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New article about Richey, William Burroughs, John Gray by...well...me
Hi all.
I hope you'll forgive some shameless self-promotion but an article of mine that talks a lot about Richey and his lyrics has just been published here; http://www.theweeklings.com/philip-m...of-the-writer/ The article also mentions Manics favourites William Burroughs and John Gray (as well as one of my personal favourite writers, Italo Calvino) so should be on-topic enough for this forum, I think. I hope you enjoy it, and let me know what you think. |
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Interesting. Were you asked to write about this subject matter or did you propose it to the website?
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I proposed it. I'd written a couple of articles for them about the election and they asked me what I wanted to do next. I'd already written the first draft for myself. The irony is that it's a US-aimed web site and my editor is American, and I don't think she knew much about the band at all at the time she commissioned it - she probably knows more than she ever wanted to now!
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You may find this interesting following on from your piece http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/...s-9700345.html I've never read any Calvino. I've never wanted to know too much about the lives of authors - well, there are exceptions - Plath, the Brontes whose lives interest me and in the Brontes case their times and the place they grew up - although despite her fame Emily Bronte remains a shadow. And that's a good thing - who wants the author peering over their shoulder as they read or narrating it in your head....I don't want to think do I like/dislike this person and have those feelings risk colouring their work. Writing fiction at least is about imagination, the inner world.....how can you write if you're concerned with fame....it's unlikely to come through writing for one.... Regards Richey, sure there's the personal there - self disgust is self obsession, he wasn't above acknowledging it but you can read too much into things and limit your reading/hearing by constantly looking for revelations on the writer's mind. What's remarkable about The Holy Bible is how political and analytical the lyrics are and even when they become personal - 4st7lbs - he views it objectively through another's eyes and he could still do that at a point where he himself was ill - it's when you lose that objectivity, that ability to see things through the eyes of others, imagine yourself in another's shoes that you lose perspective and creativity In a culture obsessed with self we need books to explore the worlds of others and of the imagination, to escape just the self, even more
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"There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, There is a rapture on the lonely shore There is society, where none intrudes, By the deep sea, and music in its roar: I love not man the less, but Nature more," - Byron 'I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied; And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying, And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.' (from Sea Fever - John Masefield) "Hope is the thing with feathers That perches in the soul And sings the tune without the words And never stops at all" - Emily Dickinson |
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Thanks so much for engaging with the article and taking the time to write such a considered response! |
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Mailer and Hemingway - I've never read so stand to be corrected - but they're off-putting to me because they feel like very 'male' writers/egotistical writers (am I equating the two? ha)....I don't generally hold with the writers for men/women thing but they seem very masculine in their outlooks and attitudes. New Journalism, again I know little about but wasn't Capote's In Cold Blood held as an example of that writing? Which would fall into journalism/non-fiction rather than fiction. I'm probably alone in the world in disliking In Cold Blood for several reasons but I do agree it was a turning point although maybe a turning point in non-fiction or narrative non-fiction maybe rather than fiction. And of course one of the problems, for me, with In Cold Blood is that Capote over shadows it in a way...he let his personal feelings overtake the book, he was arguably manipulated by the murderers .... it makes an interesting study, that in itself, but it also shows the pitfalls of a writer becoming a 'character' so to speak, their fame overshadows their work. Other writers have explored similar themes and become entangled themselves.....Joe McGinness' Fatal Vision is an excellent example and also an example of a journalist who realised it. And a very good read
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"There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, There is a rapture on the lonely shore There is society, where none intrudes, By the deep sea, and music in its roar: I love not man the less, but Nature more," - Byron 'I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied; And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying, And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.' (from Sea Fever - John Masefield) "Hope is the thing with feathers That perches in the soul And sings the tune without the words And never stops at all" - Emily Dickinson |
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I do like Alan Ginsberg's poems though so all is not lost. Sunflower Sutra is a favourite
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"There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, There is a rapture on the lonely shore There is society, where none intrudes, By the deep sea, and music in its roar: I love not man the less, but Nature more," - Byron 'I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied; And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying, And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.' (from Sea Fever - John Masefield) "Hope is the thing with feathers That perches in the soul And sings the tune without the words And never stops at all" - Emily Dickinson |
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