san isidro day at plaza mayor, madrid

we hit the main plazas yesterday to see the locals don their gay apparel; the traditional costumes called chulapas. if you're a woman, you wear what looks like a flamenco dress for laura ingalls with a kerchief on the head and a rose sprouting from the crown of your head. if you're a man, you dress like a newsie.

chulapas: man and woman's version

revelers, both costumed and plain-clothed, filled the streets and cafes, drinking and being merry. children chased each other and old men played cabaret tunes on their accordions --it felt like the spanish version of moulin rouge. the sheer exuberance among the crowds was palpable. this is why i'm enchanted with spain. the spanish have a real zest for life; they eat with gusto, take siestas and party till the wee hours. what's not to like about that?

see the pho-tos from san isidro day on my flickr photostream.

After a hectic Friday, you can hear the team review the day's events in our Daily Festival Wrap - Friday. Our own Richard, Joyce, Donna and Philip are joined in conversation by special guests Brit writers/poets John Burnside, Sarah Hall and Jacob Polley, who share their thoughts on the festival and Auckland itself. Duration 7 mins 30 secs. Listen on our Festival page, or right here.

[audio http://library.christchurch.org.nz/Guides/GoodReads/WritersandReaders/2008/Auckland/audio/DailyFestivalWrapFriday.mp3]

On the ground in Auckland, the library team have their eyes on a few events in particular today:

• An hour with J.M. Coetzee. The Nobel winner will be reading from, and talking about his work, but won’t be answering questions as our team mentioned in their Daily Festival Wrap – Thursday. Read our profile of him. Event details
• Tessa Duder launches her new book Is she still alive. Our own Richard caught up with Duder at the festival, and you can read his interview with her. “I think this book fits quite nicely into the idea of crone-lit,” she says. Event details
• The Michael King Memorial Lecture: An hour with Hermione Lee, biographer of Virgina Woolf, Willa Cather, and most recently, Edith Wharton. Our profile of Lee. Event details
• Running throughout the day is Open Mike, giving budding poets attending the festival the chance to recite their work alongside James Brown, Alison Wong, John Burnside, Ryan Knighton, and Karlo Mila. Event details

Keep sending your comments through, including questions you’d like us to ask at the festival, and you can find all our author profiles, interviews and audio wraps on our Festival page.

Following on from the very successful exposition by four local artists on the 26th and 27th April; which incidentally was accompanied by porte ouvert (open door) at the local market gardeners and at the depot de vins; we have 2 events posted up for May/June so far.

25th May is Fete de Meres (Mother's Day) in France. Pierreville celebrates with an invitation from the Mayor and Council for all mothers from the commune to a vin d'honneur at the Mairie.

1st June the Tour du Pays Cotentin passes through Pierreville on the RD66 in the direction from Bricquebec to Surtainville between 0900 and 1000hrs.

Click into Pierreville's blog for details of these and other events happening in this commune. Also Surtainville, Barneville, Les Pieux and others for details of the summer seasons' events.

Bob and Marjory.

Coldplay has announced a summer concert tour and dates are going on sale tomorrow.

07/02/08	Washington, DC	Verizon Center		on sale 05/17/08
07/03/08	Hartford, CT	XL CENTER		on sale 05/17/08
07/05/08	Auburn Hills, MI	Palace of Auburn Hills		on sale 05/17/08
07/06/08	Cleveland, OH	Quicken Loans Arena		on sale 05/17/08
07/19/08	Las Vegas, NV	MGM Grand Hotel		on sale 05/17/08

Auckland is an interesting city, vibrant and always plenty going on. There was a good crowd eager to hear about their city and literature. The city was a common link between the authors… chair Paula Green waxed lyrical about the melange of cities, landscapes, remembered and invented Auckland.

Stephanie Johnson has published several novels, and been a Katherine Mansfield scholar and is also one of the main people behind the festival. She joked that most of her books were set in Auckland “because I haven’t been anywhere else”.

Derek Hansen used to worked in Advertising. That’s very Auckland, where lots of people used to work in advertising.

Paula Morriss likes to look at maps and some of her work is inspired by how things appear when laid out on paper. Shanghai is a nostril in the beak of an eagle, Auckland like a seahorse.

