1
2
3
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
Monday, 15 March 2021
More piccies to delight small minds (and large ones if you have one)
Friday, 12 March 2021
So what might ‘abstract writing’ be (apart from, sadly, a little tedious the longer it went on)?
GIVEN that who was a modernist artist and what constituted a modernist work is these days unhelpfully vague, it is not an easy subject to talk about. In music and the plastic arts it might prove easier to distinguish ‘modernist’ art from what else was being produced at the time, but literature presents an additional problem: it deals with words, whether in prose or poetry.
Music — essentially a noise or, if you like, pure sound — and pigment — essentially a medium refracting light — are in themselves abstract and wholly without meaning. Whatever cultural, ritual, social, personal or emotional ‘meanings’ we attribute, for example, to a certain colour, that colour — that is the ‘light refracted through it at a certain wavelength’ — is in itself ‘meaningless’. The same is true of a note or a combination of notes — a noise or a combination of noises. It is nothing but ‘noise’ (or more genteelly ‘sound’). But words are a little different.
Words do have meaning (and leave aside, for a moment, the possibility that what you understand by a certain word is not quite what I understand by it, though often we might not know that). We use certain words because they have a certain meaning, and that makes communication, verbal and written, possible. But words have other attributes: they have a sound and they also have — well, it’s difficult to find just one word to describe it. All of the following carry elements of that somewhat elusive attribute: ‘import’, ‘overtones’ and ‘undertones’, and ‘echoes’.
For example, take the verb ‘to shrive’ or one of its various derivatives. I first came across it as a young boy reading Roger Lancelyn Green’s King Arthur And His Knights of The Round Table and I have rarely, if ever, heard it used since, though a familiar derivation is ‘Shrove Tuesday’, the day before Ash Wednesday when in less heathen times (or better, from my point of view, the heathenism was of Roman Catholic and later Anglo Catholic variety) when believers souls were ‘shriven’ to be pure for Lent.
Were I to use the words ‘shrive’ or ‘shriven’ in everyday conversation or writing here in this blog, it would convey information quite apart from the sound of the word (whether heard or read) and its meaning.
And finally the Webern:
Music — essentially a noise or, if you like, pure sound — and pigment — essentially a medium refracting light — are in themselves abstract and wholly without meaning. Whatever cultural, ritual, social, personal or emotional ‘meanings’ we attribute, for example, to a certain colour, that colour — that is the ‘light refracted through it at a certain wavelength’ — is in itself ‘meaningless’. The same is true of a note or a combination of notes — a noise or a combination of noises. It is nothing but ‘noise’ (or more genteelly ‘sound’). But words are a little different.
Words do have meaning (and leave aside, for a moment, the possibility that what you understand by a certain word is not quite what I understand by it, though often we might not know that). We use certain words because they have a certain meaning, and that makes communication, verbal and written, possible. But words have other attributes: they have a sound and they also have — well, it’s difficult to find just one word to describe it. All of the following carry elements of that somewhat elusive attribute: ‘import’, ‘overtones’ and ‘undertones’, and ‘echoes’.
For example, take the verb ‘to shrive’ or one of its various derivatives. I first came across it as a young boy reading Roger Lancelyn Green’s King Arthur And His Knights of The Round Table and I have rarely, if ever, heard it used since, though a familiar derivation is ‘Shrove Tuesday’, the day before Ash Wednesday when in less heathen times (or better, from my point of view, the heathenism was of Roman Catholic and later Anglo Catholic variety) when believers souls were ‘shriven’ to be pure for Lent.
Were I to use the words ‘shrive’ or ‘shriven’ in everyday conversation or writing here in this blog, it would convey information quite apart from the sound of the word (whether heard or read) and its meaning.
Some of that information would be about me: the word is old-fashioned, not to say archaic, so why am I using it? Do I believe that in the context in which I am using it that it is the only possible word that could be used? Am I by using it simply some pretentious git trying to persuade you (the listener or reader) that I am ‘deep’, ‘well-read’ or ‘intellectual’?
Some of that information would be ‘external’: why is ‘shrive’ being used when a more modern alternative might be available? With its archaic overtones, it might also subtly influence the sentence in which it appears in some way or another. There are many possibilities, all of consequence over and above the sound of the word and its meaning.
Apart from what using the word might convey about the speaker or writer, there are the ‘import’, ‘overtones’ and ‘undertones’, and ‘echoes’ the word itself has: and these are, in fact, harder to define, so perhaps I should offer two other examples to try to elucidate those vaguer ‘import’, ‘overtones’ and ‘undertones’, and ‘echoes’.
How about ‘fealty’ and ‘loyalty’? Fealty might itself sound archaic, but it is in more common use these days than ‘to shrive’ (and using it would not necessarily make you sound like a pretentious git) but more to the point using it instead of loyalty might convey subtleties because of the varied ‘import’, ‘overtones’ and ‘undertones’, and ‘echoes’ of both words. I suggest that ‘fealty’, in a sense, goes over and above plain ‘loyalty’.
His loyalty to the Conservative Party / Republicans was unquestionable
and
His fealty to the Conservative Party / Republicans was unquestionable.
Writing this, of course, I have no way of knowing whether or not those two words convey the same to you as to me (and thus whether my point stands or is pretty much nonsense).
I suggest that the shorter the piece — in verse form or a short piece of prose — the greater chance it has of holder a reader or listener’s interest — that is, engaging them. But as the piece gets longer, I suspect that the prospects that readers or listeners are happy to sit through a ‘performance’ decline very fast.
The sound of words — as in ‘the music’ they might create — would be very helpful in ‘engaging’ listeners. This is most probably why verse is so attractive (when it is attractive): it is the ‘musicality’ of the piece of verse which might carry it even though we have no idea what it ‘means’ or what the writer is hoping to express (and it’s ‘musicality’ might well be one of the elements he hopes will engage a reader or listener).
