Trendy But Casual

New Zealand in Berlin

TM and I are just back from Berlin, where I was taking part in an event called the Berlin Sofa at the English Theatre. Peter Rider, the New Zealand ambassador to Germany, invited me to join him so we could present a short program on NZ lit, with lots of readings and chat.

We divided our presentation into four sections - The Edge of the Universe; This Sporting Life; Islanders; and Flying Kiwi.

The Edge of the Universe - our unique place in the world

‘New Zealand begins with sea and ends with sea. Understand this and you begin to comprehend New Zealand and the New Zealander.’ Maurice Shadbolt

 Poems by Bill Manhire (‘Milky Way Bar’); Allen Curnow (‘House and Land’), and Denis Glover ('Home Thoughts'); part of the story ‘The Doll’s House’ by Katherine Mansfield; the final page of Making Peoples by historian James Belich; and two novel excerpts: The Matriarch by Witi Ihimaera and Tu by Patricia Grace.

This Sporting Life - our national obsession

‘Apart from history, there are only two spheres in which New Zealand has been a world superpower. One is the export of protein. The other is sport.’ James Belich

 Excerpts from two novels - The Book of Fame by Lloyd Jones and Lovelock by James McNeish, and my father's favourite poem,  ‘Referee’ by Hinemoana Baker.

Islanders - voices from the edge

“In a country inhabited for a mere one thousand years, everyone is an immigrant or the descendent of an immigrant.” Michael King

An excerpt from the novel Going West by Maurice Gee, and poems by Selina Tusitala March (‘Guys Like Gauguin’); Sonja Yelich (‘talking to a brick wall’); Tusiata Avia (‘Aunty Lapo’a calls Nafanua and talks about her holiday’); Alison Wong (‘Chinese Settlement, Arrowtown’ and ‘One Hundred Pounds’); and Karlo Mila ('Sacred Pulu').

Flying Kiwi - writers (and books) that roam

“The islands are moving.” Dylan Horrocks

Excerpts from two novels - The Conductor by Sarah Quigley and Rangatira (by me) and from the essay ‘NZ Return’ by the late, great Nigel Cox.

In addition to the readings, we showed various clips, beginning with clip of the All Blacks' haka (there was method to this madness - believe me: we wanted to talk about oral traditions, and also about exploring NZ BEYOND the All Blacks), then a short film about our books and writers made when New Zealand was invited to be 2012 Guest of Honour at the Frankfurt Book Fair. At the end of the second section, just before the break - for a good deal of NZ wine - we showed an amazing clip of Jack Lovelock winning the 1500 metres and breaking the world record at the Berlin Olympics in 1936, with a commentary by Harold Abrahams. At the medal ceremony, by the way, the anthem played was God Save the King ...

During the 'pause' we played some footage from the Diversity Stage at Polyfest, so people could see the range of cultures and languages represented in Auckland high schools. You can see the 2012 performances here. At the very end of the programme, after we talked about possible futures for NZ lit, and emerging new voices. So of course we couldn't resist ending with a clip of Joshua Iosefo's 'Brown Brother' speech. You can see the original and the TV3 version on YouTube.

The event was quite a success, I think, with a good-sized audience of both native English- and German-speakers. Peter Rider was an excellent reader, and I hammed it up, as ever. Lots of audience members wanted to hang around and talk afterwards. We wanted to include more excerpts, but time was limited, of course. The audience especially liked the third section, even though there were numerous cultural references (and words from various languages) that were new to them. People were willing to make the imaginative leap, and to immerse themselves in the unexpected, the unfamiliar ... Unlike a certain profoundly ignorant Danish politician.

I loved being in Berlin. I like the way cities jolt me out of routine, the way they swarm over me with their new noises and sights and smells. (And tastes, too: let's not forget currywurst.) The picture above is us in the dome of the Reichstag. Below are a few more Berlin pictures - random, of course, as I can't seem to manage anything orderly these days.

 

So Much Germany

We're going back to Germany this weekend, so I can take part in The Berlin Sofa event at the English Theatre there on Monday night. We have lots of poems and excerpts from novels and non-fiction to read, and lots to talk about, so I hope we can fit it all in.

TMiddy is coming along, but it's unlikely that Berlin can match Hamburg for him - for this reason:

 

He can only be John Lennon in Hamburg.

Tom Time

We live in Sheffield now, apparently. The last two weeks have been about packing and unpacking, lugging and wheezing, driving up and down the country. After almost five hours of carrying furniture and boxes down three flights of stairs, our East End movers were exhausted. (“Thank God that’s over,” one said.) The next day they had to set off at five AM to drive to Yorkshire. We live on the ground floor now, so moving us in only took them two hours. I think it’ll take us about two months to unpack.

