Nebel. Image: Giovanni Giacometti, Nebbia (Maloja). Scrapbook for October 2020-10-01 — 2 minutes Social media filtering | Swiss healthcare | Website changes Herbsttag, Autumn Day 2020-10-31 — 6 minutes Rainer Maria Rilke's farewell to autumn – or, why great poetry should be read slowly. The end of Covid-19 2020-10-29 — 2 minutes With a bang, not a whimper. Swiss tease 2020-10-25 — 3 minutes Sleepy Joe? No. Hunter's laptop? No. Burisma? Ignorance is Swiss bliss. Goethe's Römische Elegien 2020-10-21 — 1 minute The master's midlife crisis. [8 pages] Goethe's Römische Elegien I-IV 2020-10-21 — 45 minutes I Prolog II Saget, Steine, mir an III Mehr als ich ahndete schön IV Ehret, wen ihr auch wollt! Goethe's Römische Elegien V-VIII 2020-10-21 — 33 minutes V Laß dich, Geliebte VI Fromm sind wir Liebende VII Froh empfind ich mich VIII Kannst du, o Grausamer Goethe's Römische Elegien IX-XII 2020-10-21 — 18 minutes IX O wie fühl ich in Rom X Wenn du mir sagst XI Herbstlich leuchtet die Flamme XII Alexander und Cäsar Goethe's Römische Elegien XIII-XVI 2020-10-21 — 54 minutes XIII Euch, o Grazien XIV Hörest du, Liebchen XV Amor bleibet ein Schalk XVI Zünde mir Licht an, Knabe! Goethe's Römische Elegien XVII-XX 2020-10-21 — 32 minutes XVII Zwei gefährliche Schlangen XVIII Cäsarn wär ich wohl nie XIX Warum bist du, Geliebter XX Manche Töne sind mir Verdruß Goethe's Römische Elegien XXI-XIV 2020-10-21 — 56 minutes XXI Eines ist mir verdrießlich XXII Schwer erhalten wir uns XXIII Zieret Stärke den Mann XXIV Epilog Goethe's Römische Elegien Paralipomena 2020-10-21 — 49 minutes Some bits on the side. Scrapbook for August 2020-08-01 — 7 minutes FoS website changes | The guess: the new real | Only a matter of time… | Page view statistics | The Slough of Despond, then and now | This cannot end well | Sweet-rationing in the UK | Too clever by half | Hobby horse, gnomic edition Sanity-checking insane energy 2020-08-21 — 7 minutes Does not compute. Plague notes, ad interim 2020-08-17 | 2020-08-20 — 17 minutes Where are we and how did we get here? Butch browsing 2020-08-14 | 2020-08-14 — 3 minutes Google Chrome, the coding man's browser of choice. The lady in waiting 2020-08-13 — 2 minutes Kamala Harris, the great unwanted – even by Democrats. After the Swiss party 2020-08-02 — 5 minutes 2 August: Sunday morning coming down. Paying the Harvesters 2020-08-01 — 22 minutes A close look at Léon Augustin Lhermitte's magnificent painting. Swiss National Day, 1 August 2020-08-01 — 4 minutes Gottfried Keller's poem Sommernacht. Scrapbook for July 2020-07-01 — 1 minute The Railway Man prince | Eighteen shades of incompetence Hot Romans 2020-07-29 — 5 minutes The dog days of the Roman Warm Period revisited in the Tibullan guide to climate change. Born in the USA 2020-07-20 — 4 minutes The forces of destruction are not at the gates; they were born within them. Blacking out for Britain 2020-07-16 | 2020-07-18 — 4 minutes Government by nonsensical directives enforced by law — a bit like COVID-19, in fact. Friedrich Rückert's Über alle Gräber 2020-07-10 — 8 minutes Recovering a particularly poignant poem from the Kindertodtenlieder Winston Churchill's love of horses 2020-07-09 — 4 minutes The wartime prime minister was an excellent rider with a lifelong love of horses. Schubert in da hood 2020-07-08 — 5 minutes Franz Schubert growing up with family, friends and neighbours in a close-knit community. [8 pages] Brothers and sisters from the east 2020-07-08 — 11 minutes The Schubert brothers and the Vietz sisters find their way to Vienna. The two Schubert families 2020-07-08 — 6 minutes The Leopoldstadt and the Himmelpfortgrund Schuberts. The Schubert family businesses 2020-07-08 — 20 minutes Surfing the wave of educational reform in the Austrian Empire. Ignaz and Elisabeth Wagner 2020-07-08 — 13 minutes The close friends from the east. Michael Holzer 2020-07-08 — 17 minutes The choirmaster in Lichtental, Schubert's first music teacher. The Grob family 2020-07-08 — 15 minutes The Swiss silk-weaving families in Lichtental The female factor 2020-07-08 — 9 minutes The female community in Himmelpfortgrund, Lichtental and Rossau. The family bond 2020-07-08 — 15 minutes A close family despite their differences. Scrapbook for June 2020-06-01 — 1 minute Lieder evening in Vienna | 'Latest comments' change | Barn wall smiley Scrapbook for May 2020-05-01 — 3 minutes Not the Age of Reason | 'Latest comments' panel | Clap for the NHS | What would Treebeard say? Hidden Schubert 2020-05-29 — 4 minutes The Schubert materials we can't show you. The Atzenbrugg enlightenment 2020-05-19 — 24 minutes A review of Oliver Woog's book Franz Schubert und sein Freundeskreis in den Schlössern Atzenbrugg und Aumühle. Franz Schubert und sein Freundeskreis in den Schlössern Atzenbrugg und Aumühle 2020-05-11 — 2 minutes Announcing a recent book by Oliver Woog, the concert guitarist and Schubert researcher, which throws new light on the party life of the young Schubert crowd. Oiling the Swiss paywall media 2020-05-01 — 6 minutes The Swiss government wants to lubricate the inaccessible with lots of nice slippery money. Scrapbook for April 2020-04-01 — 2 minutes Who's that train? | Schubert portrait 'Young Franz Schubert' The American shambles 2020-04-28 | 2020-04-30 — 4 minutes November: hoping for the least worse, whoever that might be. Scrapbook for March 2020-03-01 — 8 minutes COVID-19 sanity check | Disgusting | Thuggery | New site navigation | Saint Joseph's Day | Can the UK National Health Service cope with COVID-19? | Do not touch me, woman | Two inspectors call | And don't step in the excrement | Country music for the doolally | The Schubert guide to handwashing | Before social media Purging the planet 2020-03-29 — 1 minute A breathing space for the Earth. Exposing yourself to COVID-19 2020-03-24 | 2020-04-01 — 16 minutes But just a little bit, of course. The Trump insight 2020-03-23 — 1 minute COVID-19: the cure must not be worse than the disease. Beyond bananas 2020-03-19 — 3 minutes Meghan and Harry's message to a grateful world. Laughing at the afflicted 2020-03-18 — 3 minutes Shouldn't do it, but we need something to pass the time in our isolation cells. Quote and image of the month for March 2020-03-14 — 2 minutes Quote: Conrad Ferdinand Meyer, Säerspruch. Image: Albin Egger-Lienz, Der Sämann. COVID-19: time to start worrying? 2020-03-12 | 2020-03-26 — 16 minutes Even the normally sunny disposition of Matt Ridley is clouding over. Nobody panic. Sheep Herding for Dummies 2020-03-10 — 2 minutes The art of letting no crisis go to waste. The greening of Boris™ 2020-03-08 — 1 minute Climate sceptic to climate alarmist in six months. Mr Cherry 2020-03-08 — 9 minutes Certainly gone, but still not forgotten. In praise of maturity 2020-03-05 — 6 minutes Let's stop listening to the revolting young. Over the waterfall 2020-03-02 — 2 minutes Avoiding the rending pain of re-enactment. Mining the data mountain 2020-03-01 — 10 minutes Putting content online is only the first step – just try and find it again… or bend it like Google. Scrapbook for February 2020-02-01 — 6 minutes More COVID-19, among other things | Government by weirdo | Lest we forget | Brexit smoke and mirrors Trust me, I'm from MI5 2020-02-25 — 6 minutes Searching for signs of intelligence in the UK intelligence services. So far, none found. Coughs and sneezes spread diseases 2020-02-25 | 2020-02-26 — 4 minutes You are a dot on the Blue Marble, now learning to live and die with COVID-19. Social media on the couch 2020-02-20 — 13 minutes And its users. 'Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad.' Swiss neutrality decoded 2020-02-14 | 2020-02-15 — 8 minutes Beware the Swiss, bringing encryption equipment. The Swiss news magazine Republik, circling the drain 2020-02-10 — 1 minute Good. Du bist die Ruh, swipe right edition 2020-02-09 — 2 minutes A lonely reader of the New York Review of Books looking for Miss Perfect. Du bist die Ruh D 776 2020-02-09 — 17 minutes Another masterpiece from Friedrich Rückert's Oestliche Rosen (1819/1822), masterfully set to music by Franz Schubert (1823/1826). Thuringia voted! 2020-02-07 — 5 minutes Three months ago. The last election worked so well that they had better have another one. Quote and image of the month for February 2020-02-03 — 7 minutes Quote: Bertolt Brecht, Fragen eines lesenden Arbeiters. Image: Albin Egger-Lienz, Mann und Weib. 17 May, the end of Switzerland? 2020-02-01 — 4 minutes Jumping from the referendum frying pan into the EU fire. A book burning 2020-02-01 — 8 minutes The Frankfurt Book Fire of 1758. Scrapbook for January 2020-01-01 — 1 minute Peter Schreier (1935-2019) Democratic discontent 2020-01-30 — 7 minutes The Centre for the Future of Democracy is worried. They will be when the tumbrils get there. Quote and image of the month for January 2020-01-25 — 2 minutes Quote: Siegfried Lenz, Heimatmuseum. Image: Anshelm Schultzberg, A Winter Morning after a Snowfall in Dalarna. Jägers Liebeslied D 909 2020-01-24 — 13 minutes Franz von Schober's much ado about nothing sinks without trace, taking Schubert's rubber ring with it. Die Sterne D 939 2020-01-20 — 8 minutes Musical mission impossible: Leitner's terrible poem and Schubert's attempted rescue. Franz Schubert and Franz von Schlechta 2020-01-17 — 20 minutes Cracking the door, but just a little bit. Fischerweise D 881 2020-01-15 — 21 minutes Franz Xaver Freiherr Schlechta von Wssehrd's mediocre poem, rescued by Franz Schubert. Schubert portrait Whac-A-Mole 2020-01-05 | 2020-02-16 — 31 minutes As soon as we whack one, another one pops up. Ueber allen Gipfeln Ist Ruh' D 768 2020-01-01 — 46 minutes One genius stands on another's shoulders: Goethe and Schubert. 2019 2019-01-01 Article list for 2019 Scrapbook for December 2019-12-01 — 1 minute Legitimacy restored Schubert in love 2019-12-21 — 22 minutes Four trembling hands in F minor. Limericks in German 2019-12-18 — 2 minutes Liebesgrüsse aus Limerick: A suitable case for treatment. Chillin' with the Kinskys 2019-12-18 — 40 minutes Joseph von Spaun touches his forelock. Quote and image of the month for December 2019-12-16 — 5 minutes Quote: Werner Bergengruen, The Shepherds. Image: Jules Bastien-Lepage, The Annunciation to the Shepherds. 