a number of flour, an amount of flowers

I know language has to progress. I know it has to change. I know our grandparents spoke different to us. They knew about adverbs and adjectives. They even knew that if you were disinterested, you might not also be uninterested. These preserved nice distinctions. I accept, however, that at some stage in the not-too-distant future I'm not going to wince when somebody says 'none of them were there' ('none' is singular) or 'he talked fast' ('quickly' is the appropriate adverb). At present these misconstructions still sound a bit ignorant and illiterate to me. However, when a BBC Radio 4 presenter says 'no amount of newspaper headlines', I have no intention of progressing or accepting further abuse of the English language. Radio 4 is considered by many, especially the English, to be the finest speech radio in the galaxy, and it behoves it to err on the conservative side of change. It's what most listeners expect. Let them say an 'amount of flowers' on Radio 2, but on Radio 4 I insist on a 'number'. Otherwise those who want to simplify and degrade the language's many fine distinctions will win, and the rest of us -- those who want a rich, analytical language -- will suffer. As I am suffering from Edward Stourton's 'amount' on tonight's Pick of the Week.

more reasons to like Longwood

I'm not in the employ of Longwood Gardens, PA, so I'm sure you'll take this as pure, unbridled enthusiasm and not marketing. One thing that really made an impact on me at Longwood and in many other places in the US is the lamps, the lighting. Too often in Ireland and Britain the lighting is done in the cheapest most expedient way, but at Longwood, as the picture shows, the lamps are majestic and provide two levels of lighting, one about a meter up. Throughout the gardens long vistas of these fine structures compete with the trees for our attention. I can't wait to get back there. (The picture was taken in March 2006.) 

Hayes, Middlesex

It doesn't look much, and I suppose the weather didn't help, but this is the holy of holies for me. Neither the blitz nor the post-war planning blight has removed the former buildings of HMV from the otherwise depressing town of Hayes, near Heathrow, not so near London. These are some of the original buildings that have survived, though none of them is now owned by EMI so far as I'm aware. But they are still there, and walking through you can just about imagine all those great singers and conductors wending their way to the recording studios to make their acoustic recordings. Later, when electrical recording took over and they used central London venues, Hayes remained the epicentre of the recording industry in Europe for several decades, like Camden, NJ in the States (sadly, far less survives in Camden).

Even thinking about this great but lost era brings tears to my eyes. So much artistry and seemingly inexhaustible talent. Where is it now? What has happened to the recording industry and classical performance?

Incidentally, one crucial part of EMI is still there: the archive, abeit in a new building. Thousands of original masters, recordings, and treasures beyond imagining, from the Beatles to Furtwangler.

90 minutes I've lost with An American Haunting

Pleased to have a new book contract in prospect I went to the cinema last night on spec. Arriving at 18.00 there wasn't a vast amount on so after a distinctly mediocre chicken sandwich courtesy of Burger King (how do they get away with it?) I elected to see An American Haunting. IMDB contributors give it 6.8, which is around about the bottom of what's likely to be tolerable, and some moron describes it as the 'Scariest movie since The Exorcist' in his 9/10 review. Well, I guess if you find porn movies erotic you'll find this scary, because from the moment the curtain goes up we have action. Bump, bump, scream; scrape, scrape, scream; etc. ad molto nauseam. Donald Sutherland heads the excellent cast, and after we have circled round all the haunting stingers for the umpteenth time we discover -- MAJOR SPOILER COMING UP -- that he is abusing his daughter and so in some disconnected way, all the spirit's awful visitations are down to him. And I suppose the modern family that very briefly bookends the early ninetenth-century haunting is having the same problem (mother and father are separated). Or are they? do I care?

But what a waste of time. 90 minutes that I could have spent rearranging the ornaments on my mantlepiece, ironing, or looking out the window. Why can't film makers understand that if you go full tilt at the beginning you can't generate a climax? If they can't get their heads around it in constructing a narrative, think of it in terms of love making -- you know, foreplay, etc.

The cinema at the Liffey Valley Centre (just outside the city of Dublin) is no longer called Ster Century but Vue. In other respects it's business as usual. The speakers now distort so badly on certain material that the experience is painful, and about 30 minutes into the film a group of tweenies entered (this is a 15+ film, so they were illegally there) and witnessed disturbing scenes of abuse and very graphic blood associated with it. They responded by giggling, talking loudly, playing with their mobile phones, and repeatedly heading off to the shop to stock up on food. I hope their lives are blighted forever. I don't think their delightful behaviour made much impact on my response to this pointless film though.

flowers at Longwood

The spring display in the famous conservatory at Longwood Gardens fairly blew me away in March. My camera was active. 

what's in a date

It shows the power of culture and language that people all over the English-speaking world respond at such a deep level to the two numbers 9-11. It's a date of course -- a very terrible one in world history. But it's a date that only Americans would normally use, surely. To me it says, when extended, 'the 9th of November', which is not what it actually means, which is September 11. But I'm English, and neither the Irish nor the English (I live in Ireland) say September 11: we say September the 11th. Neither do we write 9.11.01 if we mean September, we write 11.9.01. If we want the month-day-year order, we go to a lot of trouble to be clear and write September 11(th), 2001 -- the -th is optional.