At this point I, who loves music of all kinds, must confess that I am forever unconvinced when some young Baltic or Persian or Scottish or Peruvian composer has a piece she or he has written performed and insists something along the lines of ‘it’s about the courtship by the ancient stone god of one of the water nymphs’ or ‘I’m examining the frugality of love and respect in a post-modern environment in which desire has become redundant’. Or some such (there’s a lot of it about).
Doesn’t do it for me. I’m firmly a man described by Sir Thomas Beecham who said ‘The English may not like music, but they absolutely love the noise it makes’. That’s me, except that I do like music, and I really don’t care who knows. I can listen to what I’ve been told classical orchestra players often refer to as ‘squeaky gate music’ for hours and hours: I just love the sound and — for me at least — it is totally without meaning. Oh, and until I looked up the exact wording of the Beecham quote, I thought it began ‘The English don’t understand music . . .’ which would have suited me and my argument better. But there you go, you can’t have everything.
I think because for all of us words are so closely wedded to meaning of some kind, ‘abstract writing’ or rather attempting to create it faces an additional hurdle. I mean would you really want to read or listen to 80,000 words of gobbledegook however nice they sounded?
Right, that’s me shriven. And here are two pieces of music along the lines of the above, the first by Stockhausen more abstract than the other, the second by Schoenberg and finally a piece by Anton Webern. I have no idea what any of these pieces ‘mean’(as some might argue — me, I don’t think the ‘mean’ anything), but I do know I enjoy listening to them and others like them a great deal.
The Schoenberg:
Apart from what using the word might convey about the speaker or writer, there are the ‘import’, ‘overtones’ and ‘undertones’, and ‘echoes’ the word itself has: and these are, in fact, harder to define, so perhaps I should offer two other examples to try to elucidate those vaguer ‘import’, ‘overtones’ and ‘undertones’, and ‘echoes’.
How about ‘fealty’ and ‘loyalty’? Fealty might itself sound archaic, but it is in more common use these days than ‘to shrive’ (and using it would not necessarily make you sound like a pretentious git) but more to the point using it instead of loyalty might convey subtleties because of the varied ‘import’, ‘overtones’ and ‘undertones’, and ‘echoes’ of both words. I suggest that ‘fealty’, in a sense, goes over and above plain ‘loyalty’.
Loyalty might imply that under most circumstances I would offer my support to whoever or whatever I am ‘loyal’ but might, as moral being, hold back from doing something illegal or immoral. With ‘fealty’ there might be no such scruples and I would be fully prepared to demonstrate my ‘fealty’ if needs be. That’s the background, and to 
put it in context, I suggest that the ‘import’, ‘overtones’ and ‘undertones’, and ‘echoes’ of both words help to convey more than they seem to in the following two, very similar, sentences:
put it in context, I suggest that the ‘import’, ‘overtones’ and ‘undertones’, and ‘echoes’ of both words help to convey more than they seem to in the following two, very similar, sentences:His loyalty to the Conservative Party / Republicans was unquestionable
and
His fealty to the Conservative Party / Republicans was unquestionable.
Writing this, of course, I have no way of knowing whether or not those two words convey the same to you as to me (and thus whether my point stands or is pretty much nonsense).
But whether you do or not, it boils down to this: the fact that I might chose to use ‘fealty’ where ‘loyalty’ would seem to work perfectly well, implies that I don’t think ‘loyalty’ would work perfectly well and that ‘fealty’ carries ‘import’, ‘overtones’ and ‘undertones’, and ‘echoes’ which convey better what I want to convey.
It is this facet or dimension of words, a facet or dimension over and above and apart from their ‘sound’ and ‘meaning’, which is another tool for writers (and one, I have to add, many writers don’t seem much to care for in that many seem simply to ignore it).
I feel ‘closer’ to music than the plastic arts, but I don’t believe ‘sound’ and ‘pigment’ (or whatever material an artist working in the plastic arts is using) has that facet or dimension. We often hear that a certain musical key or mode has a certain ‘quality’ (and artists might make similar claims about different colours, for example, that blue ‘is cold’), but I suggest that the ‘quality’ is not part of the essence of the sound we are hearing but simply our human perception of it.
It is this facet or dimension of words, a facet or dimension over and above and apart from their ‘sound’ and ‘meaning’, which is another tool for writers (and one, I have to add, many writers don’t seem much to care for in that many seem simply to ignore it).
I feel ‘closer’ to music than the plastic arts, but I don’t believe ‘sound’ and ‘pigment’ (or whatever material an artist working in the plastic arts is using) has that facet or dimension. We often hear that a certain musical key or mode has a certain ‘quality’ (and artists might make similar claims about different colours, for example, that blue ‘is cold’), but I suggest that the ‘quality’ is not part of the essence of the sound we are hearing but simply our human perception of it.
That is not the case with words, though I have to admit that the use of ‘import’, ‘overtones’ and ‘undertones’, and ‘echoes’ might fail if a listener or reader is not familiar with a word I am chosing to use specifically because of what I believe to be its ‘import’, ‘overtones’ and ‘undertones’, and ‘echoes’, Oh, well. You can’t win them all.
The above began as part of what I am at the moment writing about Hemingway and his alleged ‘modernism’, but I switched it to this blog as it is something I wanted to write anyway. It occurred to me some time ago when I was wondering, for the umpteenth time, whether ’abstract writing’ is possible.
. . .
We have ‘abstract music’ and ‘abstract art’ and, on the face of it ‘abstract writing’ should also be possible. I have to admit that of course it is possible, but — well, I think it less likely than not to succeed, in the sense of ‘being interesting’, ‘being engaging’ or by whatever yardstick you want to judge ‘success’.
