Happy International Women's Day! My Female Writing Inspirations

I like to think that I take my lead from a wide variety of incredible female influences. I have been lucky enough to spend the first part of my life constantly surrounded and supported by fellow women in all aspects - I grew up in a predominantly female household with 3, lets say, headstrong, women (and 1 pretty headstrong brother too), I went to an all female school (yes I still learnt how to interact with boys) and now I find myself working in an all female office. Of course I also have male influences in my life, I even live with one (gasp), but I do love a chance to celebrate all the lovely ladies I know, and wish I knew.

Being a literature lover (hadn't you heard?) I wanted to celebrate International Women's Day by looking to the women who inspire me creatively. So, to a soundtrack of the glorious Tracy Chapman, I settled down to think about the key female writers in my life. 

Aemelia Lanyer

Specialising in Early Modern Studies, you take as a given that you're really not going to come across many female writers, and very often that's the case. However, I'm pleased to inform you that in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries women actually did exist, and some of them could even write. Aemelia Lanyer remained an inspiration since I learned of her early on in my degree. She is recorded as the first woman to write, print and gain patronage for a substantial amount of poetry. This in itself is a feat worth celebrating, but I was also attracted to Lanyer for the topic of her poetry, and her personal background.

Lanyer's most famous volume, Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum, tells the story of Christ's Passion from an entirely female perspective. In short, Lanyer was one of the first women to stand up and say "shouldn't Adam take some blame for the whole apple scenario?" Patronage and literary success in this period came from high places, and as a middle class woman of no fortune, it's pretty impressive just how well Lanyer did for herself. Her connection with two women, Lady Ann and Margaret Clifford, inspired The Description of Cookeham, a poem that has always fascinated me for its description of an unapologetically all female environment akin to a Garden of Eden, allowing for productivity and creativity, without the anxiety of the male imposition. Lanyer's consistent use of religion, such a male-dominated topic in the period, to subvert and muddle gender roles, strike me with awe at every re-reading of her poetry.

Doris Lessing

On top of her long list of popular and influential works of fiction (and non-fiction), Lessing has a number of impressive accolades attributed to her name. In 2001 she was awarded the David Cohen Prize for a lifetime's achievement in British Literature, in 2008 she was ranked 5th in The Times' run down of the 50 greatest British writers since 1945, and of course in 2007 she was awarded the Nobel Award in Literature.

Since finishing the last page of The Golden Notebook, I have professed it as my favourite book, and am constantly torn between my desire to experience new writers and just hide away with a stack of Lessing's works. Her fiction has affected the reader and writer in me in many different and deep ways. Initially what drew me to The Golden Notebook was her exploration of women's mental health - I had never experienced such a frank expression of this, and the complexity of the issues directly translate themselves onto the complexity of the pages of the notebooks, both a topical and technical feat. What's more, the blurring between fiction and non-fiction is a constant fascination in Lessing's work. Undoubtedly, her writing on Africa, Communism, the post-war era, female friendship, all of these are based on her own experiences and relationships. However, the meticulous nature of the writing, the creative thinking behind each and every character, sentence, word, comma, proves that these are truly works of fiction. This ability to take on one's own experiences and translate them into a fictional tale, whilst reflecting on such current societal issues, is truly inspirational, and I think the aim of so many writers today.

Arundhati Roy

Another writer I have mentioned before on the blog, God of Small Things author Arundhati Roy opened my eyes to fiction about a culture other than my own that needn't be exoticised or sensationalised. I have Roy to thank for my love of books based across the world, that explore humankind in the context of cultures I have not personally experienced. 

However, Roy's personal and political actions are also inspirational, and her ability to write so eloquently about these is so important in translating messages to the general public. In my eyes, a writer who uses their platform and their creative talent to speak up about their beliefs is the best kind of writer. Despite garnering praise from household names in the Western world, and receiving numerous awards and titles for her work, Roy has remained unapologetic in her criticism of many government policies in India, the US and elsewhere. Raised in a world where Tweeting wasn't the go-to forum for complaining, Roy has always responded to political policies and movements through her writing, giving us a plethora of essays on so many subjects to learn from. Although Roy is often cited as a fictional author, and this is indeed where I first came across her, her archive of non-fiction works is actually far more extensive, and she is a shining example of a prominent female voice of activism, be it environmental, social or economical.

Sylvia Plath

I am currently reading Sylvia Plath's Unabridged Journals. It is very, very, very long. So long that I've become someone with a 'bus book' (is that just me and my mum?) - I've had to relegate Sylvia for only bedtime reading as she's just too huge to lug around everywhere.

However, only about 100 pages in, and I've already learned so much about a writer who I already felt pretty comfortable in my knowledge of. What I've realised since starting the journals, which being in her adolescent years, is that my view and knowledge of Plath was inextricably linked to her husband. I first learnt about the two as a pair, I studied poems that they wrote about each other, which they mimicked from one another, and my main point of reference for Plath was her creative but destructive marriage to Ted Hughes and eventual suicide. The journals are revealing to me a completely different side to Plath, and her use of journalling to practice her writing has alone spurred me on to pursue my own writing more. Plath's dedication to her own creative ability, her constant challenging of herself to write something worthwhile, or to write anything she observed, is at times breathtaking. Often in fictional diaries the writer describes everyday occurrences and people in such a fluent, indepth and thoughtful way that it seems unrealistic. Similarly, Plath's own deliberation, descriptive tone, and deep analysis of every single tiny aspect of her day and her stream of consciousness is constantly causing me to remind myself that this isn't a work of fiction, but the daily writings of an 18 year old student.

