Live, From London!

Reflection on London, Part 10. (Photo by Emily Quinn, 2015)

It’s hard to believe I’m down to my last two weeks in London. It’s even harder to believe that 85 days in London have come and passed so quickly, so quietly, and yet with so much vibrancy; in color, in people, in sights seen, in places explored.

Some of this still feels like a well-thought out, heavily planned and faraway dream for my future. I remember being fourteen and trying, every single night, to lucid dream. No matter what I did before going to sleep, no matter what psychological journal article on REM cycles I read and studied religiously, I couldn’t do it. I found myself unable to control my dreams, much less be aware when they were happening.

Being in London feels like how I imagine lucid dreaming feels.

Not necessarily in the sense that I have control; because, if anything, I’ve come to find myself not always being able to control the outcome of a given situation in my time here.

Being in London feels like how I imagine lucid dreaming feels because, since my arrival at London-Heathrow, I’ve adopted this surrealist sense of everything going on around me, a heightened awareness of how long in the making my being here has been – and then my rejection of that reality, as I’m living in it. Talk about self-sabotage.

But London has slowly crept into my bloodstream, the near 100-days of living and working and studying here have found their way into my thoughts and actions – nearly every page of my journal is covered in romanticized observations and drawings of London life. I’ve let myself become an observer rather than a participant since getting here. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing; it’s just the way things ended up.

Tate Modern Writing Exercise: Roy Lichtenstein (Photo by Emily Quinn, 2015)

“I pressed the fire control… and ahead of me rockets blazed through the sky…”

Roy Lichtenstein They danced and spit flames the way a roaring campfire might. Like a tear in time itself, the jet was swallowed in a mass of smoke and flame; that small section of the sky temporarily rendered to be solely for the purpose of the absolute destruction and burning of both flesh and metal. Crank and click. Flash and bang. A simple two-step process in the game of War, which in this case had become purely a game of speed and agility: who would shoot whom faster? Peter thought of roasting marshmallows over the fire with his Father and brother, then slapped away the thought and steadied his grip on the jet’s gear.

Reflections on London and Paris, From London Pt. 9 (First Photo by Thibault Camus/AP, Second Photo by Oliver Dixon)

2/12/15 I’m sick of not sleeping. I’m sick of stressing myself into a corner, defenseless to my own racing thoughts. I hate the kind of person, the kind of version of myself, that school turns me into: and I hate that not even London can stop her from making an appearance most days. I guess I thought leaving the country to study abroad, I might be able to escape that – but I guess I thought wrong. Being here for three months has challenged me in more ways than just being homesick or confused by drivers on the “wrong” side of the road: it’s challenged my emotions, my strength and drive to pursue my education. And in the short time I’ve been here, I’ve lived through and experienced the complete horror that came with the ever-growing threat of ISIS. On the 13th of November, several coordinated terrorist attacks occurred across different parts of Paris, France. After all was said and done, the Islamic State would publicly claim responsibility for the attacks that came to claim the lives of 130 innocent people. I remember sitting in the kitchen of my flat, staring at my phone in complete disbelief as news brief after news brief alerted my phone. I was the first of my friends to know, and had to tell them all what had happened. I could barely manage the words “there’s been a terrorist attack in Paris”. It still didn’t seem real.

I was so, so scared for my life the day after the attacks. I was scared to leave my flat in Harrow. I was scared to ride the tube.  I was scared to go into Central London.  What scared me most, though, was not just the stomach churning, heart-breaking acts of terrorism themselves, but the specificity of the attacks. Just days before I left the states, I saw one of my favorite bands in concert in Tucson: Eagles of Death Metal. If I’d decided to go to Paris that weekend, I would have been at the Bataclan that night. Why wouldn’t I have been? I was just like all the people that had been at the show that night – only looking for a fun night with good music. I already knew how fantastic the band was live – what would have held me back from being in the audience when the gunman stormed the doors? Nothing but my own sheer laziness in not scheduling my pre-planned, hopeful weekend-trip to Paris that never happened. 

This fear has not been replaced, so to speak, but only accompanied by a rapidly increasing desire to go home and be with my family.  

Brick Lane Market Notes

I hear a warm swell of voices from every direction. Each rises and falls in their own unique melody of dialect and accent. They fall over me and my empty headphones (there only for the illusion of not-listening) like a thick honey. I don’t even know where to start in my attempts to identify and trace the accents’ origins. It’s like a song everyone else but me knows the words to.