Oh, and you might also object, and not without reason or cause, that ‘achieving success’ or ‘succeeding’ is not the an appropriate measure for ‘art’. As usual, it comes down — very boringly, it has to be said — to definitions: surely simply achieving what you want to achieve when you create ‘art’ can be regarded as ‘a success’? But that aside, just what might a piece of ‘abstract writing’ consist of?
I suggest that the shorter the piece — in verse form or a short piece of prose — the greater chance it has of holder a reader or listener’s interest — that is, engaging them. But as the piece gets longer, I suspect that the prospects that readers or listeners are happy to sit through a ‘performance’ decline very fast.
The sound of words — as in ‘the music’ they might create — would be very helpful in ‘engaging’ listeners. This is most probably why verse is so attractive (when it is attractive): it is the ‘musicality’ of the piece of verse which might carry it even though we have no idea what it ‘means’ or what the writer is hoping to express (and it’s ‘musicality’ might well be one of the elements he hopes will engage a reader or listener).
Equally helpful in ‘engaging’ listeners would be the ‘import’, ‘overtones’ and ‘undertones’, and ‘echoes’ of different words and their juxtaposition. I suppose in theory the ‘meanings’ of the words read or spoken might also be useful if their juxtaposition created some sort of pattern, though I’ll tell you now, I’m busking here, trying to give the idea of ‘abstract writing’ a sporting chance to exist.
And to be frank I can’t even persuade myself: I rather think readers and listeners would, despite themselves and their conscious expectations, be suckered into expecting eventually to have ‘an overall meaning’ to the piece revealed. But there is none — it’s abstract.
At this point I, who loves music of all kinds, must confess that I am forever unconvinced when some young Baltic or Persian or Scottish or Peruvian composer has a piece she or he has written performed and insists something along the lines of ‘it’s about the courtship by the ancient stone god of one of the water nymphs’ or ‘I’m examining the frugality of love and respect in a post-modern environment in which desire has become redundant’. Or some such (there’s a lot of it about).
Doesn’t do it for me. I’m firmly a man described by Sir Thomas Beecham who said ‘The English may not like music, but they absolutely love the noise it makes’. That’s me, except that I do like music, and I really don’t care who knows. I can listen to what I’ve been told classical orchestra players often refer to as ‘squeaky gate music’ for hours and hours: I just love the sound and — for me at least — it is totally without meaning. Oh, and until I looked up the exact wording of the Beecham quote, I thought it began ‘The English don’t understand music . . .’ which would have suited me and my argument better. But there you go, you can’t have everything.
I think because for all of us words are so closely wedded to meaning of some kind, ‘abstract writing’ or rather attempting to create it faces an additional hurdle. I mean would you really want to read or listen to 80,000 words of gobbledegook however nice they sounded?
Right, that’s me shriven. And here are two pieces of music along the lines of the above, the first by Stockhausen more abstract than the other, the second by Schoenberg and finally a piece by Anton Webern. I have no idea what any of these pieces ‘mean’(as some might argue — me, I don’t think the ‘mean’ anything), but I do know I enjoy listening to them and others like them a great deal.
NB I was told a great anecdote about Stockhausen which might be apocryphal or it might be true. He was once rehearsing an orchestra in a new piece and informed one player he did not want him (or her) to come in with his/her part until he/she felt she was in communion with the music of the the universe.
‘But, Herr Stockhausen,’ the player asked, ‘how will I know when I'm in communion with the music of the the universe?’
‘I shall tell you,’ said Stockhausen.
Here is a Stockhausen piece:
PS And just because I like this style of drawing
Monday, 1 March 2021
A few piccies
A few more piccies, taken on a dog walk today, then dicked around with in Photoshop. The idea is to produce (I hope) interesting and attractive ‘images’ rather than true-to-life photos.
Thursday, 11 February 2021
How do you get from ‘devil dogs’, the red tops and keeping in with Fleet Street news desks to EC president Ursula von der Leyen, her cock-ups, EU tardiness, Brexit and covid and the vaccines to a pointless, drunken spat I had with my sister? Er, I don’t know. So just read on. Once you’ve found out — if you find out — get in touch, ’cos I like to know myself
PS I had, as my next post, intended to post loads of semi-inarticulate images and pose the question ‘When is art art and when is it just a load of idiots quite possibly talking bollocks? A meditation’. Well, this latest post (which I bloody hope you’ll read, you ligging wasters) superseded it, so that will have to wait for another time. But you can view the images here.Doing my ‘Hemingway: Wanker or not? You decide’ blog, I discovered ‘pages’, which is now proving useful as you can see those images on a dedicated page. The post and whatever related words I can think up to go with them will eventually appear.
I haven’t pontificated about the EU here for a while, so the time has come to rectify that appalling state of affairs. Like everyone else (and that means you, too, none of us is special), I can only judge what’s going on by what I’m able to pick up from the media, and all too often the coverage isn’t at all comprehensive because newsdesks follow their own agenda and we don’t even get half of what is happening. On that last point, let me explain a little.
Several years ago, there was a spate of attacks by Rottweilers on their owners and often on their owners’ young children, some of which ended in death. The first time it happened, it was, of course, very sad news and was reported nationwide. So ever-alert news agencies around Britain kept an eye out for similar attacks.
these guys are pros (in both senses) and really do know what they are doing — that Joe Public had had enough of those particular tragedies and was keen for some new kind of tragedy. So en masse the papers moved on to a new, sexier story.
You can be very sure that the incidence of deadly ‘devil dog’ attacks before that first deadly attack hit the headlines was by no means lower and suddenly shot up. And you can be surer that after all those ‘devil dogs’ had suddenly decided to call it a day for the incidence of such attacks did not fall.
