Prologue – Circling Russia and the Nature of Evil Artificial Intelligence, appearing this year in what the Germans would call my Umfeld — my environment — in a multitude of ways is giving me the writing and thinking assistance for which I’ve always craved. This therefore is perhaps the address I wish I could have given to … Read more …
Thoughts on Ukraine/Gaza and climate/Gaia and the paradoxical power of AI. There is no shortage of noise about war in our world today. Ukraine, Gaza, Sudan, Venezuela, Taiwan — the names change, but the pattern doesn’t. Group upon group, tribe upon tribe, nation upon nation, we replay the same ancient theatre of violence, each side … Read more …
Rather good to be back in rainy November Berlin, visiting friends now old, like us, in every sense of the word (50 years history and more), standing once again at the literal line that divided Europe and massively shaped both our lives. This place connects directly to old friends. The pastor of the original Versöhnungskirche, … Read more …
It was an extraordinary thing to be at all four BBC Prom concerts this opening September weekend of 2025 — from Friday through to Sunday evening — first to stand in London’s Royal Albert Hall with Jutta, immersed in sound on a truly monumental scale, and then to listen to those same concerts again later … Read more …
Now back home after a cycle tour of Central Europe and an exploration of Hungarian learning that didn’t exactly unfold as planned – see previous posts – I’m looking forward in the coming months to going deeper into the other AI (as in Artificial Intelligence cf ai-EMDR, attachment-informed), and have again been blown away by … Read more …
Just – February 2025 – came across this account written 10 years ago of how Jutta and I got together again in 2013, and the journey thereto.. Braynes reunited A contribution from Mark and Jutta Brayne to commemorations of the CCPE’s 30th anniversary. It’s well known, of course, that training in psychotherapy can have a … Read more …
It’s been extraordinarily good fun to talk to Ian Sanders of the Cold War Conversations podcast about my times as student and reporter in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe through the 70s and 80s, and here’s the final episode, focusing on Romania. As Ian writes on the shownotes, Mark Brayne worked as a Reuters … Read more …
As this website has been updated, in April 2025, I’m now making accessible literally ALL the raw cassettes I recorded first as BBC World Service Central Europe Correspondent based in Vienna (1981-84), then as BBC Radio China Correspondent (1984-1987), and on to BBC World Service Diplomatic Correspondent (1988-1992) as I covered the end of the … Read more …
A very (very) long break since our last post, so here’s just a glimpse of a big moment looming in our life, as Daisy2 our tandem prepares to be collected tomorrow, Monday July 11 2022, for delivery to Robin Thorn in Bridgwater to be, yes, electrified. I guess we’re feeling a bit like Bob Dylan … Read more …
We’re very grateful to one of Audrey’s former students and summer visitors from Heilbronn, Petra Mueller, for the following memories of Mum, penned for readers in Germany and translated here with the help of Google Translate. Original article in German here – Petra has captured Mum to a T. 1985-86 I was staying at the … Read more …