I have to arrive at some strategies that will enable me to avoid these hiatuses. This one's not as long as it may have seemed. I was blogging all through May (I did mention it in a previous post) at Open Book Toronto. It was a very enjoyable gig. Many thanks again, to Amy, Clelia, and OBT! And also to my inimitable, generous, joy of an editor, Gillian Rodgerson.
But I've not been here for all of June and a big chunk of July. Too long! I'm thinking that if I can't find the time to write something coherent, I'll post a poem or a part of a story, or maybe a whole story. On the subject of whole stories online, I visited Neil Gaiman's site recently. If you've never been, go have a look. Amazing!
That brings me to another strategy. I'll post interesting people and events I've come across, actually or virtually - worthwhile stuff, hopefully, as this blog won't ever be about whether or not I've been having a headache or bought a new toothbrush or had a fight with my best beloved. Not that those things are unimportant, but I'm not called to write about them, not here anyway.
So, because this has to be a quick one, here are some recent encounters.
Saw Kate Story, author of the novel BLASTED, this week. Am reading the novel, at the minute. She's funny, and funny ain't easy to write!
Saw JAMAICA FOR SALE http://www.jamaicaforsale.net/ a documentary by Esther Figueroa and Diana McCaulay at the Caribbean Tales Film Festival today. (Plaudits to Frances-Anne Solomon for the Fest, in its fourth year!) It's overwhelming. It's heartbreaking. It's how to ruin a small island with ostensible 'tourism development'! It's a formidable piece of work. And it has a ten second clip of yours truly, doing an interview for JIS-TV too long ago to even remember when. See it if you can. Support the effort to save a collapsing environment and the livelihoods of the 'small people' who depend on it.
Also if you haven't been here http://writing.upenn.edu/pennsound/ just GO! Listen to poets reading their work, Guillaume Apollinaire (yup!), Kamau Brathwaite and Christian Bok and endless other. No Walcott, though. Wonder why?
Heard from Rethabile Masilo, who is about to travel from Paris to this side with his family. Travel safe, and have a great time, Rethabile.
Liz Hearne, wife of the late Jamaican author, John Hearne and mother of super editor at UWI Press, Shivaun, died recently. Our condolences to her family and loved ones. We'll miss Liz.
One more big piece of news, but it'll keep till next time. Walk good meantime.
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Visit to Calgary: Part Three
My last engagement in Calgary on this winter 2009 visit was at St Stephen’s Church downtown http://www.ststephenscalgary.org/ where, on Friday March 6, Howard Gallimore, Jamaican-Calgarian who had read with me on my previous visit, joined me, reprising his role of Samuel, as we read my Good Friday poem, De Man. I read Naomi. I am a Roman Catholic, as is Howard, but, as the Lord would have it, the readings of this poem in Calgary have, on both occasions, taken place in Anglican churches. We are grateful to our Anglican brethren for hosting us on both occasions.
The story of the reading was a Jamaican pumpkin vine story, running off in different directions as it put out its blossoms and then bore fruit. Dr Cecille DePass, a Professor at U of C, and a good friend and supporter, had, when she heard I was coming back this year to visit the University once more, offered to put me up once I’d fulfilled my obligations to the University. In addition, since the visit would again be in Lent, she had proposed that I do a reading of De Man, as I had done in 2007. Professor DePass is that rara avis, that endangered species, an enabler. So she undertook to find a church that would host the reading. Enter Dr Jean Springer, Rector’s Warden at St Stephen’s and a good friend of Cecille’s – and, unknown to me, an old friend of my husband’s family. In fact, his father was married in her parents’ house, the Barretts and the Mordecais having known one another from Columbus came over. Jean agreed to approach Rev. Brian Pearson, the rector at St Stephen’s, and we were delighted when we heard that he had agreed. Jean and I spoke on the phone, I discovered the family connection – I knew Jean’s sister, concert pianist, Nerine Barrett – and when I came to Calgary, Jean took to me to lunch and we got to know each other a bit better.
Which was how, on the evening of Friday March 6th, Rev. Pearson came to be welcoming Howard and me and introducing us to a small but welcoming audience at St Stephen’s. We could not have been more received more thoughtfully. We had met the associate priest, Rev. Cathy Fulton, and also Brian’s wife, Jean, beforehand. There were microphones and lecterns at the ready, the church was lit, and there was water to hand. We were promised refreshments in the Canterbury Room afterwards.
A little bit about the poem: De Man: a performance poem is my second book of poetry, and is really a verse play. A two-hander written entirely in Jamaican Creole, it is the story of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ as reported by two imagined characters, Naomi, a maid in the court of Pilate’s wife, and Samuel, a disabled carpenter of Nazareth to whom Joseph taught the trade. It has been performed many times in Canada and in Jamaica.
But it is always a challenge, especially in Canada, where we, the performers, are aware that we are reading in a language that is not familiar to many in the audience. We make adjustments for this, but even then, one is never sure. It helps when, as has been the case on both occasions, there are Caribbean people in the audience. Naomi and Samuel have their own story, which unfolds as they watch Jesus on his way to Calvary. Naomi is a bit of a busybody, and a forthright speaker of her opinions, and, never mind that this is a terrible tale, there are light moments, as there must have been when the true history happened.
After the performance, we gathered in the Canterbury Room for refreshments, graciously provided by parishioners and well-wishers. Everyone I spoke to said that that it had been deeply moving, and that those who hadn’t come had missed something. English speakers found that they could understand once they became accustomed to the rhythms of the Creole. People generously purchased books, a portion of the sales having been promised to support the church’s ministry.
The reading was memorable for another reason. We discovered later that, unbeknown to us, Howard’s grandmother in Toronto had died while we were performing the poem.
Someone in the audience asked me, as we spoke afterwards, if I had seen the movie, The Passion of the Christ. I told him that I hadn’t and wondered why he had asked. He recalled Samuel’s description, as he observed the clothes being torn off of Jesus:
Dem tearing off him clothes
And scab and blood and skin
And flesh hold onto dem.
Him is a open wound.
A walking sore.
