A. Writer's Road to Publication - My Road to Non-Fiction

My Non-Fiction

When I was a student way back in 2001, I was studying Media Studies in the hope of one day becoming a whisky drinking, ulcer having journalist. So far, it's not happened.

Now that I'm writing fiction I haven't completely forgotten about my dreams of one day becoming a whisky drinking, ulcer having journalist.

Here are a few of my non-fiction articles that I wrote way back in 2001.

A Profile on Robert De Niro
Scottish Football in Decline?
Global Warming
Local Traffic Problem

A Profile on Robert De Niro

Robert De Niro is, without doubt, one of America’s best actors. With five Oscar nominations and two Oscar successes, that include best supporting actor for ‘The Godfather, Part II’ in 1974 and best actor for ‘Raging Bull’ in 1980.

A selection of his best-known films will be shown over two consecutive weekends on BBC1. This includes ‘Taxi Driver’, ‘Raging Bull’, ‘Cape Fear’ and ‘Casino’.

It all started in New York City on the 17^th August 1943. Born to Robert De Niro and Virginia Admiral, both of whom were artists, De Niro Jr grew up to study at the Actors Studio with Stella Adler and Lee Strasberg. He entered films in the late 1960’s but it wasn’t until 1973 that De Niro really began turning heads in Hollywood, with his portrayal of dying baseball player, Bruce Pearson in ‘Bang the Drum Slowly’.

In the same year, he appeared in Martin Scorsese’s ‘Mean Streets’, beginning a long time collaboration that has resulted in a total of eight films, including ‘Taxi Driver’, ‘Raging Bull’ and GoodFellas’, yet it was Francis Ford Coppola’s ‘The Godfather, Part II’ that turned Robert De Niro into a superstar.

A fiercely dedicated actor, De Niro demonstrated this dedication to his craft when he gained 60 pounds to play aging boxer, Jake LaMotta in ‘Raging Bull’ (1980), for which he won the best actor Oscar. During his acceptance speech, he thanked LaMotta, who was actually at the time suing United Artists for their portrayal of him in the film.

Some of De Niro’s mid-90’s films were panned by the critics as they thought they had put ‘a series of chinks in his iron method’. Roles in such films as ‘We’re no Angels’ (1989) and ‘Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein’ (1994) made the critics question De Niro’s motivation. A popular story around that time was that De Niro was in fact trying to raise funds for his Tribeca Film Centre, a company dedicated to promoting New York film production, that he formed in 1989. After a run of rather poor films, compared to his past work, De Niro came good again in the hit films, ‘Heat’ and ‘Casino’ (both 1995) which confirmed that De Niro could still play the bad guy. Both ‘Sleepers’ and ‘Marvin’s Room’ (Both 1996), illustrated that he could also play kinder, gentler characters. His quirkier side came through in the films ‘Jackie Brown’ and ‘Wag the Dog’ (1997). Unfortunately for De Niro, his career dipped again in 1998 with both an updated ‘Great Expectations’ and a thriller, ‘Ronin’ both proving unsatisfactory to the cinema going public and the critics. De Niro got off to a good start the following year with a good performance in ‘Analyse This’ a mobster-meets-analyst film. Later that same year, he delivered a surprisingly tender presentation in Joel Schumacher’s ‘Flawless’ in which he played a homophobic security guard who submits very reluctantly to speech therapy sessions with his pre-op transsexual neighbour after suffering a paralysing stroke. He made a full range of films throughout 2000, firstly a children’s film, ‘The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle’, the comedy, ‘Meet the Parents’ and the action Thriller, ‘Men of Honour’. De Niro seems to be back in the big time where his career is concerned.

De Niro has firmly protected his private life. At the beginning of his career he would give interviews and would freely talk about anything, private life or career, then abruptly he decided that his personal life had nothing to do with his film career. He married sometime Actress, Diahnne Abbott in 1976 and they had a son, Raphael, and he adopted her daughter, Drena, from a previous relationship. After only a few years they separated, rumours surrounding the separation were that it was an open marriage. Rumours are never far from De Niro’s life, another circulating involved child support over twins he had with former girlfriend, Toukie Smith, Smith claiming that De Niro was nothing but a sperm donor. He has put this behind him and married his long time girlfriend and former flight attendant, Grace Hightower in a top-secret wedding ceremony in 1997.

Robert De Niro will always be one of America’s most critically acclaimed actors. The characters he has played will forever be remembered, for example, Travis Bickle in ‘Taxi Driver’ will always be associated with the line, “Are you talkin’ to me? You talkin’ to me?” and therefore Robert De Niro will forever be many people’s favourite actor.

The Scottish Premier League compared to others, isn’t the most exciting or challenging league in the World. Yet to the Scottish fans, it means everything, but things are changing dramatically.

