Monthly Archives: December 2012
Tito’s cancer: the enemy at the gates
This was not something the Mayan calendar predicted but the news that Tito Vilanova’s cancer has returned has a fateful element to it. Cancer has a terrible unpredictability about it. It is likely that Tito, under medical advice, would have taken on the job of Barca manager, knowing that he was on borrowed on time, keeping the big enemy at a sufficient distance not just to live but to create. We will never know how the sheer stress of succeeding Pep Guardiola and putting up with the pressure of keeping …
The Litvinenko case: Truth must prevail
My old newspaper the FT with a typical understatement of a ‘non-core’ news story relegates the Litvinenko pre-inquest review hearing story to a page 2 read-through today. Others were rather bolder. The Times splashed on it, and the Spanish media have got pretty excited too. Whichever way you look at it, the Litvinenko case , which the FT gave me both time and column inches to cover back in 2006 , is one that certainly needs revisiting, however much sectors of the UK and Russian governments would like it to …
Author’s personal favourite now on kindle
How time flies. I remember just two years ago finding myself berating a fellow passenger on a train from Washington to New York who was on the seat next to me reading from a kindle. “You are putting me out of a job!” I moaned. The book he was reading was not only not one of one my own but the thought of a whole new generation begining to opt for a download and a screen in preference to a firm hard back and a visit to the library filled …
A bad week for journalism
Nothing quite like meeting up with old British media friends to be reminded what a good move it was to liberate one-self from full-time journalism when one still has the energy and spirit to do something altogether more worthwhile and positive-like choosing what to write, when and for whom. While my former colleagues immersed themselves in gossip- an as yet unpublished scandal, rumours of imminent redundancies, the slick performances of certain editors on Question Time, and the struggle of older journalists to feel appreciated- I could think only what a …
From Viña del Mar 1906 to London 2012: A Chilean family story
From Viña del Mar 1906 to London 2012 – A Chilean family story “Mientras escribo estoy ausente,Y cuando vuelvo ya he partido, voy a ver si a las otras gentes les pasa lo que a mi me pasa… “While I write I am absent and when I return I have already left; I am going to find out if other people experience the same thing as I do, if they are as many as I am, if they look like each other, and and when I have found all this …
Books old & new available in print & digitally
Jimmy Burns’ books, including some ‘classics’ of the genre, are now available as e-books as well as in print. (see Amazon UK and Endeavour Press websites). They include his prize winning account of the Falklands War and Argentina, The Last that Lost Heroes ; a hugely entertaining Literary companion to Spain; the Real Deal (original title when first published When Beckham went to Spain) , an updated history of Real Madrid ; Barca: A People’s Passion, a history of FC Barcelona and the rise of Catalan nationalism; Papa Spy: Love, …
Cuando el idioma se convierta en una arma politica
Los nacionalismos en España se reflejan uno a otro en su esencial anti-democrática, basados en una justificación historia basada en la mitología y una evasión de la realidad hacia un futuro igualmente fantasioso. La polémica alrededor del proyecto de reforma educativo del ministerio José Ignacio Wert se nutre de dos posiciones antagónicas en lo que supone el sujeto de la imposición, – o sea el Castellano o el Catalán. Ya, hace semanas, Rajoy defendió el proyecto de Wert , diciendo que en materia educativa lo que él quiere es que …
