You might be surprised, or disappointed, to learn that Bad Shoes Festival is not about your embarrassing footwear.
Instead, it is collaboration between Bad Language Manchester and Shoe String Magazine, two budding young writery projects from Manchester. Their aim is to create an exciting, interactive arts festival that will bring all ages and lovers or all art forms together for one Sunday afternoon.
The event will take place on Sunday 25th September from 12.30pm, in two venues across Chorlton, Manchester; Electrik and Dulicmer. The Dulcimer will be home to music and art exhibitions and just down the road, Electrik will host a spoken word stage, craft stalls and book stalls for you to spend your guilty Sunday pennies.
There will be secret interactive art projects, and writing competitions to get involved with throughout the day, and yes, there will indeed be bad shoes to be won.
So.... Exciting things that have been happening since I last blogged.....
Bad Language have the third anthology designed and complete and in the post! The title is Electric Sky after Fergus Evans poem The Hurricane. You can view a sneak peak of the front cover here, designed by local artist Laura Richardson. The book launch will take place on Wednesday 25th May at the usual venue of The Castle Hotel. You can invite yourself along here
.
Flash Mob Writing Competition have announced their short list and I'm one of the 12! The other's shortlisted are here.
The winner and 2 runners up will be annouced at the Flash Mob Literary Salon next week on Thursday 26th May as part of Chorlton Arts Festival. The event will be broadcast live on Chorlton FM! Come and invite yourself along.
And one last exciting thing just to give you a good Saturday.... Tonight is the final night for Station Stories. Station Stories is a live literature performance taking place at Manchester Piccadilly station using digital technology and improvised electronic sound. Six writers read specifically comissioned stories to a private audience through headphones. I'm going to the 7pm viewing which I think is the very last show so watch this space for an update.
Bad Language will now be taking part in somethingeveryday which is a website that Max Wallis originally set up to challenge himself to write something new everyday. For 2011 he has decided to 'lease' the site to various writers, poets, small presses for them to write something new everyday.
You can follow our progress via the website and feel free to comment on it and let us know what you think!
Also just to finish, here is a video of other editor of Bad Language, Daniel Carpenter, from his performance at This is May Day last night.
Also may I add to that list buying nearly a whole bookshelf of books and writing more poetry than normal. Hooray! If only I had more time to read them. Here's a few thoughts gathered on March. Bad Language took place this month at The Castle Hotel as normal, all except for the fact that it was moved forwards one week to the 23rd March rather then the last Wednesday of the month. As usual me, Dan, and Joe ran the night and the entertainment was provided by a long list of quality open micers. The theme, rather unintentionally seemed to vere towards poo, as quite a few writers seemed to feature a horrible poo story one way or another in their piece. The night's very special guest was Gerry Potter, a brilliant performance poet who has had two books published, PLANET YOUNG and PLANET MIDDLE AGE both available from http://www.flapjackpress.co.uk/. It was good to see a few new faces down for the night including Matt Tuckey and Nija Dala. We'll be specially reserving a few places each month for brand newcomers from now on just to stir things up a bit! Stir Stir Stir...
Another exciting thing which has taken place this month was Frankenstein by the National Theatre Live which I was lucky enough to see on the second try. I watched it broadcast live at The Cornerhouse in Manchester and although the experience lacked the atmosphere you would get from a live theatre show I wouldn't have missed it for the world. Highlights were the stage lights which were built of hundreds of different types of lightbulbs hanging above the stage and flickering in various motions. It looked like afterthoughts of fireworks cracking as you anticipated something exciting about to happen. Also a steamtrain that drove right through the middle of the stage on a track! Lowlights were a few wobbling camera technical faults and a small amount of wooden actors (not literally) but I won't name names.
