Karavansara

East of Constantinople, West of Shanghai


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A brief rant

Now something weird happened, and I think I will vent my frustration and my preoccupation here.
Sorry to use you guys as a lightning rod, but sometimes blogs are also useful as safety valves.

The thing goes like this.
I am told that many of the ills of our current culture depend on the fact that we grew up with the Classics, that are basically books written by misogynistic, racist white heterosexual males, and therefore we all turned out—well, bad.
11848986Having enjoyed the works of, say, Charles Dickens, I am obviously a misogynist with little or no respect for other cultures1.
The thing, in all honesty, reminded me of the old George Orwell warning, that any kid growing up with Tarzan would turn into an animal-killing big game enthusiast.

Is it possible?
Indeed it is.
Is it a given? Thank goodness no. Continue reading →


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Writing across the cultural boundary

I’ve been interviewed.
I don’t know when or where the interview will be published, but it will be in Italian anyway, and for all I know my bits could be cut in the end.
But, something interesting came up during the interview and I thought I’d expand on the subject a bit here on Karavansara because… well, because as I said the question was interesting, because I think it might be worth expanding upon and yes, I love talking about myself and what I do.
So, like that man said, I suffered for my art, now it’s your turn… Continue reading →


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Going with the Flow

battery_16-512As it usually happens, once I get to the bottom of a story, and I have it packed and delivered – to a publisher, or to Amazon or Gumroad – I basically collapse like an old wreck.

 

It’s not anything extraordinary – it happens to a lot of writers, and I think it can be applied to any creative job, or any job at all, in which you have to keep your brain on constantly.
I actually read and studied what happens during the writing process, and it is a fascinating topic.
Let me tell you about it. Continue reading →


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AMARNA, episode 5

Amarna preview smallThe fifth episode of AMARNA is live on Gumroad, where you can download the ebook in mobi, epub and pdf format, as a handy zip file.

I hope everything works fine – in the last few days, thanks to the GPDR thingie the European Union implemented, I have been experiencing all sorts of troubles: basically there is a digital wall around Europe, and many service providers outside of the EU are simply discontinuing their support for European customers until they understand what exactly the GPDR means for them.

I hope everything’s fine.
In case of problems, please let me know.


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Ancient Greek Insults – a primer

Greek was the language of phylosophy (and of commerce) to the ancient Romans, and therefore it was sort of a lingua franca in the Mediterranean.
As I have often explained, it is likely that Aculeo and Amunet speak in Greek to each other – and indeed Amunet tends to use Greek swearwords wjhen she goes over the top, reserving Latin profanities only to those she is sure can understand them.

dirtywords-300x217So, after yesterday’s roundup of Latin dirty words, here’s a quick list of Ancient Greek terms that are absolutely not safe for works, especially if you are a citizen of the Empire… Continue reading →