As I say, I can only write about what I read and hear (and, possibly, to which I might add my wise two ha’porth, though I shouldn’t bank on it); and as far as the EU is concerned, there are just two stories current. I’m sure there are more, but I’ve not heard much.
Those two stories are that the EU — apparently — has made a complete balls-up of trying to end the covid pandemic by getting everyone vaccinated. I say apparently, but it is far more likely not to have been the fault of ‘the EU, but of one Ursula von der Leyen and her style of leadership. And she’s a piece of bother, it seems.
As a minister in the German government, she was accused, though subsequently acquitted, of plagiarism in her doctoral thesis. Though she was cleared — an investigation concluded that although just over 40% of the thesis had been plagiarised, there had been ‘no intention to deceive’ (and I can’t quite get my head around that last bit — von der Leyen couldn’t have been that attentive while writing her thesis if she didn’t realise she was copying someone else’s work). It’s not a particularly useful to have noted on your CV that you were accused of plagiarism but go off — people talk and, more to the point, your enemies make sure it is not forgotten.
The highest post she reached in the German government was a pretty high one — she was appointed defence minister in 2013 — and by all accounts she didn’t shine, although we should always be aware of the malign influence and gossip spread by whatever are the opposite of ‘well-wishers’. Though again, you have to ask yourself why someone acquired a coven which did not like to see her flourish.
Equally less impressive is the fact that she only got the job last December of European Commission president because neither of the two favoured candidates could win enough support and von der Leyen was a ‘compromise candidate’. A rather unkind way of putting it that she was no one’s first choice (and there were whispers, probably from those who are the opposite of ‘well-wishers’ — I’ll look it up later — that many in the German government promoted her as the compromise candidate for the job because they were glad to see the back of her.)
It might well have been in keeping with her allegedly less than proficient stewardship of the German government’s defence ministry that when a mini crisis developed over the EU-wide acquisition of anti-coronavirus vaccine, it was von der Leyen who made a drama out of a crisis.
NI and the UK mainland. Well, there will if you are the EU and there won’t if you are the British government trying to keep the loyalists in NI happy.
It was your classic fudge, but an intricate part of the ‘Brexit trade deal’ which both the EU and the UK knew was a time bomb, but had nodded through because both sides were desperate for a deal and neither side could come up with anything the other side could sanction. All this took place under von der Leyen’s watch. I suspect she won’t see out her time and when she gets her watch it will be tin-plated.
Here’s another the $64,000 question: what can we — or anyone — do about the bloody customs checks (EU) and no customs checks (UK) fudge? That must be sorted out before various loyalist and nationalist gunmen/criminal smugglers in NI decided to sort it out the only way they know how.
Brexit is only 42 days old, but it does seem to be coming apart at the seams rather sooner than even I expected. OK, it is a done deal (and the ones responsible, the Rees-Moggs, the Farages, the Johnsons etc, will never be held to account, ever. They will retire to their stash, write their memoirs, take the ermine and command huge sums for waffling after dinners up and down the land; and it seems thoroughly pointless and a waste of time not to take stock of the situation and pragmatically investigate what can be made of a very bad job. The trouble is that when I say that to people — to Remainers — I am immediately regarded as some kind of traitor to the cause.
Along those lines, a few years ago, I had a long, animated and inebriated debate with my sister (born half-British/half-German like me, but now married to a German, living in Germany for the past 38 years and with dual nationality) about three months after the referendum. ‘The British should never have voted for Brexit’, she said — repeatedly.
‘But they have, and there’s now bugger all we can do about it,’ I answered, repeatedly. The ‘debate’ got nowhere (as we all got more drunk. You can find a fuller account of it here).
She accused me — wrongly — of being a closet Brexiter, I accused her of fighting yesterday’s battles. But fighting yesterday’s battles is still what too many are doing.
We are where we are. I suspect a toxic combination of covid and Brexit will do a great deal of damage to the UK and the next government — probably Labour — will have to deal with it. But in the meantime the world rolls on and other things happen.
For example, I believe the EU — quite apart from Brexit and the pandemic — is probably in for a rough ride. Its awful response to the pandemic has revealed that it is not the wondrous institution of its own estimation.
Quite apart from Brexit, there are forces in the EU — look no further than Hungary and the current political top dogs in Poland as well as their tacit allies (mainly former Soviet bloc states) who are more than happy to accept the goodies and the handouts, but are not in the slightest bit sold on the enlightened, liberal values the EU likes to think it represents and is keen to encourage.
Several years ago, there was a spate of attacks by Rottweilers on their owners and often on their owners’ young children, some of which ended in death. The first time it happened, it was, of course, very sad news and was reported nationwide. So ever-alert news agencies around Britain kept an eye out for similar attacks.
This was when the world was still in black and white and before the internet and email and ‘social media’ and all the rest and in those days, I believe, such news agencies would make a decent living. They scoured every last local paper, evenings and weeklies, scavenging it for any news they thought the nationals up in The Smoke thought would interest their readers.
Thus after that first attack, popping up pretty much every day for several weeks was a report of another attack by yet another ‘devil dog’ (as some astute Fleet Street sub-editor nicknamed the Rottweilers). In fact, thinking about it now, I don’t believe it was primarily Rottweilers who did most of the attacking, but some hybrid dog — a pit bull terrier? — bred specifically to be fierce, dangerous, ruthless, appeal to Nazi skinheads and look particularly menacing in a red-top photograph.
Over those few weeks, it seems, somehow, in the manner we saw in the film 101 Dalmatians, word had spread among the ‘dog community’ that it was time to attack, attack, attack, kill, kill, kill, and if you could get at a babe in arms being suckled by a young mother, so much the better. Then it all stopped.