13 December Saint Lucy's Day 2019-12-10 — 44 minutes What's in a name? From obscure beginnings to theological eminence. Comments on Figures of Speech 2019-12-01 — 3 minutes A new plaything for our readers – not just for Christmas, either. Scrapbook for November 2019-11-01 — 3 minutes In the bleak midwinter | 240 years ago today | The illustrated Schubert collection | A Boris™ Johnson lie tracker Wrecking the Brexit Party brand 2019-11-12 | 2019-11-13 — 4 minutes Nigel breaks his new toy. Dice throwing for beginners 2019-11-04 — 3 minutes The inscrutable UK election on 12 December. All Souls' Day 2019 2019-11-02 — 3 minutes 2 November in the words of Rainer Maria Rilke. Quote and images of the month for November 2019-11-01 — 7 minutes Quote: Robert Frost, The Star Splitter. Images: The Orion constellation. Scrapbook for October 2019-10-01 — 5 minutes Citation functionality changes | That Brexit Deal thingy | A geological excursion | Greta Thunberg: climate victim (2) Climate facts and a Climate Credo 2019-10-30 — 4 minutes Essential tools for surviving the Gretaceous era. Boris™ blusters on 2019-10-29 — 3 minutes The terror of the empty ditch on Halloween: is the corpse still walking the earth? Thuringia has voted! 2019-10-28 — 4 minutes Another rip in the increasingly tattered fabric of German politics. Still no change though – yet. Hate speech sanitizer 2019-10-26 — 4 minutes A simple tool for those who don't want to cause offence. 'So shines a good deed in a naughty world'. Switzerland has voted! 2019-10-20 | 2019-10-21 — 2 minutes Be still my beating heart. Or, even better, be young and be green. Quote and image of the month for October 2019-10-18 — 2 minutes Quote: Georg Trakl, Verklärter Herbst. Image: Peder Severin Krøyer, Wine Harvest in the Tyrol. Another Schubert portrait turns up 2019-10-17 — 6 minutes Well, its got the specs at least, but nothing else. Dividing the two Irelands 2019-10-15 | 2019-10-20 — 5 minutes More at stake than the administrative fudge of a 'backstop'. The green daydream 2019-10-14 | 2019-10-15 — 10 minutes A 20-second animated glimpse into the psychopathology of the green mind. The quince 2019-10-08 — 5 minutes Still inedible after two and a half millennia. Green steering charges 2019-10-04 | 2019-10-05 — 13 minutes Bad if they don't work, terrible if they do. Scrapbook for September 2019-09-01 — 5 minutes The Brexit deal explained | On the rug edge | Half-baked | Dim and dimmer | Greta Thunberg: climate victim | Home page illustrations | Die Schöne Müllerin website A Swiss simpleton's guide to Global Warming 2019-09-29 — 4 minutes More fakery from MeteoSwiss, created for and by simpletons. A Schwanengesang website 2019-09-29 — 3 minutes Will this delusion ever end? Doesn't look like it. The trembling aspen 2019-09-27 | 2019-09-30 — 30 minutes A look at the literary and musical life of a Populus tremula, with a contribution from Franz Schubert. Boris™ in the bunker 2019-09-19 | 2019-10-07 — 5 minutes The end cannot come soon enough for the incredible one. David Cameron 2019-09-18 | 2019-09-19 — 4 minutes Risen from the crypt but still not getting it. Quote and image of the month for September 2019-09-17 — 8 minutes Quote: Rudolf Hagelstange Bei den schwarzen Baptisten. Image: Norman Rockwell, The Problem We All Live With. The New Age dawns in the EU 2019-09-14 — 4 minutes Social engineering in the service of the European Way of Life. Dr Rita Steblin 2019-09-13 — 1 minute An obituary notice for the Beethoven and Schubert scholar. The European Green Deal 2019-09-11 — 2 minutes Double Dutch: for 'Deal' read 'Diktat'. Franz Schubert and Ludwig Rellstab 2019-09-09 | 2020-10-22 — 42 minutes Yet more Schwanengesang nonsense. Seven execrable poems, six desperate settings, one super hit. No change in Sachsen and Brandenburg 2019-09-02 — 5 minutes State elections in Germany: All quiet on the eastern front – and everywhere else for that matter. Scrapbook for August 2019-08-01 — 1 minute Tempting fate | The Dam Busters | Contempt karma German solidarity 2019-08-29 — 6 minutes Sticking it to the rich. The chestnut tree at the gate 2019-08-28 | 2019-10-04 — 10 minutes How to learn German in nine days. Heinrich Heine and Franz Schubert 2019-08-26 — 29 minutes Two worlds collide. News from the bunker 2019-08-20 — 1 minute The Swiss People's Party readies itself for the next election. Are they mad? Franz Schubert and Heinrich Heine 2019-08-14 | 2019-09-15 — 1 hour 23 minutes Dismantling Schwanengesang — and about time, too. Quote and image of the month for August 2019-08-01 — 3 minutes Quote: Arthur Schopenhauer Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung. Image: Jan Sanders van Hemessen, The Extraction of the Stone of Madness. Swiss National Day, 1 August 2019-08-01 — 2 minutes Alphorns in high places. Scrapbook for July 2019-07-01 — 1 minute Boris™ again | Remainers still at the controls | On the moon | Carl Gustaf saves the planet Boris™ blusters 2019-07-27 — 23 minutes A ten-minute rhetorical shambles from the new UK Solon. Boris™ 2019-07-24 — 2 minutes Start as you mean to go on – with a shambles. Nothing has been learned 2019-07-21 — 2 minutes Looking in vain for some backbone in dealing with Iran. Matter and light 2019-07-19 — 9 minutes Clearing away legacy thinking about colour. Catullus and Lesbia 2019-07-16 — 8 minutes The arc of a love-hate affair. Catullus at work 2019-07-16 — 18 minutes How did he write his poetry? Dicing with oblivion 2019-07-16 — 25 minutes The creation and transmission of the Catullan canon down the centuries. The Lesbia poems 2019-07-16 — 1 hour 6 minutes Piecing together the arc of a love-hate affair from the shards that are left. Scrapbook for June 2019-06-01 — 3 minutes Boris the Card | Lindenbaum | The choice is theirs | News from the asylum | The last insanity Why does the Devil have all the best tunes? 2019-06-24 — 2 minutes Because he has the best people writing them. The Green-Red media infestation in Germany 2019-06-22 — 4 minutes Mixing green and red makes brown – no arguing with that. Getting down with the kids 2019-06-21 — 1 minute Swiss climate propaganda for little ones of all ages. Schubert the Insignificant 2019-06-21 — 29 minutes Time to get rid of the 'Circles of Friends'. While we are about it, let's cast a gimlet eye on the Schubertiaden, those instruments of exploitation and oppression. Goethe on ice 2019-06-16 | 2019-11-13 — 19 minutes Showing off in Frankfurt and Weimar. Could a UK prime minister be worse than Theresa May? 2019-06-10 — 4 minutes We are about to find out. The dreary political months in prospect in the UK. Diving deep into Goethe's Der Fischer 2019-06-08 | 2019-06-12 — 40 minutes Keeping cool on the bottom with the eighteen year-old Franz Schubert. How many people listen to Schubert's music these days? 2019-06-02 — 8 minutes Not many. Scrapbook for May 2019-05-01 — 1 minute Calm and contented | Doris Day | Seen recently in passing The European Parliament election 2019 2019-05-27 | 2019-05-27 — 3 minutes No comfort for Brexiters as the green-red tsunami rolls on. The Tory party at prayer 2019-05-26 — 4 minutes They are going to need all the divine intervention they can get. Not a portrait of Franz Schubert 2019-05-23 | 2019-05-28 — 43 minutes Let's sort it all out, once and for all. Franz Schubert's Mensch 2019-05-13 | 2019-05-14 — 21 minutes What did the preacher in Zseliz mean? 19 May: Another day, another referendum 2019-05-06 | 2019-05-26 — 4 minutes Another act of Swiss obeisance to its international partners. 5 May 1799: A little local difficulty in Switzerland 2019-05-05 | 2019-05-08 — 37 minutes 220 years ago in the land of neutrality, peace and compromise. Quote for the first day of May 2019-05-01 — 2 minutes From romance to realism Scrapbook for April 2019-04-01 — 6 minutes Blending in | David Lama | Sunday morning coming down | Lest we forget | To leave or not to leave… Walpurgisnacht 2019-04-28 — 1 minute Chimney breasts – bottoms, too. Can Walpurgisnacht survive the #metoo era? Two fabled stones from Graubünden 2019-04-24 | 2019-04-26 — 17 minutes A walk on the wild side to Saint Zeno's Stone and the Baby Stone, both currently gathering moss. Pollen 2019-04-17 — 12 minutes Earlier and more pollen – another nail in our climate coffin. Notre Dame: What now? 2019-04-16 | 2019-04-17 — 5 minutes Knock it down and build something better. Isaiah the Obscured 2019-04-15 | 2019-10-30 — 22 minutes Where is he when we need him? All things Winterreise 2019-04-11 | 2019-07-16 — 1 minute An impressive new website for the Schubert/Müller song cycle. Scientists – dontcha luv em? 2019-04-03 | 2019-04-20 — 26 minutes Not much. Switzerland 2019-04-01 | 2019-07-28 — 26 minutes All rocks and hard places at the moment. The old Switzerland has gone, but can the new one survive? Scrapbook for March 2019-03-01 — 1 minute Pete North: defiant to the end Heloise Höchner's first and last love 2019-03-20 | 2024-04-20 — 1 hour 43 minutes That dithering, heartless narcissist, Franz Grillparzer. A farewell to Google 2019-03-04 — 7 minutes The new Figures of Speech site search. Scrapbook for February 2019-02-01 — 2 minutes New: citation function | Let them eat plastic | http/https on Figures of Speech Wilhelm Müller's 'three suns' 2019-02-01 — 5 minutes Memories of Die Winterreise in the current northern hemisphere cold snap. Scrapbook for January 2019-01-01 — 2 minutes Brexit: Are we there, yet? | Why was this website taken offline etc.? In praise of simplicity 2019-01-29 — 5 minutes Francis Jammes' Prayer to go to Paradise with the Donkeys. Speaking in tongues through a glass darkly 2019-01-27 — 7 minutes Bernard-Henri Lévy – madness mangled. Wer böpperlet a der chammer a? 2019-01-25 — 3 minutes Burns Night, 25 January. Night-time pranks, Swiss style. Doris Leuthard: smiling through 2019-01-24 — 24 minutes A review of Werner Vogt's new biography of a Swiss political superstar. Brexit: the end is in sight 2019-01-17 — 2 minutes But what end would that be? Who knows? Dass sie hier gewesen D 775: Rückert and Schubert 2019-01-16 — 12 minutes Two lyrical geniuses at work. Friedrich Rückert – Kindertodtenlieder 2019-01-13 | 2020-07-11 — 2hours 4 minutes Blogging rhymes of passage through the dark forest of shades. 2018 2018-01-01 Article list for 2018 Scrapbook for December 2018-12-01 — 1 minute Spot the human dot | What's in a name? | Aspen year Thoughts for the coming year 2018-12-14 — 7 minutes But no tidings of comfort and joy. 13 December: Saint Lucy's Day 2018-12-09 | 2018-12-17 — 22 minutes 220 years ago, William Wordsworth sent his 'Lucy' poems to Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Alinde D 904: Rochlitz and Schubert 2018-12-03 — 24 minutes A lesson in metrical magic from the master. Quotes and images of the month for December 2018-12-01 — 11 minutes Quotes: George Eliot Journals, Friedrich Hebbel, Diaries. Images: Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, Virgin and Child. Scrapbook for November 2018-11-01 — 2 minutes More Envy of the World™ | InSight lands on Mars | Something for the flag experts | Three-bar flags | Good idea, Angela! | Our aspen | More means less Brexit: where there's life, there's hope 2018-11-24 — 2 minutes Parliament 1 : People 0. Hunting down immigrants in Chemnitz 2018-11-19 — 5 minutes At last some facts, three months after they were really needed. Better late than never. 