An anecdote about waiting at a table
I arrive early, and wait.
Who knows what they’re thinking when they discuss politics?
Politics?
When I meet my old friend who I haven’t seen for years,
I describe my life in great detail.
When it’s his turn, I focus on that space between his eyes
where his eyebrows nearly meet.
If eyes are windows to the soul, the door is a movable structure used to close off an entrance, consisting of a panel that swings on hinges.
Sitting adjacent is a girl with lipstick marks on the side
of her chin.
She wears her hat on her sleeve.
I eavesdrop on her phone conversation.
She’s talking about what kind of building Jesus gets rejected from.
I guess it’s a bit of an inn-joke.
Surely only a physicist would deny that it’s possible to be in a roomful of strangers
and to no longer exist.
I realise that Jonathan Coe and Jesus Christ have the same initials.
I wonder if he’s realised yet, or whether he is just too busy
saving our souls.
What a Carve Up! is a better book than the Bible.
In John 19:22, Pilate says, “What I have written, I have written,”
thus pointing out the obvious.
Jonathan Coe is more subtle.
Surely only a mathematician would deny that it’s possible to be half-right,
half-wrong and half-unsure at the same time.
The definition of a boss is half-man, half-ager.
A dyslexic man walks into a bar and comments on how dyslexic people
don’t necessarily have to spell everything incorrectly.
My friend is still talking.
I think he’s lived his life in squares of alternating colours to form a diagonal pattern.
That’s my way of saying he’s lived quite a chequered past.
He’s still talking, so I have to wait to make that joke.
He’s talking about architecture, which is a bit like dancing to music.
I wonder if it’s going to rain later.
Surely only a biologist would deny that it’s acceptable to serenade an umbrella,
especially if it’s about to rain.
Humans are typically 65% water, but 80% if your name is Walter
or if you’re a waiter.
The same applies to watters, if there such a thing as a watter.
If it rains for months, could man become an island?
Maybe I could write a TV series called Dr Where.
Instead of travelling through time, the doctor takes a bus to Tracey Island.
If zombies visited Tracey Island, they would eat Brains.
If a zombie uprisal did happen, conscription would probably come back.
‘Conscription’ is fighting for your country.
‘Conscription?’ is fighting for your contrary.
And then – at last – it is my turn to speak.
Book review: Like a Fiery Elephant (by Jonathan Coe)
Like A Fiery Elephant is Jonathan Coe’s biography of B.S. Johnson (1933-1973), a unique writer who never gained the recognition he felt he deserved. Coe acknowledges that many readers will not have heard of Johnson, let alone read his works, and he caters for this with a short introduction called “A Life In Seven Novels”. From this, the reader is enticed from learning about Johnson’s experimental techniques ranging from cutting holes in pages to see into the future, and arranging The Unfortunates into a box of twenty-seven sections to be read in any order to mirror the chaos of real life. What follows is a thorough account of Johnson’s life that provides more information than the reader could ever need.
Given that Johnson aimed his writing to be autobiographical, Coe fittingly includes relevant extracts from diaries, novels, poems, plays and letters. Thus, the bulk of the book is entitled “A Life In 160 Fragments”, with 160 chronologically scattered extracts to remind the reader that Johnson was always writing throughout his life. This structure is so successful that sometimes you wonder if you are better off reading Johnson’s own works instead. After all, Johnson described each of his novels as ‘a diagram of certain aspects of the inside of his skull’.
At this point, I must admit to being biased with this review as Jonathan Coe has written The House Of Sleep which is probably my favourite novel that I have ever read. However, it is the type of conventional novel Johnson would have despised, and Coe even wonders if he could ever compare as a writer. Perhaps, as a consequence, there are elements of Coe emulating Johnson’s style in Life A Fiery Elephant; the fourth wall is broken down so that there is no barrier between the author and reader, and the book finishes with a coda, just as in Johnson’s Albert Angelo.
