At Cross Purposes…

Posted on September 17, 2014 by literarylad

Hat03The British Legion sent me this cross. I like the British Legion. They’re a worthy charity, and they do valuable work, including providing social clubs for millions of people across the country (even if many of those clubs are in decline). It’s just; why did they have to send me a cross? They want me to write a message on it, send it back to them and they’ll include it in the field of remembrance at Cardiff castle. To commemorate those who fought, and in many cases died on our behalf. But what did they fight for, our selfless ancestors, friends, relatives? Surely it was freedom. Freedom from tyranny and oppression, freedom to enjoy basic human rights such as freedom of thought and freedom of speech. And freedom of belief. But the British Legion don’t seem to understand this. According to their leaflet they have other remembrance tribute options available, such as a crescent or a star. Presumably they have an option for those who aren’t religious. You have to phone them though, to find out about these, and to have them send you one specially. Because the British Legion made the decision to send a cross, a Christian cross, to everyone – a lazy assumption that we are all, by default, Christians, unless we speak up and tell them otherwise. For all they knew I could have been a Muslim or a Jew, or a member of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. As it happens, I’m an atheist.

After WW1, the Imperial War Graves Commission insisted on a standard, non-denominational headstone for war graves, in order to reflect the equality of death.(1) It seems that some people have learned nothing. The British Legion could have stuck with the inclusive image of the poppy for remembrance. But no doubt those that run the organisation are Christians, and saw no reason not to use a Christian symbol; no reason not to perpetuate the ongoing insidious, subliminal indoctrination that we encounter everywhere in our daily lives.

So the cross is still sitting there on my sideboard, a small insult, a symbol of religious oppression, yet another attempt to make me feel an outsider in my own land; a subtle suggestion of the establishment’s disapproval of my beliefs. As usual, I expect to mark the 11th November with my own personal thoughts, ignoring the religious ceremonies imposed on the nation by our government and the established churches. As for the cross, I’ll probably use it for kindling (as I don’t have any bibles left…)

1. Source: http://www.archaeologyuk.org/ba/ba109/feat4.shtml

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Where have all the trees gone…?

Posted on August 12, 2014 by literarylad

Dead trees

The green revolution starts at home. Or at least it should. The reality is, we’re going in the wrong direction. Every week now, as I walk, cycle, or drive around my neighbourhood I see more gardens being denuded of plant life. In spring, summer, autumn and winter, suburbia is alive with the sound of chainsaws. Mature trees that have been growing for decades or even centuries are routinely felled on the whim of a householder who thinks it might be nice to have a bit more light in the house, a bit more sun in the garden. Houses are bought and sold, and so often the new owner sends in a team of landscape ‘gardeners’ to change the garden into an ‘outside space’, which means raising it to the ground and replacing the greenery with decking and patios, barbeque areas and hot tubs, sterile wastelands of bamboo.

It’s not even just the gardens. Every year the Council has the street trees pruned to within an inch of their life, for fear that a falling branch might lead to a claim for compensation, and at the slightest suggestion of disease, they have them felled, the stumps ground out and the resultant hole quickly tarmac’ed over. They never think of replacing the ones they take out. Perhaps they know from experience that any new trees would have to be big enough to stop passing drunken idiots snapping their trunks.

Not so long ago domestic gardens were being described as the saviours of wildlife, providing refuges from the deserts of concrete and tarmac, and the chemical soaked wastelands we laughingly refer to as agriculture, which make up the bulk of our fabled green and pleasant land (Fairest Isle; my arse!)

I’d say that I just don’t understand people, but the truth is they don’t understand themselves. Studies have consistently shown that the presence of plants, and particularly trees, is beneficial to human well-being, and that their absence is detrimental, and yet people don’t seem to understand this. They think that they don’t like plants, that they prefer concrete and brick. They think that plants are a nuisance, that they obscure their view, get in the way of their cars, reduce the space available for a barbeque or hot tub, drop troublesome leaves everywhere and take too much time and money to maintain. Do they really not understand that plants absorb carbon dioxide and traffic pollution, and in return give us back fresh, clean oxygen, which we all need in order to live? And that however much people might insist “Oh no, I’m a city person at heart, I can’t be doing with all that green stuff” the absence of trees, plants, parks and green spaces is as detrimental to their health and their state of mind as it is to the environment.

 

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Isn’t the right to self-determination important?

