“Always laugh when you can. It is a cheap medicine.” Lord Byron
“The only good reason for swimming, so far as I can
see, is to escape drowning.” Helen Cresswell
“Dying is easy. Comedy is hard.” Donald
Wolfit
“Power brings a man luxuries but a clean pair of hands
is seldom among them.” Robert Harris
“Hitch your wagon to a star or you will just stay
where you are.” D H Lawrence
“James Bond has about as much to do with the
intelligence profession as Billy Bunter has to do with public schools.” Stella Rimington
“What is the use of preaching the Gospel to men whose
whole attention is concentration upon a mad, desperate struggle to keep
themselves alive.” William Booth
“Everybody judges from the point of view of his own
inadequacy.” Stanley Middleton
“I measured love by the extent of my jealousy.” Graham Greene
“The secret of happiness is not in doing what one
likes, but in liking what one does.” J M Barrie
“The art of writing is to explain the complications of
the human soul with the simplicity that can be universally understood.” Alan Sillitoe
“Shyness in the young may be charming to look at but
is painful to the one who suffers it.” Dorothy Whipple
Can you match each quote to a former Notts resident? The following quotes have come from, in no particular order, Graham Greene,
Stanley Middleton, Helen Cresswell, Robert Harris, Stella Rimington, Donald
Wolfit, Lord Byron, D H Lawrence, William Booth, J M Barrie, Dorothy Whipple and Alan Sillitoe, but who said/wrote what?
The Quotes:
“Always laugh when you can. It is a cheap medicine.”
“The only good reason for swimming, so far as I can
see, is to escape drowning.”
“Dying is easy. Comedy is hard.”
“Power brings a man luxuries but a clean pair of hands
is seldom among them.”
“Hitch your wagon to a star or you will just stay
where you are.”
“James Bond has about as much to do with the
intelligence profession as Billy Bunter has to do with public schools.”
“What is the use of preaching the Gospel to men whose
whole attention is concentration upon a mad, desperate struggle to keep
themselves alive.”
“Everybody judges from the point of view of his own
inadequacy.”
“I measured love by the extent of my jealousy.”
“The secret of happiness is not in doing what one
likes, but in liking what one does.”
“The art of writing is to explain the complications of
the human soul with the simplicity that can be universally understood.”
“Shyness in the young may be charming to look at but
is painful to the one who suffers it.”
I’m devastated. Hate has defeated hope. Labour has haemorrhaged working-class
voters, seduced by three horrible words “Get Brexit Done!”. We’ve been here
before, Cummings’ “Take back control” did the damage in 2016, showing the power
of words and the impact of repeating them.
Labour is being criticised for betraying people on Brexit
but a pro-Brexit stance, whilst backing a damaging outcome for Britain, would
have split the party. With a mostly pro-Remain membership (and MPs) it could
have been stronger on Remain but those traditional Labour seats would still have
been lost. It goes back to those three badly constructed and deceitful, but
brilliantly effective, words “Get Brexit Done” and the calculated collapse of
the Brexit party.
The popularity of Jeremy Corbyn obviously didn’t help. The anti-Semitism
in the labour party, and his reaction to it, damaged him more than the racism in the Conservative party (and racist language of its offensive leader) damaged the Tories. Now the right is on the
rise. Not just here but across Europe where social democracy is in crisis. It’s
ironic that that a politician who has campaigned against racism for decades has
had his reputation shredded by a right-wing press intent on portraying him as
a security threat. Yet in Scotland, a leader who has said that she would scrap trident
and never go near a nuclear button has swept to victory. A leader whose position
is not far from the “far left” that Corbyn’s Labour has been portrayed.
So what now? Brexit will be done. It’ll take time to get a
deal, or not, with the EU but we will be out, either with a worse deal than we
have now, one which will damage our lives in many ways and reignite Farage’s “it’s not what we voted for” brigade. Or a no deal Brexit, possible
before 2020 is out, proving that the ERG have played a blinder. It looks like
we’re screwed.
By 2024 the electoral boundaries will have been redrawn,
making it easier for the Tories to win seats, and
it will be harder for people to vote. The young, the poor, those not born in
the UK, will be most affected by the further hoops to jump through and required ID, and there will be no votes for 16- and 17-year olds. As for PR, forget it, we'll still have a two party, first past the post system.
