Paul Magrs's Blog, page 16

Happiness for Beginners - Carole Matthews

I haven't reviewed a book on here for ages!  I've read some lovely novels recently, so maybe I'll get back to it. Here's a look at one i've just finished...

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My favourite books create a wonderful sense of place, I’ve realized. The books that I treasure and return to are ones that build an environment I want to spend more time in. The hectic farm at the heart of Carole Matthews’ new novel becomes just that kind of place. It’s a special kind of farm that’s a haven for displaced and damaged animals and young human beings. We get to spend a lot of time with wonky hens, anti-social sheep, diva alpacas and difficult kids.
There’s a strong sense of time running out for this messy and cheery paradise though, as the land is being sold out from under our heroine Molly and her ramshackle caravan. The whole idyllic place is going to be thoroughly ploughed up and ruined by the futile onslaught of a high-speed railway. Molly has to find somewhere new to move her fifty-odd eccentric animals and the kids who’ve come to depend on her alternate school. However, she has recently fallen into the orbit of Shelby Dacre, a local minted soap star and his surly son, Lucas, and all their fates look as if they’re destined to become entwined. It’s not hard to guess what’s going to happen, but these lovable and independent-minded characters manage to put enough stubborn obstacles in the road of their own happiness to give the tale some lovely and funny suspense.
Mostly, however, it’s a story about learning the trick of happiness, and how to find it in the simplest and sweetest things. Shallow, materialistic and selfish characters are given short-shrift and, as ever, in a Carole Matthews novel, the loyal, hard-working, and slightly crazy characters are the ones to win through in the end. In this book it feels like the reader is drawn in to belong to this mismatched family of llamas and heart-throbs, baby goats and young poets – and Hope Farm really becomes somewhere you’re sad to leave at the end.

Bernard Socks on Poetry

Bernard Socks on Poetry

1. Bernard Socks Responds to Criticism
I’m lying on his side of the bedAll day longI’m deliberately shedding hairAnd licking my asshole
Absolutely furious
Jeremy didn’t like my last poem‘As much’ he said‘As your previous work.’
WellLet it piss downAll dayLet it piss down on himSmoking outsideWhat does he know anywayAbout cat poems?



2. Bernard Socks Reflects on Form and Content
What I’m sayingAt the end of the dayIs that I’m a catAnd I guess that’s the stuff I write about
It’s gonna reflectCat-type concernsCatty kind of stuff
And you might think my world is narrow(I think it’s huge)And you might think It doesn’t touch on wider themes(It does)And you might think my appreciation ofPoetic form, rhythm, metre, etcIs rudimentary(Ha!)
But this is what you getWhen you ask The cat what he thinks


3. Bernard Socks on Editing
Revising poemsIs a bit like chewing your feetTeasing gravel chunksFrom between your toes
Licking all your fur downSo it lies smartlySmarming in the cat spitAnd chewing on your nipples
You have to check every lineTaste it Give them a careful niff niff niffSeeing that they sit straight
Do they lie sleekly in the same direction?Can you twist your neck aroundAnd lick That bothersome ideaPerfectly into shape?
Cats like being succinctThey don’t hang aroundSay what you’ve gotta say
See you later, losers.


4. Bernard Socks at the Open Mic
“I’m not sure if this will work in performance Me being more of a language poetAnd allButHere goes:
“Weeeeee-
oooooooooWeeeeeeeee-
OOOO
OO                                    OOOOO
RRrrrr  rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
Rrr
MOWMOWMOWMOW
Ungow!
Weee
ee-oooo
MOWMOWMOW
Rrrrrr.”



5. Bernard Socks on Humankind
Sleepy catAre humans daft?
Yeah, humans are daftAll right
Humans are crazy.

'Stop 'No Outsiders!'...