19 November 1828: the death of Franz Schubert 2018-11-18 — 39 minutes 190 years ago – time to be rational. Thinking in tongues 2018-11-12 — 5 minutes A coda to Albrecht von Haller's Bernese dialect upbringing: some excerpts from Martin Walser's speech 'Remarks on our dialect'. Quote and image of the month for November 2018-11-10 — 2 minutes Quote: Karl Friedrich von Kübeck: the viva voce examination, 1801. Image: Follower of Caravaggio, Saint Matthew and the Angel. Empty gestures make most noise 2018-11-08 — 5 minutes The fake pieties of Armistice Day keep coming. Protecting the German constitution 2018-11-07 — 5 minutes Enough empirical truth for the moment, Maaßen. Get out now, before you cause any more trouble for the Dear Leader. Blasphemy redux 2018-11-06 | 2019-04-15 — 6 minutes The unpleasant face of secular piety. Lottery wins 2018-11-04 — 5 minutes Coping with divine rejection – a sufferer writes. Richard North, the angry Sage of Bradford 2018-11-02 — 4 minutes Up a fjord without a paddle. 'My beautiful Flexcit! Wrecked, I tell you, all wrecked.' A well-known opera – but which? 2018-11-02 — 2 minutes Guess. Three early November anniversaries 2018-11-01 — 9 minutes Tristram Shandy's birth, the death of Byron's 'Boatswain' and Arthur Rimbaud's crossing of the Gotthard Pass. Scrapbook for October 2018-10-01 — 7 minutes Kubitschek: down but not out | Aspen calm | The Great British Winter Festival | Gottfried Keller's 'Dreambook' That German right-wing landslide 2018-10-30 | 2018-10-31 — 3 minutes German politics through the looking glass. Albrecht von Haller's love poem Doris 2018-10-29 — 1 minute 16 October 2018: 310 years since Haller's birth. Life before Doris 2018-10-29 — 11 minutes Childhood isolation to adult fulfilment 1708-1732. Albrecht Haller's poem Doris 2018-10-29 — 28 minutes A grown-up love poem 1730-1732 Life after Doris 2018-10-29 — 13 minutes Bereavements, rejections, ill-health and loss 1732-1777 Pepper, the dim robot 2018-10-18 — 2 minutes Compliant Members of Parliament outclassed by a laptop. It didn't take much. Ballet Zürich's Winterreise 2018-10-15 — 1 minute Great despair – and that's only the audience. The Bavarian earthquake 2018-10-15 — 2 minutes — Did the earth move for you, Marie? — Not that I noticed. Perhaps next time. Digital servitude 2018-10-10 | 2018-10-16 — 5 minutes From digital deathbed to bridal-bed bliss in one hectic weekend. Phoenix rising 2018-10-04 — 5 minutes A review of Werner Vogt's new book SWISS – Die Airline der Schweiz Scrapbook for September 2018-09-01 — 3 minutes Lunacy of the Year award | Of moles and men | Late summer Tennyson Gay days in Old Vienna? 2018-09-30 — 6 minutes Oh no, not that again! Deviant deed or personality type? 2018-09-30 — 6 minutes Writing about homosexuality when there wasn't any. The Poets' War 2018-09-30 — 16 minutes Heinrich Heine and August Platen calling each other names. Warm beds and elevated feelings 2018-09-30 | 2019-09-30 — 17 minutes Sublime thoughts, openly expressed. Is Theresa May the bottom of the U-bend? 2018-09-21 — 3 minutes Probably not: it appears to be one long pipe going straight down. How to write a big book in two days 2018-09-19 — 4 minutes Professor Julian Horton shows us how. Schubert's downward spiral, 1827 2018-09-17 | 2018-09-18 — 41 minutes Driven to despair by a fourteen-year-old girl, apparently. The pig got up and slowly walked away 2018-09-04 — 1 minute 7 September: 75 years since the death of Frank Crumit. Scrapbook for August 2018-08-01 — 9 minutes Rattling the begging bowl | Coexistance | Ten to three | The noise of apples falling from trees | Tommy Robinson free | The obituary from Hell Franz Schubert in search of lost time 2018-09-01 | 2018-09-07 — 49 minutes Does happiness linger in places? No. Rolling the bacterial dice in Old Vienna 2018-08-23 — 47 minutes Ah, Treponema pallidum pallidum! — and who's your pretty friend? Google, facebook, Switzerland – peas in a pod 2018-08-13 | 2019-07-28 — 6 minutes Internet user tracking the official Swiss way. Language, Truth and Logic 2018-08-06 — 12 minutes We're right, you're wrong. Go away and shut up. Scrapbook for July 2018-07-01 — 6 minutes Two lettuce leaves short of a salad | Tommy Robinson | For your diary | Our aspen in summer | Here we go again | Don't do it, Vernon! | The free market | That Brexit shambles | Novichok: the story so far Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock: Der Zürchersee 2018-07-30 | 2020-10-22 — 54 minutes Love Island 30 July 1750, with a Seefahrt that is not to be sniffed at. A meditation for the Swiss National Day, 1 August. The Poetry Bookshop 1913-1935 2018-07-17 | 2019-01-06 — 16 minutes Just what was needed on the eve of the Great War. Brexit: statements to remember 2018-07-14 — 4 minutes Just make sure you remember them correctly. Jean-Jacques Rousseau's herbarium 1772 2018-07-13 — 2 minutes 2 July 1778: 240th anniversary of Jean-Jacques Rousseau's death. Germany: where are we? Where are we going? 2018-07-10 — 5 minutes Nowhere. Fast. Does it matter? No. Franz Schubert below stairs 2018-07-08 | 2019-05-08 — 1 hour 24 minutes July-November 1818: 200 years ago in Hungary. Scrapbook for June 2018-06-01 — 5 minutes Solar sucks | Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS) | The Art of the Deal | Yet more site changes | More site changes | Site changes | Trump meets Rump The Kaiserbrunnen in Konstanz 2018-06-28 — 19 minutes 25 years ago the 'Fountain of the Emperors' caught up with the modern world. 5 July 1948: 70 years of the NHS soup kitchen 2018-06-25 | 2018-10-13 — 19 minutes It could have been worse. No, it couldn't. Folk Devils and Moral Panics 2018-06-22 — 6 minutes Just don't mention the war – even if you manage to remember it. All at sea with Seehofer 2018-06-20 — 8 minutes Sink or swim time for Germany's flexible Interior Minister and his aggrieved party. 20 June 1914: blasting and blessing 2018-06-18 — 23 minutes Whipping up an artistic storm as the thunderclouds gather. Hitler: demon, dummy or smooth operator? 2018-06-12 — 5 minutes Oh no, not him again… The Swiss, bless 'em! 2018-06-11 — 2 minutes Sense and senselessness, all in one weekend. Image of the month for June 2018-06-10 — 4 minutes Henriette Browne, A Girl Writing. 3 June 1828: Fugue at midnight 2018-06-03 | 2018-06-27 — 24 minutes Franz Schubert once again working for nothing, 190 years ago. Leftist bias at Google? 2018-06-02 — 1 minute Surely not! Seek and ye shall find… Scrapbook for May 2018-05-01 — 6 minutes Site changes | Yulia Skripal | Yet more on the GDPR | The GDPR(?) | UK trade post-Brexit | Playing the Windsors | Comment of the day | That time of year when… | 999 blue balloons | Site changes 23 May 1618: the Second Defenestration of Prague 2018-05-30 — 13 minutes 400 years ago, the brutal start of the brutal Thirty Years' War. Tommy Robinson: jailbird 2018-05-28 | 2018-06-14 — 22 minutes That'll learn him. We certainly hope so. Richard North: still bouncing off the walls 2018-05-27 — 4 minutes A quick glimpse through the peephole of his padded cell. No change – best not open the door. German transgender gender 2018-05-26 | 2018-06-11 — 21 minutes No laughing matter. Serious advice for all men 2018-05-23 | 2018-06-06 — 6 minutes Scouting for Girls or Boys. Some words for the innocent: Be prepared. Peter Winkler reports from Planet Zog 2018-05-22 — 6 minutes At last, the Swiss get to hear the truth about that Trump chap. It's worse than they thought. British Republic Day 2018-05-21 | 2018-07-18 — 5 minutes 20 May 2018 was the start; the end will come sooner than anyone thinks. Staring into the cultural abyss 2018-05-20 | 2018-05-21 — 6 minutes A wedding that will be remembered – but for all the wrong reasons. Brexit and Ireland 2018-05-18 | 2018-07-13 — 3 minutes Let the UK have a fresh start with Ireland. Suicide by cop in Gaza 2018-05-17 | 2018-05-17 — 2 minutes David picks up a rock and lobs it in Goliath's direction. We know how this will end. Diana's revenge 2018-05-16 — 2 minutes The fall of the House of Windsor: coming along nicely. Winston Churchill: animal lover 2018-05-16 — 8 minutes Horses, dogs, cats, geese, goldfish – even the odd ladybird. Behind the copyright ramparts 2018-05-11 — 5 minutes Doing dead artists no favours at all. Our battery-powered Smart Grid 2018-05-09 — 4 minutes Dumb as a rock – but at least it really is dumb now. The New Hambacher Fest 2018 2018-05-08 | 2018-05-10 — 12 minutes Those right-wing thugs winding us up again. Good job so few people heard about it. 5 May 1818: Marxmas 2018-05-02 | 2018-05-05 — 23 minutes The 200th anniversary of the birth of Karl Marx. Still crazy after all these years. 3 May 1810: Lord Byron and Lt. Ekenhead swim across the Hellespont 2018-05-01 — 24 minutes Not as simple as it sounds. Scrapbook for April 2018-04-01 — 3 minutes King Louis | Pallywood | The art of wellbeing tour | Sun Queen nuts | Germany: Toddlers mixing paint | Patience The case of Alfie Evans 2018-04-29 — 4 minutes Awful. In every respect. The hydrogen fuel cell takes flight 2018-04-27 | 2018-04-28 — 10 minutes Bye bye, kerosene. You have served us well but it's time to go. 20 April 1945: Hitler's last birthday 2018-04-20 — 60 minutes The Klemperers' refugee flight during the last months of the Nazi regime. The poisoning of the Skripals 2018-04-06 — 3 minutes An opera buffa of Wagnerian length, lacking all humour. On the French road to nowhere 2018-04-05 | 2019-07-30 — 4 minutes And currently getting nowhere fast, too. Balsamico, Swiss style 2018-04-05 — 1 minute Cheap and cheerful – a good Helvetian compromise. 3 April 2018: Happy birthday, Balsamico! 2018-04-03 — 8 minutes Twenty years and still going strong. Dr Groddeck will see you now 2018-04-01 — 10 minutes Our Easter special: a psychoanalyst's view of Jan Davidszoon de Heem's Still life with bird's nest. Scrapbook for March 2018-03-01 — 5 minutes The cloud of unknowing | Nerve gas: you ask, we answer. | The cheque's in the post | Amelia Earhart | Persil Man | Dog-bites-man State of the Climate 2017 2018-03-28 — 2 minutes The ten points you need to know. Figures of Speech discussion group closed 2018-03-23 — 1 minute Silence is golden, it seems. 26 March 1828: Schubert's only concert 2018-03-22 — 18 minutes A breakthrough for Franz 190 years ago that came just too late. 21 March 1918: Operation Michael 2018-03-20 — 7 minutes The beginning of the end of the First World War, one hundred years ago. The key question in abstract art 2018-03-19 — 4 minutes What on earth does it mean? Going to the dogs 2018-03-11 | 2019-09-28 — 10 minutes The decline and fall of Andermatt, Switzerland. The Sound of Martial Music 2018-03-06 | 2018-03-24 — 45 minutes Seven days in March eighty years ago: the Austrian Anschluss. Judgement of Solomon required 2018-03-01 — 5 minutes Never mind. Let's all sit down and have a chat about it. To Charlotte While Shaving 2018-03-01 — 2 minutes A remarkably prescient verse portrait of the childhood of Theresa May. Scrapbook for February 2018-02-01 — 7 minutes Dementia and alcohol | A new dawn breaks | Deplorable fake news | Not so grand Coalition | Germany: Grand Coalition defined | Cuprinol Man 'Now WE ask the questions' 2018-02-27 — 8 minutes The wind of change in Germany? Götz Kubitschek's speech to the Zukunft Heimat demonstration in Cottbus on 24 February. 