We like it here, though we still can’t find a post office. At night the only noise is the rushing of the river, Porter Brook. It sounds like tropical rain.

I’m on a book deadline, so won’t write much here today. Here’s the story catch-up, for those of you following the game:

 

Story #56: ‘The Light of the World’ by Ernest Hemingway (1933)

Story #57: ‘Her Table Spread’ by Elizabeth Bowen (1930)

Story #58: ‘A Tale of the Cavalry’ by Hugo Von Hoffmansthal (1898)

Story #59: ‘I Am an American’ by James Alan McPherson (1974)

Story #60: ‘The Night Face Up’ by Julio Cortazar (1967)

Story #61: ‘The Visit’ by Stephen Millhauser (1998)

Story #62: ‘Troll Bridge’ by Neil Gaiman (1999)

Story #63: ‘7 PM Wife’ by Dan Lungu (2005)

Story #64: ‘What You Hear From ‘Em?’ by Peter Taylor (1968)

Story #65: ‘Making Father Pay’ by Frank Sargeson (1975)

Story #66: ‘The Eye of the Maples’ by Ieva Toleikyte (2011)

Story #67: ‘The Story of the Siren’ by E. M. Forster (1928)

Story #68: ‘Thunder Snow’ by Ari Behn (2011)

Story #69: ‘My Aunt Gold Teeth’ by V. S. Naipaul (1958)

Story #70: ‘Aurelia Frequenzia Reveals the Heart and Mind of the Man of Destiny’ by Richard Stern (1976)

Story #71: ‘Swans’ by Janet Frame (1951)

Story #72: ‘Connie Bronson’ by Marilynne Robinson (1986)

Story #73: ‘The Rule of Jenny Pen’ by Owen Marshall (1992)

Story #74: ‘You Leave Them’ by Mona Simpson (1985)

 

Recently, on one of our many long drives, TM announced his intention to have his own show on BBC Radio Sheffield. We agreed that it should be called ‘Tom Time.’

PM: You could have phone-ins.

TM: I could have phone-ins and cut people off.

PM: You would be good at that.

TM: I could have a segment where I predict the lyrics of songs.

PM: You could have a segment called ‘Tom Knows Best.’

TM: That would be the whole show. And it would have to be an afternoon show, because I like to sleep late, and I get tired in the evenings.

 

Packing, and Playing with Dolls

 

We’re packing up in preparation for the move from Glasgow to Sheffield, interspersed with showing prospective tenants around the flat and obsessive readings of the IKEA catalogue. Also, on Friday evening, we went to see the film ARGO, which I enjoyed very much. (And the setting inspired me to read a particular short story on Saturday - #54 in the list.)

The story-reading goes on, of course, despite all the distractions.

Story #49: ‘Pornography’ by Ian McEwan (1978)

Story #50: ‘Starring Gary Cooper’ by William Gay (2013)

Story #51: ‘Angel Baby Blues’ by Wanda Coleman (1987)

Story #52: ‘Only the Dead Know Brooklyn’ by Thomas Wolfe (1935)

Story #53: ‘The Pedestrian’ by Ray Bradbury (1953)

Story #54: ‘Tehran Calling’ by Nam Le (2008)

Story #55: “Grand Froid’ by Paul Emond (2011)

Today we were sorting through tubs and boxes, and packing things to take down to Sheffield this week when I go down for work. Of course, while TMiddy laboured and cleaned and packed, I was concerned with the most important things.

There was a short interruption so I could do some remedial hair-brushing (of  dolls’ hair, not my own), and a bout of dressing-up.

 

These dresses were made for my dolls by my great-aunt, Auntie Violet, sometime in 1980, when I was fourteen. The white dress was made with scraps from my sister’s wedding dress; the pink dress was made with leftover pieces from my own bridesmaid dress.

Those dresses that Auntie made, and the clothes my grandmother made seven or so years earlier for my then-new Barbie, are among my most treasured things. I was so delighted to get these, and conscious – even then – of how much time and care had gone into them. What I didn’t realize, I think, was the love that went into them as well.

If you’re wondering why I was still playing with dolls when I was fourteen, you should know that I continued for some years after that. I should never have given them up.

In the Land of Dreamy Dreams

Much of this week was consumed by illness, which continues to nibble at my time and occasionally to gnaw huge chunks of it: I can’t get up in the morning, and want to spend all my afternoons sleeping. This week my ears were painful, aching the way they did when my brother and I were children and spent too much time in the water.

