I have learned one thing from Charlotte though. That phrase: “Reader, I married him.” often pops into my head when I’m writing my novels. As I write, I have two imaginary readers; there is one that looks over my shoulder and nods or tuts at the words that leak onto the page or the screen. I don’t like that reader. That reader is too critical, checking all the time if I am following the correct rules, pressurising me to think about plot and structure and character development, and eventually driving me away screaming with frustration.

It’s the other imaginary reader I like, the reader that Charlotte addresses. This is the reader that sits enthralled at the fireside on a damp dark night, sipping from a glass of warm mulled wine; or smiles to herself on a bus, as the words I am writing chime with something real and beautiful deep inside her. That reader exists for me now, as I write, it’s just time that separates us. When I finish writing something to my satisfaction I bundle the words up into messages, put them in bottles and send them off into the cosmos. Before the internet those bottles invariably ended up in a drawer, and when that got full, up the attic in boxes.

In the pre-blog days I tried to get bottle messaging companies to take my bottles to the seaside and set them free but they weren’t interested. That upset me at first. Why are my messages unacceptable? I asked myself. It took a decade of rejections and the acquisition of an MA in Creative Writing before I realised that the rejection was nothing to do with the quality of the message - it was simply that the bottle delivery companies are actually commercial entities, their job is to make as much money as possible while doing as little work as possible. Naturally they go for the safer options of sticking to bankable names and those that write in a way that has sold before. There is not much room for new voices. Occasionally a writer is plooped from the slush pile and bandied about as the next literary genius, but that’s just because it makes good television, like the X-Factor or American Idol.

Things are different now, they really are. Some of my imaginary readers have now got names and e-mail addresses and blogs. Without the internet my bottles would gradually decompose and their contents disintegrate without ever finding a fellow human being’s eyes to devour them. They would be brushed aside by some future archaeologist as he grabs for the fascinating object that is my decomposed computer monitor.

Having instant access to the opinions of readers does have its problems though. As I write now, I’m thinking of how the output of my fingers will fare out there in the ether of the internet. Will it attract praise? Am I exposing myself as a deluded twat, like those miserable wannabees on the X-Factor? If I do get praise, is it genuine? Who cares anyway? And so on. Of course thinking of these things will influence my writing, I might as well go and study Jane Eyre and accept that I’m just not good enough to share my own voice; I should learn instead how to mimic and modify the formula, to dress it up in contemporary clothes and apply a thick layer of anti-seramide-dioxin-plump-it-up cream to every crevice of its bloated body.

The thing is, I can’t do that. There is another, much more important imaginary reader. He is my future self. He insists that I deliver only truth in my own voice. He is the other human being waiting at the end of the universe for my communication. Of course, he is not me in the sense of who I am in this particular form in this particular place and at this particular time. For I am a Shapeshifter and a Timelord, so there!

Derec’s Website

(click on the image for a better view)

Here they are: (Click on the Blaggers for a larger image)

Created by Derec Jones and Gabrielle Nowicki - Illustrated by Gabrielle Nowicki

The Blaggers haven’t got a busy bone between them. They are all always on the make, avoiding any form of effort except when they think they can get something for ‘nothing’. It’s a shame, if they put as much energy into real work they’d all be millionaires.

The Blaggers’ lives revolve around the Blaggers Bookshop, a shabby excuse for a business that just enough people mistake for a charming family business to make it viable.

Here’s a brief introduction to The Blaggers:

Betsy is a librarian, she’s always taking days off and pretending to help her husband in the bookshop - hiding when people pass by.

Brian - Betsy’s husband - runs the bookshop, he is struggling himself but likes to take advantage of authors and small publishers - always late paying, constantly being hassled by suppliers and trying to sell review copies and freebies at inflated prices.

Belinda is the teenage daughter of Betsy and Brian, all she wants to do is read celebrity gossip and bunk off school.

Barry is Betsy and Brian’s early teenage son - still learning the Blagging trade but shows great promise.

Beowulf is Brian’s cousin from the dubious side of the family - a pretentious poet and painter. He’s unemployed and hangs about in the bookshop, blagging whatever he can.

Brenda is Brian’s mother and grandmother to Belinda and Barry. She is very thrifty and is obsessed with cutting coupons and likes to garner sympathy by playing on her age.

Bert- Brian’s father and the original Master Blagger - has had a job on the council arts promotion dept for 40 years and is adept at avoiding any real work. He spends most of his time finding and organising free junkets and collecting ‘samples’ of writer’s and artists’ work which he then sells under the counter in the bookshop.

Here are some definitions from the Urban dictionary that might go some way to explaining their outlook on life.

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=blag

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=blagger

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Blagging

Occasionally the Blag will set a competition. For this special launch issue your mission is to write a Haiku. You can define Haiku the way you want to, but for the purposes of this competition the type of Haiku that will stand the best chance of winning will be:

• A short poem written in English and formatted into 3 lines
• The first line should be five syllables
• The second line should be seven syllables
• The third line should be five syllables
• Direct metaphors, similes and other poetic devices should be avoided
• The poem should be an observation of part of the cycle of nature

Here’s an example of the type of Haiku we are looking for.

blown leaves collecting
at the foot of the elder
the forest is bare

A selection of Haiku will be published in the next issue of the Blag and one will be chosen to receive the prize of a signed book

Please send your entries to the Blag by using the form on the contact page with the subject “Haiku competition”. Please include your name, location and e-mail address with the statement: “This Haiku is my own original unpublished work”

Here on the cliff I am surrounded by the coconut warmth of the gorse, the freshly cut grass from the fields behind and the salty tang from a sea that next hits land in America. A digital camera could capture the scene but it could not give the aromas that leach from a wind that is blowing off the land.