Reading the journals reminds me of Carol Ann Duffy's Before You Were Mine - Plath had no idea she was going to be a successful writer, suddenly catapulted into the world of creative British intellectuals. Reading the inner workings of the 18 year old Plath's mind gives a snapshot into the famous writer and writer's wife before she was any of those things. In this way, the journals prove that Plath was a writer long before her move to Cambridge, and inspire me to practice and challenge my own writing at any opportunity

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What actually struck me about writing this post, was how narrow my encounter with female writers has been thusfar. Having been a literature student, particularly at Sussex, I pride myself on the variety of literature I have studied and enjoyed. However, whether it's because women are still so often relegated to that age old 'Women and Literature' course you'll find on your syllabus, or because the hallmarks of any given genre are still generally men, I am making  a mid-year (?) resolution to educate myself on female writers, from every country, every culture, every background, every genre. Any suggestions welcome!

The Bone Clocks - David Mitchell

I've just finished the book I started last autumn. I knew David Mitchell (no not that David Mitchell) would be complex and at times challenging when I went into this book, not to mention the sheer size of it, but I hadn't anticipated it might take up a casual five months of my life. Meanwhile the To Read list was piling up and up...

Perhaps better known for the novel Cloud Atlas, which I haven't read, David Mitchell is an English novelist who I wasn't so familiar with. If you've read any of my previous posts you'll know I'm not the most clued up on modern literature, so this was a welcome change for me, and his references to other contemporary writers - such as in the character of Crispin Hershey - provided comic entertainment that I was just pleased to understand - for the most part.

Did I enjoy this book? The answer is probably as complex and labyrinthine as the book itself. Perhaps an appropriate adjective for a book that is indeed in some ways revolved around labyrinths. The labyrinth of time, of the brain, of the body, and of human connections and relationships.

It's no secret that we as a culture love connecting stories. You only have to look at the popularity of films like Love Actually or that brilliant classic, Valentine's Day (...) to understand how much people enjoy a tale of interweaving relationships, people meeting and parting, relationships beginning and ending, all somehow linked together in what becomes a quagmire of connections.

The Bone Clocks begins with Holly Sykes, a hormonal Gravesend teenager in the height of her rebellion against anything and everything. I didn't love the Holly voice, I found it stereotypical and slightly *cringe*. Unaware that the narrating voice was to change multiple times throughout the novel, this got us off on the wrong foot and owed to the lengthy reading time. It's only having read the entire book that I can look back with understanding and admiration at this first section I initially scathed, packed with innuendos and clues about what is to come in this hugely multifaceted story.  So I guess my advice is: persevere.

We go through Holly, Ed, Hugo, Marinus to name a few, and one of the beauties of this book is certainly the sheer time and distance it spans. From Kent in the 1980s to Australia in the 2020s, and deepest darkest Ireland in the 2050s, Mitchell shows off his incredible knack of painting a detailed and familiar picture of any time zone and landscape, transporting the reader across hundreds of years and thousands of miles in a matter of pages.

You may be thinking: what on earth is this book about? The truth is, it's hard to say. Starting off as a tale of a teenager running away from home, this book slowly and subtly turns into a fantasy thriller before transmuting into an apocalyptic tale of what we may see happen to the planet in our own future. Of course, the fantasy element was the plot that strung the whole thing together - in short, the war between souls with the ability to ingress into dying people's bodies, those who do it to bodies already dying and those who are bodysnatchers and murderers - but really I felt this plot was a tool for exploring the strength of human relationships and, ultimately, love.

I'm not a fantasy gal normally, but I will try anything (except coriander. Never coriander). I did find the fantasy element overly complex, though. Having read about the book since finishing I've seen that Mitchell is a fan of re-using his characters and elements of his old books in new ones, so I think there's something to be said for the fun in spotting those clues. I felt that Mitchell had created a world so immense and layered that he needed the page span of Lord of The Rings to explain it properly, but maybe if I had read his previous works I would have felt more in tune with this aspect of his writing and seen a development in the world he created.

There are two things I bang on about in almost every book review I write, and this book executed them both brilliantly. Firstly, the ability to write in an accessible and simple (not simplistic) way without sacrificing any literary value - probably why the book was called 'one of the best novels of 2014' by Stephen King. Second, the spanning of one person's entire life through one story. Ultimately, this book was for me about Holly's life on a small scale, and the state of our society and planet in the large scale, rather than your standard off the shelf fantasy thriller.

Read it now! Get it here

BIG SCREEN ADAPTATIONS - Yea or Nay?

 I do love a cinema trip. Recent events have shown me I'm much more easily pleased by films than I am books. Take my most recent book, Our Story, by the Kray twins and Fred Dineage. Pretty atrociously written, rather transparent in its motivations and intentions, and extremely repetitive. Throw Tom Hardy (x2) into the mix, a great soundtrack, and a tragic love story, and I was professing it as one of my favourite films of 2015. So much so, I raced home to order two books about the Krays in order to feed my newfound obsession. A word of advice: leave it at the film. But perhaps if the book had been brilliant, I would be quicker to attack the film, which got me thinking about the relationship between page and screen - does it matter which one we see/read first, and how does the opinion of one effect the other?

The visual nature of films certainly brings writing to life, as the cliche goes, but I often feel a simultaneous lacking in that films can never fully translate the language used on the page. Watching a film, we may physically hear and see more, but they often don't say nearly as much as their wordy inspiration. Moreover, the visual nature of films that can so give life to your favourite book, can also destroy all your own imaginings and creative ideas taken from that book in the first place - can you relate to the story so well when it's quite clearly Keira Knightley in the role of Elizabeth Bennett, and not yourself as so often imagined? The crucial relatability of books can often be snatched away, and even more often, totally ruined, by some Hollywood director's decisions.

