we fat all /
creatures else to fat us, and we fat ourselves for /
maggots

Only invest what you can afford to lose and for most people (9/10, I think) a low cost tracker fund is probably the best vehicle for them. For others who want to invest for the long term themselves, Warren Buffett is a very good guide. He writes in his 2007 shareholder letter:

“Charlie [Munger] and I [Warrren Buffett] look for companies that have a) a business we understand; b) favorable long-term economics; c) able and trustworthy management; and d) a sensible price tag. We like to buy the whole business or, if management is our partner, at least 80%. When control-type purchases of quality aren’t available, though, we are also happy to simply buy small portions of great businesses by way of stock-market purchases. It’s better to have a part interest in the Hope Diamond than to own all of a rhinestone.

A truly great business must have an enduring “moat” that protects excellent returns on invested capital. The dynamics of capitalism guarantee that competitors will repeatedly assault any business “castle” that is earning high returns. Therefore a formidable barrier such as a company’s being the low-cost producer (GEICO, Costco) or possessing a powerful world-wide brand (Coca-Cola, Gillette, American Express) is essential for sustained success. Business history is filled with “Roman Candles,” companies whose moats proved illusory and were soon crossed.

Our criterion of “enduring” causes us to rule out companies in industries prone to rapid and continuous change. Though capitalism’s “creative destruction” is highly beneficial for society, it precludes investment certainty. A moat that must be continuously rebuilt will eventually be no moat at all.

Additionally, this criterion eliminates the business whose success depends on having a great manager. Of course, a terrific CEO is a huge asset for any enterprise, and at Berkshire we have an abundance of these managers. Their abilities have created billions of dollars of value that would never have materialized if typical CEOs had been running their businesses.

But if a business requires a superstar to produce great results, the business itself cannot be deemed great. A medical partnership led by your area’s premier brain surgeon may enjoy outsized and growing earnings, but that tells little about its future. The partnership’s moat will go when the surgeon goes. You can count, though, on the moat of the Mayo Clinic to endure, even though you can’t name its CEO.

Long-term competitive advantage in a stable industry is what we seek in a business. If that comes with rapid organic growth, great. But even without organic growth, such a business is rewarding. We will simply take the lush earnings of the business and use them to buy similar businesses elsewhere. There’s no rule that you have to invest money where you’ve earned it. Indeed, it’s often a mistake to do so: Truly great businesses, earning huge returns on tangible assets, can’t for any extended period reinvest a large portion of their earnings internally at high rates of return. …”

Strangely (although perhaps not so strangely if you look at incentive structures in the industry) few money managers who purport to invest for the long term, actually manage to or manage money anything close to what Buffett advises…

‘Playwrights don’t give answers, they ask questions‘

Mark Ravenhill writes an article ahead of the Royal Court season of readings, I hope to catch some of the plays although I am travelling out of London most of the time.

The Caryl Churchill readings are at the Royal Court, September 16-26.
020 7565 5000, royalcourttheatre.com

This is a theatrical highlight of 2008.

The play is brilliant and Lucy Kirkwood adapts it excellently (I’m jealous, I didn’t do it - please someone call me next time (!!) I’d give it a good go…).
Carrie Cracknell directs with keenness. The physical relationships between the characters staged beautifully, concentrating the language and conflict.

The use of a second stage level, I thought was a superb idea. Designer (Holly Waddington) or director or whoever deserves plaudits. The set seemed to sit just right for the atmosphere, peeling layers of neglect, so much potential, needing love. Even, the humid claustrophobic night of the summer we are having, conspires to add to the electric, cloying environment.

The acting was, across the board, excellent and of the highest level. [On a personal note, it's fascinating to see how an actor changes and develops over the years. I remember - not that well - Alice Patten at Cambridge University (Queen's I think), and then in Vincent in Brixton].