Hells Mouth. The land plummets away from me in a 200ft drop to the aquamarine sea below. A cheery place Cornwall, full of rather beautiful suicide spots.

I know I am lucky. This piece of land, this County of Cornwall, is an inspiration to a thousand painters, a glut of sculptors and a heap of photographers – all clamouring for a piece of the wildness that has refused the call of modern times. It is not difficult to displace yourself on this piratical coast, imagining du Maurier’s smugglers dragging contraband up the many hidden coves to the waiting warren of caves.

I sit on my seagull perch and watch a shoal of mackerel, moving as one between an outcrop of rocks and a gently moving forest of wrack but my pen has not found its way to the notebook open on my lap. The pages remain blank, free from the clue words of a fresh poem or the descriptive sentences that may eventually work their way into a new novel.

I live in place that could be termed one huge muse, Zeus’s fattest daughter if you like, dramatic cliffs, quaint villages, barren moorland and lush forest at every turn. But can a place actually call forth inspiration, wrap it up and deliver it as a whole piece? Some would say yes, that surroundings are as important as the writing, that we should write about what we know - but should we actually be sat amongst it?

This question comes from a writer who tapped totally into her surroundings when writing Coven of One. The southern lands in this book are based completely on Cornwall, but I did not sit on the quay in Polperro or wander the winding streets of Mousehole to collect the ambience I wanted. Come to think of it I did not write The Geishan Kumiai in Japan and as far as I’m aware I have not experienced the ice age of Capricorn Wind.

I return home to a house that has sea views, in a town that still boasts more houses from the 18th century than new. My desk faces neither. The window to the side overlooks a neglected courtyard, and to my left are shelves filled with books and writing clutter. My only view is the screen in front of me and this is how I like it.

My writing world sits within a metre square, filled with things I love that negate the need for rolling countryside and craggy mountains. These inspirements range from a gonk that I had when I was ten, to a laughing Buddha, and a tin of my children’s teeth (I know!). Peruvian worry dolls, that were purchased from a little know Peruvian town in deepest Dorset, sit in a glowering line as a brass Shiva beside them holds out her hands expecting the literary miracles that are one day going to come tripping from my fingers. My desk is home to Esme, a patient cat, a pot of special pens that no one is allowed to touch, small gifts from friends that mean a lot and of course, my laptop, my gateway to the world.

All is here and once I am immersed in writing there could be a nuclear holocaust going on outside and I wouldn’t have a clue!

Joyce once said “When I die Dublin will be written in my heart”. Cornwall will no doubt be written on mine but while I am writing my lovely county is forgotten. Banished to somewhere beyond the front door because what could be more perfect than setting one’s imagination free to run riot in a land of one’s own making?

***

Kate Bousfield is the author of the novel Coven of One.

Kate blogs at The Inner Minx

The real poetry I’ve discovered over the last while is mostly due to a confluence of influences – the blog and the internet. God bless high speed internet access. There are some real gems if you’re prepared to spend time cruising from one link to another. I am here to help you in that voyage of discovery, and cut down on some of the time spent online fruitlessly, so let’s get going.

First off, I’m pointing you in the general direction of Rob MacKenzie. Rob I came across via a Open University student who partook of PFFA (and was a damn fine writer too). Some explanations are in order here. MacKenzie moderates for Poetry Free For All, a poetry workshop website, devoted to the critiqueing of poetry. I can verify that the standards of critting and writing on this forum are high, and are getting higher. You can begin in the General forum and work your way through the various levels as your confidence and knowledge begins to increase.

Why crit? I hear you ask. For the same reasons as face to face work-shopping improves your writing. It is very difficult to keep writing in a vacuum. You learn to read a piece using the technical jargon, and can strip down elements in a poem easily, seeing how the sum is made of its differential parts. Critting then improves your own writing. You can see quicker what won’t work way before you go to the forum. PFFA can offer valuable readings of your poem, showing you that people don’t always see things the way you do. It helps remove the ego from the writing, and lets the writing do the talking instead.

Back to MacKenzie, however. In his blog over a period of time, I have seen his writing, sending out and getting poetry published, winning praise and a reputation for his work. His blog is interesting reading too. He often reviews collections or poets, and likes to raise issues outside of poetry too – see some of his archived posts on Celebrity Big Brother.

How about his work, then? I’d describe Rob’s work as using metre and form, as well as very vivid imagery. Metre is where there is an underlying rhythm – tum te tum te – or te tum te tum- they are the most basic units of analysis, the te is the unstressed word, the tum is the stressed, where the eye or voice lingers slightly longer. Form is where the poem is organised into stanzas or compartments.

