Jeffrey Beall is a blogger who keeps track of those publishers who have been less than ethical and have taken money to say articles have been published, it’s not entirely clear if those articles have actually been published and are available for purchase or viewing but it’s indicated that they aren’t. One of those publishers is now sueing for $1m. Beall has kept clear records so it’s going to be an interesting court case. Not sure yet whether this is going to go ahead in the US or India. It will certainly be something worth following.

The Complete Uncle

A series of books written by J. P. Martin and Sir Quentin Blake and published in the 1960s and 1970s will be republished thanks to a crowdfunding through Kickstarter. There will be lots of new material and old illustrations. Instead of paying $USD1702 for pre-loved copies you’ll soon be able to buy the whole set for only £37 plus postage.

Qantas has bespoke books

Qantas has decided to get on board with reading during flights and has had some books published which are designed to be read on the plane. They expect you should finish the book just as you touch down at the other end of your journey. Not sure if I’ll get to try these out the next time I fly Qantas as it seems to be for their members from Bronze to Platinum and I don’t think I qualify.

We all know and many of us love Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes. I’m sure many of you have read the books and have enjoyed Benedict Cumberbatch as Holmes and are enjoying Lucy Liu as Dr Watson in Elementary. Today Conan Doyle would be 154.

Peter Matthiessen is well known as the author of The Snow Lepoard, his two month search in the  Dolpo region on the Tibetan Plateau in the Himalayas. Today he is 86, a good age. Happy birthday!

Finally, we have Wallace West, if he was still alive would be 113 today. West wrote many short stories for the pulp fiction magazines starting with Weird Tales in 1927 and appearing in magazines until 1960. Besides being a lawyer he was also a pollution control expert. His exciting claim to fame is writing two Betty Boop books: Betty Boop in Snow-White Assisted by Bimbo and Ko Ko; and Betty Boop in Miss Gulliver’s Travels. These two books are currently hard to find and worth more than I’m prepared to pay.

What do you read?

What do we read? What a terribly strange question you ask. There are so many of us residing in this library and it is very obvious that we must be reading each other. Rather, we would very much like to read each other but Mr Gatsby hasn’t seen fit to cut the pages. He made certain to buy real books, not cardboard or anything cheap but then did not cut the pages.

We do sometimes read to each other to help alleviate the boredom of sitting on the shelf all day. We trust Mr Gatsby will cut our pages one day, it will all depend on if he lives after his little dip in the pool. There was another man nearby, we think he had a gun and we all know what a gun can do.

No, we don’t feel like answering any more strange questions. Goodbye.

Thank you to the Library from The Great Gatsby, I pay great respect to F. Scott Fitzgerald for bringing us this wonderful work.

I found they do come from the same root meaning place, from the Middle English liue, from Anglo-French liu, lieu, from Latin locus and was first used in the 14th century. With the tenant part coming from the Anglo-French tenir to hold, from Latin tenere. Confused? I was so I googled (love the way a noun has changed to a verb in such a short time) lieutenant and was sidetracked by its pronunciation.

‘Lieutenant’ looks like it should be pronounced the French way ‘loo-ten-ant’ but many English countries pronounce it ‘lef-ten-ant’ and the reason is unclear to me. It appears that the Old French word had a final ‘w’ which was often pronounced ‘f’ by certain areas even if it shouldn’t have been. That sounds like a logical idea and the one I like the most but I found several other thoughts.

1. A common English word for ‘toilet’ is ‘loo’ and they didn’t want to be derogatory towards the officers so they started pronouncing it ‘lef-ten-ant’

2. A deliberate Anglicisation of a French word. The English and French have been at odds for a very long time. When we were intending on travelling from England to France we were told we’d be fine if we mentioned we were Australian.

3. Someone thought it had something to do with Russian and German!

4. The letters ‘v’ and ‘u’ being almost the same in English they were swapped.

5. A mouth injury to a Lieutenant Lefting made it hard for him to pronounce his title and the ‘Leftenant Lefting’ stuck.

6. Noah Webster changed things a bit when he wrote his American dictionary.

7. The lower ranking officer walked on the left side of his senior officer and protected it, giving rise to the ‘left-tenant’.

8. In medieval times when people actually fought their own battles the Lord of the Manor would be in the middle with his Head Knight on his right and his Head Tenant on his left, when the Head Tenant had enough money he paid someone else to fight in his stead making him a ‘left-tenant’.

It’s all very interesting and that’s with only a half hour research. I do wonder how much more rubbish I could find if I took more time. I do love some of the inventiveness of these people. I leave you with a link to the History of English, it seems to be fairly close to what I already knew but I found someone disputing some of it.  The joys of the internet.