Hedda (Cara Horgan) was sensual, vulnerable, manipulative, fragile and tough at each turn. Lots of beautiful leg and bare feet, yet appropriate and not gratuitous. A beautiful flower “rain dashed”
George (Tom Mison) in love with a girl, he can’t save; in awe of a man he can’t match - awkward but somehow still steering a mainly sincere and hopeful course
Thea (Alice Patten) a nervy rabbit, wanting to blossom into the woman she knows she could be. A woman Eli has allowed her to come.
Toby (Christopher Obi) - a smooth snake; a “lawyer at heart”
Eli (Adrian Bower) - perhaps Toby was right when he called him a make-believe; but “I don’t want to be that man but the things is that I also do… because it’s boring with him life is fucking dull that’s what nobody admits”
Julia (Cath Whitefield) - the “spinster”, elder sister / mother figure

And all the interlocking triangles these tangled loves and lovers make. All judged extremely well. A beautiful, heart rending mess.

I expect tickets will sell out fast although it may extend slightly or be transferred. Be quick.

At Gate Theatre, until 27 Sep
http://www.gatetheatre.co.uk/ 020 7229 0706

“dira’ que loque me interesa en el teatro es que no hay replica posible. Cuando cae el telon te vas. Una pieza deberia tener esa anolidal no poderla replicar”

“I would say that what interests me about the theatre is that no reply is possible. When the curtain falls, you leave. A wok of art should have ths quality of not being able to reply.”

I saw this translated as “art should have this quality of not admitting a reply” but I read it as art should make the viewer unable to reply/speak.

I’m not sure I agree in all cases as I consider theatre often a conversation, and art too. It is not complete without a viewer, without an audience. The audience some times needs a reply.

Yet, the best art can leave you “speechless” and perhaps this is what Munoz is alluding to. Or maybe it is as the first translator says, he thinks great art has the quality of not being able to be argued with.

Wonderful, small, independent book shop on 109 Kensington Church Street, W8 7LN. Persephone “reprints forgotten classics by twentieth-century (mostly women) writers”

Persephone Bookshop

I confess to a bias, as I used to work in Elgin Books and when Elgin Books had to close down, it survived in a non-shop form for many years. However, it has now joined Persephone and its spirit lives on. I bought three books; two cookery and one fiction.

Good Things in England by Florence White is an amazing recipe book and record of old English recipes.

The blurb suggests: “‘Ever wondered how to cook Thomas Hardy’s frumenty, make Izaak Walton’s Minnow Tansies or pickle elder buds?’ asked the Sunday Telegraph. ‘Good Things in England is a collection of 853 regional recipes dating back to the C14th. First published in 1932, it was written by Florence White, the country’s first ever freelance food journalist, and, like all classic culinary works, it is a pleasure to read.”

Recently had my wisdom teeth out. Ouch.

Look out for pay as much as you want nights and Mondays are good too.

Gate Theatre has Monday as pay as you want. Royal Court has a cheap Monday.

This is on top of previews, and other regular offers.

Milan Kundera: “The struggle of people against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting.

How many times have you written letters that you have not sent? I’ve been meaning to write to John Berger for around 15 years. I think this year I may finally do it…

I can’t tell you what art does and how it does it, but I know that art has often judged the judges, pleaded revenge to the innocent and shown to the future what the past has suffered, so that it has never been forgotten.

I know too that the powerful fear art, whatever its form, when it does this, and that amongst the people such art sometimes runs like a rumour and a legend because it makes sense of what life’s brutalities cannot, a sense that unites us, for it is inseparable from a justice at last. Art, when it functions like this, becomes a meeting-place of the invisible, the irreducible, the enduring, guts and honour.

Under the Blue Sky. David Eldridge play. I know David, although not very well and he was a great blogger before he closed his blog. His play is many faceted, but I like it as 3 connecting love stories, which I think, in the end, affirm life. And if you take away from the theatre more than you began with, then that has to be worth seeing. Interview in Indy here.

Stars in the Morning Sky. At the Riverside Studios. I’ve not seen it but a friend is in it and could be worth a trek West London.

…some trace of her at the National Theatre. I like Katie Mitchell’s work and Hattie Morahan is a friend. I wonder how the mise-en-scene has developed since Attempts on her Life… suggestion from the Whingers, maybe not that much.

Both Kung-Fu Panda and Wall-E. I love animation in all its forms and these are two - different - but hugely enjoyable films for all ages. You will learn about the Wuxi finger hold in Kung-Fu Panda and be charmed by robots in the other!

On the home front: I’ve now had several portions of home grown french beans and courgettes. Courgettes particularly are easy to grow, so if you have any outside patch I say plant one in a pot next year. If you only have indoor space then I recommend radishes.