Tonight I went with a friend, by chance really, to 'Sam Brown's DJ night with Chanje Kunda at the Iguana Bar on Manchester Road in Chorlton as part of Chorlton Arts Festival.
The warmth (not from the heating) in the room grew and grew. Smiling faces, colourful dresses, rhymtic movements, words, words, words.
Poetry that wasn't about blah but that passionately spoke of the world, people, the world we live in, want to, have done, continue to do. About women not prepared to be used as bodies, that we have more to offer, that we want to use our thoughts and our minds and spirits.
About language and bankers about love and old style courting. And love. And politics. And love.
The movement of the lyrics and lines and verses flowed through the spoken words and moving bodies.
Songs exploring breath and sound and emotion. A harmonica and heartache. And joy throughout everything. A joy in the words and sharing. Everything flowed outwards nothing was taken back. Beautiful.
All the performers shared their words with facial expression, body ripples and lifts, eye contact, smiles, pauses, silence, sound and meticulous articulation. We heard the cleverness of the ideas and the rhymes, the passion of the emotion and the humour of the predicaments and the pain of the human condition.
And Chanje Kunda gave us her poetry and song and held the evening together, telling people they'd been on long enough, get off, calling people to the open mic and ending with a song. One Voice. She is on tour. Hip hop, reggae and rap. I've learnt a lot tonight.
Thank you to the Iguana Bar for hosting this event. Thank you to Sue for suggesting it. I feel inspired as a writer and a human being and a woman.
Saturday 21 May 2011
Thursday 12 May 2011
Seve Ballesteros
The Spanish golfer, Seve Ballesteros has died aged fifty-four. With my dad, I used to watch him play on television. He shone, both his golf playing and personality. People who knew nothing of golf knew about him.
He had brain cancer and I was still shocked to hear he was dead.
He had brain cancer and I was still shocked to hear he was dead.
Wednesday 11 May 2011
Living
Lizzie has been through the wringer. At first she was just out for herself. Then she was all over the place, one minute she felt this, the next that, who could tell what she'd do next?
When would she snap out of it?
There's supposed to come a point when we all snap out of it, isn't there? Everybody's turning point, moment of revelation, when we say, 'enough is enough' comes in our own time.
The difference is, Lizzie is a character in a book. She has to be real, but a distorted real. At some point in the pages she must change.
It has taken a long time to get to know Lizzie. I knew Tessa in 'Meeting Coty' immediately. Lizzie is different. She had no goal. She didn't have many redeeming qualities. She didn't have people around her who could define her.
And then there are people. Stangers who accept her immediately. And Jez who seems to see another side of her that no-one has recognised before.
Is that what all of us are looking for? Someone else to see where we sparkle inside? This isn't confidence I'm talking about, this is the recognition that we are here to interact. No show, no prestige, no one up manship, no gloss, just the basic needs we have.
I read a book years ago which I must re-read about a journalist who travels to the Amazon. He's an intellectual, he comes from a wealthy background, he thinks he knows everything. He meets a woman and this goes out of the window as only she and he exist in the Amazon.
He is happy just living day to day and then a rescue party arrives. He is elated. He can go back to civilisation. She doesn't want to go. He goes and almost straight away regrets his decision. He tries to refind the place where they lived. He cannot find it. I can't remember if he eventually does and she is living happily with someone else.
That doesn't make a bad ending, it's actually better because it shows that she lives by her needs and is happy with that. He was doing the same until his brain kicked back into gear.
So. And I've wondered this before. Would we be better off not intellectualising everything and just get on with living?
Ha. The irony.
I'm digressing too. I know what's going on in my head, well, sort of. And I'm wasting time talking about it. And making excuses. Start again?
No-one is an island as my mum would say. How do we become an island? Break off from the mainland? Mmm. Lonely. Where's that other island?
And then
When would she snap out of it?
There's supposed to come a point when we all snap out of it, isn't there? Everybody's turning point, moment of revelation, when we say, 'enough is enough' comes in our own time.
