Scene 1 of 1
Caffe Nero
A new customer approaches a table. As he does so, the couple on the next table pile their prolific collection of cups, mugs and plates on that table, grabbing their coats
New Customer: Oh thanks for that. [No reply] You could have left them where they were.
Departing customer 1: It's untidy.
New customer: Well you could have taken them to the counter.
Departing customer 2: [Mildly affronted] Why should we?
New customer: Ah, yes. Well, I quite see your point of view. And it's your democratic right --
Departing customer 2: It is. Yes.
New customer: to be a thoughtless waste of a human body.
Saturday, 3 March 2012
Friday, 2 March 2012
Last on Gulliver's Travels
I haven't been able to the give a "good rereading" to Gulliver's Travels but a lot of the words have gone through my eyes and I have jumped around quite a bit in pursuit of my worries about what I have recently heard. The BBC have played merry hell with it.
One scene in particular had bothered me. When Gulliver is sexually attacked by a female Yahoo, he responds. That's not in the book. Not at all.
I think now that it is no longer available to listen to; so this is just by way of tidying up my own thread.
It's hardly useful to worry away at everything now; I just note I am disappointed that they did so much violence to the text. The narrative seemed to have been chopped up and pulled from a bag, Cabaret Voltaire-style, in pursuit of a shortened story.
Some of it seemed pointless -- like the radio versions of French novels where people speak, in English, with peculiar French akSENTS to other French people. (John Keats gets a Kings English voice of course)
Why dramatise it? It's not a dramatic book. It needs a straight reading. Now that would be something.
I could say that to the BBC; but they write back saying they're right.
One scene in particular had bothered me. When Gulliver is sexually attacked by a female Yahoo, he responds. That's not in the book. Not at all.
I think now that it is no longer available to listen to; so this is just by way of tidying up my own thread.
It's hardly useful to worry away at everything now; I just note I am disappointed that they did so much violence to the text. The narrative seemed to have been chopped up and pulled from a bag, Cabaret Voltaire-style, in pursuit of a shortened story.
Some of it seemed pointless -- like the radio versions of French novels where people speak, in English, with peculiar French akSENTS to other French people. (John Keats gets a Kings English voice of course)
Why dramatise it? It's not a dramatic book. It needs a straight reading. Now that would be something.
I could say that to the BBC; but they write back saying they're right.
Thursday, 1 March 2012
Google and my information
Just had an email from google
a no reply address
but it does have a link which, when I get there, suggests I give them my private phone number; lots of other things, some perhaps innocent, but I noticed that
well, this space, I believe, comes from google, so they can have my comments even if they don't want to receive them; their wonderful system can inject them with my opinions via the back passage
I am rather worried by what I hear from EU about your invasion of privacy
and if you don't want me to reply then don't write to me
don't TELL me what I may or may not say
especially if you are then going to talk about freedom and choice, and I just bet you are
a no reply address
but it does have a link which, when I get there, suggests I give them my private phone number; lots of other things, some perhaps innocent, but I noticed that
well, this space, I believe, comes from google, so they can have my comments even if they don't want to receive them; their wonderful system can inject them with my opinions via the back passage
I am rather worried by what I hear from EU about your invasion of privacy
and if you don't want me to reply then don't write to me
don't TELL me what I may or may not say
especially if you are then going to talk about freedom and choice, and I just bet you are
A meeting in the Agora
Act 1 of 1 – the reduced shelves at Morrison's Supermarket
Member of the electorate: What you doing!
Victim: I'm sorry?
Member of the electorate: You just got in my way!
Victim: Did I? I'm sorry.I didn't realise. [Returns to looking at the shelves]
Member of the electorate: Why d'you do that? You got right in my way.
Victim: I didn't know I did. As I have said, I am sorry.[Returns to looking at the shelves]
Member of the electorate: You did. You went like this. [Performs an elaborate and ugly ballet, his backside sticking out behind him, his belly hanging forward, his face showing intense concentration, like a dog defecating, and slides and twists over many square feet in front of the small cabinet of shelves] That's you. That's what you did.
Victim: Well, I find it hard to believe all that was me; but I have said that I am sorry for getting in your way.
Member of the electorate: But why did you do do it?
Victim: I don't think I did actually. Anyway, I am very sorry to have caused you so much stress.
Member of the electorate: You must be retarded.
Victim: [After a long silence] What if I were retarded?
Member of the electorate: What?
Victim: If I were retarded... Would that be an appropriate way to speak to me?
