This piece was an unsuccessful competition entry. The brief was "memories of cinema-going". Not for us the spurious joys of cider by the fountain, or Tennent’s behind the hut in the top park. The summer my friends and I turned sixteen we marked this coming-of-age by getting into the cinema to watch 18-rated films. With … Continue reading 1990: summer of cinema
I've written about maps in fantasy fiction before. For every reader who enthuses and pores over a double-page spread of spidery waterways and jagged mountain ranges, there's another whose heart sinks at the OCD-level of detail, the neatness of it, the aura of omniscience. I'm currently reading "Passing Time" (l'emploi du temps) by Michel Butor. … Continue reading The mapping problem
Changing Track, described on the blurb as "at once experimental and engrossing", was originally published by Calder Books in 1958 as "Second Thoughts" and has long been out of print in English. Alma Books have relaunched the Calder imprint1 with this, and other works from the Calder backlist are to follow later in the year. … Continue reading Review: “Changing Track” by Michel Butor
It's a good start to the year for fans of mid-century experimental fiction. Alma have reprinted Michel Butor's Changing Track, and now And Other Stories have gathered these short pieces and fragments by Ann Quin. Quin, who drowned off Brighton beach in 1973 aged 36, has long been a cult figure. She was one of … Continue reading Review: “The Unmapped Country” by Ann Quin
Happy New Year. I don't tend to write much over Christmas; I always find it a time for generating new ideas or doing the writing-tasks-that-aren't-writing, like submissions or editing or planning. And looking back at old stuff to see if it can be resurrected (a fun task, but the answer is always "no"). Consequently, the … Continue reading Progress
We moved from Edinburgh to Peterborough in January 2000. At that point, my sole experience of the Soke had been a trip a few weeks before, to find a place to live, and as a stop on the East Coast railway line. The landscape around the town was a revelation, even when just viewed from … Continue reading The mutation of an idea
In my previous post I wrote about nostalgia and the loss of contiguity that can trigger it. There are books, though, that I have always had: every house move has seen them boxed, shifted and unpacked; and, in time, re-read. For these books, each re-reading reveals new aspects: a form of anti- or a-nostalgia. One … Continue reading All change: Jan Mark’s “Thunder and Lightnings” (1976)
"Proust had a bad memory...The man with a good memory does not remember anything because he does not forget anything." Samuel Beckett, 'Proust' To begin with, the first part of the quote above must look like exceptional contrariness on Beckett's part. Proust's most famous work is, after all, Ă€ la recherche du temps perdu (In … Continue reading The lure, the lie and the lessons of nostalgia
I have four writing priorities at the moment. They are, in no particular order (and that's the problem): this blog and my duty to you, dear reader unfinished fantasy novel, 185 MS pages after 3 years' work pro-cycling-themed gamebook, 1st draft completed, needs reworked Robin Hood novel, completed 3 years ago and redrafted, and submitted … Continue reading Priorities
Clive Barker’s 1988 novel Cabal is short: at 253 pages, padded out by chapter breaks and illustrations, it’s practically a novella. After the effort of writing the 700-odd pages of Weaveworld, this was a refreshing length for the author: "One of the interesting things about going to Cabal after [Weaveworld] was that I found a … Continue reading In praise of brevity: Clive Barker’s “Cabal” and the anti-epic
Into the Gyre 