In Coe’s The House Of Sleep, several complicated plot strands are left unravelled until the end when every string is tied together after a brutal twist. Coe takes this aspect of his own writing style to Like A Fiery Elephant, and surprises the reader in the coda by creating an unexpected mystery in the re-examination of a diary entry from the first chapter. Although it is only speculative, Coe argues the case for Johnson having a secret obsession with the supernatural and having homosexual tendencies. If Coe is correct with his discoveries, it implies a contradiction within Johnson’s truth-telling novels that are perhaps closer to fiction than fact.
Coe promises in the introduction to ‘knock down the walls of [Johnson’s] house’ and take the reader for a ‘wander together through the rubble’, and the attention to detail confirms this pledge; Coe is present with the reader until the final word, maintaining a heart-felt sincerity throughout. Bizarrely, Coe’s story becomes equally fascinating when he reveals the eight year struggle it took to finish the book. You believe Coe when he admits that he feels he is the person who knows most about Johnson after reading everything by and about him, and meeting everyone who ever knew him. Tellingly, the saddest moment in the book is not Johnson’s tragic suicide, but Coe regretting that he was never able to meet his hero.
The science of hugging
Did you really not sleep last night, or did you dream of not sleeping?
The feminist neuropsychiatrist Louann Brizendine believes that men and women are almost two separate species, even writing a book about it called The Female Brain. One ‘fact’ she proposes is that when a woman is hugged by someone for more than twenty seconds, enough oxytocin is released in order to trigger the trust circuits of the brain. Thus, Louann Brizendine uses this as a warning to women to never hug a man that they do not want to trust. This does suggest that all men are potential vampires, therefore making me a potential vampire, confirming what I have always believed to be true.
To gain somebody’s trust should take several months, possibly years, if it is to be a relationship with strong foundations. Obviously, if Louann Brizendine is to be believed, several generations have been wasting their time with the now obsolete task of ‘friendship’. If all it takes to gain a woman’s trust is to trick her into being hugged for twenty seconds, then the unwritten laws of justice should dictate that men should have their own unique weakness. However, until a masculinist neuropsychiatrist makes a similar scientifically suspicious discovery, the world will remain to be unfair.
To take advantage, the hugging trick can be used in order to save money on a daily basis. For instance, a visit to the hairdresser’s can be free if, at the end, you can convincingly claim that you forgot your wallet, so will return the next day to pay. The main difficulty involved is somehow deceiving the hairdresser into hugging a complete stranger for twenty seconds, and this is only if you can ignore the embarrassment and subsequent guilt. You could always pretend to be so cold that you need to be held closely in order to warm yourself up, but this trick won’t work during the summer if it’s warm, if you have an ‘unhuggable’ appearance, or ever for the matter; the police could be called before your arms are fully stretched.
There are very few situations when the twenty second hug could be appropriate. One of these is if you can cry on command, thus requiring sympathetic consoling. However, if you can produce tears whenever it’s beneficial to your scheming, calculated life, you should already be an expert in social manipulation. Another scenario is to pretend to have won the lottery, thus the ‘hug of happiness’ becomes acceptable
The main problem is that, despite what Louann Brizendine claims, not even a week-long hug can create the strongest emotional bond. Still, how does a hug manifest itself as a gestation of trust and reliance? There may be a connection, but that is broken as soon as the hug is over. The real trust comes from the end of the hug, knowing that the other person is willing to let you go. There are notable exceptions: the condescending hug, usually performed in front of a small, smug audience, and the Jack The Ripper style of hugging necks with bare hands.