Americans often leave out the article in dates and other constructions with numbers, and very confusingly they go month-day-year, against logic, which would surely suggest going from small to large, in ascending order, i.e. day-month-year. When did Americans start doing things in this somewhat odd way?

Working in the library at Penn recently I saw the date on a letter given as '6.8'. I asked a librarian if I could be 100% certain that it referred to June, because in my world this would be August. He thought about it and said that he couldn't be sure because he didn't know when the month-day order was adopted. So I couldn't date the letter. What is the answer?

When people start complaining that everywhere is the same -- Starbucks in Dublin, New York, and Moscow (?) -- we should remember how very different this way of saying and writing the date is. It shows deep cultural differences that I for one would be very sad to see given up (and we know who would be doing the giving up, I think). 'June 21' is as American as apple pie.

Shannon

After a week in America in late May this year, I shall return from JFK to Dublin on Aer Lingus's last flight out of the the airport of the day. Instead of flying direct to Dublin we make a detour barely 15 minutes flying time away. Why? Because we have to land at an airport created by the devil himself called Shannon. It serves an Irish city, Limerick, affectionately known as 'murder city'. A desperately ugly place, which in a sensible world wouldn't exist, its main attraction is its proximity to the Cliffs of Moher and other stunning spectacles on the west coast. As to the airport ... Try getting coffee there. You will be served, but it's the sort of service designed to remind you that we are all sinners and will answer for our crimes. If you can bear to sit upon the unbelievably cheap and shoddy upholstery, take a careful look first, because it's never clean. (Alternatively you can remain in the almost luxurious confines -- by 757 standards -- of one of the airline's excellent new airbuses.)

So why, we ask, do we land in a city just a few minutes flying time from Dublin? To protect the airport from going bust, that's why. The airport pockets landing charges and the aircraft wastes fuel and subjects the already exhausted passengers (customers) to the squalor of this truly diabolical place. Some flights are obliged by law to land at Shannon. It's called the Shannon stopover.

I believe this anti-competitive practice is about to stop; it can't be too soon for me (anyone who actually wants to visit Limerick should get a shuttle from Dublin). I would then like to see the airport vaporised and its former staff sentenced to life terms at the Irish School for Etiquette and Customer Service.

By the way, if you choose to enter the airport terminal you might think you can see hundreds of American soldiers. Blink and then look again. It's an illusion born of paranoia. Ireland is a neutral country so its government would never allow American soldiers going to and from Iraq to coffee there; it would make Ireland an active agent in a war not sanctioned by the UN and opposed by well over 80% of the Irish population. Don't be fooled by deluded liberals.

Friday 28 April

It's not even Friday the 13th and I'm writing a blog. I'm doing it without a hint of anonymity, which seems pretty daft, but then, what's the point of people not knowing the id of the writer? I also wonder who's going to read it! I've no doubt there will be more than a little moaning going on here, as that's the person I am -- always aware of failings all around me. However, I am setting myself the challenge of finding at least one postive comment per posting.

I live in a 'village' called Chapelizod, which is now at the western-most point of the city of Dublin in the Republic of Ireland (it's never moved, but I imagine the city limits have). Like much of Ireland it doesn't really do much for the eye in terms of architecture. Cromwell, famine, the ludicrous lack of interest in heritage and attractive architecture of governents in the post-war years make the local environment pretty drab in terms of the buildings. Even so, the village 'square' is pleasant, and there is the vast expanse of Phoenix Part behind it; we should also mention the Liffey, which flows through the middle dividing the village into an old part (north) and a new part (south).

Yesterday I learnt that a local resident has been given full planning permission to construct a private car park on the banks of the Liffey next to his house. The fact that the bank and its pretend stone wall are an attractive feature of the south side of the village doesn't seem to deter the planning department of Dublin City Council. Still --positive point coming up -- they've done worse: a historic house with assocations with the Battle of the Boyne (the King's House) stood in Chapelizod until fairly recently: somebody gave permission for the destruction of this structure.

I lecture in music at Trinity College Dublin. So expect lots on music, lots on Ireland, plenty on America (I'm a recent convert but despise Bush and the religious fundamentalists), and numerous other nuggets of wisdom.