Member of the electorate: [Slight perhaps confused pause] Oh fuck off
Victim: Don't you have any compassion for people you call retarded? They're often a lot more polite than you are.
Member of the electorate: Fuck off.
Victim: Is “fuck off” all you can say?
Member of the electorate: Fuck off.
Victim: [Leaning towards the other] Perhaps you're worried it is you who is retarded, Sir; and you can't handle it.
Member of the electorate: Don't you come near me! Don't you touch me!
Act 1 of 1 – the reduced shelves at Morrison's Supermarket
Member of the electorate: What you doing!
Victim: I'm sorry?
Member of the electorate: You just got in my way!
Victim: Did I? I'm sorry.I didn't realise. [Returns to looking at the shelves]
Member of the electorate: Why d'you do that? You got right in my way.
Victim: I didn't know I did. As I have said, I am sorry.[Returns to looking at the shelves]
Member of the electorate: You did. You went like this. [Performs an elaborate and ugly ballet, his backside sticking out behind him, his belly hanging forward, his face showing intense concentration, like a dog defecating, and slides and twists over many square feet in front of the small cabinet of shelves] That's you. That's what you did.
Victim: Well, I find it hard to believe all that was me; but I have said that I am sorry for getting in your way.
Member of the electorate: But why did you do do it?
Victim: I don't think I did actually. Anyway, I am very sorry to have caused you so much stress.
Member of the electorate: You must be retarded.
Victim: [After a long silence] What if I were retarded?
Member of the electorate: What?
Victim: If I were retarded... Would that be an appropriate way to speak to me?
Member of the electorate: [Slight perhaps confused pause] Oh fuck off
Victim: Don't you have any compassion for people you call retarded? They're often a lot more polite than you are.
Member of the electorate: Fuck off.
Victim: Is “fuck off” all you can say?
Member of the electorate: Fuck off.
Victim: [Leaning towards the other] Perhaps you're worried it is you who is retarded, Sir; and you can't handle it.
Member of the electorate: Don't you come near me! Don't you touch me!
i.m. David Rathband
My first full awareness today, after the shipping forecast, was the news that David Rathband, the policeman blinded by Ralph Moat, had killed himself -- although no one had the strength of character to say that in those words.
In due course, I expect mistakes will be identified and lessons will be learned, and all the other bullshit. David Rathband will still have been blinded and will still be dead.
Saying he was brave, as Ms May has, hardly helps, like much of what Ms May says.
I don't know if he was or wasn't brave. It is not a virtue I rate highly. And being shot in the face does not make you brave, just as being blown up in Afghanistan doesn't make you brave. You may or may not be. Well, some of us are; some less so.
It's like hair colour; and, like that, can be changed chemically.
It is rare for me to think kindly of police, though I would like to be able to. I can do it in particulars; but I lost my general enthusiasm in Trafalgar Sq late one night in my teens. I was on my way home from gigging, trying to find a night bus, carrying a shoulder bag full of poetry books.
A policeman asked me what I had in my bag and I told him.
In reply, he grabbed me and threw me hard against the railings saying "I've had enough smart answers from fucking public school boys."
Then he opened my bag and found I was telling the truth. He arrested me.
After being searched and insulted by him and his mate at the station, they let me go without an apology.
My opinion of the police did not improve one day in the early 1980s when most of my school class were absent, locked up by the police. Earlsfield. (Inadvertently, I did earn the nickname, one of several, some less affectionate, Upton Top Rankin, when I indicated recognition of the students' experiential opinion of the force.)
The plight of David Rathband, however, moved me considerably. I had recently been considering suicide myself. Sorry to drop that in suddenly; it would deal with a few problems; but not when the problem is with dungheads, so I got up to write this and do other things.
Sorry, as I say, but let's not get too het up about it. A lot of us do think of it. It has always seemed to me entirely sensible to kill oneself when one has really had enough; and I have no sympathy with people suffering from incurable belief systems who would seek to impede us in this. They can stay and offer it up as a sacrifice if they want to; but they can stay out of my death.
Constable Rathband did not seem to have had enough until Ralph Moat was allowed to maim him.
I was late up by my own plan as I lay for a long time thinking on this: that he is now "free" of his own suffering and the bullshit which surrounds it.
I was dysfunctional as I bought a take away tea in the bakers and left it behind and went on to the railway station where I bought the wrong ticket, still thinking of Constable Rathband and associated thoughts.