As for the young. They have been let down. Again. There will
be no Green New Deal and the throwaway 2045 carbon neutral pledge will be futile.
There will be no 'free at the point of use' higher education (or re-education for
adults) - of course the Tories don’t want the people to be able to think! And in
any case, the only jobs will be low-skilled as the slave labour of low paid,
insecure jobs continues. High levels of employment and a strong economy might happen as we race to the bottom in a state of tax haven. But to what end if all the money is going to the few, the rest working
several jobs to just about not manage, whilst their health suffers and public
services are not properly funded to deal with it.
I’ve not even mention Trump, that Scotland will continue
to demand a second referendum on independence and, when denied one, will have
their own and now vote to leave in a Catalonia style poll, or the impending troubles in Ireland. I’m struggling to find hope. Perhaps in the
fact that 52% of voters did side against the dark side and that 1/3 of voters
were prepared to vote for radial change. The fight goes on. Extinction
Rebellion is going nowhere and the electorate are beginning to see Boris Johnson for
the lying, self-centred coward he is.
To the
vulnerable, the resisters, the guardians and protectors of the mind, I wish you well, and hope
to see you on the other side of this. The flame cometh before the phoenix. Labour has time to rebuild.
Someone has put a poster up in the window of their flat. It
reads: ‘Think of the most vulnerable people you know. Then vote.’
It’s a powerful statement and cuts to the heart of this
general election. If you bring to mind the vulnerable in society: the millions
in poverty, the widespread use of foodbanks, cuts to disability benefits, an
underfunded NHS or the precarious state of the planet, you simply cannot vote
for the Conservatives.
To make matters worse, Boris Johnson treats the working
class with disdain. His comment that working class men are “likely to be drunk,
criminal, aimless, feckless, ignorant and hopeless” sums up his view but that's just for starters (keep reading). Of course, it's well known that he's made offensive comments but it's usually the ones that play to the right that appear in the media. What you don't hear is what he's said about the working class as they are the voters he needs.
Nottingham is steeped in protest, with the roundheads,
dissenters, luddites, reformers, chartists, miners and more standing up to the establishment.
Perhaps inspired by the legend of Robin Hood, our writers also have a history
of rebellion and being on the side of the people. One example is Lord Byron
using his maiden speech in the House of Lords to speak up for the
frame-breakers, another is William Booth, the Nottingham born Salvationist and
author of Darkest England and the Way Out, who wrote:
“When women weep, as they do now, I’ll fight.
While children go hungry, as they do now, I’ll fight.
While men go to prison, in and out, as they do now, I’ll
fight.
While there is a poor lost girl upon the streets, I’ll fight
I’ll fight to the very end!”
Many of the great Nottingham writers throughout the
centuries would despair at the prospect of Johnson’s cruel Tories winning this
election. That after nine years of austerity we could be getting a hard-right
government that will slowly drag us out of a union set up to protect us. But
then the Tories have never liked unions.
Byron once wrote: “Opinions are made to be changed – or how
is truth to be got at.” And, as I write this, there is still hope. For efforts
are being made to prevent the anti-Tory vote from splitting. Websites such as
remainunited.org are offering advice on the best way to vote to keep out the
Tories. This has seen people switch their voting intentions doing what needs to
be done in order to kick the lying, cowardly piece of toerag out of Downing
Street. Here’s how it all relates to Notts:
Ashfield
With a Labour majority of just 441 and a 69.8% Leave vote,
the Tories may capture Ashfield, a constituency with some of the most deprived
areas in Notts. Lee Anderson is the Tory candidate. He’s the guy who said that
anti-social people should be put in tents and then faked a random doorstep encounter
where he was caught on mic telling his friend what to say. Anderson is a
liability and may lose votes to the Brexit candidate Martin Daubney, a former
editor of The Sun’s page3.com. They’ll
face a tough challenge from Independent Jason Zodrozny who you might remember running
for Police and Crime Commissioner. With the Lib Dems coming 5th last
time, it’s not surprising that that both the GetVoting and Remainunited websites
are advising people to Vote for Labour’s Natalie Fleet. If she’s to win, not only
will she need many would-be Green and Lib Dem voters to back her, she’ll need
to convince Labour leavers that this election is about much more than Brexit. The
anti-establishment stance is strong in Ashfield but many see the EU as the
establishment when the true danger comes from the Eton elite.
