Absence makes the heart and all that

Well the summer raced by with a blaring distraction that took me away from the internet world and into the strange new world of bumps and babies and things (never again to be mentioned). It was, however, a rather good excuse for not blogging for so long. But, oh! What this blog has missed. It has been a glorious summer of Shakespeare. I saw two productions that I won't soon forget and may have lodged themselves into my consciousness as *definitive* versions.

Tweets and Giggles

Being a (fairly quiet and largely ignored) part of the Twittersphere has been an interesting experiment so far. I am regularly supremely jealous of people who are able to sit at home on a week day and work on their romantic novels. I am even more jealous when these romantic novelists mention their gardens. This lunchtime I saw that Wayne Rooney has had his hair transplant (or whatever the treatment it is he’s flogging for oodles of cash). Rio Ferdinand proceeded to rib him about hair extensions. Yes, it is slightly embarrassing that I follow them, but it is all in the noble name of research. And apparently Twitter can predict stock market movements (according to an article in the Economist's Technology Quarterly - you have to subscribe to see online). If you’re feeling anxious and you tweet it (clap your hands?!) then you contribute to the ‘mood’ statistics that seem to lead market trends. It’s a whole world - one microcosmic second at a time.

Cause Célèbre (or the things we do to each other)

Of all the juicy theatre I wanted to see, I did manage one: Cause Célèbre. It was a puzzling piece of theatre, much debated and deconstructed on the train home. Similar to Flare Path, I had to ask myself whether Rattigan was just labouring an obvious point or whether the real probing question was something quite different.

Too much theatre, too little time

There is so much out there I would like to see at the moment, but I need to keep up the editing on #bookwithasillyname (as yet untitled), which is terribly time-consuming. I would love to see the JM Barrie adaptation Mary Rose at the Brockley Jack (I wanted to see Project Snowflake there, too, but missed that one). I love the Brockley Jack: great food, great space, interesting productions. I may yet take the time to see I am a Camera at the Rosemary Branch (in Islington, for us South Londoners who don’t know it :-p). I read Goodbye to Berlin a few years ago (soon after saying goodbye to Berlin myself). More Isherwood background might get me off my behind (and computer) and into the theatre. Thrill Me - the Leopold and Loeb story would be awesome if it didn’t freak me out a little. And Cause Celebre is closing soon, too, and it’s too good an opportunity for comparison with Flare Path.

I haven’t been to Theatre503 for a while, but there haven’t been any productions that jumped out at me. I had a chuckle at their most recent production: SOLD. Why am I not surprised that an Australian playwright is writing about real estate? Oh, I know it’s about the characters and dark undercurrents, but there must be people in Australia who aren’t obsessed with real estate (sorry to be harsh on my own peeps).

Plus there’s a Tom Stoppard and then Ralph Fiennes in the Tempest at the Theatre Royal Haymarket. The Trevor Nunn season seems to be drawing me in very effectively...

Ten Lame Titles for my Book

To hopefully get it out of my system, I’m going to brainstorm ten very silly names for my book. It has already had about seven working titles, worthy of varying degrees of cringing. I can’t seem to stop satirising myself. It means I have injected an amusing degree of cynicism into the book (and into that sappy tart Lizzy), but it makes finding a title a minefield.

The reason I’m looking at titles is rather exciting, though. I am going to make some attempts again to get it out there. Still some editing to go, but in a few months I will have a submission (and in a few months after that, I will have a flurry of rejections).

Looking back at my list, I’ve managed to sabotage myself again by including some that might actually be semi-decent. I strongly dislike the self-conscious nature of sharing work. Some of the titles are satisfyingly stupid, though (gonna get that dirt [read: cliches] off my shoulder).

Mentally Spaced

After 10 days of cycling and camping in Europe (lord I’m so British these days - I mean on the Continent), I’ve managed to come back to daily life with more spark than usual. ‘Just pedalling’ cleared all the mush out of my brain. Our longest day was 126km (although the 90km of hills was more exhausting), achieving a comfortable rhythm and my first new ideas for months.