Traditionally you organise a particular idea into each one –so that a poem is like a train with compartments joined together by the direction the train is going in and the rhythm, the noise it makes on the tracks. That’s how it’s supposed to work, but it is generally a lot easier to spot in other peoples work than in your own! Rob has a pamphlet available sampling some of his work, and I hope it won’t be too long before we are seeing his first collection.

Rob’s pamphlet The Clown of Natural Sorrow was published in 2005 by Happenstance Press. It contains a muscular grouping of twenty six poems. The main themes linking them are places and people. His way of looking things is quite unusual and he treads a fine line between showing and telling, the two main tools of writing. Showing is when the writer uses the actions of the protagonist or subject to allow the reader the impression of what is going on behind the scenes. Telling is when the writer just straight up and tells you, leaving no room for building your own impressions. An example of showing from MacKenzie’s work:

From ‘The Hedge Artist’

The latest caller wants to shape my hedge like a Great Dane
to dunk the Scotch Terrier across the road
in shadow. He works for both sides. […]

Instead of just going for ‘my dog is bigger than yours’ McKenzie introduces the idea of a go-between, the hedge artist. This seems surreal and makes the reader think about the situation beyond the normal social context. He shows us this by building up the telling details, and letting the reader read between the lines. Where we get the confirmation of this is at the end of the poem:

[…] he says to drop the work
would leave someone else worse to pick it up. Of course,
all I care about it keeping up appearances.

That last line is telling the reader, giving the final clue as to the thrust of the poem.

I spoke earlier of how McKenzie uses form and metre in his poetry, so here’s a look at a sonnet that he has in The Clown of Natural Sorrow:

Girl Playing Sudoku on the 7.15

I sit down opposite. She doesn’t blink
or cough, her pencil-scratch the only noise
beyond the train’s dull chitchat. Teenage boys
slouch up the centre-aisle, unleash to the stink
of Lynx. She keeps on scrawling to the brink
of suffocation. I admire her poise,
open windows, plumb my brain for ploys
to start a conversation. I can’t think.

Our eyes squint out of synch. Although I stare,
I don’t dare interrupt her concentration
and when she finally completes the square
I focus on the floor. One hesitation
begins a hesitation. I set up solitaire.
The train heaves on, already past my station.

Firstly look at the rhyming scheme at the end of lines. This sonnet uses end-stopped rhyme: blink/stink, brink/think, noise/boys, and poise/ploys. The first eight lines are grouped together making a stanza of eight lines or an octet. The rhyme scheme is also abba abba. And those rhymes because they are one syllable long, are called masculine rhymes (they just are, okay?). Two syllable rhymes like station, hesiTATION, concenTRATION are called feminine ones. Because the scheme is abba abba in the first octet, this looks like it could be an Italian or Petrarchan sonnet. Looking at the second stanza or sestet (six lines) will show is whether that is true.

The sestet scheme here looks to be stare/square/soliTAIRE , which we’ll call c and the opposing rhyme we will call d. So, cd,cd,cd – this is a variation on the expected format of the Italian sonnet which can be cdd cee or any other variation of cde. It is not an English sonnet, as they usually end on a couplet with a brand new rhyme: gg. Still with me?

After looking at the rhyme scheme, it’s time to think about the rhythm. Well there is a gentle te tum, te tum, going on there, with variations. I don’t want to get too hung up on this aspect, but it is enough to say that the metre is loosely iambic pentameter which is stress based. An iamb is a foot, usually consisting of a light stress, a dot, and a heavy stress, a cross, pattern:

I FOCus ON the FLOOR. One hesitation
. x / . x / . x / etc.

The stresses in the early part of line are my emphasis – and I may well have it wrong. Read it out loud for yourself to hear where the stress falls. If you’re very interested in metre and rhythm, there are some great books out there particularly by Mary Oliver. Google her Rules for the Dance and A Poetry Handbook.

Putting together rhythm and rhyme in this sonnet then, can add a lot to our enjoyment of it giving extra meaning under the surface of the poem: the rhythm suggests the rocking of the train that the narrator is on; the rhymes emphasise the figures that the narrator mentions: the sheer concentration of the other passenger: blink etc. the teenage boys; and also effectively places the narrator of the poem in the reader’s mind. We can see and feel through the narrator, this train and the fascination with the Sudoku completer. These work additionally with the imagery that MacKenzie has created.

I hope you might enjoy this enough to lend some support to Rob Mackenzie and try out his poetry for yourself – there is a common maxim these days that everyone who wrote poetry bought just one book each, there would be lot more riches for poets to share. Whether that is true or not, being able to illuminate what makes poetry so interesting beyond the internal ‘hmm,’ is great fun. Next time out, we’ll look beyond the shores of Europe to see what else is out there.

***

Barbara Smith’s first collection of poetry, Kairos, published by Doghouse Press is available now.

Barbara blogs at Barbara’s Bleuuugh!

Think of Oxford and you think of dons in billowing academic gowns, boat races and gentle punting on the Thames, students hurrying to lectures and hallowed halls of learning grouped around tranquil green quadrangles. Yet Oxford, the City of Dreaming Spires (a term coined by the poet, Matthew Arnold), its skyline dominated by the towers and domes of the golden stone buildings of the University is so much more than just the university – even though, at about 900 years, that university is one of the oldest in the world.