The whole world is in Auckland Johnson said – so huge and tumultuous; a frontier town where people seek fortunes, take opportunities, tough and fair-minded, unique in NZ…

Derek Hansen says Auckland goes beyond geography – a mature cosmopolitan city, a city of the world, unique. Wellington pretty but very small…

There was no talk of BMW’s or traffic or prices, which is what I associate with the stereotype of Auckland. Poet Karlo Mila said to me in an interview immediately prior to this session – that Auckland was an octopus – long-tentacled arms wrapping her and wounding her body.

I liked that analogy – Auckland reaching out to the south and north and pulling people and resources towards it, ever-hungry. She also said it was a ‘trickster’ of a city. I put it to the panel. Is Auckland an octopus, a trickster?

Derek Hansen said it would be a strange looking octopus; Johnson agreed, saying it would be more of a giant squid. Everyone has a different experience, she added.
Paula Morriss preferred her seahorse image.

And with that the session ended. I left pondering the presenters’ sidesteps to the question, but got a different sort of answer in Aotea Square. The market day was in full swing and the Auckland Art Gallery were doing a promotion.

I took the opportunity and sat in the chair. Welcome to Auckland, pal.

"...Αντίστοιχα είναι τα προβλήματα της «Φωλιάς του λιονταριού» του Πάμπλο Τραπέρο από την Αργεντινή. Η ιστορία παρακολουθεί μια νεαρή γυναίκα που φυλακίζεται για τον φόνο του εραστή της και του εραστή του. Εγκυος μπαίνει στη φυλακή και γεννά εκεί, σε ένα τμήμα για μητέρες και εγκύους. Οσο θα μείνει φυλακισμένη θα αποκαταστήσει και τις σχέσεις της με τη μητέρα της. Και εδώ, η προσεκτική παρακολούθηση του θέματος και των ηρώων δεν είναι αρκετές για να προχωρήσουν την ταινία ένα βήμα παραπέρα από την προσωπογραφία χαρακτήρων...."

".. .Βασικό θέμα στην ταινία «Λεονέρα» («Το άντρο του λιονταριού»), του Αργεντινού Πάμπλο Τραπέρο, είναι τι απογίνονται τα παιδιά που γεννιούνται στη φυλακή από καταδικασμένες γυναίκες και πόσο ωφελούνται από το κλειστό, επικίνδυνο περιβάλλον. Η ιστορία στρέφεται γύρω από την Τζούλια, που φυλακίζεται με την κατηγορία της δολοφονίας του εραστή της και που μέσα στη φυλακή γεννά και προσπαθεί να μεγαλώσει το παιδί της. Ενώ, παράλληλα, η μητέρα της προσπαθεί να κρατήσει την Τζούλια στη φυλακή και ν' αναλάβει η ίδια τη φροντίδα του παιδιού. Ο Τραπέρο (δημιουργός του Mundo Grua, που είχε διακριθεί στο Φεστιβάλ Βενετίας του 1999) σκιαγραφεί με συμπάθεια το πορτρέτο της ηρωίδας του, δημιουργώντας ταυτόχρονα την κλειστοφοβική ατμόσφαιρα της φυλακής και πετυχαίνοντας μια πολύ πειστική ερμηνεία από την πρωταγωνίστριά του, Μαρτίνα Γκούσμαν..."

"...Γυρισμένο αρχικά σε ψηφιακή μορφή, το «Waltz With Bashir» μονταρίστηκε ως μια ολοκληρωμένη 90λεπτη ταινία και στη συνέχεια έγινε κινούμενο σχέδιο (όχι όμως με την τεχνική του rotoscoping την οποία χρησιμοποίησε ο Ρίτσαρντ Λινκλέιτερ στο «A Scanner Darkly»). Συνδυασμός κλασικού animation, κινουμένου σχεδίου Flash και τρισδιάστατου σχεδίου, η ταινία «ζωγραφίστηκε» από την αρχή (με 2300 σχέδια) υπό την επίβλεψη του καλλιτεχνικού διευθυντή Ντέιβιντ Πολόνσκι για να ζωντανέψει το όραμα του Φόλμαν, να εκπροσωπήσει μια δημόσια συγνώμη του Ισραήλ για την σφαγή και να βρίσκεται ήδη από την πρώτη μέρα του Φεστιβάλ σίγουρα μέσα στα βραβεία που θα δοθούν το επόμενο Σαββατοκύριακο. Ευτυχώς όχι πρωτίστως για την απαστράπτουσα τεχνική της, την απαράμιλλη ομορφιά της και την ευφάνταστη αφήγηση της, αλλά κυρίως για το τι ακριβώς τολμά να πει πίσω από τις φλεγόμενες από το πάθος εικόνες μιας ολότελα «θεραπευτικής» διαδρομής προς την αλήθεια.... "