Stop ‘No Outsiders’!
I had a good education. I went to a Comprehensive School in the 1980s and we were taught to think for ourselves. I grew up with a healthy disrespect for received wisdom, dogma and cant. A lot of the stuff I learned at school was a waste of time, naturally. Too much learning by rote, perhaps, too much stuff about arable farming and crop rotation. I could have done with more time for reading, of course.
            One thing missing from my education was any acknowledgement that LGBTQ people existed anywhere in the world. It was a huge absence in every lesson, every school assembly, every form of communication sent out by this mostly progressive, modern establishment. It was a great big Queer elephant in the room.
            At the time it was illegal, of course, for a school or its teachers to say or present anything that normalized homosexuality or anything that wasn’t hetero. Any utterance suggesting that queers of any stripe were in any way normal was deemed to be ‘promoting’ homosexuality and therefore forbidden in our schools.
            This was a big thing to grow up with in those years and it was all thanks to Mrs Thatcher and her government’s pernicious and weirdly puritanical commands. And it lasted all the way until the early 2000s, this strange state of affairs: thou shalt not speak of Queers in the classroom.
            It meant that, when we were all taught about relationships, sex, bodies, feelings – all that stuff – it was always, only, about what mummies and daddies did to make babies. That was the kind of cursory and rudimentary attention that the breadth and complexity of human sexuality and emotions received. All of that glorious stuff was something that could be taught – clinically, quickly – during one Tuesday afternoon.
            Elsewhere… in discussions of art and literature and history, queers were routinely swerved round, or their kinks were straightened out. Michelangelo daubed muscle men’s bottoms and willies over the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, but you could never really talked about why. Oscar Wilde went to prison but, even in the 1980s, we got to discuss the ins and outs even less than did maiden aunts reading the news back in the day.
            The only time queers got mentioned via horrendous schoolyard bullying and braying. Oh, and of course, our primate PE teachers screaming at us on the playing fields, calling us puffs and nancies. Curious, the unerring gaydar of the PE teacher. While other teachers turned a blind eye to the whole topic, their primitive, lumbering track-suited fellows always seemed to know just who to shout their homophobic abuse at. It might almost make you think that the official silence about Queers encouraged and licensed the abuse and the bullying outside the classroom. Funny that, isn’t it?
            And the Eighties was such a tricky time for queers anyway. The Sunday papers we got at home were horrible tabloid ones, full of salacious stuff about vicars and tarts – and also queers and AIDS. Really vicious, nasty stuff about gay men. I read it all and grew up completely terrified at the thought of growing up gay and the horrors it would entail.
            And the Eighties pop charts were full of queers and what were then called ‘gender benders.’ Some in the closet, some out of the closet. Some hugely brave and successful and lauded. Other sneered at and disparaged. Many of them dying, dead, gone forever.
            A complicated, terrible time in many, many ways.I feel I must repeat this: our schools were wonderful. But they did nothing. Absolutely nothing to help us understand. They did absolutely zero about enabling LGBTQ youngsters to orient ourselves and operate in the adult world.             Nothing about safe sex, even.             Nothing about asking for help.            Nothing about fitting into the world, or finding your tribe, or finding someone to talk to, or even that such a thing was possible.            Nothing. They really did nothing.
            Some of us were lucky enough to go into further education. But only a very small proportion. We got to move away from our little town and go and living in a city or a campus. There, things were a bit different. You could learn at a lot at college. There were GaySocs and Nightlines and all kinds of ways to start learning. But there were a lot of peers who had grown up in the same ignorant set of circumstances that we had. We had a lot of the internalized homophobia to deal with, because of the cockeyed way we’d been brought up and educated.            Still, there were adventures to be had and mistakes to be made.
            I always felt, as a gay man who came out at twenty that I was years behind my straight friends. It’s a running joke amongst my friends that gay men in their early twenties run around like girls do in their teenage years. They’ve got a lot of catching up to do.
            We can be shouty, brilliant, gorgeous, arrogant, silly, bullish, proud, angry, joyful, depressed, manic, crazy, addled, unwise, confused, messy, destructive, superficial, wild, marvelous.             Sometimes all in the space of one night.
            But what queers of this particular generation are – the ones who grew up in the shadow of things like Clause 28 and all that weighty, embarrassed silence – is neglected. That’s what I think we are. We grew up and we had to figure out everything for ourselves.
            By the time a LGBTQ person finds their first significant lover and has those big conversations and shares their backstory with each other… there is a lot of backstory to share. They are the product of a culture that has willfully ignored them. A culture predominantly straight, and a culture that saturates all available space with explicit heterosexual imagery everywhere you look. (Strange, all this brainwashing. You’d think the predominance of heterosexual stuff would turn us, wouldn’t you? All that aggressive promotion, eh? Surely it’s going to turn our heads and turn us straight..? Is that how this stuff works, hmm?)
            So I always think: hurray. Good for you. Especially for the LGBTQ adults who grew up in those dark years when their schools didn’t teach them anything and wouldn’t listen to them. Good for you. You dragged yourself up and you got into the world and survived.             Many didn’t.
            This kind of neglect can destroy lives and foster homophobia.             And there can be no going back.             We must never let bigots, homophobes and their dopey, backward ideas creep back into education. They can do terrible damage to people’s lives.
            There’s nothing wrong or shameful or dirty about the L or the G or the B or the T or the Q or any of the other stripes we’ve added to the flag we’re waving. We’re equivalent and we’re equal to everyone else.
Hearing bigots spouting off about education sends shivers through me. The very thought that the government or local councils or schools might cave in and kowtow to ignorant people’s ideas about what should be taught brings back awful memories of the things we had to put up with.
            I love the fact that there is a course called ‘No Outsiders’ in that Birmingham school, and it places everyone on equal footing, and that pupils will learn that human nature is more complex and wonderful than religious bigots would like them to think. It sounds such a kind and thoughtful course, too.
I think it’s important to demystify these things. We grew up in such fear of the unknown. As LGBTQ kids of the 1980s we felt we were part of the terrifying unknown ourselves.
            We can’t go backwards into this ignorant stuff. We can’t indulge bigotry. People must be told: no. This is the curriculum now, in any civilized society.
            I had a great education – in terms of thinking for myself, and being trained to question authority, cant, dogma and received wisdom. But there were huge things missing from it. The great big Queer elephant in the room sat there waiting. All that has been addressed and sorted out since, thank goodness and we have courses called things like ‘No Outsiders’.
No matter how shrill or fervent the bullies are, we really, really can’t go backwards.