When pondering this, I thought back to some of my favourite screen adaptations, and how much the film matched up to the book...

The Great Gatsby

CONFESSION TIME. I didn't love the book that's been heralded as the epitome of the roaring 20s and Fitzgerald's masterpiece. I don't know what it was - rushed reading, bad timing, something just didn't do it for me and I wasn't wowed. All the more surprising as I usually love books from that era (Edith Wharton is a particular favourite).

Thus, I wasn't as ecstatically excited as most about the film coming out in 2013. One thing I was looking forward to, however, was Baz Lurhman putting his touch on it. I count Romeo and Juliet and Moulin Rouge among my favourite films and couldn't wait to see the cinematic artistry and hear the unpredictable soundtrack that he would inevitably inflict on the story. I won't bore you with the details, I have no doubt most people have seen this, but safe to say I absolutely love this film and can still watch it over and over. The costumes are dazzling, the filming is innovative, and the soundtrack matching Lana Del Rae with Beyonce and Andre 3000 is still one of my favourite playlists. For me, it seems, this book most definitely did need to be brought to life, and Lurhman did it perfectly (Leonardo Di Caprio didn't hurt either).

Angus, Thongs, and Perfect Snogging

I made no promises about the calibre of films/books being mentioned here, so refuse to be ashamed of this choice, or the fact I watched it weekly between the ages of 14 and 20. This film is absolutely priceless, even if you're not a teenage girl on the hunt for her first pull (PULL!) and trying to fill out an angel bra (eg. my 19 year old male flatmate at uni loved it). 

Diary books are always a popular genre for this age, from Adrian Mole to Anne Frank, the diary genre is so relatable and captivating at such an impressionable age. My teenage diaries certainly go through phases of resembling the style of each of my favourite fictional diary-writer and I think they're great for inspiring youngsters to get the pen and paper out.

The worst thing about this film is that they never did a sequel. If you're familiar with Louise Rennison's series, you'll know there's just about 100 books in it so there was so much scope to keep these films going. Alas, the beauty of it seems to be its singularity, I guess overkill can ruin things. I feel the same way about this film as I do my own diaries: deliciously *cringey* (a direct quote from the film right there) but completely addictive and always ensuing hilarity when rediscovered.

Life of Pi

I won't spend too long on this one as I previously wrote about this wonder of a novel, mentioning the film briefly.

I'm not surprised it took a decade for this adaptation to follow Yann Martel's book. Rarely has a book captured my imagination in such a way, creating a film of its own within my mind and remaining so utterly readable through such saturation of imagery over dialogue. The film was a huge cinematic production, and you didn't need your 3D glasses on to see that. Wild animals, raging seas, and colours you couldn't dream up - I was on the edge of my seat the whole time, just as with the book.

Titus Andronicus

Shakespeare adaptations are one of the most popular inspirations for films these days, and I count many among my favourite. When I say my favourites I'm talking about the chick flick style Julia Stiles Amanda Bynes starring ones, obviously. Occasionally, I delve into more serious adaptations. Titus Andronicus, starring Antony Hopkins, is definitely an interesting place to start.

Shakespeare scholars are certainly split on this one, but I think it's such a brilliant introduction to the play, one that loses none of the trauma, linguistic art, or character creation, but that is accessible to the novice playreader/watcher. I have revisited and written about Titus Andronicus countless times, and the images conjured up by this production often help me visualise such violence and horror that the play encapsulates. 

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As I said at the beginning of this post, I'm much more easily pleased by films, and this is clear through my love of these four very different adaptations. It's worth pointing out, however, that none of these is a book I would call my absolute favourite. With those I'm much more wary. An adaptation of The Golden Notebook, The God of Small Things or even Lolita I would (and have) shied away from. Film adaptations definitely have their place, they can give colour and new light to a story and can also promote and inspire audiences to pick up the original book. But nothing can ever replace the art of language and personal narration that the novel evokes.

Summer Catch-up #2

The Quickening Maze - Adam Foulds

The Golden Notebook remains perhaps my all time favourite book for many reasons, and I've spoken to many people over the past year about mental health issues and how these are finally coming to the fore in news, politics and medical treatment. During one of these discussions, and having mentioned how much I love literature that explores these issues, a friend recommended The Quickening Maze. 

I devoured this in about 4 days on holiday. It's an easy and quick read, but no less hard hitting than it should be. Based in a  19th century asylum, the book explores the relationship between control, power, and treatment that dictated attitudes and responses to mental health. Greed and monetary ambition drives the owners of the asylum, resulting in horrific abuse and disrespect of the patients. The variation of voices and seamless flowing between people's experiences and the natural surroundings of the forest allow the decline of the patients' mental health to come through effectively and movingly. It's hard to know, by the end of the book, what's truth and what's in the characters' imagination, and the reader is left feeling the importance of understanding mental health in order to help people.

Essentially a historical book, Foulds still manages to enlighten opinions of mental health in today's society, conveying the ahistorical personality and behaviour behind the stereotypes of the Victorian asylum

My Brilliant Friend - Elena Ferrante

Two things have become obvious to me about my reading tastes since starting this blog: 1) I can't resist a good bildungsroman (coming of age novel) or biography, and 2) I love any kind of story set in a culture other than my own. My Brilliant Friend promised to be both these things, and was raved about here and across the pond - we've all seen the New Yorker review. Obviously, I eagerly put it on my birthday list. Just before I started it, I read a somewhat scathing review on The Guardian, but if the New York Review had called Ferrante 'one of the great novelists of our time' it must be worth reading, right?