It was as though the word out on the streets in dog land was ‘no more attacking, lads, no more killing’. Actually, what had happened was straightforward: after a couple of weeks of appalling, frightening, what is the world coming to, questions in Parliament, advice on Radio 2 ‘devil dog’ deaths, Fleet Street’s newsdesks decided — and
Thus after that first attack, popping up pretty much every day for several weeks was a report of another attack by yet another ‘devil dog’ (as some astute Fleet Street sub-editor nicknamed the Rottweilers). In fact, thinking about it now, I don’t believe it was primarily Rottweilers who did most of the attacking, but some hybrid dog — a pit bull terrier? — bred specifically to be fierce, dangerous, ruthless, appeal to Nazi skinheads and look particularly menacing in a red-top photograph.
Over those few weeks, it seems, somehow, in the manner we saw in the film 101 Dalmatians, word had spread among the ‘dog community’ that it was time to attack, attack, attack, kill, kill, kill, and if you could get at a babe in arms being suckled by a young mother, so much the better. Then it all stopped.
It was as though the word out on the streets in dog land was ‘no more attacking, lads, no more killing’. Actually, what had happened was straightforward: after a couple of weeks of appalling, frightening, what is the world coming to, questions in Parliament, advice on Radio 2 ‘devil dog’ deaths, Fleet Street’s newsdesks decided — and
You can be very sure that the incidence of deadly ‘devil dog’ attacks before that first deadly attack hit the headlines was by no means lower and suddenly shot up. And you can be surer that after all those ‘devil dogs’ had suddenly decided to call it a day for the incidence of such attacks did not fall.
It was just — well, newsdesks were no longer interested in ‘devil dog’ stories, so news agencies throughout the land no longer kept an eye out for them and didn’t bother trying to flog them. Thought you might like to know. So just because it’s not ‘in the papers/on the telly news’ doesn’t mean it’s not important or not happening. Might be an idea to get that clear.
. . .
Those two stories are that the EU — apparently — has made a complete balls-up of trying to end the covid pandemic by getting everyone vaccinated. I say apparently, but it is far more likely not to have been the fault of ‘the EU, but of one Ursula von der Leyen and her style of leadership. And she’s a piece of bother, it seems.
As a minister in the German government, she was accused, though subsequently acquitted, of plagiarism in her doctoral thesis. Though she was cleared — an investigation concluded that although just over 40% of the thesis had been plagiarised, there had been ‘no intention to deceive’ (and I can’t quite get my head around that last bit — von der Leyen couldn’t have been that attentive while writing her thesis if she didn’t realise she was copying someone else’s work). It’s not a particularly useful to have noted on your CV that you were accused of plagiarism but go off — people talk and, more to the point, your enemies make sure it is not forgotten.
The highest post she reached in the German government was a pretty high one — she was appointed defence minister in 2013 — and by all accounts she didn’t shine, although we should always be aware of the malign influence and gossip spread by whatever are the opposite of ‘well-wishers’. Though again, you have to ask yourself why someone acquired a coven which did not like to see her flourish.
Equally less impressive is the fact that she only got the job last December of European Commission president because neither of the two favoured candidates could win enough support and von der Leyen was a ‘compromise candidate’. A rather unkind way of putting it that she was no one’s first choice (and there were whispers, probably from those who are the opposite of ‘well-wishers’ — I’ll look it up later — that many in the German government promoted her as the compromise candidate for the job because they were glad to see the back of her.)
. . .
The EU had first-off all persuaded (probably for the best of reasons) that the vaccine acquisition and roll-out should be handled centrally. But it was very slow getting started and began to look very silly when those bastard Brexit British, unexpectedly it has to be said given their handling of the pandemic was otherwise less than spectacularly good, got a very good march on them. Then AstraZeneca which was producing one of the vaccines, announced that one of its factories Belgium producing was having problems and informed the EU that its order would be delayed.
What put von der Leyen’s nose out of joint was the same company was still able to produce and deliver to the Brits (who had, to be fair long got their order in). What did she do? She briefly sanctioned what can only be seen as a smash-and-grab raid on a deliveries of the vaccine as it crossed the border from the Republic of Ireland to Northern Ireland. This — it is important to note — was dead against the advice of her diplomats who are not dumb. She reversed ferret very soon, but by then the damage had been done.
This, though, led to highlighting the second piece of EU news which has come my way: the dog’s dinner that is the ‘protocol’ on how to handle trade between the EU and the UK when it passes through the island of Ireland.
This, though, led to highlighting the second piece of EU news which has come my way: the dog’s dinner that is the ‘protocol’ on how to handle trade between the EU and the UK when it passes through the island of Ireland.
And I have to be specific in that rather boring way because that protocol insists that Northern Ireland is, de facto, in the EU customs union and that there will be no border checks between the Republic and NI. Instead — and this is where it gets very, very silly — there will be some kind of ‘customs checks’ on goods being transported between
NI and the UK mainland. Well, there will if you are the EU and there won’t if you are the British government trying to keep the loyalists in NI happy.
It was your classic fudge, but an intricate part of the ‘Brexit trade deal’ which both the EU and the UK knew was a time bomb, but had nodded through because both sides were desperate for a deal and neither side could come up with anything the other side could sanction. All this took place under von der Leyen’s watch. I suspect she won’t see out her time and when she gets her watch it will be tin-plated.
. . .
Brexit is only 42 days old, but it does seem to be coming apart at the seams rather sooner than even I expected. OK, it is a done deal (and the ones responsible, the Rees-Moggs, the Farages, the Johnsons etc, will never be held to account, ever. They will retire to their stash, write their memoirs, take the ermine and command huge sums for waffling after dinners up and down the land; and it seems thoroughly pointless and a waste of time not to take stock of the situation and pragmatically investigate what can be made of a very bad job. The trouble is that when I say that to people — to Remainers — I am immediately regarded as some kind of traitor to the cause.
