Tag: #queer

Creative Reading

I was particularly, especially, thrilled to be invited to read some of my work at the December 2023 ‘Wintertide’ festival arranged by the Mandy Apple Collective – imaginative, enthusiastic, talented creatives in Scarborough. Thanks to Nell Williams for the invite and the other writers who performed on the night. Honestly, they were such an inspiration of funny, thought provoking, poignant. A lovely night.

 I was ‘especially’ happy about the invitation because I certainly needed energy and vision of other writers. My writing was/is going through a dry period. I have no trouble finding words, or indeed stories, but stories with a satisfying arc alluded me. (Thanks to Matt Cooper for the photo).

As Christmas came and went I tried to ignore the growing anxiety and even resentfulness of feeling writing as a nagging chore. Partly because my partner bought me an all-course pass for BBC Maestro and I do like a course to busy myself with. I typically got a stack of books (of course). Also, it was Christmas – a break right? Maybe it was just time to give up writing? But then my fabulous friend Fin McMorran who makes amazing art and animations reminded me that we do what we do because of the joy in it. Not for audience, or reward or some external thing but for the fun and somewhere along the way, I’d lost the thrill of finding just exactly the right word and the surprise when a story takes an unexpected turn. Writing is fabulous fun –playing with imaginary friends in games I make up in my imaginary playground is the best! (Thanks for the reminder Fin).

Reading inspires me and once again the Guardian had a ‘Books to look out for in 2024’ feature. Way back in 2019 I decided to review their review of ‘books to look forward to’ for the forthcoming year. I chose their suggested books for every month across the year and though the list was ‘partial’ to say the least (see my analysis of the data drawn from their suggested list) it was actually a reading adventure. I read a great many books I would just not have picked up at Waterstones. The new 2024 Guardian list was as good a place as any to look for inspiration.

The Guardian recommendations for January included The Vulnerables. By Sigrid Nunez (Virago) and I Seek a Kind Person: My Father, Seven Children and the Adverts That Helped Them Escape the Holocaust by Julian Borger (John Murray).

The Vulnerables has been richly reviewed by Sam Byers in the Guardian and, for the most part, any words I might write about it would echo theirs but I will add that I enjoyed it. It is written in an unusual style. A writer, talking about changes to their way of life in the context of lockdown, wonders if any kind of literature still serves us in uncertain times.

It was a good one to start the year with and kick started a reading binge. So far this month I have read six books and discarded a seventh quarter of the way through. (I haven’t yet started the Borger book – it is next on my list).

Books read in January

  • The Vulnerables by Sigrid Nunez (Virago)
  • 61 Hours by Lee Child (Random House)
  • The Last List of Mabel Beaumont by Laura Pearson (Boldwood Books)
  • Spare by Prince Harry (Penguin Random House)
  • After That Night by Karen Slaughter (Harper Collins)
  • The Bad Weather Friend by Dean Koontz (advance copy) (Thomas and Mercer)
  • Meditation by Marcus Aurelius (Penguin Random House)

The one I gave up was the Karen Slaughter. My tolerance for violence against women and misogyny in crime novels is thoroughly exhausted. I listened to ’61 Hours’ as an audio book. I have not, in the past, taken to audio books but gave this title a go specifically to listen to the way the story is written, for the techniques, for the craft. It was a useful exercise listening rather than reading it, but also, I had forgotten what ripping yarns Lee Child writes and what an amazing character Jack Reacher is.

Stephen King and Lee Child (amongst many others) say that good writers must be committed readers. Each encourage an eclectic approach to the reading choices we make. I think my list would count as eclectic! For the record, mock if you will, I really enjoyed ‘Spare’ and have completely changed my opinion of HRH Harry – in a positive direction.

I am never sure how inspiration actually works but I started writing a story – it is a ploddy mess but woke up one morning with a flash of ‘this is what it needs’ and am enjoying re-writing it. I also committed to doing two new (paid) pieces of writing to an April deadline and there is nothing like a deadline to motivate.

I wouldn’t say my writing mojo is fully back (though I am writing a blog post for the first time in *ahem* a while) but I am thoroughly enjoying curating an abundant reading list which is a fabulous place to re-find fun in the written word.

Queer Spaces Live! Its back!!!

Note: In March 2022 Roots Touring company gave me the opportunity to write and perform my own work as part of their ‘Queer Spaces Live!’ show. It was such a wonderful experience. I wrote about it here

‘Queer Spaces Live!’ is back this year at both the Stephen Joseph Theatre Scarborough on 22nd February  and York Theatre Royal on 3rd March.