In 2005, Ernst Fehr of the University Of Zurich carried out experiments with human guinea pigs inhaling a nose spray with a heavy dose of oxytocin, with the results indicating that the paid volunteers had a stronger willingness to trust. Disturbingly, the kind of people willing to risk their health for bizarre scientific experiments have too much blind faith as it is, if they are taking advice and receiving orders from a potentially mad scientist wanting to force nose spray on to strangers. Although these findings are inconclusive, it does suggest a potentially sinister side to science; those with ‘knowledge’ have an ability to manipulate emotions for their own purposes. It’s not a terrible sci-fi plot yet, and seems laughable when compared with the insidious nature of cloning and stem cell research over recent years. It does, however, serve as an uncomfortable reminder that the human brain can be easily influenced through any of the five senses.
Advertisers on television aim to influence the viewer mainly through two of the senses: sound and sight. Often with sexually alluring images, a catchy jingle can be employed to fix itself inside the memory. In terms of taste, several foods contain a chemical called monosodium glutamate that has an addictive effect when eaten, which is unsurprisingly rarely advertised. If the research is correct, touching and human contact will affect trust levels through rising oxytocin levels through hugging, or a shortcut can be taken by sniffing Ernst Fehr’s specially designed nose spray.
In fact, people are often walking advertisements for themselves, promoting their positive characteristics, wanting to be liked. Complete strangers can be more trustworthy than casual friends or colleagues, simply because they don’t care about you. Yet, if you have to pick someone to rely upon, you would prefer to know the person, rather than inviting the next stranger walking along the street to keep your spare keys.
Recently, particularly in America, several schools have banned hugging in playgrounds. This outlawing of displaying affection has not been brought upon to prevent unknown releases of oxytocin manipulating trust circuits of unsuspecting, hugged victims. The similarly ridiculous reason is to prevent students from being late to lessons. Perhaps it is being taught at a young age that small acts of affection can lead to betrayal, which only needs an emotionally unstable person to add it to the syllabus.
You would hope that there are some people whom you can completely depend upon, namely family and extremely close loved ones. However, it is harder to accept someone you didn’t grow up with. Once on BBC Radio 4, I heard the journalist, Jon Ronson, interview a woman called Mary Turner Thomson whose husband, Will Jordan, for many months kept it a secret from her that he was an American CIA agent, hence why he was sometimes absent for several weeks. To maintain her trust, Will didn’t have to organise elongated hugs or drugging with ‘oxytocin nose spray’. Instead, he gained her faith by being a loving husband for six years, producing two children together. The punch line (only because it didn’t happen to you) was that he was also married to another woman with whom they shared five children. Will was sent to prison for bigamy and fraud, having ten children from four different women. And, if you were wondering, he wasn’t really a CIA agent.
Not everyone’s a pathological liar or a manipulative sociopath, so it would be too alarmist to always assume the worst. This does contradict the clichéd instruction to young children to never take sweets from a stranger, robbing generations of hungry youths of sugary delights, but still being sensible advice.
What isn’t taught is that it can often be harder to trust yourself. Whereas a stranger will stick to their word if someone else is involved, often to save embarrassment, the satisfaction of self-destruction haunts many memories. A lack of self-control and an inability to resist temptation are fatal ingredients, with no one to blame but yourself. It may not be betrayal, but either alcohol or a rush of emotions can affect your judgement, which can lead to breaking promises that you made to yourself. Did you really not sleep last night, or did you dream of not sleeping? If you can’t trust yourself, there are few options other than hugging yourself for twenty seconds.
It would be naive to believe that by hugging a stranger, you have made a friend. As I live in London, it would be even more naive to attempt this as people fearfully avoid eye contact on public transport. It is friendlier at a sports match, where it would be rude not to hug back a fellow supporter if your local team wins. However, if you try this at a local theatre to celebrate the richness of the dialogue, security would probably be informed.
The solution is obvious: never trust anyone, and live a sad, lonely existence. After all, paranoia is an expression of creativity, and occasionally genius; Leonardo da Vinci wrote his notes in a backwards code to prevent his imaginary enemies stealing his ideas.
