Entrepreneurial Kiss
This production is one of the most professional pieces of student drama I have seen. In lieu of the talents and experience of both director and actors however, this is no more than should be expected. James Rogan, the director, has already entered the history books. At eighteen, he became Britain's youngest ever film director with the feature film Dead Bolt Dead, which recently had its British premiere at the Raindance film festival in Leicester Square. The play's three actors Alastair Sooke, Richard Goulding and Rosamund Pike are all well known on the Oxford stage, and Pike has recently been arousing interest as one of television's most exiting young actresses, appearing in A Rather English Marriage and Wives and Daughters for the BBC....
Books: Booker Prize Review: What a Cop-out
The Booker Prize is a phenomenon without equal in the literary world, not just in terms of crass commercial value but also debatably in artistic terms. Margaret Atwood, this year's winner with her universally acclaimed The Blind Assasin, has a pedigree no less prestigious. Her oeuvre puts her clearly ahead of the rest of the field, with perhaps the notable exception of Kazuo Ishiguro, and even then, an argument can surely be made out for her as being somehow more deserving of recognition. Ishiguro's disturbed, yet genteel novels do not shape up well politically against Atwood's feminist critique of modern society....
Books: Thanks but no thanks
It's a funny old game, being a book reviewer. I mean, usually you choose to read a book because you like the author, or you've heard it's good, or your tutor told you to, and you have some idea of what's coming your way. Not so with Thanksgiving by Michael Dibdin, cunningly released in time for the beloved American holiday, no doubt to cater for airline passengers stuck in the obligatory storm delaying one's long-awaited reunion with skanky relatives. It is a very short book, a change from his previous offerings, and one could probably gallop through it in a couple of hours....
Books: Book of Pages - Poop of Ages
David Whiteland has written a book. A book about the modern condition. A book about how technology, promising to simplify, complicates. Being a book, it has pages. David Whiteland has called his book the Book of Pages. Simple, you see. David Whiteland thinks he is very clever indeed.