Rather unexpectedly, I’ve returned to my first love - the book of many titles aka the story of my now five-year-old heroine Lizzy (with a Y). Somehow I just can’t let this book die, despite some of my newer work being of higher quality. The hero is so devastating I just can’t give him up. I’m still so very conscious that the setting will put a lot of publishers off, but I know the potential for readers is there. And so I’m editing again, but my ideas are comfortably slotting into place and I’m taking a few risks (not my forte).

My most recent experimentation has involved the very difficult to tap resource Twitter. It’s an amazing source of information and inspiration. I now follow a very odd list of people and organisations. @EnglishHeritage and @NationalTheatre of course make perfect sense, but they now share space with @rioferdy5 (a prolific tweeter) and a few other names from *that* world. I couldn’t bring myself to follow @Cristiano, though. The pic was too cringe-worthy.

A bigger step up on the risk scale is that I am experimenting with incorporating tweets into the novel itself. I hear the creak of rolling eyes. A gimmick it may yet turn out to be, but it’s also surprisingly funny and easy to incorporate. Facebook is such a visual medium it requires more creativity to incorporate it into traditional fiction, but Twitter fits naturally, an externalisation of a character’s inner monologue. Twitter grammar also lends itself to being recorded on paper (specifically the @ and the #). Twitter is also a widespread social outlet. It seems odd that it’s not included in more fiction.

Taking a bit of a plunge, I’m going to spoil a scene here. It was previously not only dull, but revealed how very sappy Lizzy was. Add Twitter, and it’s worth reading.

Nineteenth-Century Emo

I have had such a marvellous week of treats at the National Theatre. Not only was there an excellent excuse to put my slowly settling ideas about Frankenstein back into the blog (there is still so much to say!), but I enjoyed a quiet evening with Polly, my netbook, in the foyer cafe before the Q&A last night, pausing only to people watch during the interval of Hamlet, playing at the Lyttleton. But last Friday was the greatest treat: Keats, Shelley and Byron.

That's theatre, man

Just back from the late night Frankenstein Q&A session in aid of Dramatic Need. It was just as superficial as expected, but amusing. For the people interested in the production, there were some interesting points made, but it rather frustratingly proved my point about the unquestioning lack of thought put into the discussion of science, which is at the heart of the book. Only the most trite aspects of science versus religion were discussed in any depth, once again completely neglecting the horror of the novel.

Flare Path by Terence Rattigan

Currently playing at the Theatre Royal Haymarket, the Rattigan revival Flare Path is an enjoyable piece of mainstream theatre. This was my first Rattigan play and, given my previously stated affinity for Tennessee Williams, I was curious to see the work of his British counterpart (in age at least). The differences were striking, although of course not solely attributable to geography.

Lumps of labour

Economists are good for some things. One is coming up with concise explanations (and catchy names) for concepts that kind of make logical sense, but it would take a course of in-depth research to prove why they do. Such is the case with me and the ‘lump of labour’ fallacy. I discovered this fallacy this morning after experiencing it dancing just beyond my comprehension for about a week, unable to properly explain why I thought something was wrong, but knowing nonetheless that it was.

Lisbon - The Walkmen

No, not another city break, just the album of the first three months of this year for me. It’s not new. The album was released last year, but it’s been my companion a lot and feels especially apt for the beginning of spring. From the first upbeat riff on the slightly bluesy signature electric guitar in the first track Juveniles, the sun comes out from behind its winter cloud.

Realism and Revolution

I have been preparing for my first foray into an online space for new writers and there has been much musing. The chosen site for this foray will be YouWriteOn.com, mainly because they are running the Next Big Author competition (competitions I should say, because there’s the May one and the July one), which I figure will lead to a surge in members and therefore a more serious chance of creditable feedback. I have great hope for the online ‘publishing’ industry that seems still in its infancy. As long as a small number of sites like YouWriteOn or eNovella can attract large membership communities, it is a self-sustaining industry. The members will submit their work, it will become known among the other members, the other members will buy the ebook and the author will buy other ebooks. But the fact that these sites are still babies in the world wide web shows surely it’s not quite as simple as that. It will take a long time to wean people off over-marketed, genre-copycat products from the big publishing houses, just as it has taken a long time to wean people off physical books. But the Kindle hit its Christmas boom last year and there is only one direction it can go from here.