"...Πιο επιτυχημένη από τις τρεις πρώτες ταινίες της διοργάνωσης είναι το «Waltz with Bashir» του Ισραηλινού Αρι Φόλμαν. Χρησιμοποιώντας την τεχνική του animation, όπως έκανε την περασμένη χρονιά η Μαρζάν Σατραπί στο «Persepolis», ο Φόλμαν αφηγείται την ιστορία των προσωπικών του τραυμάτων από τη συμμετοχή του ως φαντάρος στον πόλεμο του Ισραήλ με τον Λίβανο στις αρχές της δεκαετίας του ’80. Ο ίδιος ως κινούμενος ήρωας κινείται ανάμεσα στους εφιάλτες του και τους πρώην συντρόφους του στον στρατό, αναζητώντας απαντήσεις στα κενά της μνήμης του, σε μια ταινία τολμηρή τόσο σε καλλιτεχνικό όσο και σε πολιτικό επίπεδο..."

"...Η ταινία αρχίζει με το επαναλαμβανόμενο όνειρο-εφιάλτη ενός άνδρα, που τον κυνηγούν 26 σκυλιά, όνειρο που αφηγείται αργότερα σ' ένα φίλο του κινηματογραφιστή, για να φτάσουν στο συμπέρασμα πως έχει σχέση με τη συμμετοχή τους στον πρώτο πόλεμο του Λιβάνου και τη σφαγή στους καταυλισμούς των Παλαιστινίων. Γεγονός που τους σπρώχνει να συναντήσουν και να συζητήσουν με παλιούς φίλους και συντρόφους του πολέμου, με αποτέλεσμα ν' αποκαλυφθεί σταδιακά η φρίκη της σφαγής από την πολιτοφυλακή των χριστιανών φαλαγγιτών του Λιβάνου, με την υποστήριξη του τότε υπουργού Αμυνας του Ισραήλ, Αριέλ Σαρόν..."

So, imagine my excitement when I found out that on this Saturday, the first annual Great Orlando Beer Festival will be happening from 2 pm until 7 pm downtown in the lot for the Club at Firestone. At $25 a ticket for advance tickets, it's not cheap, but there will be unlimited beer samples. UNLIMITED! Okay, really the limit is what you can intake which, in my case, might be around the $25 mark. Judging by the list of breweries participating at the event, it'll be money well-spent. Flying Dog Brewery, for example, puts out excellent beer I'm well-acquainted with from bringing it over to friends' houses. Our very own Orlando Brewing will also be involved, as well as Red Hook, Lagunitas, Otter Creek Brewing, Rogue and more. Food will be available for purchase, as well as a live band, but really, it's all about the beer.

Sadly, I've asked around and it looks like a handful of my best beer-lovin' friends will be working. If you're lucky enough not to fall into that category, it's $35 to enter the day of the event and $25 if you buy early, so if you think you'd like to attend, get your tickets Friday and save yourself ten bucks. If you're the designated driver, you get in for $10, and can get free non-alcoholic beverages. You can buy the tickets online, or you can visit one of three locations where they will be selling tickets for the festival:

• Redlight Redlight - 535 W. New England Avenue, Winter Park (near Park Avenue)
• Underground Bluz - 12261 University Boulevard, Orlando (near UCF)
• Orlando Brewing - 1301 Atlanta Avenue, Orlando (near AMTRAK station)

If you're seriously broke, but still want a piece of the action, you may still be able to volunteer to work at the festival. Some free schwag, like a t-shirt, may be your reward. If you happen to be pouring a beer for me, I don't like that much head on mine, thanks.

For directions to this wonderful brouhaha (or... brewhaha?!), you can click here for a Mapquest map and some written directions, or simply GoogleMap "42 West Concord Street, Orlando 32801," which can give you a good idea of the what and the where. Also, the website says you can park in the Courthouse parking lot, but there's also parking on the street along Orange Avenue and along some of its side streets. The metered parking is waived during the weekends, unless there's been a change in policy, so you should be good to go.

