Five For Friday #18

1. Things Discovered

Probably the most common piece of advice given to writers is to 'read, read, read'. It expands not only your horizons, but also your vocabulary: I'm constantly discovering new (or at least new-to-me) words, as well as finding that words with which I had considered myself familiar don't actually mean what I thought they did.

This week, I came across:

marcescence: the withering but persistence of plant organs (such as leaves) that are usually shed; I think hornbeam does this;  

ruderal: used of a plant growing in wasteland, or among rubbish, plants that are the first to colonize disturbed ground;

temerarious: reckless, rash; 

pristine: not meaning clean, as I thought, but ancient, original.  

2. Things Watched

This year's first episode of Emma Newman's Tea and Sanctuary podcast

One of the most delightful aspects of the run-up to Christmas were the bite-sized episodes of the Tea and Sanctuary advent calendar series. So naturally, I came back for more when the new season of the podcast proper kicked off 

Join author Emma Newman for a cosy chat over a nice cup of tea. In this episode, Emma talks about a little adventure with her grandmother, the Blind Boy podcast, Baileys, the TV show Sharpe and Kim Stanley Robinson's 'The Ministry For the Future'. She also mentions her short story collection 'Before, After, Alone'.

In a new departure for the podcast, it went out in video as well as audio format, so I watched in on YouTube. 

3. Things Read 1

An article relating to Flann O'Brien by Stan Erraught.

I was directed to Stan Erraught’s article in the Irish University Review on ‘silent music’ in works of Flann O'Brien and Ralph Cusack by a tweet from the International Flann O’Brien Society highlighting temporarily open-access articles. (I rather like the idea of there being an International Flann O’Brien to go with the Irish-based one.).

In this article, I explore two quite different descriptions of this kind of experience as set out in two mid-twentieth-century Irish novels. In one, Flann O'Brien's The Third Policeman, the narrator watches one of the titular sergeants enjoy music that he – the narrator – cannot hear. In the second, Ralph Cusack's Cadenza, the narrator watches as a village priest mimes playing the piano on a café table, a performance he ‘hears’ and appreciates.

This also meant that I came across another work from an Irish author I did not know, Ralph Cusack (1912–1965); Cusack was a painter, but wrote one book, a memoir. Erraught calls it a “surreal, absurdist work” and the Dictionary of Irish Biography calls it ‘unorthodox’. From the sound of it, this means ‘mad as a box of hair’, so I do look forward to giving Cadenza a whirl. 

Also according to the DIB, Cusack once chased out of his house the critic Herbert Read for having criticized Chagall’s work. The writer Henry Reed—author of my favourite radio plays—was often mistaken for Herbert Read, causing Reed to name the main character of his plays 'Herbert Reeve', and have the other characters constantly get the name wrong.      

4. Things Seen

The works of the printmaker Laurie Rudling, brought to my attention by a tweet by Brigit Strawbridge.

I have always been interested in prints as an art-form, though I have never tried making them myself. When I worked in Newcastle upon Tyne, I frequently visited the Biscuit Factory art gallery, which featured the work of many print artists. The work of several of the northern artists I saw on display in the gallery had similarities with that of the Norfolk-based Rudling, who says of his art

My work is divided between intricately drawn highly technical two plate copper etchings of landscape and richly collaged textured plates producing collagraphs prints of mysterious architectural spaces or abstracted bird forms cubistically interweaved with the landscape in which they fly.

My sister, a more consistent and dedicated artist than I could ever aspire to be, has taken up print-making with a vengeance in the past couple of years; I think I might start pestering her for tutorials…

5. Things Read 2

Two stories from The Collected Connoisseur, by Mark Valentine and John Howard. 

It has become customary at home that Thursday nights are dedicated to sitting in front of the fire (comfortingly ablaze in season) and reading aloud from a suitable novel or collection of short stories. These are generally works of the uncanny or of mystery, and belonging or harking back to an earlier age; they are accompanied by hot chocolate, brewed to a recipe that it would be death to divulge. 

We are currently making our way through The Collected Connoisseur: last night's stories were not the first I have read from this collection, but are strong favourites so far.  'Sea Citadels' references the shipping news, which will never fail to charm, while 'The Prince of Barlocco' was set on a remote island and involved chthonic mystery, and postage stamps. Brief reviews to come soon: advance tl;dr ‘those were really good.’ 

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