Thursday 27 January 2011

on the shoulders of others

"For masterpieces are not single and solitary births; they are the outcome of many years of thinking in common, of thinking by the body of people , so that the experience of the mass is behind the single voice”  - this quote from Woolf is incorpoarated in  the essay I am currently writing on tradition and how the 20th Century authors viewed tradition. By the turn of the 20th Century there was minimal  literary heritage for women writers causing Woolf to champion the rise in feminist issues. But what I have been thinking about further to this discussion is the progression of literature built upon its own shoulders. Taking Jane Eyre and Rebecca, we see Du Maurier rewriting the storyline and the deeper intellectual prepectives of Jane Eyre, creating what is generally seen as a popular fiction novel, as opposed to the "high" fiction of Bronte's novel. Many intertexts have subsequently circled around Rebecca, such as Susan Mills " Mrs de Winter" and Beauman's " Rebecca's Tale" and of course the films, of which the most famous would be Hitchcocks in 1940. I have joined the Du Maurier society - it is free and keeps the members up to date with current events and news  - http://www.dumaurier.org/ . Within these two parallel texts above, the houses themselves become personalised and raise many symbolic issues - the influence of the Gothic; the element of class politics; the psychoanalytical aspect of the third floor being equated to the mind (Bertha) and the fire at the end of each novel symbolising death, either of the guilt that Maxim and the unnamed second Mrs de Winter carry, or Rochester's secret first wife and his hopes of happiness.  It can also symbolise the death of English society as it was then and in fact, in the discussions broadcast on Radio 4 in 2003, this point of view is substantiated. Most of the women interestingly enough start to admire Rebecca's fight and independence, regardless of her sexual infidelities and disregard for marriage. Perhaps this is indicative of how marriage is viewed now. Women got the vote and the patriarchal stronghold on society was gradually dissolved. But returning to the topic of tradition for a final comment. Woolf broke all the boundaries  of gender, genre and time constrictions in her writings; it begs the question of whether there are any more literary traditions left for those of us in the 21st Century to break or do we build on the shoulders of the writers gone before us and re create traditions for our own followers? This is our challenge.

Friday 21 January 2011

self analysis of cameo

I think it always helps to put a piece in context and I was surprisingly pleased with this short vignette on Virginia Woolf which concludes my obsession with her as I move onto other thoughts.
The fact that she had to choose not between life and death but between life and madness, finally  choosing death is crucial. Filling her pockets to weigh herself down she walked into the river Ouse and drowned herself. The reference to Shakespeare might seem contrived but in actual fact her works were influenced greatly by the playwright  - her famous fictional Judith Shakespeare in "A Room of One's Own" and the reference to seeing him in "Orlando". The line, "I fell in love" refers to the question of heterosexual love that Woolf felt particularly for Vita Sackville West and the fascination of the Bloomsbury group with sexuality, dual gender etc. The actual word bisexual was not in common use until 1960's but the subject matter was being widely discussed.
I have referred to her timeless voice, which transcends the years - another very important theme to Woolf in the period in which she was writing. The subject of Time was being philosphically discussed and she entered the debate with her analogy of the time of the mind and the time of the clock. "The Lighthouse "crosses 10 years in one space; "Mrs Dalloway" is set in one day; and "Orlando" spans 300 years so she was playing about with the concept. In "The Lighthouse " time passes while the characters sleep - hence my mention of  sleep and the fact that Woolf 's ideas have  subliminally changed my own perceptions even as I sleep. Questions were being asked in every area of the Arts and the Impressionists, such as Picasso, were a huge influence on Woolf. Hence the idea of splashes of colour, introducing my next train of thought which will be on fragmentation. It afforded Woolf the chance to equate literary aesthetics to art.
Finally, the aloe, native to New Zealand and referenced in Katherine Mansfields famous short story, only blooms once in a hundred years - almost the time span between the time of Woolf's prolific writings and today.

cameo for VW


stones in her pockets
river of life, river of death,
parted waters now closing
Ophelia – like

i fell in love a little
for a while,
her voice, a timeless whisper
disturbing my sleep

splashes of thoughts
coloured my thinking;
and the aloe bloomed once
between then and now.

Monday 17 January 2011

A room of one's own

I have just finished re  - reading Virginia Woolf "A Room of One's Own" the seminal work by  first wave feminist writer Virginia Woolf , looking at Women in Fiction. Based on a lecture given to female students at Gerton College, Cambridge , and later expanded into a 6 part philosophical novelette on the subject, it was like sitting listening to the lecture myself. I had read it years ago but realise that it is true that a book is meant to come to you at a particular stage in your life where you are receptive. This is true when I read "A Room of One's Own". The analogies that she uses such as the invention of Shakespeare's fictional sister to prove that a woman could not have written his plays at that time; the closed doors of the library; and the famous taxicab blending the two minds of female and male into an androgynous mind are illuminating. She does eventually reject androgyny in favour of feminism and her arguments are strong. You have to have walked down Whitehall in the skirts of a woman before you can understand what it is to think and be a woman. The clothing was restrictive which also brings me to thinking about the conventions of dress nowadays. On the catwalks today androgyny is always present but as Woolf discovered that does boost the idea of male  intellectual superiority over the female who was forced in the interwar years to cross dress or become a "mannish lesbian". A woman should always be a woman and Woolf broke many literary traditions to champion this .

Saturday 15 January 2011

Sketch One

It was one of those early spring days in March when the sun shines a palpable light of freshness over everything The Botanic gardens. I sat on my usual bench commanding a view over the city. There was a small patch of warmth on the arm of the bench under my hand.
An hour to myself. But what was an hour? The philosophers say that time passes as a stream of consciousness in between the spaces and that our lives are created by  moments crystallised in time. Is that right? Look at that small snowdrop over there For months now it has been growing under the soil, unknown , unseen by us, and then for one moment of glory we see it flourish and pass. Is that what we are like? Time passing while we sleep and breath and our lives simply  moments of blossom?