I was firstly disappointed by the descriptive element, or lack thereof. Ferrante heavily emphasises the setting of Naples wherever she can, with its violence and poverty, but it comes across as rather...superficial. I didn't come away with a sense, or even an image, of the place in which the book is set - one of the main promises that drew me in. The central relationship between Lila and Elena is at times affecting and moving - we can all empathise and relate to complex friendships at any age, and their growth through adolescence, together and singly, was the highlight of the book. 

Being a trilogy, I was expecting to want to pick up the next instalment almost immediately. And I did...for about five minutes. Since finishing the book, I can barely remember the characters' names, and look back on it as rather 1 dimensional - a shame as with some more in-depth development I could have really loved this book.

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Other summer reading highlights include: What Maisie Knew by Henry James (intriguingly narrated and very challenging), The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark (subtle and full of inferences, populated with characters we can all relate to, as I've come to expect from Spark) and Not That Kind of Girl by Lena Dunham (hilarious).

Catch Up

I logged onto this blog this week and realised just how neglected it's been. I need to do just about 101 things to it to make it look and read how I'd like but we'll save that for another day when I'm feeling a little more techy (ie absolutely never).

I'm not under any illusions that anyone actually reads this except my immediate family (which still constitutes quite a large readership, the perks of being one of six), but having actually finished uni - for good this time - I just really miss writing. Afraid that this feeling would send me into a misguided sense of desire to do a PHD (GOD forbid) I decided the only thing for it is to start up the old blog again and see what happens.

Having OD'ed on theatre over the past year, but still feeling like a complete play going novice in comparison to some of my classmates, I'm taking a break from all things Shakespeare. I'm finally enjoying reading for leisure again and literally devoured numerous books over the summer. However, I'm well aware that 'numerous books' to me and 'numerous books' to an actual book blogger is wildly different. Fully fledged book bloggers get through about 10 or 12 books a month as far as I can tell, and that's just not how I roll. Trying to fit all that reading around working (yes I actually got a job) and all the other things I love like cooking, fitness and just general life feels too much like a chore. Also, Netflix.

So from now on this blog will be less strictly bookish themed and just bits of writing that pop up. I'm an adult now. I can do what I like.

At risk of sounding totally hypocritical and slightly psychopathic, I am now going to do a very bookish post of all my summer reads (yes I am changeable, no I'm not ashamed). NB. according to recent news, psychopaths are recognisable through their love of gin, black coffee and dark chocolate. No mention of red wine and Quorn scotch eggs though.

The Miniaturist - Jessie Burton

There was a period of time this year when you couldn't go into a bookshop without being bombarded with a display of Jessie Burton's debut novel. Having read the blurb numerous times and not quite grasping what the book would be about aside from potentially a creepy doll's house, I decided to take the plunge and read my first mainstream book in years.

Nella is a young woman married off to a rich older businessman in Amsterdam, forced away from her family home and into a solitary and gothic household. An interesting premise and a real page-turner. There are two strands to the story: Nella's distant and mysterious husband, and her seemingly prophetic doll's house. These come together slowly and methodically throughout the story, but the final chapters left me dissatisfied and confused. Burton leaves so many unanswered questions, opens so many boxes that just stay wide ajar for eternity. And there's nothing worse than unfinished business. Don't get me wrong, I like an open ended conclusion that leaves you to make your mind up, but this just felt a little unintentional. Like the story had snowballed and abruptly reached its word limit. 

An emotive plot line, but with occasional stilted language and loose ends that leave a lot to be desired, I struggled to understand the hype around this book.

Cat's Eye - Margaret Atwood

I purchased this for 50p on one of those unheard of afternoons where you have a free hour to explore the London streets, finding a second hand book stall set up in a quiet residential road, and absolutely go to town on their wares. Both my sister and mum are huge Atwood fans but I was yet to read anything by her.

Cat's Eye follows Elaine through a return to her hometown of Toronto, where she is overcome by memories of her traumatic childhood and development into an adult. As so many authors try to do, Atwood utilises a child's voice and manipulates it to create the oh so unreliable but revealing narrator. A rarity for so many books like this, Atwood manages to combine a childlike and naive point of view with the retrospective knowledge and insight of an adult looking back. The book is a brutal one; the tale of young girls, best friends, who can be so cruel to one another, and the longterm effects it has on someone's life and creative output. It is not sentimental, it is not wishy washy, but it touches on the mental impact of early experiences and relationships in a way that is so relevant in today's society, perhaps more so than ever. 

A beautiful and brilliant book that effected me deeply and has well and truly set me off on the Atwood path.

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I'm splitting the summer book haul into two posts because it would just be too long otherwise. After the overload of reviews I may do something unthinkable and share some of my creative writing. I'm sure you're all (hi Mum) dying to read it.

As You Like It at Shakespeare's Globe

'All the world's a stage' says Jacques in As You Like It, and for most of Monday evening I felt like my entire world was the stage - more precisely, the Globe's extended stage, which they utilised more than usual to depict the expansive Forest of Arden. 

The Globe's production was my first experience of seeing As You Like It live on stage, but my excitement was incensed by imaginings of what the mystical wilderness of Arden would look like. Incidentally, the stage was the barest I've seen it,  bar a few flags and some understated foliage on the columns, but what it lacked in décor it made up for in energy and hilarity.

