Most of us know that Transylvania was the home of the invented literary character Count Dracula. The word itself is a perfect example of thought transference, as when someone says “Transylvania!” the brain immediately provides images of a gentleman with fangs who might, thanks to the art of the cinema, resemble Los Chaney, or... »

Everyone in Europe knows what happened; now, six years after the super-tanker Prestige sunk off the coast of Galicia, leaving hundreds of miles of oil slick to slime the region’s rocky coast, costing millions of euros in a tremendous cleaning-up operation, the official Inquiry into causes and effect of the accident has published the... »

Louis B. Mayer was one of the original founders of MGM; here are one or two things said about Mr Mayer, and by whom: “They say Louis B. Mayer is his own worst enemy. Not while I’m still alive”. Jack Warner, one of the original founders of Warner Bros. “A bastard’s bastard”. Garson Kanin, famed screenwriter. “He charms the... »

(Photo: Playa de El Médano. Tenerife. Canary Islands) My personal objection to the building of a second port in Tenerife (on the coast in the municipality of Granadilla) is that it it can only be seen as ‘necessary’ by those who imagine that a second port for Tenerife will ‘open up the island to... »

During the German occupation of tiny Norway in the II World War, Scandinavia’s greatest classical actor was appearing in an important play in Oslo’s biggest theatre. One snowy evening the front eight rows of the auditorium were filled with German officers in full uniform, among them plenty of SS. Everyone applauded when Norway’s greatest... »

Cinema is history too, and hace muchos días two pushy American film producers called Harry Saltzman and Cubby Broccoli persuaded author Ian Fleming to sell them the rights to the titles of his highly successful James Bond thrillers. They couldn’t make their movies directly from the original stories, but they could use all names... »

G.K. Chesterton was an internationally famous historian, journalist, novelist and wit. At the peak of his powers around 1906, his novels about the Catholic priest/private detective Father Brown sold in thousands. He was an enormously fat man, given to sitting in his London club by himself, and not encouraging any other member to approach. »

Diana Fluck was born in Swindon in 1931. When she became England’s answer to France’s Brigitte Bardot and America’s Marilyn Monroe, as a sex bomb on the cinema screen, her agents thought her name was in such obvious danger of mispronunciation that they changed it to Diana Dors. After she had become super-famous in Britain,... »

The President of the Catalan Parliament is an independist, communist republican (ERC) called Ernest Benach. The Spanish, Catalan and European papers have been having a field day with Mr Benach, who seems unmoved by the fuss. Every official in political office throughout the EU has a car at his disposal, usually with chauffeur thrown... »

Quite recently the big guns in the European economy, France, Germany, Britain, Italy etc., held a summit meeting to discuss what the administrations of each could do to simmer down emotions over the imminent ‘catastrophe’ of a Grand Recession (awaited not exactly with bated breath, but a certain weary acceptance) by financial experts for... »