22 February 1943: the White Rose 2018-02-24 — 4 minutes Hans and Sophie Scholl, Christoph Probst: guillotined on this day 75 years ago. The PostAuto car crash 2018-02-24 | 2019-07-28 — 5 minutes The unpleasant whiff of subsidy corruption in Switzerland. Mass shootings in the USA 2018-02-23 — 3 minutes No quick fix, no easy solution. Kippered Kirsty: a lesson to us all 2018-02-21 | 2018-02-24 — 4 minutes In defence of the unreasonable, the bloody-minded and the pig-headed amongst us. Midnight, 21 February 1818 2018-02-21 — 29 minutes On this day 200 years ago, Franz Schubert was drunk in charge of an inkpot. Martin… er… who? 2018-02-10 | 2018-02-10 — 2 minutes The German Foreign Minister for 36 hours. Gone and soon to be completely forgotten. It's a hard life at the FBI 2018-02-08 | 2018-02-25 — 2 minutes Maybe get a blister on your little finger. Maybe get a blister on your thumb. Watergate through the looking glass 2018-02-05 — 3 minutes No smoking gun but a lot of mirrors. Desperately hating Donald 2018-02-02 | 2018-02-07 — 22 minutes The German-speaking media opines on President Trump's SOTUS speech. Pulling the plug on the Swiss broadcaster 2018-02-01 | 2018-03-04 — 3 minutes An interesting referendum coming up on 4 March in Switzerland. The real Elizabeth Layton 2018-02-01 — 8 minutes Wartime clouds of smoke in 10 Downing Street. The Peter Principle – May extension 2018-02-01 | 2018-02-24 — 16 minutes Every day more and more people ask themselves: How did someone as dim and incompetent as Theresa May get to be Prime Minister of Britain? Quote and image of the month for January 2018-01-01 — 2 minutes Quote: Gérard de Nerval, Aurélia ou le rêve et la vie. Image: Vincent van Gogh, The Starry Night. Scrapbook for January 2018-01-01 — 6 minutes Germany: no change – as usual | The End of the Rainbow | A word to the wise | Ordinary Passengers | Our solitary aspen cluster | NHS excuse of the week | Envy-of-the-World™ – no change | Warpaint | Eight dummies and a funeral Franz Schubert's 31st birthday 2018-01-30 — 5 minutes 31 January 1828. Celebrating his last birthday with a big hit. January 1818: Franz Schubert dodges the draft 2018-01-24 | 2018-02-14 — 4 minutes Saved for musical posterity by three quarters of an inch. 21 January: Saint Meinrad's Day 2018-01-21 — 5 minutes Clubbing in the Dark Forest. Even the ravens were upset. Hotting things up in the USA 2018-01-19 — 3 minutes A guide to making measurements fit the theory. Swiss Government-sponsored CAGW alarmism 2018-01-18 | 2018-01-30 — 22 minutes Does the Swiss Federal Metereological Office actually believe the stuff they write? We hope not. Gary Oldman shines in Darkest Hour 2018-01-16 — 4 minutes An actor with Winston Churchill's DNA – A review of Joe Wright's film Darkest Hour. The Base and the Superstructure 2018-01-14 | 2018-01-14 — 25 minutes Why you can never control social media. It is what it is. W.H. Auden's poem The Witnesses 2018-01-10 — 4 minutes Poetry for the social media age. What Theresa did next 2018-01-09 — 1 minute Our puzzled readers write. Hole in the wall 2018-01-06 — 2 minutes The one in the north wall of the Eiger. Mistrust of strangers 2018-01-05 | 2018-09-18 — 12 minutes Too late for Mia Valentin. New Year's greetings from the fuzz 2018-01-02 — 2 minutes The police in Cologne spreading happiness around. Two Swiss railway station waiting-room murals 2018-01-02 — 11 minutes Witnessing the collapse of civilisation. Perhaps. Were the Nazis left-wing extremists? 2018-01-01 — 7 minutes Yes. New Year's Greetings from the Oxford Sausage, 1772 2018-01-01 — 1 minute Student humour 245 years ago. No safe spaces here. 2017 2017-01-01 Article list for 2017 Scrapbook for December 2017-12-01 — 3 minutes 'On the Morning of Christ's Nativity' | You have been warned! | A puzzle we can answer | Every terror cloud has a silver lining | Grumpy Monday | Dim and Dhimmi | Judith: not to be messed with The Windsors: only a matter of time 2017-12-28 — 5 minutes A grumpy end of year report. A Christmas Carol revisited 2017-12-24 | 2023-06-27 — 12 minutes The time travel subtleties of Dickens' remarkable classic. 21 December: the centenary of Heinrich Böll's birth 2017-12-22 — 2 minutes Rushing to the post office. Strategic goals for the UK post Brexit 2017-12-18 — 1 minute A least someone in the UK is thinking strategically. Martin Schulz and the New European Order 2017-12-16 — 3 minutes Berlusconi, Bloom and Beppe were right – just ask the Hungarians. Rocks, hard places, cherries and unsquared circles 2017-12-16 — 2 minutes A Swiss view of the Brexit negotiations – as baffled as everyone else. Brexit: all you need to know so far 2017-12-14 — 1 minute Ten days of Dim Theresa. It could have been worse. Actually, no. Ocean plastic – go and preach at the real miscreants 2017-12-14 — 2 minutes Please can we have our supermarket bags back? Here comes the sun 2017-12-12 — 2 minutes Well, now and again – in winter not so often, but certainly never overnight. Cooking the goose and the gander 2017-12-11 — 2 minutes What's sauce for the MSM goose is sauce for the Breitbart gander. 13 December: Saint Lucy's Day 2017-12-11 — 18 minutes Johann Peter Hebel's classic story Unverhofftes Wiedersehen, 'The Unhoped-for Reunion'. 4 December: Saint Barbara's Day 2017-12-05 | 2017-12-13 — 13 minutes Empirical fact and the triumph of human imagination. The Germanwatch Peruvian shakedown 2017-12-02 — 6 minutes Taking on Big Coal. Nothing happens till the lawyers get involved. Scrapbook for November 2017-11-01 — 6 minutes Don't worry, be happy | Shaping the science agenda | Diana's revenge | Peace at last | Thanksgiving | Dim and dangerous | Site changes | Distraction therapy | Still on your own Richard North beyond redemption 2017-11-28 — 3 minutes A quick glance through the peephole of his padded cell. There's no hope for this one. Abnormal normals 2017-11-26 — 18 minutes Mr Climate takes normals to abnormal lengths in pursuit of global warming. Squaring circles in Berlin 2017-11-22 | 2017-11-27 — 6 minutes Or political Venn diagrams with no overlaps. The UN Climate Change Conference in Bonn 2017-11-21 — 4 minutes Ten days of conspicuous consumption come to an end. Good riddance. No change, please – we're not Jamaicans 2017-11-20 — 3 minutes This gripping German soap: we can't stand the tension! Sextus and Cynthia, a lovely couple 2017-11-14 — 8 minutes Just don't invite them to your dinner party. Extreme weather: quite the norm, really 2017-11-13 — 3 minutes After a sip of the green stuff, Mr Climate gets a little overexcited. Sheer uselessness 2017-11-09 — 4 minutes Counting down to Christmas the UK Government way. Figures of Speech discussion group 2017-11-09 — 1 minute Talking amongst ourselves An outrageous libel of a dead hero 2 2017-11-05 — 2hours 14 minutes Beyond the press reports it's worse than we thought. Quote and image of the month for October 2017-11-01 — 14 minutes Quote: Brian Aldiss, Report on Probability A (1969). Image: William Holman Hunt, The Hireling Shepherd (1851). Scrapbook for October 2017-10-01 — 5 minutes CSI: Las Vegas – Crime Scene Incompetence | More days of autumn | British beer | Stag hunting | The twelve days of autumn | Swiss family picnic | Dice rolling by a skilled opponent | The unseen cost of wind [energy] The UK Communications Act 2003 2017-10-18 — 3 minutes The process is the punishment, yet again. Think on. The mystery of Schubert's Unfinished Symphony 2017-10-17 — 32 minutes A tour of words in single quotation marks, such as 'given', 'acquired', 'stolen', 'hidden', 'lost', 'found', 'unknown' and 'discovered'. An outrageous libel of a dead hero 2017-10-07 | 2017-11-05 — 4 minutes Smears and innuendoes come easily to climate scientists. Mrs Shopping-List meets Pericles 2017-10-05 | 2017-10-06 — 8 minutes Not a good match. Even the slogan needs to get a grip. Quote and image of the month for September 2017-09-01 — 1 minute Quote: Wolfdietrich Schnurre, Der Schattenfotograf, 1978. Images: Various, The Cheder. Scrapbook for September 2017-09-01 — 3 minutes Last supper [updated] | A century of progress | Please, Lord, let they handmaid depart in peace (ASAP). | Keeping an eye on the Germans | The school run – alpine style | How to become a published author The Envy-of-the-World™: solution found! 2017-09-30 — 3 minutes More of it. Luddites of the world, unite! 2017-09-28 | 2017-11-06 — 2 minutes A civilisational reboot in a small Swiss town, now up before the beak. The AfD: the uncouth, the amateur, the gormless. 2017-09-26 | 2017-09-30 — 8 minutes Still better than the others, though. No change, please – we're German 2017-09-25 | 2017-10-17 — 7 minutes Waiting for Brünnhilde to finish – but why bother? The ending is always the same. Still on your own 2017-09-24 — 2 minutes Wear a bin-bag over your head and a bullet-proof vest. Theresa goes shopping in Florence 2017-09-23 — 6 minutes The shopping-list Prime Minister does the Renaissance. Goethe's Gotthard obsession 2017-09-20 — 4 minutes Three long journeys in 22 years, culminating in a pact with the Devil. 1775. Lili: the first Gotthard journey 2017-09-20 | 2017-11-19 — 34 minutes On the road with the Werther tribute band. 1779. Charlotte: the second Gotthard journey 2017-09-20 — 1 hour 10 minutes Educating your duke. Don't bother. 1797. Barbara: the third Gotthard journey 2017-09-20 — 35 minutes Tell, Faust and a box of rocks. 