Warning: Look away if you are of a sneering, supercilious disposition.
Journalist Miranda Sawyer was on 6 Music this week, being interviewed about her book. The little I caught, before I had to dash out into the stormy afternoon to do the school pick-up, was focused on how to feel good (when you are middle-aged!), without having to take drugs or get drunk. She mentioned Art, music and running; with a particular emphasis on Art. That’s timely, I thought, I’ve been thinking the same thing myself lately; how sometimes seeing a good play, film, exhibition or gig, can transform your state of mind. It can be an almost transcendental experience. At the risk of sounding pretentious, it reminded me of the Alexander Pope quote, carved in italics in the rafters at Richmond Theatre - ‘To wake the soul by tender strokes of art’.
So here are a few uplifting things that I have read/experienced/taken part in recently.
- PLAY: The Taming of the Shrew at Shakespeare’s Globe
It feels a little weird writing about this, given that a couple of people I went to the theatre with might read this and think - No, it wasn't like that at all - she is completely misrepresenting it. But our lives are screened through the prism of our own experiences/worldview, aren't they? I mean, what is reality?...
Anyway, I digress (as usual).
I went to the theatre (my first visit to the Globe) feeling a little apprehensive about having a 'standing' ticket. Could I stand it? Standing up for a couple of hours. Like being at a gig but without being able to dance.
I loved the play and this is what I discovered about having a standing ticket, a list of pros and cons:
PROS:
- You are close to the stage so it feels like a more immersive experience.
- It forces you to concentrate on the action a bit more as you are unable to slump.
- It is so cheap! Going to the theatre is a costly business, usually, so I love the fact that the standing tickets are £5 - cheaper than going to the cinema!
- You do (sort of) get the chance dance a bit; or at least do a bit of foot tapping. The production we saw had some stirring Irish music in it and the audience were encouraged to clap and cheer along - a certain amount of foot tapping went on, maybe some of the more confident members of the audience actually threw some shapes.
- The ‘lucky’ folk who are standing right at the front are involved in the actual performance. One man was ridden like a horse.
CONS:
- The ‘lucky’ folk who are standing right at the front are involved in the actual performance. One man was ridden like a horse.
- The hardest thing about standing for that length of time is having to stay still and not being able to really move. I did feel a little stiff at the end of it - legs felt a tad achy.
- Tall people should really do the decent thing and stand at the back - but they don’t, the big rotters.
All in all, though, a wonderful experience which ended with a dance from the whole cast (as do all Shakespeare plays at the Globe, I believe). This particular production has an Irish cast and has shifted the time scale to the 1916 Easter rising. The costumes and songs reflect this, although the dialogue is still Shakespeare’s own. I found the whole play electrifying and particularly appreciated emerging from the theatre to be greeted by the fairy lights in the wooden trees. Magical.
2) BOOK: Where’d you go, Bernadette? By Maria Semple
Like all the best forms of art, it is difficult to paraphrase this book or to explain quite why it is so good. I’ll give it a clumsy try:
Where’d you go, Bernadette? Deals with the disappearance of the Bernadette of the title; a once brilliant architect who won the MacArthur grant but never followed up on her first stellar successes and has been hiding out in Seattle ever since. It is a town she loathes and most of her energy seems to be devoted to disparaging its inhabitants and trying to avoid most human contact. Her fifteen year old daughter, Bee, is an exception to this and it is she who attempting to find out what happened to her mother. Bee is trying to retrace her mother’s steps by going through a raft of emails, letters and FBI reports, which have mysteriously been delivered to her. (The story is written in this form).
I think that I enjoyed this book so much because it is funny and smart and the voices are pitch perfect. It also has a (rather loose) theme of redemption.
One of the other great things about it is that, it would be all too easy and predictable for it to present the classic, problematic Mother-daughter relationship (as my own unsuccessful YA novel does!). But the mother-daughter relationship in this is touchingly close and (seemingly) based on mutual understanding. Bee and her mother are friends, the latter recounts an incident which demonstrated how much her mother was her champion. There is a heartening memory of the two of them sitting in the car, listening to and singing along with The Beatles, Abbey Road album (my own personal favourite). There are interesting facts about the Beatles and the Abbey Road album in particular. I love books which reference music, which brings me neatly onto my next choice.
3) MUSIC: Anything by Joanna Newsom
To my shame, I used to mock and deride Joanna Newsom, saying that she sounded like the squeaky, blonde, stringy-haired muppet from The Muppets.
Would that I had a modicum of her talent! True, her voice does take a bit of getting used to, can be a little challenging at first, but once you do become acclimatised to it, it can be quite transcendental; that and her wonderful harp playing. The lyrics to her songs are really interesting; they tell a story and are educational, I mean, no offence to the T-Swizzle but you wouldn't learn about the difference between a meteor and a meteorite from one of her songs, would you?
I went through a phase, a few months back, of listening to Joanna Newsom as I was getting ready for work in the morning. I would have it on on my laptop, playing the videos on YouTube. My older daughter, having dressed for school, would come and lie on the bed and watch the videos with me. It was a blissful moment of rare calm, before we rushed out into the world.
‘This music makes me relaxed.’ She said once, she is only five so I think that’s quite cute (and I’m sparing you from cuteness overload by not writing 'music' the way she actually pronounces it).
‘This music makes me boring.’ The younger, less appreciative one said. (Obviously meaning bored.)
But there is definitely something about listening to Joanna Newsom’s most recent album that makes you want to lie down and just appreciate it.
So, to sum up - music, books and all that - they are really amazing! I had been experiencing feelings of extreme moroseness, (psychic) paralysis and malaise. I couldn't write anything, hadn't the heart for it but I'm sure that it's no coincidence that a lifting of the spirits occurred at the same time as going to see a good play.
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