The first signs of spring are trying to fight their way out and through the weeds in my garden; I’ve been watching the green buds and now pristine white flowers of snowdrops near the remains of a pear tree and in various hidden corners of the carnage which should be a lawn and flowerbeds. We’ve…

In my last letter to you I left a form of question hanging in the air, about how young women were able to open their own photographic studios in Germany when craft trades, and most businesses, were only open to men. It is something that I have been thinking about for a while, but which…

The first church bells begin ringing at ten in the morning, waking the local inhabitants of this small town from their righteous slumbers, reminding them that there was once, a very long time ago, a requirement to dress and make their way into the various buildings dedicated to some form of higher deity. Countless believers…

I’ve always considered the term ‘bookish’, which you use in your profile, as being somewhat strange, something which doesn’t quite hit the nail on the head but plays around or even avoids what a person means or wishes to say. It suggests to me that this person’s character is like a book, that they feel…

I’m not sure whether the sound of rain, falling against the window directly behind my head as I write, is soothing or not. It is mirrored by the rhythmic beat of rain falling on a small balcony in the next room; the two are separated by a double sliding door, a common feature of houses…

I sometimes get to the end of a page or a paragraph and have the niggling feeling that there is nothing more to be said, that everything worthwhile has been written – not necessarily by me, but over many centuries – and everything which follows is mere repetition. Perhaps there really is nothing new under…

I was trying to decide what the highlight of my last week was, and managed to cut the possibilities down to very few indeed, all of them to do with books. The postman visited my house three times over the last week, adding to my library with works on Emily Dickinson,  the beginnings of Latin…

Monday is one of those days many people either fear or loath, depending on their outlook on life or, more especially, what they’ve done over the weekend, what they can expect to be doing for the coming week. For me it is one of the best days of the week: the weekend is over –…