Benedict Cumberbatch and Jonny Lee Miller swapped roles of the Creature and Victor each night which I imagine is an extremely challenging thing for an actor to do; working on two roles in depth and rotating when the nights you play them, though at the same time refreshing to take a break from such an intense role as the Creature. What I find more fascinating is the two different approaches the actors took to playing the Creature. One stated that he copied his 4 year old son learning new things and brought this childlike element to the role. The other stated that he watched stroke victims in recovery; a fully grown mind trying to remember what it's like to function normally. Two very different approaches but they both worked, so I hear. I only got to see one of the nights so I can't make an accurate comparison. I love the sound of the bell in this trailer. It's the same bell that opened the play as the Creature was born.
This month I forced myself to read Running Dog by Don Delillo. I say forced, not because I didn't enjoy it but because it's quite hard to keep your patience whilst trying to figure out what's happening in the plot. Despite there being too many character and plotlines, the style of writing kept me gripped so I found I didn't need to follow every detail to enjoy the book. What let the book down was the failure to establish which character storyline each chapter or paragraph opened with (as it changed that quickly) due the lack of name use and individual characteristics which could help to identify this. I love, however, the fast paced dialogue and how two characters can have completely different conversations in the same moment.
I'm now reading Haruki Murakami's What I Talk About When I Talk About Running (notice the unintentional running theme!) As a new runner I hope to find something in this book to keep me inspired to run. What amazes me about the book is it proves what I have always thought about good writers; that to be a good writer, you can write any subject and still build a story from it. It's about the angle you take on the story and the language used, rather than exceptional plot.
Exciting things happening in April:
NapoWrimo - A bit like NaNo WriMo (National Novel Writing Month) but with poetry. The aim is to write a poem every day for the full month of April and potentially publish it somewhere on the internet so people can see who's taking part. Bad Language will be taking part and I will be attempting to post a poem a day on here.
Flash Mob Writing Competition - As part of this years Chorlton Arts Festival Flash Mob will be running a writing competition for stories of 500 words or under. There will also be a snazzy prize giving ceremony and live event OOoooooOOO! So get writing and booking. More details on the website.
Bad Language - Yes. As per usual Bad Language will be hosting a live literature event at The Castle Hotel in Manchester and this time it will be in it's usual spot of the last Wednesday of April. The very special headline act will be Rod Tame who is a performance artist, actor and host of Write Out Loud Sale and Rhyme and Dine at Manchester’s Earth Cafe.
I leave you with a photo of the inside of a castle ruins to see if it scares you. It reminds me of how a headache feels. Happy April!
Bad Language will be running another brilliant night of poetry, prose, general amusement with a fantastic special guest, Jo Bell.
From her website: "Jo is a writer and performer, facilitator, workshop leader, editor, live literature promoter and manager of creative projects across the UK. Her main job is to co-ordinate National Poetry Day, for which she is the Director. She is also a director of Living Derby and a trustee of Ledbury Poetry Festival.
Jo devised the online/ hard copy writing project Bugged and is currently writing a play for young people with Action Transport Theatre."
The last Bad Language event took place on Wednesday 26th January at the cosy Castle Hotel (which ironically is not a hotel) in Manchester. David Gaffney was the guest slot and read from his new book The Half Life of Songs complimented with other Powerpoint stories. Accompanying this there was an interesting mix of performance poetry, short stories and improv pieces. I think my favourite piece of the night was Bad Language's very own Joe Daly and his slightly unerving piece about a stalker.
The most creative performances of the night (bar David Gaffney's) were Fat Roland's, who performed a piece in letter stuffed in percarious places around his body, and the latest piece from 330 Words, Joely Black's Stalker. I read a new piece based on Deansgate in Manchester about the disillusion that the build up to new years can bring. I'm currently doing a few more edits before I consider submitting this piece to Rainy City Stories.
Exciting Bad Language news is that our submissions are now open for the third anthology. You can come along to the next Bad Langauge @ The Castle event on the 23rd Feb and test out your new piece ready to submit. Jo Bell will be headlining the next event which I'm very exciting about! There are still open mic slots available so if you're interested email: events@badlanguagemcr.co.uk for a slot! They're running out fast so hurry.
Jo Bell has now taken over the website for Something Every Day, which Bad Language will be hosting in May. We said goodbye to Anna McCrory's at the end of January following a month of quirky poems about everyday problems, and welcomed Jo's experiemental, sometimes bitter poems. I'm enjoying the links she includes to the places she gets inspiration from as well.