And then there were Ian Tomlinson and Mark Duggan, both dead, those responsible being slowtracked at best through the system.
And de Menezes and Blair Peach.
I remember Bob Dylan's lines about lynching over 4 decades ago -- Two men died neath the Mississippi moon /Somebody'd better investigate soon
And I still think of Kevin Gately. In 1974, I believe. Red Lion Square. Merely showing peaceful opposition by marching only to be kettled and then hit.
I subedited a draft of an account of the investigation of his death and that whole day.
I remember being shown photos. I remember standing at the place he was killed. It was not difficult to work out. I am pretty certain I know the name of the man who struck the blow on that clearly innocent man as they let the NF through jeering their racist chants.
I quote a quote from a friend of mine from my poetry collection Next Door on the fascist undertones of the London Borough of Sutton.
A fine human being, Waclaw Kessling, lots of medals; never pretended to be brave but seemingly died bravely.
"Upton, you have a wonderful country. It is such a pity that the Normans are still in charge."
In due course, I expect mistakes will be identified and lessons will be learned, and all the other bullshit. David Rathband will still have been blinded and will still be dead.
Saying he was brave, as Ms May has, hardly helps, like much of what Ms May says.
I don't know if he was or wasn't brave. It is not a virtue I rate highly. And being shot in the face does not make you brave, just as being blown up in Afghanistan doesn't make you brave. You may or may not be. Well, some of us are; some less so.
It's like hair colour; and, like that, can be changed chemically.
It is rare for me to think kindly of police, though I would like to be able to. I can do it in particulars; but I lost my general enthusiasm in Trafalgar Sq late one night in my teens. I was on my way home from gigging, trying to find a night bus, carrying a shoulder bag full of poetry books.
A policeman asked me what I had in my bag and I told him.
In reply, he grabbed me and threw me hard against the railings saying "I've had enough smart answers from fucking public school boys."
Then he opened my bag and found I was telling the truth. He arrested me.
After being searched and insulted by him and his mate at the station, they let me go without an apology.
My opinion of the police did not improve one day in the early 1980s when most of my school class were absent, locked up by the police. Earlsfield. (Inadvertently, I did earn the nickname, one of several, some less affectionate, Upton Top Rankin, when I indicated recognition of the students' experiential opinion of the force.)
The plight of David Rathband, however, moved me considerably. I had recently been considering suicide myself. Sorry to drop that in suddenly; it would deal with a few problems; but not when the problem is with dungheads, so I got up to write this and do other things.
Sorry, as I say, but let's not get too het up about it. A lot of us do think of it. It has always seemed to me entirely sensible to kill oneself when one has really had enough; and I have no sympathy with people suffering from incurable belief systems who would seek to impede us in this. They can stay and offer it up as a sacrifice if they want to; but they can stay out of my death.
Constable Rathband did not seem to have had enough until Ralph Moat was allowed to maim him.
I was late up by my own plan as I lay for a long time thinking on this: that he is now "free" of his own suffering and the bullshit which surrounds it.
I was dysfunctional as I bought a take away tea in the bakers and left it behind and went on to the railway station where I bought the wrong ticket, still thinking of Constable Rathband and associated thoughts.
And then there were Ian Tomlinson and Mark Duggan, both dead, those responsible being slowtracked at best through the system.
And de Menezes and Blair Peach.
I remember Bob Dylan's lines about lynching over 4 decades ago -- Two men died neath the Mississippi moon /Somebody'd better investigate soon
And I still think of Kevin Gately. In 1974, I believe. Red Lion Square. Merely showing peaceful opposition by marching only to be kettled and then hit.
I subedited a draft of an account of the investigation of his death and that whole day.
I remember being shown photos. I remember standing at the place he was killed. It was not difficult to work out. I am pretty certain I know the name of the man who struck the blow on that clearly innocent man as they let the NF through jeering their racist chants.
I quote a quote from a friend of mine from my poetry collection Next Door on the fascist undertones of the London Borough of Sutton.
A fine human being, Waclaw Kessling, lots of medals; never pretended to be brave but seemingly died bravely.
"Upton, you have a wonderful country. It is such a pity that the Normans are still in charge."
On collaboration etc
Surfacing after a horrible couple of days and writing to a friend / collaborator, I referred to a talk I gave
went looking for it and was still quite pleased
On collaboration in art and in research into art
Well, the link doesn't work here. I'll look at it later.
It is
http://www.gold.ac.uk/media/Talk_-_on_collaboration_Lawrence_Upton.doc
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