On the weekend, after going to see Chekov's "The Cherry Orchard", we dined in a rather good restaurant near the Old Vic called "Bar + Kitchen"; popular with pre-play diners and, like us, after-play diners. I had pan fried duck in a port sauce with French beans and potatoes Dauphinoise. It was delicious. I had been out of sorts all day and was, before the show, worried about how my stomache would greet food; it greeted it with a smile.
I had almost chosen the cod and chips meal which, I thought, might have been kinder to my unsettled stomache, but I have a sort of rule about eating out (which I rarely do) - I don't eat fish and chips in anywhere but fish and chip shops/restaurants.
I read today a short additional obituary/memory to Edward Downes in The Times in which the writer, friend and colleague of the conductor, told how, when visiting Leeds, Downes always ate fish and chips at a certain favourite chip shop.
I too have in memory a certain fish and chip shop which serves the best plaice and chips I have ever tasted. It is in Stratford-on-Avon in a street whose name, at this moment, I cannot rememeber (see further blogs for more accurate info.).
But a few months ago I discovered an almost equally good restaurant which serves fish and chips as well as, surprisingly, other meals; this one is on the front in Western-Super-Mare.
I am told that there is a great fish and chip restaurant in Muswell Hill which, since my daughter lives there, I shall soon visit. It has something most fish and chip joints do not have - a wine list.
An added attraction!
Tuesday, 28 July 2009
Monday, 27 July 2009
Chekov
I remember once some time back hearing that Chekov said to someone concerning a character in one of his, Chekov's, plays: "You must remember, he wears yellow shoes." I did not know what he meant then but now I have an inkling, having just come back from London's Old Vic Theatre and seeing "The Cherry Orchard".
At the beginning of the play Lophakin, the serf made good - or at least, made wealthy - is telling to a servant about himself and in so doing he mentions that he now wears yellow shoes. Why tell someone this? Because, I suppose, in his eyes it meant that he was now an important someone, not the serf he once was, but a person of distinction.
But, of course, he isn't. He has made a lot of money but that doesn't mean he has successfully transformed himself into a cultured gentleman or, which is more important to people of an upper class, into a member of the upper class. You can't do that by wearing what you think will be accepted, like yellow shoes - which would not be accepted. But Lophakin doesn't think this way.
Reminds me a little of Malvolio who wore yellow stocckings which were laughed at.
Stanislavsky apparently directed the play as if it were a tragedy whereas Chekov had regarded it as a comedy. There are tragic elements in it of course but they are not of the highest level in whih, say, a great person is brought down to ignominy. The wealthy family in "The Cherry Orchard" is brought down but it's not "the end of the world" for them. Comedy, to Chekov, I think, meant that the characters are living lives which do not reflect the way society is changing; they are stuck in the past. When a man like Lophakin comes along and attempts to shake them out of the coma-like state they are in, he becomes ridiculous but they become absurd. And there is a high comic element in this.
Chekov broke one of his rules in this play: he said that if there is a gun on the wall in Act 1 it must be fired before the end of the play. Well, there was a gun brandished in Act 1 but it was never fired.
At the beginning of the play Lophakin, the serf made good - or at least, made wealthy - is telling to a servant about himself and in so doing he mentions that he now wears yellow shoes. Why tell someone this? Because, I suppose, in his eyes it meant that he was now an important someone, not the serf he once was, but a person of distinction.
But, of course, he isn't. He has made a lot of money but that doesn't mean he has successfully transformed himself into a cultured gentleman or, which is more important to people of an upper class, into a member of the upper class. You can't do that by wearing what you think will be accepted, like yellow shoes - which would not be accepted. But Lophakin doesn't think this way.
Reminds me a little of Malvolio who wore yellow stocckings which were laughed at.
Stanislavsky apparently directed the play as if it were a tragedy whereas Chekov had regarded it as a comedy. There are tragic elements in it of course but they are not of the highest level in whih, say, a great person is brought down to ignominy. The wealthy family in "The Cherry Orchard" is brought down but it's not "the end of the world" for them. Comedy, to Chekov, I think, meant that the characters are living lives which do not reflect the way society is changing; they are stuck in the past. When a man like Lophakin comes along and attempts to shake them out of the coma-like state they are in, he becomes ridiculous but they become absurd. And there is a high comic element in this.
Chekov broke one of his rules in this play: he said that if there is a gun on the wall in Act 1 it must be fired before the end of the play. Well, there was a gun brandished in Act 1 but it was never fired.
