Nice Things Done This Week

First, I spent a day with twenty students aged 14 to 18 from three different schools in Ipswich, taking a creative writing workshop day. A wonderful day, challenging, buzzy, and exhausting! By the end, I felt like Einstein looks in the photo!

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Then I discovered a book of little known short stories by the greats of the nineteenth century. So far, I have read a story by Charles Dickens and one by Anthony Trollope. Shackleton
Then, I visited The National Portrait gallery, sepcifically to see the Constable Portraits exhibition. It is very good, very interesting. A real glimpse into the life of the times. And some are so lovely- the people could walk out of the canvasses. I did not know he was also a portrait painter. But then, having an hour or so to kill, I went to look at the early 20th century displays. Wow. All those massive canvasses from WWI, portraits of Kitchener, French, Haig, Smuts. And portraits of the Bloomsbury crew, and politicians, and explorers. having trodden in the footsteps of Shackleton earlier this year, that was lovely.



Lastly, I went to Chicago, the musical. ... interesting, but tired, tired tired. Despite some valiant efforts on the part of the lead women, the thing is wooden, and the routines are too slow!