Bakers Dozen: Proust Questionnaire 13 – SK, and goodbye!

After ending on a high last night with the celebration of Dennis O’Driscoll’s life and work, Dublin Writers Festival 2013 is closing its doors for another year. Thank you so much for reading. It has been a pleasure contributing, and here is number 13 to make the Proust Questionnaires a “bakers dozen”. Thanks also to all the contributors, and goodbye for now – SK. p.s. Richard Ford did warn me beforehand that he wasn’t good with questionnaires. Just to clarify (!).

What is your idea of happiness?

Being with the people I love most in the world. But also, having time alone, reading, listening to music, watching things I really like, walking by the sea, pottering, tippling prosecco and watching the world go by, writing, swimming, cycling, daydreaming uninterrupted.

Where would you most like to live?

Dublin is home in so many ways, but I would also like to live (and may yet) in New York, Reykjavik, Paris, Copenhagen, anywhere in Italy, and then near Blacksod Bay in Mayo, which is home-home.

What is your favourite virtue?

Honesty.

What are your favourite qualities in a man?

Honesty, communication, kindness, humour, courage, gentleness, loyalty.

What are your favourite qualities in a woman?

The same, really.

What do you most value in your friends?

Their senses of humour, their gentleness, loyalty, and also their kindness and strength, their acceptance and open-heartedness, their differences and good natures, and that I seem to corral them into mad things without too much trouble.

What is your biggest weakness?

Overthinking things. Worrying. Anxiety. Daydreaming and drifting when I should be working.

What do you enjoy doing most?

Doing things for others. Writing. Reading. Listening to music. Watching really good television. Walking by the sea. Cycling. Dinners with friends. Music festivals. Swimming. Going to live music as much as possible. Going to the pictures. Seeing a really good stand up comic. Watching a great football match. Travelling. Being cosy, by the fire. Watching/listening to political programmes. Listening to the radio. Sewing things that need mending.

What is your most marked characteristic?

Curiosity. Passion for things. Being reliable. Loyalty. Nervy. Tired (these days).

What is your idea of misery?

Being misunderstood. Being let down really badly. Someone I care about being very unwell. People struggling and lonely.

If not yourself, who would you like to be?

I suppose you just have to try and be yourself, sadness comes from trying to be someone else.

What is your favourite colour and flower?

Deep scarlet red, and emerald green. Freesia.

What is your favourite bird?

The owl, followed closely by the robin.

Who are your favourite writers?

A very long list, but some that spring to mind instantly are; John McGahern, James Joyce, Edna O’Brien, David Sedaris, Christopher Marlowe, Charles Dickens, Alice Munro, Ben Jonson, William Shakespeare, Juvenal, Tove Jansson, Roald Dahl, Horace, Lester Bangs, Jane Austen, Henry Miller, Stan Lee, George Bernard Shaw, Grant Morrison, William Goldman, George Eliot, the Bronte’s, Elizabeth Gaskell, Ralph Waldo Emerson, William Trevor, Shalom Auslander, Annie Proulx, Henry Fielding, Alexander Pope, Louisa May Alcott, Halldor Laxness, Lewis Carroll, Richard Ford, Ernest Hemingway, Alan Moore, George Plimpton, Anais Nin, Ronald Dworkin, John Stuart Mill, Flann O’Brien, Raymond Carver, James Baldwin, Edgar Allen Poe, Kurt Vonnegut, Iris Murdoch, Homer, Stendhal, Laurence Sterne, Samuel Beckett, Marcel Proust, the list goes on and on…..

Who are your favourite poets?

Seamus Heaney, Tim Key, Patrick Kavanagh, Wendy Cope, Christina Rossetti, John Keats, W.B. Yeats, W. H. Auden, Philip Larkin, Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman, and so many more….

Who are your favourite artists?

Louise Bourgeois, Edward Gorey, Georgia O’Keeffe, Paula Rego, Sandro Botticelli, Francesca Woodman, Leonarda Da Vinci, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Diane Arbus, and so many more. And then if expanding on the term artist, I would include people like Daniel Kitson, Woody Allen, Chris Rock, Louis CK, Amy Sedaris, Neil Hamburger, Phyllis Diller, Jon Stewart, Dylan Moran, George Carlin, Gilda Radner, Bill Cosby, Rodney Dangerfied, Jerry Seinfeld, Andy Kaufman, Tina Fey, Bill Murray, Larry David, Richard Pryor, George Burns, Carol Burnett, Amy Poehler, Jackie Mason, Dave Chappelle, Steve Coogan,  and so many others who have made the world a better place just by their very existence, and ability to make me laugh a lot. And Eric Cantona, of course, who is a wonder.

Who are your favourite musicians?

