Bryan Islip's Blog, page 42
July 23, 2011
Reality versus 'Decency'
I've just finished a short story that I intended to be my September story of the month. It is certainly amongst the most powerful of my works, concerning as it does the last day on earth of a prostitute; of a 39 years old woman I should say.
However I've been advised by a couple of people who know about writing and who care about mine not to publish this tale on-line. I've taken their advice and, instead, have entered it into one of the most important of short fiction competitions. I'll post here in October with the result, whether favourable, unfavourable or - as is most likely - unknown having sunk without trace.
But where is the line that one must not cross when it comes to works of imaginative art, whether in words or line or indeed music? We have all read of this week's death of Lucien Freud, 'the most important (ex) living artist on earth' quote / unquote. His painting entitled, 'Welfare Worker Sleeping' is at the same time very ugly and very beautiful. The lady concerned is extremely fat and totally unclothed but somehow this picture cannot help but produce real, sympathetic emotion. Not just for her but for her clients. And it makes for real understanding in the eyes and the mind of the viewer, for you are looking at her through the mind not just of Freud but of the lady herself. There is a desperation here, and so much of life is indeed desperate.
How much more worthwhile is this than the anodyne me-too images and (quote) graphic abstractions (unquote) of the thousands of eager young things spewed out from the art colleges desperately eager to impress but knowing far, far too little of the stuff of life to do so. They should go out and tackle life - and I do mean live - for thirty more years before they have the understanding with which to clothe their skills in order successfully to address their fellow Man, I think.
Anyway I must get on. My August story of the month is primed and ready to cyber-fly forth and September's needs to be written. I'm thinking about a man and a bank robbery ...
p.s. If it should mean anything, Freud's Welfare lady sold a few years back for $12.5 millions.
However I've been advised by a couple of people who know about writing and who care about mine not to publish this tale on-line. I've taken their advice and, instead, have entered it into one of the most important of short fiction competitions. I'll post here in October with the result, whether favourable, unfavourable or - as is most likely - unknown having sunk without trace.
But where is the line that one must not cross when it comes to works of imaginative art, whether in words or line or indeed music? We have all read of this week's death of Lucien Freud, 'the most important (ex) living artist on earth' quote / unquote. His painting entitled, 'Welfare Worker Sleeping' is at the same time very ugly and very beautiful. The lady concerned is extremely fat and totally unclothed but somehow this picture cannot help but produce real, sympathetic emotion. Not just for her but for her clients. And it makes for real understanding in the eyes and the mind of the viewer, for you are looking at her through the mind not just of Freud but of the lady herself. There is a desperation here, and so much of life is indeed desperate.
How much more worthwhile is this than the anodyne me-too images and (quote) graphic abstractions (unquote) of the thousands of eager young things spewed out from the art colleges desperately eager to impress but knowing far, far too little of the stuff of life to do so. They should go out and tackle life - and I do mean live - for thirty more years before they have the understanding with which to clothe their skills in order successfully to address their fellow Man, I think.
Anyway I must get on. My August story of the month is primed and ready to cyber-fly forth and September's needs to be written. I'm thinking about a man and a bank robbery ...
p.s. If it should mean anything, Freud's Welfare lady sold a few years back for $12.5 millions.
July 18, 2011
So what comes next?
All ideas, all opinions have to be based on or sparked off by something. My yesterday blog on the troubles of capitalism originated, I suppose, in the following passage from my novel, 'More Deaths Than One' ... the scene is a Saudi Arabian beach house / palace owned by Thomas Thornton's employer, Abdulrahman Al-Sottar. Abdulrahman is playing host to a few of his big money friends and to Thornton ...
Abdul-Rahman shouts, "Joey". The Philipino servant appears as if by magic. "Bring Mister Thomas the microphone." He leans towards you. "But before that, let me ask you something else that is serious, my friend. In our lifetime, what have been the two great competing influences in the West? There is capitalism and there is communism, am I right?""Yes, I guess so," Thomas says. He wonders where his employer is going with this. Abdul-Rahman says, "Yet one of these great competing concepts, this - what you call it - this philosophy of communism, where is it right now? Gone, finished, from one day to the next, caputo. Therefore capitalism is the winner?""So it would seem," Thomas says, cautiously, "Although politics and philosophy really aren't my subjects." "That, my friend, is what you would call a cop-out. Listen to me now; this demise of communism, you saw it coming?""No of course not, Nobody did. Nobody I know of, anyway.""Exactly. And you cannot see now the demise of capitalism?""Come on, Abdul-Rahman," he says, "You might as well say the demise of everything.""Exactly, my friend. Every thing! But more important for us than wealth is the life of the spirit, of God. This - this is the difference. Our lives here are, let us say, eighty percent spiritual and twenty percent material. You of the west are the other way around." The sheikh looks around at the bearded faces of his big-money friends. "Nothing is forever, we know this to be true. And when capitalism passes away, as did communism, what will be left for you and what for us, Thomas? What will be left for we of ancient, Arab descent who are neither east nor west, we for whom your capitalism is just a temporary tool, we the people from amongst whom God has always chosen his prophets?" There is a silence whilst Joey refills the whiskies and hands you a microphone, its lead trailing across the marble patio floor and back inside the house. Thomas says, "You talk of the future, Abdul-Rahman, and you may be right. But I would like to propose another toast, gentlemen." He lifts his re-charged tumbler. "Here's to life here and now and to all the good things of this wonderful world." The five Arabs raise their glasses, nodding their approval, murmuring endorsements. Thomas blows experimentally into the microphone, goes into the first lines; …"Start singing the blues, I'm going today… " He's unsure of the exact words but hell, what does it matter?