Here's a picture of Jo Bell reading at the last Bad Langiage event so you know what to expect for February:
One of my favourite stories of the month is from someone who was featured in the last Bad Lanaguage book Scattered Reds, David Hartly. He's had a story published at Rainy City Stories called The Primark Invasion, and for those of you who have visited the Primark in Picadilly Gardens before, it's not hard to imagine.
I went to see Black Swan with Daniel Carpenter the other day and am left with images of nail files being stabbed in faces. It's an entertaining film at face value but take a look at Daniel Carpenters blog about what is wrong with the film overall - spoiler warning!
I leave you with some more calming pictures of peoples backs.... at least it made me feel like taking a walk on a summers day, if only this Manchester rain would stop.....
I know I've been neglecting you lately. I have been distracted with all things life shaped and now here is a list of things to come/things that have been inspiring me.
First thing to mention is: for all you literary lovers out there the next Bad Language event coming up. It will be on Wednesday 26th January starting at 7.30pm in The Castle Hotel in the Northern Quarter, Manchester. The event will be jam packed with open mic performances, Bad Language performances and the special special guest David Gaffney. If you want to come along sign up on facebook or just come along, the event is free so more money for booze!
From the start of the new year I've been taking inspiration from photography; trying my hand at my own amateur photos and looking at professional photos. I got a digital camera from my boyfriend for christmas that can take decent photos of scenery - so if you want to check out my weak attempt at photography look here. Alternatively, if you want to check out decent photography - I've been following these guys on twitter for a while and they've put some pretty amazing stuff up.
Something interesting that I've been looking at a lot more recently is my friend's fashion blog - Bow Dream Nation. I'm not that interested in fashion but I like looking at the pretty pictures and she usually has cute accessories.
A project which I'm excited about this year is something every day. It's a website originally run by performance poet Max Wallis in which he attempted to write a piece of poetry everyday. For the duration of 2011 the website is being guest hosted by various writers/poet/small press for a period of time each. Bad Language will be hosting it for May 2011 so we'd better get writing! I'm working on a birthday themed one to upload on my birthday.
My favourite comic of 2010 (meaning what I read in 2010 not what was release in 2010!) is Y The Last Man written by Brian K Vaughan. The premise is that all the men are suddenly wiped from the world in mysterious circumstances; all except one man. The man that's left, Yorick, is a bit of a bum with no true direction in life, and a trained escape artist. He spends the whole series searching for his girlfriend who he was about to propose to when the disaster happened. I like how this novel plays with stereotypes and the battle of the sexes, it gets you thinking about how well woman would be able to survive without men and what changes would happen. For example the writer explores the idea that once all the men are dead there is no electricity and all manual labour trades fall apart.
My current book, which is a mammoth book I started for 2011, is Homicide by David Simon. It is described as a true crime classic; detailing the journey of a journalist who spent a year on the street with the homicide police in Balitmore. If anyone has seen the TV show The Wire, it is based on this book. I'm loving getting my teeth sunk into this book because the writing style is literary and although the events are distressing it's not written to manipulate.
So that's my update for today. I need to finish writing a piece for the Bad Language event on Wednesday. I can't decide on what the maximum length of a performance piece should be.
In preperation for The Literature Pub Quiz which is the next Bad Language event on the 2nd September I have been attempting to make pretty things. However, pretty things aren't as easy to make as they look. Thinking I was a genius I decided to make oragami books to compliment the literature theme. But my skeptical brother tried to prove me wrong by stating that oragami books would be no different to normal books. Well brother, the internet proved you wrong.
I attempted the below under the false hope that having never done oragami before, I would be a pro. After four attempts and weird triangle pages, I decided I needed to start with something simpler.
So if you're as unskilled as me, the above is a good alternative to attempt to make pretty things without hurting your brain too much.
