Tag Archives: headlines

Unknown's avatar

The news at the end of a wet week

by

I caught snatches of today’s news as we quarter-circled around the M25 out of London. Here’s what I heard.

First up were a prince, his spokesman and paper dragons. The spokesman said that getting burned was the price the prince had to pay for fighting dragons. Meanwhile a paper dragon flamed about suntans, California, and sharing breathing space with the truth. It seems the prince and the paper dragons are not done yet.

Then we heard of a British teenager, missing for six years, but apparently found recently in the middle of the night. The man who found him was a French student working as a delivery driver in his spare time. He saw the youngster wandering along a lonely road near Toulouse and offered him a lift. They got talking, and the story told in the cab that night, and later passed to the police along with the teenager, was about a mother, who ran away with her son and her father. They joined a group leading a nomadic, off-grid life, but the son – the wandering teenager – is now keen to be reunited with his grandmother in England.

It was a strange story, that left us imagining, and was then followed by news of pirates in the Red Sea. There have been attacks and threats, and ships re-routed, and it sounds a lot like things might get worse.

I preferred the account of the grandson heading home.

Copyright Georgie Knaggs & The Phraser 2023

Unknown's avatar

Attention grabbing – the first sentence

by

There are two reasons for this postcard today. The first is a course I did looking at the opening lines in children’s literature, and the second is a headline I heard on today’s news.

I’ll start with the headline. This is from The Straits Times: “US military asks for help finding its lost stealth jet” Losing a stealth jet? Of course I want to know happens next.

It’s the same with the first sentence of each of these novels, picked from the bookcase a few minutes ago.

“Wilson sat on the balcony of the Bedford Hotel with his bald pink knees thrust against the ironwork.” The Heart of the Matter by Graham Greene

“I discovered the hiding place because the ball ended up there.” The Day Before Happiness by Erri De Luca

“I am doomed to remember a boy with a wrecked voice – not because of his voice, or because he was the smallest person I ever knew, or even because he was the instrument of my mother’s death, but because he is the reason I believe in God; I am a Christian because of Owen Meany.” a prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving

“Two years before leaving home my father said to my mother that I was very ugly.” The Lying Life of Adults by Elena Ferrante

“At 7.45 on the morning of November 28, 1931, a young woman in the first stage of labour was handed by her husband into Lismore’s only hackney-car.” Wheels within Wheels – The Making of a Traveller by Dervla Murphy

“There is a fish in the mirror.” This Mournable Body by Tsitsi Dangarembga

For me, each of the above is like a keyhole, giving a glimpse and tempting me to step inside and close the door.

Copyright Georgie Knaggs & The Phraser 2023