Last night I read some old poems at The Art House in Southampton. As usual I was filled with dread and terror, asked self very many times: why am I doing this? It's pure masochism! Went to the cinema with a friend to see the King's Speech, thought it would occupy my mind nicely in fact I slept through most of it - according to my friend and she was supported by a woman the other side of me so I believe it and I felt quite perky on the way out. As a fairly fanatical republican I probably shouldn't have gone but I saw Firth in 'A Single Man' recently and thought him marvellous.I expect he was marvellous in this too - everybody says so, once more I am in minority of one - nothing new there then. Anyway I got very cross about Helen Bonham Carter who had little resemblance to the doughy faced woman that I remember seeing once at Epsom race course and a million photographs.I think I will move on away from the royals lest my blood pressure rises and I make more enemies!
The reason for the old poems is the fact that my old computer has taken a turn for the worse and refuses to download any files so I can neither print out or work on documents. My new computer is cute and awaits conversion into my chief tool of communication the expert is comng later frabjus joy! I - hope. Meanwhile I can play with emails, facebook and Twitter all day with no compunction at all a guilt free dilettante day.
I must write new poems too with a slightly less anti male bias. Now that I have a woman lover I can afford to be more tolerant of the male -not being in direct fire so to speak, at least in theory. In fact I still seem to be rampantly pro female but I can work on this. Perhaps.
Still the need for public affirmation perplexes me but it seems to be there so I will obey my instincts and carry on taking my heart in my hands and hope the audience laughs, preferably in the same places that I do.
Here is the link to the superbly delivered reading by Nina Ludovica Smith of an excerpt of my novel, A Blues for Shindig which was recorded at a gig in the Arts Laboratory in Berlin. It is not our preferred piece and the interview is inaccurate in a few places but who cares? ( apart from me!) We hope to perform at NotaBar in north London soon and hold both self and work to ridicule again soon!
(In fact this link does not work so I will erase it!I will get it on to my blog another way, it is already on the Legend blog click on picture of my book & it will appear.)
Thursday, 20 January 2011
Monday, 17 January 2011
THE WHAT FACTOR
Some weeks ago I went to a party and saw the Xfactor for the first time. I was comfortable and had a chair and I stayed riveted. I had managed somehow not to see this though many of the people I know enjoy it. I found it barbaric and sad. The noise was hideous, the enormous amount of energy that exploded onto the screen was obscene. Seemed to me that this vast energy could be far better spent and when I heard that more people vote for this than vote in elections I nodded to myself in a self congratulatory way. This is the danger of emphatic disapproval it leads to conceit. After all. Who am I to disapprove of a programme that is designed and succeeds in pleasing the public?
But public hangings were a real hit I believe with characters queuing up to watch the twitching death of another of their species - no doubt roaring their approval and derision. Bear baiting too was seen as a good night out and dog fighting still remains popular so do we give the punters what they want at any price? Well, no we don't. We manufacture something that appeals to the lowest common denominator, costs nothing for the performers who clamour to be on television and makes at least one person fabulously rich. The advertisers must fight to flog their products during the breaks in this particular programme.
So, have I become a supporter of censorship. An arbiter of good taste. No and yes .I am now po faced critic who finds the humiliation of the 'losers' revolting to watch and I won't watch again. Did I mention my opinion to my friends who were hooting along to the show? Certainly not, who am I to judge? And who wants to be seen as a humourless reactionary?
I stayed shtoum!
But public hangings were a real hit I believe with characters queuing up to watch the twitching death of another of their species - no doubt roaring their approval and derision. Bear baiting too was seen as a good night out and dog fighting still remains popular so do we give the punters what they want at any price? Well, no we don't. We manufacture something that appeals to the lowest common denominator, costs nothing for the performers who clamour to be on television and makes at least one person fabulously rich. The advertisers must fight to flog their products during the breaks in this particular programme.
So, have I become a supporter of censorship. An arbiter of good taste. No and yes .I am now po faced critic who finds the humiliation of the 'losers' revolting to watch and I won't watch again. Did I mention my opinion to my friends who were hooting along to the show? Certainly not, who am I to judge? And who wants to be seen as a humourless reactionary?
I stayed shtoum!
Friday, 7 January 2011
Greed as virtue
Food glorious food
I am a radio four fan/freak to the extent that I arrange my car journeys around programmes I like and have been know to sit outside my house in the car until a particularly enjoyable programme ends. Ed Reardon is my favourite and I cringe and identify particularly when his writing group rebels - I 'taught' creative writing for a very long time - too long.