I know it will be absolutely fabulous. Book tickets before they all go!

Freeing our work

I am chuffed to bits Alexandra Mathie has been cast as ‘Chris’, the lead character in my play ‘Kray to Crone’ to be performed at the Lowry Theatre, Manchester on 14th and 15th July.

Alexandra trained at LAMDA and has an impressive CV (I am not sure if that’s what actors call their experience list) which includes theatre, radio and TV.

Some time ago I was in a zoom scriptwriting workshop with writer, director and actor Charlie Josephine. Charlie mentioned having seen one of their scripts performed and being surprised by where the actor took their words. They also wisely reminded participants that once our work was ‘out there’ we had to let it go, not be precious about it, that our words would be interpreted and shaped in ways we as writers hadn’t imagined in our telling of the story.

It was such helpful advice because creative work is such a personal thing. ‘Kray to Crone’ although fictionalised, is shaped from my experience as a member of the Queer community. Sending it out into the universe creates a sense of vulnerability.

True, I have ideas about the pace of my script, where emphasis should be, how some of the words should be delivered, but now, that is really none of my business. The team at Hive North  are fabulously experienced at presenting LGBTQ focussed work. I trust the process. Alexandra is so experienced and talented. It is such an honour having her play ‘Chris’. I am really excited to see what she makes of the role.

#scriptwriting #LowryTheatre #Hive_North #AlexandraMathie #lettinggo #CharlieJosephine

My Queer Spaces video

I am immensely proud of this contribution to Queer Spaces – a production produced by @Rootstouring. It is well written and I am no performer but I wanted to give it a go. I didn’t do bad all things considered. Mostly though, I am proud of making a small contribution to a dyke history archive which is, of course, a part of the LGBTQIA history archive. We were there, we were queer and we weren’t going shopping 🙂

Queer Spaces Revisited

In a previous blog post I pondered on what ‘queer spaces’ are

My contribution to the Roots Touring production of ‘Queer Spaces Live!’ was a reflective piece on, specifically, dyke bars I frequented in my younger days. I spoke about how the UK community/communities of queers fought so hard for the right for any and all spaces to be inclusive but we hadn’t, arguably, considered what we might lose once they are.

Thanks to the amazing Tyler Whiting for the photo!

Almost all of the spaces I came out into and grew up in have gone.  Some we are well rid of (Wednesday evening community centre women’s discos, bring your own booze, finished at 10:00, dodge the mean feral youths who waited for us on the way out) but other spaces were places of growth and love and fun and adventure.  They were places to meet and belong.  They were uniquely lesbian and gay spaces – The Alex, Vox and Sill in Hull, The Marlborough, the Candy Bar and Revenge in Brighton. Four of those venues are closed.  One is no longer a dyke bar but advertises as ‘everyone is welcome’. Only one specifically identifies as a specifically gay venue. 

Does it matter?  Should we lament the loss of so many distinctly queer spaces or celebrate that everywhere is potentially our space now?

I don’t know 

What was fascinating about the Queer Spaces Live! production was that each of the performers spoke of claiming space in one way or the other, but a thread throughout each was that the spaces needed to be claimed. Whilst people were radically empowered to take the spaces there was a centrality to the essential nature of the spaces as queer; as distinct; as vulnerable.

The performances within Queer Spaces Live! Suggested to me that Queer Space is still, on the one hand contested for its challenge and, on the other hand, a place for forming identity. Queer spaces are still places of resistance. Do they need to be distinctly queer spaces to offer this?

I don’t know – but I think so

The Roots Touring Company created a queer space.  It is what it does.  For me there was an exciting circularity to the space being created and what the performers did with it – and that it felt like a space of bold activism as well as the creation of beautiful art.

I must give a shout out to the people involved.  Oh. My. Days.  My colleague performers were extraordinarily talented – and generously supportive of my own lack of performing talent (note: I am now a BAFTA level talent on acting ‘milling about’ thanks to their teaching – I owe you guys 🙂 ).

• Phoenix Andrews
• Emma Bates
• Joy Cruickshank
• Erin Enfys
• Arden Fitzroy
• Max Percy
• Ela Portnoy
• Eliza Beth Stevens

presented stories of growth and love and challenge and joy and each were MAGNIFICENT.  Keep an eye out for these names because they are uniquely and breathtakingly talented and they are going to take over the whole world.  I can hardly believe I had the privilege and joy of sharing a stage with them.