Posted on July 21, 2014 by literarylad

Once again a bill to allow assisted dying is being put before parliament. And once again the churches are using the full weight of their power and privilege to lobby; to bully MP’s into rejecting it. And because of this, and because religious representation in parliament is so out of proportion to the level of religiosity in the population as a whole, it seems likely that this bill, like all of its predecessors, will be voted down. The role of MP’s is to represent the people. Surveys have consistently shown that around eighty percent of the population are in favour of assisted dying, but most MP’s pay no heed, simply vote according to their own consciences (which tell them that their own religious beliefs, along with keeping the powerful religious lobby happy, are more important than doing what their constituents ask of them).

I would argue that popularity isn’t actually relevant in this issue, because the granting or withholding of a right should be determined not by its popularity, but by its reasonableness. To illustrate this point I would ask you to consider whether if eighty percent of the population thought that we shouldn’t read books, it would be reasonable to burn all the books and make reading a crime. People can choose whether they want to read or not; those that don’t want to don’t have to, those that do can, and cause no harm to anyone by doing so. It’s the same with assisted dying, which is essentially the right to self-determination. It might be that very few people ever want to make use of this right, but it should still be there for those who want it. Religious representatives have the right to tell us if the tenets of their religion hold that to take a life is wrong, regardless of the situation (although this is down to individual interpretation of ancient texts). But when they try to enshrine their religious ideas into secular law, they must  be stopped.

Self-determination, an essential part of which is the right to choose not to live, is as important a right as the right to life. Of course, this doesn’t mean that we should do nothing to stop someone from trying to kill themselves, particularly if it’s just because they’re having a bad day. We have a responsibility to help our fellow human beings in times of trouble. For instance suicide (which we should remember is thankfully no longer classed as a crime) is often driven by depression, which is almost always a transient state. Where someone is feeling suicidal due to depression we have a moral obligation to do what we can to show them that the condition will pass, that they have the potential to live a full and happy life. But ultimately, if we fail, can we deny them the right to self-determination?

The idea of assisted dying is to give someone who is in dire circumstances, and who is incapable of ending their life by themselves, the right to have someone else do it for them. All of the bills that have been presented have ensured that there would be proper safeguards in place. The church would have us believe such legislation could be used by unscrupulous people to rid themselves of disabled or elderly relatives who are a burden to them. This is an under-hand tactic and is clearly nonsense. The legislation – the human right – is for those whose quality of life is so deteriorated as to make life not worth living. It’s for people who may be suffering terrible pain, whose condition may be terminal, irreversible; who in all probability will only deteriorate further, suffer ever worse pain, become ever more debilitated, ever more humiliated by their condition. How can we reasonably withhold from these people the right to end their suffering; the right to self-determination? This is not ‘Christian’, it’s inhuman.

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Religious schools are the problem

Posted on June 10, 2014 by literarylad

I’m not surprised that Michael Gove’s free school program has run into difficulties. The focus of discontent has so far been limited to fundamentalist (i.e., extreme) Muslim schools. It’s easy to see the danger of allowing a school to be run by people who may hold backward, harmful views about issues such as the right to equality for women or homosexuals, or even for people who hold other beliefs. But the problem is wider than that. We need to teach children to think for themselves, rather than force-feeding them world views that are subjective, limited, and in many cases harmful and abusive. Religious schools deprive kids of a basic human right – the right to freedom of belief, which requires an open mind and free access to information and ideas. Religious schools segregate children and emphasise the differences between people, rather than their similarities, and foster alienation, disdain and even hatred.

It’s right that religion should be taught in schools. After all, it’s probably been around for as long as there have been societies, and in almost all of those societies it has exerted a very strong (and often very harmful) influence. In all societies around the world religion is still (unfortunately, in my view) adhered to by a significant proportion of the population, and still exerts a powerful influence. Religion (or rather religions, in the plural) are a part of our culture and a part of our history. However they should be taught objectively, not subjectively, in an atmosphere of openness, where children feel able to ask questions, to be critical and so, over time, develop their own world view. At present, this doesn’t usually  happen. Instead, generation after generation of children are sent to schools where they’re brain-washed into accepting the religious beliefs of their parents. It’s very interesting, and rather damning of the credibility of religion, that despite this so many of them grow up rejecting those beliefs.

