tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-61567252024-03-13T10:24:28.621-07:00my vedanaliteracy...new media...education...lifeGuy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.comBlogger1383125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-77031105724854376292024-03-13T10:23:00.000-07:002024-03-13T10:23:42.368-07:00The reading habitMy reading habit is almost as bad as my writing habit. In fact it may be worse. It costs more for a start and it has the added disadvantage of cluttering the place up with its remnants - books. I usually read a couple of them a week. Sometimes non-fiction but most of the time these days fiction. A long term ambition has been to make some sort of reference to what I read here, on this blog. But Guy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-32791015403587886302024-01-27T03:16:00.000-08:002024-01-27T03:18:04.284-08:00Don't lean on me manScribbled notes on a scrap of lined paper sold for £89,000 the other day. They were the draft lyrics for Rock n Roll Suicide and Suffragette City – complete with the added revisions ‘Hey man!’, ‘Don’t lean on me man’ and ‘Outasight’. The everyday nature of the materials and the rather unremarkable addition of those words might seem trivial or even banal if it were not for the huge impact of Guy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-67164127260012319272023-12-10T03:57:00.000-08:002023-12-10T03:57:18.571-08:00Killers Perhaps Martin Scorsese is playing with conventions, but 3 hrs 26 mins sounds like a very long movie. Killers of the Flower Moon is that long but I can honestly say that it didn't drag, the evening just had to be rearranged to accommodate it, and that's no bad thing. The murders, the casual racism and the downright evil intent of William Hale are dramatisations of real-life events that tookGuy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-22122893370895607902023-10-05T01:48:00.007-07:002023-10-05T01:55:57.260-07:00Why writing still matters, too For the cover of Why Writing Still Matters I wanted an image that conveyed some of the messages that are to be found in the book - and that's quite a big ask. This image of Tom Price's wonderful piece called Network, which is in the Yorkshire Sculpture Park, was an obvious candidate. It might make you think of writing as it is becoming - writing with technology, which is consistent with theGuy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-43114720344629334482023-10-01T04:34:00.006-07:002023-10-05T01:13:31.051-07:00Paper matters, tooIn Why Writing Still Matters I spend some time tracing the invention and development of paper as a writing technology, but not with the detail and enthusiasm that Basbanes applies in On Paper. But I do note that after the French Revolution writing paper began to appear bearing the names of new government offices and departments. Sometimes this was lavishly produced from engravings of the motif Guy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-89941565487808951392023-09-10T02:42:00.010-07:002023-09-10T02:44:26.716-07:00Why Writing Still MattersMy new book Why Writing Still Matters was published by Cambridge University Press last week. I haven't actually seen a copy yet - distribution being something slightly different from printing and publication, but I'm fairly certain it exists in that particular material form. And that's actually a significant transformation because up until this point in time it has been entirely digital. From Guy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-16980796596341440072023-08-26T02:14:00.006-07:002023-08-26T02:17:28.715-07:00Thinking about Yoko OgawaI read The Memory Police about a year ago and I thought it was so good that I should post something about it. I put the book down on the deep windowsill in my study which functions a bit like an in-tray. That's where I put things I'm working on, or things I need to attend to - work, parking fines, speeding tickets, tax notices and so on. For a while, each morning, I'd look at it and think about Guy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-5935323116019684812023-07-12T04:22:00.005-07:002023-07-12T04:26:09.889-07:00The deskWhen my mother died, I couldn't work out what to do with the desk she had. It was rather like the one here, and it had been part of the family home as we grew up. About five foot in height, the hinged front pulled down for a writing surface revealing a series of small cubby holes that could be used to store things like envelopes, tape, pencil sharpeners and so on. I say five foot in height, but IGuy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-74795227626952104372023-02-04T02:51:00.005-08:002023-02-04T02:59:42.054-08:00Fountain pensI remember a time when writing with a fountain pen was something to aspire to. Yes, the fountain pen with its little metal lever, delicately hinged against the soft bladder within, to syphon up the ink. I remember the wet, metallic smell of ink. Quink in glass bottles - presumably the qu- for quick, as in quick drying; ink as in ink. The syringe-like way in which it was drawn up into the pen. AndGuy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-22099035495257889002022-11-20T03:41:00.012-08:002022-11-20T03:46:08.225-08:00Writing migrationHelping us to reflect on our particular position in the wider sweep of social and cultural life is something that literature does well. I don't mean that all literature does or indeed should do that, but it is often the case. It was a pre-occupation of nineteenth century novelists, who often constructed dynamic localised narratives against the backdrop of social and political change. Guy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-80458990032082754792022-10-09T03:38:00.002-07:002022-10-09T03:38:20.241-07:00Remote island fictionYou could imagine a particular kind writing workshop. There's an assignment: sketch out a story set on an island. Have two main characters, and a small cast of locals. The main characters go to the island, some events unfold and then they return to the mainland. End of story. It doesn't seem like much, but there's still plenty of possibility. Amy Sackville's novel Orkney and Audrey Magee's Guy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-16627933950030741492022-08-19T03:04:00.004-07:002022-08-19T03:04:35.818-07:00Half full and half emptyIn one way or another a work of fiction is always subject to the gravitational pull of the time in which it is made. Whether we're thinking of its material form as Ozeki does, or whether we're thinking of its subject matter, shape and substance are important. A print book has a particular heft and the 550 pages of The Book of Form and Emptiness lend it a certain weight. The extent to which that Guy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-40823943585993569882022-03-13T03:52:00.004-07:002022-03-13T03:56:42.027-07:00Travelling with TolstoyThe passenger sees the world from a particular point of view. Separate, like a