“What is it Tom?”  The small boy was hunkered over, his baggy cord trousers wrinkled above his red wellies and his blue dinosaur hoodie too big over his waistband. He was holding a stick and stayed motionless looking at the path. His mother came up, a slim pretty blond girl dressed simply in jeans and a beige belted raincoat. “What have you got? “ She bent over. The little boy prodded something with his stick and the worm wriggled and then was still, camouflaged against the stony path.
“It’s a wriggly worm, she said. “Shall we save it Tommy?”. She put her hand on his, and together they hooked the worm over the stick and carefully and slowly carried it over to the flower bed. “There we are, our good deed for the day. Come on then.” She held out her hand and the two of them moved on, the small boy running to keep up.

An elderly couple plodded past, he bent over slightly with a walking stick and she still light on her feet but slow.  A daily walk , in step with each other all of their lives. They were dressed in muted shades but their eyes were still quick. They knew the names of the trees and flowers and stopped occasionally to notice a new foliage or to comment on a birdsong . A lithe jogger pounded past, plugged into his music, oblivious of his surroundings. Just a daily exercise routine for him.


Snapshots shared with others, marked on the memory of another. Tom may not remember the wriggly worm incident but I will. As a reflector then do I define that moment in his life as real? I was still musing on this when I heard the clock strike. An hour had passed. I picked up my satchel and walked quickly towards the wrought iron gates of the gardens back to work.

a surrealist picture

I have to admit to becoming hooked on Virginia Woolf on whom I am writing my essay for honours OU. I have been reading several papers on her from the archives, about her contribution to feminism, her arguments about gender, sexuality and androdyny and of the relative "streams of time" which was the topic of much debate in the early 1900s. Russell's  idea of streams of consiousness became important to Woolf in Orando but up until then she had been experimenting, ala her rival Katherine Mansfield , with the idea of the "moment in time" being crystalised in short stories. This latter was the literary equivalent of Impressionism and I started to think about art and literature. I had a picture in my mind that was surrealistic so wrote it down in words - it is not a great formulaic piece but more an experiment of a different type of writing than my norm. Here it is;


float into your mind’s arena
where fish swim in the mist
and no boundaries exist.
curl round the figures of your thoughts
 follow their footprints in the air
in faith they lead straight and fair

here a voiceless woman sings
her notes freezing into glistening icicles;
here a thirsty child drowns
in the flowing tears of a unicorn;
here the golden bracelet round a wrist
brands a tattoo of unity
and the black and white shadows
melt into the sky’s muted canvass.
 here it is that truth dances
like dust caught in stained glass
rays of light
intangible reflections of reality

yet  here we stand with feet of clay
unable to escape the quicksand
and  make the silence sing.

Thursday 13 January 2011

A New Biography

Virginia Woolf exploded the genre of biography when she wrote Orlando published in 1928 changing man into woman and spanning 400 years of history in one character’s lifetime. Woolf  was an expert on the subject of biography and with Orlando, challenged her own father’s life work – ( Stephen Leslies the Dictionary of National Biography) She wrote a paper, the New Biography 1927 and now nearly 100 years later I heard of someone who is using another medium to record the lives of the women in her life, in quilt.
The two ideas  merged together in my head last night  and the outcome was this poem, written to commemorate Deb’s 21st century stitched visual biography


 A new biography 2011



unlike Woolf who changed man into woman
revolutionary writing on the pages of a book,
she will take thread and stitch their names
weaving into life’s quilted fabric
the bloodline of her family

her manuscript, a quilt; her pen , a needle
her words, stitches ; a
material memoir crafted for  today ‘s
preservation

 great grandmother to granddaughter
six generations, named in silk
flowing down the cover
umbilically linked by thread

within each panel,  a life
perhaps a quilted  vignette,
a representing symbol, a corner of
a delicate woven christening robe


her mother, herself, her sister
 and in the heartbeat of the central  womb
her two daughters, side by side
equally loved


i thought white vaguery
but she sees life’s vibrant colours
the hot red touches of Africa
city chic colours of European living
the English Rose of the older daughter
the geometric designs of the artistic younger
perhaps her own creator’s cool blue of serenity,

at the bottom  white panels of innocence
just names , symbols yet to be traced
unfinished stories still to be stitched.
the incompleteness of balancing generations.

Later , the artist  will sleep, cradled among mothers of mothers

Wednesday 12 January 2011

Jilted

I wrote this poem last year and this is what prompted the ironic title of my blog - "The Happy Poet" since my now 15 year old thinks it's too dark!

perhaps i can turn myself inside out
like a ragdoll ripped open at the seams
stuffing spilling out in white confetti clumps
over the red carpet.

perhaps my eyes will become still,
button eyes, wooden, unsighted
no longer watching out for a future
that will never happen

i will hold this doll in my arms
wrapped in a mocking hug
the strands of  coarse woollen hair woven through mine
one motionless body tacked to another

later he will find her
the torn, twisted body discarded on the floor
limbs disjointed,
a joker's grin slashed across her one eyed face

but he will never find me

The Hostess

small pink roses swarm over delicate china
blooming in painted clusters
spreading onto lips
as they lift the teacups to drink

sunshine shifts through  chintz curtains
catching the lace trims of  tablecloths;
inconsequential chatter murmurs at the edges
as the clock chimes a civilised hour

their eyes meet over the rims but
caught between the shortbread
and the scones, flavoured with etiquette,
their voices melt  into vapour

she lifts the teapot lid
and quietly stirs six words into
the hot aromatic liquid
 “I don’t love you any more”