People ask me about how much of More Deaths Than One is autobiography. I say, about two percent. The above quoted passage would be included in that two percent. These days I wonder whether my Saudi friend had it more correct than, at the time (1999) I (or anyone else) realised.
Abdul-Rahman shouts, "Joey". The Philipino servant appears as if by magic. "Bring Mister Thomas the microphone." He leans towards you. "But before that, let me ask you something else that is serious, my friend. In our lifetime, what have been the two great competing influences in the West? There is capitalism and there is communism, am I right?""Yes, I guess so," Thomas says. He wonders where his employer is going with this. Abdul-Rahman says, "Yet one of these great competing concepts, this - what you call it - this philosophy of communism, where is it right now? Gone, finished, from one day to the next, caputo. Therefore capitalism is the winner?""So it would seem," Thomas says, cautiously, "Although politics and philosophy really aren't my subjects." "That, my friend, is what you would call a cop-out. Listen to me now; this demise of communism, you saw it coming?""No of course not, Nobody did. Nobody I know of, anyway.""Exactly. And you cannot see now the demise of capitalism?""Come on, Abdul-Rahman," he says, "You might as well say the demise of everything.""Exactly, my friend. Every thing! But more important for us than wealth is the life of the spirit, of God. This - this is the difference. Our lives here are, let us say, eighty percent spiritual and twenty percent material. You of the west are the other way around." The sheikh looks around at the bearded faces of his big-money friends. "Nothing is forever, we know this to be true. And when capitalism passes away, as did communism, what will be left for you and what for us, Thomas? What will be left for we of ancient, Arab descent who are neither east nor west, we for whom your capitalism is just a temporary tool, we the people from amongst whom God has always chosen his prophets?" There is a silence whilst Joey refills the whiskies and hands you a microphone, its lead trailing across the marble patio floor and back inside the house. Thomas says, "You talk of the future, Abdul-Rahman, and you may be right. But I would like to propose another toast, gentlemen." He lifts his re-charged tumbler. "Here's to life here and now and to all the good things of this wonderful world." The five Arabs raise their glasses, nodding their approval, murmuring endorsements. Thomas blows experimentally into the microphone, goes into the first lines; …"Start singing the blues, I'm going today… " He's unsure of the exact words but hell, what does it matter?
People ask me about how much of More Deaths Than One is autobiography. I say, about two percent. The above quoted passage would be included in that two percent. These days I wonder whether my Saudi friend had it more correct than, at the time (1999) I (or anyone else) realised.
July 17, 2011
The end of capital?
Once there was a man - the world's greatest leader of men in fact - who chased the moneylenders out of a Jerusalem temple. This man knew something that we all know but have chosen to ignore.
There is no real (as opposed to superficial) human benefit to be gained from the spending of unearned money, nor in the acquistion of it, nor in the lending of it.
If I labour in the fields or the factories or the shops or the offices, or anyplace ese that benefits my fellow man in return for the cost of my family's daily subsistence plus a a little more (to add an enjoyment factor), then everything is right. I have given and I have received. Money is my good servant.
But if I beg, borrow, steal or even if I inherit such funds everything is not right, for unearned, undeserved money has become my misery-making master even when its source is a secret known only to myself.
This morning the Guardian http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/20... reveals that the USA's indebtedness has reached fourteen and a half thousand billion dollars and that its whole economy teeters on the brink. Of what? And the Guardian notes that the USA is not alone. Greece, Ireland, Belgium, Italy and Portugal are in the same boat. Spain, France, the UK, Netherlands are all headed that way.
Even now there are plenty of politicians who continue to advise that the way out is to borrow more money. Which seems to me a bit like a doctor advising a heroin addict to cure himself by increasing his dosages. Trouble is, that kind of political or mediacal advice will indeed work in that the patient will undoubtedly die. End of problem.