The difference is, Lizzie is a character in a book. She has to be real, but a distorted real. At some point in the pages she must change.
It has taken a long time to get to know Lizzie. I knew Tessa in 'Meeting Coty' immediately. Lizzie is different. She had no goal. She didn't have many redeeming qualities. She didn't have people around her who could define her.
And then there are people. Stangers who accept her immediately. And Jez who seems to see another side of her that no-one has recognised before.
Is that what all of us are looking for? Someone else to see where we sparkle inside? This isn't confidence I'm talking about, this is the recognition that we are here to interact. No show, no prestige, no one up manship, no gloss, just the basic needs we have.
I read a book years ago which I must re-read about a journalist who travels to the Amazon. He's an intellectual, he comes from a wealthy background, he thinks he knows everything. He meets a woman and this goes out of the window as only she and he exist in the Amazon.
He is happy just living day to day and then a rescue party arrives. He is elated. He can go back to civilisation. She doesn't want to go. He goes and almost straight away regrets his decision. He tries to refind the place where they lived. He cannot find it. I can't remember if he eventually does and she is living happily with someone else.
That doesn't make a bad ending, it's actually better because it shows that she lives by her needs and is happy with that. He was doing the same until his brain kicked back into gear.
So. And I've wondered this before. Would we be better off not intellectualising everything and just get on with living?
Ha. The irony.
I'm digressing too. I know what's going on in my head, well, sort of. And I'm wasting time talking about it. And making excuses. Start again?
No-one is an island as my mum would say. How do we become an island? Break off from the mainland? Mmm. Lonely. Where's that other island?
And then
Thursday 5 May 2011
Publishing
A discussion following the London Book Fair about how to get to writers before they take the self publishing route:
The final comment is that traditional publishing is dying and has been since the early 1990s.
The only way for writers is Print on Demand and then use a good marketing, publishing, new media company to get the book on phones and reading devices. Not the traditional book format. You will need to pay for this service.
All traditional advertising is to point people to your website.
And will you make a living? Another discussion.
A writer who went the self publishing route with a children's picture book took advice from schools and libraries and other resources. Kodak displayed the book at the London Book Fair. A follow up comment from a children's publisher invited this author to send him the book. As did another.
There are suggestions that many agents and publishers are rude and difficult to reach. There are some that are not. A few. One well known publisher usually rejects and tells you to buy her book on publishing. Briefly.
Contacts? Who you know? Become a 'celebrity' and publishers will ask you to write a work of fiction. A review of Dawn French's novel said it was good but went on to say that if it had been written by an unknown, it would not have been published.
That's the world - it's not merely moved onto electronic publishing.
It's not only that traditional publishing is dead because of its format, it's dead because for many it's a story that's written by someone whose picture they recognise.
And what drives this? Success. Success breeds success. And then the question, what is your definition of success?
One makes me want to throw up.The other fills me with joy.
The final comment is that traditional publishing is dying and has been since the early 1990s.
The only way for writers is Print on Demand and then use a good marketing, publishing, new media company to get the book on phones and reading devices. Not the traditional book format. You will need to pay for this service.
All traditional advertising is to point people to your website.
And will you make a living? Another discussion.
A writer who went the self publishing route with a children's picture book took advice from schools and libraries and other resources. Kodak displayed the book at the London Book Fair. A follow up comment from a children's publisher invited this author to send him the book. As did another.
There are suggestions that many agents and publishers are rude and difficult to reach. There are some that are not. A few. One well known publisher usually rejects and tells you to buy her book on publishing. Briefly.
Contacts? Who you know? Become a 'celebrity' and publishers will ask you to write a work of fiction. A review of Dawn French's novel said it was good but went on to say that if it had been written by an unknown, it would not have been published.
That's the world - it's not merely moved onto electronic publishing.
It's not only that traditional publishing is dead because of its format, it's dead because for many it's a story that's written by someone whose picture they recognise.
And what drives this? Success. Success breeds success. And then the question, what is your definition of success?
One makes me want to throw up.The other fills me with joy.
Tuesday 3 May 2011
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