Multitasking the holidays

And now the  holidays have begun.

This is a time in which most people sigh in relief, safe in the knowledge that the only writing and reading they shall be doing will be on tiny-screened communication devices, but not me. For me this is a time when I can totally immerse myself in any and all words of my choice.

The holidays are a time when I can choose my own literary intake and am not limited to set-work novels and textbooks chosen by someone I'll never meet because someone told him everyone should have a knowledge of  a Shakespearean tragedy or an allegory on Communism and that they should know how plants operate and how this came about. I'm not disputing the work of Orwell or Shakespeare and I'm  not saying that auxins and evolution do not interest me, I'm just stating that had I a choice these would not be the topics I'd look into at the moment

For the next few weeks my reading material shall consist of an old book on Living fossils, 2 Bond novels and The Sign of Four, a Sherlock Holmes tale. I shall, of course be reading them all at the same time.

In fact all four of the novels will be lying open on my bed alongside my ancient Dell laptop, a copy of popular mechanics, my 4 notebooks (Manuscript for novel, ideas for novel, non-novel stuff and pocket book), my sketchbook and probably a discarded banana peel whenever I am awake. When I am not awake my things shall be relocated to the floor, desk and bedside table in equal measures where they shall stay until I wake up  again and they can re-colonise the bed. I also have a bag big enough to fit them all for when I am away from my place of rest. Let it be said here and now that I will not spend any amount of time without a pen, a pencil, a paintbrush and a piece of paper within reach. Exams start soon after these holidays and so there shall be nothing exam themed in them at all.

I never posted that poem

did I? That was rhetorical, I didn't. Here's a poem about death because we're all emo really

Beyond the button

When the square button is pushed what plays next on the screen?

Does the darkness shine on for eternity or

Does a switched off movie play on evermore

Do the righteous become blockbusters and the wicked

Is there a place where films go post pause or does the ending notice flash for all to see evermore?

When the whistle blows and the players retire

Is the game born again or does the pitch remain always barren

Do the players walk out for a rematch, for a chance to right the wrongs they left unrighted

To fix the mistakes that left them wanting before

The bell goes and pens drop to the paper

The bell goes and men retreat to the corners

Is there a retry?

A round beyond the round

A test beyond the test

The sequel is hidden from our view

Endings are just beginnings in reverse

The Story of Adolf Hitler is a Shakespearean tragedy

A tragedy is a very specific branch of Shakespearean literature. It requires a number of things to happen, including a fair amount of death and the hero of the play has to be a tragic hero; one who is likable and has many positive qualities but is also governed by a fatal flaw that ultimately leads to their demise and sets the closing scenes of the tradegy into motion.

Othello, for example was a decorated war hero, well liked by the people of Venice. He had found himself a beautiful wife whom he loved despite her father's wishes. His one weakness was his jealousy and it was this that lead to him being tricked by his ancient into killing his wife and himself one evening.

Hitler was also a decorated war hero well liked by the people of Germany. He found himself a good spot in the German government despite the wishes of the Jewish socialists. His weakness was the dislike of said Jews and this lead to him being hated by the world at large and allegedly killing himself in a bunker one evening.

So yes Hitler at the beginning of his story was very likable; he was a boy from a middle class family who was a true patriot. He had stood up for his beliefs in the great war and had spoken strongly against beliefs he didn't believe in. People liked him and that is the first mark of a tragic hero. He had a flaw which is the second mark and he died in the end; the third mark.

Yes, you might tell me, but these are stories. There are no real tragic heroes. You'd be wrong of course: Julius Ceasar was both a real person and the star of  Shakespearean tragedy. So were Anthony and Cleopatra. If they could be tragic heroes then why not Hitler?

I like the tale of Adolf Hitler a lot as the hero is probably the most spectacularly human person of all times: He was creative, bright but far too destructive. Potentially a good man but ultimately evil. It sums up our civilization in such an amazing way if you think about it. Here we are, apex predator of the world, the only creature with such a thing as a civilization but we're screwing everything up with our predisposition toward violence. That, however, is a story for another day. Here is a picture I drew for a friend of mine, the caption means "'Top hats' make everything better." It is naturally in German.

I am the beast

ing. It draws a comparison between this situation and the way some of us feel after a night out drinking, about how we enjoy losing our inhibitions

I am the Beast

“Phil are you ok?” a voice called from the next room.