I decided to make two things for the quiz. First, a set of small chap books for a poem of mine called Graceful. It's something I've been thinking of doing for a while and not got round to creating a design for. The chap books are hand written and tied up with gold embossed paper and string, which I thought went with the delicate theme of the poem. I will be attempting to sell these at the pub quiz for £2.50 each.
I also made the minature oragami books for decoration, mainly to prove my brother wrong. They will sit among cup cakes on the tabels to hopefully make the venue look pretty and entice people in. I made the books out of hand made paper which was a present from my lovely friend Nell Ellwood. Nelly makes hand made paper and also beautiful hand crafted paper jewellery. Nelly lives in Derby. Nelly is lovely.
Now that you know my friend Nelly, that's about the extent of my pretty things. I also had a go at painting but as my boyfriend pointed out; 'It looked like the void'.
The poem included in the chap book is below. It would be nice to hear what you think. The quiz is this thursday at The Waldorf next to Picadilly station, if you're interested click on the link at the top of this blog for more information. I am also very excited about guest speakers David Gaffney and Max Wallis! I hope to see you there.
Graceful
Too weak
To smile
She lifts her head up off the pillow and,
Breathes.
And,
She thinks of a time when
Her bed didn’t wear a cage. And
Her body didn’t need two extra arms to help it sit.
Hi! I've been so caught up in work that I've had absolutley no time to think of writing, or even having creative thoughts at all. Spending all day sinking under a pile of paperwork and listening to grumpy managers and engineers who want your response 'right now!' is not what I call creative inspiration. On the other hand I am desperately trying to change the situation and have new projects to focus on.
First thing is the Bad Language book launch which is now happening on Wednesday 2nd June at The Bay Horse in the Northen Quater. Finally! We had a few issues with dates and venues but have finally settled on a date and I refuse to move it any more, even if the Queen came to beg me to move it. Not that she would. Bad Language are also working on their next event which will be a literature quiz night filled with many surprises!
Also, next week, on the day after my birthday, is the exciting Unsung Festival which I have been looking forward to for a long time! A whole day of cider, music, literature and art, at least I hope there's cider. I'm going to treat it as my real birthday seeing as I have to work all day on my actual birthday. Work is even less fun at the moment as I'm covering someone who usualy has so much work to do of their own that they do 30 hours over a month on adverage. I have to pick that up and maintain my own workload! Anyway, enough of work rants. More fun planned...
The next project is the World Cup Special with Bad Language. We're looking for short pieces of fiction or poetry centered around the World Cup, which I have to admit is quite hard when you're not into football. But then again, it was Joe's idea, who is a football enthusiast. The first piece has already been posted to the Bad Language blog, which gives you a taste of how you can write about football when you're not that enthusiatic about it.
The next personal piece I'm working on is the inspiration from Russell Morgan's picture, as mentioned in the last blog. I've been throwing ideas around for a while but have been waiting until my words have stopped drying up from work. I'm working on a very short micro fiction, or extract, about a dead girl who is stuck in a man's mind due to his memories. She cannot move on until the man stops thinking of her so much, and also faces much frustration as he changes and manipulates both their memories into something that isn't truth. This may prove to be quite a complex idea to fit into a short piece, which is why I say extract.
I've started reading The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers, which makes my skin tingle. It follows the story of a mute man and his relationships with the people around him. I am up to the moment when he allows a lonely, lost, drunk man to move into his home and share his life. I find the ideas about how satifying the protagonist finds the relationships in his life romatic; the rhythms and patterns in McCullers language is like reading a song.
I'm also reading Watchmen, old skool I know, but I have been reading it on and off since the big craze about it started. I'm not really into superhero comics but I enjoy the relationship side and the idea of how focusing on the negative side of society can make you corrupt. It's quite a fun novel but I also enjoy how it's influenced by real life events and the philosophical ideas behind the plot.
That's all I've got to say for now. The short piece about Russel Morgan's art will follow shortly, and I am also writing interview questions for my first two artist interviews. I hope to see people at the official book launch where you'll hear readings from the performance poets/writers featured in the new book, visual/audio literature, art work and possibly live music. Also, if you're in Manchester next weekend please make it along to Unsung, that looks to be set to tickle your artists taste buds. Farewell for now!
