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Got three big re-reading projects on the go: It’d been 30 years since I read all of E M Forster, doing them chronologically and am on Howard’s End and he’s a lot odder than those Merchant Ivory films give him credit for; just finished volume 4 of Proust which I’m really enjoyed much more than...

Shaquiri and Xhaka having fun at the Serbs’ expense. This one was always going to cut up rough. Plenty of bad blood. No double headed eagle celebrations this time.

the thing is - when there is a dispute about whether the ball is over the line for a goal, they usually rustle up the graphic which shows the decision in minutes - the chip in the ball giving the officials a clear image. so, why haven't they produced that picture? they must have it, surely...

Monument is a big old bag of spanners but it’s got a great energy to it that means I forgive it for moments that might be considered self indulgent. I really liked his Memorial Device prequel that came out this summer - Industry of Magic and Light.

I’ll get on that - currently on a re-read of Alms for Oblivion.

No 1 son is in a bar in Austin. Match finished and they blare out Born in the USA - bar joins in, unironically

Is it me or have there been more headed goals than usual?

Richarlison - that’s a cracking goal.

Wilko very much a local legend round these parts

This almost made me want to read them https://www.backlisted.fm/episodes/165-mervyn-peake-gormenghast

Our Struggle Wayne Holloway - novel set in the 80s - it’s really about a time of unrest, protest, union action and French theory. It’s a bit ramshackle in places but it’s full of energy and fits with a mini genre of working class writers returning to look at the 80s as a time of genuine dissent...

Well…lots of MSND is blank verse but some uses the heroic form. Early plays are much likely to be more reliant on heroics as that was the convention at the time. But as he develops he stretches the potential of the standard iambic pentameter and flirts with something much closer to prose at...

Teaching unions held their ballot last week. Expecting that the result will be a call for strikes. Pretty much every branch of public sector workers will be out - obviously it would be even more effective if it could be simultaneously- like a general strike.

In simple terms all of his previous bullying behaviour finally caught up with him as one after another of his victims called him out. The publication of a text exchange about him throwing a fit for not getting an invite to the Queen’s funeral was the start of the end.

I’m enjoying it - it’s very aware of what it’s doing and I think there might also be a bit of potential Pale Fire stuff going on in there too.

Esc&Ctrl - Steve Hollyman. Just arrived yesterday from Influx. Two parallel stories interwoven complete with two alternative sets of footnotes which constantly draw attention to the Pomo nature of footnoting in lit texts. Essentially having its cake and eating it but done really well - it’s a...

David Keenan - Monument Maker is full of nested, buried stories that also comment and reflect on each other. In fact he’s in the process of creating this whole Keenan universe where characters re-occur in other novels. I think he’s out there like Alan Moore on a psychedelic quest.