Philip Spires commonplace book

I have kept a commonplace book for many years. It's a place where scraps of impressions are filed for future reflection. It's not a diary, it's just a mental scrapbook, concentrating on book reviews, concert reviews, visual arts and some occasional pieces on travel. It is also a place where I occasionally reflect on what I write. Details of my books can be found at http://www.philipspires.co.uk

Thursday, April 28, 2022

Shelley by Jon Addington Symonds

›

Consider these elements. A young, rich and gifted man is obsessed with revolutionary idealism. He attends prestigious schools and the most p...

Saturday, April 9, 2022

Costa Blanca Arts Update - Adam Fischer, Elisabeth Leonskaja and the Dusseldorf Symphoniker in Beethoven and Mahler in Alicante's ADDA

›

I have seldom had the privilege of participating in a concert audience that showed their appreciation with such heartfelt enthusiasm. At t...

Tuesday, April 5, 2022

The Life of Lord Byron by John Galt

›

John Galt published his Life of Lord Byron in 1830, just six years after the poet's death in Missolonghi, in what is now modern Greece a...

Saturday, April 2, 2022

Das Lied von der Erde in ADDA Alicante and a mention for a bass trombone concerto

›

This was a more than merely memorable concert, ending with the Valse Triste of Sibelius as an appropriate encore. “Appropriate” is an import...

Monday, March 28, 2022

G. F. Watts by G. K. Chesterton

›

GK meets GF sounds like the title of one of those mid-twentieth century albums when a producer with an eye for a buck teamed up some ancient...

Wednesday, March 23, 2022

Time Regained by Marcel Proust

›

All we have is the present. Our future, if it might exist, is a mere proposition of whose eventual reality none of us can be sure, may only ...

Tuesday, March 22, 2022

Costa Blanca Arts Update - Marin Alsop, Kian Soltani and Vienna RSO play Eisendle, Schumann and Dvorak in ADDA

›

It’s hard to describe what a complete success this concert was. For the first time I have heard Marin Alsop conduct a live concert. I expe...

‹

›

Home

View web version

About Me

philipspires: I was born in Wakefield and was brought up in Sharslton, a mining Village. I went to London University and then became a maths teacher, working initially as a volunteer teacher in Kenya. I spent sixteen years in London, in Balham and Islington. In 1992, I left Britain for Brunei and then Zayed University in Abu Dhabi. I currently live in La Nucia, near Benidorm in Spain. I am interested in the relationship between nature and nurture, birthright and experience. Themes of culture and identity and their relation to economic and social roles underpin my writing. What we are born into relates to what we become, but we are rarely in control. What others do, our interests and intellects and the way we choose to earn a living, all of these shape us into what we become. It may be that culture is the sum of all assumptions that others make on our behalf, whereas identity represents our reactions to them. I did a PhD on the effects of education in economic development in the Philippines. I was President of Alfas del Pi Music Society for twelve years.

View my complete profile