We may as well get straight to the star of the show: Michelle Terry as Rosalind. She was the first true comedian I've seen on the Globe stage, her comic nature wasn't a deliberate part of this particular character so much as her natural comedic talent showing through. Nonetheless, it suited Rosalind perfectly, and made her an erratic, bordering on manic, character with none of the 'female hysteria' mockery added on. Director Blanche McIntyre may well take credit for this refreshing portrayal of a Shakespearean woman: although Rosalind is inherently allowed many 'feminist' traits through her disguise as Ganymede - something emphasised by the brilliant whipping off of her wedding dress to reveal the remaining breeches in the final scene - Celia (Ellie Piercy), the quintessential feminine figure in the play, is not pathetic and laughable either, but witty and charming. 

Although Terry really does dominate the second half in her guise as Ganymede, prancing from mood to mood one minute in ecstasy the next unforgiving rage, more minor characters such as Touchstone (Daniel Crosseley) and Audrey (Sophia Nomvete) manage to keep the pace up and the plotline refreshing. The choice to have the interval so early was an interesting one, making the second half a testing 1.5 hours. For those that don't know the story, there was the surprise of so many new characters and subplots in the second half, rather than merely focussing on the Rosalind/Orlando (Simon Harrison) story of the first half. I sensed McIntyre was aware of the unusual length of this half and the musical numbers (written by Johnny Flynn) really kept the energy up and the audience's excitement palpable.

On page, Jacques has always struck me as a confusing cross between melancholy and fool, and admittedly I wasn't looking forward to his lengthy role. However, James Garnon took it on expertly and understatedly. He was unpredictable, suddenly sarcastic, suddenly cutting, suddenly friendly, suddenly desolate - he brought substance to his much quoted speeches and fitted in perfectly to this brilliantly modern twist on original Shakespearean performance the Globe does so well. Blanche McIntyre is fast becoming my most anticipated director of seasons to come.

NB if you need just ONE reason to go to see this, make it Orlando's appropriately lengthy shirtless wrestling scene. If anything's worth standing up for 3 hours, it's that.

Watch it now! Book tickets here

Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown

Making my way to the Playhouse theatre on the river bank, I prepared myself for a troubling and emotional afternoon. My judgement was based purely on: a) the title (see above), b) the fact the production is  modelled on Spanish director Pedro Almodovar's film Mujeres al borde de un ataque de nervios known for its black comedy, and c) the minimal number of Spanish films I have seen, which are brilliant, but hardly uplifting. Retrospectively, perhaps I should have based it on comic actress Tamsin Grieg's role as protagonist, Pepa, the colourful and stylish poster plastered in every tube station, and the fact that it was my sister who recommended we get tickets (she's not one for serious, sit-in-the-dark-and-shut-up theatre).

We had seats in the circle, but were instantly upgraded to stalls, the fourth row from the stage! Still unsure as to the reasons for this thanks to the mystique of theatre (a box office assistant telling us it was down to unsold seats and his manager promptly scolding him for over-sharing), we eagerly took our VIP seats and admired the stage, modern and full of pops of colour. And the performance followed suit. The opening scene was a chaotic dream sequence of characters running on and off stage to a backdrop of Spanish guitar and singing from the highly talented Ricardo Afonso who played the taxi driver - a guardian angel with a comical (and musical) twist. This fast-paced and fluidly blocked scene set the tone for the rest of the performance - characters whizzed across the stage, twirled and fluttered from entrance to exit, bursting into song at every opportunity, whilst the scenery seamlessly transformed behind them.

I'm not usually one to notice costuming in a modern-era play, but the gorgeous styling of this production was hard to miss, and reflected the bright and upbeat nature of the story, even in its lowest moments. It also helped to drive home the point: these were fashionable, powerful women, all seamlessly coiffured and made up on the outside, but falling apart on the inside. 

In a two hour production, it can be hard to create lasting and believable relationships, but Grieg's affectionate and gentle way of performing gave her relationship with best friend Candela (Anna Skellern) a truly touching and genuine portrayal. Pepa, and indeed all the characters, are loveable because they're real. They have unlikeable and annoying traits, and they make mistakes, they're not all independent women who can cope without men all of the time, but at least they're trying. And hey, the men definitely can't cope without them either. This realism is of course due in part to the original film plot, but the acting really allowed it to shine through - the combination of slick physical movement and natural  speech created an atmosphere in which we could enjoy an entertaining and exciting piece of theatre whilst genuinely relating to and believing the characters.

Grieg was visibly emotional by the end of the performance. I'm not sure whether this happens to her at every show, whether it was exhaustion, or pride. But for me, the emotional aspect was the lasting message that, no matter what catastrophic thing may happen (and in this play all the catastrophic things happened), the sisterhood of women and female friendship is strong enough to get through just about anything. Totally empowering, and the perfect play to see with the three best ladies in my life.

See it now! Get tickets here

The Changeling at The Sam Wanamaker Playhouse

The Changeling is....I find myself struggling to finish this sentence. Anyone who's ever read or seen the play will be feeling my pain. It's humorous yet darkly intricate at best and random and fragmented at worst. Those of us who find ourselves reading more and more obscure Jacobean plays as the weeks go by (no? Just me?) will be well aware of the questionable sub-plots that crop up from time to time. The Changeling, however, takes this to another level. As what can only be assumed is a comical relief from Beatrice-Joanna and DeFlores' spree of murder, manipulation, and rape is a random spattering of scenes in a psychiatric hospital, concerning various patients, the Dr, and his wife. 

Sounds pretty far-fetched, right? And potentially very tricky for a modern day theatre to produce. The recently born Sam Wanamaker Playhouse took on the challenge, and who better? The only theatre in the country which has attempted to mimic the seventeenth century Blackfriars indoor playhouse - complete with candles, claustrophobia, and uncomfortable seating. It is an unbeatably fascinating experience, never have I been so close to the actors, so utterly focussed on the action onstage, so aware of my fellow audience members.