Two More Bernard Socks Poems

Socks is a Good Cat
All the neighbours’ cats drink ginIt’s trueThey say it’s neat ginThey drink it sloeCall it gourmetThink themselves fancyThey’re still pie-eyedBy sunrise
All the neighbours’ cats smoke fagsThat’s them, puffing awayIn the undergrowthTabbing their heads offStinking their paws upCoughing like madHow do they manage to inhale?Or strike matches?But they do
All the neighbours’ cats commit murderWithout blinking
All the neighbours’ cats get sexyIt’s revolting!Everyone’s wriggling and gigglingSpraggling and wagglingBums in the air!Everyone’s shagging and gagging like madBoys and boys and girls and girlsEspecially the ambiguously gendered!They’re the worst of the lot!They’re all mad for it round hereReally, I’m quite shockedMost of the time
But not meI am a good catI am the best cat in the worldYou know me
Butter wouldn’t meltOn my cold wet nose





Bernard Socks Has a Quiet Day

My usual palaver is on holdAll the scritchingAll the scratchingAnd the bombing about
Don’t worry about meI’ll be curled up in a ball somewhere
I’m only dreaming About exploring other lands Conquering worlds andComing up with the wildest schemesEvery idea I haveWould amaze youReally
But today’s plans are quiet onesI’m having a quiet day
Maybe back about five?

Bernard Socks Writes...

Socks in the Evening
Our guests are gone nowSo I’m sitting stillWhile they were here I listenedTo every word they saidA lot of it was dull.
Someone ruffled up my hairdoAnd I didn’t mind thatToo much.
Our guests are gone nowAnd so it’s just me and my boysAs the house settles down With creaking pipes and
It must be time soonFor a little bite?Something to crunch on..?
Our guests are gone andThe great heavy darknessComes down all smelling of nightExcitements and the little door flaps
Calling me out to playBut nowOur guests have gone andThe house is so comfy and warm.


Defending the Realm
Did you see me?Did you hear me? I was yelling fit to burstMy tail’s flared up – look!In a fabulous, furious display.
That wicked creature; thatOh-so demure and vicious Neighbour of ours – what’s he called?He’s been round The bottom of our garden again.
Skulking fluffilyAnd trying to be friends
I saw him offDon’t you worryI hissed and howledBut I didn’t get too closeThem fluffy, demure onesThey can go mental on you.
Anyhow.I’m coming in now.Dreamies.