A very long list, but here are a few; Planxty, Kate Bush, Rakim, Tommy Peoples, A Tribe Called Quest, The Roots, Oscar Peterson, Allen Touissant, Van Dyke Parks, The Walkmen, Harry Nilsson, Count Basie, Randy Newman, Björk, Owen Pallett, Destroyer, Future Islands, Prince, Wu-Tang Clan, Mary J. Blige, Mel Torme, Paul Simon, Mos Def, The Smiths, Talib Kweli, Grizzly Bear, Dirty Projectors, Belle and Sebastian, Elvis Costello, Phil Lynott, Low, Public Enemy, Nat King Cole, Big Star, David Bowie, Beach House, Dan Deacon, Owen Ashworth, Bobby Short, Miracle Fortress, Creedence Clearwater Revival, El-Producto, Junior Boys, The Zombies, Charles Mingus, The Modern Lovers, Miles Davis, Slick Rick, Roy Orbison, Joni Mitchell, Beastie Boys, Max Roach, Dusty Springfield, Juan Atkins, Notorious B.I.G., Suicidal Tendencies, Pavement, Cocteau Twins, Clipse, Thelonious Monk, Daniel Johnston, Arvo Pärt, Prokofiev, Satie, and so many more….

Who are your favourite heroes and heroines in fiction?

Elizabeth Bennett, Stephen Dedelus, Jane Eyre, Little My, Jo March, Batman, Catwoman.

Who are the heroes and heroines in your life?

My parents, my brothers, my friends, others that have come in and out of my life and left a legacy.

Who are your favourite heroes and heroines in history?

Grace O’Malley, Martin Luther King, Tony Benn, Michael Collins, Mary Robinson, Charles Stewart Parnell, Constance Markievicz, so many more if I start really thinking about it.

What is your favourite food and drink?

Food: Roast chicken dinner, hot buttered toast, cheeses, stew. Drinks: prosecco, coffee, red wine, hot chocolate, milk, and when the occasion requires it – a little glass of Guinness, a little glass of turfy whiskey.

What are your favourite names?

Patrick, Marcella, Finbar, Tomás, Woody, Agnes, Bridget.

What do you most dislike?

Thoughtlessness, people being unkind, lack of courtesy, people not being honest and true, bigotry and fascism in all its forms.

Which historical figures do you most dislike?

I suppose anyone associated with fascism, bigotry, and bullies really get me down.

What event in history do you most admire?

The civil rights movement in particular.

What social movement do you most admire?

The civil rights movement, socialism, feminism, anything that looks to level the playing field.

What natural gift would you most like to possess?

To fly like a little bird.

How would you like to die?

In the full knowledge of it, feeling like I gave life my best shot, and that I’d been true.

What is your present state of mind?

Very tired. Very woolly and worn out. Rainy.

What is your biggest pet peeve?

Thoughtlessness.

Which fault in others do you most easily tolerate?

Lateness, although maybe I don’t see it as a fault, as I am often late (!)

Which fault in yourself do you most easily tolerate?

I don’t know if I do, but perhaps procrastination, and being scattered.

What is your motto?

Young Hearts Run Free, and on days I don’t feel like that, I just watch Annie Hall or Barefoot in the Park and hope that tomorrow might be better.

Or this – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xAAGh-3sw0

Rebecca Miller: Today!

Go to Smock Alley at 4pm today to see the award-winning film director Rebecca Miller, with Deirdre Madden, discussing her new novel Jacob’s Folly, and notions of memory, fate and free will.

It follows her debut novel The Private Lives of Pippa Lee, and her brilliant collection of short stories, Personal Velocity, both of which were made into films.

Tomorrow I’ll be contributing one more thing for the Writers Festival, so do come back then, and enjoy the last day of what has been a really memorable DWF 2013.

(SK)

Rebecca Solnit: Today!

Go and see the brilliant Rebecca Solnit today if you can. There are so many reasons why, but one of them is  A Book of Migrations (1997). It is essentially about her time wandering around Ireland, but is also a memoir of personal and family history, as well as exploring a nation’s complexity and poetry, with deft and great artistry.

In the midst of all our political and economic turmoil, it is too easy to forget what a majestic landscape we live in. When Solnit gets to the Cliffs of Moher she writes, “a deeper blue than my own churning gray Pacific, blue as though different dreams had been dumped into it, blue as ink.  I imagined filling a fountain pen with it and wondered what one would write with that ocean.”

She will be at Smock Alley at 2pm.

(SK)

Publish and Be Famed – The inside track on getting published.

We gathered indoors to the cool, still interior of the Smock Alley Theatre on Friday afternoon to get the inside track on what it takes to get published. Talking us through for the afternoon were Seán O’Keeffe, Publisher and MD of Liberties Press; Alice Dawson, Publicity and Marketing Manager at Liberties Press and the charming Declan Burke, Irish author of crime fiction novels such as Absolute Zero Cool.

As an aspiring novelist, the prospect of getting published can often seem like light years away from the daily slog of getting your story down on paper. Getting a chapter finished is a big deal and when you finally complete a draft manuscript, you then have to grapple with the realisation that you will have to go through the entire process again for your next draft. Ernest Hemingway said that ‘There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed’ – yet what about after the bleeding is done, what about getting your story out there and into the world of publishing?