True, the university dominates the city, gives it life, presence and even a certain magic. There is, after all, something evocative about stepping through the great wooden doorways of the colleges and leaving behind the clamour of traffic and city life. It is as though you enter another world entirely – one which is a sanctuary of tranquility and stillness where the imagination and the mind can soar.

It was this unexpected peace of a college garden awash in the golds, crimsons and yellows of autumn and the sight of a fox loping between the bushes that set me to thinking about the magical effect that Oxford has had on so many minds - from a literary perspective. As I gazed at the fox going about his business I wondered… was he real or a creature from some other world? What, after all, was a fox doing in an enclosed college garden in the middle of a city? Enchanted and captivated, my mind swung back to my favourite childhood books of fantasy and other worlds… The Chronicles of Narnia by CS Lewis, The Hobbit by JRR Tolkien, Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll… Oxford, you see, has produced many great writers – and many books, television series and films have been set in the city.

It was while he was teaching at Christ Church that Charles Dodgson, a shy mathematics don, wrote the Alice in Wonderland stories under the pen name of Lewis Carroll. The stories began on a summer’s afternoon when Dodgson took Alice Liddell, the daughter of Dean Liddell, and her sisters on the river Thames. The journey, starting at Folly Bridge, ended five miles away in the village of Godstow and to while away time the Reverend Dodgson told the girls a story that featured a bored little girl named Alice who goes looking for an adventure. Alice’s Shop in Through the Looking Glass was based on the shop opposite Christ Church in St Aldate’s where the real-life Alice Liddell used to buy her barley sugar sweets. The shop is still there and will captivate children and adults alike. Aside from buying Alice memorabilia, visitors can still buy Alice’s favourite barley sugar sweets… yes, I did, and they were full of childhood memories.

In my meanderings through Oxford, an amble along Cornmarket Street, just off the High Street, with its wide selection of popular retailers (including department stores, boutiques and bookstores) brought me to St Giles, home of The Eagle and Child pub. It is here that the literary group most famously associated with Oxford congregated. Known as the Inklings, the leading members included CS Lewis and JRR Tolkien. They and their peers, George MacDonald, Charles Williams and Owen Barfield amongst others, met regularly every Monday or Friday before lunch during the 1930’s and 40’s. There they drank and talked usually in an area at the back of the pub, which was then a private sitting room and is now known as the Rabbit Room. Although not members of the Inklings, WH Auden, TS Eliot, Dorothy L Sayers and GK Chesterton were also associated with the group. The Eagle and Child is, unsurprisingly, a visiting place for many exploring Oxford, especially those doing Tolkien “pilgrimages”. Known amongst students as the Bird and Baby, it has also been called, as one might expect in a city populated by students, as the “Bird and Brat”, the “Bird and Bastard”, or the “Fowl and Foetus”.

Other writers connected with Oxford include Evelyn Waugh, Aldous Huxley, Oscar Wilde, Graham Greene, Vikram Seth and Plum Sykes, the poets Percy Bysshe Shelley, John Donne, A. E. Housman and Philip Larkin, and Poets Laureate Robert Bridges, Cecil Day-Lewis and Sir John Betjeman.

Aside from being the home of many writers, Oxford has also been the setting for numerous works of fiction. The city was mentioned in fiction as early as 1400 when Chaucer in his Canterbury Tales referred to a “Clerk [student] of Oxenford”: “For him was levere have at his beddes heed/ Twenty bookes, clad in blak or reed,/ of Aristotle and his philosophie/ Than robes riche, or fithele, or gay sautrie”. As of 1989, more than 533 Oxford-based novels had been identified, and the number continues to rise.

In popular fiction Oxford is probably most closely associated with British author Colin Dexter’s Inspector Morse books on which the 33 episode TV series was based. Set primarily in Oxford with a vintage Mark 2 Jaguar, a thirst for beer, intellectual snobbery and a penchant for Wagner, Chief Inspector Morse (played by John Thaw in the TV series) is a likeable character despite his sullen and cynical temperament. In the TV series the fictional colleges of Lonsdale and Beaumont are used but they are based on the real Brasenose College (used to represent Lonsdale), and Corpus Christi (used for Beaumont). Both fictional college names are, however, the names of real streets in Oxford. A stroll around Oxford for anyone familiar with the books and the TV series will reveal many places that are recognisable, such as the Randolph Hotel, the Carfax, the Bear Inn, the world famous Blackwell’s bookstore and the Sheldonian Theatre. As I wandered around I kept looking over my shoulder, who knows, I thought, perhaps there might be a real life Inspector Morse tailing me…

Oxford’s mystery and magic has also been revealed through Philip Pullman’s excellent His Dark Materials Trilogy. Although written for teenagers, the books have appealed equally to adults and the movie, The Golden Compass, based on the books and produced by New Line Cinema (who also produced the Lord of the Rings) is due for release in December 2007, starring Daniel Craig and Nicole Kidman. Lyra Belacqua, the principal character is a young girl brought up in the cloistered world of Jordan College, Oxford and it is from here that she and her companion, Will Parry, venture out to discover a multiverse of parallel universes. Pullman’s last work featuring Lyra is simply called Lyra’s Oxford and, with a map tucked away inside the book, it provides a wonderful way for fans to spend a magical afternoon following in Lyra’s footsteps as her adventure unfolds around the city. You’d be well advised though to take along your own copy - all Oxford’s bookstores seem to be regularly out of stock – unsurprisingly!

