Historian Tom Holland was guest-editing the 'Today' programme on BBC Radio 4 recently. He spoke about his experience of AI 'hallucinations', that now increasingly well-known phenomenon whereby Artifical Intelligence makes up information in response to a question. Tom...
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I seem to have read an unusually high number of books this year - surprising, because it was a unusually busy year. Looking back, I realise that long train journeys provided hours of reading time. I often took two books with me on a trip in order not to run out of...
I have been proofreading my book about Nocturnes, which has reached the stage of being typeset. This is the point at which it starts to look like a proper book. As the author, you dare to believe that it will one day really be published and start to live in heads...
Last night I saw the Japanese edition (published by Shunjusha) of my book 'Out of Silence' for the first time. Its translator, the concert pianist Noriko Ogawa, flew back from Tokyo yesterday and very nobly came straight from the airport to visit me, bringing me a...
On this morning's 'A Point of View' on Radio 4, Adam Gopnik shared some amusing thoughts about how authors deal with negative reviews. He described how many authors write fierce late-night responses and reubuttals, which they're usually dissuaded from sending. He...
Today in Tokyo, the first copies of Noriko Ogawa's translation of my book 'Out of Silence' roll off the press. The cover (see photo) is much the same as the British edition's, but my name appears in Japanese, with Noriko's name alongside it as translator. I feel...
Noriko Ogawa has finished translating my book 'Out of Silence' into Japanese, after more than a year's work. As Noriko zooms about the world, she and her editor in Tokyo have been corresponding about the precise choice of words and the appropriate tone, and I have...
Over New Year I have been corresponding quite a bit with pianist Noriko Ogawa, who has almost finished translating my book 'Out of Silence' into Japanese. Though I am really looking forward to the Japanese edition, due out in spring, I am rather sorry that the stream...
'A widget?' I hear you ask. No, I didn't know either. But it seems that a widget is a clever little package of information, in this case about my book 'Out of Silence'. Its publisher, Boydell Press, is embracing widgets as a new kind of promotional material. If you...
Usually I take part in music festivals, so to be invited to a Literary Festival is an exciting change. Yesterday I was at the Rye Festival talking about music and musicians. In between readings and bits of talk, I played little piano pieces. I'd been given one of...
Noriko Ogawa arrived back safely from Japan, and here we are playing piano duets for Woman's Hour. We're also talking about my book 'Out of Silence' which Noriko is translating into Japanese. The broadcast is on Tuesday 29 March sometime between 10 and 11am, and you...
Woman’s Hour, the iconic BBC Radio 4 programme, is to feature an interview with me and fellow pianist Noriko Ogawa on March 29. The interview was originally planned as a discussion between me and Noriko about my book ‘Out of Silence’, which Noriko is currently...
I've just finished reading a fascinating book published in 1944: The Baton and the Jackboot, by Berta Geissmar, the personal assistant of conductor Wilhelm Furtwangler during his great days in Germany. After Geissmar had been forced to leave Germany during the Hitler...
I had a lovely surprise recently, and have been waiting for an opportunity to mention it. The distinguished Japanese pianist Noriko Ogawa read my book ‘Out of Silence’ recently, and told me that she would like to translate it into Japanese. She has now been...
My book 'Out of Silence' has been chosen by The Independent as one of the 'best books for Christmas - our pick of 2010'. I'm told by my publisher that this has led to .... well, if not a surge exactly, then a 'bijou surgette' in orders on Amazon. Hooray! The...