Rejection, unfortunately, is part of the process and so to minimise the chances of repeat rejection, it is important to research and be aware of the publishing houses and agents that have an interest in the type of writing that you do. The ‘Writers and Artists Handbook’ should be by your side through this process and the key here is to know your market inside out,  target it with a polished product, stay patient and keep trying. This approach will go a long way to opening the doors into the publishing world, which is like any other professional business – not something wistful and mystical because the currency is books – so having a professional approach is expected.

For fiction writers, a book that is introduced by an agent is likely to get much more attention from a publisher, as a good agent with a tailored approach will know the market and what the publishers are interested in.  When the time comes to look for an agent, the rule seems to be to pitch your work to agents one at a time until you find someone who understands your work. If you are by-passing the agent route, make sure you read and follow the submission guidelines on the publishers website and it is okay to submit to a few publishing houses simultaneously.

Once your work has gained the interest of a publishing house, it’s all about packaging your book and finding readers through the publicity and marketing channels. In addition to the traditional promotional strategies of interviews and reviews, Alice Dawson also wanted us to be aware of the importance of social media. As an unpublished author, if you already have an online presence (actively blogging or using Twitter for example), it shows that you are willing to put yourself out there and create awareness about your writing.  This willingness to self-promote is a great advantage to publishers and it can act as a springboard from which to generate your book’s commercial potential. And it shouldn’t all be about ‘the book’ either – as an author, you should be able to create and engage in conversation about topics that interest you and subject matters that are perhaps reflected in your writing.

Best-selling author Dan Brown commented in the National Concert Hall on Monday night that writers by nature like to be alone, but once you have a hit book, you need to go out into the spotlight and be charming. And it seems that getting published is not about handing your book over to a publisher and letting the magic happen, in fact writing your book is only the start of the getting published process.

 

Written by Nicola Connolly.

Photo by David Mannion.

Celebrating Dennis O’Driscoll: Tomorrow

Here is a moving, short piece by Seamus Heaney on his friend, the much-missed poet Dennis O’Driscoll.

Seamus will be part of the celebration of Dennis’ life and work tomorrow evening at Smock Alley (8pm), which will be the last event of this year’s DWF.

 

Tomorrow

I

Tomorrow I will start to be happy.

The morning will light up like a celebratory cigar.

Sunbeams sprawling on the lawn will set

dew sparkling like a cut-glass tumbler of champagne.

Today will end the worst phase of my life.

I will put my shapeless days behind me,

fencing off the past, as a golden rind

of sand parts slipshod sea from solid land.

It is tomorrow I want to look back on, not today.

Tomorrow I start to be happy; today is almost yesterday.

II

Australia, how wise you are to get the day

over and done with first, out of the way.

You have eaten the fruit of knowledge, while

we are dithering about which main course to choose.

How liberated you must feel, how free from doubt:

the rise and fall of stocks, today’s closing prices

are revealed to you before our bidding has begun.

Australia, you can gather in your accident statistics

like a harvest while our roads still have hours to kill.

When we are in the dark, you have sagely seen the light.

III

Cagily, presumptuously, I dare to write 2018.

A date without character or tone. 2018.

A year without interest rates or mean daily temperature.

Its hit songs have yet to be written, its new-year

babies yet to be induced, its truces to be signed.

Much too far off for prophecy, though one hazards

a tentative guess—a so-so year most likely,

vague in retrospect, fizzling out with the usual

end-of-season sales; everything slashed:

your last chance to salvage something of its style.

`Tomorrow’ is taken from “New and Selected Poems” by Dennis O’Driscoll published by Anvil Press Poetry in 2004.

(SK)

Tonight! Help The Stinging Fly celebrate 15 years.

The Stinging Fly is something of a national treasure, having supported the writing of people like Kevin Barry, Michael J. Farrell, and Mary Costello over the last 15 years. It is a labour of love, nurtured and grown by editor Declan Meade, and deserves to be celebrated; and tonight at the Clarence Suite, from 9.15pm, you can join Kimberly Campanello, Dave Lordan, Danielle McLaughlin, The Winters and Larry Beau to do just that.

(SK)

Proust Questionnaire 12: Tony Clayton-Lea

Tony Clayton-Lea is a music journalist for The Irish Times, and will be chairing the 33 Revolutions Per Minute discussion this evening at 8.30pm in Liberty Hall.

What is your idea of happiness?

It changes, obviously. Sometimes it’s as simple as reading a newspaper or a book while I’m having breakfast. Other times, it’s just breathing between starting and finishing a piece of work. Watching movies, for sure.

Where would you most like to live?

Anywhere in a mortgage-free house, to be honest. Wish-list locations, however, include New York, Provence, Paris and County Meath.

What is your favourite virtue?

Anything that mixes honesty and humour is fine by me. Honour? Humesty?

What are your favourite qualities in a man?

Politeness, intelligence, humour, a good cologne; the ability to laugh at my jokes is a bonus.

What are your favourite qualities in a woman?

Politeness, intelligence, humour, a good perfume; the ability to laugh at my jokes is a bonus.

What do you most value in your friends?

I love the way they contact me the day before a gig looking for ticket.

What is your biggest weakness?

Apple tarts, Brandy Alexanders, Zoolander.

What do you enjoy doing most?

I really love my work (and I’d like more, if you don’t mind…)

What is your most marked characteristic?