If you wander over to this link you’ll see an assumption that the prisons in England are full of people who can’t read or people who lack good reading and writing skills. I doubt this is true of everyone but certainly a percentage of these inmates are those who can’t read or write at all and programmes such as the Quick Reads initiative must help in part but do they help people to stop re-offending when they get out? Can’t answer that question but I certainly hope so. I love the idea of this programme, if you read to the end you’ll find they gave 300 copies of the new Doctor Who book to the prisons which I hope will help people to want to read. I’m a firm proponent of the ‘find the right book and they’ll start reading’ theory so it’s good to see they’re not just being given classics but are also being given science fiction.

A while ago I found a group of people in Melbourne trying to collect donations and books to lend to prisons, they were focusing on textbooks, dictionaries and encyclopedias, I managed to give them some books but the next time I had a couple of boxes of dictionaries looking for a good home I couldn’t find them again. I think the problem with that project was the cost of postage, it’d be much better if we could just give a set of reference books to each prison in Australia and then they’re there all the time and we don’t have to worry about storage or postage. Postage is fairly expensive here and reference books weigh a lot. I can send a parcel weighing up to 500 grams for $6.95 across Australia but only small dictionaries would weigh less than that, most of them would weigh more so it’s then more economic to use a pre-paid satchel for $13.40 but that only goes up to 3 kg, the good reference works would weigh more than that. If I want to send a 20 kg parcel to Perth it’s outrageous at $67.45! The problem is the vast distance it has to cover, to give overseas people some idea of how far it is, they’re three hours behind us, it’s over 2,000 miles or 3,400 km by road.

It’s all of side A and is Tolkein reading Bilbo’s meeting with Gollum. The illustration on the front is an original picture by Tolkein of Smaug talking with Bilbo.

Reading together, parent to child, is always going to be among the foremost of all the special experiences of childhood.  Many people’s earliest memories are of being read to by their mother or father.  The special mix of being snuggled in a cuddle or a cosy bed, combined with entering a wonderful imaginative world of adventure and possibility, is unique.  Furthermore, research has shown that simply listening to someone reading to them increases activity in the language centre of a child’s brain, helping them acquire language themselves and to lay down verbal memory. Other benefits have been identified as a strengthening of relationship between parent and child, enhancing communication skills and embedding a sense of being well equipped to deal with new experiences having approached them via an imaginative route first.  For a parent, there is also the element of heritage – handing down to your child the love of a book that you were read to when you were their age, that they in their turn will one day be reading to a child of their own. The mark of an inspiring children’s book is one that endures as the top reading pick through the generations. Here are five titles worthy of the accolade “Timeless Classic.”

1. “Where The Wild Things Are” by Maurice Sendak.

Over 19 million copies of this story of the night Max put on his wolf suit and made mischief have been sold since it was first published in 1963. Max, in his costume, wreaks chaos in his house and is sent to bed without any supper. His bedroom is magically transformed into a jungle and he sails to an island inhabited by wild beasts, which he first intimidates and then is crowned by them as King Of All Wild Things and asked to stay forever.  But Max “was lonely and wanted to be where someone loved him most of all.” The fact that someone is his mother, and that she had a hot supper waiting for him after all, encapsulates the poignant message that your parents will still love and forgive you, no matter how naughty you are.

2. The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle

There can be very few people on this earth unfamiliar with the tale of the colourful caterpillar that eats his way through all manner of foodstuffs before pupating and emerging as a butterfly. This book is a winner on all counts – from its marvellous illustrations to its potential for interacting in counting games as the litany of foods eaten unfolds, to its satisfying denouement with the transformation from caterpillar to beautiful butterfly.  There are very large board book versions of this story, which are great for propping up in front of a high chair or play pen, so that your pre-schooler can enjoy looking at the colourful illustrations between readings.

3. Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown

This wonderful picture book is the perfect bedtime story for a heavy- lidded child still clinging to the last vestiges of daytime.  The gentle lulling tone, the softness of the story of a child saying goodnight to all the sweet objects and beings in her room and – finally – “Goodnight stars, goodnight air, goodnight noises everywhere” – is like sleep-hypnosis for the very young.  The gentle rhythm of the language and softness of the images makes it impossible to feel other than safe and sound at the end of the day. Indeed, many a reader has ended up accidentally falling asleep alongside their child after the whisper of the last word on the page has barely left their mouth.

4. Diary Of A Wombat by Jackie French

Published in 2002, it is easy to predict that this award winning picture book illustrated by Bruce Whatley is destined to join the ranks of stories that are read aloud to generations to come. Mothball the wombat’s diary covers eight days in his life, during which he plays havoc with a local family – not out of any malice but because he is seeing life through his wombat eyes and doing just what comes naturally.  The result is full of humour, charm and warmth that will raise a giggle from even the most serious of kids.