But among all the sleeping and dreaming there was also time for a snowy train trip down to Sheffield and back – to teach – and time to read some stories.

39: ‘Defender of the Faith’ by Philip Roth (1959)

40: ‘Ashes’ by Cristina Henriquez (2006)

41: ‘A Fire at Sea’ by Turgenev (1883)

42: ‘Super Goat Man’ by Jonathan Lethem (2004)

43: ‘The Imposter’ by Nathaneal West (c. 1931)

44: ‘The Sins of the Wolf’ by Lasha Bugadze (2010)

45: ‘Bella-Vista’ by Colette (1937)

46: ‘Helix’ by Banana Yoshimoto (1993)

47: ‘Golden Land’ by William Faulkner (1935)

48: ‘The Real Thing’ by Diana Athill (1958)

Reading a story a day is a good discipline for me, I think, as well as introducing me to new writers and making me delve deeper into the work of writers I think I know. It means I have to read some obscure things by writers with whom I’m quite familiar; it also means I’m addressing some horrible gaps in my reading. I mean, I should have read ‘Bella-Vista,’ one of Colette’s most famous stories, by now.  (How late it was, how late.)

All this sleeping has brought with it some strange dreams featuring famous people. In one, a surly Steve Coogan threatened me with legal action if I continued writing my own Alan Partridge scripts to entertain my friends; he even sent Rob Brydon over to warn me off. In another, I suspected Everton manager David Moyes of planning to murder me. These dreams of malign public figures may relate to something I’ve been plotting for a while, a blog ‘written’ by Jane Shore, the protagonist of Trendy But Casual. Jane is still a publicist, but these days she has a number of very famous clients. Maybe I’m worried about the trouble Jane’s indiscreet revelations may cause. Like the time Kierkegaard said bad things about Hegel and Goethe, and they sent Rob Brydon over to warn him off.

'In the Land of Dreamy Dreams' is  the title of the first story collection by Ellen Gilchrist, by the way, which I encourage you to seek out.

A Twist in the Tale

This week I started my new (part-time) job at the University of Sheffield. We still live in Glasgow, so at the moment the commute is kind of long, especially when it’s snowing. But soon we’ll be moving house: TM’s eighth move since we met, and my seventh. (The first was his traumatic move across the East River, still referred to as “when you made me live in Brooklyn.”)

We’ve found a flat to rent in Sheffield in a Victorian factory, overlooking a very small branch of Porter Brook – where it whooshes over a culvert – and the derelict buildings on its far bank. The flat may or may not be big enough for us, but the ceilings are high, and I can walk to my office. TM has grand plans for the space that I fear means a return of the shelf-building sickness.

My story-reading project – one a day – is ongoing. More men in this batch, I see.

25: ‘Solitude’ by William Trevor (2004)

26: 'A Short Trip Home’ by F. Scott Fitzgerald (1927)

27: ‘A Christmas in Wyoming’ by Ellen Gilchrist (2002)

28: ‘The Lover’ by Andre Dubus (1991)

29: ‘De Daumier Smith’s Blue Period’ by J.D. Salinger (1948)

30: ‘Worlds Apart’ by Penelope Fitzgerald (1983)

31: ‘The Umbrella’ by Hanif Kureishi (1999)

32: ‘The Dog of the Marriage’ by Amy Hempel (2005)

33: ‘Cheers’ by Helen Simpson (2001)

34: ‘An Unfinished Story’ by O. Henry (1906)

35: ‘This Nib for Hire’ by Woody Allen (2007)

36: ‘Blood Soup’ by Stuart Dybek (1980)

37: ‘A Final Report’ by William Maxwell (1963)

38: ‘Miss Lora’ by Junot Diaz (2012)

Hopefully securing the flat in Sheffield and getting settled at the university will put an end to my anxiety dreams, which are ridiculous right now. This morning I woke up convinced I’d a) stood up two friends for dinner and the theatre in Harrogate, just because I couldn’t finish putting on my make-up; and b) missed a crucial deadline for a Listener feature about a graphic novel by Russell Brand.

In other news, my latest YA novel, UNBROKEN, has been published in the US by Scholastic. It’s a sequel to RUINED, and it just got a nice review from Kirkus.

If there’s anyone under eighteen reading this blog, please note that my second YA novel, DARK SOULS, is not a sequel to anything. It’s set in (old) York, not New Orleans. Will it get its own sequel? Maybe. First I have to move house.

Stories, ongoing

A quick update on my New Year’s Resolution to read a short story every day. Today is January 24, so I’m up to 24 stories. TM and I have been on the road, looking for somewhere cheap and big to live in Yorkshire, so a few of the stories were found in an anthology – The Persephone Book of Short Stories – taken along for the ride.

