Welcome to May. We Made It! After a month of Book related posts we're back to 'normal' (or what passes for normal) here @ SaLT. But I have picked out a Summer Theme, running from June through August, that I'm looking forward to. It'll involve a mix of nostalgia with a sprinkling of competition.... but we have to get through THIS month first! 

Just Finished Reading: The Great Hunger by Patrick Kavanagh [50pp] 

So.... Poetry..... AGAIN! I think that both Penguin Classics boxsets are trolling me presently. Weirdly, and very unexpectedly, I didn’t mind these poems. I can honestly say, hand on heart, that I didn’t skim a single one.  

I’m not sure exactly why this was so. Generally, the poetry is about the natural world (in his Irish home) with multiple references to mountains, trees and such. By far the longest poem – hence the title of the booklet – was The Great Hunger itself. Going in I’d assumed that it was going to be about the Irish Potato Famine, but it was nothing of the sort. It was instead about the struggles of a farmer, tied to the land and to his overbearing mother leaving him alone in the world as both he and the land ages. It was, to coin a phrase, all very poetic. 

Whilst I’m not exactly going out and buying all of this poet’s works, I certainly wasn’t sorry that I read them and don’t consider my time wasted doing so. I don’t think that I’ve finally been ‘turned on’ to poetry, but that I’ve stumbled across a poet that doesn’t leave me cold, bored and confused with his use of language. We’ll see how the NEXT poet in either of these boxsets' fares! Reasonable.

...and I know *exactly* where this is!

Just Finished Reading: Why We Get the Wrong Politicians by Isabel Hardman (FP: 2018) [307pp] 

If you’re anything like me and live on the British mainland (mostly England to be honest), you’ll have probably wondered where exactly politicians come from, what exactly they do in Parliament and why (oh why?) it seems far easier to really screw something up than accomplish anything even vaguely useful. If so, this is definitely a good place to start. 

The author certainly is at the centre of things. As the Assistant Editor of The Spectator she has spent a considerable amount of time wandering the halls of Parliament and has interviewed numerous politicians of all stripes including local MPs (both long standing and of the newly minted variety), Ministers and even David Cameron himself prior to him leaving the House of Commons after the Brexit vote. She certainly had plenty of material to work with and used it wisely. It's not easy getting your bum on the green leather benches in the Commons. Not only do you need to get enough people to vote for you – possibly in a constituency you might be unfamiliar with – you need to be selected in the first place by the Party you’re part of (being an Independent makes the whole process and the likelihood of success MUCH more difficult). To do this you need to have put your time in (usually unpaid) for a number of years and be ‘inside’ enough and persuasive enough for the Party to support you through the process. This, naturally, eliminates many potential candidates and is one reason why it's rare indeed to see someone much outside the expected norms giving their traditional first speech on the floor of the Commons (there was one just recently that really stood out – a female ex-plumber for the Green Party. Knowing what I do now about the Parliamentary system I wish her well). 

It must be quite the shock – or maybe aftershock – to show up on your first day at the Commons. From what the author lays out it’s not exactly (or usually) the smooth transition many would hope. It seems that many MPs are given a brief talk and then essentially left to get on with things. The bigger more established parties have, apparently, tried to be a little more organised but I think they still have a fair bit to go. I’ve had a few creaky first weeks in various jobs, but nothing like the general experience of new MPs. Again, the experiences of INDEPENDENT MPs must be horrendous! Given a 4-5 year term (barring snap elections) it's a STEEP learning curve even for those who are already political animals – maybe previously a local councillor – but what they learn very quickly is that you vote with your Party and not with your conscience. Rebels certainly do not thrive and most certainly don’t get Ministerial positions where, naturally, most of the real power is. Those who are already (or become) Subject Matter Experts might expect to be placed on committees to scrutinise upcoming legislation (because that’s their job really) but they’d be both surprised and disappointed. The government of the day certainly doesn’t want a lowly (or NEW!) MP criticising their project with FACTS – and by extension giving aid to the Opposition(!) so no committees for them. That’s of course if they even have time to scrutinise the proposed Bill in the first place. 

This was quite THE eye-opener of a book. I certainly understand Parliament a great deal more (admittedly from quite a low bar) and am finding that I can already understand more of the language use in the Commons, both what they’re saying (or really saying) and what they’re not – both to make such unsaid comments public and to hide behind parliamentary language in order to confuse or deflect. This is definitely recommended for anyone who want to begin to understand how Parliament ‘works’ and, more importantly, why it doesn’t.  

The Last 10 Books (I added to my Wish List) - April 2026 

It’s been reasonably quiet on my Wish List – adding-wise anyway – during the last month. As usual, the additions have been prompted by YouTube prompts, paperback upgrades and the odd in-book reference or bibliographic entry from whatever I’ve been reading at the time. So, the latest are:  

A Kingdom and a Village: A One-Thousand-Year History of Moscow by Simon Morrison 

Cuba: An American History by Ada Ferrer 

In the Spirit of Crazy Horse by Peter Matthiessen 

The Word: On the Translation of the Bible by John Barton 

A History of the Bible: The Book and Its Faiths by John Barton 

What Is Free Speech?: The History of a Dangerous Idea by Fara Dabhoiwala 

Norway's War: A People’s Struggle Against Nazi Tyranny, 1940–45 by Robert Ferguson 

The Coming Storm: Power, Conflict and Warnings from History by Odd Arne Westad 

Hotel Exile: Paris in the Shadow of War by Jane Rogoyska 

Mary Wollstonecraft: A Very Short Introduction by E. J. Clery 

That’s a slightly unusual mix for me this time with the usual History heavy bias displaced by politics and religion. We’ll see just how long it takes to get around to any of them! I think the average is 2-5 years, so.... 

Happy Birthday: Edward Roscoe Murrow (born Egbert Roscoe Murrow; April 25, 1908 – April 27, 1965) was an American broadcast journalist and war correspondent.

He first gained prominence during World War II with a series of live radio broadcasts from Europe for the news division of CBS. During the war he recruited and worked closely with a team of war correspondents who came to be known as the Murrow Boys. A pioneer of radio and television news broadcasting, Murrow produced a series of reports on his television program See It Now which helped lead to the censure of Senator Joseph McCarthy. Fellow journalists Eric Sevareid, Ed Bliss, Bill Downs, and Alexander Kendrick considered, as does Dan Rather, Murrow one of journalism's greatest figures. Murrow's life has been dramatized in several films, including Good Night, and Good Luck, which takes its name from the signature sign-off phrase Murrow used to end many of his wartime broadcasts.

Murrow's reports, especially during the Blitz, began with what became his signature opening, "This is London," delivered with vocal emphasis on the word this, followed by the hint of a pause before the rest of the phrase. His former speech teacher, Ida Lou Anderson, suggested the opening as a more concise alternative to the one he had inherited from his predecessor at CBS Europe, César Saerchinger: "Hello, America. This is London calling." Murrow's phrase became synonymous with the newscaster and his network.

Murrow achieved celebrity status as a result of his war reports. They led to his second famous catchphrase, at the end of 1940, with every night's German bombing raid, Londoners who might not necessarily see each other the next morning often closed their conversations with "good night, and good luck." The future British monarch, Princess Elizabeth, said as much to the Western world in a live radio address at the end of the year, when she said "good night, and good luck to you all". So, at the end of one 1940 broadcast, Murrow ended his segment with "Good night, and good luck." Speech teacher Anderson insisted he stick with it, and another Murrow catchphrase was born.