Karavansara

East of Constantinople, West of Shanghai


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Nine TV shows that made me

My friend Jessica, over at her blog, is doing a series of posts about media that made her the writer she is. Books, movies, TV shows… I dunno, probably also videogames, LPs or whatever. After all we are the product of our experiences, and when it comes to stories, the stories we enjoyed reflect on the stories we write.
All of which simply means, I’m pilfering her idea, and I’ll do a few posts featuring stuff that had an influence on my writing.

Now Jessica’s done a post about her top five TV shows, and that got me thinking.
I grew up with more shows on the TV than films in the movie theater, and really my early years were spent between the telly and books with a few odd comics thrown in. As a consequence, I think like most from my generation I picked up some bits and pieces from the TV when I was putting together my writing language: ideas, characters, the way to handle dialog…

So I jotted down a list, that includes a lot more than five shows, and then distilled it to a handful of special shows, and I was surprised when I found out that, while unsurprisingly most shows date from between the ’60 and the ’80s, fantasy shows (including SF and horror) do not take the top positions. Curious, what?
In the end I reduced my list to nine titles. The rule of thumb for the selection: I must be able to trace at least some elements of my writing to the series, I must have watched it before I started seriously to write my stories, I can quote snippets of dialog from it at the slightest provocation.
Also, the list does not include animation and anime series.
Let’s see…

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Tarzan & Mike Hammer

Today is the birthday of both Johnny Weissmuller and Stacy Keach.
And now I want a Tarzan & Mike Hammer crossover adventure.
Called Kings of the Concrete Jungle.
Classical odd couple/buddy movie, playing on the fact that Tarzan is also Lord Greystoke, and Hammer is a veteran with two years of service in the jungles of South-Eastern Asia. These guys can move from one’s environment to the other’s with a minimum of fuss.
Might even be the start of a series…


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Money, or courage (maybe recklessness, imagination for sure)

Looks like I might need 15.000 euro, at least according to yesterday’s local newspaper, that did a short piece about a railway travel company that’s offering an Around the World by Rail package, covering 20 cities in 14 countries over a period of 56 days.
And really, to travel around the world by train?
That would be a great way to spend my final days (because really, putting together that kind of money by saving on books and movie tickets might require a few decades).

The trip as presented touches London, Geneva, Rome, Venice, Vienna, Prague, Hamburg, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Helsinki, Moscow, Ulaanbaatar, Beijing, Xian, Hong Kong, Perth, Sydney, Los Angeles, Grand Canyon, Grand Junction, Zion National Park, Chicago and New York City. It is not clear if once in New York you’re on your own, or if they’ll pack you back to London, this being hypothetically a round trip.

The 15 grands ticket is the most basic – if you want all the perks, the Museum passes and the guided tours, a private room and various whistles and bells you’ve got to double that figure.

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(Not) A writing weekend

It was supposed to be a writing weekend, but this living outside of space and time thing that comes with writing full time does have its drawbacks: I had completely forgotten tomorrow id the 2nd of June, the Day of the Republic in Italy. Not that we are so devastatingly patriotic here in this household, but we got the dreaded call from a relative, with the equally dreaded message “We’re coming to see you tomorrow! We’ll have lunch!”

The first reaction is, of course, Oh, no you aren’t!, but really, can we keep our family away?
The second reaction is, Oh, my goodness! We have to clean house and mow the lawn and pull down all those cobwebs and…!
The third reaction is, No, wait… have they just invited themselves over for lunch? What are they, hobbits?

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Jack the Lass

I’ve just watched the first episode of Gentleman Jack, a British/American mini-series based (I don’t know how loosely) on the diaries of Anne Lister, a very fascinating woman from the early days of the Industrial Revolution, and a person that had a colossal influence on the development of Britain in the first half of the 19th century.

As far as historical entertainment goes, the series seems to be just perfect, and the fact that it steals a page from Alfie, allowing the main character (interpreted by Suranne Jones) to break the fourth wall, is really fun.

There’s eight episodes in the series, and apparently a second season’s already been confirmed. Now I’ll have to look for a book on miss Lister, because I am absolutely enamored of her. Silly me.
Truly and highly recommended if you like history and smart television.


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Pulled towards the center

There are two ideas, or themes, that I have been juggling for a long while, now, and I’d like to use for something big to develop over the course of the 12 months, starting this summer.
I’ve been working on so much work-for-hire recently that I feel the need to flex my finger-muscles and do something completely mine.

Neither of the two themes is particularly new or original.
But the point is not how new your ideas are, it’s how new is the way you use them.

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A day off

And so yesterday I took the day off. It was, after all, my birthday, and so I spent the day reading a book, listening to some music, and watching a few episodes of a TV series (god bless streaming services and my high-speed satellite connection). I also had a nice serving of tiramisù (a simple dessert that apparently is very popular outside of Italy).

And because this is that kind of blog, here’s the recipe, taken from Wikibooks – and also a controversial, egg-less alternative, courtesy of the BBC. My goodness, to reach the tender age of 52 and find out that tiramisù can be “controversial”…!

As for my other birthday activities…

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