When will somebody chase the moneylenders out of our temple? Exorcise the cancer?
There is no real (as opposed to superficial) human benefit to be gained from the spending of unearned money, nor in the acquistion of it, nor in the lending of it.
If I labour in the fields or the factories or the shops or the offices, or anyplace ese that benefits my fellow man in return for the cost of my family's daily subsistence plus a a little more (to add an enjoyment factor), then everything is right. I have given and I have received. Money is my good servant.
But if I beg, borrow, steal or even if I inherit such funds everything is not right, for unearned, undeserved money has become my misery-making master even when its source is a secret known only to myself.
This morning the Guardian http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/20... reveals that the USA's indebtedness has reached fourteen and a half thousand billion dollars and that its whole economy teeters on the brink. Of what? And the Guardian notes that the USA is not alone. Greece, Ireland, Belgium, Italy and Portugal are in the same boat. Spain, France, the UK, Netherlands are all headed that way.
Even now there are plenty of politicians who continue to advise that the way out is to borrow more money. Which seems to me a bit like a doctor advising a heroin addict to cure himself by increasing his dosages. Trouble is, that kind of political or mediacal advice will indeed work in that the patient will undoubtedly die. End of problem.
When will somebody chase the moneylenders out of our temple? Exorcise the cancer?
July 16, 2011
Government - new beginnings?
There are 650 members of the Westminster parliament. Assuming a cost to the taxpayer in salary and the dreaded (dreadful) expenses of £200,000 apiece I make that one hundred and thirty million pounds a year. This is of course merely the tip of an iceberg. The burden on the nation's Treasury of the civil services necessary to support and enforce paliamentary deliberations and decisions? Heaven knows but sky high for sure.
Our Westminster system was designed hundreds of years ago on the Romano-Greek democratic model. But is a system right for six or seven million people, mostly illiterate and with neither access to nor a great deal of interest in events outside their parish still right for going on seventy multicultural millions linked by literacy and digitalia to the news of the world? Of course not. We don't often use carriages and four these days either, and almost all of us have access to flush toilets.
Recent events should be enough to demonstrate the cracks and weaknesses of Westminster. Our system of government has given way before a vast corruption of banks and media. It has shown a sad propensity for unsound wars in foreign fields. Vast empty spaces on both sides of the house have become apparent when the inbumbents think the cameras will not be noticed by we, their paymasters.
Accepting that the opposite of government is anarchy and that anarchy (everyone does what everyone wants) hurts everybody, what kind of government should we, the people, be designing / re-designing for our future - or rather for the future of our nation / race?
Look at the alternatives:
Drastic pruning of the numbers of elected members of parliament plus the connection of each and every household via the internet so that the voice of the majority can be clearly and effectively translated into law?Government by Cabinet Ministers / Ministries only?Local (law-making / tax-collecting) government of each region by elected regional parliaments, served as opposed to serving a central unit?Big government of a United States of Europe (i.e. Brussels) through existing local authorities?The monarchy and hereditary aristocracy as in days of old?Any other?I have my own preferences. In order; 3,5,4,1,2. What do you think - starting with one opinion on whether you think the questions need to be addressed at all (as do I).
Our Westminster system was designed hundreds of years ago on the Romano-Greek democratic model. But is a system right for six or seven million people, mostly illiterate and with neither access to nor a great deal of interest in events outside their parish still right for going on seventy multicultural millions linked by literacy and digitalia to the news of the world? Of course not. We don't often use carriages and four these days either, and almost all of us have access to flush toilets.
Recent events should be enough to demonstrate the cracks and weaknesses of Westminster. Our system of government has given way before a vast corruption of banks and media. It has shown a sad propensity for unsound wars in foreign fields. Vast empty spaces on both sides of the house have become apparent when the inbumbents think the cameras will not be noticed by we, their paymasters.
Accepting that the opposite of government is anarchy and that anarchy (everyone does what everyone wants) hurts everybody, what kind of government should we, the people, be designing / re-designing for our future - or rather for the future of our nation / race?
Look at the alternatives:
Drastic pruning of the numbers of elected members of parliament plus the connection of each and every household via the internet so that the voice of the majority can be clearly and effectively translated into law?Government by Cabinet Ministers / Ministries only?Local (law-making / tax-collecting) government of each region by elected regional parliaments, served as opposed to serving a central unit?Big government of a United States of Europe (i.e. Brussels) through existing local authorities?The monarchy and hereditary aristocracy as in days of old?Any other?I have my own preferences. In order; 3,5,4,1,2. What do you think - starting with one opinion on whether you think the questions need to be addressed at all (as do I).
July 14, 2011
Knowing what you like
A week or two back I posted a couple of my pastel land/seascapes, this one created in 1989 ...