Vote for Labour’s @Nataliefleet
Bassetlaw
With John Mann going the House of Lords, Labour’s 4,852
majority is being threatened in this leave-leaning constituency. Labour did
quite well in the local elections so there hope they’ll hang on. Labour’s Keir
Morrison is the only candidate to vote for if you want to keep out the Brexit
Party and the Conservatives’ Brendan Clarke-Smith, who says the priority is to ‘Get
Brexit Done!’. Clarke-Smith used to work in Romania as the Head of an
International School. The lie that Brexit can be done by January 31st
needs calling out. Johnson’s withdrawal agreement is only phase one of years of
negotiations, all to be done after Johnson pays the EU over £30 billion in
January, and the no deal risk remains, it’s only delayed. The message must be
‘Don’t Get Done by Brexit!’ And don’t get me started on the years of playing
lapdog to Donald Trump as a damaging trade deal with the USA drags on and on.
Vote for Labour’s @MorrisonKeir
Broxtowe
Another tough seat to call with the Conservatives the
current favourites. Anna Soubry won here last time by 863 votes and has since
left to become leader of The Independent Group for Change. She is standing again, hoping to snag the remain vote. Despite the Lib Dems standing
down for her, Soubry has little chance as Remainers are turning to Labour and
their promise for a People’s Vote. So much so that Gina Miller’s website
remainunited.org have changed their advice from ‘Vote Soubry’ to ‘No Advice’.
Labour’s Greg Marshall will have to work hard to win here though. The Brexit
Party were the largest party in the Euro elections and their lack of a
candidate will help the Tories as would a strong Green vote. Kat Boettge would
make a good MP but Green voters need to lend their vote to Labour on this
occasion. Much will depend on Beeston’s Marshall getting his strong message for
protecting public services across to the voters. Come on the people of
Broxtowe, vote for hope and not more of the same. Broxtowe needs a new party
and a new MP.
Don’t split the vote, go for Labour’s @Greg4Broxtowe
Gedling
Vernon Coaker is well-liked in Gedling and won here two
years ago with a 4,694 majority. Despite his popularity and strong record as an
MP it’s another close call. 55.6% voted Leave and the Brexit Party were clear
winners at the Euro election. The Brexit Party’s Graham Hunt believes the mood
to ‘leave’ is as strong as ever in Gedling, and the Tory, former Oxford law
student Tom Randall, will be hoping he’s right. Coaker may win enough leave
voters to remain MP, the constituents would be doing themselves a disservice
not to keep him.
Vote for Labour’s @Vernon_Coaker
Mansfield
This is the Conservative Party’s to lose. Ben Bradley’s 1,057
majority may be slim but the 70.9% leave vote and The Brexit Party’s lack of a
candidate could return him. The only person with a chance to stop this
happening is Labour’s Sonya Ward, a former youth worker who also worked in the NHS.
Ward will take heart from Labour winning the latest mayoral election with the
Tories back in 4th place. When Bradley - who voted remain - won in
2017 it was the first time Labour had not held Mansfield since 1923. If Labour
are to win back Mansfield it’s unlikely to be done by trying to convince
leavers that remaining is the better option, it will be by showing them what a
Labour government can do for them. There’s been anger here directed at the EU
as well as the Conservative government making it a key seat, one which has some
of the highest levels of deprivation in the county. Boris Johnson has written that the UK's
poorest communities, like some of those in Mansfield, are made-up of 'chavs,' 'burglars,' 'drug addicts,' and
'losers'. if there’s any justice he won’t be welcome.
Vote for Labour’s @Sonya_Ward
Newark
The safest seat in Notts as far as the Tories are concerned.
Robert Jenrick, a Notts resident of six years, will win here unless there’s a
major shock. Jenrick serves as Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and
Local Government. He consistently voted for a reduction in spending on welfare
benefits and voted against many measures to prevent climate change. James
Baggaley is the candidate best placed to pull off a surprise victory and he
deserves your vote.