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Theremin Trap

Posted on May 13, 2014 by literarylad

I don’t intend to write film reviews on a regular basis, but I’ve been inspired to write one now by a film that I saw at the weekend, called ‘Frank’. It’s a dark, funny and very unusual film, which was inspired by, but not based on, Chris Sievey, a Manchester comedian  and musician. Sievey created the character of Frank Sidebottom, for which he wore a rather disconcerting papier mache head. In the film, the character of Frank has a band (as did Frank Sidebottom) but the noise they make is rather harder than the real Frank Sidebottom’s synth-based pop parodies.

For many years now I’ve listened almost exclusively to music by the likes of Haydn, Vivaldi, Handel and Tallis. Partly it’s because this is the music that I love. Partly, it’s because I got bored with contemporary music. It got to the stage where I felt that I wasn’t hearing anything new. Every new band, however far from the mainstream (and I did like them far from the mainstream) sounded as though they were just mixing and matching elements of what had gone before. I couldn’t find anything that was really convincing. Perhaps, then, I imagined the reality was that there had never been anything convincing; I’d simply grown up, musically speaking, and come to see the young people’s simplistic attempts at originality as pretentious and unsuccessful.

But then I was sitting in the cinema on Sunday evening, as the scene in the film, where the band begin a disastrous and prematurely ended set, played. And their mad, chaotic, cacophonous sound whacked me round the head so hard that it sent me back to my youth. Just for a moment I was listening once more to music that was important, portentous; music that made you see that the world isn’t what you think it is. It was just a short piece of music, before the PA blew up and the band set about each other, but it reminded me of something that has been missing for a long time.

The star of the band is not the singer with the frightening false head and a talent for unusual lyrics, but Maggie Gyllenhaal’s crazed, knife-wielding Theremin player. When the new recruit, a geeky and ultimately divisive character, shows an interest in, and approaches the instrument, she takes a swipe at him and snarls, ‘Keep away from my FUCKING Theremin!’

The film led me along, not knowing what might happen next, which of the characters (if any) I should be routing for, not knowing which of the characters, never mind the band itself, would be able to hold it all together and which were sure to self-destruct. It’s largely a film about mental illness. It’s also about the difference between the ability to cope and the inability to cope, which is arguably nothing more than a matter of perception. It said to me that there are people in the world who, when allowed to do things in their own unusual way, are able not just to cope with life, but to excel. But if you push conventionality upon them, force them to operate within the standard, accepted ways, they are liable to fall apart. And I should know, because this is me, albeit in a fortunately rather less extreme version.

All I can say is that if you only see one film this year, you really need to see more films…

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Why should god have all the best buns?

Posted on April 22, 2014 by literarylad

Atheist Bun02Hmm, hot cross buns. Or as us secularists like to call them; tea cakes. Here in the literary lad household we’re not religious, but we do rather like the Easter bunny, who died on Watership down to save us all, and was resurrected in the sure and certain hope that children everywhere (well, at least in the developed world) will always have lots of lovely chocolate to eat.  (I may have got a bit confused over some of the details; myths are not really my strong point). He may not have brought us a message of importance regarding the meaning of life (although, hang on a minute; chocolate…) but he has got a cute little cotton tail and soft, fluffy ears.

I’ve become increasingly uneasy about the symbolism of the cross on my buns in recent years. At the same time, however, I very much like hot cross buns. The solution came to me in a moment of inspiration: use a different symbol. There’s no law that says it has to be a cross. As you can see from the picture, I chose an ‘A’ for Atheist, as that represents my own personal belief system. But you could put whatever you like on them really. A crescent – if you’re a Muslim –  the initial letter of your name, CND logo, smiley face, Bauhaus face; the choice is limited only by your own imagination. I can see a new tradition taking off, where every Easter people compete to create the bun with the most original symbol.

I don’t see why we shouldn’t take the best bits of religious tradition and change them to fit the modern, secular age. I’m sure there are lots of other traditions I could change. Maybe people could take part in Lent by giving up believing in god? Why not combine Diwali with Guy Fawkes to shine a light on corruption amongst MPs and give them a firework up their backsides at the same time? At Christmas, instead of celebrating the alleged birth of a character in Christian mythology, we could just buy each other lots of presents, eat far too much and get drunk. Oh no; that’s been done already…

Note:  Buns courtesy of Mrs Literarylad (and yes; they were very tasty thank you).

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News from the muse

Posted on April 8, 2014 by literarylad

They say the pen is mightier than the sword, but would you like to go into battle against a Claymore wielding Scotsman if you were armed with nothing more than a Bic? I suppose you might be able to poke him in the eye with it before he managed to strike.