No, he wasn’t ok. He clutched his head, grabbing onto the table; memories of the previous night slowly surfacing in his mind. He grinned a bloody smile; what a night that was…

He entertained a flashback of himself as the beast as he raced through the woods, powerful muscles working his legs at a lightning pace, his nose guiding the way, his mind given over to blissful, feral instinct. He saw himself leap over a fallen trunk and round the corner in a ball of fury and hunger, saliva flying from his mouth. He saw the doe as the shock passed over her face and he relived the rush as he sunk his teeth into her warm body.

He stumbled into the kitchen, eyes glistening with the memories, grabbed two bottles of water from the fridge and went looking for Shauna. He found her in the bedroom, sitting up in the bed, wearing his filthy shirt from last night – ripped and stretched to compensate for his enlarged body her face painted with exhaustion and dirt. She smiled at him as he tossed her a bottle of water, “You ok?” She asked again.

“Yeah I’m ok.” A flashback of her hunting popped up in his mind, he saw her beautiful golden fur glisten in the moonlight as she ripped the jugular from the throat of one of her victims. The blood flecks were still on her lips, it was beautiful. I crawled in next to her and kissed her, savouring the taste. We would have to get up soon, we had responsibilities to take care of, errands to run. We had to return to the mundane for the day…

But not tonight. Tonight we would let go again, shed the petty cloaks we wore for society and embrace that which lay underneath. Our eyes drifted longingly up to the sky, fixing on the point where the full moon normally hung.

Street theater and James Bond

Today's blog will just be a stream of words flowing from my fingertips. It shall be an account of things I am thinking of, which are few and far between really.

Lets talk first about drama, lets talk about a play. I'm in a play; a school production. I'm not singing and I''m quite glad. I'll sing loudly in the streets but not on a stage, its the focus of a thousand audience members that puts me off I think. There are people who take the singing part very seriously though; take for instance the girl who buried her head in her friends shoulder, devastated by the tiny hiccup she had made in the first chorus of break even, or the other girl who asked the rest of the auditionees for a beat to help her with her song. Why are you so self-conscious people? Why can't you just act?

I personally believe that performance is about looking silly. I believe that you should make a fool of yourself in order to reach the next level. Guys wear a dress, girls where a mustache. Do something you think you can't and find yourself leaving the stage dumbstruck by your own performance. I randomly break out into monologues or scenes from movies.. It is the kind of acting I love to do, not just stage acting. That's why I was dumbfounded today when someone at the auditions told me it was imperative they got in. They claimed they needed it to fuel their need to act. I responded by doing a rendition of Eddy Izzard's the tyranny of ducks from his show Glorious and promptly walked away leaving them in a sate of deep confusion. Acting can and must happen everywhere. That is why I am taking my house play cast to a mall in full costume and character. It shall be the best absurdist mall trip ever.

This brings me to James Bond, more specifically Jeffrey Deaver's new Bond novel which is a little odd really. It is a bond novel set in modern times and once you get used to Bond's iPhone (modified by Q of course) and the fact that his E-type jaguar is a vintage it can be quite fun.

This is a lot like street theater in that it shows that something classic and well loved is appropriate in every circumstance. I'm pondering the idea of writing a steampunk Bond short story just to illustrate this point. James Bond's Heroics and womanizing is as appropriate now as it was in the sixties, perhaps even more so. In a world of scandals and raw sexuality where has this hero been? I am yet to read of Bond ordering his classic Martini but I am told that his most common drink is actually single malt whiskey so I guess that's alright.

So never feel like a fish out of water; the whole world is an ocean and whatever your gills are make sure you're getting enough oxygen.

An irregular blog

So my plan to start a regular blog has already failed and this is a shame really. Perhaps, though, an irregular blog would be more like it, more the sort of thing I would write. Perhaps I should talk about the migratory pattern of cubes or the rainfall in the general area of my mind just to break from the norm of blogging and of bloggers.
At least my blog is not just a picture dumping ground, it does have that little uniqueness.
I'm a poet though and maybe my next post will be a poem of mine, that could be fun.
Here are some links of sites I like, webcomics all of them

Xkcd
Scary go round
Poorly drawn lines

Oh also this is the last post I write before I share this blog on facebook for the first time...