Un week-end à Bruxelles/Een weekend in Brussel/Ein Wochenende in Brüssel/A Weekend in Brussels

A wonderful weekend was spent in Brussels courtesy of our friend Eurostar. An easy toddle after work and a restful couple of hours with Daphne Du Maurier later, we descended the train in the rather hard to categorise city of Brussels. I was expecting something rather grander, considering its pan-European significance, and rather more organised, considering its Flemish location, although I now see it has much more French influence than Dutch. The public transport network is only just fit for purpose and shabby to boot, the centre of the city is one large (and seemingly permanent) construction site, careless ex-pats haunt every corner, and yet it’s not an unpleasant place at all. Every few streets you emerge out onto a landscaped square, parks surprise you amidst the terraces, the architecture is strikingly non-uniform, though harmonious. And for a spring weekender, is was just the right mix of laziness and stimulation for a worn-out London blogger who bit off more than she could chew with two weekends away in two weeks.

Trans-Atlantic Connections

I suspected it wouldn’t be long until I blogged about commuting. Thankfully, my commute is more often a source of amusement than it is of frustration (there’s a German word I would love to use here: Ärger). Today I noticed for the first time, after walking the same route almost every day for almost 9 months, that I walk past Captain John Smith. Yes that Captain John Smith: the one Disney turned into Pocahontas’ lover. The statue states that Captain John Smith was one of the pioneers in the proliferation of the English speaking peoples. I’m sure that was not all he proliferated.


Coincidentally, Pocahontas herself died in a town at the end of my train line aptly named Gravesend. Apparently tuberculosis was a common demise for the native Americans. But she didn’t do too badly out of her twenty-one years, marrying two men (not at the same time - and one of them actually called Kocoum, like in the Disney film), saving Captain John Smith and having the dubious honour of being remembered by him quite inconsistently. My memory had told me she died of syphilis, which would have been much more titillating, but wikipedia informs me otherwise.

Not Alone II

A self-fulfilling prophecy, perhaps, but for the last ten years I have experienced a series of Tennessee Williams-related coincidences. No, I don’t believe it’s the playwright himself sending messages from the grave, or even echoes of his lobotomised sister’s brain remnants diffused somehow in my karma. I don’t much like the idea of karma in general - but that should be a standalone post. But there have been a series of small coincidences that, when considered in isolation, are only proof of the striking ability his words have to cut straight to my heart and overwhelm my spirit with poignancy, wistfulness and a (perhaps inappropriate) light of hope.

Not alone

It seems I'm not the only one inspired to respond to Frankenstein. It's quite stunning being part of a temporary national obsession.

I found this article from the BBC website. I've rarely read such interesting comments on a BBC article from the public before. Who suspected the art of and ability to deconstruct a piece of literature was alive and well in the British public?

I wish I'd written numbers three and nine, simply for the sake of my own intellectual vanity. There are a couple of slightly mad ones in here as well.

A (Post) Modern Prometheus

The new theatrical interpretation of Frankenstein by Nick Dear is most fascinating for the statements it doesn't make, rather than any attempts to make a statement, but Danny Boyle's excellent production is a stunning experience for the soul and the two actors deserve the wide praise they are receiving. Former colleagues on an adaptation of, quite appropriately, The Last Days of Don Juan, Nick Dear and Danny Boyle embarked on this project with a clear appreciation for Mary Shelley's novel and its fascination for a modern audience. The production is particularly novel because the two lead actors switch roles every night, creating two very different productions. Although I agree with the general opinion of reviewers that it is difficult to choose which casting is better, I will conclude this review with my own impression.

In the beginning

After a particularly acute attack of Livejournal nostalgia and a vague knowledge of the professional potential of publishing my writing for the world to see, I have extended my Google identity to include a blog (and I have joined Twitter!). The occasion I have chosen for this less-than momentous achievement is last week's broadcast of the National Theatre's production of Frankenstein, which I just managed to see, by attending the pre-recorded matinee in the afternoon and travelling into the depths of Surrey to see the reverse casting at the cinema. I will publish my review shortly, because a tweet was only 10% of what I wanted to write and I thought it would be bad form to tweet more than twice about one thing.

The title is a reference to my earlier Livejournal, where I pictured myself as somewhat of a traveller. Now settled for the foreseeable future in London, the world will at least revolve while I watch and I hope to include observations, reviews and interesting facts I pick up en route.