Most famously, many scenes from the Harry Potter films have been filmed in Oxford. The Divinity School of the Bodleian Library features in the movies as the Hogwarts Sanatorium. Duke Humfrey’s Library features as the Hogwarts Library and, Christ Church College’s Dining Hall is the Hogwarts dining hall - tourism at Christ Church and to Oxford has risen by around 40% purely because of the Harry Potter movies.

Numerous books, films and TV series have created fictional colleges based on Oxford University including: Terry Pratchett’s Unseen University from his Discworld novels, Thomas Hardy’s Biblioll College in Jude the Obscure, Anthony Trolllope’s Lazarus College in Barchester Towers, Thomas Hughes’ St Ambrose College in Tom Brown at Oxford, Evelyn Waugh’s Scone College in Decline and Fall and, Elizabeth Gaskell’s All Saints College in North and South.

Acknowledging the abundant literary tradition, numerous themed walking tours can be taken in the city, including tours entitled, JRR Tolkien, Pottering in Harry’s Footsteps, Phillip Pullman, CS Lewis, the Literary Tour, Inspector Lewis (Morse’s sidekick) and most well known, the Inspector Morse Tour. And walking is certainly the best way to see the city. In fact it is probably the only way to really gain a sense of the place and the magic of other worlds that has inspired so many writers and stories – stories that only further add to the rich and varied tapestry that is Oxford. Who knows, after a visit you may be inspired to write your own story…

Resources and Information
For the visitor with more than just literary interests, Oxford is a bustling town with a cosmopolitan range of restaurants and lively pubs, a wide variety of entertainment, excellent shopping and world-famous museums. A good place to start an exploration of Oxford is at the Oxford Story in Broad Street where, through a combination of films, interactive exhibits and a 25 minute indoor ‘dark’ ride, complete with the sounds and smells of the times, takes you through the University’s 900 year history, allowing you to meet along the way, some of the writers, scientists and politicians whose careers began at Oxford.

For Official Guided Walking Tours of Oxford for individuals and families go to: http://www.oxford.gov.uk/tourism/individual-walking-tours.cfm
www.oxford.gov.uk provides a wealth of information for those planning a visit to the city.
www.multimap.com is a great reference for street maps
http://www.chem.ox.ac.uk/oxfordtour/ provides virtual tours of Oxford enabling prospective visitors with a means to plan their visit to the City
Wikipedia offers a lengthy selection of books and other media associated with Oxford at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Books_associated_with_Oxford and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Oxford#Oxford_in_literature_and_other_media

Notable libraries in Oxford include:

• The Bodleian Library
• Hooke Library
• Sackler Library
• Radcliffe Science Library

Museums worth visiting include:

• Ashmolean Museum (art and history museum)
• Pitt Rivers Museum (anthropology and archaelogy museum)
• Oxford University Museum of Natural History
• Museum of the History of Science

Buildings and Parks worth visiting include:

• Sheldonian Theatre
• Tom Tower – the main entrance to Christ Church College – Christ Church and its beautiful meadow which runs down to the rivers Thames and Cherwell are well worth a visit.
• Radcliffe Camera – which lies at the very heart of the old university
• Carfax Tower - situated at the crossroads between High Street, St Aldates, Queen Street and Cornmarket Street, the tower affords beautiful views over the city
• University Church of St Mary the Virgin – which has been in existence since the late 13 Century. Climb the 127 stairs to the top of the spire to be afforded a classic aerial view of Radcliffe Square
• Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford
• Oxford University Parks
• Oxford Botanic Garden and Harcourt Arboretum
• Rhodes Trust, the centre of the Rhodes Scholarship

Shopping:
Cornmarket Street – offers the usual High Street range of shops
The High Street offers interesting gift shops, boutiques and antique shops.
Situated off Cornmarket Street, The Covered Market is a must visit, selling everything from fresh produce to shoes and jewelry. A must visit for chocolate lovers is Chocology for the most decadent hot chocolate around.

Eating:
Good restaurants, pubs and the usual fast food outlets abound and every taste and need is catered for. http://www.dailyinfo.co.uk/venues/restaurants lists number of eateries with reviews.

Accommodation in the centre of Oxford does not come cheap and those traveling on a budget would be advised to look at hotels outside the city centre or for B&B accommodation – of which there is plenty.

By far the most well known hotels are the MacDonald Randolph http://www.randolph-hotel.com/ which is centrally located just off Cornmarket Street and the newer, very hip Malmaison Oxford Castle which caters for all a traveller’s needs and has been created within the walls of the old jail. http://www.malmaison-oxford.com/main.asp

The Old Bank Hotel on the High Street also offer excellent central accommodation http://www.oldbank-hotel.co.uk/

For those wanting to spoil themselves (and break the bank), Raymond Blanc’s Le Manoir Aux Quat’ Saisons http://www.manoir.com is a real treat at Great Milton, some 6 kms outside Oxford.