I seem to be writing my second novel one page at a time. Not through choice; it just seems to be happening that way. I’ve been squeezing in a bit of writing in my lunch break and last thing at night, when all I can manage is a page at most. I’m worried that I’m going to end up with something disjointed. I remember reading J G Ballard’s ‘The Atrocity Exhibition’, which is divided up into short sections. It reads as though he wrote the book, then cut it up into individual paragraphs (this would have been in the days when cut and paste was a literal term) gave each paragraph a title and then re-arranged them in random order. Bearing in mind that Ballard’s books are pretty wacky to start with, the result was bizarre, and difficult to follow. Interesting though the experience was, I don’t really want to emulate it. I keep thinking that I’m going to be able to spend whole mornings, or even whole days writing, but mostly that’s all it is – imaginings. Still, I think I’m making progress all the same. I’m up to nearly 40,000 words at the moment. The two main characters are well established, and I’m busy furnishing their world with subsidiary characters for them to interact with. It’s a bit like playing god now that I come to think about it. What does that say about me?

Alex was the subject of the first book, in which he had a rather difficult time. He gets off to a shaky start in this one too, but things are looking much better for him just at the moment. Not so for the new character, Maya. She doesn’t make things easy for herself. She’s a strange fish (but then she’s a writer, so what should I expect?) I’m enjoying writing for her though. She’s got some odd ideas, she doesn’t behave how you might expect, and she has an unconventional relationship with the truth. I think her heart’s in the right place, but I’m concerned that she might do something unexpected at any moment. So far, the two mains have bounced off one another a couple of times, with less than comfortable results. I like to tell myself that they might end up getting together and living happily, like her out of Jane Austen and that Colin Firth bloke, but I know that would be too dull. The reality is, anything could happen. Watch this space.

Oh my god, he’s got a pen; he’s got a pen..!

 

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Hanif you think creative writing courses are a waste of time…

Posted on March 11, 2014 by literarylad

Apparently Hanif Kureishi does. Which makes me wonder why he runs one, and why anyone would want to attend it!

I admit that I have some sympathy with his viewpoint. I think there are a number of problems with teaching creative writing. The first is that fiction, like painting, sculpture, etc., is art, and the value of a piece of writing is therefore, to a certain extent, subjective. Creativity seems to me to be instinctive. You can teach the basics of grammar. You can teach writers to think about continuity and accuracy, to make sure that when they are describing a city they get the landmarks in the right places, to make sure that when they set a scene at eight o’clock in the evening in midsummer they don’t try and tell the reader that it’s dark. These things are important. Every time you get them wrong you remind your readers that what they’re reading isn’t real – it’s been made up by you. You can teach style; analyse the different styles that are used by writers. The trouble here I suspect is that teachers tend to be dictatorial – they tell students which styles are good and which are bad, and direct them to write in a style that they think is current – fashionable – rather than showing them what can be done and encouraging them to develop their own style.

For me, one of the biggest problems with these courses is that I’m autodidactic – I tend to learn best when I teach myself. This has advantages and disadvantages. It can mean that I miss things that I would have picked up had I been taught by a good teacher. On the other hand, I think it makes me more creative, because I’m following my own path. Though this doesn’t work for everyone. It seems to me that a lot of new writers do nothing but ape the writing of authors they read – clichés and mistakes are sucked in from the donor author and spat out onto the page of their own masterpiece-in-progress. Almost every commentator tells us that if we want to become good writers we should read and read and read. While it helps to have read widely, personally I like to keep my distance from other peoples’ books while I’m working on my own, to avoid being influenced.

Perhaps the biggest problem is finding a good teacher. Sometimes very successful authors run courses because they have a passion for teaching and they want to pass on their experience. I suspect more often than not creative writing teachers are authors who have had limited success and are teaching to try and make up their income, or to bolster their self-esteem (like the fictional Ed Reardon). I nearly signed up to a course at the end of last year. It was run by a published author, at a reputable college. At the last minute I thought that I ought to try and have a look at the tutor’s writing. So I found one of their books on Amazon, clicked on ‘look inside’ and started reading. I managed about four pages. I asked Mrs Literarylad to have a look. She lasted two pages! We both agreed it was rubbish. The style and the language was irritating, and the central premise of the book just wasn’t credible (so much for the design cycle!) And the grammar weren’t great neither. And so, of course, I gave it a miss. It might seem arrogant, but I thought; ‘what can this person possibly teach me (or anyone) about writing?’

