Radio Interview

Did a brief interview on  3WAY-FM Great Ocean Radio last Thursday morning with John MacInnes.  John was asking me about The Grease Monkey's Tale and the Port Fairy launch of the PaperBooks edition, which took place yesterday evening at Blarney Books & Art (photos coming soon).  It's always good to be able to plug a book and an event, and I thank John and 3WAY-FM for that.

Such news leaves me with the option to segue into Video Killed the Radio Star, almost any track from Radiohead or On the Radio from Regina Spektor. Although I'm a fan of both Radiohead and Regina Spektor, the lady won because I've always loved the poetry of the following lyrics.

This is how it works:

You're young until you're not,

You love until you don't,

You try until you can't,

You laugh until you cry,

You cry until you laugh,

And everyone must breathe

Until their dying breath.

Spot on!

Sylvia Plath

Don't often get to see a play, unfortunately, but caught a tremendous one at the weekend on the life of Sylvia Plath: The Girl Who Wanted To Be God, directed by Brenda Palmer.  A very sharp script (with even a touch of Gerard Manley Hopkins in there) and superbly acted, it presented three personas of Plath and how they were often in conflict with one another.  Sylvia Plath's husband (the late Poet Laureate Ted Hughes) didn't come across too well (unsupportive, egotistical, adulterous) and that may well have been a fair representation of how things were, but I remember thinking years ago - when Ted Hughes visited Kingston Poly, where I was studying Literature at the time - what a cheery scene breakfast must have been in the Plath/Hughes household.  There'd be Sylvia with more than a few problems of her own on one side of the table and a dour Ted on the other - just a crumpled box of Cornflakes between them.  Both stunning poets, but each, I imagine, engrossed in their own poetry.

Incidentally, hearing Ted Hughes recite his work marked the beginning of a conviction - which I haven't changed since - that poets should never read their own poems.  There he stood in his drab overcoat, just a few feet from the Student Union bar, with a pint of beer in one hand and a tatty piece of paper in the other, monotoning his poetry to death.  Mind, it was a cold night and the beer was bloody awful... and I'm still a fan of his writing.

By the by, The Girl Who Wanted To Be God was performed at Blarney Books & Art, which is hosting an event this Saturday to celebrate the UK launch of The Grease Monkey's Tale - bless 'em.

The Moyne Gazette profile

One of the local newspapers - The Moyne Gazette - interviewed me last week and ran a one-page profile on Thursday.  I've posted the piece over on the Reviews/Interviews page (see tabs above).  It's running ahead of a local launch for the PaperBooks edition of The Grease Monkey's Tale next weekend.

Was looking through the ImprovEverywhere site for that Grand Central piece a  couple of posts back and came across the No Pants Subway Ride clip.  Tremendous.  Apparently it happens every year: thousands of New Yorkers take off their daks at the same moment to ride the subway.  You've gotta love the looks of surprise on the faces of the other unsuspecting passengers.

ImprovEverywhere pull some wonderful stunts.  Take, for instance, the Star Wars Subway Car.  Here are both clips.  Check 'em out and then go do something silly.