220 years ago on 16 September Goethe entered Switzerland en route to the Gotthard. How time flies! Quote and image of the month for August 2017-08-01 — 4 minutes Quotes: Heinrich Heine (1831) and Conrad Ferdinand Meyer (1887). Images: Léopold Robert, L'Arrivée des Moissonneurs dans les marais Pontins (1830) and Friedrich Kallmorgen, Erntezeit (1891). Scrapbook for August 2017-08-01 — 1 minute Decanting the dregs | That Google diversity thing Moral money 2017-08-10 | 2017-11-06 — 12 minutes Pierre Gauchat's wonderful Swiss banknotes: gone but not forgotten. Gratitude: the cement of civilisation 2017-08-08 — 2 minutes Thank you, ancestors, for all you have done for us. And is there honey still for tea? 2017-08-07 — 20 minutes Rupert Brooke, born 130 years ago. The days of wine and roses 2017-08-04 — 22 minutes Ernest Dowson, born 150 years ago. The Gotthard Pass: the heart of Switzerland 2017-08-01 — 60 minutes Still beating weakly despite all the bypass operations. Quote and image of the month for July 2017-07-01 — 5 minutes Quote: Georg Heym, Ophelia, 1911. Image: John Everett Millais, Ophelia, 1851-2. Scrapbook for July 2017-07-01 — 2 minutes The Grenfell fire: the EU fingerprint | Getting the most out of solar panels | What's in a name®? | Planet Snowball with brief warm spells Stephen Hawking speaks 2017-07-04 | 2017-07-10 — 2 minutes …or not, as the case may be. Either way he's a dummy. Dr Weather and Mr Climate 2017-07-03 | 2017-07-03 — 2 minutes Don't drink the green stuff in the beaker! Too late. Winston and his Swiss paintmaker 2017-07-02 — 4 minutes A review of Champagner mit Churchill, Philipp Gut's account of the friendship between Winston Churchill and his Swiss paint supplier, Willy Sax. The German connection 2017-07-01 — 3 minutes 100 years ago, on 17 July 1917, the Windsors emerged into a grateful world. The total stress of Tom Bombadil 2017-07-01 — 26 minutes The bit the Lord of the Rings films left behind, thank goodness. Quote and image of the month for June 2017-06-01 — 4 minutes Quote: Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities. A Story of the French Revolution, 1859. Image: Samuel Bough, London from Shooter's Hill, 1872. Scrapbook for June 2017-06-01 — 17 minutes Progress Illinois Style | Arnie's smallest audience | Dim and dimmer | Pulling teeth | Summer solstice | Trump: the first five months | North update: no hope | Steady as she goes | Jack of all trades, master of none | The art of political survival | No wheels on her waggon | Tesla – makes your hair stand on end | Hung parliament, unfortunately not properly | Swedish National Day | One proxy reconstruction doth not a denial make. Fifty-eight: probably | Smile, you're on Candid Camera | Lucky Lukens | Enough is enough | Breakfast like an emperor Herd management 2017-06-25 | 2017-06-29 — 5 minutes The knock on the door in the night. It's for your own good. Really. The pursuit of happiness 2017-06-19 | 2017-06-20 — 7 minutes Not as simple as it sounds, especially in two languages. The other Austrian Economics 2017-06-17 — 3 minutes The patriotic way to buy your folkwear. Ransomware: the never-ending story 2017-06-16 — 3 minutes Don't rely on antivirus software to keep you safe. It won't. UK sovereignty. Then what? 2017-06-14 — 6 minutes Some thoughts for laundry-list minds. Maria Theresia, the great Empress 2017-06-12 — 17 minutes Born 300 years ago on 13 May 2017. The wartime prime minister – shaken and stirred 2017-06-08 — 3 minutes A review of Jonathan Teplitzky's film Churchill. The Swiss, God bless 'em! 2017-06-07 — 3 minutes Cultural appropriation in translation. Goethe's Heidenröslein 2017-06-01 | 2017-07-25 — 52 minutes Surviving a little prick. Scrapbook for May 2017-05-01 — 3 minutes Still on your own | That Tory manifesto | The path of healing | Our Swiss sunbeam expert writes | The rich: not like us WannaCry – the dust settles (a bit) 2017-05-20 — 6 minutes This vale of tears, with some shafts of light. The French, dontcha luv 'em! 2017-05-19 — 3 minutes No. And neither did Goethe. The future of energy in Switzerland 2017-05-17 | 2017-05-21 — 1 minute There isn't one. Why is it always the voters who have to stick the tail on this donkey? Christian Schubart: the prison years 2017-05-15 — 3 minutes The author of Die Forelle gets taught a lesson. Schubart's dungeon cell in Hohenasperg 2017-05-15 — 13 minutes Now you see it, now you don't. The commander and the clergyman 2017-05-15 — 12 minutes Bad cop and even worse cop with some old scores to settle. His Serene Radiance 2017-05-15 — 7 minutes Carl Eugen, Duke of Württemberg. Re-education 2017-05-15 — 2 minutes Improving you until you stink. Some relief, 1778 2017-05-15 — 7 minutes The worst seems to be over. Fresh air, 1779 2017-05-15 — 9 minutes A glimpse of a distant, unreachable horizon. The permissibility of pleasure. The entertainer, 1780 2017-05-15 — 10 minutes Keeping the commander and his troops cheerful. Renewal, 1782 2017-05-15 — 5 minutes Recovering from Rieger. The Crypt of Princes 2017-05-15 — 7 minutes Insult your captor publicly: that will get you out of prison in no time. Free at last 2017-05-15 — 14 minutes He might have been better off staying in prison. Schubert: Greatest Hits 2017-05-01 — 3 minutes Pick 'n mix in the sweetshop. Some tips on getting to know Schubert's music. Scrapbook for April 2017-04-01 — 1 minute Site changes Lied auf dem Wasser zu singen 2017-04-30 — 26 minutes D 774. Great poem. Great music. Two geniuses at work. Schubert's friend Johann Senn 2017-04-24 — 2 minutes For some people, being born on the first of April is no joke. The Senn family 2017-04-24 — 9 minutes A Tyrolean family at the centre of political turmoil. The Tyrolean Fatherland 2017-04-24 — 11 minutes A land of exceptionalism, independence and Catholic bigotry. Johann Senn in the Stadtkonvikt and after 2017-04-24 — 14 minutes The young Tyrolean in Vienna. Revolting students 2017-04-24 — 6 minutes German nationalism and political reform. Cooling down the hotheads 2017-04-24 — 15 minutes The suppression of academic unrest. The first exile 2017-04-24 — 20 minutes Johann Senn's exile in Innsbruck and his army years. The wilderness years 2017-04-24 — 17 minutes Life and literary failure after the army. Who's afraid of Immanuel Kant? 2017-04-23 — 2 minutes 230 years of the Critique of Pure Reason Scrapbook for March 2017-03-01 — 4 minutes Martin McGuinness | Something that could not have been said ten years ago | Federal Bureau of Indeterminateness | PR, the European disease | Tour d'horizon (desperation edition) On your own 2017-03-24 — 4 minutes Time for a stiff upper lip. It is, after all, the only anti-terrorist weapon you have. Too much understanding 2017-03-18 — 2 minutes Gotthold Lessing's little boy Zurich-Petrograd, one-way 2017-03-16 | 2017-11-19 — 40 minutes A hundred years ago in April, a decisive moment in history. Schubert: from child to musical genius 2017-03-01 | 2017-03-03 — 32 minutes It was managed by a job… and a good job, too! Quote and image of the month for February 2017-02-01 — 1 minute Quote: George Steiner, Real Presences, 1989. Image: the new Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg. Scrapbook for February 2017-02-01 — 12 minutes Jack of all trades… | Site changes | Samoyeds | Deutschland, Deutschland über alles, reloaded | Scandi noir blacker humour | The Envy-of-the-World™, again | The madness of Prince Charlie | Scandi noir black humour | John Bates, whistleblower | Whose side is North on? | Myron Ebell at the GWPF | Sir Detail and friend | Snowflakes of the month The Wind in the Willows 2017-02-14 — 1 minute A new edition of Kenneth Grahame's classic, beautifully illustrated by David Petersen. Will the real Schubert please stand up? 2017-02-13 — 13 minutes Franz Schubert, master of disguise. CAGW in proportion 2017-02-02 — 9 minutes The Blaise Pascal guide to Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming. Finding Trumpy 2017-02-01 — 1 minute The four unaccounted hours of the most powerful man on earth. Alistair Cooke: urbane BBC opiner 2017-02-01 — 13 minutes If only Letter from America had taken comments. The media: Nixon's revenge 2017-02-01 — 5 minutes Fings ain't wot they used to be. Better get used to it and stop grumbling. Quote and image of the month for January 2017-01-01 — 1 minute Quote: Wilhelm Busch, [Sahst du das wunderbare Bild von Brouwer?]. Image: Adriaen Brouwer, Die Operation am Rücken. Scrapbook for January 2017-01-01 — 6 minutes Wimmin's busts | Faking it | Swiss snowflakes losing it | George Mikes: an oldie but goldie | Two simple questions that men cannot answer | The poor Hamburger, the poor Berliner | Rail travel costs Figures of Speech discussion group 2017-01-24 | 2017-01-27 — 1 minute Talking amongst ourselves Bedlam through the peephole 2017-01-23 | 2017-01-26 — 3 minutes A glimpse of the enlightened inmates up close. Trembling above the abyss 2017-01-22 — 5 minutes Goethe conquering one of his demons in Strasbourg Cathedral. Climate scientists 2017-01-21 | 2017-02-05 — 7 minutes Some are good, but most are just a basket of disreputables. Would you buy a used thermometer from any of them? Pie-in-the-sky charts 2017-01-19 | 2017-02-04 — 3 minutes Just run that decarbonisation thing past us again, would you? We'll do it our way 2017-01-19 — 4 minutes Blaming the Amis the European way. Franz Peter Schubert's family 2017-01-18 — 12 minutes Marking the 220th anniversary of the birth of the composer Franz Peter Schubert. Charlie to the rescue 2017-01-15 | 2017-01-23 — 4 minutes The future King saves the world with a stroke of his pen and becomes a peer-reviewed prince. Blacking up for beginners 2017-01-15 — 5 minutes The harmless pleasures of byegone days. Deutschland, Deutschland über alles 2017-01-09 | 2017-02-14 — 21 minutes 220 years and still going strong – well, some of it at least. Facing facts in the post-fact era 2017-01-03 — 11 minutes Few facts, not much truth and plenty of fake news. 2016 2016-01-01 Article list for 2016 Quote and image of the month for December 2016 2016-12-01 — 1 minute Quote: Berger and Luckmann, The Social Construction of Reality. Image: Lorenzo Lotto, Annunciazione. Scrapbook for December 2016-12-01 — 6 minutes Editor's note | Himmel und Hölle | Another mystery of modern life | Turning spare kids into money | Shutting stable doors | FoS website change | Testing for Microsoft | Thank you, President Putin! On the road to nowhere 2016-12-28 | 2018-04-05 — 7 minutes At the moment short, but tremendously expensive. That's OK, the French are paying. Backup hell: a visit to the crypt 2016-12-26 | 2017-02-03 — 16 minutes Christmas, the traditional season for tales of horror. Beyond analysis 2016-12-23 — 2 minutes Geertgen tot Sint Jans' painting Geboorte van Christus / Nativity at Night. Rolling noiselessly through the void 2016-12-21 — 1 minute A meditation upon Saint Lucy's day, data adjusted. Judge Judy, the Divine Comedy for our times 2016-12-20 — 7 minutes The TV programme is a moral compass among the lost souls of modern America. John Betjeman's poem 'Christmas' 2016-12-18 — 4 minutes It takes a proper Christian to write a Christmas poem. 