15: ‘Rain’ by W. Somerset Maugham (1920)

16: ‘The Reptile Garden’ by Louise Erdrich (2008)

17: ‘Here We Are’ by Dorothy Parker (1931)

18: ‘The Orphan’ by Nell Freudenberger (2003)

19: ‘The Martyr’ by Katherine Anne Porter (1923)

20: ‘The Photograph’ by Phyllis Bentley (1935)

21: ‘A View of Exmoor’ by Sylvia Townsend Warner (1948)

22: ‘Fort Wayne is Seventh on Hitler’s List’ by Michael Martone (1990)

23: ‘Mkondo’ by Anthony Doerr (2002)

24: ‘A Parisian Affair’ by Maupassant (1881)

At this point, everything is still new to me – or, at least, if I’ve read the story before, I don’t remember it. This is what happens as you slide towards the grave, according to TM.

Today we moved all the books and most of the papers out of my office in Stirling, so the end of that particular story now seems more real and imminent. Not short enough, perhaps.

During our trip, I questioned TM about the language of the olden days, when he was a lad.

PM: Did you say things like ‘bread’ instead of money?

TM: No.

PM: Did you say ‘far out’?

TM: No.

PM: Did you say ‘groovy’?

TM: No. I don’t know anyone who said that.

PM: Well, Greg Brady said it all the time on The Brady Bunch, but whatever. Did you call people ‘man’?

TM: Yes. It’s a useful thing.

PM: What about ‘dude’?

TM: That came later.

PM: Did you like the song ‘Wooly Bully’? [Note: this is one of my favorite songs]

TM: Yes. But I thought it was a bit gimmicky.

PM: Do you think Neil Young is a good singer? [Note: I do not think this.]

TM: I’m not going to answer that question.

I find that this kind of intellectual exchange – like the ones Wordsworth used to have with Coleridge, say, during a hearty stride across the fells – helps to pass time driving up and down the M6.

 

 

Habits, hobbies, resolutions

Recently TM told me that my hobbies were not actual hobbies. A harsh verdict, I feel. My hobbies are watching TV while lying down (in bed or on sofa); doing jigsaws; and being driven around in cars. What’s wrong with these?

I don’t count reading and writing as hobbies. They’re work. Enjoyable and rewarding work, but still. And they’re more than work, of course, more than hobbies. They’re a necessary part of every day.

My other interests, by the way, include cooking; browsing the marketplace/eating Swedish meatballs at IKEA; looking up Merrill paper dolls and coloring books on Ebay; and turning this year’s Christmas cards into next year’s gift tags. But I don’t know that any of these count as hobbies, really. Especially the IKEA one, as I get to go there so rarely. (We don’t have a car, and anyway, you have to keep the magic alive.)

One of my new year’s resolutions has more to do with work than hobbies. It’s to read a short story every day. A published short story: student work doesn’t count. (Students will understand.) No particular rules to this resolution, though I’m trying to read as much as possible that’s new to me, and I hope to range around in time and country of origin throughout the year.

Not much ranging has been possible so far. Because I’ve been traveling – in the US, hence American spelling here – most of the stories this past week have been found on the New Yorker web site. I’ve been doing research on Jean Rhys at the University of Tulsa library, thanks to a Carnegie Grant. It’s been an enormously productive week, with the added benefit of proximity to Route 66 and fantastic Tex-Mex food. Here is a picture of Tulsa.

Today is the fourteenth day of January, so I’ve read fourteen short stories.

Stories so far:

1.  ‘In the Penal Colony’ by Kafka (1914; published 1919).

2. ‘Love in the Slump’ by Evelyn Waugh (1932).

3. ‘The Girl Who Left Her Sock on the Floor’ by Deborah Eisenberg (1994).

4. ‘Heaven-Hell’ by Jhumpa Lahiri (2008).

5. ‘The Immortal’ by Jorge Luis Borges (1949).

6. ‘The Lost Order’ by Rivka Galchen (2013).

7. ‘Night Out 1925’ by Jean Rhys (published in 1976 but written much earlier).

8, ‘Creative Writing’ by Edgar Keret (2012).

9: ‘The Semplica Girl Diaries’ by George Saunders (2012).

10: ‘Elsie by Starlight’ by John Updike (2004).

11: ‘Paper Losses’ by Lorrie Moore (2006).

12: ‘Starlight’ by Ann Beattie (2011).

13: ‘Bull’ by Mo Yan (2012).