He had never seen or heard those details before – not until he’d seen the movie. I explained that I’d imagined what would have happened if a man had been whipped till he was bleeding, then had clothes put on him, then had them torn off when the blood had dried. When I returned to Toronto, my husband pointed out that the poem had been published in 1995, while the movie had been released in 2004.
I was very surprised and pleased at the invitation to have us back to repeat the performance on Good Friday! We are both – indeed all – extremely grateful to the clergy, staff and parishioners at St Stephen’s for hosting us, and in particular, to Dr Jean Springer for trusting, sight unseen, in the story of De Man. It was a great experience for both Howard and myself, I know. The plan is that we will come back for Easter next year, since it was not have possible to accept the invitation to return this Easter.
I think we all look forward to that time.
The story of the reading was a Jamaican pumpkin vine story, running off in different directions as it put out its blossoms and then bore fruit. Dr Cecille DePass, a Professor at U of C, and a good friend and supporter, had, when she heard I was coming back this year to visit the University once more, offered to put me up once I’d fulfilled my obligations to the University. In addition, since the visit would again be in Lent, she had proposed that I do a reading of De Man, as I had done in 2007. Professor DePass is that rara avis, that endangered species, an enabler. So she undertook to find a church that would host the reading. Enter Dr Jean Springer, Rector’s Warden at St Stephen’s and a good friend of Cecille’s – and, unknown to me, an old friend of my husband’s family. In fact, his father was married in her parents’ house, the Barretts and the Mordecais having known one another from Columbus came over. Jean agreed to approach Rev. Brian Pearson, the rector at St Stephen’s, and we were delighted when we heard that he had agreed. Jean and I spoke on the phone, I discovered the family connection – I knew Jean’s sister, concert pianist, Nerine Barrett – and when I came to Calgary, Jean took to me to lunch and we got to know each other a bit better.
Which was how, on the evening of Friday March 6th, Rev. Pearson came to be welcoming Howard and me and introducing us to a small but welcoming audience at St Stephen’s. We could not have been more received more thoughtfully. We had met the associate priest, Rev. Cathy Fulton, and also Brian’s wife, Jean, beforehand. There were microphones and lecterns at the ready, the church was lit, and there was water to hand. We were promised refreshments in the Canterbury Room afterwards.
A little bit about the poem: De Man: a performance poem is my second book of poetry, and is really a verse play. A two-hander written entirely in Jamaican Creole, it is the story of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ as reported by two imagined characters, Naomi, a maid in the court of Pilate’s wife, and Samuel, a disabled carpenter of Nazareth to whom Joseph taught the trade. It has been performed many times in Canada and in Jamaica.
But it is always a challenge, especially in Canada, where we, the performers, are aware that we are reading in a language that is not familiar to many in the audience. We make adjustments for this, but even then, one is never sure. It helps when, as has been the case on both occasions, there are Caribbean people in the audience. Naomi and Samuel have their own story, which unfolds as they watch Jesus on his way to Calvary. Naomi is a bit of a busybody, and a forthright speaker of her opinions, and, never mind that this is a terrible tale, there are light moments, as there must have been when the true history happened.
After the performance, we gathered in the Canterbury Room for refreshments, graciously provided by parishioners and well-wishers. Everyone I spoke to said that that it had been deeply moving, and that those who hadn’t come had missed something. English speakers found that they could understand once they became accustomed to the rhythms of the Creole. People generously purchased books, a portion of the sales having been promised to support the church’s ministry.
The reading was memorable for another reason. We discovered later that, unbeknown to us, Howard’s grandmother in Toronto had died while we were performing the poem.
Someone in the audience asked me, as we spoke afterwards, if I had seen the movie, The Passion of the Christ. I told him that I hadn’t and wondered why he had asked. He recalled Samuel’s description, as he observed the clothes being torn off of Jesus:
Dem tearing off him clothes
And scab and blood and skin
And flesh hold onto dem.
Him is a open wound.
A walking sore.
He had never seen or heard those details before – not until he’d seen the movie. I explained that I’d imagined what would have happened if a man had been whipped till he was bleeding, then had clothes put on him, then had them torn off when the blood had dried. When I returned to Toronto, my husband pointed out that the poem had been published in 1995, while the movie had been released in 2004.
I was very surprised and pleased at the invitation to have us back to repeat the performance on Good Friday! We are both – indeed all – extremely grateful to the clergy, staff and parishioners at St Stephen’s for hosting us, and in particular, to Dr Jean Springer for trusting, sight unseen, in the story of De Man. It was a great experience for both Howard and myself, I know. The plan is that we will come back for Easter next year, since it was not have possible to accept the invitation to return this Easter.
I think we all look forward to that time.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Visit to Calgary Part Two
A note on my last post. It was written before I saw Nik Korpon’s review of Pink Icing, which is why I was pleased that Nik said what he did about my narrative disappearing act.
It’s my second day in Calgary. Tuesday, March 3rd.
From Aruna Srivastiva’s office, to which Robert Majzels has so kindly brought me through ice and snow and melt, I can glimpse a strange, bare landscape. It’s not just the emptiness of winter. It maybe looks as if someone has skinned the earth, as they would skin an animal, and what I’m looking at is what’s underneath. The mountains ringing the city on the low horizon are like folds of skin, pulled back from the exposed torso and piled up at the sides of the excoriated body of the beast.
I’d heard about Aruna before I met her – we had friends in common. We talked a bit before going off to her class and she told me some more about the course being done by the students with whom I’d be visiting. She’d already said via e-mail that English 492 is a course on postcolonial and globalization studies in which students look at literature in the context of cultural and political issues. They worked in groups, and so did not often meet as one large group, and they were mostly well motivated, and got on with what they had to do. I was interested, especially in the fact that they were assessed in non-traditional ways (one being that they blogged) rather than by means of tests and papers. I told Aruna that it seemed like it would be a lot of work to mark, more harassing than correcting papers, and she admitted it was.
But it would obviously be challenging for the students and would offer insights into their progress, a grasp of how well they were acquiring skills and knowledge and navigating concepts. Also, she would quickly have a handle on any problems they might encounter.