None were forced to be involved in the performance.  Like me, they chose to be in it – to invest their time and energy and share their powerful, compelling stories and lay themselves open to critique. It seems fairly safe to presume that also like me, they thought this was an important space to create.  Were we individually and collectively invested in the creation of a specifically queer space?

(Eliza and Ela at Portal Bookshop in York. An inspiration for Eliza’s monologue)

I think so

I have to also give a shout out to the team that made Queer Spaces Live! happen. Producer Steven Atkinson, Director Ali Pidsley and Dramaturg Frazer Flintham. Despite the fact that I am literally old enough to be their mother and we play for different teams, I have a bit of a crush on all of them. A magician once told me that magic only looks convincingly effortless with hours and hours of work and commitment to being the best. These three created magic. They held the making of the performance so carefully and safely they enabled us all to grow. I am a better human being, more confident, and proud of myself because of their talent and I will literally never forget them for enabling me to perform

(Steven, Frazer and me after rehearsals).

Queer spaces provide us with places we can be ourselves and lower our defences.  They give us a place for celebration and being together – and also places where we can value each other.

Queer spaces are where we are but not everywhere we might be, is a queer space

Until we can be confident about inclusivity, queer spaces have a crucial role in resistance to oppression.

Thanks to Roots Theatre Touring Company for creating one.  

OUT OF THE WOODS: JANUARY BOOK REVIEW

Category: Non-fiction

Luke Turner: Out of the Woods. Weidenfield and Nicholson. 288 Pages.

Kindle edition downloaded 24th January 2019.  Kindle edition price £8.99

The brief book description added on the Literary Review Calendar of ‘books to look forward to’ for January said “A powerful memoir, centred on Epping Forest, about sexual abuse, a religious upbringing and life as a bisexual man”.

From the Guardian’s monthly list, this is my first to review.  I chose this book in particular because it took me out of my reading comfort zone (more of that later) but had an element of the familiar in that the writer identifies as queer. 



It was an unthreatening choice though not one I ordinarily would be drawn to in a bookshop.

In a professional capacity, I have reviewed books at the request of both publishers and authors.  For those reviews, I focused on the usefulness of the book in helping to improve my profession or its utility in enabling students to understand how to become new and better professionals. 

The Guardian carried an erudite and scholarly review by Sukhdev Sandhu published 17 January 2019 https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/jan/17/out-of-the-woods-luke-turner-review

Sandhu both gives a snapshot of the book and critiques it, so there is little merit in me offering the same. I decided instead to focus on the utility of the book to me, as a reader. Did I enjoy it?  Was the time spent on it a good use of time?  Would I recommend it to others?

To the best of my memory, I have never read a memoir.  I could not imagine why one would. 

In the context of this book, I do not know the author or his work that his name would be a draw (I have subsequently read more about him), nor am I particularly interested in Epping Forest.  I have little active interest in religion.  As a lesbian feminist activist and scholar I have read more books about sexuality than I ever planned to and so these have also somewhat lost their place on my interest spectrum.   It is safe to say this book did not call out to me, screaming to be read. 

It is something of a surprise to me that I enjoyed Luke Turner’s book so very much. It is a deliciously rich and multi-layered text, beautifully crafted read.

At first, perhaps because it was the type of book I am not drawn to, I found it a little self-consciously literary and wordy but this may be because I had decided to dislike its ‘self-indulgence’ before I read it.  It may be that it could have done with some further editing – I am unsure (though I did begin to play ‘pollard’ bingo early into my reading so very much did this word appear – so perhaps it did).

Despite my initial irritation with the book (which I own entirely as being nothing to do with the actual book and everything to do with my dismissal of memoir) I was quickly drawn into the craft of this story.  Turner artfully blends complex discussion about self, history, identity, sexuality and nature into one narrative of discovery. He uses words so thoughtfully the story flows river like, and gently.  This is an artistic, poetic use of words rather than being forensically exact in choices made. Whether one is emotionally reeling from stories of abuses of power against him, his connection to the forest or relationship changes, it is still experienced as opportunity rather than woeful/painful documentary. 

Out of the Woods was my bedtime reading book and reading it felt like a tender caress before sleep. 

Despite going into the realms of abuse, unfairness, confusion and breakdowns I was comforted by the refuge of nature that enabled Turner to find more solid ground, and assured me the reader that culturally we all became more evolved through the story Turner told/experienced/shared.

This was a bold and unusual book which I heartily recommend.  Luke Turner is a wonderful wordsmith and I am in awe.  Kudos to Weidenfeld and Nicolson for accepting it for publication. 

Thanks also to the Guardian Literary Review calendar for alerting me to the book as one to look forward to from the January publication list: you were right.