... and this one a month or so ago ...
I asked you and myself 'which is the better'? A client wished to buy the first but I said I'd paint a new version. The answers from all who responded were unanimous. Everyone liked the original (top) one. Various reasons were given. So I went back to the easel and have now amended version two above as below....
Spot the differences? Better than number two? Better than number one? Anyway I'm 'going to press' with this version and hope my client wants to buy it. No guarrantees. I once painted three versions of a River Ewe commission before she was aatisfied and who bought the latest. With a winning smile she remarked that she was known by local traders and her garage as 'the customer from hell'! Nothing like knowing what you like, is there.
... and this one a month or so ago ...
I asked you and myself 'which is the better'? A client wished to buy the first but I said I'd paint a new version. The answers from all who responded were unanimous. Everyone liked the original (top) one. Various reasons were given. So I went back to the easel and have now amended version two above as below....
Spot the differences? Better than number two? Better than number one? Anyway I'm 'going to press' with this version and hope my client wants to buy it. No guarrantees. I once painted three versions of a River Ewe commission before she was aatisfied and who bought the latest. With a winning smile she remarked that she was known by local traders and her garage as 'the customer from hell'! Nothing like knowing what you like, is there.
July 13, 2011
Your novel - a thing of worth and beauty?
When you write a novel - two novels and an anthology of short fiction in my case - unless you can find a way to achieve the necessary high grade publicity and consequent book sales it's like watching the slow death of a healthy, beloved child. That's a harsh analogy but it isn't too far off, for the writing of a novel has to be the main focus of your existence throughout the twelve or so months it takes you to deliver it, and it is the cause of so much agonising and suffering along the way but is such a great joy when first it appears in its finished form.
After this novel is born you will always say to yourself: 'this child (of my imagination) is to me a thing of worth and of beauty but is it really that - and is that what others would really think if only they could get to know about it and to read it?'
I sell copies of my books in local markets, so can get a good bit of reader to author feedback but I always have to wonder whether the nice things being said would be the things that reader would say to any friend or chance acquaintance. Of great reassurance then, when the other day a reader who I have never met and with no need to comment good or bad sent me the following e-mail ....
I am just dropping you a short note to tell you that I have finished both of your novels. And what an unexpected pleasure! I am an avid reader of most of the renowned thriller/drama authors and I have to say that your books are right up there with them. 'More Deaths Than One' is a truly great adventure story. A bit of Boy's Own, Ripping Yarns and James Bond (with a dash of Lawrence of Arabia!) all rolled into one! 'Going with Gabe' (I prefer Gabriel!) is an altogether different story with serious undertones and an 'Animal Farm' type theme which I found totally engrossing. Definitely food for thought. I finished it at 2am this morning! Knowing the amount of work and research that you have obviously dedicated to these wonderful books, I thought that you may appreciate my feedback.
Steven Leach Managing Director
Ocean Bridge
IRM Consultants Ltd
Hollinwood Business Centre, Albert Street, Oldham, Lancashire, United Kingdom
Thank you Steven Leach. I shall continue to take up my pen and now with greater resolve ...
After this novel is born you will always say to yourself: 'this child (of my imagination) is to me a thing of worth and of beauty but is it really that - and is that what others would really think if only they could get to know about it and to read it?'
I sell copies of my books in local markets, so can get a good bit of reader to author feedback but I always have to wonder whether the nice things being said would be the things that reader would say to any friend or chance acquaintance. Of great reassurance then, when the other day a reader who I have never met and with no need to comment good or bad sent me the following e-mail ....
I am just dropping you a short note to tell you that I have finished both of your novels. And what an unexpected pleasure! I am an avid reader of most of the renowned thriller/drama authors and I have to say that your books are right up there with them. 'More Deaths Than One' is a truly great adventure story. A bit of Boy's Own, Ripping Yarns and James Bond (with a dash of Lawrence of Arabia!) all rolled into one! 'Going with Gabe' (I prefer Gabriel!) is an altogether different story with serious undertones and an 'Animal Farm' type theme which I found totally engrossing. Definitely food for thought. I finished it at 2am this morning! Knowing the amount of work and research that you have obviously dedicated to these wonderful books, I thought that you may appreciate my feedback.
Steven Leach Managing Director
Ocean Bridge
IRM Consultants Ltd
Hollinwood Business Centre, Albert Street, Oldham, Lancashire, United Kingdom
Thank you Steven Leach. I shall continue to take up my pen and now with greater resolve ...
July 8, 2011
Music for Two Lochs Radio
On Sunday coming, 10 July, I'm to be co-presenter on the Two Lochs Radio's program called Sunday Brunch. (www.2lr.co.uk 11.00-13.00 and click on 'Listen' if you've a mind to) 'Bring along some of your favourite music', said Mike Webber. So this is what I'm submitting ...