I have to admit I've never read an Ian McEwan book before but I was curious to see him speak and now I am burning to read his new book. He opened by stating that this novel was a character piece; he had a strong desire to create a piece that only revealed the characters past in the last 100 pages. He said that he found it interesting to explain a characters past after we have got to know the character and his actions.
An interesting discussion that came up was how important it is for a writer to be accurate with details? I believe that Ian McEwan spent 5 years researching the topic of his new novel; Climate Change. Despite this he claimed that he is still expecting complaints from readers of supposed inaccuracies. He used an example of one of his past novels where he placed a character in a car and described the action of them changing gears. From this minor detail he got a letter of complaint stating that his details we're inaccurate and the chosen car would not change gears in this way. He always raised the question: How easy is it for writers to point to facts in novels? Is it indeed risky business.
Despite this Ian McEwan stated that he loves writers who give the taste, feel and look of details. Perphaps this is what has lead to his need to get details correct and spent a long time researching the topic of a novel.
How powerful is poetry? This is a provocative question that a member of the audience and I was curious to know his answer, although I doubt that the answer to this question can ever be given a definitive answer. Ian McEwan doubted that poetry ould make anything happen on a national level, or change an issue such as climate change. But he did seem to point towards poetry having the power to change an individual, not a nation.
Ian McEwan is quite a witty man. Here is a few sound bites from him following his reading:
'If it ended too quickly it's because you're reading too fast.'
' The novel would be dead if women gave up reading.'
'With first person writing you have to do a strange rhetorical trick; it doesn't let you off the hook with writing well.'
If that still hasn't made you feel like reading his books, here's a few words that his audience related to his writing; sinister, 'blokey', sparse and carefully chosen. I wonder what words he would use to describe he own writing?
I am happy to announce that the next Bad Language event will take place on Tuesday the 16th of February in the usual venue of Nexus Art Cafe in Manchester City Centre. This week we will be holding a workshop on non-linear fiction to complement our new collection of hand made chap books which will soon be created (although it is only Joe's story which will be non-linear but we thought it an appropraite topic).
I've spent this fine, cold Sunday looking for pretty paper and trying to find practical ways to make my own chap book; called Peppermint Tea. The piece is a short story based on a soldier who is tired of walking and spends the duration of the fiction trying not to think. The one thing that haunts him is the fact that he cannot remember his deceased mother's face, although he can vividly remember the smell of the peppermint tea he used to begrudgingly make her in the morning, even though it made him gag.
To complement the title I wanted the front cover of the A5 chap book to present a pop out teacup holding a real bag of peppermint tea. I spent hours in Paperchase this morning with my partner and fellow Bad Language-er harrasing all the pretty paper to see what would make a good front cover, tea cup template and inner page. I want the inside front and back page to be a layer of quaint pretty paper to match the teacup on the front cover. I found a delicate white tissue paper made with holes in it that could represent the snow which is falling throughout the story. However, I'm still considering this idea as the paper was £4.50 per sheet and would make each chap book quite expensive to make.
After arguing with my partner for half an hour over who had the neatest hand writing, we concluded that the title should not be hand written nor printed on as the card is proving too thick to make it through my elderly printer! We concluded that the front cover shall present only the tea cup, holding a tea bag and the title name shall be printed on small pieces of card which will be attached to the end of the teabag like a draw string. Although this will be quite fiddly I hope it will look good and save money on ink and extra materials. I also want to hand stitch the whole book together, although I may change my mind on this after the first attempt depending on how many pricked fingers I can take!
We've decided to make around 15 copies of each of our chapbooks; mine, Dan's and Joe's. We also have big ideas of publishing a forth chapbook full of submissions from our Bad Language writers group, but that depends how many submissions we get.
Anyway, it's been a frustrating and exciting afternoon making a trial chap book and I look forward to making the REAL copies with REAL paper! Hehe! Now to work on the workshop for Tuesday, if anyone fancies coming along:)