More affordable than the above, yet also central, The MacDonald Eastgate is a comfortable three star hotel just off the High Street. http://www.macdonaldhotels.co.uk/hotels/Eastgate_(The).htm

***

Nicky Schmidt is a writer, blogging at Absolute Vanilla

The Blag questioned Gabrielle for the first in a series of interviews with practising visual artists. Here are the results.

BLAG: Why Tindaisies?

GN: Tin is a commonplace utilitarian metal. Daisies, especially the wild ones that grow in ditches and vacant lots, are a bit like the floral version of tin. When these two everyday things are thrown together, the combination gives a new visual and concept. I find comfort that things such as tin and daisies are stalwart, tough, humble things that will always be around to enjoy if we ever think to pause and appreciate them.

BLAG: What mediums do you work with?

GN: Most of my work is done with computers, I use Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop and InDesign and I draw with a Wacom Tablet. Before the computer, my medium was mainly oil or acrylic paint, and graphite. The main problem with using the computer, is that you really miss hitting “ctrl z” when drawing with a real pencil.

BLAG: What does it mean to define yourself as an artist?

GN: I think it’s the way you see and think about things and to be tapped into the world inside and outside you.

BLAG: What’s the difference between an artist, a graphic artist and a cartoonist? Which one are you?

GN: It’s a matter of how you choose to let your art come out and to what degree you do so. You could also be a cello player, graphic artist, cartoonist and or artist. I suppose I’m all of the above (well, not really: I don’t play cello).

BLAG: Is the cartoon underrated as an art form?

GN: Yes! Although I think that cartoons are being seen more and more as a valid art form as daily strips have become more sophisticated and the rise in popularity of graphic novels.

BLAG: Many of your drawings are very dark, why do you think this is?

GN: I have a very black sense of humour, or a wry way of looking at things. Sometimes I have to stop and look within myself to see what demons are brewing away in there and sometimes they find their way into my imagery. I wanted to paint my bedroom black when I was a kid, but really, I’m a pretty happy person.

BLAG: Most artists are striving to find a niche that fits their sensitivities - where would you like to get to? Is there a painting or a drawing that you could point to and say “That’s a definitive Nowicki.”

GN: My work within the past 2 years has been very illustrative. This is new for me, and I am exploring it but have reached the point where I am now looking at my previous work and wondering if I should reach back and spend some time there again or should I keep on keeping on to see what transpires. Because of this mild identity crisis, I can’t say what a “definitive Nowicki” is.

BLAG: Does being such a regular Internet user help or hinder you as an artist?

GN: It’s done its share of both. Like everyone else, throughout the years I have wasted way too much time just surfing, however, because of the Internet, artists whose work I would never see are available to discover and the ease of research is invaluable. Definitely, the novelty of the Internet wore off for me long ago, but for work, it remains a valuable research asset and a great way to keep in touch and make new contacts with people.

BLAG: Simpsons or South Park?

GN: Simpsons!

BLAG: and while we’re at it, Sopranos or CSI?

GN: Sopranos, if I had the time to watch it regularly. I watch very little TV. When it comes to TV, I have about a 22 minute attention span, not including commercials.

BLAG: What’s your favourite colour?

GN: I don’t have one, but I have favourite combinations. For example, for dinner today I fried chopped tomatoes and cubanelle peppers together. The delicate lime green set against the rich red or the tomatoes was so vibrant and intense.

BLAG: What makes an artist? Is it talent or skill? Which is more important?

GN: Both talent and skill are equally important and on different levels.

From a technical standpoint, those who are born with talent initially don’t have to work as hard as everyone else. However, when you take it one step beyond just rendering images, when you start to put something from within yourself into it, that’s where the art comes in.

From an artistic standpoint, I think up to a point you can learn how to see and think as an artist, even if it’s just an appreciation for the process. The next part though, is to successfully communicate what is within you to the rest of the world. I may be just speaking for myself, but I think the bane of many creative people is the struggle of wielding their skills and intuition to do justice to their ideas: Phenomenal skill becomes weakened by an immaturely formed idea, other times it’s reversed, the idea is well formed, but the technical skill is lacking.

I also think the more you know the more about the process, the more you beat yourself up over it.

BLAG: You have said that your work as a graphic designer works best when it clearly communicates its intended message. Do the other types of art you produce carry messages? If so what are the messages?

GN: Graphic design has to arrange text and graphical components in a way to communicate both intended written and visual messages. The messages are less spelled out and less obvious, sometimes even to me when it comes to my own art - having said that, I have always been a story teller with my art.

Text often becomes part of my work, I like to work in series, sometimes the story is less obvious, and intuitiveness also plays a part. Other times, when I get sick of making visuals, I just write, and that is amazing, how both image and words can spring from the same source within you.

When you work on your own art, rather than a graphic design project, you ultimately call the shots, and it all comes from within you, you get to “let your hair down,” and wear your creative sweats instead of dressing up to go out.

BLAG: What’s your working environment? Do you have any rituals or routines to help you get started?