That’s what I keep repeating to myself: paranoia is a sign of creativity. Deeper inside, I am aware that paranoia is actually a weakness and a sign of delusion. Maybe it was actually a dream that I didn’t sleep last night. I shall hug myself later, for over twenty seconds. When no one’s looking, of course.
Book Review: Yoga For People Can’t Be Bothered to Do It (by Geoff Dyer)
‘When you are lonely, writing can keep you company. It is also a way of making up for things – as opposed to making things up – that did not quite happen.’
Geoff Dyer’s Yoga For People Who Can’t Be Bothered to Do It is a collection of eleven travel writing essays, except it isn’t travel writing – it just happens to be set in different locations. Thus, at times it feels like a joke is being played upon the reader. It is an autobiographical account with an introduction stating that some of his memoirs ‘only happened in [his] head’. He tours several countries in different continent, yet almost deliberately fails to learn anything, with a running philosophy that ‘life is there to be wasted’. Few facts are provided about himself and the places he visits, and even these feel accidental. The book can be summed up by a moment in Cambodia when he has a haircut despite not needing one, and would write about it several years later.
Consequently, the book becomes a showcase for Dyer’s deadpan humour as each chapter is a self-indulgent ramble through philosophical musings and occasional conversations with the locals. Significantly, he admits to never owning a camera, as if he rejects the idea of holding on to memories forever, which raises the question of why he would write a collection of memoirs. On the whole, they are not fond reminiscences – he is constantly searching for the Zone, suggesting he is never where he wants to be.
Although Dyer paints himself as a lazy slacker, he has obviously spent time ensuring his writing is entertaining. After all, he does repeatedly call himself ‘an intellectual’, and his well-written prose is witty enough to excuse the author celebrating his own triviality. The sentences are simple, yet never stale or repetitive, maintaining a swift pace throughout. A testament to Dyer’s talent is the banality of two of the book’s most dramatic moments that are effortlessly brought to life: when a woman he meets called Kate describes how the water ran out in the shower when she was still covered in shampoo lather, and when he loses his sunglasses.
The book’s main skill becomes how smoothly transitions can be made between different cultures, as neither the protagonist or writing style become affected. What remains consistent is Dyer’s understated loneliness, which becomes more apparent as the book progresses, especially when you realise that the chapters are not in chronological order. By the penultimate chapter, he cries over his breakfast in Detroit, admitting to being the person he ‘least wanted to be’, without explaining why. Notably, in Lybia, Dyer is so eager to see Leptis Magna that he takes a taxi in the opposite direction to ‘climax with Leptis’, which is mirrored when he finds the Zone in Black Rock City, but only in the final chapter.
In Ko Pha-Ngan, Dyer jokes with Kate that he wants to write a book called Yoga For People Who Can’t Be Bothered to Do It with the punch line being that he can’t be bothered to write it. The fact that the book materialised might suggest he gained something from his experiences. After all, he does claim the book is a ‘reliable map’ of his life, suggesting he aimed to travel himself. So it is travel writing, just probably not in the way book shops advertise it.
Poetry raises awareness for Samaritans
Cardiff poets unite for a charity event helping Samaritans
The crowd eagerly awaits the first poet to take the stage
The world of poetry is often maligned as being self-indulgent, but an event dubbed Sam Slam set out to prove that literature can be a powerful tool in communication. Cardiff’s stylish bar 10 Feet Tall opened its second floor for the poetry event supporting Samaritans.
Sam Slam took place on 23 November to raise awareness for the Cardiff branch of Samaritans. The event was organised by Steven Kenward, a performing poet who also volunteers for Samaritans. He emphasised the importance of the event was to break barriers by mixing the public with volunteers from the Samaritans.
Here he explains why:
Steven spent the night emceeing and using the opportunity to speak about Samaritans. On stage, he said, “It’s about listening to people. We don’t give advice. We don’t give our opinion on things. We don’t try to fix things. We just try to listen to people in times of distress of despair.”