Aruna had been concerned about the student turnout and lured them with the promise of food after the class, which I subsequently told her was a lunatic thing to do, because I think every man-Jack was there! I enjoyed the session. Via an Internet hook-up, Tracy, an admin assistant, if I remember right, who would normally have been present except that she was ill, could participate. We all waved to her on camera and she waved back at us. The students were alert and interested and clearly very bright.
I was a bit angry with myself, though, for getting distracted. I found myself talking about getting published, what constituted a bestseller in Canadian and American terms, etc., etc. I wish that I’d just stayed with reading stories and poems.
Aruna treated us to dinner in the grad lounge, good food and vivid cocktails. There was lively chatter, somewhat constrained by the fact that we were at a long, thin table. Across the table from me was an Asian woman who diverted us with a tale of being thrown out of a bar by a bouncer. She never went to bars, she said, and this one time had all been a crazy mix-up. Beside me a white Canadian woman spoke of spending summers picking mushrooms that grew wild. She loved it. She told me which mushrooms – it might have been morels, which grow wild in British Columbia, but I can’t remember now.
It wasn’t a very mixed group, racially, and the evening ended with an interesting conversation – by that time everyone had left and there were only the five of us – between three white young men, one of Finnish heritage, one Danish and one of Bosnian background. They discussed racial purity, which I got the impression they all thought they had. Aruna is East Indian. I am a child of so many admixtures that they are lost in the mists of generations of miscegenation.
I would see Aruna again before the end of the week, to share a cup of tea and a slice of Jamaican plum pudding at the house of my friend and hostess, Cecille DePass, a Prof in Education and another innovative teacher. Cecille was why I was in Calgary to begin with. She had approached the Department of English in 2007 about having me do a reading at U. of C., to wind up my mini tour of Winnipeg, Vancouver and Edmonton, and that had led to the current invitation. Louise Saldhana came with Aruna. During tea, Louise and I hatched a project concerning children’s literature.
It was a privilege to be with these women, as it had been to meet Mutriba Din, Senior Financial Analyst at the University. Mutriba had us to dinner before my reading at Pages the day before. Cecille DePass, Aruna Srivastiva, Mutriba Din, Hiromi Goto, Louise Saldhana, Larissa Lai, Nadine Chambers, Noga Gayle, Yvonne Brown, Jean Springer, Julie Hendrickson – women, most of whom I met on these two trips to the west. Dionne Brand, on a visit to Vancouver in fall 2008, described a “world beneath the world,” meaning the world that would have existed if all the dire things that have snagged it, had not. In a recent blog post, Larissa Lai referred to Dionne’s affirmation of the existence of this under-world, and observed, “There are women… actively making that other world...”
These are some of those women.
It’s my second day in Calgary. Tuesday, March 3rd.
From Aruna Srivastiva’s office, to which Robert Majzels has so kindly brought me through ice and snow and melt, I can glimpse a strange, bare landscape. It’s not just the emptiness of winter. It maybe looks as if someone has skinned the earth, as they would skin an animal, and what I’m looking at is what’s underneath. The mountains ringing the city on the low horizon are like folds of skin, pulled back from the exposed torso and piled up at the sides of the excoriated body of the beast.
I’d heard about Aruna before I met her – we had friends in common. We talked a bit before going off to her class and she told me some more about the course being done by the students with whom I’d be visiting. She’d already said via e-mail that English 492 is a course on postcolonial and globalization studies in which students look at literature in the context of cultural and political issues. They worked in groups, and so did not often meet as one large group, and they were mostly well motivated, and got on with what they had to do. I was interested, especially in the fact that they were assessed in non-traditional ways (one being that they blogged) rather than by means of tests and papers. I told Aruna that it seemed like it would be a lot of work to mark, more harassing than correcting papers, and she admitted it was.
But it would obviously be challenging for the students and would offer insights into their progress, a grasp of how well they were acquiring skills and knowledge and navigating concepts. Also, she would quickly have a handle on any problems they might encounter.
Aruna had been concerned about the student turnout and lured them with the promise of food after the class, which I subsequently told her was a lunatic thing to do, because I think every man-Jack was there! I enjoyed the session. Via an Internet hook-up, Tracy, an admin assistant, if I remember right, who would normally have been present except that she was ill, could participate. We all waved to her on camera and she waved back at us. The students were alert and interested and clearly very bright.
I was a bit angry with myself, though, for getting distracted. I found myself talking about getting published, what constituted a bestseller in Canadian and American terms, etc., etc. I wish that I’d just stayed with reading stories and poems.
Aruna treated us to dinner in the grad lounge, good food and vivid cocktails. There was lively chatter, somewhat constrained by the fact that we were at a long, thin table. Across the table from me was an Asian woman who diverted us with a tale of being thrown out of a bar by a bouncer. She never went to bars, she said, and this one time had all been a crazy mix-up. Beside me a white Canadian woman spoke of spending summers picking mushrooms that grew wild. She loved it. She told me which mushrooms – it might have been morels, which grow wild in British Columbia, but I can’t remember now.
It wasn’t a very mixed group, racially, and the evening ended with an interesting conversation – by that time everyone had left and there were only the five of us – between three white young men, one of Finnish heritage, one Danish and one of Bosnian background. They discussed racial purity, which I got the impression they all thought they had. Aruna is East Indian. I am a child of so many admixtures that they are lost in the mists of generations of miscegenation.
I would see Aruna again before the end of the week, to share a cup of tea and a slice of Jamaican plum pudding at the house of my friend and hostess, Cecille DePass, a Prof in Education and another innovative teacher. Cecille was why I was in Calgary to begin with. She had approached the Department of English in 2007 about having me do a reading at U. of C., to wind up my mini tour of Winnipeg, Vancouver and Edmonton, and that had led to the current invitation. Louise Saldhana came with Aruna. During tea, Louise and I hatched a project concerning children’s literature.