The Music - Some Personal Notes
Bob Dylan's Thunder On The Mountain I heard Dylan just after his first visit to the UK, at which time I was living with my young family in Ainsdale and working for a Liverpool packaging company. That would be around 1968, I think. Anyway, for the first time I realised the power of philosophical poetry delivered as real music. Here was a young man who could make us all 'think' about what was going on. Still can and still does. Truly, age shall not weary us - not all of us, at least.
Van Morrison and The Chieftains' Carrickfergus. Traditional music has always appealed to me, especially of Celtic origin whether Scottish or Irish. Irish it seems to me is generally a softer music; the words somehow more wistful. And Carrickfergus is a brilliant example. You either love or hate Van Morrison's gravelly delivery. I love it. I first heard Carrickfergus on a business trip to Belfast at the height of the Troubles - that would be in 1975 or so. Both sides respond to this one.
Giuseppe Verdi's Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves (sung here as Va Pensiero from the opera Nebucco, by The Israelite Choir) Dee and I travelled to North London to hear our daughter Kairen and granddaughter Ella sing this as part of an amateur Nebucco production. Around 1990 and it still stands my hair on end (not literally!). I don't find it surprising that, at Verdi's funeral, a huge cortege wound its way around the streets of Milan singing The Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves over and over and over. That remains the largest public assembly of any event in the history of Italy according to Wikipedia.
Sharia Twain's That Don't Impress Me Much When we lived near Winchester and our six progeny had scattered to the four winds we used to hold regular get-togethers in our old thatched cottage. Dee and I often talk about when the female grandchildren amongst them were growing into their teens and how they used to dance around in the kitchen to this Don't Impress Me Much (with their mothers and aunties). I don't know why this number in particular is the focus of our memory.
John Lennon's Beautiful BoyI was employed by a Liverpool company as a young man, undergoing training in the late 50's - early 60's. In the evenings I discovered places (clubs) like the Pink Parrott, the Jacaranda, The Ascot and of course The Cavern. I cannot claim to have foreseen the future for those shock-haired youths calling themselves the Beatles (Silver Beatles?) or indeed to have found their music especially memorable. It was only later, when they developed their own words and music, that the genius especially of one John Lennon became very, very apparent. And Beautiful Boy is one amongst many Lennon songs that really resonate with me personally.
Elkie Brooks's Lilac Wine.Why this one? Quite simply because for Dee and I it is a most lovely song, sung here most beautifully.
Elton John's Sacrifice.Again, I cannot claim to be a great aficionado of the music of Reginald Kenneth Dwight aka Elton John. I find his music too middle of everything and I actually loathed his Candle In The Wind offering at Diana's Westminster Abbey memorial. Sorry about the non-U expression but it seemed 'in very poor taste', or so I thought. I know I'm in a small minority here, especially considering that according to Wikipedia Elton comes behind only The Beatles and Madonna in the popularity stakes. However I listened to Sacrifice on a flight to Saudi Arabia in the mid-90's, immediately bought the CD and hardly stopped playing its title track as I travelled the dusty highways and byways of that desert country. Brilliant, brilliant.
Lena Martell's Bridge Over Troubled Waters. In 1969 I left the first of my lifetime employers and joined my second and last employer - 'last', that is, not counting my subsequent self-employment - an American multi-national in the same packaging field. I was sales and marketing director. During my familiarisation / indoctrination in Baltimore in 1970, Simon and Garfunkels' Bridge Over Troubled Waters came out - and knocked me out. Me and a few million others. I will always identify the song and my own situation together, as I think one often does. Lena Martell died in less than auspicious circumstances and more's the pity for she was a very fine, very strong and very Scottish voice.
Red Hurley's How Great Thou Art.As a boy I was brought up in a strongly Salvation Army family. Perhaps it is this that attracts me to this song / hymn - well, that and the conviction as it is delivered through the voice of Red Hurley. Although not overtly 'religious' I maintain a belief in the goodness of mankind and the healing power of a Godhead. And I would think all of us can respond to the the poetry within lines like these …O Lord my God! When I in awesome wonderConsider all the works Thy hands have made.I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder,Thy power throughout the universe displayed.
The Battlefield Band's Island Earth No More.I first came here to the Highlands on holiday in 1971 and since then have read a great deal about the history of the Highlands and Highlands Clearances (i.e. for 'people' read 'sheep'). This song is based upon a work of that name in 1812 and, as adopted by The Battlefield Band, is partly based on a well-known pipe tune, The Flight of Eaglets. What resoubnding words! 'Island earth for folk no longer / Graze the sheep of tyrant lords / Waits the boat to sail the landless / Island earth for folk no more.'