So I have the radio burbling in the background and tune in to anything that catches my ear. Woman's hour has been talking about food, weight and dieting - again. They seem to have been on about it for days and nobody ever says they are just plain greedy and that food is gorgeous and meant to be enjoyed. I get a lot of pleasure from food and have noticed in the last weeks that when anybody says 'How was your Christmas?' I rhapsodise about a wonderful sour cherry sauce al la Delia that I made with a duck that I cooked perfectly. These things don't always come off and this time it did so I am justifiably proud but am not sure if that should be my highlight. I also enjoyed good company and no disagreements but it is the cherry sauce that I remember.
When I was a child I was beanpole skinny and, naturally, I longed for some curves and I was called the dustbin because I would swoop on any leftovers and gobble them up. I am still greedy and like greedy people around me but I don't expect they would call themselves greedy because it is now a word of abuse. I enjoy my greed, I love to go to a new town, especially in France and spend hours wandering around looking at the menus, comparing combinations of food imagining the tastes and generally drooling, my brother- in- law who I admire tremendously took sandwiches to Paris with him when he went to the Monet exhibition. To save money he said, I said nothing but this seemed tome to be folly of the first order. Sacrilege.
Recently my partner had a young German girl staying with her who ate phenomenal amounts of food, a joy to cook for and a good lavish cook. Our eyes would gleam over my English specialities bread and butter pudding, cauliflower cheese would disappear at a rate of knots and she would make excellent German dishes and chocolate cakes. I think my fondness for her was based on our mutual love of food, food and books.
I have never had a partner who loves food as much as I do. My husband was diabetic and when we got married I got the Molly Goldberg Jewish Cookbook and indulged in Cordon Bleu which was the fashion then. He gained a vast amount of weight and I nearly killed the poor man so lush cooking had to stop.
Then I was with an excellent Irishman whose preference was for Guinness and I adapted and also gained a lot of weight. Now I am with a wonderful woman who is definitely not greedy but I am working on her, hopefully she will become less abstemious in time. Meanwhile I seek out hearty eaters and feed and admire them, in my book greed is good.
I am slightly overweight but I'm worth it!
I am a radio four fan/freak to the extent that I arrange my car journeys around programmes I like and have been know to sit outside my house in the car until a particularly enjoyable programme ends. Ed Reardon is my favourite and I cringe and identify particularly when his writing group rebels - I 'taught' creative writing for a very long time - too long.
So I have the radio burbling in the background and tune in to anything that catches my ear. Woman's hour has been talking about food, weight and dieting - again. They seem to have been on about it for days and nobody ever says they are just plain greedy and that food is gorgeous and meant to be enjoyed. I get a lot of pleasure from food and have noticed in the last weeks that when anybody says 'How was your Christmas?' I rhapsodise about a wonderful sour cherry sauce al la Delia that I made with a duck that I cooked perfectly. These things don't always come off and this time it did so I am justifiably proud but am not sure if that should be my highlight. I also enjoyed good company and no disagreements but it is the cherry sauce that I remember.
When I was a child I was beanpole skinny and, naturally, I longed for some curves and I was called the dustbin because I would swoop on any leftovers and gobble them up. I am still greedy and like greedy people around me but I don't expect they would call themselves greedy because it is now a word of abuse. I enjoy my greed, I love to go to a new town, especially in France and spend hours wandering around looking at the menus, comparing combinations of food imagining the tastes and generally drooling, my brother- in- law who I admire tremendously took sandwiches to Paris with him when he went to the Monet exhibition. To save money he said, I said nothing but this seemed tome to be folly of the first order. Sacrilege.
Recently my partner had a young German girl staying with her who ate phenomenal amounts of food, a joy to cook for and a good lavish cook. Our eyes would gleam over my English specialities bread and butter pudding, cauliflower cheese would disappear at a rate of knots and she would make excellent German dishes and chocolate cakes. I think my fondness for her was based on our mutual love of food, food and books.
I have never had a partner who loves food as much as I do. My husband was diabetic and when we got married I got the Molly Goldberg Jewish Cookbook and indulged in Cordon Bleu which was the fashion then. He gained a vast amount of weight and I nearly killed the poor man so lush cooking had to stop.
Then I was with an excellent Irishman whose preference was for Guinness and I adapted and also gained a lot of weight. Now I am with a wonderful woman who is definitely not greedy but I am working on her, hopefully she will become less abstemious in time. Meanwhile I seek out hearty eaters and feed and admire them, in my book greed is good.
I am slightly overweight but I'm worth it!