Haven’t the foggiest – although now I come to think of it I am quite organised in an almost worryingly robotic way.

What is your idea of misery?

At the moment, it’s filing copy every hour to The Irish Times via Citrix.

If not yourself, who would you like to be?

I love being me. It’s, like, so… well, me. Oh, alright then: just for an hour or so, the writer Kevin Barry in order to know how the flipping heck he wrote something as brilliant as City Of Bohane.

What is your favourite colour and flower?

Awww, c’mon! What is this – Smash Hits?

What is your favourite bird?

You’re serious, right?

Who are your favourite writers?

Old school: Evelyn Waugh, Graham Greene. Current (kind of): Carol Shields, Lorrie Moore, Patrick DeWitt, Kevin Barry. I used to love Ian McEwan, but Jeez, he’s gone off the boil in recent years.

Who are your favourite poets?

Bob Dylan, Aimee Mann, Lily Allen, John Cooper Clarke.

Who are your favourite artists?

Bridget Riley, Salvador Dali; and some of Banksy’s work is amazing.

Who are your favourite musicians?

I have a sneaking admiration for Jack White. And while we’re on the topic – I HATE drum solos.

Who are your favourite heroes and heroines in fiction?

Charles Ryder (Brideshead Revisited – although he’s not really a hero, is he?); Miss Haversham (Great Expectations – she’s probably the best written loneliest person in literature, don’t you think?)

Who are the heroes and heroines in your life?

My brother; my mother and my wife.

Who are your favourite heroes and heroines in history?

Martin Luther King; Rosa Parks.

What is your favourite food and drink?

Probably a medium-rare steak and a glass of red wine; but you know, sometimes a Big Mac just hits the spot, doesn’t it?

What are your favourite names?

Angela, Sarah, Paul.

What do you most dislike?

Rudeness, discourtesy, people that you know quite well not replying to emails.

Which historical figures do you most dislike?

Hitler, and all those whose names escape me that tried to subjugate individuality and freedom of expression.

What event in history do you most admire?

Has to be the Civil Rights movement.

What social movement do you most admire?

Feminism.

What natural gift would you most like to possess?

The ability to crap gold bars would be nice, if quite likely uncomfortable.

How would you like to die?

Quickly, painlessly, without fuss.

What is your present state of mind?

It varies between beleaguered and becalmed.

What is your biggest pet peeve?

I loathe misogyny (and yet I really like the occasional sexist joke – go figure…)

Which fault in others do you most easily tolerate?

Let’s not go there, shall we?

Which fault in yourself do you most easily tolerate?

Ditto.

What is your motto?

Fair Play To All – it’s on the family Coat Of Arms, dontcha know…

Tonight: Anthony Cronin’s ‘RMS Titanic’!

With music from Dónal Lunny, at 6pm in the Unitarian Church on Stephen’s Green, and here is a reminder of a little of his music.

(SK)

Proust Questionnaire 11: Dorian Lynskey

Dorian Lynskey is a music writer for The Guardian, and he is in conversation tonight exploring aspects of his brilliant book 33 Revolutions Per Minute with Sinéad Gleeson and Philip King at 8.30pm in Liberty Hall, but before that he will be DJ’ing at the sure-to-be-wonderful Faber Social at 6pm in Smock Alley/the Banquet Hall.

What is your idea of happiness?

Filing a piece that I’m proud of, spending some time with my daughters and then going out to a party where I can DJ. Or being at Glastonbury with my wife and friends, just before a favourite band comes on stage.

Where would you most like to live?

Where I live now – north London. Other than that, New York or San Francisco.

What is your favourite virtue?

Empathy.

What is your most marked characteristic?

I don’t know but my favourite one is making people laugh.

What is your idea of misery?

Feeling stuck.

If not yourself, who would you like to be?

Like most music writers, obviously I wish I could write great songs but then a lot of professional musicians struggle to do that.

Who are your favourite writers?

Philip Roth, F Scott Fitzgerald, Joseph Conrad, Harold Pinter, Ibsen, Larkin, Shelley, Kazuo Ishiguro, John Dos Passos, Milan Kundera, Lorrie Moore, Joan Didion, Robert Christgau, Ellen Willis, Jon Savage, Rick Perlstein and Greil Marcus.

Who are your favourite musicians?

Pet Shop Boys, Public Enemy, Manic Street Preachers, David Bowie, Randy Newman, Chemical Brothers, Beach Boys, Kinks, New Order, Saint Etienne, Nile Rodgers, Kraftwerk, virtually everyone at Motown and, currently, Vampire Weekend and John Grant.

Who are your favourite heroes and heroines in fiction?

I don’t think I have any. Many of my favourite novels have dislikable characters.

Who are your favourite heroes and heroines in history?

Martin Luther King, Emma Goldman, Nye Bevan, Victor Jara, Shelley – idealists and troublemakers.

What social movement do you most admire?

The US civil rights movement of the 50s and 60s.

What natural gift would you most like to possess?

The desire to exercise.

How would you like to die?

Older than my dad was.

What is your present state of mind?

Busy.

