A Portal of Worlds

Beyond the heavy wooden doors, oaken floor-boards are greyed by age and the walls clad in dark green enamel tiles. Downstairs doors swoosh open like a Tube carriage to reveal locals sat at computer booths along the wall. But I am drawn to the magnificently curving staircase with its stone-flagged steps and wrought-iron balustrade, topped with brass railings worn smooth by a century's hands. It's as generously wide as the idea of the building itself and as I ascend, my boots send out a satisfying ring on stone. This echoing atrium reminds me of all those Victorian libraries, favourite haunts of my childhood, Hogwartian portals to multiple worlds.

 

 

Today I am visiting that rare beast, a public library that has survived numerous culls by the Philistine hordes of government. What tugged me back to explore Leicester's Central Library was a rather lovely event staged by librarians there last week, one of a series of Write-On readings which are celebrating local writing. On a rainy Monday evening they welcomed us in to hear readings from Dahlia Publishing's shortfiction anthology, 'Lost and Found'. I was hugely impressed by this series of events showcasing Leicester authors. It's hosted by the Library on a ZERO budget but with lashings of goodwill. A really good turn-out despite the deluge outside and they made us very welcome with tea & biccies at half-time too. They have more readings planned and it's a great initiative for booklovers and writers to be supporting. And now there's an excellent review by literary blogger Emma Lee. 

 

 

So a week later I am ascending to the realms of  Literature, History and Non-Fiction though I find Newspaper collections, Maps and Musical scores here too. This upper floor is wrapped in a warm hush. No 'SSH' signs - just the quiet of minds absorbed in discovery or work. I wander off for a browse and find an excellent section on Writing Craft, next door to a more comprehensive Poetry section than I've seen in any bookshop. They even have a copy of my first book Firebridge to Skyshore which is rather thrilling because in a way it all started here. In libraries where a shelf-lined maze of learning and legend devoured the hours like a Narnia adventure. Installed in a comfy chair, I spend a very happy, productive afternoon, thumbing through chapters and stitching characters for my latest fictional venture. Next week I've promised myself I'll root out my old library card and become a Borrower once more ...

 

 

Meantime my current bedtime reading is Neil Gaiman's 'Odd and the Frost-Giants', a perfectly-formed icicle of a book. The hardback features an original children's tale by Gaiman and gorgeous illustrations by Chris Riddell encrust its pages or open picture-windows framed by silvered carvings. Gaiman's language probes the narrative with all the delicacy of that icicle. His hero, a gawky 12 year old boy with a winning smile and broken leg, is named Odd for the 'tip of a blade'. His companions are grumpy Norse gods who've been magicked into a depressive bear, a conceited fox and a monosyllabic eagle. The frost-Giant has eyes 'the colour of lake ice just before it cracks and drops you into freezing water'. Its shaggy mane has the tortured forms of a frozen waterfall I remember from Iceland. His breath is frosty steam for a voice 'like the howl of winter wind'. Beyond this enchantment of place, Gaiman's tale delivers wit, peril, humour, ingenuity and just a smidgen of sadness. It's a book my younger library-immured self would also have adored.

Trainspotting's Return Trip

“Nostalgia, that’s why you’re here.You’re a tourist in your own youth.”

 

 

Aren't we all, Sick Boy? Personally I'm finding the tug of 80s songtracks and period movies irresistible. Recently it's been anything with David Bowie in, especially that 1983 Vamp Noir THE HUNGER with Bowie and Deneuve slinking around to the throbbing wail of Bauhaus' "Bela Lugosi is Dead". Today's matinee at the Phoenix Arts Centre was T2 TRAINSPOTTING, simultaneously a 90's throwback and a 'now' movie for our out-of-control Noughties.