Thursday, 23 July 2009
Hans Rott
I was waiting in my car for my wife to finish some shopping, turned on the radio and heard a piece of music that sounded at first like something from "Hansel and Gretel". No, I thought it's not by Englebert Humperdink (no, not that one who sings pop songs, the other one who was a friend of Wagner) but it does have a touch of Wagner there somewhere.... a bit of Strauss too (no, not that one who wrote waltzes, the one who wrote "Salome").... and maybe, yes, not just a bit of Mahler, it is Mahler. It must be Mahler. But though I am not a Mahlerian I have heard a lot of his music so it couldn't be Mahler, could it? or I'd have known it.
Well it was, according to the Radio times when I looked it up, a symphony by Hans Rott.
Who? Never heard of him.
Well, he was a contemporary of Mahler - actually a fellow student - and he was coached by Bruckner and he was expected to go far up the music establishment's ladder. But Brahms didn't like his symphony, composed when he was about 20, told him to give up composing and do something else, and the famous conductor Richter didn't want to conduct the symphony in case it failed maybe. To cut a long sad story short, Hans Rott went mad, was incarcerated in a lunatic asylum (not much fun now but then.... it doesn't bear thinking about) and died of tubercolosis at the age of 22.
I played the first movement from a recording on 'youtube' and it's a marvellous work. Maybe it's too Mahlerian for Rott to be taken seriously as "his own man", but in some ways it's better than Mahler. To me anyway.
It has only recently been performed at all, lost for years. Well done Radio 3. Most of his work is either lost or destroyed by his own hands because he didn't think it good enough.
There's a marvellous new book, "The Rest is Noise", by the New Yorker critic, Alex Ross, which covers the modern music scene from the early 20th century until now and I am surprised to find Rott is not mentioned in it.
Well it was, according to the Radio times when I looked it up, a symphony by Hans Rott.
Who? Never heard of him.
Well, he was a contemporary of Mahler - actually a fellow student - and he was coached by Bruckner and he was expected to go far up the music establishment's ladder. But Brahms didn't like his symphony, composed when he was about 20, told him to give up composing and do something else, and the famous conductor Richter didn't want to conduct the symphony in case it failed maybe. To cut a long sad story short, Hans Rott went mad, was incarcerated in a lunatic asylum (not much fun now but then.... it doesn't bear thinking about) and died of tubercolosis at the age of 22.
I played the first movement from a recording on 'youtube' and it's a marvellous work. Maybe it's too Mahlerian for Rott to be taken seriously as "his own man", but in some ways it's better than Mahler. To me anyway.
It has only recently been performed at all, lost for years. Well done Radio 3. Most of his work is either lost or destroyed by his own hands because he didn't think it good enough.
There's a marvellous new book, "The Rest is Noise", by the New Yorker critic, Alex Ross, which covers the modern music scene from the early 20th century until now and I am surprised to find Rott is not mentioned in it.
Monday, 20 July 2009
Autobiographies
Maybe that should be Oughtobiographies since some are lies. Frank McCourt, who has recently died, was accused of this sort of thing - making it up instead of telling the truth - with his most famous novel (or is it a biography? Haven't read it myself) "Angela's Ashes". He strongly defended himself against the accusation.
I wrote a novel called "Looking Back" - never published though my agent at the time said it "was close" - which told the story of 3 brothers living in the early 20th Century. Publishers to whom I sent it all wanted to know if it was true, that is, if it was my autobiography. I'd have had to have been about 80 for it to be autobiographical and I hadn't reached that age then. But I am sure that if I had untruthfully said that it was my story, someone would have published it. I'd have been famous then and possibly rich too.... and would have been found out as a fraud and unable to show my face in public.
The author of "Roots" was "found out" I believe. He said it was about his descendants but someone proved it wasn't. Then there's the New York journalist working for one of the big newspapers who was "found out": he was writing "I was there" stories but he wasn't there; he was sitting in his New York apartment writing fiction not fact.
Actually, my novel is probably closer to the truth than most of those who have been "found out" since the various stories in it were told me by my father who did live through that period. So perhaps I could have said to the publisher who was interested "well yes it is true..... but it didn't happen to me."
I wrote a novel called "Looking Back" - never published though my agent at the time said it "was close" - which told the story of 3 brothers living in the early 20th Century. Publishers to whom I sent it all wanted to know if it was true, that is, if it was my autobiography. I'd have had to have been about 80 for it to be autobiographical and I hadn't reached that age then. But I am sure that if I had untruthfully said that it was my story, someone would have published it. I'd have been famous then and possibly rich too.... and would have been found out as a fraud and unable to show my face in public.