Vote Labour’s @JamesBaggaley
Nottingham East
Labour’s Nadia Whittome is rightly the favourite to win and
the 23-year-old former care worker has said that she will only be accepting a
"worker's wage" if she becomes MP donating half her wage to good
causes. Chris Leslie won last time with the largest majority in Notts and he’s
standing again. Leslie left to team up with Anna Soubry but he’s hoping to eat
into the Labour vote. He’s even using Labour’s colours on his campaign
leaflets. The better Leslie does, the more danger there is that Labour will lose
this seat, but it won’t be to Leslie.
Vote for Labour’s @NadiaWhittome
Nottingham North
Two years ago, this seat had the lowest turnout in the
county - just 57.3% compared to the national figure of 69.1%. Alex Norris
should win here for Labour but voter complacency and a high leaver turnout could
be a concern so make sure your vote is cast.
Vote Labour’s @AlexNorrisNN
Nottingham South
Lilian Greenwood is one of the county’s best MPs and she
will be hoping to win for a fourth time for Labour. In a majority leave voting
constituency, professional fundraiser Marc Nykolyszyn (Tory) and The Brexit
Party’s Julian Carter (the self-styled ‘Robin Hood of Brexit’ WTF?) will be
hoping to challenge.
Vote for @LilianGreenwood
Rushcliffe
With Ken Clark gone and calling Johnson ‘extreme’ and
Brexiteer Ruth Edwards standing instead, this seat could be up for grabs in a
remain-voting constituency. However, there is likely to be a split in the
Remain vote, letting the Tories back in. The Lib Dem and Labour candidates are
polling similar numbers. Tactical voting, such as the advice given on
remainunited.org, is telling people to Vote Labour. Their candidate is the
former Raleigh worker Cheryl Pidgeon and two years ago she slashed Clark’s
majority in half. There will need to be some large-scale tactical voting to
beat off the cruel Conservatives in Rushcliffe but it’s achievable.
Vote for Labour’s @cheryl_pidgeon
Sherwood
Mark Spencer is a loyal Tory. He was pro Remain when Cameron
then May told him to be, then pro Leave when May then Johnson told him to be.
Spencer is, unsurprisingly, the government’s Chief Whip. He’s a brash,
heartless glutton, a defender of fracking and the cruel benefits system.
Spencer caused offence with his comments regarding a local jobseeker with
learning difficulties who was left without food or electricity after being four
minutes late for a Jobcentre appointment. Spencer has consistently voted against raising welfare benefits (even in line with prices) and has voted many times for a reduction in spending on welfare.Sherwood deserves better than this and
has a chance to remove Johnson’s whip. Standing in his way is Labour’s Jerry
Hague, a candidate for real change. The alternative to Labour is more of the
same and an awful right-wing MP.
Don't Vote for Mark Spencer (above). Vote for Labour’s @jerryhague01 instead.
We need
to talk about Boris.
This election is the most important of my lifetime and I must turn to Boris Johnson. Not the "cuddly," "funny," “he lies but I like him,” media-friendly
Boris, the real man, in his own words:
Boris Johnson is a racist, writing that seeing a "bunch
of black kids" used to make him "turn a hair" and run away. Boris
Johnson is Islamophobic, writing that Muslim women look like “bank-robbers”
and “letterboxes”. Boris Johnson is homophobic, criticising “tank-topped bumboys”.
And he dismisses the environmental concerns of the young. Not only did he fail
to turn up to the leaders’ debate on climate change, he voted against measures
to prevent climate change and, in April, he said he was sympathetic to the aims
of Extinction Rebellion but described the young climate change activists as “smug”
and told them to “lecture” China instead.
Boris Johnson is a misogynist, calling Cameron a “girly
swot” and Corbyn a “big girl’s blouse”, and his advice to a man on
how to best handle his female publisher? “Pat her on the bottom and send her
on her way”. In criticising men, he spoke of their “reluctance or inability
to take control of his woman and be head of a household.” He added:
“Something must be found, first, to restore women’s desire to be married.” He
also labelled single mums as “irresponsible,” but won’t say how many
children he has!
30% of the Conservative candidates are women, 31% of Lib
Dems candidates are women, 53% of the Labour candidates are women.