It was a privilege to be with these women, as it had been to meet Mutriba Din, Senior Financial Analyst at the University. Mutriba had us to dinner before my reading at Pages the day before. Cecille DePass, Aruna Srivastiva, Mutriba Din, Hiromi Goto, Louise Saldhana, Larissa Lai, Nadine Chambers, Noga Gayle, Yvonne Brown, Jean Springer, Julie Hendrickson – women, most of whom I met on these two trips to the west. Dionne Brand, on a visit to Vancouver in fall 2008, described a “world beneath the world,” meaning the world that would have existed if all the dire things that have snagged it, had not. In a recent blog post, Larissa Lai referred to Dionne’s affirmation of the existence of this under-world, and observed, “There are women… actively making that other world...”
These are some of those women.
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Calgary Visit - Part One
I flew to Calgary on 2 March 2009 at the invitation of the Department of English at the University of Calgary. It was a return visit. I had visited before in 2007 as part of a mini-tour of Western Canada to promote my first collection of short fiction, Pink Icing. That visit took place at just about the same time in early March, and involved a lunch time reading which went well, never mind the small audience. Christian Bok had said then that the Department would ask me back.
So I begin by saying thanks to him for making good his promise.
A bit of serendipity, though, before I go any further. Roaming the web last night I came across a review of Pink Icing posted at Outsider Writers’ Collective:
http://www.outsiderwriters.org/archives/2084#more-2084
It’s a nice review that includes these comments:
"One of Pamela Mordecai’s biggest strengths as a writer is her ability to disappear. So, you’re thinking, ‘Wow, that’s the most backhanded compliment I’ve read.’ But it’s true…Her words dissolve and leave you immersed in the world of story, occupying the same patch of grass or gravel road as the characters... Her restrained prose is economical and turns many a phrase without drawing attention to the writing itself, eschewing any chance of pulling you out of the story."
You’ll see in a bit why I was glad to read that, and be reassured that I put my money where my mouth is. Thanks, Nik Korpon!
So here I was, at the end of February, being optimistic. Courtesy of a chinook, it had been relatively warm in Calgary, and Robert Majzels, poet, playwright, novelist, prize-winning translator and associate professor of the Creative Writing group in the Department of English, had sounded as though, maybe, just maybe, the weather might be persuaded to hold. But Calgary weather is mercurial, a word I have on occasion used to describe myself, so by the time I touched down, it had exercised its right to do a volte face and welcome the visiting writer with an example of her very own changeable nature. "If not, why not?" as my Granny used to say...
I'd been reading the latest Robert Majzels (say May-zels) book. The Humbugs Diet, over the previous day or two, and indeed on the flight across. I am, I confess, severely under-read, a state I tell myself I share with most of the world, so not to worry. Given the opportunity of meeting a fellow-writer, however, I usually make it my business to read his or her work. It's as good a way as any to decide on what shall be the next book I choose as I struggle valiantly with the Sisyphean task of catching up.
The Humbugs Diet, billed as a detective story, is tasty. (I won't tell you anything about the story, except that it's about old people, is not really a whodunit, and is funny. To find out more, go buy the book.) As I've said before, I dislike writing that calls attention to itself: I don't like clever that makes sure that I notice it. I'm old-fashioned, believing firmly in the celebrated "seamless unity of form and content". Ergo, "The writing is so fine!" as a statement about any book makes my antennae quiver. However fine, it should be tucked away, like a respectable lady's petticoat, at the service of the story. In this novel, Majzels uses a manner of thought, and so of writing, to create a doppelganger, an own-way, own-mind second self for his ex-detective protagonist, Rotuf Mazal. Rotuf is on the one hand not much of anybody, diffident, indecisive, letting the days go by till he can't stand to do it any more. But quirky habits of phrase and deliberation conjure his second self for us, and much of the humour in the novel derives from the interplay between Rotuf's pedestrian first self and his sardonic second self.
I have a thing about numinous quality of names (Brutus starting a spirit, and all that) so, as I told Robert, I wasn't sure about his giving the protagonist a name so similar to his own. (I wasn't to know then that the Claire of the story is also named for his partner, Claire Huot.) And this isn't a flawless work. But it was experimenting - with language, with signifying on cultures and literatures, with pushing the boundaries of a genre in an amiable, unsnooty way. Above all, it diverted me, which is what good storytelling has always been about.
If his story was wry and endearing, never mind that it concerned a murder or two, Robert, in his role as host, was equally good natured. When I found I had to postpone the visit from October 2008 to March of this year, he said, No problem - these things happen. Once we confirmed dates, I had clear indications about things that I needed to do, and what my visit would involve. The refund of my plane fare and my honorarium arrived in advance of my departure for Calgary - very reassuring for a poor writer. And Robert was always accessible and helpful.
And now, here he was on the ground, meeting me with his trusty VW steed (veteran of two cross-Canada runs, I later learned), whisking me off to the Best Western near the University, helping me with my bags to the door of my room and promising a ride to U of C the next afternoon. The next day, he arrived exactly on time, delivered me safely to the English department, never mind the treacherous, iced-over terrain, and introduced me to Aruna Srivasteva whose class I was to visit that afternoon. More on Aruna’s class in my next dispatch.
His final kindness was to introduce me the next night at a reading at Pages, a great alternative bookstore in Kensington where the own-way traffic lights must have been made in Jamaica, for dem cyaan agree. There the chairs were all occupied, the audience receptive and the owner-manager, Simone Lee, her baby son, Theo, and Martin and the rest of the staff, both gracious as well as organized - smooth as Theo's bottom. Robert and Claire saw me off at the end of the reading with good wishes for the rest of the visit.
So I'm raising my glass of sorrel in a toast to Robert Majzels, and through him, the Department of English at the University of Calgary. Thanks, Robert. Good luck with finding the house! I look forward to seeing you next year, and between now and then, walk good.
So I begin by saying thanks to him for making good his promise.
A bit of serendipity, though, before I go any further. Roaming the web last night I came across a review of Pink Icing posted at Outsider Writers’ Collective:
http://www.outsiderwriters.org/archives/2084#more-2084
It’s a nice review that includes these comments:
"One of Pamela Mordecai’s biggest strengths as a writer is her ability to disappear. So, you’re thinking, ‘Wow, that’s the most backhanded compliment I’ve read.’ But it’s true…Her words dissolve and leave you immersed in the world of story, occupying the same patch of grass or gravel road as the characters... Her restrained prose is economical and turns many a phrase without drawing attention to the writing itself, eschewing any chance of pulling you out of the story."