What is your biggest pet peeve?

Writers who pretend to hold obnoxiously provocative opinions for money.

Which fault in others do you most easily tolerate?

Lateness.

(SK)

Tonight! Lisa O’Neill and more.

“I’m Gonna Get Me to the Road” – Lisa O’Neill, filmed by Ruairi Galavan.

She plays tonight in the Clarence Suite, 9.15pm, and it is FREE! Unbelievably.

Proust Questionnaire 10: Little John Nee

Little John Nee is a writer, storyteller, performer and musician, who will be performing at the Faber Social, which takes place in Smock Alley, the Banquet Hall tomorrow at 6pm.

What is your idea of happiness?

Creating theatre shows and hanging out with friends.

Where would you most like to live?

In a comfortable barn on four acres of land.

What is your favourite virtue?

Compassion.

What are your favourite qualities in a man?

Generosity, gentleness, integrity, sense of humour, creativity and compassion.

What are your favourite qualities in a woman?

Generosity, gentleness, integrity, sense of humour, creativity, compassion and a good kisser.

What do you most value in your friends?

Forgiveness.

What is your biggest weakness?

Creating theatre.

What do you enjoy doing most?

Creating theatre.

What is your most marked characteristic?

Foolishness.

What is your idea of misery?

Bureaucracy.

If not yourself, who would you like to be?

Today Duke Ellington.

What is your favourite color and flower?

Crimson lake and gorse bush blossoms.

What is your favourite bird?

Swallow.

Who are your favourite writers?

Jim Thompson, Elmore Leonard.

Who are your favourite poets?

Dylan Thomas.

Who are your favourite artists?

Banksy, Keeva Holland.

Who are your favourite musicians?

Way too many, listening to a lot of Duke Ellington. Robert Wyatt.

Who are your favourite heroes and heroines in fiction?

Bónapárt Ó Cúnasa in The Poor Mouth, Polly Garter in Under Milk Wood.

Who are the heroes and heroines in your life?

My parents and friends.

Who are your favourite heroes and heroines in history?

Geronimo, Rosa Parks, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Samuel Beckett, Margaret Barry, Utah Phillips, Muhammad Ali.

What is your favourite food and drink?

Indian vegetarian, homemade elderflower soda.

What are your favourite names?

Ruby, Rosa and Tobias.

What do you most dislike?

Arrogance in myself, and bullies.

Which historical figures do you most dislike?

Margaret Thatcher, Richard J.Daley, Himmler.

What event in history do you most admire?

Rosa Parks sitting on the bus.

What social movement do you most admire?

Dharma Punx.

What natural gift would you most like to possess?

To dance like Bojangles.

How would you like to die?

Old, happy and singing a song.

What is your present state of mind?

Mithered.

What is your biggest pet peeve?

Bureaucracy in arts.

Which fault in others do you most easily tolerate?

Limited musical ability.

Which fault in yourself do you most easily tolerate?

Limited musical ability.

What is your motto?

The mind creates the abyss, the heart crosses it.

(SK)

Thank you for listening to my smutty Marxist filth!

Caitlin Moran in Conversation at The National Concert Hall – Thursday, 23^rd May 2013

I really didn’t know how to write this blog. There is far too much to say, and so much that I don’t know if I allowed to say in the way of expletives. I first learned of Caitlin Moran when I stumbled across How To Be A Woman browsing around The Gutter Bookshop one day about a year and a half ago; my first time in there, actually. I picked it up because I liked the cover, she said she had wanted this to be a picture of her “feminist smile”. The title also interested me, Moran said she liked the idea that a person might buy it thinking it was a self-help book and that she was going to give you loads of advice, “when actually, all I said was ‘f**k it’. It was my massive manifesto of ‘whatevs’.”

Following Sinead Gleeson’s introduction that basically she needed no introduction, Caitlin Moran marched out on stage all smiles, tartan, denim shorts and big hair. Then stopped us all straight away to take a picture of the 1200 capacity sold-out National Concert Hall and tweet it immediately. She loves Twitter; loves how she can tweet funny things from her kitchen while making her kids dinner – “then thousands of people retweet it, and I put on the pasta. Naked.” She then sat back looking as relaxed as you’d imagine she would be at home on her couch in front of the TV with a glass of wine of an evening. She had gin last night, though.  The minute she set foot upon it, Caitlin Moran owned that stage, having the audience up standing and then shouting ‘ay-ooo’ within seconds. We were in the palm of her hand and we laughed through every minute of it; which is no mean feat when still managing to broach subjects like abortion, rape, sexism, racism, class war, and of course, feminism.

It was determined early on how many men were in attendance, this was what the ‘ay-ooo’ was about. Having witnessed only 5 or so men at the Fifty Shades of Feminism event on Monday, I was surprised that there seemed to be quite there, as was she. She said she heard about men being made to read How To Be A Woman by their wives; that when they started they thought “Oh, my Caitlin Moran is as crazy as my wife”; then half way through they would think “Oh, ALL women are as crazy as my wife”, and by the end they  realised that actually all women are crazy because of the treatment they get, they began to see the point and the reason for feminism.