Willie Nelson's Funny How Time Slips awayFunny how time slips away! Reading through these reflections I realise once more how very true that is. I came to Willie late on in life, I don't know why. But since I did he has become for me a bit of an icon. I know he has not always been a good boy and is certainly no role model, but for fierce independence, free spirit and depth of feeling he'll do for me. So, Willie Nelson is a good way with which to end this to and fro musical odyssey of mine.
******
I don't think Mike will fit in all of these, but still ... and I've written a special poem in honour of iur program sponsor, Myrtle Bank Hotel in Gairloch. Oh, and am ready to read a poem of Robert Burns with a nod to the Myrtle Bank and to Ian and Jean Macmillan, leading lights of our Wester-Ross Burns Club. Don't forget, www.2LR.co.uk 11.00 - 13,00 Sunday.
The Music - Some Personal Notes
Bob Dylan's Thunder On The Mountain I heard Dylan just after his first visit to the UK, at which time I was living with my young family in Ainsdale and working for a Liverpool packaging company. That would be around 1968, I think. Anyway, for the first time I realised the power of philosophical poetry delivered as real music. Here was a young man who could make us all 'think' about what was going on. Still can and still does. Truly, age shall not weary us - not all of us, at least.
Van Morrison and The Chieftains' Carrickfergus. Traditional music has always appealed to me, especially of Celtic origin whether Scottish or Irish. Irish it seems to me is generally a softer music; the words somehow more wistful. And Carrickfergus is a brilliant example. You either love or hate Van Morrison's gravelly delivery. I love it. I first heard Carrickfergus on a business trip to Belfast at the height of the Troubles - that would be in 1975 or so. Both sides respond to this one.
Giuseppe Verdi's Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves (sung here as Va Pensiero from the opera Nebucco, by The Israelite Choir) Dee and I travelled to North London to hear our daughter Kairen and granddaughter Ella sing this as part of an amateur Nebucco production. Around 1990 and it still stands my hair on end (not literally!). I don't find it surprising that, at Verdi's funeral, a huge cortege wound its way around the streets of Milan singing The Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves over and over and over. That remains the largest public assembly of any event in the history of Italy according to Wikipedia.
Sharia Twain's That Don't Impress Me Much When we lived near Winchester and our six progeny had scattered to the four winds we used to hold regular get-togethers in our old thatched cottage. Dee and I often talk about when the female grandchildren amongst them were growing into their teens and how they used to dance around in the kitchen to this Don't Impress Me Much (with their mothers and aunties). I don't know why this number in particular is the focus of our memory.
John Lennon's Beautiful BoyI was employed by a Liverpool company as a young man, undergoing training in the late 50's - early 60's. In the evenings I discovered places (clubs) like the Pink Parrott, the Jacaranda, The Ascot and of course The Cavern. I cannot claim to have foreseen the future for those shock-haired youths calling themselves the Beatles (Silver Beatles?) or indeed to have found their music especially memorable. It was only later, when they developed their own words and music, that the genius especially of one John Lennon became very, very apparent. And Beautiful Boy is one amongst many Lennon songs that really resonate with me personally.
Elkie Brooks's Lilac Wine.Why this one? Quite simply because for Dee and I it is a most lovely song, sung here most beautifully.
Elton John's Sacrifice.Again, I cannot claim to be a great aficionado of the music of Reginald Kenneth Dwight aka Elton John. I find his music too middle of everything and I actually loathed his Candle In The Wind offering at Diana's Westminster Abbey memorial. Sorry about the non-U expression but it seemed 'in very poor taste', or so I thought. I know I'm in a small minority here, especially considering that according to Wikipedia Elton comes behind only The Beatles and Madonna in the popularity stakes. However I listened to Sacrifice on a flight to Saudi Arabia in the mid-90's, immediately bought the CD and hardly stopped playing its title track as I travelled the dusty highways and byways of that desert country. Brilliant, brilliant.
Lena Martell's Bridge Over Troubled Waters. In 1969 I left the first of my lifetime employers and joined my second and last employer - 'last', that is, not counting my subsequent self-employment - an American multi-national in the same packaging field. I was sales and marketing director. During my familiarisation / indoctrination in Baltimore in 1970, Simon and Garfunkels' Bridge Over Troubled Waters came out - and knocked me out. Me and a few million others. I will always identify the song and my own situation together, as I think one often does. Lena Martell died in less than auspicious circumstances and more's the pity for she was a very fine, very strong and very Scottish voice.
Red Hurley's How Great Thou Art.As a boy I was brought up in a strongly Salvation Army family. Perhaps it is this that attracts me to this song / hymn - well, that and the conviction as it is delivered through the voice of Red Hurley. Although not overtly 'religious' I maintain a belief in the goodness of mankind and the healing power of a Godhead. And I would think all of us can respond to the the poetry within lines like these …O Lord my God! When I in awesome wonderConsider all the works Thy hands have made.I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder,Thy power throughout the universe displayed.