Monday, 6 December 2010
A Second bite at Berlin
I was a little nervous about returning to Berlin, afraid it would disappoint. It was better than ever and the people I met before were as sound and the new ones were great. The start was a disaster with me abandoned at the airport watching people from the Moscow flight come through the gate. I felt my face alter from a semi expectant grin to anxiety through to fear and on to fury then the terror of knowing that my love was dead/ missed her flight or just abandoned me ( I have vast 'abandonment issues!!'I have been told this by many a counsellor and have obligingly believed it.) My actress friend had gone on ahead in the opposite direction to Kreizberg and I had happily gone to the correct gate and stood waving. My love has different sim cards for every country she touches down (thrift) and for some curious reason her Berlin card was not working. Eventually I phoned a number I had taken last year that I thought was the place we had stayed. The wonderful Chris answered and gave me the address - by the time I found a taxi the only defining landmark I could remember was the Swanglers Club - the actual address had slipped down into my personal delete bin so I phoned Chris again who told the driver the address.
I recognised the building and paid the eighteen euros, rang again and Chris bounded down the stairs with the joyful news that my love had arrived I find it difficult to describe the force of my fury - let me just say that I made it to the fifth floor in one go, usually I wheeze up slow and stop at least twice. Adrenalin is wonderful and I still had breath left to yell my feelings in purest Anglo Saxon. So we began our visit not speaking, Things improved and I realised that I should have taken the address for myself never rely on anybody, ever. A learning experience indeed.
Things improved and our first reading went well and we finished the evening with an invitation to read on Sunday at an open studio event and adjourned to a wonderful pub. One of the more enchanting features of Berlin pub life is the fact that when you invade somebody's table they smile their welcome and talk to you, that and the nice familiar smoky atmosphere. Also the fact that you pay at the end of the evening, which is late but on Friday and Saturday the underground runs all night and nice Turkish food is available in the tube stations. These might seem irrelevancies but they all go to make Berlin my favourite city.
The Sunday gig was fun and funny and I saw wonderful sculptures in the studios and all kinds of excellent art work of every conceivable kind in a building that was once a school.. The third event was a great success with Alan in the chair and so many lovely Germans who shame us with their knowledge of English. Plus all the hip Brits who still crash on Sofas and are cool. This is going on far too long. so thanks to Chris and Regine, Marc and a special mention for Alan and Jacinta and all the lovely East of Eden crew! And thanks to Wu Zhi and I am saving up for that picture. And most of all thanks to Nina and Albertine for friendship. And thanks to beautiful BERLIN
I recognised the building and paid the eighteen euros, rang again and Chris bounded down the stairs with the joyful news that my love had arrived I find it difficult to describe the force of my fury - let me just say that I made it to the fifth floor in one go, usually I wheeze up slow and stop at least twice. Adrenalin is wonderful and I still had breath left to yell my feelings in purest Anglo Saxon. So we began our visit not speaking, Things improved and I realised that I should have taken the address for myself never rely on anybody, ever. A learning experience indeed.
Things improved and our first reading went well and we finished the evening with an invitation to read on Sunday at an open studio event and adjourned to a wonderful pub. One of the more enchanting features of Berlin pub life is the fact that when you invade somebody's table they smile their welcome and talk to you, that and the nice familiar smoky atmosphere. Also the fact that you pay at the end of the evening, which is late but on Friday and Saturday the underground runs all night and nice Turkish food is available in the tube stations. These might seem irrelevancies but they all go to make Berlin my favourite city.
The Sunday gig was fun and funny and I saw wonderful sculptures in the studios and all kinds of excellent art work of every conceivable kind in a building that was once a school.. The third event was a great success with Alan in the chair and so many lovely Germans who shame us with their knowledge of English. Plus all the hip Brits who still crash on Sofas and are cool. This is going on far too long. so thanks to Chris and Regine, Marc and a special mention for Alan and Jacinta and all the lovely East of Eden crew! And thanks to Wu Zhi and I am saving up for that picture. And most of all thanks to Nina and Albertine for friendship. And thanks to beautiful BERLIN
Monday, 22 November 2010
DEPRESSION?
For many years I endured bouts of gloom that marched in from nowhere and occupied my entire being like some alien army, my mind grasped tight in a vice of misery. I would function on a superficial level as if I were normal and wouldn't share this fact. I would watch myself operating and wonder at it. Listen to myself chatting instead of screaming under this heavy grey miasma. I joke and my wit is intact if a little sharper, more barbed. In fact it hardly impaired my function at all but totally filleted any joy. I can remember walking with my dog in my favourite place feeling desolate and trying to understand how this could be. All the things I loved were present and correct yet none of it was enjoyable, I was lost in the fog of misery with both exit and entrance barred. It was pointless talking about my mood and impossible for anybody to get through to me. The isolation was total.