Boris Johnson hates the poor, saying that “500,000 women
have chosen to marry the state” but that men were “responsible for a social
breakdown which is costing us all … and which is producing a generation of
ill-raised, ignorant, aggressive and illegitimate children who in
theory will be paying for our pensions”. He also hates the working class,
writing that the “modern British male is useless” and working-class men are
“likely to be drunk, criminal, aimless, feckless and hopeless,
and perhaps claiming to suffer from low self-esteem brought on by
unemployment”. He went on to say that the UK's poorest communities are made-up of "chavs", "'burglar", "'drug addicts" and "losers".
Only this year Johnson said that spending police budgets on historical child abuse cases was "spaffing money up the wall" and, on the NHS, he has written that that free
healthcare should be only for "those who are genuinely sick, and for the
elderly." He added that "if people have to pay" for NHS
services, "they will value them more" but since becoming PM he's more careful with his words, avoiding difficult interviews and trotting out slogans written by Dominic Cummings, the Brexit mastermind, who can be heard in this short video saying what he really thinks of the Tories.
We are the 5th richest country in the world and
yet millions are forced to use foodbanks, and since the Tories took power
homelessness has gone up 165%. Something is badly wrong. I urge you, in this
festive season, to think of the most vulnerable in society when you cast your
vote on the 12th of December.
John Bishop once asked Jeremy Corbyn, “If you get into
number 10, what's the one thing that you would make sure happens?”
Corbyn took a second to think, then replied: “That nobody is
homeless.”
Ignore the right-wing media. Listen to your heart and your
conscience.
#rebelnotts, an independent art project promoting
Nottinghamshire's infamous rebel writers, are putting up silver plaques across
the city centre to showcase three of our rebel writers, Sillitoe, Lawrence and
Byron, with quotes alongside their images.
The Alan Sillitoe plaques are to be placed at Richmond
House, Canal Street; The Castle Pub, Castle Road; The Terrace, Broad Street and
The Angel, Stoney Street. With Lord Byron plaques at The Trip To Jerusalem,
Brewhouse Yard; Byron's House, St James' Street; The Bell Inn, Angel Row and Zara's,
Pelham Street. And D H Lawrence plaques at Brass Monkey, High Pavement; NTU,
Goldsmith Street; The Nottingham Council House, Long Row and Five Leaves
Bookshop, Swann's Yard.
There’s also a couple of plaques featuring all three
writers, one at Nottingham Train Station, Station Street and the other near Five
Leaves Bookshop, Swann’s Yard.
A free performance. 100 people celebrating the 50th
anniversary of B S Johnson’s book in a box ‘The Unfortunates’.
‘The difficulty is to understand without
generalization, to see each piece of received truth, or generalization, as true
only if it is true for me, solipsism again, I come back to it again, and for no
other reason. In general, generalization is to lie, to tell lies.’
As part of the Being Human Festival 2019, 100 readers are
becoming B S Johnson, spreading out across the city of Nottingham in bookshops,
pubs, churches, homes and a host of atmospheric nooks and crannies. Come and
explore the city centre, visiting up to
25 different (and often highly unusual) locations, to piece together this deeply
moving and evocative work.
‘I did not contribute anything but my laughter, as I
remember, and it was obvious from the other eight or ten there listening that
they expected him to dominate like this, that he could be relied on to perform
brilliantly, and strangers were not expected to contribute, far less interrupt him.’
The book’s 27 chapters can be read in any order, apart from
the first and last, so plan your own route using the maps provided. You can
begin the event at any time from 10am through to 3pm in the Lounge, at Broadway
Cinema, with readings of the First chapter happening every half an hour. The
Final chapter will be read from 3.30pm through to 10pm, also on the half hour.
‘To Tony, the criticism of literature was a study, a pursuit,
a discipline of the highest kind in itself: to me, I told him, the only use of
criticism was if it helped people to write better books.’
B S Johnson tragically took his own life at the age of forty.