14: ‘Experience’ by Tessa Hadley (2013).

I will not be impudent enough to give reviews of any story or – horror of horrors – assign a star rating. If I were in charge of things in the world, as I so clearly should be, I would force everyone to go cold turkey on star ratings for a while. Just a few months, maybe, so people could take a break from pronouncing their opinions and verdicts and prejudices, and deciding whether they liked something or not, and lying awake at night pondering whether they need to deduct half a star because there aren’t enough special features on a DVD …

But I guess I can share some favorite quotes without violating the review rule. So far: ‘Nothing can happen in England’ (Waugh) and ‘Actually have never been to Europe myself. Dad felt portion sizes there too small’ (Saunders).

Please join me in my story-reading hobby-resolution-thing, even if it’s just for a week or a month. I’ll keep updating my list here. You can send me story suggestions as well, but I may not pay any attention. There are enough short stories in anthologies and collections on our book shelves to keep me busy for several years, and TM keeps Suggesting Things, needless to say.

By the way, during a recent Skype session with a class in Illinois, the librarian told me that my hobbies are quite similar to those of her students – especially being driven around in cars. But she pointed out that this is because they are eighth-graders, and too young to drive themselves.

 

2012: The Year in Jigsaws

This year, as well as going to work, writing things, promoting things, travelling back and forth to New Zealand and Germany, watching anything that mentioned the words 'Olympics' or 'Jubilee,'  (sporadic) cooking and (persistent) talking too much, I've done a lot of jigsaws. Twelve, in fact. All of them a thousand pieces, aside from the two jigsaws that annoyingly had one piece missing.

Before any of you decide to tell me how much time I must have to indulge in such a retirement-age pursuit, please remember the following: a) that I wrote a book this year (UNBROKEN, which Scholastic U.S.is publishing in February); and b) jigsaws were the only thing that seemed to keep me distracted, i.e. sane, through some difficult times.

So here they are, in more or less chronological order, starting with the one begun last Christmas.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I think that the second one (the antique map of the world) was the hardest, and the Gorey puzzle was the easiest. TMiddy chose the WWII fighter planes one, even though I pointed out the excess of sky. As you can probably guess, about half of these were bought from the London Transport Museum. Two of them - Waterloo Station and the Jubilee jigsaw - I did a second time, when I had nothing new on hand and was beginning to feel jigsaw withdrawal.

Work has already begun on a new puzzle, a fiendishly difficult Renoir painting (note to Impressionist painters: you weren't really thinking ahead to jigsaw renditions of your art when you did all that blurry brushwork), and I have a follow-up ready to start. I may as well begin 2013 as I mean to go on.

 

Christmas flora and fauna

As threatened yesterday, here's a seasonal update.

It's early winter in Glasgow: frost, snow, sunshine. George Square has switched on the Christmas lights, to the despair of the taxi driver who took me to the station this morning. ("Why do thousands of people turn up to watch? The lights are the same every year!") Then I said that I thought the Blitz-like firework display was an unnecessary addition to the switching-on ceremony, and that the money would be better spent clearing ice from the streets. Then the taxi driver told me that he didn't really believe in global warming, and we agreed to disagree.

On Saturday TMiddy and I threw our annual Christmas party. We've hosted these in New York, in Iowa City, in New Orleans, and in Glasgow. Next year: Sheffield? A few weeks ago I bought an amaryllis bulb, timed to bloom in all its extravagant red profusion just before our party. And so it did. But on the morning of the party, when we were out of the house buying ice and prosecco and other necessities, the amaryllis decided to kill itself.

Undeterred, we pressed on with the party. We'd made a ham, after all.

And other yummy food too, of the feeding-a-crowd variety:

We even turned on the log-fire DVD, though it makes everyone feel hot FOR NO REASON.

And afterwards we were left with the gnawed remnants of ham, a poinsettia given to us in lieu of the recently deceased amaryllis, a dozen sodden tea towels, and a lot of washing up.

The next day, the dryer transformed one of the tea towels into an origami bird, and TMiddy was almost persuaded to get out the iron for the second time in two days. But then we came to our senses, and lay around watching HOMELAND instead.

We're neck-deep in Christmas cards now - as ever, the ones we're sending rather than receiving. I asked my students this year if they'd consider sending a card to someone elderly - a grandparent or older relative, a neighbour, a family friend, a former teacher. Some of them seemed keen on the idea, or at least willing to humour me. If any of you out there would consider doing the same - sending a holiday card to someone elderly not usually on your list - it would be a good thing, I think.

TMiddy has turned on the electric blanket. Like the George Square Christmas decorations, it's the same every winter.