Moran has also been hailed for introducing a new generation of women to feminism, and explained how she knew she needed feminism from an early age. The eldest of a family of eight, and the first of three girls before a boy came; she said it soon became clear why there was three girls – “they were waiting for a boy!” She quickly noticed how different he was treated – “His one job was to bring out the bins, which took two minutes, while I was stuck peeling 500 potatoes every day.” Also laughing that when her mother was harping on about something to her father, he would always just say ‘Alright, Germaine Greer!’ – “So I was aware of Feminism. I just thought Germaine Greer was the bad guy, and not the good guy.” And who was her feminist role model? “Sarah Ferguson – she’s a fat, ginger commoner and she married royalty. That was genuinely inspiring.”

On the subject of power, she talked about how she is noticing as she gets more fame and more money that the things that society thinks are masculine aren’t really at all – they are just about power. She likes to play her part in this by not brushing her hair. The more successful she gets, the more she just wants to be scruffy. She does think a change is happening – but it’s slow. That with feminism it is slow. She explains that music is first, and discussed her love of Lady Gaga during the evening. The comedy is next, which has started happening with the likes of Lena Dunham’s Girls, who she also loves and spoke of the Twitter eruption around her interview with her; but also Bridesmaids – “everyone now wants women being funny and a bit disgusting.” Film is next, and we’ll soon see big female centred action movies, and sci-fi heroes, etc. The last thing is legislation – “Culture is the source of change.” She spoke a bit about the storm around Savita Halappanavar, and the issue of abortion in Ireland, and said that if she could use her feminist powers to change opinions she would use it over the people who have the power to legislate on abortion laws in  Ireland. That in the end, “it’s all about politeness, ” and people shouldn’t be telling other people what to do, anyway. I could go on for hours about what she said, topics covered and the humour she brought to each and every one of them, but then this would probably be a novella and not a blog update.

Toward the end of the evening, she was standing in the middle of the stage with her top up and her hands holding her tummy to make it smile – her “feminist smile”. To a standing ovation and resounding applause she said “Thank you for listening to my smutty Marxist filth!”, and sauntered off stage to sign books for people for what is likely to be the next three days. I am still so terribly upset at myself that it never occurred to me to bring my copy of How To Be A Woman, but then I’d probably still be standing in that phenomenal queue of her fans.

Written by Caelen Dwane.

 

Tracey Thorn: By Tony Clayton-Lea

Here are a few thoughts by Tony Clayton-Lea on Tracey Thorn’s music, he will be interviewing her this evening in Smock Alley at 8pm.

“I’ve always been a fan of Everything But The Girl’s music, and I’ve always liked the dynamic between Tracey Thorn and her partner Ben Watt – it just seemed so directly honest the way it referenced their relationship without being in any way lachrymose or cheesy. I named my house after their album, Idlewild (unfortunately, Baby, The Stars Shine Bright just wouldn’t fit on the sign…) because my girlfriend and I fell in love to its soundtrack of emotive directness and sheer melodic class. Latterly, Tracey’s solo work has, I reckon, excelled that of her work with EBTG – she really seems to have fully found her voice, lyrically as much as anything else. And I love the fact that, as a woman in her 50’s, she remains as eminently relevant to anyone who wants to listen (but, I suppose, in this instance, to me) as she’s always been.” – Tony Clayton-Lea

(SK)

Interview with Dorian Lynskey

Dorian Lynskey is a music writer for The Guardian, and over the years has contributed to publications such as Word and Blender. His book 33 Revolutions Per Minute: A History of Protest Songs was published by Faber in 2011. He will be appearing at Liberty Hall on Saturday (8.30pm).

SK: 33 Revolutions Per Minute is a great book. How long had the idea been clattering around your head, and did you find it a difficult book to write?

DL: In 2004-5 I covered political music stories in Kenya, Israel and Ukraine, which gave me the idea to write a book about protest songs around the world today but I couldn’t find a publisher. One publisher, however, suggested he’d like to read a history of protest songs. At first that seemed way too big a topic – and it’s still a big book – but one day the 33 Revolutions idea popped into my head as a way of organising the material and making it accessible both for the reader and for me as a writer. For me music is inextricably linked with my political awakening at the age of 16 so I loved the idea of exploring how songs introduce listeners to political ideas and events, and I realised that the book could serve the same purpose. It’s not just about the records but the historical context.

SK: Its sweep is huge, but it must have been a painstaking editing process, surely you could have had a second, and third volume?

DL: It was surprisingly easy to choose the 33 songs, although I do now wish I’d been able to deal with feminism in music prior to Riot Grrrl, and perhaps Irish music. Other than that, it felt I was able to cover what I wanted to without making it too diffuse. But the first draft was about 50,000 words longer and cutting that material was hard. But then who wants to read a 1000+ pages? [I do – SK]

SK:How did your love of music begin, and were you quite acutely aware, for example, as a teenager, at the radiant, and sometimes strained relationship between politics and music?