‘The Unfortunates’ is an experimental work by an author who always wrote as if
it mattered. The novel was never just a vehicle for linear storytelling, which
Johnson saw as irrelevant, it was a form in which truth could be written,
and to do this he wrote from the margins, uncomfortable in the mainstream. Johnson's book in a box is more a memoir than a novel, an exploration of memory, an enquiring
melancholy. It’s Saturday afternoon in Nottingham as we hear the internal
monologue of a football reporter about to churn out his report. This week’s match
is being played in the city where his friend Tony had worked
before his death from cancer. The reporter remembers Nottingham and his late
friend. These memories have no structure and are randomly sieved through for meaning.
'I fail to remember, the mind has fuses.'
Andy Barrett, the man behind the event, has been meeting all
100 readers in preparation for the 23rd. He says, “The readers are a
real cross-section of the Nottingham community, although what unites them all
is a genuine interest in literature and the city that they live in. The venues
have all been chosen to connect as much as possible to the chapters either
thematically or geographically. One chapter is read in a car, another in a
darkened porch of St. Mary’s Church, and the tenderest chapter will be heard in
a living room next to a roaring fire.”
‘…hanged men, I could not determine whether they were
murderers, deserters, traitors, or unlucky, just unlucky, unfortunates.’
Professor James Moran, from the University of Nottingham’s
School of English, says, “Using site-specific performance is a tremendous way
of encouraging a new generation of readers to engage with this relatively
unsung writer”.
‘When everything was moving for him, just when he had
achieved what he had always wanted to do, so I believe, the rotting, the whole
of a man’s rotting telescoped into two years, was it, from then, less than two
years, to what end, ah, with what point?’
Sandeep Mahal, Director of Nottingham UNESCO City of
Literature, adds, “A delightful celebration of the avant-garde novel, But I
Know This City, will not only bring to life a book with a strong connection to
Nottingham, but also introduce people to experience one of the most powerful
explorations of human memory and grief I’ve come across.”
‘And Tony talked calmly about all the fear the word
caused, how everyone dreaded it, but only because of its mystery, he insisted,
this was, that once you faced it and understood it and knew that eighty percent
of the cases would be cured, were cured, either by surgery or by radiotherapy,
then it was quite acceptable, was that the word he used?’
The map and timetable for the readings is available online
at excavate.org.uk and leaflets are available at Broadway and other venues in
Nottingham. I’ll see you there.
Author Steven Cooper on Advice for Writers: where to go (and
not to go).
The
Non-Advice Column
Post by Steven Cooper
Advice and expertise are two different
things. It will be easier on all of us if we just accept that. Anyone can give
you advice. Ask your mother. Or your Aunt Betty. Or Cha-Cha Marie, your
chihuahua. I’m guessing your chihuahua is not an expert on writing fiction, and
I’m not all that sure about your mother or her sister, Betty. They’re lovely
people, of course, but when you ask them to give you feedback on your
manuscript, remember that unless your mom is Anne Lamott you’ll likely get a
lot of opinion and not a lot of expertise.
Everyone has an opinion, and opinion often
comes out in the form of friendly advice. Writers don’t have a lot of friends,
so forget friendly advice. Especially from your “friends” on social media. This
is where so many new writers turn for help. Every day I find all kinds of
writing advice on Facebook and Twitter. The twitterati is practically gushing
with all the Dos and Don’ts of writing fiction. Write what you know! Do sex scenes! Don’t do sex scenes! Adverbs are
evil! Dead body on the first page! No dead body on the first page! First
person! Third person! Never write in present tense! Limit yourself to 2 POV
only! No, 3! No, 4! Write as many POVs as you want! Your editor won’t care.
Your editor will care. Your editor will
care very much if your writing is completely informed by what you learn from
entirely unvetted sources on social media. Social media can be a swirling pit
of bad advice. Avoid it. That’s my non-advice advice.
My other non-advice advice is to find
someone who is further along in the publication process who you feel might have
some bona fide expertise to offer. This might sound like a daunting
proposition, but this is where you must get off your butt and network. This is
when you go to writer’s conferences and workshops and build relationships with
people (real people, not twitter or FB handles). This is how it works. You
listen to people on panels. You go talk to those people. You exchange business
cards. Now you’re in business. You’re building a network of people whom you
might be able to trust with your writing questions. Some will prove to be
worthy, others not. But you don’t need an entire glossary of experts to guide
you.