Steven Kenward emcees and addresses the crowd
Sam Slam featured 15 local poets taking turns to perform pieces following the theme of ‘listening’. One example was an astute and thoughtful monologue by Steven Quantick about his relationship with his father:
A crowd of approximately 70 people turned up for two hours of poetry. With an entrance fee of £3, everything raised went towards funding the Cardiff branch of Samaritans. It costs £3.50 on average for Samaritans to answer every call they received. But also of importance was that the existence of a Samaritans branch in Cardiff was mentioned.
The Samaritans building is on 75 Cowbridge Road East and people are allowed to drop in for someone to talk to.
View Larger Map
Simon Hatch, the Samaritans’ Director for Wales, agrees that it’s integral to raise awareness of what the charity has to offer. He said, “There are around 300 suicides in Wales each year, and although the rates are reducing, one suicide is still too many.”
The timing of Sam Slam is important as it precedes the Christmas season, the busiest period of the year for Samaritans. It is estimated that a call will be received every five seconds during this period. Last year, 192,308 phonecalls were received during the two week festive period. Fortunately, the charity continues to receive phone calls 24/7 on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Year’s Eve, New Year’s Day, just like any other day of the year.
However, for this to happen, Samaritans needs funding and volunteers. One volunteer, Kate, was there to assist with the running of Sam Slam. Here she explains why Samaritans relies on donations from fundraisers and why Christmas can be a difficult time:
One way to help Samaritans this Christmas is through their online Christmas store, with money from each purpose going to support the charity. There is also the more direct way of donating to the charity through their website. In order to volunteer for the Cardiff branch, or any other UK branch, you must first fill out a volunteer interest form, with more information on what to do next available on their website.
As a volunteer, there are many ways you can be there for someone in emotional distress:
Although the above graph indicates that 85.2% of communcation with Samaritans is done by telephone, the email service is increasingly being used:
The Samaritans have a downloadable guide for using poetry to teach children how to express their emotions during difficult times. In the guide, the poet Andy Croft says, “Writing poetry can be a form of therapy. It can be a means to focus on and crystallise inchoate feelings. It can be a way of interrogating and exploring what we mean when we try to say what we feel.”
Also in the guide, another poet Aisling Doherty says, “Research shows that one in ten self harm as a way of expressing and coping with the emotional pain they feel inside. Equipping a person with emotional skills like self awareness, empathy and the ability to communicate feelings enables them to cope with difficult times.”
The importance of poetry to express emotions was mentioned by many performers at Sam Slam. This awareness was raised by collecting so many differing styles of performers for the evening to unite for a single cause. One example was Liam Johnson, a local poet with a particularly animated form of expression:
Steven Kenward finished Sam Slam by telling the room, “Thanks for coming. It’s great to see a room full of poetry for Samaritans and raising money for the winter season.
“It’s really important that people know what we’re there for.”
Dead Mermaid
A conversation between a mermaid and a whale hunter in a runaway train crashing towards the bottom of the ocean.
Mermaid: What are you going to do when you reach the bottom?
Whale hunter: Die.
Mermaid: I guess the whales will be happy.
Whale hunter: Not really. I am extremely incompetent, and it means someone more capable will take over my position.
Mermaid: Surely you’re not that incompetent?
Whale hunter: I really am.
Mermaid: How incompetent?
Whale hunter: I’m in a runaway train crashing towards the bottom of the ocean.
Mermaid: But you might kill a whale in the process?
Whale hunter: I don’t mind dying. I’m so lonely.
Mermaid: Don’t you have many friends?
Whale hunter: No.
Mermaid: I’m not surprised: you are a whale hunter. It’s an occupation generally frowned upon by society.
Whale hunter: You are a mermaid. You are generally frowned upon by science and biologists.
Mermaid: Yes, but so are you.