The author of "Roots" was "found out" I believe. He said it was about his descendants but someone proved it wasn't. Then there's the New York journalist working for one of the big newspapers who was "found out": he was writing "I was there" stories but he wasn't there; he was sitting in his New York apartment writing fiction not fact.
Actually, my novel is probably closer to the truth than most of those who have been "found out" since the various stories in it were told me by my father who did live through that period. So perhaps I could have said to the publisher who was interested "well yes it is true..... but it didn't happen to me."
Sunday, 19 July 2009
Foreign Films
I have started to watch the new Tom Cruise film "Valkyrie" (will see the rest later tonight) and realise the story has been done before: a German film by Pabst. That was a very good film which I saw in the Cardiff Film Society many years ago. I don't think there is a Cardiff Film Society now, though there is a Cardiff University Film Society (showing "Brief Encounter" this week). Pity, because I saw many fine films there (and some stinkers too) that aren't being shown now. There is the odd one at Chapter Arts Centre (a few years ago they showed "Showboat" with Paul Robson and before that a film by Mizoguchi, a very slow moving affair that was, according to a lecturer there, his finest film - I don't think so but I can't remember the title of the one I like most).
Cardiff Film Society would have lecturers, amateur film enthusiasts mostly, who gave talks on such things as "The Criteria of Modern Cinema" - we'd sit, chin on hand listening. brows furrowed, as if we hearing some great philosophical idea that would transform our lives. But the films were very good. Films by Kurosawa and Mizoguchi, Pabst and Fritz Lang, Bunuel and Renoir, short comedies by Chaplin and Robert Benchley (some of his on youtube now).
I ordered "Valkyrie" through a firm called lovefilm.com. Must see if they have any of those old foreign films....... Mmmm! But would I enjoy them so much now? Are they that good? Sometimes it's better not to look back since one may be sadly disappointed.
Cardiff Film Society would have lecturers, amateur film enthusiasts mostly, who gave talks on such things as "The Criteria of Modern Cinema" - we'd sit, chin on hand listening. brows furrowed, as if we hearing some great philosophical idea that would transform our lives. But the films were very good. Films by Kurosawa and Mizoguchi, Pabst and Fritz Lang, Bunuel and Renoir, short comedies by Chaplin and Robert Benchley (some of his on youtube now).
I ordered "Valkyrie" through a firm called lovefilm.com. Must see if they have any of those old foreign films....... Mmmm! But would I enjoy them so much now? Are they that good? Sometimes it's better not to look back since one may be sadly disappointed.
Friday, 17 July 2009
William Styron
There is a story by William Styron in the recent edition of The New Yorker; a bit surprising this since Styron died in 2006 - does it take three years or more for the magazine to print what they have accepted?
The story is called "Rat Beach" and is more of a reminiscence than a piece of fiction; it's told in the first person and you feel that person is Styron. The action takes place on an island which the troops call Rat Beach, close to the Japanese mainland just before they are going to invade the country in a last attempt to defeat them. It gives a detailed picture of the life of a young lieutenant in the American marines and of the man's deep fear of the imminent assault.
The assault, of course, never took place; Truman dropped the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and then Nagasaki and the war was over. But the story doesn't get as far as that, it stays with the possible assault about to take place.
I wonder if Styron was giving an argument for the dropping of the bombs: at one stage a popular colonel tells his officers that the fighting will be fierce, that the Japs are not yet finished, that they will fight to the last man.... that "they'll have guns zeroed in to blow us apart. But we will have to go in and take that beachead even if it means that many of us won't be coming back." In short, that for victory the cost to American lives would be enormous.
This is, of course, a good reason for dropping the first bomb - unless one is of the opinion that the dropping of any atomic weapon on civilian communities is an act of barbarianism which is humanitarianly inexcusable - but it's no reason for dropping the second, surely.
But the story is not about the bomb, it's about fear, a deeply felt fear that consumes the young man to such an extent that he wonders if he will be able to act at all never mind couageously.
Tryon wrote later: "When I was a young platoon leader, there was this incredible sense of fate. The myth at that age is you're going to live for ever. Well, I never believed that and my friends didn't. I thought I was going to die."
The only book I read by William Styron was "The Long March", another army story of gruelling endeavour. That was published before his best seller "Sophie's Choice" which I think I will now read (and/or see the film with Meryl Streep, who won an Oscar I believe).