Along those lines, a few years ago, I had a long, animated and inebriated debate with my sister (born half-British/half-German like me, but now married to a German, living in Germany for the past 38 years and with dual nationality) about three months after the referendum. ‘The British should never have voted for Brexit’, she said — repeatedly.
‘But they have, and there’s now bugger all we can do about it,’ I answered, repeatedly. The ‘debate’ got nowhere (as we all got more drunk. You can find a fuller account of it here).
She accused me — wrongly — of being a closet Brexiter, I accused her of fighting yesterday’s battles. But fighting yesterday’s battles is still what too many are doing.
We are where we are. I suspect a toxic combination of covid and Brexit will do a great deal of damage to the UK and the next government — probably Labour — will have to deal with it. But in the meantime the world rolls on and other things happen.
For example, I believe the EU — quite apart from Brexit and the pandemic — is probably in for a rough ride. Its awful response to the pandemic has revealed that it is not the wondrous institution of its own estimation.
Quite apart from Brexit, there are forces in the EU — look no further than Hungary and the current political top dogs in Poland as well as their tacit allies (mainly former Soviet bloc states) who are more than happy to accept the goodies and the handouts, but are not in the slightest bit sold on the enlightened, liberal values the EU likes to think it represents and is keen to encourage.
On Hungary and its nasty little leader Orban and his systematic destruction of various liberties, not least Press freedom, the EU tried to at tough, then caved in. That caving in has weakened it considerably. And Orban can carry on strutting.
Over this past year, covid as rather spoiled the — well, illusion is the only word I can think of — of EU unity and solidarity. When push came to shove member states were less inclined to look to the centre than themselves. The finally agreed to allow the pandemic to be handle centrally, and then von der Leyen and I don’t know who else screwed it up. OK, she has apologised blah, blah, but that wont’ save her: her rivals will have long memories.
The EU is not von der Leyen, you might object. No, she isn’t. But such was the flawed unity of the EU that she — as I say a compromise candidate, as in no one’s first choice — got the nod.
In my book, Brexit (which, dear sister if you are reading this, I still regret) is to some extent also the fault of the EU. The way I see it British membership was not only in British interests but also in the EU’s. The UK performed a valuable role balancing Germany against France as well as giving a voice to a number of smaller members who were glad it could speak out on their behalf.
Over this past year, covid as rather spoiled the — well, illusion is the only word I can think of — of EU unity and solidarity. When push came to shove member states were less inclined to look to the centre than themselves. The finally agreed to allow the pandemic to be handle centrally, and then von der Leyen and I don’t know who else screwed it up. OK, she has apologised blah, blah, but that wont’ save her: her rivals will have long memories.
The EU is not von der Leyen, you might object. No, she isn’t. But such was the flawed unity of the EU that she — as I say a compromise candidate, as in no one’s first choice — got the nod.
In my book, Brexit (which, dear sister if you are reading this, I still regret) is to some extent also the fault of the EU. The way I see it British membership was not only in British interests but also in the EU’s. The UK performed a valuable role balancing Germany against France as well as giving a voice to a number of smaller members who were glad it could speak out on their behalf.
All that has now disappeared and in my view the EU will be the poorer for it. So I believe balancing a desirable outcome with its ‘principles’ (and let’s face it at the end of the day in politics principles are always negotiable) should have tried to be more accommodating to help Britain remain a member.
Yes, I’m familiar with all the arguments as to why the EU could not ‘bend the rules’, and I think they are all very poor and unconvincing. In realpolitik anything and everything is possible if there is the political will. SOME solution could and should have been found. But it wasn’t.
As for the post-Brexit future for the UK, I still insist, let’s wait and see how the land lies, if only because there is sod all we can do about it now and in the immediate future.
I’ve just posted some random images on a related page. One of them is this (below) and, looking at it, I was wondering whether I might just get away with claiming it is a lost version of The Turin Shroud. Answers please on a postcard and if you are a woman and I fancy you, I might even offer to buy you a drink.
Yes, I’m familiar with all the arguments as to why the EU could not ‘bend the rules’, and I think they are all very poor and unconvincing. In realpolitik anything and everything is possible if there is the political will. SOME solution could and should have been found. But it wasn’t.
As for the post-Brexit future for the UK, I still insist, let’s wait and see how the land lies, if only because there is sod all we can do about it now and in the immediate future.
. . .
Saturday, 30 January 2021
Lockdown or no, it’s time to take a — guilt-free — day off
For well over a year, I’ve been contributing to a website called Deadlines For Writers. I know I have mentioned it before, but as some reading this now might not have read my earlier entries about it (this one of them and this is another), so I’ll briefly recap.
I came across Deadlines For Writers when I was googling for websites or magazines who might carry short stories and to which I might submit some. Having said that, I must admit my ‘output’ till then had been anything but prolific, and the whole point about finding such websites and magazines was to help me, as they say, get my shit together, get my finger out, put a rocket my arse, get bloody working — in short to become less of a talker about writing, or, in my case, a ‘thinker about writing’, and get stuff down on paper. ‘Stuff’ might not be the word folk who are ‘passionate about literature’ care to hear, but it does the job.
In fact, I rarely, if ever, talk about writing and don’t find it interesting when, occasions, others do. We are all apt very soon to be talking a grand amount of nonsense. To illustrate that point, here’s a quote from the writer A.L. Kennedy I came across when I was writing an entry for my Hemingway project, in this case mentioning his ‘rules about writing’ and his rather silly ’theory of omission’.