GN: I sit at a boring computer desk but I have it set up in the front room of the house, it’s out of the main household traffic and has become a study. In front of the window is my drafting table should I ever start a drawing on paper, or a painting but for the time it’s a perfect place for my children to do their homework.

I go for a walk every morning, then I go into work and design stuff for other people and work on the newspaper. When I get home I try to get into my own work for a while, usually my ritual is waffling around and avoidance until I get some gumption to sit down and conquer.

BLAG: Who is Gabrielle Nowicki the artist? Any biographical details you’d like to share?

(Gabrielle couldn’t answer this question, claiming to be “all biographicalled out” Maybe there’s a clue in the illustration below?)

Minnie and Dot Amabale were identical twins, save for the fact that Minnie was very, very good and Dot was very, very evil.

More on Gabrielle at:
www.tindaisies.com
http://gabriellenowicki.blogspot.com/
http://tindaisies.blogspot.com/

by Suzan Abrams

This article reflects my radical view as a past lover of South Asian literature. If it is ever possible to dissolve a relationship with a certain category of books, I am now contemplating plunging down that ravine while staying intent on a literary divorce and a hearty reconciliation with past loves.

I picture writers from the East who stay determined to write only about ethnicity as a pompous grandeur of heritage and culture, as squeezed into hovels or boxes with no chance of escape. This after reading dozens of books that all precariously cling to the same themes.

I fear sometimes these authors are their own worst enemies especially the majority of the newer South Asian novelists.

Do exclude the likes of award-winning novelists like Salman Rushdie, Anita Desai, Vikram Seth, Arundhati Roy, Hanif Kureishi and other pioneering authors who once before, manoeuvred modern Indian writing in English with colourful and extraordinary stories of emigration and identity and who still command the top league with ease.
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But several of the newer writers from the Indian sub-continent, I fear, encourage publishers to label them in ways that limit their creativity like a straitjacket.

They insist on writing about race and nationality & forget the free rein of the imagination. There are broods from certain countries even in South-East Asia who insist on patriotism being screamed at from their plots…where freedom of thought is captured and patriotism which reflects a commissioned agenda, is dutifully mastered.

Of course, I stay convinced that there can never be originality in their very obvious fiction.

Tell the world about our country…the world doesn’t know our country…kind of thing” and the whole affair of English literature in that particular country ends up pathetic, contrived and superficial.

Because of such catch-labels, they exploit the ancient topics of emigration and identity. And where they were once the new rage for world publishing in the 1990s, they have now succeeded through their own persistence on writing about ethnicity in all its dull predictability, in destroying their popularity worldwide.

It is my view that such a community of multicultural fiction writing stays maimed when the rewards could easily have been trebled for literature in its new international form.

To say nothing of a work of fiction you may end up paying twice as much for, only to realise with a nagging intuition afterwards, that you’ve read it all before. Even the experienced book-buyer can’t always be too careful.

I feel writers from other continents could make a big difference if they wrote what moved them through a strong flow of imagination i.e. by what they feel compelled to rather than out of an obligatory service to the nation.

Perhaps, even a laziness is invoked when a writer chooses to rest on his laurels with a comfortable but stale view of history, nostalgia and familiarity, rather then having to probe the mind’s tougher reflections, insights and ideologies.

One of the braver ones I daresay is bestselling New Delhi author Vikram Seth, based in Great Britain.

When Seth was asked why he chose a complete European cast - this with the exception of a fictitious Japanese musician for his novel ‘An Equal Music’ (1992) where an English violinist stayed haunted by memories of a lover, he replied simply that it was because he ‘felt inspired to.’ And it all stopped there. There was nothing else to add, despite the fact that he offered no hint of an Indian anecdote.

For a start, there are the same-ish themes employed by Monica Ali - the only difference being that she spotted a Bangladeshi culture, also by Jhumpa Lahiri’s The Namesake - the only difference being that she employed the greater eloquence, Preethi Nair’s 100 Shades of White had similar themes to both stories, though they were all written at different time periods.

All complain about a loss of identity. All contemplate returning home. All decide at the end of the day, they can’t bear their homeland.

Of course, Hanif Kureishi wrote about identity. But in the midst of it, he tackled subjects like homosexuality in all its wonderful brazen analysis and also displayed erotica in prose and film like the subject was a series of curious paintings.

I have not seen any other South Asian writer in 2007 courageous enough to do this. Kureishi also honed a distinctive style and actually helped pioneer a lively experimental scene in Britain and Europe in the 80s and he still rules the fort.
He’s not part of the predictable copycat stories South Asian writers conjure up these days.

Kureishi once tackled a difficult true story in Intimacy (1998) on abandoning his lover and 2 sons in London from a fear of commitment. This had nothing at all to do with emigration etc and ended up causing a fair amount of annoyance that he would dare walk out on his young family with no stricken conscience or shame to show for it afterwards. But at the time, he aroused a strong interest and created the kind of heavy controversy that made for a refreshing difference.

That’s the kind of subjects Asian writers should be daring themselves to write about. Anything that cajoles them to come out of their one-roomed shells. I have no doubt the window views are prettier.

Please look at this link to have some idea.

http://www.sawnet.org/books/fiction.php

Do you hear the majority of these writers being spoken about today in 2007? Yet, at one time for a season or two, they were. They may boast brilliant profiles and their books are said to be popular worldwide.