Spoken For

Spoken For
You never shut upAnd you drive me crackersOn a daily basis
But…
That phrase I heard todaySays everythingAbout all the stuff I promiseI’ll never take for granted:
Spoken for.
Isn’t thatA great saying?

Levenshulme in the Snow

Nipping outside - even with the flu - to stand in the snow and paint. Using snow instead of water, and getting Jeremy to breathe on the colours to get them to melt. Making these little cameo scenes of Levenshulme.

Horror of Glam Rock - An Apology

I’d like to address something that’s been brought to my attention recently – to do with the use of the T-word in one of my Doctor Who audio dramas. The story is ‘The Horror of Glam Rock’ from 2007 and in it one of the characters uses the T-word in a throwaway, jokey line about a dead glam rock star found in the snow.
I apologise now if this line leaps out of the drama as inappropriate or offensive. The script was written in 2006 when I wasn’t aware of the T-word being a transphobic slur. Back then it seemed the right word for the context, the time it was set in and the character of Lucie Miller to use in a casual, slangy, jokey manner. Nowadays I just wouldn’t use it. I’d avoid it on the off-chance that it was going to hurt someone’s feelings.
I think that, whatever they’re writing, writers have a responsibility to muck about with language and to turn the world around and to be fearless and experimental. But we also have to watch out for unnecessarily causing offence or hurting people. We can’t go back in time to, say, 2006 or 1974 or whenever and make things right then, but we can hold up our hands now and say: I wouldn’t say it that way today.
Meanings have shifted. Language has evolved. We view the past through the lens of language and ideas from today. I just had to say that: I’m aware that the word might stick out as offensive, and I’m sorry now that it’s there at all.

2018 in Review

2018...


2018 has been my year of saying yes to more or less everything. It’s meant that I’ve worked too hard, really. It’s been another year of trying very hard and doing the best I can… and trying to make the world notice that I’m here doing my thing.
I’ve made some glorious new friends, and met some online friends in the flesh for the first time and got on fantastically well. Making some new friends means a year has been a good one.
I’ve read a fair number of books. I’ve bought too many. I’ve followed my nose and this year rediscovered my love for novelizations, 70s science fiction, blockbusters, war fiction and even literary fiction.
I’ve worked and worked and worked, supervised each day in my study by the indefatigable Bernard Socks.
I’ve tried to be a good friend to those I care about. I’ve tried not to be too caught up in my work.
I wrote a lot of words. I wrote a whole kids’ novel and three-quarters of a historical novel for grown-ups. And I wrote some scripts, and sold my first Crime story.
I had two Doctor Who audio plays published. I had the third book in my Mars trilogy published. I wrote a ten hour long mystery series published by a Swedish audio company. I wrote the text for a computer game. My first four novels were republished so handsomely by Lethe Press.

I got Brenda and Effie optioned for TV again, and this seems hopeful, but the stage musical seems to have gone quiet again.
I didn’t manage to get ‘Stardust and Snow’ published as a short, perfect Christmas gifty hardback. Two near misses, but no. That was a massive disappointment.
I did an awful lot of drawing and painting. Mostly for myself, but quite a lot of commissions. I painted cats and dogs and lots of naked men.
I even wrote some poems, and a tiny little play that will be on in Manchester next year.
I went to Paris for four days with Jeremy, and Baltimore with several Doctor Whos and friends.
I spoke at things like the Edinburgh book festival and taught and ran about and did some other events – for anyone who would ask, it seemed like.
Sometimes – doing what I do, and not really fitting in – it can all feel like a bit of a fight and a struggle. But I really value my friends and my FB friends and everyone who supports me by taking an interest. But this is what I do and here it all is.
Sending my love and all my very best wishes to you all xxx

'Tin of Clouds' - free to my Patreon subscribers

I'm posting something a bit different on my patreon page this week, especially for my subscribers. It's a little book of all the poems I wrote this year, and a selection of my drawings. I rarely write poems - or so i thought - but there's a small bunch of them here that i'm pleased with. 'Tin of Clouds' will be available this Wednesday from my page - www.patreon.com/Paulmagrs