Eventually the mood would move off spontaneously and I was capable of happiness again, or at least of a peaceful mind. During the glooms I often had a tune going through my brain, I remember one in particular was Chinatown my Chinatown and when I woke it was a warning of misery. Though a gloom is quite different from misery that can be addressed and dealt with or at least talked about. I can remember when I was teaching that during a gloom I would watch myself and even admire my performance which was detached and outside my self.
Alternatively I would drink myself into a stupor with the vain hope that it would shift the gloom and occasionally it did temporarily but it would roar back along with a hangover when I woke and the idiot song would churn in my mind like some unholy carousel. Beside which it was expensive and with the danger of revealing my pain in some drunken moment and I was terribly ashamed of these glooms. I often read about gifted people who vaunted their glooms as part of their genius as if the fact of desperate moods make them special but I knew this didn't apply to me and it sounded like a poor consolation too.
So why am I writing about this now? Because for the last few years since I had a stroke I have not had the glooms. Perhaps my brush with mortality scared it out of me or perhaps brain damage occurred. I am very glad to get out of desolation row mood and even as I type the words I am afraid of tempting fate but I will take a chance because the subject interests me and I can never resist a disclosure!
I know that we are all unique and that my own experience is not the same as that of anyone else but I would be interested in other experiences of the glump.
Eventually the mood would move off spontaneously and I was capable of happiness again, or at least of a peaceful mind. During the glooms I often had a tune going through my brain, I remember one in particular was Chinatown my Chinatown and when I woke it was a warning of misery. Though a gloom is quite different from misery that can be addressed and dealt with or at least talked about. I can remember when I was teaching that during a gloom I would watch myself and even admire my performance which was detached and outside my self.
Alternatively I would drink myself into a stupor with the vain hope that it would shift the gloom and occasionally it did temporarily but it would roar back along with a hangover when I woke and the idiot song would churn in my mind like some unholy carousel. Beside which it was expensive and with the danger of revealing my pain in some drunken moment and I was terribly ashamed of these glooms. I often read about gifted people who vaunted their glooms as part of their genius as if the fact of desperate moods make them special but I knew this didn't apply to me and it sounded like a poor consolation too.
So why am I writing about this now? Because for the last few years since I had a stroke I have not had the glooms. Perhaps my brush with mortality scared it out of me or perhaps brain damage occurred. I am very glad to get out of desolation row mood and even as I type the words I am afraid of tempting fate but I will take a chance because the subject interests me and I can never resist a disclosure!
I know that we are all unique and that my own experience is not the same as that of anyone else but I would be interested in other experiences of the glump.
Berlin
I will be supporting the lovely Nina Ludovica Smith who will read excerpts of my novel A Blues for Shindig and I will strut my stuff very briefly with a couple of three poems at the the events below in Berlin in late November
Stardust Boogie Woogie
Tania Antoshina, Mo Foster, Marcela Iriarte, Christian de Lutz, Jane Mulfinger, Bob & Roberta Smith, Jessica Voorsanger and a reading by Nina Ludovica Smith
Curated by Francesca Piovanot
Finissage with a reading by Mo Foster: 26 November 2010 8PM
Special event: Tuesday 30 November 2010, , A reading by Nina Smith and Mo Foster at the East of Eden International Bookstore, Schreinerstr. 10, 10247 Berlin-Friedrichshain - www.east-of-eden.de
Stardust Boogie Woogie
Tania Antoshina, Mo Foster, Marcela Iriarte, Christian de Lutz, Jane Mulfinger, Bob & Roberta Smith, Jessica Voorsanger and a reading by Nina Ludovica Smith
Curated by Francesca Piovanot
Finissage with a reading by Mo Foster: 26 November 2010 8PM
Special event: Tuesday 30 November 2010, , A reading by Nina Smith and Mo Foster at the East of Eden International Bookstore, Schreinerstr. 10, 10247 Berlin-Friedrichshain - www.east-of-eden.de
Friday, 12 November 2010
DEAD DOG
DEAD DOG
I have been resisting the impulse to write this one for fear of seeming maudlin but maudlin is OK on occasion and if you don't like pets it will be best if you don't read this.