DL:The first song I was ever obsessed with was Rent by Pet Shop Boys when I was 13. It can’t quite explain why – it just flicked a switch that turned ordinary curiosity about the Top 40 into a lifelong passion. Then when I was 16 and thinking more about politics I had Public Enemy, Ice Cube, New Model Army, etc – a little later there was Riot Grrrl and Rage Against the Machine. It always felt to me that music was a great gateway into other things, including politics. While writing the book I was reminded that the first time I grasped the concept of nuclear war was while listening to the 12″ of Two Tribes by Frankie Goes to Hollywood. That’s a pretty heavy revelation to get from a pop song, let alone one that was number one for nine weeks. I think lots of people have that experience, whether it’s hearing about apartheid through Free Nelson Mandela or racial politics in the US via hip hop. It didn’t seem problematic to me then – it just felt like one of the things pop music can do. I think it’s a shame that younger listeners don’t have as many mainstream artists who can make them excited about politics and dissent.

SK:Folk music has always harnessed protest, and the oral tradition handed down, honouring stories that have gone before, but which remain topical. There are so many different kinds of protests, and preoccupations within protest  – is that what you have found with your research?

DL: That’s a very broad question but yes, it’s the variety that keeps it interesting. Some songs are great because they’re so specific and describe a particular person or incident, but other are equally great because they’re vague and universally applicable.

SK: Hip-hop harnessed my imagination quite early on, and I am still drawn to it, the love of language, the verve. Do you think it has gone away from its early touchstone of social change, and a restless kind of need to speak about what is genuinely happening on the streets?

DL: Well hip hop started off “stupid” so to speak with Rappers Delight, didn’t touch on politics until The Message, and only really had a big political phase circa 1988-92. I think that’s the period that people get nostalgic about, and not just because the music was great. It’s tempting to fetishise the “sound of the streets” and want it to be socially conscious but there were factors at play, from the popularity of the Nation of Islam to old-fashioned bandwagon-jumping, that don’t exist now. Even Mos Def and Talib Kweli, when they first arrived, were marginal by comparison. You can still find political lyrics coming from artists as big as Jay-Z, Kanye and Lil Wayne but they’re not central to their identity in the same way they were to Public Enemy. But there are ways of exploring moral complexity and social problems without self-identifying as political. I think Kendrick Lamar’s last album engages with the problems of growing up poor and tempted by a life of crime with far more elegance and empathy than NWA ever did – he just doesn’t have a song like Fuck Tha Police to rally around.

SK: I really enjoyed the recent film Good Vibrations, not only because of Terri Hooley’s boundless enthusiasm for music, but because it was such a love-letter to those people in Northern Ireland who needed music to protest a life outside of the Troubles, to say that Belfast, or Derry, or wherever, should not only be synonymous with violence, unrest and pain – but creativity, fun, and good music – and The Undertones being played twice by John Peel – that “teenage dreams so hard to beat” still existed in the North. Music becomes a life force, a saviour – another example of art outweighing a lot of other concerns. What do you think?

DL: Absolutely. I tried to make clear in the book – but perhaps it could be clearer – that I was writing about explicit protest songs but there are countless other ways in which music can reflect its political context and respond to its listener’s needs, whether for escapism or catharsis. That was the message of the disco chapter.

SK: You have always been a very literary music writer – what is your relationship like to literature, and who are some of your favourite writers?

DL: Thank you! I’m not sure I see myself that way but I do try to keep the language and ideas interesting and I did study English Literature at university. Off the top of my head I like Philip Roth, F Scott Fitzgerald, Joseph Conrad, Harold Pinter, Ibsen, Shelley, Larkin, Kazuo Ishiguro, John Dos Passos, Milan Kundera and Lorrie Moore. In terms of cultural journalism, Joan Didion, Robert Christgau, Jon Savage and Greil Marcus are all good at seeing the big picture as well as the details. And the biggest influence on the writing of 33rpm was Rick Perlstein, author of Nixonland. He has a knack of making you feel as if you’re present at key historical events, his research is faultless and he has a sharp sense of humour.

SK: What do you think about musicians who say they don’t see songwriting as a “real” form of writing? For me, some of the greatest writers have been songwriters, the best language has its own rhythm, its own music – what do you think?

DL: Of course songwriting is real writing, just as poetry is. I don’t know why anyone would say it wasn’t. To pick a very recent example, the lyrics on the new Vampire Weekend album are as sharp and evocative as a novel.

SK: Where do you think protest music is right now? In terms of popular culture, you feel that in the sixties and seventies, the trickling into the mainstream seemed more real, more alive – now it seems more fragmented. Who are our great young protest singers now? Who are our brilliant minds in pop music?

DL: This is a topic for the event and too big for me to address here!

SK: I believe that David Margolick’s Strange Fruit was an interesting touchstone for your book – was it because of its placing the song so carefully in its political context, and its exploration of the variety of reactions? What was the most surprising thing for you, reading that book, and how do you think it has informed your own?

DL: That was the book that made me realise you could tell a huge story about a period in history by starting with just one song. If not for that I’m not sure I would have believed my book could work. And Strange Fruit was a natural starting point for me because of the tense collision of nightclub entertainment and brutally vivid subject matter.