In terms of the performance, if I had been in any other theatre I probably would have zoned out on more than one occasion. I was lucky enough to nab a seat in the Musicians' Gallery, behind/above the stage. I say lucky in terms of being so near the live, authentically dressed musicians, the site of a psychiatric patient invasion in the second half, and being able to see both sides of the stage pretty equally. It was perhaps unlucky in particular for this performance, as manyof the hospital scenes were based upstage, in particular actually within the walls and doors connecting to backstage. As such, no matter how much we clambered over the bannister and craned our necks downwards, we couldn't see any of the comical elements of these scenes, rendering this subplot pretty much redundant. However, I'm willing to relent that this was only a problem for the eight of us in these seats. By all accounts - and by this I mean all the whooping and guffawing going on from the rest of the audience - these scenes were real comic highlights of the whole production.

To the main plot: I found Beatrice-Joanna too breathy and monotonous, and DeFlores too comical. This may sound harsh, but by the end I actually thought, maybe this is the best way to portray the characters. Maybe I've always taken the play too seriously, and maybe that's the problem. After all, Beatrice-Joanna is changeable, unlikeable and unsympathetic. DeFlores is creepy, disloyal, and only seems to open up to the audience. No matter how much I wanted to take these characters seriously, the way they were portrayed merely emphasised the ridiculous nature of the play and the fickle motivations of all the characters. What I initially felt was negative has apparently transmuted into a positive since my initial trip to the theatre.

Prior to the performance, I was lucky enough to attend Middleton expert Gary Taylor's lecture on the interior nature of the play. I realised, The Changeling is the perfect play for the enclosed and dark atmosphere of the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse. I'm not sure I would ever have raving reviews of a production of The Changeling, but thanks to the unexpected portrayal of characters and oppressive environment, it was one of the most exciting and authentic theatre experiences I've ever had.

SWP still have some great productions coming up before the end of the season, have a browse and buy tickets here. Whatever you do, make sure you pay attention to the candles, the productions use them in innovative and unique ways and scenes often revolve around them, something you're really not going to experience anywhere else.

Merchant of Venice at the Almeida

In the past six months I've being reading more and watching more plays than ever before, and yet the blog has all but died. Ironic? I honestly couldn't tell you - the concept of irony baffles me. But I do know it's not great blogger form, and now I have a humongous backlog of great books and performances that I'm dying to write about. Besides, the fact that I have three essays looming over me in the next month is a great motivation to get back to the blog. 

First up, The Merchant of Venice at the Almeida theatre. Artistic director Rupert Goold has set Shakespeare's dark comedy of prejudice and property in the glistering, superficial world of Las Vegas, complete with Antonio the melancholic gambler (Scott Handy), Launcelot the Elvis impersonator (Jamie Beamish), and Portia (Susannah Fielding) the Southern blonde bombshell princess. Now, I am well aware of the fervently anti-modern-Shakespeare-adaptation faction out there, even more so since beginning my MA and feeling like the least serious, phoniest Shakespeare scholar out there. What can I say? I love a good change of scenery in a Shakespeare play, it keeps it fresh for people less academically minded and often offers a new perspective on an over-exhausted debate. That being said, adaptations always need to be done well -  I've found they work best when they don't need too much complex explanation and emphasise the fun element of pitching a seventeenth century script in a totally alien element. Programmes are great ways of engaging the audience and allowing the director to explain their thought processes, but at about £4 or more a pop not everyone is going to invest - an adaptation needs to be self-explanatory, but leave room for the audience to think once the show is over.

For me, Merchant at the Almeida did exactly this. There have been hugely mixed reviews of it, a lot negative, and I faced quite a negative reaction when admitting my positive thoughts about it to fellow students. The general consensus is that the bright lights and exaggerated Americanisation clouded the all-important plot. Fair enough, at times I was mesmerised more by Portia's bouncing golden ringlets than her lamentations over her imprisonment in Belmont, and Elvis' hip thrusting warbling might not have been exactly what Shakespeare was going for. But the production did have some stand out points that really made me think. Firstly, the portrayal of foreignness and prejudice in such a modern setting was troubling and unavoidable. I spoke with my mum for a long time after this about the way  the play outlined stereotyped racism - even though we may no longer racially mock the Spanish, or the Moroccans, racial and religious stereotyping is certainly not dead, and the audience was starkly reminded of this throughout the performance.

The final scene was another triumph for this production. Bearing in mind I saw this way back in January, this scene is still vivid in my mind, which is always a true testament to any performance. What has always struck me about Merchant is the apparent unhappiness of all the couples at the end, no one seems very invested in each other - everyone's got what/who they want but suddenly it's totally unfulfilling. At the Almeida this translated into a closing sequence of Portia teetering on a high heel, performing something between a ballet sequence and a slow motion breakdown. Making it all the more haunting, the characters she circled - Bassanio and Antonio, Lorenzo and Jessica, Gratiano and Nerissa - alternated between staring blankly outside the stage space and awkwardly at one another. Following a comedic and extravagant two hours and a half, I was left with an empty and uncomfortable taste in my mouth. This is exactly how I feel every time I re-read the playtext, after the triumphant celebration of the trial scene, the spats between the couples over Portia and Nerissa's rings leaves a gaping awkwardness that the play apparently runs out of time to fill or resolve. This production ended on the perfect note of questionable happiness and uncertain love matches and friendships.