I know that writer’s conferences and
workshops can be expensive. Do you know what aren’t? Books. You’ll find some of
the best expertise on writing in books about writing. There are heaps of them.
Some great, some not so great. I can’t possibly publish a list here of all the
greats, but I’ll suggest a good batch to start with:
Stephen King, On Writing
Anne Lamott, bird by bird
Ursula K Le Guin, Steering the Craft
Donald Maass, Writing the Breakout Novel
Colum McCann, Letters to a Young Writer
Strunk & White, Elements of Style*
William Zinsser, On Writing Well
*this is your Bible, treat it as such. You will need to refer back to
it often. What do you mean you don’t have it?
So, now that you’re done reading the batch
above, I have another suggestion: read, read, and read some more. Find a book
by your favorite writer. Read it three times. That’s as good, maybe as
effective, as meeting your favorite writer and asking for advice. The proof is
on the paper. You want to know how it’s done? Observe how it’s done. Over and
over. The more you read, the more will resonate. Every book is like a lecture
on writing. Even the bad ones. The bad ones tell you what not to do. Don’t read
too many bad ones, though. They will make you angry that bad books get
published.
Here’s my final piece of non-advice advice:
Maybe this isn’t the time for you to worry about expertise. Maybe you need some
more time to improvise. Who am I to crush your spontaneity? I am nobody. Go
wild. Take an adventure. Get that stuff out of your brain and onto the paper. Put
your dead body on the third page and your sex scene on the first. Sprinkle
adverbs liberally (Stephen King will vomit because he famously hates adverbs) then
kill them just as liberally. Write in first-person present tense, or past
tense, or future tense. Who the f-ck cares? The point is: just write. Worry
about seeking expertise when you’re done with the first draft. Seriously. Just
write that shit down. Asking for expertise or, God forbid, advice before you’ve
written a first draft is just procrastination by any other name. If you’re just
looking to procrastinate, go have lunch with your mother. Or take Cha-Cha Marie
for a walk. Give my love to Aunt Betty. This article first appeared on the Crime Thriller Hound website.
Former investigative reporter Steven Cooper’s latest Gus
Parker and Alex Mills novel, Valley of Shadows, is out now.
Want to find out more about Nottingham UNESCO City of
Literature and meet the people who make it happen? Then read on...
Every summer, NUCoL holds an annual open meeting to report
back to the city on their plans and what they’ve been doing for the past year. This
Saturday the NUCoL team will answer your questions and hear your ideas about Nottingham’s
role as a UNESCO City of Literature. This year's meeting, which will also be
attended by members of the NUCoL’s collaborative board, takes place on Saturday
July 13 at 1pm at Nottingham Mechanics (www.nottinghammechanics.com) on
North Sherwood St.
The meeting is expected to be ending by 2.30pm. Please come
along, meet the team, hear what they’ve been doing and find out more about
NUCoL. There will also be opening the call for a Nottingham writer to join the
NUCoL’s board of trustees and this will be an opportunity to find out what the
role involves.
Friday July 12th is Big City Readers’ Day, with
four of the featured authors appearing between 9.30am and 1.00pm in the Council
House Ballroom.
As part of Nottingham's first ever Big City Reads campaign, you
can join us as we celebrate the power of reading for pleasure in this special
readers’ event, co-produced by Nottingham’s 14 Young City of Literature
Ambassadors.
Welcoming a selection of authors from the four books
featured in the campaign, the event will feature a blend of author readings and
discussion/creative activity and will be of particular interest to individuals/organisations
engaged in working with young people and literacy projects in the community.
Confirmed authors (so far) are Alice Oseman (Heartstopper:
Volume One), Natalia Gomes (We Are Not Okay), Catherine Johnson, Ayisha Malik
(A Change Is Gonna Come)
IMPORTANT: Tickets for this event must be booked in
advance online, as none will be available at the door.
Link for tickets: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/big-city-reads-readers-day-tickets-62715093533
What Is The Big City Reads?
Four books, championed by our young ambassadors, have been
nominated for distribution to libraries, schools and cultural venues across the
city, ready to fill neighbourhoods with stories that speak to what it is to be
alive in 2019: engaging with the voices, themes and issues of our time:
A Change Is Gonna Come - Anthology
We Are Not Okay - Natalia Gomes
Heartstopper: Volume One - Alice Oseman
The Boy Who Lied - Kim Slater
The books have been available for free and feature positive
messaging that explores relevant, experiences, including assets such as reading
guides to encourage discussion, debate and a deeper exploration of the diverse
stories found within them.