You’ll see in a bit why I was glad to read that, and be reassured that I put my money where my mouth is. Thanks, Nik Korpon!
So here I was, at the end of February, being optimistic. Courtesy of a chinook, it had been relatively warm in Calgary, and Robert Majzels, poet, playwright, novelist, prize-winning translator and associate professor of the Creative Writing group in the Department of English, had sounded as though, maybe, just maybe, the weather might be persuaded to hold. But Calgary weather is mercurial, a word I have on occasion used to describe myself, so by the time I touched down, it had exercised its right to do a volte face and welcome the visiting writer with an example of her very own changeable nature. "If not, why not?" as my Granny used to say...
I'd been reading the latest Robert Majzels (say May-zels) book. The Humbugs Diet, over the previous day or two, and indeed on the flight across. I am, I confess, severely under-read, a state I tell myself I share with most of the world, so not to worry. Given the opportunity of meeting a fellow-writer, however, I usually make it my business to read his or her work. It's as good a way as any to decide on what shall be the next book I choose as I struggle valiantly with the Sisyphean task of catching up.
The Humbugs Diet, billed as a detective story, is tasty. (I won't tell you anything about the story, except that it's about old people, is not really a whodunit, and is funny. To find out more, go buy the book.) As I've said before, I dislike writing that calls attention to itself: I don't like clever that makes sure that I notice it. I'm old-fashioned, believing firmly in the celebrated "seamless unity of form and content". Ergo, "The writing is so fine!" as a statement about any book makes my antennae quiver. However fine, it should be tucked away, like a respectable lady's petticoat, at the service of the story. In this novel, Majzels uses a manner of thought, and so of writing, to create a doppelganger, an own-way, own-mind second self for his ex-detective protagonist, Rotuf Mazal. Rotuf is on the one hand not much of anybody, diffident, indecisive, letting the days go by till he can't stand to do it any more. But quirky habits of phrase and deliberation conjure his second self for us, and much of the humour in the novel derives from the interplay between Rotuf's pedestrian first self and his sardonic second self.
I have a thing about numinous quality of names (Brutus starting a spirit, and all that) so, as I told Robert, I wasn't sure about his giving the protagonist a name so similar to his own. (I wasn't to know then that the Claire of the story is also named for his partner, Claire Huot.) And this isn't a flawless work. But it was experimenting - with language, with signifying on cultures and literatures, with pushing the boundaries of a genre in an amiable, unsnooty way. Above all, it diverted me, which is what good storytelling has always been about.
If his story was wry and endearing, never mind that it concerned a murder or two, Robert, in his role as host, was equally good natured. When I found I had to postpone the visit from October 2008 to March of this year, he said, No problem - these things happen. Once we confirmed dates, I had clear indications about things that I needed to do, and what my visit would involve. The refund of my plane fare and my honorarium arrived in advance of my departure for Calgary - very reassuring for a poor writer. And Robert was always accessible and helpful.
And now, here he was on the ground, meeting me with his trusty VW steed (veteran of two cross-Canada runs, I later learned), whisking me off to the Best Western near the University, helping me with my bags to the door of my room and promising a ride to U of C the next afternoon. The next day, he arrived exactly on time, delivered me safely to the English department, never mind the treacherous, iced-over terrain, and introduced me to Aruna Srivasteva whose class I was to visit that afternoon. More on Aruna’s class in my next dispatch.
His final kindness was to introduce me the next night at a reading at Pages, a great alternative bookstore in Kensington where the own-way traffic lights must have been made in Jamaica, for dem cyaan agree. There the chairs were all occupied, the audience receptive and the owner-manager, Simone Lee, her baby son, Theo, and Martin and the rest of the staff, both gracious as well as organized - smooth as Theo's bottom. Robert and Claire saw me off at the end of the reading with good wishes for the rest of the visit.
So I'm raising my glass of sorrel in a toast to Robert Majzels, and through him, the Department of English at the University of Calgary. Thanks, Robert. Good luck with finding the house! I look forward to seeing you next year, and between now and then, walk good.
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Just some notes...
I'm going to be blogging in two places in the month of May. I'll be here as much as I can, but I'll also be posting at http://www.openbooktoronto.com/ where I'll be Writer in Residence for the month of May. So stop by there too, if you can.
I've some good news – better than good. Spouse Martin's book, Blue Mountain Trouble, has been getting great reviews. See one here
http://www.quillandquire.com/books_young/review.cfm?review_id=6474
It's a crossover YA novel, about twins (a boy and a girl) who live high in the mountains of Jamaica and who encounter a magical goat. Published by Arthur A. Levine Books, an imprint of Scholastic Press, simultaneously in the USA ($16.99) and Canada (C$21.99). ISBN9780-0-545-04156-0.
See an interview with Martin at
http://www.yardedge.net
I haven't let go of the matter of my last post. I'm coming back to it soon, but it's time to give an account of my visit to Calgary, late though it may be. So that's what's coming up next. Traveling tomorrow, so see you on Friday – in both places. Till then enjoy the frolics of spring...
I've some good news – better than good. Spouse Martin's book, Blue Mountain Trouble, has been getting great reviews. See one here
http://www.quillandquire.com/books_young/review.cfm?review_id=6474
It's a crossover YA novel, about twins (a boy and a girl) who live high in the mountains of Jamaica and who encounter a magical goat. Published by Arthur A. Levine Books, an imprint of Scholastic Press, simultaneously in the USA ($16.99) and Canada (C$21.99). ISBN9780-0-545-04156-0.
See an interview with Martin at
http://www.yardedge.net
I haven't let go of the matter of my last post. I'm coming back to it soon, but it's time to give an account of my visit to Calgary, late though it may be. So that's what's coming up next. Traveling tomorrow, so see you on Friday – in both places. Till then enjoy the frolics of spring...