The Battlefield Band's Island Earth No More.I first came here to the Highlands on holiday in 1971 and since then have read a great deal about the history of the Highlands and Highlands Clearances (i.e. for 'people' read 'sheep'). This song is based upon a work of that name in 1812 and, as adopted by The Battlefield Band, is partly based on a well-known pipe tune, The Flight of Eaglets. What resoubnding words! 'Island earth for folk no longer / Graze the sheep of tyrant lords / Waits the boat to sail the landless / Island earth for folk no more.'
Willie Nelson's Funny How Time Slips awayFunny how time slips away! Reading through these reflections I realise once more how very true that is. I came to Willie late on in life, I don't know why. But since I did he has become for me a bit of an icon. I know he has not always been a good boy and is certainly no role model, but for fierce independence, free spirit and depth of feeling he'll do for me. So, Willie Nelson is a good way with which to end this to and fro musical odyssey of mine.
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I don't think Mike will fit in all of these, but still ... and I've written a special poem in honour of iur program sponsor, Myrtle Bank Hotel in Gairloch. Oh, and am ready to read a poem of Robert Burns with a nod to the Myrtle Bank and to Ian and Jean Macmillan, leading lights of our Wester-Ross Burns Club. Don't forget, www.2LR.co.uk 11.00 - 13,00 Sunday.
July 6, 2011
For Big Brother do not read News Of The World
I have no idea why we are always so shocked by the low end extremes, the depravity, of our fellow humans' behaviour. Lord knows we have seen quite enough of wars, pestilence, plague, genocide and bloody awful bad manners. By now we all ought to be inured to it thanks to the efforts of our so-called FREE PRESS.
There is a story well known (if unpublished) in Northern Ireland about a leading journalist at the height of the troubles. It seems that this gentleman, always the worse for drink, incarcerated himself on the top floor of a well-barricaded hotel in Belfast from where he sent his headlines across the world. All hearsay reporting of course, except the photo sequences. One of these showed a rioting crowd rushing the camera position, ostensibly as a prelude to a sectarian killing. Actually the guy with the camera had been stationed outside a football ground as the match finished. He caught the home team fans celebrating their victory. Well done!
How much is the news actually made or at least heavily influenced by a media so good at the surrepticious pouring of petrol on to small fires in order to make a big conflagrations? That's one question and this is the other; why do we need to know? Does my life or your life or anyone's life benefit from knowing exactly how the latest sex crime took place? I think not. And what, really, is the point of 'news' that is of no direct concern to us and that we can do nothing about anyway? Sure I feel bad about mass starvation in the horn of Africa but I cannot stop the promiscuous over-breeding that leads to those situations. I cannot force the rains to come.
I grew up in times of war when all news was heavily censored. Nobody had a problem with that but when the war was over censorship became a dirty word. The News Of The World, known colloquially as The Screws Of The World has now become so far outside the bounds of decency as to prey on the deaths of little children in order to make another few bucks. Mr bloody Murdoch and your nasty cohorts, your behaviour is intolerable, truly execrable. You should at least be censored constantly but preferably jailed for a very long time. Your money-grab tactics, your encouragement of sick voyeurism and the human suffering you continue to cause deserves no less.
Preferably, your so-called 'newspaper' should be closed for all time. But how can any of that happen when by some accounts you have our police, our Law and our prime minister so comfortably (comfortingly) in your pocket?
There is a story well known (if unpublished) in Northern Ireland about a leading journalist at the height of the troubles. It seems that this gentleman, always the worse for drink, incarcerated himself on the top floor of a well-barricaded hotel in Belfast from where he sent his headlines across the world. All hearsay reporting of course, except the photo sequences. One of these showed a rioting crowd rushing the camera position, ostensibly as a prelude to a sectarian killing. Actually the guy with the camera had been stationed outside a football ground as the match finished. He caught the home team fans celebrating their victory. Well done!
How much is the news actually made or at least heavily influenced by a media so good at the surrepticious pouring of petrol on to small fires in order to make a big conflagrations? That's one question and this is the other; why do we need to know? Does my life or your life or anyone's life benefit from knowing exactly how the latest sex crime took place? I think not. And what, really, is the point of 'news' that is of no direct concern to us and that we can do nothing about anyway? Sure I feel bad about mass starvation in the horn of Africa but I cannot stop the promiscuous over-breeding that leads to those situations. I cannot force the rains to come.