The endless variety of luchador masks on a colorful display remind me of the hue adjustments on Photoshop. I wonder if I can click and drag and tweak their shade and saturation. The whole colour spectrum is represented here, in this collection of for-sale fabric wrestling masks. It reminds me that London is the same way with people, but that the people aren’t really on display. Though I’m sure many of them wear masks.

Linton Kwesi Johnson’s poem ‘Inglan is a Bitch’ speaks with an incredibly specific, audible dialect described as “West Indian patois”. I first read the poem, then looked up video of Johnson performing the poem on-camera in 1980. I quickly learned that this particular piece comes from an entire album of spoken-word poetry released by Johnson that same year. There was an interesting juxtaposition in the way that I interpreted the piece when I first read it versus when I heard Johnson performing it. There was some obvious difficulty in actually understanding some of the words written in the poem the first read-through. The written poem itself initially reminded me of one of the short stories assigned for reading earlier on in the semester – Courttia Newland’s ‘All Woman’. After hearing the piece read by Johnson himself, I feel safe making the assumption that English is not his first language. This sort of forces the perspective of a non-native Englander on the idea of England itself, as well as its sense of nationalism and working-class system. As an audience, we’re given a first-hand account of the upwards journey of an  immigrant to England’s working-class, where Johnson is first assigned duty as a dishwasher in a large hotel. By referring to England as a ‘bitch’, Johnson refers to the cyclical manner in which British society behaves, most especially with regards to immigrants.

 Analysis: ‘The London Breed’ (poem) by Benjamin Zephaniah

My initial impression of the poem is it’s interesting use of voice and language – an obviously slang-like, improper and foreign dialect is adopted by the speaker from the start. Use of the word ‘dis’ instead of ‘this’ is repetitious and indicative of the slang and sound of the speaker’s voice.

‘Here ravers come for drum and bass’ this particular line is of special interest to me because the repeated use of the word ‘here’ could have been appropriately replaced with the word ‘hear’, as the line includes the description of sounds ‘drum and bass’. This also could tie back into the concept of actually hearing the dialect that the speaker has adopted, while bringing the reader back to the idea of being ‘here’, in London.

Reflections on London, Pt. 8 (Photo by Emily Quinn, 2015)

25/11/2015

Analysis: Helen Simpson’s ‘With a Bang’

Helen Simpson’s 1999 short story ‘With a Bang’ chronicles, with great attention to detail and imagery, the paranoia and constant presence of modern aviation as well as Y2K theories. Simpson pieces together several of these potential means for the world’s end through the protagonist, Cassie, and her astute observations: “Several stars are almost discernible through the dense maroon-tinted vapour of early morning.”

Writing Exercise #1: Plague of London

“The rat flea, xenopsylla cheopsis, was the main conveyor of the Great Plague of 1665,” is what future museum inscriptions depicting such a time, such a sickness and desperation will say. What they won’t tell future generations, though, is what happens when your own Mum contracts the plague and is, herself, proclaimed a main conveyor of the disease.

 My older brothers fled from London at the earliest signs of the sickness, mid-February 1665: “Be good,” they told me, “and be well.” My Father, one of the city’s few remaining in-practice apothecaries refused to work from home for fear of bringing the sickness into our flat. That left just Mum and I, most times, and I was never, for a period of at least five months, allowed to leave the flat. Of course Mum had to step had to step out occasionally, and one fateful day when she did, she came back, as did she normally, with an armful of double-bagged groceries, but this time, with a swelling twinkle in her eye. She knew, then, that’d she’d just been too close. Too close to the source.

The symptoms arose by the end of that week.

 My Father, of course, felt the obligation and desire to treat his wife, knew it his civic duty to help as many others as her could. Starting that week, he spent late nights with me upon his return from even longer days of work, teaching me the basics of his trade. He turned on to me his entire library of medical and apothecary books, taught me how to roll out pills and ointment pastes for Mum. Sometimes, when supervising my mixing and cutting, he’d doze off for an hour or two. Come dawn he’d be awake again and we’d check in on Mum together, give her the previous night’s concoctions, and he’d kiss her damp forehead before braving the empty, cold streets for another day of treating the ill.