Why Are We Doing This?
We want to celebrate reading for pleasure and encourage
everyone in Nottingham to pick up a book. We believe there is something for all
communities to connect with in our selection of books and want to champion the
range of voices and experiences of our readers. This is also a timely
opportunity for us to shine a spotlight on our young readers in a campaign
co-produced by them, championing what they are reading and why.
For any queries around this event or the Big City Reads
campaign as a whole, please contact our Programme Manager, Jim Hall:
jim@nottmcityoflit.org
In 2014 Nottingham was
named the first UK City of football. A year later, Nottingham became a UNESCO City
of Literature, a permanent title. But which accolade do we most deserve? That question
was answered at last Sunday’s Ey Up Duck event at the Canal House.
I presented a strong argument
for each title. Kicking off with football I began with Forest’s first great
player Sam Weller Widdowson who came up with the first formation, invented
shins pads, helped introduce the whistle, refereed the first match with goal nets
(the first player to put the ball in the back of the net was a Hyson Green man playing
for Everton), facilitated the first night matches (using gas light then
electricity) and founded the amateur cup. Cloughie was then given the full ‘top
one’ treatment before the focus shifted to Nottingham’s shaping of Italian
football, our current obsession with the game, and the rise of girls' football in the city.
As for literature, I
explored how our radical writers have changed the world with their words, looking
at how we influenced the American constitution and the UN Declaration of Human Rights,
how we presented the first coherent theory of evolution, how the Chatterley
trial impacted on censorship, and how working-class characters have been
represented. Writing of many forms was highlighted including the role our journalists, scriptwriters
and poets have played in making us a city of literature, and how we have led
the way in children’s reading with the first children’s library, Mee's The Children’s
Newspaper and Children's Encyclopaedia, Trease, Howitt, and our current writers and plans for the future.
The audience were then
asked the question, are we a city of football or a city of literature? and a
vote was undertaken. The result was a resounding win for literature with about
75% of the audience deciding that Nottingham is a City of Literature.
After the interval she will give a taster creative session where you will be encouraged to fire up the imagination, develop an idea and produce a short piece of work of your own.
All proceeds for Newark-based charity Think Children.
Tickets cost £7.50 and can be purchased in advance from Think Children by calling 01636 676887, emailing Sarah at think.children@tiscali.co.uk or at Carriages Cafe.
Ticket includes a filter coffee or tea. Fully-licensed bar available.
A brilliant new project launches today which aims to encourage
everyone in Nottingham to get reading.
Books are appearing in a host of unusual and wonderful places
from July 1st. Four special titles, selected for their suitability for
teenagers and upwards, and championed by Nottingham UNESCO City of Literature’s
Young Ambassadors, are available for free – you just have to find them!
The city’s collective page-turners are:
A Change Is Gonna Come – an anthology
We Are Not Okay by Natalia Gomes
Heartstopper by Alice Oseman
The Boy Who Lied by Kim Slater
Clues to the books’ whereabouts are being left on social
media via the hashtag #BigCityReads
If you find a book please celebrate the fact with a photo.
And, after you’ve read it, pass it on to a friend. You can even submit a review
of the book to the City of Literature website.
There is to be a Meet the Authors event taking place on
Friday July 12th at the Council House, with the books’ authors all
in attendance (tickets can be booked HERE).
Big City Reads 2019 is supported by generous grants from
Arts Council England and Nottingham Hospitals Charity. Key partnerships include
Nottingham City Libraries and Nottingham Education Improvement Board.
Jim Hall, Project Manager of Nottingham Big City Reads said
“Big City Reads is a unique chance to collectively celebrate the power of
reading for pleasure. We are excited to create a dialogue throughout the city
of the stories matter to our communities, encouraging everyone to track down a
book, read it, then share how it made them feel using our hashtag
#BigCityReads.”
For updates, follow @Nottmcityoflit , Facebook, Twitter,
Instagram, Website #BigCityReads
