Writer friend Samuel Taradash dropped by one sunny lunchtime with his portable recording gear, and we went for a walk and recorded an outdoor reading of my story The Bells at Christchurch. We thought we’d picked a nice quiet spot, but we were right by the train tracks. ‘Cessed la Vye,’ as my sixteen-year-old friends would have said, once upon a time. Anyway, here it is if you want a listen.
I will have become a real commuter the day I start religiously bringing a book with me. Not to read, but to carve out a space on the train, to ward off the noise and the spurious intimacy of rush hour. No wonder so many books are sold in London – they are sword and shield, blanket and magic potion.
Been going into work early, sometimes even early enough to get a seat. The Tube is very bedroomy then. No one speaks. Some women paint on make-up, hold out little mirrors to check they’re doing a passable job. But that’s rare. Sleeping or reading are the usual things. Mostly people read books. A guy next to me is reading history: the Age of Europe. 1600s, I think. He turns the pages incredibly slowly. I ask if it’s the Age of Asia now, but he says no, today we are in the Postmodern Age. He closes his book and gets off at Mornington Crescent, leaving me thinking, Funny that, because Postmodern sounds so old… Like aeroplane or Hi-Fi Stereo. Hovercraft, Information Superhighway. So what age do we live in? Perhaps the Age of Plastic. Yeah, still.
It’s quiet here, but busy too, and it’s a place where I feel I belong. Speech is rare because, like me, other people here are busy writing, making notes, or simply reading. Of course, life couldn’t be like this all the time – it’s a relief at times to go over the road for a coffee and hear voices again. But it’s great, I love it.
I was in a different library recently, one newly built with public funds… There were 50 people there, all quietly reading, when in walks this one guy yelling into his mobile. You know those ‘I’m-on-the-bus’ conversations? Well, this time it was ‘I’m-in-the-library’. The person at the other end didn’t believe him, he kept on saying ‘I’m-in-the-library’, louder each time. This guy didn’t want to use any of the library facilities except an armchair; he settled in one near me, still talking. After a bit I gave up and left. A librarian saw, and apologised. ‘I can’t say anything,’ she said. ‘Our new policy says it’s OK to talk or use your mobile phone.’ Weird. There are already so many places to use a phone. Why would we need another?
When I said what came next might be something Jane Austen would hate, I didn’t mean the video in that last post — which I have a feeling she wouldn’t really object to. No, I meant Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, which people may have noticed in their bookshops recently. It is anyone’s guess how Jane Austen would react were she brought back to life to comment (the most annoying aspect, from her point of view, might be that the writer responsible has probably minted more than she ever made from the sale of her own books). But I suppose I’m slightly concerned that if this is a hit, we’ll be treated to a ‘literary’ diet of zombies with everything (which here means, everything classic with expired copyright). Like chips with everything, that could be a little dull. The one person I know who has a copy of this book is saving it for when she goes on holiday, so if you’ve read it or have strong views, do get in touch.
Two hundred years ago, in July 1809, Jane Austen moved to Chawton village in Hampshire, where her brother had inherited the local manor house from a cousin. Jane lived with her mother in a cottage on the estate, now the Jane Austen House Museum. Here, she revised the manuscripts of ‘Sense and Sensibility’, ‘Pride and Prejudice’ and ‘Northanger Abbey’, and wrote ‘Mansfield Park’, ‘Emma’ and ‘Persuasion’.
I am not sure whether to be surprised it is as much as two centuries since Jane Austen’s work began to be published, or surprised that it is only two centuries. Her work has had a massive influence on literature and on attitudes to life in these parts. And she is big in Bollywood too. What next? Well, it may be something she’d hate… but if she was around today, who knows?
Tie-breaker Q: Who were the Romantics and what defined them? NB this is a no-google question, please just answer Rorschasch style with the first thing that comes into your head, sending your answer as a comment. The winner will be contacted by email and the book sent to them by post. Deadline to enter: 21 June 2009
Punk Fiction reviewed in The Guardian: “You leave its pages realising that being a punk really just means being young, high on the fumes of freedom and puffing your lungs up big enough to breathe life into the world.”
Does anyone reading this know who the Romantics were? Or why they were called that?
This is WITHOUT Google, without any other online search or phone-a-friend, just what you KNOW. I am just as interested in wild guesses as I am in the truth. Who you think they are? Or might be? If you cannot hazard names, hazard a century or a theory about how best to describe them. Imagine there is a huge prize to motivate you (there isn’t).
Actually there could be a prize, will have a rummage and make an offer tomorrow…Answers in a comment box please. Anonymity guaranteed if wished – just say Not for publication in your comment. Ta very muchly…
[OK, this is not the story the BBC recorded - but it is a true No 4 bus story.] It’s about the time I left my laptop on the bus.
It’s your worst public transport nightmare, isn’t it? And you can’t imagine how anyone would… Well, here’s how: the No 4 rambles around north London like a free sightseeing tour, and by the time you reach the last stop you’re nearly asleep. Downstairs the driver helpfully flashes the lights a few times to signal to passengers that the last stop is coming up. He leaves the lights off in the end for some reason, so you stumble downstairs in the shadows, neglecting to notice the bag with your bits and bytes in it. Of course you’re some way down the road when it occurs to you how nice and light you feel, walking along without… without your bag!
The other morning when I took this photo, the other tube passengers bristled as the flash went off. But once they realised I wasn’t photographing them, they didn’t say anything. (Doubt they would have, anyway…. Northern Line, in the morning? Don’t think so.) Besides the sticker says it all really. Without offending nearly as much as the average free paper that people on the tube were busy reading.
I fell this week, on Holloway Road. Still not sure how exactly. Maybe a passing motorbike handle looped through the handle of my bag as I was crossing the road, I don’t know. I was tired and something jogged me off balance. Anyway, the thing is, even though the pavement rushed to meet me and whacked me on the chin – I can still see that close-up of pavement with some of my blood on it – even though I did go to pieces a bit and worry if I would permanently have an enormous lopsided jaw – I got up, went home and iced the cuts and bumps. And now I’m back getting on with things. How is this related to writing? Maybe it’s like getting rejection letters. (One or two of those this week too.) But you have to keep going, don’t you?
