New interests meme

[nwhyte]

I was hoping for someone to write one that would pick ten interests at random; but this will do.

LJ Interests meme results

1. belfast:O the bricks they will bleed and the rain it will weep,
   And the damp Lagan fog lull the city to sleep;
   It's to hell with the future and live in the past:
   
   May the Lord in His mercy be kind to Belfast.
   City of my birth, where I still like to return when I can, whos daily doing I follow as closely as I am able from two stretches of water away. Some of my Western European friends complain that I often brandish my Belfast origins during meetings when we are ostensibly discussing the Balkans. I don't care.
   
2. china miéville:
   A fellow graduate of Clare College, Cambridge, though he arrived immediately after I left in 1991. Rather better known as the cutting-edge sf writer of Perdido Street Station and The Scar.I haven't actually met him, though I suspect we were in the same room once or twice at WorldCon.
   
3. dutch:
   When I was 12/13 my family spent a year in the Netherlands and I attended a local school. My knowledge of Dutch stuck with me, and twenty years later I found myself living in Flanders. I admit I mainly use it to talk to my children's teachers, and to impress Dutch and Flemish diplomats and very occasionally for other work purposes. An interesting language, with many of the quirks of German but a more relaxed attitude to where you put the verbs. The Dutch Dutch accent is fiendishly difficult; the Flemish much milder.
   
4. h.g. wells:
   The first great sf writer, of course. Time machines, war with Martians, the invisible man, the sleeper who wakes; I can't say that Wells was the first to write of any of these but he was the first to hit the popular mind-set ith them. Also of course he was the lover of that other superbly lyrical (if blinkered) writer, Rebecca West.
   
5. james white:
   Writer of competent, good natured sf novels, many set on an interstellar hospital; also the first Irish winner of a Hugo Award, as "outstanding Acti[ve ]Fan". Clearly much loved and influential in Irish and world-side sf fandom. Also davesangel's grandfather.
   
6. literature:
   I like reading. I particularly like reading science fiction (and fantasy). Occasionally I worry that I'm not reading enough Great Literature. I'm trying to work out exatly what that is; and have set up an incompletely fulfilled reading plan to find out.
   
7. monty python:
   Not as consistently great as, say Fawlty Towers, or even Yes Minister, but a continuing source of amusement and fun. I've been obsessively re-reading the script of the episode where the bloke on a cycling tour encouters a travelling compaion who transforms into Eartha Kitt, Edward Heath and Stalin. And whensoever two or three or more are gathered together in one place, they shall recite The Parrot Sketch. Amen.
   
8. philip pullman:
   Answered this last time round. Will be looking out for more of his work.
   
9. scifi:
   I have a demanding day job, OK? I del with horrible conflicts and traumatic situations, at surprisingly high levels of political engagement. So I make no apology for reading escapist literature when I can.
   Except that it's more than just wanting to get away from my work. SF (preferred abbreviation rather than scifi) is at its best a literature of ideas; it gives me something else to think about, challenges me to keep my mind open, especially when dealing with people whose circumstances require them to keep their minds closed. And of course there's a whole social aspect to it as well.
   
10. transdniestria:
    Not a lot of people are aware that the Soviet Army is still occupying a small corner of Europe. And explaining Transdniestria is not easy, in that first you have to explain Moldova, which they are trying to secede from. A fascinating and yet horrible little conflict, with undertones of international football, where the best that can be said for the protagonists is that they make decent cognac.

Enter your LJ user name, and 10 interests will be selected from your interest list.