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Should Andrew Buchanan send an angel with an avenging sword?
Today’s post includes a poem of mine called “The True Blue of Islands.” It is the title poem of my last collection of poetry. According to the blurb on the back cover, “The True Blue of Islands is a collection of poems exploring violence, beginning with the brutal treatment of slaves, journeying through child abuse and self-mutilation and ending with the callous murder of the poet’s brother.” Though the poem was written to remember my brother Richard, who was murdered in Jamaica on 30 May 2004, I post it today as a requiem for Andrew Buchanan. For the circumstances surrounding his death, please see “A Lesson in Social Justice” by Yvonne McCalla Sobers at http://www.jamlink.com/
If the use of violence by the Israeli army against innocent Palestinians (see post of April 20) is despicable, so is the arbitrary use of force against the ordinary citizen by the forces, ostensibly of law and order, in Canada, the USA, Russia, China, Jamaica, or anywhere else. It seems increasingly that those who should protect us have become those whom we need to fear most.
But there is a larger question, a question about whether it is we who are conscripting young human beings and making killers of them.
At http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mary-mapes/looking-back-at-abu-ghrai_b_191531.html
MaryMapes considers, inter alia, the unfairness of political and military administrations who devise policy, impose it on ‘underlings’ and end up blameless, free as birds, while those who followed the orders (to which we now say they should have objected) are punished for their obedience. She mentions as an example Chip Frederick who, at 42 years old, having lost his wife, his military pension and his medals – and his pride – is out of prison and trying to restart his life.
“I do not think Chip Frederick – or any of the other inexperienced, poorly trained reservists at Abu Ghraib – went to Iraq full of original ideas about how to torment the locals that just happened to match the methods designed by the Pentagon…I believe he and others at the prison were fed a steady diet of these toxic tactics…And they paid dearly for their lack of protest.”
But those who do object, as Greg Mitchell reports,
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/greg-mitchell/us-soldier-killed-herself_b_190517.html
do so at great personal cost, for no one likes people who rock the boat. American soldier Alyssa Peterson refused to take part in torture, and shortly thereafter took her own life. Reporter Kevin Elston of the Flagstaff radio station, KNAU, unwilling to accept the official report of Peterson’s death as having been ‘from a "non-hostile weapons discharge”,’ was stonewalled by officialdom and finally had to file a Freedom of Information Act [FOIA] request that led to startling revelations about her death. According to Mitchell, the station reported:
"Peterson objected to the interrogation techniques used on prisoners. She refused to participate after only two nights working in the unit known as the cage. Army spokespersons for her unit have refused to describe the interrogation techniques Alyssa objected to. They say all records of those techniques have now been destroyed."
Mitchell goes on: “The official probe of her death would later note that earlier she had been ‘reprimanded’ for showing ‘empathy’ for the prisoners. One of the most moving parts of the report, in fact, is this: ‘She said that she did not know how to be two people; she ... could not be one person in the cage and another outside the wire.’”
So we are now in the business of manufacturing killers – you, me, all of us. We have seen the monster enemy; indeed, we have created him. We should think on it. Selah.
The True Blue of Islands
for Richard murdered 30 May 2004 RIP, and today, for Andrew Buchanan, RIP
So here’s my friend
writing of how poets
have named the blues
of these small islands.
I see him hold his brush
testing the tones
another poet
set to name them too.
Truth is those are
fake colours.
Counterfeit.
Watch and I’ll paint
the islands’ blues for you.
Just over from
the next door bar
my brother’s
napping in his car
too tired to drag
himself to a safe place.
(Besides, this
is his island —
every place
is safe.)
Blue is the hue
exhausted
of his face
starting awake.
It is the black
and bruise
of the dark hand
he wipes
across his brow
to try the truth
before his eye.
Must be a lie.
It seems he’s
looking at a gun.
Beyond his arm
the sea of night
is indigo. The wind
is warm. The stars
gleam cold as steel.
Smelt blue the shade
of this night’s
lesser lights
smelt blue this
snarling nozzle
set to bite.
His mind is fuzzy.
Didn’t he just
park his old
aquamarine
gas-guzzling car?
Say to his friend,
“You go on up.
I’m going to have
a smoke or two”?
He puffs.
Lavender clouds
halo his head.
He thinks of bed
yawning a grin.
That gun? He knows
it’s too much gin.
Pushes the door,
heaves out his gut
follows it with
a sandaled foot
stands up turns back
slams the door shut.
“Give me your gun.”
The voice treads air.
“Don’t have no gun.
And further to that, why
you need another one?”
My brother — fair
and reasonable
till the end.
“Too bad. No gun
mean man must dead.”
Three swift reports.
He stumbles.
Grabs his side.
Calls out
“Help me!
I’m shot…”
bleeds royally
then dies.
Electric planets
punctuate
a firmament
of navy skies
spill laser
points of flame-
blue light
drill purple
worm holes
in the forehead
of the night.
While lilac drafts
of incense rise
my brother slips
his dark blue skin.
The dog-grey sea
licks at his toes
noses his corpse
looking for clues.
Like that old poet
wrestling the wind
I study shades
of island blues.
If the use of violence by the Israeli army against innocent Palestinians (see post of April 20) is despicable, so is the arbitrary use of force against the ordinary citizen by the forces, ostensibly of law and order, in Canada, the USA, Russia, China, Jamaica, or anywhere else. It seems increasingly that those who should protect us have become those whom we need to fear most.
But there is a larger question, a question about whether it is we who are conscripting young human beings and making killers of them.
At http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mary-mapes/looking-back-at-abu-ghrai_b_191531.html
MaryMapes considers, inter alia, the unfairness of political and military administrations who devise policy, impose it on ‘underlings’ and end up blameless, free as birds, while those who followed the orders (to which we now say they should have objected) are punished for their obedience. She mentions as an example Chip Frederick who, at 42 years old, having lost his wife, his military pension and his medals – and his pride – is out of prison and trying to restart his life.
“I do not think Chip Frederick – or any of the other inexperienced, poorly trained reservists at Abu Ghraib – went to Iraq full of original ideas about how to torment the locals that just happened to match the methods designed by the Pentagon…I believe he and others at the prison were fed a steady diet of these toxic tactics…And they paid dearly for their lack of protest.”
