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Rob Spence
@spencro.bsky.social
Former Eng Lit academic. I have written about Ford Madox Ford, Louis de Bernieres, Wyndham Lewis, Penelope Fitzgerald, Robert Nye, but mainly about Anthony Burgess, a fellow Mancunian. robspence.org.uk Reviews at shinynewbooks.co.uk
317 followers680 following315 posts
Reposted by Rob Spence
SM13sarahmurphy.bsky.social

This isnā€™t news. Itā€™s Tory propaganda. Barely bats an eye when Zahawi heats his stables, Johnson freeloads his arse off or McVey takes Ā£18K freebies in 2months. Rayner pays for something expensive herself and The Times wants to shame her. What a nasty, snobby, shit-stirring rag.

Times headline:
Proud socialist Angela Rayner bought boyfriend a suit from royal tailor
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Reposted by Rob Spence
CMcolinmurray.bsky.social

Heartily sick of how almost deliberately ignorant commentary re the Chagos Islands decision has become. It's a function of the territorial integrity rule in self determination. It has no direct bearing on Falklands/Gibraltar. Nor can it be linked to Brexit. www.independent.co.uk/voices/chago...

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RSspencro.bsky.social

Iā€™m biased, but Burgess seems to have fared better than many of his vintage. Frequent reprints of his novels, and thriving critical scholarship.

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RSspencro.bsky.social

You'd have to be an AI bot for that to happen.

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RSspencro.bsky.social

I wouldn't disagree. The local papers decided not to report actual news some time ago. My local, the Manchester Evening News, has a formula: this thing happened on daytime TV; fans "took to Twitter" to express their outrage; here are lengthy quotes of said outrage, complete with spelling errors.

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RSspencro.bsky.social

Absolutely! Sadly, this kind of stuff is the norm these days.

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RSspencro.bsky.social

I see the arricle is by ā€œReporterā€: presumably Phil Space was too ashamed to add a byline to this obviously made up nonsense.

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RSspencro.bsky.social

Is this Mr Gradgrindā€™s academy?šŸ˜‰

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RSspencro.bsky.social

Yes, agreed. Last week of summer term is often all about games rather than study. But I still think if you said "kid has 95% attendance" most folk would think that's great. But if the 5% is a termtime holiday, somehow that becomes a major problem.

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Rob Spence
@spencro.bsky.social
Former Eng Lit academic. I have written about Ford Madox Ford, Louis de Bernieres, Wyndham Lewis, Penelope Fitzgerald, Robert Nye, but mainly about Anthony Burgess, a fellow Mancunian. robspence.org.uk Reviews at shinynewbooks.co.uk
317 followers680 following315 posts