  Writing Exercise #2: ‘The Pleasure Gardens’

As soon as I saw her, I knew she was a woman of high-class, poise, and most importantly, as indicated by the volume of her gown, made, I suspected, of a very fine muslin imported directly from India, I’m sure, just for her. Her soft eyes illuminated all of the gardens when she laughed, a full, hearty laugh, that cast a light upon every shadow, beneath every tree, illuminating every thing and every one, including myself. I suppose I may have appeared to be staring at her with an intense fervor and admiration rather than an eye of speculative plotting. That was when she saw me, when she acknowledged my very existence and presence, her light shining across the gardens.

“Pardon me, for a moment, won’t you?” she said with a slight curtsey to the small group of equally-well-dressed socialities she’d been engaged with. I looked away quickly, pretending to look elsewhere.

“Abigail?” one them asked, eyes following her with uncertainty as she walked in my direction.

Oh, God, I’ve been found out. I began to hide the day’s earlier pickings from what may very well have been some of her friends or acquaintances. I fumbled about, and then sat up straight, fixing my hair in the process. I hadn’t thought of my own feminity until she took those final, graceful steps in my direction, fanning herself as though it were the appropriate thing to do, given the circumstances.

She sat herself upon the same bench as I, smoothing out the creases of her dress. I didn’t dare breathe. Was her Father perhaps an important member of parliament capable of assuring just punishment? Would she report me to the authorities and have my hanged? All these thoughts rushed my mind when she finally filled the silence with her throaty, but melodic voice,

“Funny place to seek out such a particular, private companion. Don’t you think?”

As she posed the very question, she finally turned to face me, a smile building brick-by-brick across her lips, brows slightly raised. I had tried not to, but let out a stifled, choking-cough of sorts,

“I’m sorry, I don’t think I follow, miss..”

#2. Think about the street outside and write about it for ten minutes. Then, go out into the street and spend 10 minutes writing down in actuality what you see. Compare both descriptions and analyze which is best/most effective. 1) The street outside my flat is of pavement both wet and black, at almost all times and sometimes reflects an interesting puddle-mixture that appears to contain oil, cigarette butts, and pebbles. The exception here arises from the fallen leaves that sometimes reside with a glue-like suction, to the pavement. Cigarette butts oft litter the ground. There is, during the weekdays, usually the smell of coffee, as the neo café immediately adjacent to the exit from my flat operates brief but busy hours for morning commuters. The grass of the vast, open fields of Northwick Park carries a scent I’m quite used to at this point; dew-ridden natural greenery. The metropolitan line runs along the park, making for the noise and clatter of the station’s regular hours of operation: the sound of the doors inside the trains opening and closing, “Mind the Gap”, “This is Northwick Park”, “The next station is… Harrow-on-the Hill”. Most often, though, I hear the slamming of doors around the halls. I hear them from inside my flat at all hours of day, and still am unsure of which doors it is that reminded me of gunshots my first days living on-campus.

Analysis of Andrea Levy’s Loose Change 

Andrea Levy makes great use of description in her short piece entitled ‘Loose Change’ and uses it as such to delay crucial information and create suspense in getting to know the character of Laylor’s backstory. As the reader and the narrator become invested in Laylor and her terrifying journey to London as a political asylum, we’re still enticed mostly by Levy’s descriptions: “dirt under each of her chipped fingernails, the collar of her blouse crumpled and unironed, a tiny cut on her cheek, a fringe that looked to have been cut with blunt nail-clippers” (73). The sudden notice Levy’s narrator takes in Laylor’s appearance snowballs towards the narrators sudden rise in emotions: “But why me? I had my son to think of.”

A thick fog began to roll in from the southern edges of the field by the time she’d gotten him to sit down next to her on the park bench. She hadn’t realized just how big the field of Northwick Park were until she could no longer see their boundaries; the fences that separated the grass from the neighboring residential properties and the adjacent metropolitan line they’d taken to get here. There was no particular reason for their getting off at this stop; he had stormed out from their shared flat near Tower Bridge after she approached him with the photos, and she had followed him with the hopes she might get some answers. They sat in silence, occasionally interrupted by her starting up with another statement along the lines of “…What I just don’t understand is…” She didn’t realize it until the silence that fell between them prompted her to look over the incoming fog, but that was probably the last time they’d be in that flat together: screaming, eyes rolling, fists-clenching, doors slamming. Would those be the last notes of their cacophonous duet?