But those who do object, as Greg Mitchell reports,
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/greg-mitchell/us-soldier-killed-herself_b_190517.html
do so at great personal cost, for no one likes people who rock the boat. American soldier Alyssa Peterson refused to take part in torture, and shortly thereafter took her own life. Reporter Kevin Elston of the Flagstaff radio station, KNAU, unwilling to accept the official report of Peterson’s death as having been ‘from a "non-hostile weapons discharge”,’ was stonewalled by officialdom and finally had to file a Freedom of Information Act [FOIA] request that led to startling revelations about her death. According to Mitchell, the station reported:
"Peterson objected to the interrogation techniques used on prisoners. She refused to participate after only two nights working in the unit known as the cage. Army spokespersons for her unit have refused to describe the interrogation techniques Alyssa objected to. They say all records of those techniques have now been destroyed."
Mitchell goes on: “The official probe of her death would later note that earlier she had been ‘reprimanded’ for showing ‘empathy’ for the prisoners. One of the most moving parts of the report, in fact, is this: ‘She said that she did not know how to be two people; she ... could not be one person in the cage and another outside the wire.’”
So we are now in the business of manufacturing killers – you, me, all of us. We have seen the monster enemy; indeed, we have created him. We should think on it. Selah.
The True Blue of Islands
for Richard murdered 30 May 2004 RIP, and today, for Andrew Buchanan, RIP
So here’s my friend
writing of how poets
have named the blues
of these small islands.
I see him hold his brush
testing the tones
another poet
set to name them too.
Truth is those are
fake colours.
Counterfeit.
Watch and I’ll paint
the islands’ blues for you.
Just over from
the next door bar
my brother’s
napping in his car
too tired to drag
himself to a safe place.
(Besides, this
is his island —
every place
is safe.)
Blue is the hue
exhausted
of his face
starting awake.
It is the black
and bruise
of the dark hand
he wipes
across his brow
to try the truth
before his eye.
Must be a lie.
It seems he’s
looking at a gun.
Beyond his arm
the sea of night
is indigo. The wind
is warm. The stars
gleam cold as steel.
Smelt blue the shade
of this night’s
lesser lights
smelt blue this
snarling nozzle
set to bite.
His mind is fuzzy.
Didn’t he just
park his old
aquamarine
gas-guzzling car?
Say to his friend,
“You go on up.
I’m going to have
a smoke or two”?
He puffs.
Lavender clouds
halo his head.
He thinks of bed
yawning a grin.
That gun? He knows
it’s too much gin.
Pushes the door,
heaves out his gut
follows it with
a sandaled foot
stands up turns back
slams the door shut.
“Give me your gun.”
The voice treads air.
“Don’t have no gun.
And further to that, why
you need another one?”
My brother — fair
and reasonable
till the end.
“Too bad. No gun
mean man must dead.”
Three swift reports.
He stumbles.
Grabs his side.
Calls out
“Help me!
I’m shot…”
bleeds royally
then dies.
Electric planets
punctuate
a firmament
of navy skies
spill laser
points of flame-
blue light
drill purple
worm holes
in the forehead
of the night.
While lilac drafts
of incense rise
my brother slips
his dark blue skin.
The dog-grey sea
licks at his toes
noses his corpse
looking for clues.
Like that old poet
wrestling the wind
I study shades
of island blues.
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Top 100 Jamaican songs. Get it right!
I’ve got to thank Rethabile Masilo for pointing me to Reuters’ report
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090422/music_nm/us_jamaica_1)
announcing a list of Jamaica’s top 100 songs over the 50 years between 1957 and 2007.
A panel of seven made the selections, assisted by members of the public attending a symposium at the University of the West Indies, Mona, on April 16th. The audience helped to shape the criteria for the selection, as well as vote on the compositions to be included in the top 100. Former Finance and Planning Minister Omar Davies headed the panel, which included businessman Wayne Chen, musicologist Vaughn "Bunny" Goodison, founder of the Soul Shack Disco and creator and host of the popular radio show, "Rhythms," Frankie Campbell of the Fab Five band, broadcaster Francois St. Juste, journalist Basil Walters, and musician Sly Dunbar of Sly and Robbie fame.
Bob Marley's "One Love" topped the list with "Simmer Down" coming in at No. 9. "No Woman No Cry" was picked No. 12 and "Redemption Song" No. 14. "One Love" garnered 726 points. The second placed song, "O Carolina," originally recorded by the Folkes Brothers, scored 540 points.
Reuters reported the list as follows:
The Top 10 songs and the singers were:
1. "One Love" - Bob Marley & the Wailers
2. "Oh Carolina" - The Folkes Brothers
3. "54-45" - The Maytals
4. "Got to Go Back Home" - Bob Andy
5. "My Boy Lollipop" - Millie Small
6. "Many Rivers To Cross" - Jimmy Cliff
7. "Israelites" - Desmond Dekker and the Aces
8. "Cherry Oh Baby" - Eric Donaldson
9. "Simmer Down" - Bob Marley & the Wailers
10. "Carry Go Bring Come" - Justin Hinds & the Dominos
I’m not a fan of top 10s, top 100s, Grammys, Oscars, etc., for reasons that I think are good ones, and that I won’t go into in this post. However, it’s nothing but good when people come together to weigh, discuss and celebrate their culture – in this case, their music. Give thanks and praises for that.
Three things struck me.
First, Horace Helps, the Reuters reporter, and Bob Tourtellotte, the editor, have managed to distort the title of the song in the No. 3 spot. "54-46 – That's My Number" is a song by Fred "Toots" Hibbert about the 18 months he spent in jail on a ganja charge. (Toots claimed he was arrested while helping to bail someone.) It’s not “54-45,” though there are sites on the Internet misnaming it that way.
