Books and Bees

On 10 May I shall be flying to Auckand to talk about my Golding biography and take part in a "What Good Are the Arts?" discussion at the Auckland Festival of Writers and Readers, then on 17th I shall be in Sydney for the Sydney Writers' Festival discussing the Golding book with Ramona Koval on ABC Radio National's The Book Show, and taking part in a "Judges and Winners" debate about literary prizes with Thomas Keneally, Colm Toibin and Su Tong.
The bee news is good on the whole. The two surviving hives have strong (and quite aggressive) colonies. The oilseed rape in our part of Oxfordshire is coming into full flower, and the bees have started foraging. n the other hand, the big expanse of field beans sown in the autumn in the field next to the hives seems to have been completely wiped out by the cold winter.