There is, I think, one major advantage to creative writing courses and qualifications – agents and publishers love them. So however pointless they might seem, they probably do increase your chances of getting published. It depends upon the course you choose. There’s a guy who runs courses at Bute Park in Cardiff (http://parkwrite.wordpress.com/). I can’t tell you whether he’s any good, because I’ve not been on any of his courses, but what he writes on his blog suggests to me that he probably is. His courses are good value for money, and he likes to work with ordinary working class people and the unemployed, which shows integrity. He has been very dismissive of Curtis Brown, who also run courses, but who charge something like £1600. I respect his viewpoint. I too am sceptical about the quality of these courses. However, Curtis Brown are a large literary agency, and by enrolling on one of their courses you are putting yourself in their way. If you are a good writer, it’s a way of getting noticed, though there’s still an element of luck. And of course being good isn’t enough – you need to be able to produce the kind of work that they want; to match their subjective view of what a good novel should be. And £1600 is a lot of dough to lash out when you don’t earn much! I doubt they make much profit on the courses mind, even at that price. I’d rather they spent more time and effort on their slush pile. I’m probably being unfair, but I can’t help thinking that their creative writing school might be something of a factory for turning out identikit writers in their preferred mould. But I’m prepared to be persuaded otherwise. Perhaps I should start saving my pennies…

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How to get ahead in self-publishing

Posted on March 2, 2014 by literarylad

I’ve been doing some more research into self-publishing, and the amount of work involved, particularly in promoting and selling your book yourself, is daunting. One website (www.writersservices.com – has anyone had any experience of using them?) says ‘resolve to allocate one day each week to ringing round, writing letters and working to get your book into the marketplace.’ This reminded me of an interview I read, many years ago, with a successful band (‘The Icicle Works’). When asked what aspiring bands needed to do to get on, their advice was to do what they had done and give up the day job, because it’s just not possible to become successful while working around a full-time job. However, it’s a brave writer (or musician) who gives up their job to concentrate on their creative career, bearing in mind the low success rate amongst aspiring artists.

What’s also daunting, in addition to the problem of how to find sufficient time after earning a living, doing all those necessary chores and fitting in some time for relaxation, is coping with the actual work of self-promotion. I may well have touched on this before, but it seems to me that what’s required is two very different, and often mutually exclusive skill sets. Self-promotion requires an out-going personality and self-confidence. It requires a great deal of sociability – having a large network of friends and contacts. It requires people skills. The right person for the job will spend most of their time talking, corresponding and generally connecting with people; they’ll thrive on noise and external stimuli.

A typical writer, I would suggest, is someone who is quiet and introspective; the kind of person who observes, rather than interacting directly. The personality profile for a writer would be someone with an active (probably over-active) imagination; someone who spends a lot of time alone, quietly thinking and working on ideas. Constant noise, constant interaction, stifles a writer, because it gives them no room to think.

Reconciling these two different sets of requirements is very difficult. There will be some people who are good at both, but I would suggest they are in a minority. I suppose this explains the traditional relationship between a writer and an agent or publisher – one does the writing, the other deals with the promotion.  Except that it seems to have become increasingly difficult to get an agent or publisher. There are too many people writing; too much competition, and publishers and agents have too little time to look for new talent. And so, we take advantage of new technology, like electronic publishing, to bypass the publishing industry. Which is fine, except that we then have to deal with the tricky problem of how to promote our work…

I don’t suppose there are any out-going, confident people out there who fancy trying their hand at being an agent and want to team up with a talented but introverted writer? Hey, I said talented – maybe I’m more confident than I realise…

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A scent of success?

Posted on February 3, 2014 by literarylad

I sent sample chapters of my novel to quite a few publishers last year, without any success, or so I had thought. But then, last week, I had a request from one of them for the full manuscript. I knew not to get too exited; that this was no guarantee that they would offer to publish the book and, sure enough, a few days later I received a message saying that although they liked the book they didn’t think it was right for them. Despite the eventual rejection, it made me feel quite positive. I had a few days of hope. It also focussed my mind on what I might need to do next, once I have found a publisher – what they will expect of me and how I might live up to those expectations. And it gave me renewed confidence in my writing. This was the first feedback I’ve received from a publisher and it was very positive, both about the narrative and the characters.

So, no publishing contract just yet, but I’m going to renew my efforts to get one.

Link to Single Point Perspective on Amazon.com

Link to Single Point Perspective on Amazon.com

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