'Modesty' – or not, as the case may be. 2016-12-17 — 2 minutes Antonio Corradini's veiled masterpiece: no modesty at all here, in any sense. Energy made easy 2016-12-15 | 2017-01-04 — 7 minutes The thinking person's guide to Energy Derangement Syndrome (EDS). The Nobel Ceremony 2016 2016-12-11 — 3 minutes The bling! The frocks! The food! The hypocrisy! No wonder King Charles the Unbathed looks grumpy. Who is Schober? what is he? 2016-12-09 — 1 minute Why are you asking me? I've no idea either. Growing up, growing apart 2016-12-09 — 6 minutes All change: Sweden, Germany and Austria On the couch 2016-12-09 — 5 minutes Austrian analytics: detachment, integration, inferiority, compensation. Family life 2016-12-09 — 12 minutes Depravity, tragedy and 'bluebottles' taking notes. The cloud of unknowing 2016-12-09 — 5 minutes Managing the documentary record. The Schobert wakes 2016-12-09 — 12 minutes Schubert and Schober: charisma, friendship, money and social power. The cultural circles: 1815-1823 2016-12-09 — 20 minutes The singer, the salons, the reading club and the dilettante. The dark years: 1823-1826 2016-12-09 — 7 minutes Schubert's crisis years, Schober in Breslau. The final Schubert years: 1825-1828 2016-12-09 — 10 minutes The days of wine and roses in the coffee-house. Schober after Schubert 2016-12-09 — 16 minutes Moving on and falling out. Quote and image of the month for November 2016-11-01 — 1 minute Quote: Jules Laforgue, Winter Coming On. Image: Édouard-Léon Cortès, Place de Madeleine, après la pluié. Scrapbook for November 2016-11-01 — 9 minutes Envy-of-the-World™ – again | Snowflakes of the Month | Back to the palace | Pointless polling | North gets it – not really | Nigel Farage | Trump: change and hopes | FoS website restructured | All Saints' and All Souls' Days 2016 | Emailing for dummies OUP WOTY 'post-truth': WTF! 2016-11-16 — 3 minutes OUP discovers 'objective facts' and sticks it to us knuckledraggers. We still won though, and that's a fact. Man and machine 2016-11-11 — 2 minutes The Bad Aibling rail crash 09.02.2016: the idiot who operated the system, and the idiots who designed it. Climate cognitive dissonance 2016-11-07 | 2016-11-10 — 7 minutes Coping with uncomfortable climate facts: time to give up? The Schubert trajectory 2016-11-04 — 16 minutes Standing back for a detail-free biography. Esprit de corps in elected bodies 2016-11-01 — 3 minutes Lurches to the left of me, lurches to the right, here I am: stuck in the middle with you. Quote and image of the month for October 2016-10-01 — 1 minute Quote: René Descartes, Meditations on First Philosophy, Meditation III. Image: Edward Hopper, Automat. Scrapbook for October 2016-10-01 — 11 minutes More intimations of mortality | Alan Turing, useful genius | Dismantling Hillary | Aberfan: a tale of two inquiries | Matt Ridley: Global Warming versus Global Greening | Snowflake of the Month | A grave question | More Waugh | The plague of politics | Intimations of mortality | Mummy knows best | Looking over your shoulder | Spare the rod The Man in Black: an expert writes 2016-10-26 | 2017-11-07 — 8 minutes Art historians – they are just not like us. The tedious tale of this slapdash portrait continues. Freedom of speech 2016-10-23 | 2016-10-24 — 3 minutes Alive and well and at ease in Swizerland, its home since the 18th century. A victim remembers 2016-10-22 — 3 minutes A gentle encounter behind the tarpaulin. The conquering hero 2016-10-21 — 2 minutes That Batley and Spen by-election. Schiaparelli 2016-10-20 | 2018-11-27 — 5 minutes Yet another European bites the dust on the red ink planet. The Man in Black 2016-10-17 — 11 minutes No, not that one, the other one – the expensive one. It's still all about cash, though. Brian Cox: the zombie staggers on 2016-10-10 — 2 minutes Back in your box, Jean-Jacques! Bees pulling strings 2016-10-07 — 6 minutes It's always the same in hierarchical societies. Those formative years 2016-10-06 — 4 minutes The truth never hurt anyone. The compact guide to developing a thick skin. John Dalton, 250 years old 2016-10-05 — 2 minutes One of the founding fathers of the Scientific Revolution. Thank you, Sir. The grape harvest 2016-10-04 — 5 minutes French white wine: alcohol, child labour, girls for hire and a certain unmistakeable 'finish'. Babi Yar 2016-10-03 | 2019-07-28 — 3 minutes Where is there an end to it, the soundless wailing. Bible studies 2016-10-02 | 2016-10-25 — 5 minutes Short meditation for Sunday 2 October involving the Bible, that essential book for atheists. Oh… and that other book. The Jacobin Conspiracy 2016-10-01 — 9 minutes Making the mood music of Schubert's times. Circles of conspiracy 2016-10-01 — 6 minutes Secret meetings, handwritten circulars and strange gestures. Franz Hebenstreit 2016-10-01 — 14 minutes The hothead cavalry lieutenant with the big voice. Andreas von Riedel 2016-10-01 — 19 minutes The mathematics teacher. How much can a man survive? Joseph Vinzenz Degen 2016-10-01 — 3 minutes Some pieces of silver. Fortune favours the betrayer. Making the punishment fit the crime 2016-10-01 — 2 minutes Learning from the conspiracy. Closing down discussion and criticism. The atmosphere under the belljar 2016-10-01 — 9 minutes The calm people of the becalmed empire keep their noses clean. Quote and image of the month for September 2016-09-01 — 1 minute Quote: Marianne Hem Eriksen, Doors to the dead; T. S. Eliot, Burnt Norton. Image: Martinus Rørbye, Entrance to an Inn in the Praestegarden at Hillested. Scrapbook for September 2016-09-01 — 9 minutes Late learning | Immigrants, always resented | Snowflake of the Month | Design update | Feed a cold, starve a fever | One mystery fewer | Restoration and reconstruction | Missing links | The medium is the message, Tim | Quelle finesse! Wrong again 2016-09-24 — 1 minute And again and again. Ashes and hyssop time on this website. That Sappho thing 2016-09-23 — 1 minute Hold on tight to your dreams. Rustling inspiration 2016-09-22 — 5 minutes More for Schubert fans: a closer look at Wohin? from Die schöne Müllerin. Channelled speech 2016-09-19 | 2016-09-20 — 7 minutes Decorating the slaughterhouse with geraniums. The houseman's friend 2016-09-17 — 2 minutes An illustrated guide to emptying the Gtech floor cleaner: a disgustingly filthy corner of the internet. Wishful thinking 2016-09-15 — 2 minutes There are practical limits to making allowances, however worthy. Churchill in Zurich 2016-09-13 | 2016-09-21 — 5 minutes Seventy years ago on 19 September 1946 Winston Churchill delivered his famous 'Europe' speech in Zurich. Only the people were delighted. Franz's belljar 2016-09-13 — 25 minutes The belljar of the Austrian Emperor Franz II comes down over his people. Young composers included. The other Spaun 2016-09-05 — 30 minutes Crazy uncle Franz Seraph von Spaun: an heroic life of principled resistance bordering on the psychotic. Walking with Walser 2016-09-04 — 7 minutes Martin Walser, Heimatkunde and the art of leaving things unsaid. In praise of Stephen McIntyre 2016-09-02 — 18 minutes Dipping a curious toe into the murky pond of climate science. Sharks or minnows? Quote and image of the month for August 2016-08-01 — 2 minutes Quote: Friedrich Schiller, Wilhelm Tell. Image: Ernst Stückelberg, Wilhelm Tell mit Sohn/William Tell and son. Scrapbook for August 2016-08-01 — 8 minutes The Fall of Man, not quite | Democratic accident | Nice binary dates | Swiss birthnames in 2015 | 'Deep Insight of the Month' award | Sledghammer vs. dagger… | The official mind | Snowflake of the Month Arthur Szyk: FDR's 'Soldier in Art' 2016-08-29 — 10 minutes Satan Leads the Ball considered. Climate alarmism 2016-08-27 | 2016-10-29 — 11 minutes Down the rabbit hole into the strange, topsy-turvy world of climate alarmism. Citroën DS23 2016-08-26 | 2016-09-01 — 3 minutes Gone but not forgotten: the rustbucket goddess remembered. Artificial Intelligence 2016-08-23 | 2017-01-03 — 7 minutes Not a very intelligent thing to have. Portrait of the age 2016-08-20 — 32 minutes Joseph, Leopold and the Enlightenment manifesto made visible by Pompeo Batoni. The shipwreck on the winedark sea 2016-08-15 — 1 minute Tempestuous times for patient polymaths with time on their hands. The antennae of the race 2016-08-15 — 8 minutes A lot of crackles, whistles and static during a storm-tossed life. Non-linear obscurity 2016-08-15 — 21 minutes Looking inside his head. Obscurity, manifestations, light and shade in fragments. The Odyssean shipwreck 2016-08-15 | 2023-05-25 — 11 minutes Struggling on with the windswept Odysseus: over, on and under the water. The Pisan shipwreck 2016-08-15 — 17 minutes Pound scribbling in the shipwreck of the prison camp. The shipwreck in Rock Drill 2016-08-15 — 21 minutes The white goddess hits the waves in an ample bikini. Grab it while you can. The shipwreck in Thrones 2016-08-15 — 12 minutes Getting to the end of the journey, somehow. Conclusion and bibliography 2016-08-15 — 10 minutes Was it worth it, the great tempest? No. Quote and image of the month for July 2016-07-01 — 3 minutes Quote: Robert Graves, Goodbye to All That. Image: William Orpen, Ready To Start. Self Portrait. Scrapbook for July 2016-07-01 — 4 minutes Turkey: the choice | You ask, we answer | Two charts | Respected journalist | Hip dysplasia | Goddess | In video we trust | The chosen ones choose | Boots The Bastille Spirit 2016-07-17 — 3 minutes The Green Fairy is not your friend, Brendan. Classic books 2016-07-16 — 12 minutes The great unread, a mountain to be climbed? Or shall we just skirt round the outside, like sensible people do? Renaissance mechanics 2016-07-14 — 1 minute Skilful recreations of some classical paintings as garage workshop scenes. Devaluing the family 2016-07-10 | 2016-10-04 — 9 minutes Let's not upset the childlessly carefree with all these nasty value judgements. Andrea Leadsom, next Prime Minister of the UK 2016-07-08 | 2016-07-12 — 7 minutes Without a shadow of a doubt. Dinner in the desert 2016-07-08 — 2 minutes Help yourself to whatever you want; the choice is yours. Just don't vomit on your host. The cradle of the Habsburgs 2016-07-07 — 31 minutes Great oaks from little acorns grow. Not only that, Emperor Rudolf I died 825 years ago on 15 July 1291. UK politics grassroots guide 2016-07-01 — 4 minutes Puzzled and confused by politicians? Empress Maria Theresia knew what to do. The thinking person's guide with detailed construction plans suitable for every level and all budgets. Quote and image of the month for June 2016-06-01 — 1 minute Quote: Basil Bunting, Briggflatts. Image: Aureliano de Beruete, Espinos en flor. Plantío de los Infantes (Flowering Hawthorn). Scrapbook for June 2016-06-01 — 10 minutes Leave means leave | Jo Cox™: the people speak | Hitting nail on head time | Jo Cox™ | Journalist falls off bar stool | Richard North's posting pause | Mark of respect | Nutjob loners | The funeral parlour | Gotthard conundrum | Envy-of-the-World™ | Gotthard tunnel. Gotthard tunnel? | Brown people The Tory Chosen Ones 2016-06-28 — 1 minute Toeing the party line. EU Referendum, mopping up 2016-06-24 — 2 minutes First thoughts after the non-deluge. Voters 2016-06-23 — 1 minute Now you see them, now you don't. The fine art of wonderment 2016-06-22 | 2016-06-25 — 11 minutes The Vincent van Gogh guide to Platonic astonishment. Infamous last words 2016-06-19 — 4 minutes For all things there is a time: a time to sniff; a time hold your nose and look away. Gretchen am Spinnrade 2016-06-13 — 13 minutes Schubert again. This time the seventeen year-old's 'stroke of genius of the first order'. The alien hatches 2016-06-09 | 2016-06-24 — 6 minutes Blood on the body, the table, the walls and the floor – just don't mention the Tiber. Carbon dioxide: the science is settling nicely 2016-06-08 | 2016-06-09 — 5 minutes More vindication for the Chief Scientist of this website. Ignorant? Uninformed? Thick? 