Ian on Sunday

Politicians love to praise themselves or arrange for others to praise them.

When one thinks about it, the concept of “Government” is a strange one for it assumes as its fundamental premise that certain men and women – human beings like you and me – can and should be allowed to take upon themselves the right to direct the rest of us what to do, presumably for our own good.

I have been re-reading Derek Walcott and realising how much I have loved his poetry.

I will very soon be 86. A young man once wrote – or rather sent an email – to me asking about the magazine Kyk-Over-Al, which I used to edit once upon a time.

The golden shower orchids in my wife’s garden are particularly lovely.

I have always loved sport. All throughout my boyhood and youth I delighted in games.

Giacomo Leopardi, who was to become one of the greatest poets of his or any time, was born in 1798 on his parents’ estate near the small Italian town of Recanati in the dusty hills above the Adriatic Sea.

In following the news nothing is more terrible than learning of the death of a child.

After an absence of a couple of years, the Link Show has been revived at the National Cultural Centre.

As I get older, I find I try to capture in memory more fully than ever the passing marvellousness of an ordinary day by writing down what happens in a journal.

About to arrive at the age of 86, so suddenly after being born, I recognize very clearly that I am slowing to a jog, approaching a hobble.

Perhaps my oldest memory—I must have been two or three—is of my mother hugging me at night when she put me into bed and holding the palms of my hands together while she said a simple prayer, which I soon learned by heart.

My father was a gentle, calm, and wise man. “He never raised his voice except to give encouragement nor raised his hand except to greet a friend.”

In two of the main centres of democracy, America and Europe, democracy is rapidly failing.

When I worked in the sugar industry I remember once discussing a problem with a young colleague.

There are times when even the best sportsmen fail not for want of talent, pride, serious application and commitment.

We often wonder why those around us – very much including those in supreme authority – are making such a mess of things.

 Our lives of such infinite value come and go in a whirl of busyness. 

So many Christmas poems from which to choose. E.U. Fanthrope’s lines:   “And this was the moment When a few farm workers and three Members of an obscure Persian sect   Walked haphazard by starlight straight Into the kingdom of heaven.”

Even in the worst of times – and who can doubt that the times are pretty bad– reading comes to the rescue by revealing other worlds of experience where cruelty and mindlessness and man’s inhumanity to man do not continually have the upper hand.