Folks know I get upset by inaccuracies, sloppy dealing with facts, figures, events, history, the truth. This is a simple story, and the reporter and editor have easy access to media where the correct information is available. Further, it’s as if some people are perversely dedicated to getting it wrong. For example, anyone listening to the recording at
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x8950_54-45-was-my-number_music
a site where the song is incorrectly advertised as “54-45 WAS MY NUMBER," will hear the musicians singing the right thing.
There was no place for comment or feedback on the Reuters site, so no chance to set the record straight.
Secondly, the fifth place song is of interest for a couple of reasons. It's the only one where the recording artiste is a woman. Also, whatever the criteria used for “Jamaican” were, “My Boy Lollipop”, unlike the other nine songs, was not written by Jamaicans. Singer Robert Spencer of The Cadillacs, a doo wop group from Harlem, and the group's manager, Johnny Roberts, are usually ascribed the writing credits. The song's first recording was by teenager Barbie Gaye in 1956. Millie Small's 1964 cover, rearranged by Ernie Ranglin and distinctive for its ska/bluebeat-style, became a huge hit in Britain, reaching the No. 2 spot. It went to No. 1 in Ireland and No. 2 in the USA, topped the charts in Australia and was the first record to help Chris Blackwell's Jamaican label, Island Records, make millions. With over seven million copies sold, it still is one of the best-selling reggae/ska hits. So it’s an important song in the history of the development and export of Jamaican music, but it’s not as completely Jamaican as the others in the top ten are.
Finally, the fact that the Department of Government at UWI are the ones who organized the symposium is either a very good or a very bad thing... One hopes it's a good thing. One worries though, when, in a release from the aforesaid department, one reads sentences like: "Its [the music's] impact on the aesthetic and ontological development and expression of global popular music is phenomenal". I have argued in a long document elsewhere that the social sciences aren't really sciences at all. Forgive the bellicose metaphors, but is this fodder for my cannon, or ammunition for my gun?
As ever, all comments, corrections, and new information are welcome.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090422/music_nm/us_jamaica_1)
announcing a list of Jamaica’s top 100 songs over the 50 years between 1957 and 2007.
A panel of seven made the selections, assisted by members of the public attending a symposium at the University of the West Indies, Mona, on April 16th. The audience helped to shape the criteria for the selection, as well as vote on the compositions to be included in the top 100. Former Finance and Planning Minister Omar Davies headed the panel, which included businessman Wayne Chen, musicologist Vaughn "Bunny" Goodison, founder of the Soul Shack Disco and creator and host of the popular radio show, "Rhythms," Frankie Campbell of the Fab Five band, broadcaster Francois St. Juste, journalist Basil Walters, and musician Sly Dunbar of Sly and Robbie fame.
Bob Marley's "One Love" topped the list with "Simmer Down" coming in at No. 9. "No Woman No Cry" was picked No. 12 and "Redemption Song" No. 14. "One Love" garnered 726 points. The second placed song, "O Carolina," originally recorded by the Folkes Brothers, scored 540 points.
Reuters reported the list as follows:
The Top 10 songs and the singers were:
1. "One Love" - Bob Marley & the Wailers
2. "Oh Carolina" - The Folkes Brothers
3. "54-45" - The Maytals
4. "Got to Go Back Home" - Bob Andy
5. "My Boy Lollipop" - Millie Small
6. "Many Rivers To Cross" - Jimmy Cliff
7. "Israelites" - Desmond Dekker and the Aces
8. "Cherry Oh Baby" - Eric Donaldson
9. "Simmer Down" - Bob Marley & the Wailers
10. "Carry Go Bring Come" - Justin Hinds & the Dominos
I’m not a fan of top 10s, top 100s, Grammys, Oscars, etc., for reasons that I think are good ones, and that I won’t go into in this post. However, it’s nothing but good when people come together to weigh, discuss and celebrate their culture – in this case, their music. Give thanks and praises for that.
Three things struck me.
First, Horace Helps, the Reuters reporter, and Bob Tourtellotte, the editor, have managed to distort the title of the song in the No. 3 spot. "54-46 – That's My Number" is a song by Fred "Toots" Hibbert about the 18 months he spent in jail on a ganja charge. (Toots claimed he was arrested while helping to bail someone.) It’s not “54-45,” though there are sites on the Internet misnaming it that way.
Folks know I get upset by inaccuracies, sloppy dealing with facts, figures, events, history, the truth. This is a simple story, and the reporter and editor have easy access to media where the correct information is available. Further, it’s as if some people are perversely dedicated to getting it wrong. For example, anyone listening to the recording at
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x8950_54-45-was-my-number_music
a site where the song is incorrectly advertised as “54-45 WAS MY NUMBER," will hear the musicians singing the right thing.
There was no place for comment or feedback on the Reuters site, so no chance to set the record straight.
Secondly, the fifth place song is of interest for a couple of reasons. It's the only one where the recording artiste is a woman. Also, whatever the criteria used for “Jamaican” were, “My Boy Lollipop”, unlike the other nine songs, was not written by Jamaicans. Singer Robert Spencer of The Cadillacs, a doo wop group from Harlem, and the group's manager, Johnny Roberts, are usually ascribed the writing credits. The song's first recording was by teenager Barbie Gaye in 1956. Millie Small's 1964 cover, rearranged by Ernie Ranglin and distinctive for its ska/bluebeat-style, became a huge hit in Britain, reaching the No. 2 spot. It went to No. 1 in Ireland and No. 2 in the USA, topped the charts in Australia and was the first record to help Chris Blackwell's Jamaican label, Island Records, make millions. With over seven million copies sold, it still is one of the best-selling reggae/ska hits. So it’s an important song in the history of the development and export of Jamaican music, but it’s not as completely Jamaican as the others in the top ten are.
Finally, the fact that the Department of Government at UWI are the ones who organized the symposium is either a very good or a very bad thing... One hopes it's a good thing. One worries though, when, in a release from the aforesaid department, one reads sentences like: "Its [the music's] impact on the aesthetic and ontological development and expression of global popular music is phenomenal". I have argued in a long document elsewhere that the social sciences aren't really sciences at all. Forgive the bellicose metaphors, but is this fodder for my cannon, or ammunition for my gun?
As ever, all comments, corrections, and new information are welcome.
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