A quick word with Sam Llewellyn
The sea is a really interesting thing
This is what Cardiff Bay always looks likeSam Llewellyn is “one of Britain’s great storytellers” (according to his website), a “sought-after public speaker” (according to his website) and wakes up early “to watch the sun rise” (also according to his website, but don’t we all?). He’s probably all those things, but what stuck out for me is just how quotable he is, like a human tumblr, but with original content.
I was fortunate enough to speak to the sea thriller novelist a few days ago, and I asked him about the dichotomy between inspiration and craftmanship.
He replied, “The sea is a really interesting thing because you can’t beat it. You can just go with it and preferably get out of it when it gets really horrible. The old chestnut is that you must have tremendous respect for it in all its moods. The craftmanship is understand the way that the sea works.”
I asked him if the sea should be used as a metaphor, which seemed to touch a nerve, like an anchor pentrating sediments upon the seabed.
His answered, “The problem with Virginia Woolf is that there was no lighthouse in To the Lighthouse. I dreamt up this ideal, or non-ideal, for a typical British sea novel where somebody sits in a car park behind a beach, watching the sea, sniffling and throwing their Kleenexes out of a window. They see this wave coming towards them that’s travelled thousands and thousands of miles. How very much like a love affair you’ve just been having. It comes to the beach, destroys itself, and you think it’s even more life a love affair you’ve just been having. You burst into tears and throw even more Kleenexes out of the window.”
A poem I just read out in front of lots of people who might be reading this now
I took part in Sam Slam a few hours ago. It was an evening of poetry raising money for Samaritans. I will post more about it in a few days with photos, videos, audio, statistics, information and tender affection. This was what I read out:
My name is Nick Chen, and I fly on planes just to watch films. Here, at last, I hear a gasp, and rejoice – is it hope? A voice tells me: nope. Another dirty dream about capitalism, and the sheets are stained with poverty. I read the uncollected works of Shakespeare and every novel by Ibid, but find no reference to myself, not even in Macbeth. I’m in the library because I came here to listen. I don’t read books – I listen to people. And keep my ears pressed between the gaps in the shelves. If I could hear the world through your ears, I’d need to wear glasses. If I could see the world through your eyes, I’d record it on a Dictaphone and listen to it on an endless loop on my MP3 player in a playlist with an audiobook of the thesaurus. Who wrote the thesaurus? The thesaurus is the greatest love story of all time. You’ll never find a book that has more ways of describing love. I toy with the idea of being a book being borrowed, wandering and wondering if there are worse things in life than being a loan. I like to listen to the owls at night. I cannot find the main door, so I start a fire in order to use the fire exit. It is dark outside; the streets are lit by self-aware ideas. Have a listen. How very lamppostmodern, because the truth hurts. The truth: I am not a memorable person. If I was an acid, I would be an alkali. I struggle and cannot take the heat, so I get out of the fridge, and what I get out of the fridge, I don’t share in any weather. Sometimes I can’t hear myself think. I just overhear the conversations of strangers: “Honey, you don’t need a haircut.Your name is seven letters too long, just like your hair that gathers dust on the ground behind you. You’re a modern day Rapunzel, but only because you live in a bungalow. Maybe you should get a haircut.” And by overhearing these people I’ve never met I also learned that there doesn’t have to be a lesson to everything. You may think you have the solution, but it’s one punctuation mark away from being a question. There are no answers, really, so I have to be patient. What’s the different between the present tense and future tense? Is it just a few hours? I don’t know, but I walk home because I’m a walking advert for walking and I think so deeply about lampposts that I walk into a lamppost.
My temporary bookshelf
Express Lit has a new post about the most essential books to take on your travels. I moved to Cardiff from London by train, so I couldn’t take that many things with me. Here is what I considered to be more important than a pillow:
NCTJ Teeline Gold Standard for Journalists by Marie Cartwright: An unused guide to shorthand, an inessential tool for essential journalists.
