Civil rights with a pretty hat on...?

How, I wonder, would I be received if I were to put a book on the market tomorrow? Would people immediately presume to know what my book is about, how it has been written, and its overall quality as a piece of literature in general? I suspect they would. They’d assume that it was some Belle De Jour-esque thing, probably to do with men and relationships, written to a fairly low standard and somewhat simplistically. This is just a fact of life – we all imagine we ‘know’ a person on first glance due to stereotypes, even if we aren’t aware or willing to admit that we’re so judgemental.

When I walked into the room on Wednesday and saw that the people who’d be giving the talk were dressed from head to toe in bright red with shaven heads and wearing sandals and various beads about their necks I (and I’m ashamed to admit) presumed to know them already, as though they weren’t individuals at all; simply a religious collective. Looking at it from a different perspective, and imagining that they, ‘the Buddhists’, were to walk into a room fronted by a group of females in their early twenties whom, perhaps, resembled the cast of Hollyoaks, would they be so kind as to give the benefit of the doubt? Would they even stay to listen? I wonder.

I realised, you see, from listening to ‘the Buddhist’ Braziers, that image is fundamental to how you’re perceived in the world of writing as well as the everyday world, and that it can either work with you, or against you. This brings me to the idea of feminism (which is always fun) and something Katherine Whitehorn said with regard to women in today’s society. The concept of shame, she said woefully, is practically obsolete nowadays, as is so gracefully portrayed in the media every day. Is it really the case, as my flatmate Sofia said over pesto and pasta this evening, that women should not aspire to be equal to men as that would be setting their sights too low? I don’t know. But it did make me consider what goes into my writing, and whether what I write about would constitute a ‘shameful’ representation of modern women. Hmm…

-A

Exchanges

Words encased in reason
Silence bound by truth
Seeping eloquence
And now
Unbroken threads
Anew

Louise Holt

A minor mishap.

When events go back to back,
Life can be a bitch
Running the clepham stairs and back
Events, not to be missed.
So imagine breifly if you can,
A growing atomic mushroom
When the CE staff forgot to mention
A quite slight change of room.

So we sat there till ten past five
In clepham 3.1, Alas!
Like bible, follow booklet true,
A bid to see mark Thomas.
Though his discourse still goes on,
For what? I am not there?
The actual room being full as fuck
To library, to vent hot air!


By "Culturally Dejected"

Sock problem

Does anyone else seem to have a lot less socks than when they started the year? I'm sure someone is stealing mine, worse, only stealing one of each pair!!!

I am a Tuna fish / Swimming in a sea of discontent

12:50pm. The designated time for meeting...so where was Georgia? I hung back, away from the queue of people, hoping that it was just a case of her running a bit late rather than her having arrived early and gone in without me. I alternated between keeping an eye on the stairs and on the lift, catching snippets of conversations from the people ahead of me.

"If you just wait here, we'll see if we can fit you in."

"Have you booked? What was the name?"

12:55. Still no sign of Georgia. Maybe she had gone in already, after all? Quickly texting her, I moved closer to the line of people, figuring that it was long enough that even if she was just running late, she would probably still arrive before I got in. Besides, I didn't want to miss my chance for hearing Sue Townsend speaking.

Ping. The doors to the lift opened, revealing several adults and Georgia. She grinned at me and moved to join me in the queue.

***

12:54. I was eager to reach the lecture theatre, and wished the lift would move quicker. I was excited about seeing Sue Townsend as I had read Adrian Mole countless times since I was about ten. Adrian Mole inspired me; I loved the writing style and was determined to ask questions to aid me in my own writing. After all, its not everyday this happens is it?! It was the only reason I stayed for Cultural Exchanges really. The other speakers were good but not as famous as good old Sue Townsend.

12:55 I recieved a text from Sam. 'Where are you? I'm waiting outside, hurry up.' The lift door opened.

***

They hadn't been waiting long before two fellow creative writers from their class headed towards them. Georgia invited them to stand behind her and Sam and the four waited to be allowed in. Suddenly two girls ahead of them in the queue turned around, looking disappointed and complaining that all the seats were taken.

"There aren't any spaces left. We were told that you had to be here 15 minutes early even if you booked, to ensure that you actually get in. But we've been here since quarter to, and we still can't get in."

"But we booked spaces..." Georgia said quickly. "We booked online over a week ago, how can all the seats be taken?"

One of the girls shrugged. "We booked too, but they've already let in some people that didn't."

As the disgruntled and somewhat confused girls turned to leave, a steward walked towards them and apologised, but all the girls could talk about was how to write a blog about a talk they hadn't got to hear.

The end.

G. Norwood & S. Pavely.

Tom Leonard - Tuesday

Hey everyone, i just got featured on RAD RADIO! I phoned up and asked to have a five minute slot to talk about Tom Leonard and i got it! Sometimes flukes happen! Anyway, here is me appearing live on air!

RAD RADIO 1

I'll hopefully be doing more later in the week. Enjoy the rest of CE!
CD

Please note: there is actually no rad radio, i just made it up. It sounds good though and if such a station were in existence i would give it a listen, epecially if i was allowed to participate. More madness later!

I have to see Tony Garnett!!!!