Kennedy tells would-be writers:
Contrast this with the exceptionally airy advice to writers from Jonathan Franzen:
I came across Deadlines For Writers when I was googling for websites or magazines who might carry short stories and to which I might submit some. Having said that, I must admit my ‘output’ till then had been anything but prolific, and the whole point about finding such websites and magazines was to help me, as they say, get my shit together, get my finger out, put a rocket my arse, get bloody working — in short to become less of a talker about writing, or, in my case, a ‘thinker about writing’, and get stuff down on paper. ‘Stuff’ might not be the word folk who are ‘passionate about literature’ care to hear, but it does the job.
In fact, I rarely, if ever, talk about writing and don’t find it interesting when, occasions, others do. We are all apt very soon to be talking a grand amount of nonsense. To illustrate that point, here’s a quote from the writer A.L. Kennedy I came across when I was writing an entry for my Hemingway project, in this case mentioning his ‘rules about writing’ and his rather silly ’theory of omission’.
Kennedy tells would-be writers:
‘No amount of self-inflicted misery, altered states, black pullovers or being publicly obnoxious will ever add up to your being a writer. Writers write. On you go.’
Contrast this with the exceptionally airy advice to writers from Jonathan Franzen:
‘You have to love before you can be relentless’
and
‘Fiction that isn’t an author’s personal adventure into the frightening or the unknown isn’t worth writing for anything but money.
I don’t doubt Kennedy’s arty types who wear black pullovers and enjoy their self-inflicted misery would persuade themselves they know what Franzen means when he speaks ‘being relentless, and are only too eager to accept that their fiction is a ‘personal adventure into the frightening or the unknown’, but I don’t, though this easy-going liberal firmly believes in that in most matters it’s ‘each to his own’.
As for his snobbish dismissal of ‘writing for money’, I have to say only an successful author like Franzen who, I should imagine, is no longer obliged to write for money, could dismiss ‘money’ so easily. It’s notable how the notion that ‘money is unimportant’ is only adhered to by those who have it. Those on their uppers might sing a different song.
Yes, I’m sure (i.e. I’ve never sold a word of fiction and am now unlikely ever to do so, so I’m in no position to strike an attitude) ‘writing to make money’ is something of a fool’s ambition and that when you sit down to write, you might be better advised to have a loftier motivation.
As for his snobbish dismissal of ‘writing for money’, I have to say only an successful author like Franzen who, I should imagine, is no longer obliged to write for money, could dismiss ‘money’ so easily. It’s notable how the notion that ‘money is unimportant’ is only adhered to by those who have it. Those on their uppers might sing a different song.
Yes, I’m sure (i.e. I’ve never sold a word of fiction and am now unlikely ever to do so, so I’m in no position to strike an attitude) ‘writing to make money’ is something of a fool’s ambition and that when you sit down to write, you might be better advised to have a loftier motivation.
On the other hand, though, ‘writers’ and would-be writers are free to write what the hell they like: and if someone sits down to produce ‘chick-lit’ or sci-fi instead of ‘serious literature’ (whatever that is though, presumably, it’s what Franzen turns out), who is anyone to dismiss them or their work? I’ve never read a work of chick-lit in my life and the last sci-fi story I read was at least 50 years ago. But I don’t doubt in their fields (as in others) there is the good, the bad and the indifferent, and surely trying to do something well, whatever you are doing, is admirable enough?
My final point though, and this is one I would put to Mr Franzen were I ever to meet him is that for all the honours, awards and prizes you are given and however much you are assured you are ‘one of today’s leading writers’, the sincerest form of flattery by far is being paid. When folk part with their money, you know they are being more honest than when they assure you ‘what a marvellous chap you are, and such a good writer’.
But there, I’ve already blown myself off-course and it’s lucky this is nothing but yet another insignificant blog entry and nothing more.
I’ve found Deadlines For Writers to be invaluable: membership costs nothing (although you can get ‘an evaluation’ of the work you submit for if you opt for paid membership) and the routine is very simple. Every month the organiser (I think there’s only one) posts ‘a prompt’ for a short story (and there’s another for a piece of verse) and stipulates a word count. Then it is up to the member to write and submit a story (or piece of verse) every month. These are then posted on the website, and if you are lucky other members read them and comment on them. Sometimes those comments are useful (though bear in mind, judging by the kind of stories that are submitted, each member has different notions of ‘what works’ and what doesn’t. Sometimes the comments make it plain that, either you didn’t succeed in doing what you set out to do, or the commentator simply isn’t in tune with the kind of story you want to produce.
I should add that as far as I am concerned when evaluating a piece of fiction (or, for that matter, a piece of music or a work of plastic art) the most useless words are ‘good’ and ‘bad’. Quite apart from the fact that judgment is subjective, ‘good’ and ‘bad’ convey nothing. Far, far more useful are ‘interesting’, ‘boring’, ‘engaging’, ‘confusing’ and other such observations, and as far as I am concerned being told by someone (who judgment I respect) for example where I seem to have gone wrong or where the reader lost the thread or where something wasn’t convincing are far more useful than being patted on the back and schmoozed. Fuck schmoozing. I loathe schmoozing. Show me a schmoozer and I’ll show you dishonesty.
The upshot is that Deadlines For Writing has been for me a great, great motivator. OK because of the stipulated word counts, which have ranged from 2,500 words to just 500 words, my stories aren’t very long, but I’ve now written some. And what with the ‘essays’ I’ve been turning out for the Heminway project, I seem finally have got into the swing of ‘writing regularly’. And that, dear hearts, brings me to what was to be the point of this latest entry.
Over the years (and I’ve been writing this blog for eleven years now) I’ve joked about this an that, not least my age. That, really, was just a form of defence: in some ways I haven’t liked getting older and, crucially, being regarded by the world as ‘an older man’ at all. So making jokes about ‘being 95’ or ‘being 110’ was, I think, just a way of warding it all off, pretending I didn’t really care. But the fact is that I was born in 1949 and in the late autumn I shall turn 72.