With the domination of Rangers and Celtic over recent years, the exciting side to Scottish football has declined steadily and many people have decided to follow other sports or to support football teams from England, Italy or Germany.

So why has Scottish football got so unpopular? There are many answers to that question. The main answer being because of the influence Rangers and Celtic have over the game. The teams from the lower leagues, and even some teams in the Premier League, are struggling for survival while the two biggest clubs in Scotland keep raking in the money as well as the domestic football trophies.

Domestic honours have largely been shared between Rangers and Celtic over the last ten years with the odd exception. This doesn’t make exciting football for the fans of the other teams, of course the fans of Rangers and Celtic love their domination but for both the aim is for European success however neither have been able to make a big enough impact on the European stage.

There is such an enormous gap between Rangers and Celtic and the other teams that the possibility of them leaving the Scottish Premier League has arisen. Ideas of forming a Trans-Atlantic League or a European League have all been thought of, yet neither have been more than ideas. Fans of Scottish football argue about whether Rangers and Celtic should leave, some saying it would allow the other teams the chance to get some domestic success and others saying that if Rangers and Celtic were to leave the smaller teams would suffer substantial financial loss.

The number of foreigners in the Scottish game may also affect its popularity. Some fans and football chiefs say that the foreigners coming and playing for Scottish clubs are pushing out the good young Scottish talent that is being developed at Scottish teams. The views on this subject differ greatly as many fans say that the foreigners make the game more appealing with their technical abilities.

Rangers and Celtic exploit the fact they can get big name foreigners to play for them by forming teams that only have one Scot playing for them. That doesn’t bid well for the Scottish clubs nor for the Scottish National Side, which would suffer significantly with the number of players available to play for the National Side reducing at a steady rate.

Foreigners could be good for Scottish football yet they could be counter productive as well, currently the number of foreigners in the Scottish game is high and it looks like the number will rise and rise.

Money plays a huge role in Scottish football. It has a big say on the future of the game in Scotland. With the big money transfers, the players’ mammoth wages and extensive television deals, football is a big business.

Nevertheless for some of the smaller clubs in Scotland money is a problem. Finding enough money to run the clubs is a difficult task for some chairmen and many, if not all the clubs in the first, second and third leagues are running at a loss. The smaller clubs are losing money and selling their best players to the bigger clubs is the only way they have a chance of surviving yet without their best players, clubs can’t expect much success on the pitch so they are just selling their best players to keep the club afloat.

Premier League clubs are also affected, they too, are struggling with financial troubles, with the exceptions of Rangers and Celtic who, unsurprisingly, have very good bank balances.

Because of the success that Rangers and Celtic have had, they have fans all over Scotland and all over the World. This doesn’t help the small clubs because the people who would be their fans want success, and so they travel to see Rangers or Celtic instead. But even the success of Rangers and Celtic isn’t enough for some people, they would much rather follow English, Italian or German teams because of they have much coveted European success. Clubs try to make themselves more appealing to their own town’s fans but it is hard for them to compete with the pull of success by Rangers, Celtic and/or the big European teams, like Manchester United and Real Madrid. The bigger teams like Rangers and Celtic have the popular, more lucrative players that the fans would want to see. So the smaller clubs don’t really have a chance. Luckily for the teams in the Premier League, they get a share in the money that these players bring because the teams play Rangers and Celtic at least three times a season and this means bigger gate receipts and more money.

Scottish football is struggling to survive. There have been many ideas on how to make it more exciting, for example, changing the league sizes, yet the most unusual and untested yet will come into force this year, when the SPL splits in two after 33 games. The top half fighting for the title and European places and the bottom half fighting against relegation. Whether or not this will help make Scottish football more exciting again, we’ll have to wait and see, but it looks likely that Scottish football needs more than a split in the league to keep the Scottish game together.

© A. Writer 2001-2007. All Rights Reserved.

Global Warming

Global Warming is an issue that most human beings in the new millennium will have to take notice of sooner rather than later.

Although there are many problems connected with Global Warming, the biggest and maybe even the worst, is Climate Change.

It may not be obvious at the moment, but in the coming years, Climate Change will affect every living thing on this planet.

Climate Change involves the Earth’s temperatures getting higher due to ‘The Greenhouse Effect’, resulting in events such as the polar ice caps melting, making the water levels rise to perhaps extraordinary levels.

The Greenhouse effect, called this due to its resemblance to how a greenhouse works, occurs when the Solar Radiation from the Sun gets trapped by the Earth’s atmosphere and absorbed by the Earth’s surface. Some of the radiation bounces off the surface and passes back through the atmosphere yet some does get trapped and is therefore re-emitted, resulting in the warming of the planet.