spectator, a world unfolds through the frame of the window. The framed scene outside is textualized, having a cinematic quality, as the passenger moves through the world without engaging with it in any other way than simply viewing it. There is a quality to this experience that prompts reflection, and it turns up time Guy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-22502018218316634402022-02-27T02:31:00.007-08:002022-02-27T02:31:42.662-08:00Texting charactersIn the study of writing we often overlook the fact that the most commonly spoken language in the world is Chinese. Using characters - a form of logographic writing, is the most obvious choice for a population of over 1.5 billion. And so associating literacy with the alphabet is both limiting and inaccurate. In fact, there is no better illustration of how political and economic power intersect Guy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-60510879481659918212022-02-05T03:29:00.005-08:002022-02-06T03:47:12.601-08:00Literacy practices in librariesThe public library was an important landmark in my childhood. It was in safe cycling distance, it was always warm, and it was the context for a ritualized, and mildly intimidating, interface with the adult world. I can clearly recall the heart-thumping point at which I would offer up my chosen books to be date stamped. I was in awe of the librarians who to my childish mind held the power to Guy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-23160689492413685882021-12-04T03:00:00.009-08:002021-12-04T03:04:00.571-08:00Powerpoint fiction....anybody?If you'd told me that the novel I was about to read contained over 60 pages of Powerpoint slides using some of the standard insert graphics you get, I think I'd change my mind and pick something else. Haven't we all had enough of Powerpoint? Surprisingly though, Jennifer Egan makes this device work so well in A Visit from the Goon Squad that I actually found myself really enjoying it. It's one ofGuy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-81928026364238142152021-10-02T02:29:00.003-07:002021-10-02T02:29:32.846-07:00Going slowIt's been a while. Perhaps it seems as if I'm a blogger on a go-slow, but really it's just the sign of a changing relationship with what I write. Recently posting has become a way of rehearsing thoughts that later become more extended pieces of writing - but somehow or other I didn't need to do that for the book Stacking Stories (out soon!). So that's where my energies have gone, writing Guy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-79639572352504138622021-06-25T07:36:00.001-07:002021-06-25T07:36:03.866-07:00Works in progressI've come to think of all work as work in progress. A busy couple of months have seen me mulling over what things in the literacy world look like after lockdown, and several things are out there already including this bulletin and this contribution to a UKLA symposium. At the same time I've been working for the Journal of Early Childhood Literacy on our pro-Black initiative and wanted to Guy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-58924742740890481742021-04-30T05:46:00.003-07:002021-04-30T05:46:20.177-07:00Fake profilesThe Pinterest algorithm got to know me pretty quickly. I'm not sure if it knows when and where I was born but it must be narrowing it down. The app feeds me old photographs of where I grew up, some are even in the black and white of old memory. I spend time on these images. Then I get poster art from the sixties and photos of the bands I used to follow back then. Pinterest serves me up with ideasGuy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-65457386122632637742021-04-22T12:15:00.008-07:002021-04-22T12:19:36.002-07:00Three short piecesOne. Events pass through novelty and nowness to become history, obviously. I'm thinking of when doing things or going places one perhaps registers either to one's self or whoever you're with, that you're here. This is happening, I'm in Santiago, Singapore, Cyprus or some other place, doing this and conscious of doing it, too. And then looking back on it, that was life, that was what happened, theGuy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-50090524899559338322021-03-17T06:53:00.006-07:002021-03-20T02:40:53.924-07:00A hall of mirrorsNarrative fiction has become an important site for exploring interiority and the complexities of self-reflection. The conscious separation of author from narrator always present in fiction opens possibilities that twentieth century writers have been keen to exploit. Think of the unbelievable narrator of 'The Good Soldier' or the pathological one that tells us all about 'Lolita'. Stefan Zweig is aGuy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-33266541089436355992021-03-11T02:19:00.007-08:002021-03-20T02:43:33.189-07:00Back to schoolOn Monday children in England returned to their classrooms for the first time since the 2021 lockdown was introduced. I knew that because I heard them clattering past my house on their way to school. There was an exuberant atmosphere, much swinging of bags, slamming of doors and rattling of railings. And there were voices, too. Some subdued, some loud and unruly - but it all reminded me of how Guy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-25636237163626041252021-01-24T03:05:00.008-08:002021-03-20T02:46:18.312-07:00Doing the Romans Apparently school in lockdown has arbitrary rules just like school in real life. I have it on good authority that one such rule is that you don't do online learning in bed. But rules are there to be broken and when there's nowhere else it's obviously the most sensible option. And, after all that's been written about the benefits of family learning we could probably be making a lot more out Guy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-70048236224305054212021-01-21T03:40:00.034-08:002021-03-20T02:49:15.292-07:00Doing it differentlyI really enjoyed the Doing Data Differently project because it was a move out of my comfort zone and into the realms of educational data - an area that I'd previously been extremely wary of. Cathy has written a great blogpost about the project, there are several journal publications out there and some examples of the postcards and discussions can be seen here. But just like all of the Guy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6156725.post-90548102131571287582020-11-05T02:35:00.003-08:002020-11-05T02:38:47.992-08:00Why Talk About Data (in Education)? An Online Colloquium12th-19th November 2020What does data do in education? What does it become? Why does data visualisation matter? What might teachers do with data?This online colloquium will generate debate about the role and purpose of data in education. It brings together researchers whose work, in different ways, raises issues about data use in schools, coinciding with the launch of a Guy Merchanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08784893606954405651noreply@blogger.com0