 

 

Genius. So funny and raw and sad and sordid and soulful and crazy and swaggering too. The original T1 cast obviously relished getting their teeth into these mid-life stranded characters who launched their acting careers. Ewan McGregor and Johnny Lee Miller may be on a sabbatical from Hollywood but it's Ewan Bremner - wrestling his face and body into so many quirky grimaces - who's the pulsing heart of the thing, dodgy deathwish notwithstanding. The women are largely wry onlookers as the men lug around their backstories in a battered carry-all. Even an incandescent Begbie can't get it up these days.

 

 

 

I relished the flashbacks to the gory 'glory days' of Trainspotting 1 and even their 70s childhoods. Also loved the soundtrack stuttering into brief silence early on for a nod to David Bowie. And the rainy Edinburgh cityscapes oozing more with melancholy than menace. Then screenwriter John Hodge's 'Choose Life' rant in the middle is a glorious throat-clearing gob of invective. But still the film fizzes with a kind of joy too, from the sly humour to the gorgeous photography and punchy songs that keep on coming. Like Renton's bedroom bop to his old LPs in the final trippy shot, Danny Boyle has still got the moves.

 

I wondered if T2 would disappoint after the break-out originality of the first film. But Boyle proves the sequel was more than a cash-in on 90s nostalgia. Irvine Welsh, whose later novel 'Porno' was raided for the new script, believes they've actually surpassed the first film. And the photo above certainly does it justice. Just compare it to that cocky fuck-you 1996 poster. 'First there's an opportunity - then there's betrayal.' Are you ready? Here comes the crash.

Venus Unshelled

For a feast that feeds the eye and ear in equal measure, it's hard to beat the unique fusion of performance poetry and figurative painting in Lydia Towsey's show THE VENUS PAPERS and its companion Scott Bridgwood exhibition. For one night only we enjoyed a consummate storyteller and a ravishing smorgasbord in one building. Throw in the wine and cupcakes and it was practically Dionysian.

 

Credit: http://www.uffizi.org/artworks/the-birth-of-venus-by-sandro-botticelli/

 

At the exhibition preview, there was plenty of time to immerse ourselves in the intimate and sensuous world of Bridgwood's nude sequence. I can't remember such a compelling 'muse' narrative since I came across Andrew Wyeth's Helga paintings. My favourites here were probably the earthy brown 'boxed-in' series but I also loved the cool aqua blue in certain paintings. And how the figures morph from charcoal sketching to broad-wash strokes to knots of solid flesh that insist on their female presence. The exhibition is open till Sunday the 12th February at the Attenborough Arts Centre on Lancaster Road Leicester (or take a peek at Bridgewood's on-line gallery). Gorgeous work.

 

 

Credit: Ambrose Musiyiwa & http://www.renaissanceone.co.uk/events/ 

 

 

Credit: Ambrose Musiyiwa

 

Meanwhile over in the theatre Lydia Towsey was impish, seductive, sad, satirical on the turn of a verse-line in her VENUS PAPERS show. Her deft performance took in a range of characters but we were always rooting for her modern washed-up migrant Venus. I loved the props - an ingenious pink plastic sculpture strung with light-bulbs to serve as her Botticelli 'Birth of Venus' shell; a pop-up book with scenes from Renaiisance art to Tabloid headlines; and then there were was musical accompaniment, clever sound effects and slapstick murders from her two accomplices David Dhonau and Ola Szmidt. It was a magical hour, an odyssey through memory and contemporary urban landscapes with a woman wholly in command of her craft. The show came courtesy of Renaissance One but Towsey's accompanying poetry collection from innovative indie press Burning Books is also well worth seeking out.

 

 

It's a while since I've been up to the Attenborough Arts Centre for an event. Sitting in the Princess of Wales Hall always makes me nostalgic because one of my very first shows, 'Stories Drummed to Polar Skies' was staged here. It's a great venue with decent stage, intimate but properly theatrical, and ideal for a poetry performance event like Towsey's. I was delighted to also visit the new Gallery extension which provides much-needed exhibition space for visual art in Leicester. Bridgwood's canvases of his Venus muse had room to breathe here and performance and painting spoke to each other throughout the evening in teasing allusions. Delicious.