The impact that that could have on the Earth include the rise in sea levels and a change in precipitation and other climate conditions. The Changing of regional climate could alter forests, farmland and water supplies. It could also threaten human health, and harm birds and fish and many other ecosystems that are dependant on a certain Climate.

American Scientists say that a rise in sea levels could result in some of the low lying countries being swamped, if not completely washed away. Their coastlines would be totally different.

But can someone or something be blamed for the change in Climate?

Scientists at the United States Environmental Protection Agency generally believe that the continual burning of fossil fuels and other human activities are the main reason for the increased concentration of carbon dioxide, the main gas in the Earth’s atmosphere. Plant respiration and the decomposition of organic waste releases more than 10 times the carbon dioxide released by human activities, but this is balanced throughout the centuries, whereas the human activities have just started relatively recently with the Industrial Revolution.

Fossil Fuels burned to run vehicles, heat homes and businesses and power factories are responsible for about 98% of carbon dioxide emissions. Increased agriculture, deforestation, landfills, industrial production and mining also contribute a significant share of emissions into the earth’s atmosphere.

These scientists say that human activities may add to the threat of climate change, but there are conflicting arguments about who really is to blame.

Dr Robert C. Balling of Arizona State University USA claims that: "98% of total global greenhouse gas emissions are natural (mostly water vapour); only 2% are man-made sources"

He also says that man-made emissions have had no more than a small impact on the climate. Although the climate has warmed slightly in the 100 years, 70% of that warming occurred prior to 1940 before the rise in greenhouse gas emissions from industrial processes.

So finding out who or what is actually to blame for Climate Change is still a problem for scientists, but currently they are more concerned with finding ways in which to combat Climate change, stopping it from getting any worse. Action is happening at every level to reduce, to avoid and to better understand the risks linked with Climate change. Many countries across the world have prepared greenhouse inventories; and many are actively pursuing programs and policies that will result in Greenhouse gas emission reductions.

Countries around the world have also expressed a firm commitment to strengthening international responses to the risks of climate change, for example America is working to strengthening international action and broaden participation under the Framework Convention on Climate change.

This means that politics and science have come together to decide what can be done to fight climate change. To make things happen, politics would have to get involved to change the law in certain places so things such as reducing greenhouse gas emissions, are definitely done.

If Global Warming occurs, scientists want to know if it will be harmful. Scientists at the Arizona State University have found that it is possible that a slight increase in temperature – whether natural or man-made – is not likely to lead to a massive melting of the Earth’s ice caps, as sometimes claimed in the media and larger quantities of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and warmer climates would likely lead to an increase in vegetation.

The whole idea of Global Warming and Climate Change could be confusing to those who don’t know much about it. With the many conflicting ‘facts’ coming from scientists all over the world, it’s no wonder humans will be confused to what is happening to the world.

Until there is definitive proof that something is happening to the Earth, good or bad, humans will carry on with their normal lives because right now there are too many different thoughts to what is really happening to the world.

© A. Writer 2001-2007. All Rights Reserved.

Local Traffic Problem

The heavy traffic in Broughty Ferry’s main road, Brook Street, has always been a problem for the residents of the suburb. With the large numbers of cars, taxis, buses and above all, lorries that use Brook Street, the people of Broughty Ferry are worried about their safety. The majority of people in Broughty Ferry are old age pensioners and they in particular, are fearing that Brook Street is getting too busy.

Only a few weeks ago there was an incident involving a bus and a taxi. The bus was turning the corner from Gray Street on to Brook Street, when a taxi pulled out in front of the bus, forcing the bus to brake suddenly, making passengers waiting to get off, fall forward. Two pensioners were slightly injured and the taxi sped off, it’s unknown if the taxi driver actually knew if he had caused people to get injured. The police were not involved, yet the two injured went to the local health clinic and the bus driver took their details. This is only one example of the trouble that is caused due to the busy traffic on Brook Street.

Improvements to Brook Street have been suggested and some even put into place. Yet the residents say that the improvements that have happened are inadequate. These improvements are ‘nibs’ where the pavement juts out into the road, supposedly making it easier for people to cross. If anything it makes it harder. Other suggested improvements include making Brook Street for one-way traffic only and vehicles parked on one side of the road. None of these suggestions look likely to happen due to the shop and business owners in Brook Street complaining, as their deliveries would be interrupted. Lorries and buses seems to be the biggest problem in Brook Street due to their size, Brook Street is not a wide street and sometimes, when a lorry is delivering it’s load to a shop, this could cause double parking and if there is a bus trying to get past at the same time, there is a problem.

The residents of Broughty Ferry have strong opinions about the traffic on Brook Street and they feel its time something happened because if nothing does, its only a matter of time before a serious accident occurs on Brook Street. One Broughty resident said:

"The Nibs in the road are nuisance, they don’t help at all, something MUST be done and soon, because Brook Street is just a nightmare at the moment."