creative and critical writing

Author: Daniel D. Watkins

  • l’homme qui s’est parlé

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    Daniel D. Watkins
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    Auguste Lefèbre was exactly middle aged. That is to say, he was thirty eight and would die aged seventy-six on 1st June 1926, his birthday, in fact. And there, at the end of Rue de Nélaton rose (or fell) ‘La Tour de Babel’. To Monsieur Lefèbre it was a monstrous scaffold. What Guillotine had started,…

  • ghost story

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    Daniel D. Watkins
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    When Gerald woke from the edge of a dream, he had a vague sense that someone was lying beside him. He felt calm at this invasion, not numb or horrified or outraged. Perhaps, he felt thoughtful. Yes, in fact he even found himself reflecting on the way his mind was occupied with reasons and possibilities:…

  • departures

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    Daniel D. Watkins
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    There was a piano near our departure gate. I sat outside Starbucks, while we waited for our flight and to people watch. Sal had gone to queue.  While I was waiting, three teenagers approached the piano for a laugh. Two were egging on a third to sit down and bang the keys. I was curious…

  • such

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    Daniel D. Watkins
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  • gurus of the glittering generalities — on the alchemy of dumb down

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    Daniel D. Watkins
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    First published, 17th April 2013 At least I’m going to start this month’s blog on a positive note but when I slide into the panic that comes, quite regularly these days – in the way it used to come to me as a child when I read or heard apocalyptic fables of the last tree…

  • best summer reads!

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    Daniel D. Watkins
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    First published, 25th June 2013 I want to write a sort of response to Michael Krüger’s remarks quoted in Publishing Perspectives this month. Soon to retire after forty five years at Carl Hanser Verlag, he laments: “I only know there are good and interesting books, and bad ones. You can read them on paper or on…

  • prom 37: con fusion and the rocky horror show

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    Daniel D. Watkins
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    First published , 29th August 2013 “When men are most sure and arrogant they are commonly most mistaken, giving views to passion without that proper deliberation which alone can secure them from the grossest absurdities.” ― David Hume When the impresario, Robert Newman invited Sir Henry Wood to conduct the first promenade concerts in London…

  • plenty of nothing — on the price of culture and the value of art

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    Daniel D. Watkins
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    First published, 20th September 2013 Damien Hirst once said: “I can’t wait to get into a position to make really bad art and get away with it. At the moment if I did certain things people would look at it, consider it and then say ‘f off’. But after a while you can get away…

  • metrocalypse apocalypso

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    Daniel D. Watkins
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    First published, 30th December 2013 For over ten years Cairo has succeeded in drawing me back. These days I visit from Riyadh in the hope that I might reaffirm that I haven’t died and taken a squat in some weird supernatural pre-sin assessment waiting room. Not yet.  I’m going to start by asserting that Cairo…

  • unexpected flying objects

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    Daniel D. Watkins
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    First published, 31st January 2014 In January not one single skinny fly landed on my web. Two flies landed yesterday (2nd February). I couldn’t settle last night after flying in from London to Riyadh. I’ve been thinking of writing a novel about Saudi for ten years. Each year I edge a little closer to what…