Still, in their current measure, he said nothing. He hadn’t said a word since before Baker street. In fact, she thought, he hadn’t really said anything to her in months.

The fog seemed to rise and expand like helium in a balloon: she was glad this was case tonight. She didn’t want to be visible. The grass was wet with the dew of an early sunset thanks to daylight savings the week before – if only she knew then what she knew now… Would they be here?

Craig Raine, ‘A Martian Sends A Postcard Home’ (poem, 1979) ‘Caxton’ (noun): referencing the William Caxton (1422-91), English printer, translator, and author – established first printing press in England, 1476. Can also be used to reference any one of the books printed by Caxton, all of which are in black letter, or the kind of type imitating Caxton’s black letter. (dictionary.reference.com) Taking on the narrative voice of a Martian who, in the form of the poem, makes an effort to describe in a postcard home the things it sees as defining man-kind and the planet which they inhabit. First referenced are ‘caxtons’ (defined above), described as “mechanical birds with many wings” which describes books written and read by humans, taking on the appearance and nature of birds. This is the first of many metaphors to make the recurring thematic comparison between man-made technology and nature. Next, the Martian-speaker compares to sky to a sort of programmed machine that is sentient in the idea that it can become “tired of flight/and rests its soft machine on the ground”. The Martian also brings into question the validity that man-made technology: Television is said to be like rain, “…it has the properties of making colours darker”. This suggests a kind of illusion of reality from an outside perspective – what are we really looking at when we’re watching a film or television? Raine forces as foreign a perspective as possible – a Martian, of all creatures near or far – so as to deconstruct and reflect upon the every day activities and habits of humans: reading, watching television or films, driving cars, and finally, sleeping and dreaming.

Philip Hensher, ‘To Feed The Night’ (1999) In Philip Hensher’s 1999 short story ‘To Feed the Night’, we are immediately put into the setting, time, and place of a young, well-off married couple living in London in the late 1980’s. We learn, in the first paragraph that the wife, 24 years old, makes 11 thousand pounds a year, whereas the husband, 26, earns 13 thousand pounds a year. This becomes an immediate repetition in detail and that comes to define the couple and the underlying struggle for balance of power in their relationship, as well as the frequent discussion of money and monetary value. In throwing a housewarming party at their new flat with friends and acquaintances, the husband seems dissatisfied with the size and price of the flat they’ve moved into, but only the morning after, stumbles upon a new, bigger flat that is cheaper. So begins the recurring themes of monetary value, space (‘narrow’, ‘large’, etc) as the couple promptly moves from flat to flat at the advisement of the enigmatic Mr. Bell: “The expansion of their lives had begun” (245). The consistent referencing of space and monetary value, becomes something of an obsession for the couple, defining their lives and their degree of satisfaction. While their relationship seems to take on more of a loveless form of a partnership than a marriage, they find themselves brought together in a way, again and again, each time they move into a newer, bigger flat. When the man’s old girlfriend asks what they need all the space for at their third flat-warming party, the man’s wife responds simply, “Nothing. . . Nothing at all. That’s the beauty of it” (248).

“…with every thing changing, with every square inch of carpet, every tiny room doubling in value by the day, there was nothing they could do, nothing but rejoice, self-consciously, in the house, so much bigger, so much more than they, with their puny small movements, could ever think of filling” (248).

Excerpts from Virginia Woolf, Mrs. Dalloway (City Lit, p. 8)

Virginia Woolf’s middle-aged, upper-class socialite Mrs. Clarissa Dalloway is followed around for a day in London, as she prepares to host a party later in the evening that same day. We are exposed to Clarissa’s feelings on the bustling morning traffic of Westminster, the anticipation, “a suspense. . . before Big Ben strikes” (8). Clarissa is consumed in a moment of “what she loved; life; London; this moment of June”, by way of heavily-utilized description that sometimes result in long-winded run-on sentences. Clarissa, by way of a third-person narrator created by Woolf, is described as feeling almost foolishly in love with the city and it’s movements, and assumes the same of all other Londoners.

Virginia Woolf, Mrs. Dalloway (City Lit, p. 131)