2016-06-06 | 2016-06-09 — 2 minutes We would really like to have your considered opinion on Brexit. No X please, you're not British 2016-06-03 | 2016-06-23 — 7 minutes An electoral shambles, just what is needed for a close-run referendum result. Sahra[sic] Wagenknecht 2016-06-01 — 6 minutes Neo-Stalinist political lunatic of the first order; a fantasist, too. The green tick 2016-06-01 — 2 minutes The successful parasite does not kill its host. Blood sucking in Norway gone wrong. Quote and image of the month for May 2016 2016-05-01 — 1 minute Quote: Stefan Zweig, Die Welt von Gestern: Erinnerungen eines Europäers. Image: Friderike und Stefan Zweig auf einem Bahnhof/The Zweigs on a station platform. Scrapbook for May 2016-05-01 — 4 minutes Equation | Not a good end | The Donald | How to feel inadequate | Unbalanced revulsion | Le Temps des cerises At the court of the Sun Queen 2016-05-28 — 4 minutes One of Hillary Clinton's courtiers speaks out: the result is not reassuring. Before Schubert 2016-05-24 — 1 minute The ancestors who made him possible. Carl and Susanna Schubert 2016-05-24 — 22 minutes The pious farmer who educated his sons; the farming family who survived disease and famine to prosper. The two brothers 2016-05-24 — 12 minutes Johann Karl and Franz Theodor: from the farming village to the Jesuit High School. The brothers reach Vienna 2016-05-24 — 9 minutes Karl lands on his feet in the big city, then helps Franz Theodor to do the same. The two sisters 2016-05-24 — 5 minutes Elisabeth and Magdalena Vietz: two sisters for two brothers. Franz Theodor and Elisabeth's children 2016-05-24 — 3 minutes The composer's family: fifteen children, few survivors, one musical genius. European wars 2016-05-10 — 1 minute Your cut-out-and-keep guide, specially designed for the use of British Prime Ministers. In search of lost timelessness 2016-05-10 — 6 minutes That midnight feeling. Saving time 2016-05-08 | 2016-12-11 — 5 minutes Why? The EU referendum to date 2016-05-04 — 4 minutes An incoherent shambles, totally predictable. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism 2016-05-01 — 5 minutes One reason among many for the decline and fall of the Habsburg Empire. On your own 2016-05-01 — 3 minutes The three pillars of the Protestant revolution: salvation by faith alone, through Christ alone and through scripture alone. The calling 2016-05-01 — 3 minutes Do your best with what you are given: the importance of the 'calling'. The elect 2016-05-01 — 4 minutes Are you one of the elect? Prove it, particularly to yourself. The heavenly balance sheet 2016-05-01 — 2 minutes The cycle of redeemable sin compared with the fixed plan of virtuous action. Rewards on earth and in Heaven 2016-05-01 — 4 minutes Irresistable grace will bring the rewards of Earthly life. For the greater glory of God: Carl Schubert 2016-05-01 — 10 minutes The servant of the Catholic God leads an upright and pious life albeit without lasting utility. For the greater glory of God: Benjamin Franklin 2016-05-01 — 9 minutes The servant of the Calvinist God follows a programme of self-improvement. The trivial round, the common task 2016-05-01 — 3 minutes The beneficial effect of work in pursuit of the 'calling'. Work: unpleasing to God 2016-05-01 — 4 minutes Work if you have to, but not too hard. It might even be better to live on your own in a cave for a few years. Quote and image of the month for April 2016-04-01 — 1 minute Quote: William Shakespeare, Cymbeline. Image: Dandelions: Two photos of a Swiss alpine meadow taken three weeks apart. Scrapbook for April 2016-04-01 — 11 minutes Aide-memoire | #BringBackOurMen | Heartwarming | Dressing gown | Boaty McBoatface | John Whittingdale, chick magnet | The devastating power of hashtags | The terrorists are winning | Butch Spaniards on the rampage | A helpful tip for savers | Headline of the year candidate | The helping hand Cherry blossom time 2016-04-25 — 1 minute Unfortunately coinciding with April snow time this year. Dark chocolate, green lunacy 2016-04-22 — 5 minutes Fear and loathing in the aisles: buying chocolate the insane way. Out of the swamp 2016-04-17 — 16 minutes More Schubert. Matthisson and Brun wallow, Goethe and Schubert ascend to the light. Richard North 2016-04-14 | 2016-08-16 — 8 minutes Psychiatric case review: condition worsening. Do not sleep… 2016-04-13 — 4 minutes …while the stewards of the world are busy. Imperial chemistry 2016-04-05 — 12 minutes Emperor Leopold II's secret and dangerous hobby. The real Lili Marleen 2016-04-03 — 4 minutes Certainly not hanging around lamposts. The Habsburg lip 2016-04-01 — 8 minutes Branding a dynasty with a genetic defect. If you've got it, flaunt it. Quote and image of the month for March 2016-03-01 — 1 minute Quote: Gilbert Ryle, The Concept of Mind. Image: Albert Edelfelt, Good Friends, Portrait of the Artist's Sister Bertha Edelfelt. Scrapbook for March 2016-03-01 — 3 minutes Tears: an instrument of foreign policy | Wasting police time | Headline of the year award | Rigour, not mortis | Geography made easy | The god of the forest | Hyacinth time | Swiss referendum updates | The Dohlen are here! Bedsheet, spreadsheet 2016-03-24 | 2016-11-16 — 14 minutes How much is your health worth to you? What's the French for 'dodo'? 2016-03-23 — 2 minutes Whatever it is, it's dead. Lenten thoughts, newly assembled 2016-03-18 | 2016-03-24 — 4 minutes As Christians come to the end of Lent, a period of self-denial and reflection, we ask the question: is it good not to spend money? Heinrich Heine, 17 February 1856 2016-03-17 — 5 minutes A tardy commemoration of the 160th anniversary of the death of Heinrich Heine. The great survivor 2016-03-14 — 11 minutes The Swiss artist Hans Erni's monster mural Die Schweiz, das Ferienland der Völker. Rescued, but why and for whom? The Swiss muddle 2016-03-04 — 4 minutes Switzerland, Britzerland! So much rubbish, so little time to dispose of it all. The Hans Erni lockdown 2016-03-03 — 6 minutes Imprisoned in museums and coffee table books, his work is destined for internet oblivion. Switzerland: now safe to visit 2016-03-01 — 2 minutes Another spine is pulled from the Swiss hedgehog. After safer travel we now have worry-free flatpack shopping. It may not end well. Tristram's bad start in life, 2 March 1718 2016-03-02 — 3 minutes Two hundred and ninety-eight years ago Tristram Shandy was conceived – anything but immaculately. Montségur, 16 March 1244 2016-03-04 — 3 minutes The ashes of the 'Friends of God'. The Cathars, the 'Friends of God' 2016-03-04 — 5 minutes Recovering the traces of an obliterated monastic order. The Albigensian crusade 2016-03-04 — 5 minutes The terrible crusade against its own people and the royal conquest of the Languedoc. The community under siege 2016-03-04 — 8 minutes The siege of the hilltop fort of Montségur. Eight months of resistance until the attackers found the fatal flaw in the defenses. The crowned knot of fire 2016-03-04 — 7 minutes The fiery end of the 'Friends of God' on Montségur and the obliteration of the movement. Montségur: video materials 2016-03-04 — 1 minute Selected video materials about Montségur. Quote and image of the month for February 2016-02-01 — 1 minute Quote: Fink et al., The Oasis of Happiness: Toward an Ontology of Play. Image: Benjamin Williams Leader, February Fill Dyke. Scrapbook 2016-02-01 — 4 minutes Solar Impulse update | Spare the rod, spoil the child | Swiss snow having orderly fun | The propagation of nonsense | Accumulated wisdom | Some more people not saying things | Eamonn and Ruth's little secret | Headline of the year award From a night of frosty wreck 2016-02-27 — 1 minute From George Meredith's The Thrush in February. Language Lab 2016-02-26 | 2016-02-26 — 6 minutes The untouchables: decimate and beg the question. Swiss democracy, seriously compromised 2016-02-22 | 2016-03-03 — 6 minutes Fighting the ruling classes. Do Swiss referendums matter, or are they just national focus groups? False gods in graven images 2016-02-17 — 6 minutes Will the real John Walker please stand up? Die Forelle 2016-02-07 — 1 minute Fishy tales, speculations, a decade in a dungeon, oblivion and immortality. You can't beat a good song. Franz Schubert – The Trout Quintet 2016-02-07 — 6 minutes The young genius playing for his supper in provincial Austria. Franz Schubert – The Trout 2016-02-07 — 1 minute A taste of immortality for a forgotten poet from an unknown composer. Christian Schubart – The road to doom 2016-02-07 — 35 minutes How to make enemies and the fine art of annoying nearly everyone at the same time. Christian Schubart – Taking the bait 2016-02-07 — 31 minutes Muddying the waters and choosing the perfect bait for the victim: a masterpiece! Christian Schubart – The Trout 2016-02-07 — 8 minutes The bright, romantic allegory of deception and kidnap on the autopsy slab. The grass on the weirs 2016-02-01 — 12 minutes Serenity amid the tumult of life. Reflection and regret. Quote and image of the month for January 2016 2016-01-01 — 1 minute Quote: Edward FitzGerald, The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Image: Ivar Arosenius, Backusfest. Rabid lexicography 2016-01-26 | 2016-01-26 — 6 minutes The insensitivity, it drives you mad! Not like us 2016-01-25 | 2016-05-07 — 12 minutes Our continental friends, God bless them! Language Lab 2016-01-23 — 5 minutes A collection of Americanisms and the Great British Stress Shift. IKEA's loose screw 2016-01-19 — 5 minutes The last thing you want in a cheap flatpack company is a screw loose. Steptoe and Son go scandi noir. Nathan's rings 2016-01-18 — 4 minutes Lessing's Nathan, not called 'the Wise' for nothing. Brief Encounter II 2016-01-18 — 2 minutes Fings ain't wot they used to be: Not every man is Trevor Howard. Girls should listen to the accumulated wisdom of the ages. Mohammed: not my prophet 2016-01-17 | 2016-02-06 — 2 minutes Do I have a choice? Probably not. Lunatic calendars 2016-01-17 — 3 minutes A cheerful month-long Ramadan fast in Svalbard (a.k.a. Spitzbergen) in summer. Is it supper time yet? Hemingway under the hood 2016-01-15 — 8 minutes Let's lift the lid on the genius and his chiasmic creations. Sharing the risk 2016-01-09 | 2016-01-10 — 4 minutes We agree with Mark Steyn on almost everything — just not this. Bathtime for St. Kevin 2016-01-09 — 12 minutes Seventy-two reasons not to read 'Finnegans Wake'. And one reason to do so. The dismal science 2016-01-06 — 1 minute Still guessing after all these years. The below above 2016-01-06 — 2 minutes The mould spreads slowly but surely into the jam below. Sanitised swearing 2016-01-05 — 7 minutes A trigger warning: sensitive souls should have the sal volatile handy. Souvenirs 2016-01-03 — 1 minute Which is real, the souvenir or the memory? Rockers do it better 2016-01-03 | 2016-01-09 — 3 minutes Stylish exits by those two rockers, Lemmy Kilmister and Arthur Schopenhauer. They'll be back! 2015 2015-01-01 Article list for 2015 Quote and image of the month for December 2015-12-01 — 1 minute Quote: Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. Image: Modesto Urgell e Inglada, La vuelta del entierro/Returning from the burial. Die Winterreise 2015-12-31 — 2 minutes Schubert yet again, but no cheerful bits at all this time, just loss, betrayal, rejection, alienation and wandering. Chapter 1 – The birth of the text of Die Winterreise. 