5. The Cat In The Hat by Dr Seuss

The exotic and charismatic cat of the title holds all the power in this, the first of Dr Seuss’s Cat In the Hat series which has taught generations of children to read.  Written in upbeat rhyme, it is the perfect read-aloud book which narrates a rainy day in which two bored children are left alone by their mother. Enter the eponymous cat and life becomes a little wild and more than chaotic.  Reactions to the exploits of the exuberant figure who performs all sorts of whacky tricks are typically divided among children who take gleeful delight at the cat’s outrageous anti-authoritarian antics and those who literally squirm in anticipation of the return of the children’s mother to a totally upturned domestic scene – wherein comes one of the best last lines of any book ever – “Well, what would YOU do if your mother asked you?”

Anthony Smith is the Chief Operating Officer of an Australian childcare management company, Guardian Child Care Alliance.  As a parent himself, Anthony recognises the importance of reading to children allowing them the freedom to thrive and in an educational and nurturing environment.

What do you read?

I’m not a big reader. I read the newspaper, there are a lot of pictures in the newspaper, it makes it easier to read.

Why do you read?

I read to pass the time, when I’m not mowing the lawn or drying dishes. Sometimes the family leave the telly on and I watch that. Good programme on now, it’s Playschool they’re about to go through the window. It’s a dog! Woof! I’m a dog! Want to play with the dog on telly! Woof! Woof!

My apologies for that, I didn’t know how long he’d last. When Uncle Alfred sees a dog he behaves like a dog. I think I should take him to the park for a game of fetch. He comes from the book I’ll Plead Insanity by Melbourne lawyer David Cross.

Instead of finding something to write about I’ve been tidying, I’d like to see my desk so I’ve been dealing with things. All cords have been tidied and been placed into a box, the pile of books has been put away and I’m currently in the middle of entering business cards into my gmail account so I can access the information easily. I saw someone else photoraph a business card, put it into her virtual filing system and then give the card back so I thought I’d do a similar thing and spent the weekend using lots of swear words downloading business card apps on my phone, finding they don’t work too well, deleting and then trying another. Having tried three apps I decided I could use my finely honed data entry skills and do it manually, 16 cards and a couple of hours later (I won’t talk about the interruptions) I feel I’m well on my way to having the 50 odd cards sorted and thrown out before I move onto the ones in my filing system.

Gmail is great for this as I can put people in groups and add extensive notes so I know when and where I met them, what we discussed and what further action I need to do, the groups are awesome as I can just select a group and work some magic with them. The extensive notes are seriously needed as I have a head like a sieve and really need some organising to ensure I don’t forget to do something I’ve promised. Once that’s done I’ll have to work on the papers and then consider actually cleaning the desk before moving onto some other part of the house.

I was hoping to make an announcement today but I think I’ll just leave everyone on tenterhooks, I’m waiting either for confirmation or a photo or both before I publish an article which I hope will be the first of many and a slightly new direction for this blog.

I hope everyone had a great Mother’s Day.

I don’t write about every time I go out but it does look like it as I don’t go out very often. Last night was a special night as I’d managed to acquire tickets for the preview night of The Producers by JYM theatre co. We were in The Phoenix Theatre in Elwood, it’s a small theatre which they managed to make it work so well for them.

The Producers was released as a movie in 1968, written by Mel Brooks and with his voice over in the movie, the play and subsequent movie during the dance routine of Springtime for Hitler using the words ”Don’t be stupid, be a smarty/Come and join the Nazi Party”. It’s all rather irreverent and brings Hitler down to size.

I was never crazy about Hitler…If you stand on a soapbox and trade rhetoric with a dictator you never win…That’s what they do so well: they seduce people. But if you ridicule them, bring them down with laughter, they can’t win. You show how crazy they are. ”
Mel Brooks, in an August 2001 interview

The story is that of a washed up Broadway producer whose accountant suddenly realises it’s easier to make money with a flop than a success, thus begins the romp of a lifetime.

The play last night was a small scale version of the original. With a small cast, except for the leads, they all played multiple characters and the men often dressed as women. The walker scene where all the little old ladies are dancing with their walkers was made even more hilarious with the addition of the men in drag, some of the men hammed it up and enjoyed themselves way too much, total fun.

It was very polished and I have trouble believing it was the preview, there were very few gaffs and they were so minor such as dropping a champagne glass or having the adding machine fall off its perch. The scene changes were built into the play with the cast coming on in character and moving furniture etc around, I thought this very clever and managed to miss many parts as my attention was drawn elsewhere such as watching the tall, blonde, gorgeous man who was having way too much fun and hamming it up, I missed his name.

The performances as a whole were really great. The man playing Max Bialystock did a really good job as did the man playing Leo Bloom. For me, the stand out performance apart from the tall, blonde and did I say gorgeous? man was the man playing Roger De Bris, he had the most lovely deep voice and hammed it up to the max.

It’s well worth the money at between $35 and $42, rivalling the large and more monied productions which you can pay a mint for, if you can I really suggest you go, it has a short run starting tomorrow and finishing on the 25th May. Bookings can be made online here.