That is another, though minor reason, why literary superstardom, a perpetual round of drinkies in North London with other literary hacks and profiles in the ‘serious newspaper’ are certainly never going to come my way. And, by the way, a few months ago, I read two novels which were highly lauded by the great and good who pass judgment, and I thought both were bollocks.
But there, I’ve already blown myself off-course and it’s lucky this is nothing but yet another insignificant blog entry and nothing more.
. . .
I’ve found Deadlines For Writers to be invaluable: membership costs nothing (although you can get ‘an evaluation’ of the work you submit for if you opt for paid membership) and the routine is very simple. Every month the organiser (I think there’s only one) posts ‘a prompt’ for a short story (and there’s another for a piece of verse) and stipulates a word count. Then it is up to the member to write and submit a story (or piece of verse) every month. These are then posted on the website, and if you are lucky other members read them and comment on them. Sometimes those comments are useful (though bear in mind, judging by the kind of stories that are submitted, each member has different notions of ‘what works’ and what doesn’t. Sometimes the comments make it plain that, either you didn’t succeed in doing what you set out to do, or the commentator simply isn’t in tune with the kind of story you want to produce.
I should add that as far as I am concerned when evaluating a piece of fiction (or, for that matter, a piece of music or a work of plastic art) the most useless words are ‘good’ and ‘bad’. Quite apart from the fact that judgment is subjective, ‘good’ and ‘bad’ convey nothing. Far, far more useful are ‘interesting’, ‘boring’, ‘engaging’, ‘confusing’ and other such observations, and as far as I am concerned being told by someone (who judgment I respect) for example where I seem to have gone wrong or where the reader lost the thread or where something wasn’t convincing are far more useful than being patted on the back and schmoozed. Fuck schmoozing. I loathe schmoozing. Show me a schmoozer and I’ll show you dishonesty.
The upshot is that Deadlines For Writing has been for me a great, great motivator. OK because of the stipulated word counts, which have ranged from 2,500 words to just 500 words, my stories aren’t very long, but I’ve now written some. And what with the ‘essays’ I’ve been turning out for the Heminway project, I seem finally have got into the swing of ‘writing regularly’. And that, dear hearts, brings me to what was to be the point of this latest entry.
. . .
Over the years (and I’ve been writing this blog for eleven years now) I’ve joked about this an that, not least my age. That, really, was just a form of defence: in some ways I haven’t liked getting older and, crucially, being regarded by the world as ‘an older man’ at all. So making jokes about ‘being 95’ or ‘being 110’ was, I think, just a way of warding it all off, pretending I didn’t really care. But the fact is that I was born in 1949 and in the late autumn I shall turn 72.
That is another, though minor reason, why literary superstardom, a perpetual round of drinkies in North London with other literary hacks and profiles in the ‘serious newspaper’ are certainly never going to come my way. And, by the way, a few months ago, I read two novels which were highly lauded by the great and good who pass judgment, and I thought both were bollocks.
One was The Sea by John Banville, and you read can my review here, and the other was Saturday by Ian McEwan, and my review is here. Both writers are getting on a little but still literary darlings of the Western World, laden with honours and regarded as all-around artistic good eggs. What does that say for my judgement? I don’t know, but I’ll repeat, both novels, for one reason or another, were in my view shite. I must remind you, though, chacun à son goût (and, yes, although I’ve long been familiar with the phrase, I did have to look up the spelling).
The point about giving my age is that I am now retired, but to this day still feel guilty if I ‘haven’t done some work’. That work is no longer sitting on the third floor of the Daily Mail office in West London and checking puzzles against hard copy, proof-reading pages and hunting down errant commas, but — well, writing of some kind.
Since I began the Hemingway bollocks in July 2019, writing more of that and slowly moving towards conclusion has been my ‘work’. And I have been getting far more disciplined about getting down to it (which was one of the essential points of undertaking the projects, though I still have some way to go). But, I’ll repeat, I somehow I fritter away the day and don’t do very much, I feel horribly guilty. That is odd, but true. There is no obligation at all do it, quite apart from finishing it: but I have to. No one will know whether I do succeed and, far more to the point, no one will give a flying fuck: but I shall know and care!
I’ve been thinking about this a lot and I’ve come up with a solution: officially to give myself two days off a week. So on those days I wake up and do what the hell I like — piss around with Cubase in my shed and record, surf the net aimlessly, watch shite on Amazon — it doesn’t matter: this will be my time off and I shall have nothing to feel guilty about. Anyway that’s the plan.
Pip, pip.
The point about giving my age is that I am now retired, but to this day still feel guilty if I ‘haven’t done some work’. That work is no longer sitting on the third floor of the Daily Mail office in West London and checking puzzles against hard copy, proof-reading pages and hunting down errant commas, but — well, writing of some kind.
Since I began the Hemingway bollocks in July 2019, writing more of that and slowly moving towards conclusion has been my ‘work’. And I have been getting far more disciplined about getting down to it (which was one of the essential points of undertaking the projects, though I still have some way to go). But, I’ll repeat, I somehow I fritter away the day and don’t do very much, I feel horribly guilty. That is odd, but true. There is no obligation at all do it, quite apart from finishing it: but I have to. No one will know whether I do succeed and, far more to the point, no one will give a flying fuck: but I shall know and care!
I’ve been thinking about this a lot and I’ve come up with a solution: officially to give myself two days off a week. So on those days I wake up and do what the hell I like — piss around with Cubase in my shed and record, surf the net aimlessly, watch shite on Amazon — it doesn’t matter: this will be my time off and I shall have nothing to feel guilty about. Anyway that’s the plan.
Pip, pip.
If you are interested, there are more ‘rules on writing here’. Some are sane, some most certainly not. My favourite is the very good, one-word, advice to writers from Neil Gaiman: ‘Write.’
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)