obituaries – T E Shepherd

John Hurt was The Storyteller

Thomas — Sat, 28 Jan 2017 15:54:02 +0000

Saturday. Woke to the news that the actor John Hurt has died. Tributes pour in and obituaries read. Amongst his most famous credits are appearances in Alien, Doctor Who, the Harry Potter films, and of course as The Elephant Man. There is little to no mention of the iconic series in which I first discovered him, and will always remember him – that of Jim Henson’s The Storyteller from 1988, and in which he was the storyteller.

I remember thinking then that he must have been 77, and was an actor who always seemed older than he actually was. Clearly he was an actor that could play “old” very well.

When people told themselves their past with stories, explained their present with stories, foretold the future with stories, the best place by the fire was kept for… The Storyteller.

1940–2017

Clement Freud, you will be missed without hesitation, repetition, or deviation

Thomas — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 09:43:00 +0000

I canât really add anymore to the news that Clement Freud is with us no more, other than to link to the articles on the BBC and The Guardian and remember fondly how he used to beat every young comedic upstart on the panel show Just a Minute by listing with dry wit every kind of animal, vegetable, mineral, station, person, man, woman, child, without hesitation, repetition, deviation until the whistle is blown and the scores are awarded…

Death of a Genius

Thomas — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 19:45:00 +0000

It’s a sad, sad day. Aged 54, Anthony Minghella has died. Such a fantastic talent, cut short. He will of course be remembered for Emma’s favourite film, The English Patient, but everything he touched seemed to turn to gold (okay, personally I didn’t ‘enjoy’ The Talented Mr Ripley, but it was a good film). Before you forget he was the man behind the stand-out scripts for Jim Henson’s The Storyteller, and the script editor for the golden years of Grange Hill.

The mead of inspiration

Thomas — Mon, 08 Jan 2007 22:51:00 +0000

My story has been too complicated. Working through the reasons that Ódinn/Gyrdir/Gunnlaugr needs for the the story to work out, it actually is much simpler that you might think.

What does Gunnlaugr want?

He has been cast-out of his world by the &Thorn;urs and the alfar
He must find a way to cross the bridge – the Bifrost – and to destroy Yggsdrasil, the tree of live
To do this he needs the assistance of a descendent Solveig to allow him through
Eleanor, Ben and Hanna Katla are the descendents – he picks Eleanor
To gain her trust, he saves her when she is lost (he also gets her lost to save her from it)
She is a writer, and a poet. He feeds her the mead of inspiration from the vessel Óð-rœrir…
…and gives her the belief of her power to cross into the world of the þurs.
He makes up something for her to steal, and then bring to him in the mountains.

Charles Ancell and the Thermo-Tunnel is a side plot – a scientific reason for the changes in the world. They are mistakingly inter-twined.

Now I just have to make the alterations to my 100,000 word manuscript!

~~~

In other, sadder news, Magnus Magnusson has died. I was never a particular fan of Mastermind, mainly I should imagine because it just compelled in me just how bad I am at having facts and general knowledge ‘on tap’. But he did have such a wonderful voice. I was thinking over Christmas actually (because Andy listens to a lot of audiobooks) that Magnus Magnusson would probably be top of the list for doing the audiobook of my story.

I did discover though that I did get one thing right though, if you take the Magnus’ daughter Sally Magnusson as an example, for the British children of an Icelandic man, they do follow the father’s second name British-style rather than the slightly more confusing Icelandic naming convention. I am therefore okay in having my two sibling protagonists being Eleanor and Ben Ármannsson.