Since my delightful Border Terrier died I have felt desperately lonely for her company interspersed with feeling of guilt. I feel rather like Nero who gave the thumbs down to some misbegotten gladiator. There really wasn't much choice, the vet said she was in a great deal of pain and there was not much chance of her recovering fully. She had had Cushings disease for several years and now she appeared to have had a seizure and in spite of Rescue Remedy and drops of brandy she stood stiff, unable to sit, she also had a very high temperature and she was fifteen, so I let her go via the vet.
Miss Saffie was a special dog, I wanted to call her Sappho but she lacked the gravitas - or I did. I didn't get her from new so I missed all house training and she was the most continent of dogs - until Cushings struck and I had to measure her water intake against her visits outside quite carefully, her early days were spent alone because her owners both worked and when I came along to have her during the week she was very pleased and went into paroxysms of joy when she saw me and deep gloom when I left her so when I asked if I could keep her they said I could.
I always thought she was a bit dim and she was incredibly lacking in bravery, although she had very bold moments when she fell for yet another unsuitable very butch fighting dog. She was smitten with an unspeakable monster in the hairdresser shop round the corner a Japanese piece of exotica who hardly responded at all, she would rush in rudder waving, He would retreat. She was never put off and the next day she would plight her troth again. There was a dog called Hercules that she was quite passionate about and he reciprocated and she would become young again and cavort with him all over The Point in Greenwich.
A few months ago she was attacked by two Staffordshire Bull terriers one of which grabbed her throat in his teeth with no preliminaries at all, the other went for her tail. I kicked the second one away, a small crowd of onlookers gathered but the only person who intevened was a young Moslem guy on his way to the Mosque. He took off his slipper and whacked the dog in the face and it ran off. Then he dashed away white robes flowing into the Mosque. Heroic I thought - knowing the Moslem dislike of touching dogs. Since this incident Saffie had little taste for walks locally in Southampton which is hardly surprising. And I became more cautious. So we would drive in the car to places where she was happy to walk and on our train journeys to Waterloo she would make friends with people, I believe she had a happy life and she brought a lot of happiness to me. At a friends house yesterday she reminded me of the pitter patter of her claws on the floor as she trotted to the back door in he endless search for water. Even cat lovers liked her and I loved her so it's goodbye to you Miss Saffie and thanks again..
I have been resisting the impulse to write this one for fear of seeming maudlin but maudlin is OK on occasion and if you don't like pets it will be best if you don't read this.
Since my delightful Border Terrier died I have felt desperately lonely for her company interspersed with feeling of guilt. I feel rather like Nero who gave the thumbs down to some misbegotten gladiator. There really wasn't much choice, the vet said she was in a great deal of pain and there was not much chance of her recovering fully. She had had Cushings disease for several years and now she appeared to have had a seizure and in spite of Rescue Remedy and drops of brandy she stood stiff, unable to sit, she also had a very high temperature and she was fifteen, so I let her go via the vet.
Miss Saffie was a special dog, I wanted to call her Sappho but she lacked the gravitas - or I did. I didn't get her from new so I missed all house training and she was the most continent of dogs - until Cushings struck and I had to measure her water intake against her visits outside quite carefully, her early days were spent alone because her owners both worked and when I came along to have her during the week she was very pleased and went into paroxysms of joy when she saw me and deep gloom when I left her so when I asked if I could keep her they said I could.
I always thought she was a bit dim and she was incredibly lacking in bravery, although she had very bold moments when she fell for yet another unsuitable very butch fighting dog. She was smitten with an unspeakable monster in the hairdresser shop round the corner a Japanese piece of exotica who hardly responded at all, she would rush in rudder waving, He would retreat. She was never put off and the next day she would plight her troth again. There was a dog called Hercules that she was quite passionate about and he reciprocated and she would become young again and cavort with him all over The Point in Greenwich.
A few months ago she was attacked by two Staffordshire Bull terriers one of which grabbed her throat in his teeth with no preliminaries at all, the other went for her tail. I kicked the second one away, a small crowd of onlookers gathered but the only person who intevened was a young Moslem guy on his way to the Mosque. He took off his slipper and whacked the dog in the face and it ran off. Then he dashed away white robes flowing into the Mosque. Heroic I thought - knowing the Moslem dislike of touching dogs. Since this incident Saffie had little taste for walks locally in Southampton which is hardly surprising. And I became more cautious. So we would drive in the car to places where she was happy to walk and on our train journeys to Waterloo she would make friends with people, I believe she had a happy life and she brought a lot of happiness to me. At a friends house yesterday she reminded me of the pitter patter of her claws on the floor as she trotted to the back door in he endless search for water. Even cat lovers liked her and I loved her so it's goodbye to you Miss Saffie and thanks again..
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