Anyway it is Tuesday and i have already seen two out of the four I intended to see. Quite a few people were commenting on Sue Townshead, as I was not a fan myself I decided against going. I changed my mind at the last minutue but it was booked up. So far I have seen Claire Jennings 'In conversation' without Claire Jennings I was slightly disappointed but it was still a good lecture. Although it was about animation it stil gave me a of lot of information about stories in general. As I would like to maybe try script writing it had a lot of emphasis on the fact that it is the image that is most important and the dialogue comes last. A point he made was that the way animation is mostly made is that the image is thought of first and then the dialogue comes last. Someone in the audience argued that an animator had said it was the other way around. So Paul Wells said that it is dependant on the animator themselves. The second I went to was Dr Kamillia Elliot where she talked about unfilmable books. I was intrested in this because I have never really liked any films that were once books. However I found the discussion on the film 'Adaptation' was very intresting. Books can be turned into films but some of the best films which have been based on books have been there to make fun of the film industry and how it is hard to actually adapt a book. because it depends on different interpretations.

In Advance of Cultural Exchanges

(Just as a foreword, I actually wrote this five days ago, but due to internet problems and the lack of a properly functioning short-term memory, it's only just being posted now)

"Cultural Exchanges" they tell me... Cultural... Exchanges...? At first I thought this was some kind of foreign exchange programme, but with extra added culture. Was my university planning to trade me for some French kid and ship me off to the Louvre? I still don't understand quite why it's called that, but never mind; that's its name.

Basically, the university has set up a week of talks, workshops, guests and events for us to go to and to learna nd become all cultured and stuff. In return for this, we get a week off lectures. Well, not all of us do. As far as I can work out, it seems to be only Drama and Creative Writing that are off and, seeing as those are the subjects I take, hello 'week off'. But they didn't really explain that to us properly in the beginning and thus one of my friends, who shall remain nameless, had arranged to go home for half the week and booked her bus/train/other form of public transport tickets before discovering that only half of her course was off. Oops... It's not just a week off though, our duty is to attend and we Creative Writers have been given the mission of adding to the blog (see this blog) to talk about it, so here I am!

My main problem with this week though is the limited places and occasional fee. Admittedly, I understand the fees, it's just that we're all students and are cheap. The bit I don't get is making certain things so limited. I've been hearing about things with only thirty places. If they want us all to go and take part in this event, shouldn't they have given us more seats? Having attempted to book a few events, I found that all but one of them were already full up. The only one from my first choice selection which hadn't been booked up was the one I was least interested in and thought was most likely to be full. But apparently not... And the range of subjects is a bit iffy in my opinion. The Drama students get their lessons off, but there are hardly any Drama things to get involved with, which seems a little odd. But alas, we shall have to try our best. I shall hopefully return to inform you on what happened.

Anon, blog readers... Anon.

Claire Baldwin

an afternoon out

"I'm taking my mother-in-law," one lecturer said. It would be unkind to name him, especially since he added, "and I'm looking forward to it too."

She may write for Saga magazine now, but I doubt her wit has diminished with age. Wikipedia has a series of quotations from her. These are the first three:

"Outside every thin girl is a fat man, trying to get in."

"The trouble with so many born-again people is that you wish they hadn’t been born the first time."

"When it comes to housework the one thing no book of household management can ever tell you is how to begin. Or maybe I mean why."


I don't have the excuse of a mother-in-law to accompany, but I think I'll be there at 3.00 tomorrow (Tuesday) - for myself.

My Thoughts On Sue Townsend Session

I think that I've heard her name once before somewhere - maybe she was a guest talker at a lecture? Or was she mentioned in a lecture? Or I've probably skimmed her name in a book or other. But anyhoo, her name looked familiar to me for some reason, which got me interested in wanting to attend her lecture session in Cultural Exchange. The description in the brochure sounded good enough, interesting. I'd like to learn of her life as a writer and of the many tips and advice she could offer to become a better one individually. It would be great to learn from someone more talented and wiser than I am! I'm looking forward to hearing from her.

Po

A kafuffle indeed...

I must say what a kafuffle this whole cultural exchanges malarky has caused. Indeed, all the academics of the clephan building that we've come to know and love have been extremely excitable these past few weeks. Not that they've been acting out of character you understand, and I probably wouldn't have even noticed had it not been for the constant repetition of 'CULTURAL EXCHANGES' every few sentences. Not that this has annoyed me in any way though, we are creative writing students after all and we all know how unreliable we are.

Im not sure yet which talks I shall be attending, but I have my eye on quite a few. Lucky for us it shouldn't be too much of a problem to just turn up on the day. I mean booking is rather the sensible option isn't it.

Oh, and I'm considering going in disguise.

unmissable!

I've just used the on-line booking form and made all sorts of advance reservations ... and now I'm wondering if I've chosen the right events. A bit of music would be good.

For me, the highlight has to be Tom Leonard. I've read some of his books and listened to his recordings - and I'm a devotee of Tom Leonard's website. I also linked through it to easy peasy meals and read his recipe for lentil soup. I don't suppose he'll be handing out free samples at Cultural Exchanges. But, judging from his "Litany for Blair's Britain", there's a good chance he'll say something controversial.

This is where it ends.