For several (not all), the lacklustre fiction cannot be beefed up even by the use of exotic elements. The issues of emigration don’t seem to offer any fresh insights, from the same questions another South Asian writer may have posed a few years ago.

The theme for Monica Ali’s Brick Lane bore a subtle but striking resemblance to Sunetra Gupta’s Memories of Rain written in the 1990s in Oxford England. Both plots talked about escapism…the return to the Indian homeland that would solve all problems.

Amulya Malladi’s The Mango Season, Lahiri’s The Namesake and Chitra Banarjee’s Queen of Dreams also spun a repeated nostalgia for the homeland, the visit to India and the relief once more in returning to the States. You could almost predict the plots.

By the time, Monical Ali wrote her second novel, Alentejo Blue (2006), that talked about eccentric characters, love letters and Portugal, it was too late. Her reputation had already been set with yet another story of Bangladeshi emigration and nostalgia in Brick Lane.

Had she made it her first, I believe she would have been seen as a highly-talented young author, fine-tuning her craft to an adventurous plot.

Publishers would have observed her taking the road less travelled and expounded on that trait. She would have set an exciting trend. Then there may have been other copycat stories, following hers.

But it didn’t happen that way.

Fame came along but to a familiar setting.

It is often somewhat difficult for one’s second novel to rise against the first. If you are involved in theatre, you would know that the second performance often hardly pulls in as big a crowd as the first before it begins to find its way up the ladder again.

In the last few years, Monica Ali’s name was everywhere. I heard it in Singapore, Australia and so forth. With the second book, one hears hardly anything at all. Her popularity has taken on a severe decline.

Veteran writers who have already made their names are feted when a new book comes out.

That’s no surprise. But newer south-Asian writers scatter like ants when they cling to the perimeters of dusty topics incapable of a good polish except for the familiar themes of a slight wistfulness, homesickness & nostalgia.

Why are these writers so afraid to tackle hundreds of other new subjects that have nothing to do with leaving the homeland for instance and just attempt to break the glass ceiling placed on them?

I believe that these writers give publishers and their agents a very easy time to pigeonhole them.

And it’s sad. It’s sad that south Asian writers offer so few choices in themes when the world being the playground it is could have afforded them hundreds more.

The road less travelled. The comic novel. The psychological thriller. The drama of present-day contemporary fiction without the constant meditation of the kind of past that moulded India’s history. This whether the author lives in the States or Europe. A blatant sexual episode and not one hidden by saree drapes or caught in a locked bedroom. A family trilogy. Pure adventure. So much more. But it simply isn’t so.

I’m also not referring to a success in its material aspect as to perhaps the greater more exciting subject of evolvement in literature and where it would have headed today if these writers had been a little more daring and adventurous with the attention afforded to them for the longest time, before the world slowly moved its eyes away again. They could have challenged the publishers/agents and got away with it if they wanted.

On a deeper introspection, many of the newer writers command an average mettle and they do succeed in dulling the reader’s mind. But if I probed this thought more carefully, then the topics chosen have definitely contributed to a major stalemate and it may affect even the sales of more talented and newer south Asian writers coming along. Some of the older ones who stay comfortable with their work have settled into conformity. Some stories stay politically correct while others lack a profound beauty.

I think where publishers are concerned, they may be riding an old horse. Because of the pioneering and highly talented authors that went before like Vikram Seth, Kureishi, Arundhati Roy and in a later version, the likes of Monica Ali, they keep hoping for another Roy or another Ali but the book-buyers haven’t as yet for a long time of late, given them that. They think the old themes filled to the brim with exotic elements are still safe but somehow, I don’t think so and time will tell as it already has for me.

I’ve been studying the market for this kind of literature for years. The damage will only be discovered later, not now. But it isn’t as easy for south Asian writers to get the notice of agents & publishers as they once did. In the 90s, they were all the rage and Time Magazine devoted a major section to Indian authors making it big in the West.

Interest has steadily dwindled but I don’t know if the technicalities have actually been probed fully by any media. I’d consider it early days yet. Give it another year or 2 is my reckoning and the effects will be clearly seen.

In the meantime, be prepared that such veteran writers may fail to garner sparkling reviews as they used to, although they could still expect a generous attention from their own communities.

A new south Asian writer who wants to be noticed worldwide for her/his writing from now, should take up the difficult challenge of seeking innovation by offering a completely different storyline to juggle happily with a distinctive talent. Otherwise, the new novel too is likely to be done for. There’ll be a season or 2 of publicity and a couple of quick prize nominations, before the once ‘promising’ read drowns sadly in the glut.

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Suzan Abrams is a writer and journalist and blogs at Behind the Curtain

Normal literary blogs serve a function, and it is an important function for many, that is, to provide a friendly and supportive space where like-minded people can gather to discuss or showcase literature. Unfortunately, for those of us who hoped that blogging alone would provide us with a big enough platform to justify the time and effort, there are a couple of major problems.

The space around a blog is rather small, there’s only room for a handful of regulars, and that can be frustrating for a writer who wants to find that wider readership.

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The Editor