Peanuts: Anniversary Treasury by Charles M. Schulz: I’m generally not a fan of comic strips or graphic novels. However, I am a staunch fan of Peanuts, and I tend to read it when I’m feeling sad. People who haven’t read many of them or are only aware of them through Snoopy merchandise might not be aware of the melancholy and pathos in the print.
The Family Pack by John Hegley: A signed copy of a collection by a [performance] poet/musician who writes mostly about carrots, dogs, glasses and potatoes.
Wowee Zowee by Bryan Charles: Part of the 33 1/3 book series where writers focus on their personal experiences with albums. This time, Wowee Zowee by Pavement. The book’s not that well written, particularly as I don’t care about Bryan Charles’ anecdotes about breaking up with his girlfriend. What interests me is the exclusive interviews with the band members and technicians about the recording process, especially as it turns out Stephen Malkmus played nearly every instrument, even drums.
Dove Release: New Flight and Voices edited by various poets: I have some friends with poetry in this, so it’s the less sentimental version of how some people bring framed photo montages of them with their friends.
I Am America (and So Can You!) by Stephen Colbert: A faux-Republican guide to America.
Submarine by Joe Dunthorne: A fine novel by someone who sold his soul by accepting a cheque in exchange for creative control of a terrible film adaptation that was made by someone else. It’s set in Wales, so I thought I’d bring it with me, although the characters make several references to hating Cardiff.
Woody Allen on Woody Allen: Woody Allen talks through the creative process of him filmography in chronological order. Really fascinating, but also really not.
Great Minds Think Alike by Ted Staunton: A bland children’s book that followed Maggie and Me but preceded Greenapple Street Blues about Maggie and Cyril, two friends who live fairly mundane lives. I will never read it again, but I find comfort having it with me.
The Psychopath Test by Jon Ronson: A breathtaking and hilarious piece of investigative journalism. Also, I got it signed by Caitlin Moran.
I also have with me a torn up copy of The Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger because I sometimes use it as wrapping paper for birthday gifts.
Ride the bus to help write a play
Playwrights take inspiration from the 95 bus to Barry
- Are you sitting next to director Bridget Keehan and poet Grahame Davies?
You could become part of the writing process of a new theatre piece if you happen to be on the right bus this Saturday.
Poet Grahame Davies and director Bridget Keehan are devising a play by spending the day speaking to passengers on the 95 bus. These conversations will be used as a workshop to be turned into a production for the stage.
The 95 bus runs between Cardiff City Centre and Barry Island. This will be the second Saturday in a row the pair will spend talking to passengers.
Bridget said, “I’d like to chat to people and build the first layer of possibilities of what the journey’s going to take in.”
Grahame added, “It’s a devised piece of theatre, so it’s new for me.”
The 95 bus
The 95 bus runs every 20 minutes on Saturday 19 November between Cardiff and Barry, via Dinas Powys and Cadoxton. The timetable can be found here. Although much will come down to chance, Bridget and Grahame will ride the bus between 10am and 5pm.
Bridget Keehan
Bridget Keehan is a director from Barry. Earlier this year, she directed a play called The Container in Chapter Arts Centre which received a four star review in The Guardian.
She said, “What I’m trying to achieve is a way for the audience to see characters and their journey. There may be stories, but it’s rooted in character. I think Barry is a place that has some extreme examples of deprivation, yet also some natural beauty like the coastline and Porthkerry Park. I think it’s a place of extremes that hasn’t fulfilled its potential.”
A trailer for Bridget’s play The Container from earlier this year can be seen here:
Grahame Davies
Grahame Davies is a bilingual poet and novelist who can often be heard on BBC Radio 4. In 2002, he won the Wales Arts Council’s Book of the Year award.
He said, “With the play, the writing shouldn’t be more complex than necessary, which is a bigger challenge than writing something enticingly esoteric. The art should be as simple and direct as possible. I love communicating. When I see things work with non-specialist audiences, that’s very gratifying. To do that, I think you have to keep close to a natural voice.”
A video of Grahame performing two of his poems can be seen here:
