Devenish

"An incredible trick" The starting point for this piece is an observation that Simon Kirby made a long time ago in the introduction to a BBC Horizon programme Why do we talk? , a documentary that I have used for nearly 20 years in my language acquisition classes at Konan. It is a scene-setting observation, one which seems self-evident and innocuous, and to which I paid next to no attention until a few months ago.  I can walk up to someone I don’t know, and I can make a sequence of noises…that I’ve never made before…by pushing air through my mouth. I will take a thought in my head…and make it go into their head . That’s an incredible trick. It would be incredible, if that was what happens. Yet a moment's reflection - or perhaps twenty-plus years of rumination, I'm not sure which - tells me that this is completely wrong. We do not take our thoughts and cause them to go into other's heads. That would be amazing. Instead, whatever is involved in verbal communication i...

it wasn't, but a family triumph most certainly. After four weeks of occasional rehearsal, Sean, Julian and I appeared on stage in support of Justin's first piano recital. The quality of the performance does nothing to detract from the historic significance of this event: 10 years ago, I could not have imagined that Justin would be able to take piano lessons, nor that Sean and Julian would have rallied round in such a way to support their brother. Justin has brought out the best in all of us.

 Dear mum Following on from Sunday's pictures, I thought you might be interested to see some shots of our daily life. I've just come back from a 30-minute walk with Mutley to/from the shops to get some vegetables for supper. 1) 4:15 pm. Setting off, heading east. We're off to the shops in Okamoto village. The road outside our house runs beside the railway line. This is typical of the amount of traffic during the day. 2) About 100 metres further on. The total walk to the supermarket is about 1km (5/8 mile). 3) Entering Okamoto village. A few more people around, almost everyone wearing masks. As you can see, most of the village contains one-way streets, cars have to share with pedestrians. 4). Okamoto village, looking south. People are coming up from the local train-station, the one that Julian goes to school from every day. 5) Turning around, heading home. We are one block further south, now heading west. 6) Looking south to Justin's school. 7) Passing the GP surgery (bl...

at La Suite Kobe Oceans Garden Kobe Port at Night: View from the Banquet Hall The next day, Pizza Lunch at Suma Beach:

Knossos, Crete This time last week I was in Rethymnon, Crete, to give a talk about nominative case in Irish English and Late Middle English to an expert workshop audience . Concerning the talk itself, it was an instance (pun avoided) of "least said, soonest mended" – an unfashionable, and probably unhelpful proverb. Yet, in addition to discovering how outdated my theoretical knowledge had become, I did learn many useful things. Ironically, all of these lessons are even older than my education, and have greater relevance than ever. The trip began and ended with in-flight movies. '...for we will shake him …or worse days endure.' Shakespeare, Julius Caesar The Oryx entertainment system on the Qatar Airways flight from Haneda to Doha offered about 100 movies, almost none of which were watchable unless bad rom-coms or Marvel comics are your thing. The one remarkable outlier, in the Classic Movies section, was the 1953 Brando/Mason/Gielgud MGM production of...

Almost Blue Nearly two months, I got to choose some English language books for my birthday. Books I actually wanted to read, as opposed to what I should be reading. In addition to two Indridason krimis (English lacks this useful German/Dutch word), and a study of Robert Doisneau 'From Craft to Art', I also brought home Dennett's 'From Bacteria to Bach', and two books on Jazz: Ted Gioia's 'History of Jazz', and James Gavin's 'Deep in a Dream: The Long Night of Chet Baker'. While I suspect that Ted Gioa's book, and Doisneau's plates are the only things I'll look at again-though I haven't properly started on the former-it's the comparison of Dennett and Gavins, and their relationship to their subject matter, that interests me most here. First to Dennett's book. I should say straight off that I haven't finished this, in fact, I'm only a third of the way in, and it's quite likely that this is as far as...