The story is called "Rat Beach" and is more of a reminiscence than a piece of fiction; it's told in the first person and you feel that person is Styron. The action takes place on an island which the troops call Rat Beach, close to the Japanese mainland just before they are going to invade the country in a last attempt to defeat them. It gives a detailed picture of the life of a young lieutenant in the American marines and of the man's deep fear of the imminent assault.
The assault, of course, never took place; Truman dropped the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and then Nagasaki and the war was over. But the story doesn't get as far as that, it stays with the possible assault about to take place.
I wonder if Styron was giving an argument for the dropping of the bombs: at one stage a popular colonel tells his officers that the fighting will be fierce, that the Japs are not yet finished, that they will fight to the last man.... that "they'll have guns zeroed in to blow us apart. But we will have to go in and take that beachead even if it means that many of us won't be coming back." In short, that for victory the cost to American lives would be enormous.
This is, of course, a good reason for dropping the first bomb - unless one is of the opinion that the dropping of any atomic weapon on civilian communities is an act of barbarianism which is humanitarianly inexcusable - but it's no reason for dropping the second, surely.
But the story is not about the bomb, it's about fear, a deeply felt fear that consumes the young man to such an extent that he wonders if he will be able to act at all never mind couageously.
Tryon wrote later: "When I was a young platoon leader, there was this incredible sense of fate. The myth at that age is you're going to live for ever. Well, I never believed that and my friends didn't. I thought I was going to die."
The only book I read by William Styron was "The Long March", another army story of gruelling endeavour. That was published before his best seller "Sophie's Choice" which I think I will now read (and/or see the film with Meryl Streep, who won an Oscar I believe).
Wednesday, 15 July 2009
Ivor Novello
There's a new statue in Cardiff of Ivor Novello. About time many people would say. Especially many people of a certain age, that age being over fifty or more likely, over sixty.
I wrote a short booklet about Ivor Novello some ten years ago - "A Portrait of Ivor Novello"; published it myself (which is easy) but could not distribute it easily (distribution is the big problem with publishing yourself and with paying someone to publish it - called Vanity Publishing; they do the job, don't do much distributing and you are left with remaindered copies). I sold about fifty copies over the years mostly to a bookseller in Eastbourne - no ides why he was more interested than anyone else.
Novello was born in Cardiff in a street opposite St David's Hospital; there is a small plaque on the wall next to the front door and that is all the official recognition he had until now.
When writing the booklet, I asked various young people if they knew who he was. Few did; most who had heard the name had heard it in connection with The Ivor Novello Awards. No one knew he was a popular film and stage actor or that he wrote successful plays and very successful musicals or that he wrote one of the most famous of all WW1 songs, "Keep the Home Fires Burning". But why should they know those things? The musicals are never done now - excerpts only and those rarely (e.g. "Friday Night is Music Night") - the plays are dead and never to be resurrected.
But it is good to see a quite magnificent bronze statue of the man, sitting in a chair in a casual way, on a column which has on its four sides some of the titles to his musicals and to some of his most famous songs. Good to see that at last Cardiff has recognised an immensely talented man who was once the toast of London society.
I wrote a short booklet about Ivor Novello some ten years ago - "A Portrait of Ivor Novello"; published it myself (which is easy) but could not distribute it easily (distribution is the big problem with publishing yourself and with paying someone to publish it - called Vanity Publishing; they do the job, don't do much distributing and you are left with remaindered copies). I sold about fifty copies over the years mostly to a bookseller in Eastbourne - no ides why he was more interested than anyone else.
Novello was born in Cardiff in a street opposite St David's Hospital; there is a small plaque on the wall next to the front door and that is all the official recognition he had until now.
When writing the booklet, I asked various young people if they knew who he was. Few did; most who had heard the name had heard it in connection with The Ivor Novello Awards. No one knew he was a popular film and stage actor or that he wrote successful plays and very successful musicals or that he wrote one of the most famous of all WW1 songs, "Keep the Home Fires Burning". But why should they know those things? The musicals are never done now - excerpts only and those rarely (e.g. "Friday Night is Music Night") - the plays are dead and never to be resurrected.
But it is good to see a quite magnificent bronze statue of the man, sitting in a chair in a casual way, on a column which has on its four sides some of the titles to his musicals and to some of his most famous songs. Good to see that at last Cardiff has recognised an immensely talented man who was once the toast of London society.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)