Yorkshire Writers' Lunch

  It’s term time again, when disgruntled teachers and students are glaring at each other across the classroom, parents breath a sigh of relief and retired teachers raise a large glass of wine to celebrate. But not everything is doom and gloom. I chanced to look at some snippets I still keep from those halcyon days, so here they are for your amusement. Business students often get the wrong idea about the world of work. One young person informed me that ‘small businesses cannot have special offers to attack customers’. Quite fortunate if you regularly support your local shop. The Office Shops and Retail Premises Act apparently states that ‘Sedentary workers must be suitable in design’, though also specifies that ‘Clothing should not be worn during working hours.’ So if you’re a budding naturist, and are suitable in design, you’ll be in with a chance of a job. Spelling errors accounted for many a laugh in the staff room, even before we ‘helled a reunion party...

The man in the kimono was waiting for me at the bench. One would think his green clothes would have made him seem quite natural in the setting but, of course, no dew-dotted leaves or grass shined quite like it. With one last glance around, I showed him the book. I was careful only to show the first couple of pages before snapping the cover shut. “I want a hundred for it,” I told him. I watched him warily as he reached inside his kimono and produced a silver cashmere purse. He filled my hand with notes. I counted them twice before passing the Book of Sand to him. As he began to riffle through the pages, I stood up and hurried away. “Why do you run?” he asked me. I glanced back once. “Don’t question my motive. The book is yours now.” He said nothing else, just left me to run as fast as I could. Of course my suspicious behaviour might have prompted him to check the book but then I could tell he was an idle sort. He had his thick leatherbound tome for display purposes so why w...

  Call me mistaken or mad but I’m sure I found The Book of Sand . Jorge Luis Borges, please forgive me.             At the time I was working at The National Library as an assistant, though my heart wasn’t in the full responsibilities of the job. Whenever possible, I would avoid visitors and their confounding inquiries and disappear into the stacks.             Being a reader of Borges in my youth, I fancied that The National Library he wrote about was the very same that I worked at. Recalling the story of The Book of Sand , I browsed the basement where the book had allegedly been abandoned. I rummaged through yellowing maps and tissue-thin periodicals till I found a damp shelf. It was fragile but still standing with three books on it. I took each out and opened them until I found the one that contained more pages than the spine would suggest. More pages than seemed pos...