2015-12-31 — 5 minutes The 'Urania' text, the 'Waldhornist' text and Schubert's synthesis. Chapter 2 – Poems 1-12 2015-12-31 — 8 minutes A narrative of loss, rejection and wandering: the first twelve poems of the Die Winterreise and the narrative thread. Chapter 3 – Poems 13-24 2015-12-31 — 9 minutes Themes of despair, alienation and wandering: the last twelve poems of the Die Winterreise; thematic structure and the death paradox. Chapter 4 – Wilhelm Müller 2015-12-31 — 8 minutes The biographical background to Wilhelm Müller's poem collection Die Winterreise. Chapter 5 – Franz Schubert 2015-12-31 — 10 minutes The biographical background to Franz Schubert's setting of the song-cycle Winterreise. Language Lab 2015-12-15 — 1 minute Follicle mites face off, likely causing problems. M'learned wag 2015-12-15 — 1 minute The search for wit in lawyers continues. Close shaves of the Scholastic kind 2015-12-14 — 5 minutes We use Alexander's sword to cut the Gordian knot of William of Occam's non-existent razor. Solar Impulse 2015-12-07 | 2016-02-29 — 5 minutes More news from the suspension of belief department. This time Wacky Races meets Alice in Wonderland. Fidei defensor 2015-12-06 — 1 minute Defender of the faith: The Christmas message of the second in line to the British throne. Suspending disbelief in modern life 2015-12-04 — 3 minutes The operatic guide to the week's news in which we do not go quietly into that good night. Die schöne Müllerin 2015-12-03 — 1 minute Schubert again. Two blondes making out. A talking stream looks on as the hunter gets the girl. Many trigger alerts here. Chapter 1 – The song-cycle and its prologue 2015-12-03 — 9 minutes The genesis of the idea of a song-cycle from Wilhem Müller's prologue to Die schöne Müllerin. Chapter 2 – Poems 1-12 2015-12-03 — 10 minutes Love and joy: a structural analysis of the first twelve poems of the Die schöne Müllerin. Chapter 3 – Poems 13-23 2015-12-03 — 11 minutes Despair and death: a structural analysis of the last eleven poems of the Die schöne Müllerin. Chapter 4 – The context of the work 2015-12-03 — 10 minutes The problem of the narrative song-cycle; the biographical component. Quote and image of the month for November 2015-11-01 — 1 minute Quote: Wilhelm Müller, Die Winterreise. Image: Carl Julius von Leypold, Der Wanderer im Sturm/The wanderer in the storm. Shaken, stirred and rusted 2015-11-28 | 2016-02-10 — 3 minutes Objects of technological desire do not die, they just rust away and become ever more pointless. The dramatic Climatic Unit 2015-11-27 — 1 minute One aspect of climatic nonsense still going strong after nearly half a century and now probably too late to fix. Language Lab 2015-11-25 — 3 minutes Today we are reaching out to all the significant others on the planet. Tumbril for two, please! 2015-11-24 — 3 minutes The Swedish Charlie tackles the evils of this world: hot baths. Engaging God: God help us! 2015-11-22 — 3 minutes After the atrocities in Paris, Justin Welby, Archbishop of Canterbury, 'engages God' on a walk. What have we done to deserve this? Enlightenment redux 2015-11-19 | 2016-02-10 — 24 minutes Brendan O'Neill calls on us to fight for the Enlightenment. Don't bother: it's dead and gone. Jigsaw-puzzle grammar 2015-11-13 — 8 minutes Writing for meaning, as opposed to writing for tedious pedants. Antisocial media 2015-11-12 | 2016-07-01 — 4 minutes The definitive guide to staying sane in the social media age. Highbrow cat-stroking 2015-11-11 — 1 minute If you don't mind displaying your intellectual credentials, here's how to do it. Myth Thwitzerland 2015-11-11 — 21 minutes The 700th anniversary of the Battle of Morgarten in Switzerland and the cloud of unknowing that surrounds it. Something for everyone. Jean-Jacques Rousseau's NBFF 2015-11-04 — 1 minute Rousseau befriends an extremely rich autocrat who wants to use mathematical skills to control the world. Mars will now say a few words 2015-11-03 — 2 minutes The God of War speaks on the impending Armistice Day, 11.11.2015 Wiki-wacky 2015-11-03 — 3 minutes Wiki-wacky-woo, I don't know you. Or much about anything else, for that matter. Microsoft. How do I hate thee? Let me count the ways… 2015-11-02 — 4 minutes Vista, Ribbon, Win 8, Win 10. Shall I go on? All Souls' Day, 2 November 2015-11-02 — 7 minutes Some thoughts for All Souls' Day, 2 November on the Litany for All Souls' Day of Johann Georg Jacobi, set to music by Franz Schubert. All Saints' Day, 1 November 2015-11-01 | 2018-10-03 — 5 minutes Some thoughts for All Saints' Day, 1 November on the painting La Toussaint by the French artist Émile Friant. How to lose money 2015-11-01 | 2016-01-27 — 8 minutes Desperate to lose some money quickly? Here's how to do it: buy gold. Here is the thinking person's guide for which you have been waiting so long. Quote and image of the month for October 2015-10-01 — 1 minute Quote: Ezra Pound, The Cantos of Ezra Pound. Image: Édouard Manet, Un bar aux Folies Bergère. Carbon dioxide: the science is settled 2015-10-30 — 6 minutes The much-awaited canonical statement of this blog on the subject of Anthropogenic Global Warming and Climate Change: our chief scientist reports. Transitioning to November 2015-10-28 — 1 minute Whatever happens, don't mention the H-word! We offer an alternative for those damaged. Fanatics: the good and the bad 2015-10-24 — 8 minutes Jean-Jacques Rousseau's good fanatic: let's see how that worked out. The bad old days 2015-10-23 — 1 minute Thank goodness they have gone! Forced gender assignment, a complete lack of ethnic, religious or sexual diversity. Rousseau! Back in your box! 2015-10-19 — 4 minutes The Swiss people have spoken. Will Jean-Jacques finally flee back to his sarcophagus, in Switzerland at least? Troubling the living stream 2015-10-19 — 7 minutes Easter 1916: The stony heart of fanaticism as seen by W.B. Yeats. Wittgenstein’s disease 2015-10-16 — 4 minutes Many people suffer from this disease in silence, attempting to hide their distress from others. A sufferer writes. Who are you calling a snob? 2015-10-16 | 2016-04-14 — 6 minutes Classical music? Let's take this outside in the car park. Red Burgundy – The agony and the ecstasy 2015-10-15 — 5 minutes How to waste a lot of money and suffer much disappointment in the search for the special one. Skid Row awaits. Nietzsche's birthday 2015-10-15 — 1 minute Friedrich Nietzsche would have been 171 today, so let's dig out one or two of his undeservedly neglected poems to celebrate the occasion. Rousseau in Nature 2015-10-15 — 2 minutes He's on the stagger still, this time in two Danish universities. [corrected 17.10.2015] Business Girls 2015-10-15 — 2 minutes John Betjeman. For once not the lovable eccentric with a fondness for women, old buildings and steam railways, but the poet. The very good poet. Data despair 2015-10-14 — 2 minutes One more push in the battle against 'data are'. There are still pockets of resistance: bitter people with nothing to lose who will probably fight to the last bullet. EU referendum: No thank you! 2015-10-13 | 2016-02-05 — 10 minutes Holding a referendum on the UK's membership of the European Union is more than slightly bonkers. If it didn't work in 1975, why will it work now? Rousseau staggers on 2015-10-11 — 1 minute Latest sightings of this website's favourite zombie. Some people seem quite shocked. How to end an extremely long poem 2015-10-11 — 1 minute You have scribbled 6,000 lines of impenetrable poetry. How do you stop? Like this. Atlas Shrugged: 'Whatever…'. 2015-10-10 — 9 minutes The great unread: a literary assessment of Ayn Rand's magnum opus. As doorstopper, serviceable; as novel, beyond awful. Democracy and delegation 2015-10-09 — 1 minute Quote of the day: Modern democracy and delegation from an Ancient Greek perspective. Celestial advice 2015-10-09 — 1 minute There is always room for helpful celestial advice when things don't seem to be going your way. Jeannot in church 2015-10-03 — 2 minutes A contribution from a member of the French branch of our therapy group for the liturgically damaged. The good old days 2015-10-04 — 3 minutes The good old days of life on the land before the curse of industrialisation. Quote and image of the month for September 2015-09-01 — 1 minute Quote: Blaise Pascal, Pensées sur la religion et sur quelques autres sujets. Image: Hubble, the Pillars of Creation. Bye bye, democracy. Hello, general will. 2015-09-28 — 14 minutes We seem to be reading more and more these days about the limitations of democracy and the need to take decisions for the common good. All this can only mean one thing: the zombie has awakened and is walking abroad once more. Its name? Jean-Jacques Rousseau. … Tests of faith, the lunatic's friends 2015-09-30 — 6 minutes Two ancient stories about belief, lunacy, faith and other quite important things. Schubert, you idiot! 2015-09-28 — 8 minutes How Franz Schubert managed to write one of the greatest secular choral works, despite messing up somewhat.Part of an occasional series on the composer. S.E.E.D. 2015-09-09 — 5 minutes It's only now that you find out who your true friends are. You swine! 2015-09-04 — 3 minutes It’s a pretty horrible smell. Imagine Saturday night in the gents of the Dog and Badger, late, after every gent has been in there, and even the dog and the badger by the smell of it. Greenwich Dump Time 2015-09-15 — 9 minutes Greenwich Gasworks, where are you now? Don't ask. Updates list 2015-01-01 A list of updated content Contents list 2015-01-01 A complete list in date order of the content on this website Site search 2015-01-01 Search in the articles on this website About 2015-01-01 About this website Beginning Schubert 2020-05-22 — 4 minutes An introduction to his biography and works dealt with on this website. Schubert collection 2018-07-08 A list of the articles on this website related to Franz Schubert or his world. Home picture browser 2019-09-01 Home picture browser
