Bedsit, with three clowns, and a rottweiler

This is a joyous book, a happy book and while there is plenty of sadness here, it holds it's sadness lightly. It's a classic, in the classic sense, since it deals with the classic themes, of family, love and estrangement.   Quichotte does not only deal with the obvious romantic loves, but with the love between a brother and sister.  Of how when siblings are estranged, not present, not spoken of, beyond our awareness, shut away in secret compartments in our minds.   Their absence shapes our thoughts in ways we are scarcely aware of.  The love in our lives and the indelible marks it leaves on us, is the theme I found most prominent in this book. 'Life was short and each day of love stolen from it was a crime against life itself.'   Quichotte is full of the whimsical, full of surrealist motifs.  Occasionally, they  appear a little too conspicuous, but their obviousness only serves to heighten the underlying humour. This was my first time re...

Helen Lewis' 'Difficult Women.' casts a cold eye on the feminism it chronicles. A cold, but open, realistic and human eye. The kind of eye that adds depth and understanding. Lewis tells the stories of those women who have been written out of feminism history, women such as Erin Pizzey, founder of the charity Refuge, a service that has supported tens of thousands of women to escape violent homes. Admittedly Pizzey's current opinions are objectively distasteful, but is that a reason to ignore the good she has done? Lewis points to the lesbian feminists, whose stories are strangely absent, most likely willfully ignored. Women like Maureen Colquhoun, Jackie Foster and Babs Todd. Their contribution is not limited to gay rights or feminism, they have dragged our community towards greater kindness and civilization. Lewis argues that contemporary feminism is afraid of complex stories and here she probably has a point. However, when she extends the explanation for thi...