These aren't my highlights as such, they were really the two things that struck me about the performance. The one thing that did jar for me was the transformation of the casket plot into a game show - I understand the sentiment but ultimately it confused the plot and made it more complicated than it needed to be. Aside from what I've mentioned, and the individual performances - none of which I can majorly fault - the performance was more or less a bit of fun. But there's nothing wrong with that, and going for fun rather than super serious in terms of updating an early modern play is often the most successful way of doing it. Even those of us who are seriously the seriouest of the serious Shakespeare scholars need a bit of fun once in a while.

Two Gents Productions - Taming of the Shrew

It’s been a while since I’ve seen a show and actually wanted to rush home and write the review immediately – hence a recent lack of posts. But tonight things changed. I almost didn’t get my bum off the sofa and make it to the White Bear pub/theatre to see the Two Gents play Taming of the Shrew. Boy, I’m glad I did.

The Two Gents (for tonight) were literally made up of two actors, one is, in fact, a gent, and one is a woman – Isaac and Dilek. These two are backed by what they describe as a ‘cross cultural touring company’ – you could see from the audience alone the tight bonds within this small group, I recognised a number of the spectators from the backstage pictures on their website.

So how do you perform a play with a 21 strong character list with just two cast members? To find out the answer, you really need to see the Two Gents performing for yourself, but I’ll try to give a bit of a taster. Isaac and Dilek entered the small performance room in plain clothes, bucket in hand, and laid out housekeeping rules and information about the performance to come to the sound of Isaac’s drumming beat on the bucket. This immediately introduced a sense of total ease and comfort – if a line was forgotten or a wrong character trait was used it was laughed off rather than awkwardly covered up, a much more comfortable informal theatre experience in my book.

We were told each character would have their own characteristic to differentiate and make quick transitions clearer – I was dubious about how easy this was going to be to follow. Well, this may sound impossible, but each character was well developed and recognisable. This was potentially down to the camaraderie that both actors kept up with the audience. Taming has a lot of scenes with a lot of characters in them, this was tackled uniquely by targeting specific audience members to fill in the physical absence of more actors – and, with a little bit of imagination on our part, it worked every time.

A word on the Kate and Petruchio storyline. This was particularly important to me as I have recently been reading a lot of feminist criticism on domestic violence in the play. Critics such as Emily Detner have suggested that the play should be taken seriously in today’s society as it dramatically undermines mental manipulation and domestic abuse that effects so many women. I was therefore unsure about seeing the play performed so comically as this production was clearly going to be. Maybe my expectations of the actors were too low, but I was surprised with how well they dealt with it. Dilek played Petruchio and Isaac played Katherina. At first Kate was a butch, aggressive…..shrew? but her (or his should I say?) development into a silent, solemn-faced coward-in-the-corner was truly realistic. Petruchio’s superficial offer of food before refusing to allow a starving Kate to eat without thanking him was a seriously chilling moment in the midst of  all the comedy.

From the flawless switching of characters between each other, to the imagination of props and setting, the chemistry between Isaac and Dilek was perfection. Their relationship drew the audience into a very interactive theatre experience. Admittedly, they nearly lost me at the end with the final speeches, but everyone was fully brought back to life with an updated version of the old-school Shakespearean jig, complete with beat drumming and hip swaying. I will certainly be following this innovative theatre group in all their future endeavours.

Take a look at their next set of dates here

The Comedy of Errors at The Globe

Oh unhappy day, the Globe outdoor season has come to an end. But, to be honest, looking out of the window right now is not inspiring me to purchase a ticket to stand shivering under the clouds with rain dripping off my nose. Not even to watch the hilarious adaptation of Shakespeare’s The Comedy of Errors again. Although, now I think of it, watching the Dromios run and trip their way across a minefield of puddles clothed in sopping robes would potentially add even MORE hilarity to the unrelenting slapstick scenes. If that’s possible.

The ‘ante-show’ was utterly delightful, with Dromio of Ephesus (Jamie Wilkes) trying anything and everything to get that last item of laundry down from the washing line pinned high above the stage. This was a play in which I really appreciated the choreography, and no more than at this point. Dromio’s uncertainty and wobbly movements were such that the whole audience gasped when he fell from the top rung of a ladder. Having got in the mood for the light-hearted physical comedy that was to come, the first scene was, I have to say, a slight disappointment. The Comedy of Errors isn’t a play you go to see for its plotline by any accounts, but Egeon’s explanation of the happenings before the play are crucial to understanding the sets of twins situation – the foundation on which the entire play rests. For me, James Laurenson’s portrayal didn’t quite match up to the emotional, heartbroken old man I had imagined. The speech seemed rather dry, and at times I couldn’t even hear it, meaning that a few audience members looked unsurprisingly lost once he had finished. I did appreciate the image of a lonely widower who has lost all hope, but felt the speech really needed to be amped up to provide more of a setting for the rest of the play.

From then on in, the audience spent two hours ranging from quiet titters to raucous roaring consistently. From the word go, there was no let up from the slapstick scenes, with props being utilised here there and everywhere. There was the oversized fish used for slapping people around the face, the octopus being thrown all around the stage, and of course the turkey with which one of the Dromios spent the majority of a scene with his head in. Every stage direction and every aspect was amped up to its fullest – the witchdoctor scene was a particular highlight, complete with a magical feast for the eyes and ears.

Each cast member was a comic genius in their own right. I found Adriana, played by Hattie Ladbury, specialised in subtle asides and sarcastic improvisations to put her own stamp on the role of neglected wife. Becci Gemmill, meanwhile, played the perfect princess Luciana, balancing innocence with jealous sisterly rivalry to a tee. Out of the four main men, I really couldn’t pick out my favourite twin from each set. Despite knowing the story, I had to double check which Antipholus/Dromio had entered the stage each time, even if they didn’t look absolutely identical, they had sure learnt how to act it. Antipholus of Ephesus (Matthew Needham) was certainly the angrier twin, really mincing the physical scenes for all they were worth, whilst the connection between Dromio and Antipholus of Syracuse seemed that little bit realer (Brodie Ross and Simon Harrison respectively).