SK: You formed a band when you were younger, what kind of music was it, was it based around a kind of incoherent protesting, or more coherent?

DL: Well we thought it was coherent! We were called Vida Loca – after the Love & Rockets comic book, not the Ricky Martin song that came along later – and our demo tape was called Apathy Kills. We wrote songs about the Iraq war, the LA riots and other early 90s topics. It was all rather gauche, and we shouldn’t have tried rapping, but it was fun and well-intentioned and I’m still quite proud of the way we used samples, albeit in a very primitive way.

SK: Who have been some of your favourite musicians to interview, and why?

DL: I’ve been lucky enough to conduct multiple interviews with Neil Tennant, Bono, Wayne Coyne, John Grant and the Manic Street Preachers. They’re all very different and some of them probably hate each other but each one is funny, clever, gracious and full of theories and ideas. It’s actually hard not to come away with a great interview. But most musicians are pleasant and interesting and some of those that aren’t, like Morrissey, are entertaining in their hostility.

SK: What are you watching, reading, and listening?

DL: Reading: Patrimony by Philip Roth

Watching: Mad Men, Parks and Recreation

Listening: New albums by Vampire Weekend, John Grant, Pet Shop Boys and These New Puritans. I’m also in a big Paul Simon phase.

And all that is left is prose…

James Salter – Smock Alley Theatre – 6pm – Wednesday, 22^nd May 2013

Liam Browne the Programme Director of the Dublin Writers Festival introduced the event, and highlighted what an honour it was for him to welcome James Salter to Dublin, a beloved writer whom he never thought he would have the opportunity to meet. To be honest, before reading through the festival programme, I had not even heard of James Salter. For shame. I admitted this to his publisher at the book signing afterwards, and she asked “And now?” Well, now I can’t decide whether to pick up All That Is or The Hunters first to bury my head in immediately.

The event was chaired by Stephen Matterson, Professor of English in Trinity College Dublin. He gave a highly complementary introduction, also emphasising the sense of occasion about the night in having such a distinguished writer in our midst. He then gave a brief biography and listed some of the accolades Salter has achieved  in his time. James Salter was a pilot in the US Airforce when his first novels were published; Salter himself describes these novels as “juvenilia”, and says his 1967 publication, A Sport and A Pastime, should be considered his first real book. On his writing, he has said that “I’ve written only about the essential things…the world as it is, at least for me.”

James Salter then took to the podium to read from his new novel, All That Is, explaining that it is the story of a life, and the many characters in it. The section he read was not about the main character, Bowman, but a book editor colleague of his, Edmonds. He said he would limit the reading to ten minutes – “In America, readings are longer, 20-25 minutes, but I was told if I read for that long that the audience would disappear.” Somehow, I think he may have been misinformed; he is a fantastic reader and every person in the sold out theatre was hanging on his every word. I was certainly awoken from some small reverie when he suddenly finished reading.

The Q&A session followed and they began discussing the novel. The book traces Bowman through from his time in the Navy up to his career in the book publishing industry. The novel stems from the late 1940s up to the 1970s in a particular time of publishing when, as Matterson put it, “people seemed to publish books they liked.” As someone who works in book publishing now, I might have to take slight issue with that and hope that it is still the case. Salter agreed that it was a “golden age” in publishing, when houses were smaller and owned by partners, before big companies took over, combined, and people got lost. Matterson mentioned  how people often see this time as an important era for literature and the novel; Salter replied that it felt like regular life, but perhaps it turned out to be important. He said that everyone knew that Hemingway had something, though, and that he has endured. So did Hemingway influence him? Salter laughed – “Well, you can’t avoid him.” He agreed that Hemingway is influential and he is everywhere, but that he is not particularly influenced by him. That perhaps in the beginning, but that he has done everything he  can to cut the tie – “He’s gone his way and I’ve gone mine.”

The ever present question about publishing in the modern age then arose – do books have a future? Salter said while some eminent novelists say that they don’t think so, and seem to be certain about it; he feels that there is a huge swell of writing happening, not only novels but online – blogs (yay!), articles, and so on. That publishers are publishing books madly, so the book can’t be dead and he laughed – “I don’t know – show me the body!”

With his first new novel in over 30 years, and now at the age of 87, he says he feels very much his age, but that “you can carry youth with you in your heart, and that is how I felt.” The event closed with some final beautiful words from James Salter –  “Your memories start to be not so distinct, so many of them, it starts to become dreamlike…People take history with them and all that is left is prose. That prose is worth enduring.”

Honestly, I loved this event, and I was surprised by how entertained and engaged I was throughout, particularly having never heard of James Salter before last week. I could have gushed on for far more words than a blog should allow, more about his life and his writing and his thoughts on writing, after listening to him read and speak for just an hour. The event was followed by a signing across the road in The Gutter Bookshop, which went on for another hour. People queued around the shop and out the door to get to meet him. I stood beside him for the majority of the 60+ people queuing, many of whom had multiple books signed, and he engaged with every single one. A great writer, a beautiful reader, a wonderful speaker and a truly lovely man.

Written by Caelen Dwane.

Photos by David Mannion.