I grew up in times of war when all news was heavily censored. Nobody had a problem with that but when the war was over censorship became a dirty word. The News Of The World, known colloquially as The Screws Of The World has now become so far outside the bounds of decency as to prey on the deaths of little children in order to make another few bucks. Mr bloody Murdoch and your nasty cohorts, your behaviour is intolerable, truly execrable. You should at least be censored constantly but preferably jailed for a very long time. Your money-grab tactics, your encouragement of sick voyeurism and the human suffering you continue to cause deserves no less.
Preferably, your so-called 'newspaper' should be closed for all time. But how can any of that happen when by some accounts you have our police, our Law and our prime minister so comfortably (comfortingly) in your pocket?
July 5, 2011
There's a big train coming.
Ten years ago a Saudi sheikh informed me privately that Capitalism would soon follow Communism into the history books. 'Yes? What's left after that?' I asked him. 'God plus mankind and the other 99.9999 percent of planet earth that is not capital,' he said, 'So what is the problem?'
I am reminded ... in the light of today's headlines from Wall Street maybe the guy was right after all.
If he is, then, as usual, those in charge of the system are wholly responsible for its decay and destruction. No need to go into the excesses of people put in charge of great establishments, the years of massive self-enrichment without the risk of losing personal penny number one, the unbelievable (I mean literally unbelievable) failure of these God-like creatures in ivory towers to see the approaching iceberg; reckless lending and borrowing by the banks, naturally followed by billions of individuals wanting to feel good and to hell with payback time ...
But I see nobody throwing themselves out of those high towers, nobody arraigned before a court of law on charges of grand larceny. I only hope that, if my friendly sheikh was indeed right, the collapse of capitalism is not to be swiftly followed by the collapse of the Law.
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There are few irritants to equal the 'I-told-you-so' mantra. So - I'm sorry, because I wrote the foregoing blog page on the 15th September 2008. Batten down the hatches, folks.
I am reminded ... in the light of today's headlines from Wall Street maybe the guy was right after all.
If he is, then, as usual, those in charge of the system are wholly responsible for its decay and destruction. No need to go into the excesses of people put in charge of great establishments, the years of massive self-enrichment without the risk of losing personal penny number one, the unbelievable (I mean literally unbelievable) failure of these God-like creatures in ivory towers to see the approaching iceberg; reckless lending and borrowing by the banks, naturally followed by billions of individuals wanting to feel good and to hell with payback time ...
But I see nobody throwing themselves out of those high towers, nobody arraigned before a court of law on charges of grand larceny. I only hope that, if my friendly sheikh was indeed right, the collapse of capitalism is not to be swiftly followed by the collapse of the Law.
***********
There are few irritants to equal the 'I-told-you-so' mantra. So - I'm sorry, because I wrote the foregoing blog page on the 15th September 2008. Batten down the hatches, folks.
July 4, 2011
Vive le difference
The other day I showed my original (25 years old) painting of The Salmon Beach alongside a painting of the same subject just completed. Which, I wondered on this blog, is best? One respondent was kind enough to point out, correctly, that the question should have been which is 'the better' (not 'the best') but all were unequivocably in favour of the old one, their stated reasons being many and varied. I've been puzzling myself over this. In theory opinions should have been roughly equal - but if anything biased towards the new picture on the grounds that practice makes more perfect. Anyway the upshot is that I have decided to go back to the easel with the new Salmon Beach picture. I plan to inject some of the received wisdom and some new thoughts of my own and the results should be here on line in the next week or two. We shall see ...
Meantime I've finished another new painting commission and the results have gone off to my client. I won't be going into the background rationale as it is a matter private to the commissioner. Suffice to say that my original 'Seabank - Midsummer Midnight' had been seen and admired and that a new version of the same cottage was requested.
After much walking in all weathers and stages of the tide around the cottage and the shores of Loch Ewe this (below) is the outcome ... I have included my original 'Seabank' (the one that's above the other) to show how very different in 'feel' can be an artist's take on the same thing.
I will not be asking which one is the better!!
Claude Monet painted the same haystack more than a dozen times. Ditto that cathedral. Ditto his watergarden. As for Vincent and his lovely sunflowers ....
Meantime I've finished another new painting commission and the results have gone off to my client. I won't be going into the background rationale as it is a matter private to the commissioner. Suffice to say that my original 'Seabank - Midsummer Midnight' had been seen and admired and that a new version of the same cottage was requested.
After much walking in all weathers and stages of the tide around the cottage and the shores of Loch Ewe this (below) is the outcome ... I have included my original 'Seabank' (the one that's above the other) to show how very different in 'feel' can be an artist's take on the same thing.
I will not be asking which one is the better!!Claude Monet painted the same haystack more than a dozen times. Ditto that cathedral. Ditto his watergarden. As for Vincent and his lovely sunflowers ....