Throughout the play, I was looking forward to the end. No, I was by no means desperate for the performance to finish, but I was desperate to witness the reunion of the brothers. To be honest, I was expecting it to be 100% comical. It certainly was comical, as with every other scene in the play, but there was an extremely emotional and touching element to the closing scene, which was unexpected. The two Dromios were the ones who really stole the show in the end, with the final moments given to their brotherly reunion. A mixture of embarrassed bashfulness with social awkwardness and subdued excitement, the two really captured what the situation might actually be like to be reunited with a twin sibling decades later – totally bizarre and stultifying. Once the Dromios finally made their way off-stage, hand in hand, the audience erupted into emotive cheers and applause. A perfectly unanticipated touching ending to an evening of genuine confusion and genuine laughter.

Julius Caesar at The Globe

I have officially started my MA at King’s College and The Globe in Shakespeare Studies. This is exciting for a number of reasons. Firstly, living in London for the first time! Ok, maybe it’s dawned on me that this is less exciting and more terrifying and daunting compared to what now seems teeny tiny lovely Brighton. I’m just about getting to grips with it…I think. But something that has not become any less exciting is going to The Globe every day! Also being able to geek out with all the other geeking outers on the course who don’t bat an eyelid at a little (a lot) geeking out. Our first outing as a group was to see The Globe’s production of Julius Caesar.

Yawn yawn, Julius Caesar, it’s only redeeming feature is the much quoted and surprisingly useful ‘et tu brute?’. Apart from that it’s just boring men boring the rest of us with their boring man issues. Right? WRONG. As may or may not be obvious by now, I have a soft spot for Shakespeare. But we all have those plays we think the world could do without. Probably doesn’t help that I studied the play at the tender age of 13 and all I remember is a rather quaint cartoon (the creepy over-realistic kind, rather than the fun cute kind) of the play being put in front of us perhaps in the vain hope of engaging us. Well, I could now go back and tell my Year 9 teacher that if they’d taken us to see THIS production every single one of us would be JC fanatics to this day.

Before everyone had even taken their seats or picked the perfect standing position, there were plebeians and townsmen ramming a box through the audience, mounting it and chanting ‘CAESAR CAESAR’, forcing us to join in. We were no longer 21^st century audience members dubiously waiting for one of the plays widely acknowledged as LESS exciting than some others, oh no. We were members of the Roman public, part of the mob, pawns in a political crisis, screaming the name of whoever had taken our fancy that day. But more on the mob later.

Caesar (George Irving) emerged. The very first thing that struck me was his humour! Of all things, Caesar was a joker. Maybe an inadvertent, over-cocky and over-assured joker, but a joker nonetheless. After the original spectacle of Caesar’s first scene, complete with a lifesize cow swinging from the ceiling, among other things, my stars of the show came on for their first scene. Brutus and Cassius, often imagined by me as middle-aged men desperate with jealousy, instead materialised as rather dishy socialist heroes (insert cheer here). OK the heroes bit is up for debate, but I think that loaded phrase really encapsulates the political element that makes this play SO exciting – especially the fact that it totally resonates with today’s world. Marc Antony (Luke Thompson) stole the end of the first half, subtly sarcastic lines such as ‘I am no orator as Brutus’ and ‘I only speak right on’ jumped out of his manipulative tone. I felt they could have been said by any Tom Dick or Harry, or maybe Ed, Nick or Dave…the mobilisation of the electric mob mentality that was charging round the entire playhouse momentarily took over from the specificities of the Caesar plot and exploited the vulnerable malleability of people’s opinion through speech alone.

I want to briefly return to Brutus, played by Tom McKay, as this Brutus does now hold a special place in my heart. My first impression was that the actor was a little uneasy and slightly static. But then I realised, he was being such a realistic Brutus that I had almost missed it! Brutus’ internal anguish and indecision was so perfectly epitomised in the tone of every single word he spoke, every movement he made, and every expression of the eyes (I’ll give that as my reason for why I couldn’t stop staring at them). It was because of this close attention to each detail that the exact moment where Brutus switches from hesitant senate member to ring-leading conspirator was so palpable. The relationship between Brutus and Cassius (Anthony Howell) was so emotional that people around me were shedding a tear. Theirs became a love story and it worked perfectly. By the end, when Brutus reveals his wife’s death, and the ghost of Caesar comes to him (spoiler: Caesar dies), his development comes full circle: he returns to the first Brutus we met, full of courage and dignity but hopelessly conscience haunted and pragmatic.

So as not to ramble on TOO much, I have just a few more concise highlights I feel I must mention. The use of music was something I haven’t experienced too much in the theatre before, and the mix between Latin singing and more contemporary, unusual tunes added a trauma and emotion to the traditional bloody murder scenes – a great juxtaposition of spectacle and sombre mood. In particular, the harp song which Lucius plays in the second half as Brutus paces his tent cemented this as my favourite scene by far. The jig at the end was also a new experience for me, I just loved that no matter the mood at the close of the play (spoiler alert #2: it doesn’t end well), everyone breaks into a jolly, energetic dance together to end the show – so uplifiting!

One final thing – tiny details are something I love to seek out in any performance, and Decius’ slow, subtle peeling of a tangerine in the night conspiratorial scene had me in (albeit inappropriate) stitches.

PS DON’T MISS the twist at the end. Pure interpretative gold. Ok I’m done.

It’s on until 11^th October so DO get tickets here!