The event is meant to be "a celebration of craft beers," which is a fantastic way to get people introduced to microbreweries across this great country, as well as a handful of popular tasty beers that people enjoy, such as Guinness and Blue Moon. A portion of the proceeds are earmarked to help out our local Habitat for Humanity, which goes to show: drinking good beer leads to good things.

You can ruminate on what drinking bad beer will get you on your own.

Good to see another NZ public library pushing the boundaries of taking the world and their world to their customers online. Another example of what Paul Reynolds describes as "library best practice" in his blog this week? What do you think?

First it started with an essay. Then it continued with a solo show that has played Europe and a variety of downtown venues here in New York. Now, actor-writer Christen Clifford tackles the big time with the Off-Broadway premiere of her show, BabyLove, in which she colorfully ruminates on what she calls "the eroticism of motherhood." The show opened late last month at 45 Bleecker and runs until the first week of June. It is being presented by Hourglass Group, the producers of The Beebo Brinker Chronicles and the forthcoming Frequency Hopping.

With the show successfully up and running (and her son temporarily napping), Christen dropped by the ol' blog to talk about the show, the Off-Broadway move, and what else she's been up to since the last time I interviewed her. BabyLove director Julie Kramer (None of the Above, Mother Load) throws in a handy assist from time to time, as well.

When last we spoke, you were getting ready to open BabyLove at the very first FRIGID Festival. How did that run go?

The FRIGID was great for me: I got to work the show for seven performances instead of just of just one or two here and there. The other work in the festival was wild and wonderful. And it’s important to have a truly fringe festival in New York.

What have you been up to since then?
 
Well my son started PreK, only half days, but that’s been a big change since last year. Since I’m a stay at home and working mother (I just work when he’s asleep mostly!) his schedule is what dictates my schedule. Ummm..I got my MFA, won some writing awards (MFA New School Nonfiction Prize and a 2007 NYFA fellowship, woo-hoo!) I was supposed to be working on a book- if my agent is reading this I AM, I AM!!!

How has the show changed since then - or has it?
 
Christen: The show changes with my circumstances.  When I first started doing the show, I was still really caught up in many of the issues, still very confused about sex and motherhood.  Now I feel like I’ve gone over a mountain and am on the other side of it, so it has a different feel to it.  It used to be even more emotionally raw, it’s still pretty raw, but it used to be REALLY raw.  Now I have to act to access some of those emotions, when they used to just be there.
 
So that’s kind of a big difference.  After over two years, I am finally looking at the show as an actor!
 
Julie: The show has changed so much over the years that we’ve worked on it, though it’s probably changed the least between the Frigid Festival and now.  We’ve had the opportunity to do it so much out of town and it’s interesting to me how some things are pretty much exactly the same from when we first did it in Slovenia and other parts we have continued to refine.  Actually we changed some things for Frigid and this time we’ve gone back to how we did it before.  Also we brought Julie Atlas Muz back, and she expanded some of the dances, which is exciting. 
 
Mostly though, I think what’s changed has been Christen.  When we started Felix was two and everything was so raw and uncertain and frightening.  Now, he’s four.  Her marriage is strong and Felix is this really great little person.  So while the show is still unflinchingly honest and emotionally bare, I think we’re both able to achieve more clarity on what it’s about.

BabyLove originally came to life as an essay for Nerve.com. What inspired you to write it, and then turn it into a solo show?
 
I was really confused sexually after having a baby.  I had identified myself sexually, and I felt like that part of my personality was gone, or not accessible.  Like I wanted to be a mother without losing myself, but I WAS fundamentally different.  But also unchanged in my basic desires and neurosis. 
 
So as a reader I turned to books, only to not find very much out there.  As a writer, studying with two great essayists at the time, Vivian Gornick and Phillip Lopate, I wrote from my own experience.  All of my solo work has developed out of a need to express something I didn’t find out in the world, some true bit of my experience that I hope has some universal truth in it.  It started from writing personal essays, on which I then collaborated with the fabulous director Julie Kramer to turn into performance texts.  Julie and I first met when I auditioned for her for a role in something for the American Living Room festival at HERE, a funny play about Elvis and a Russian woman and a pig:  I played the Russian. Julie has devoted a lot of time to my work and I am forever indebted to her.  I was very unhappy about feeling disconnected from my sexuality, and a lot of humor can come out of unhappiness.  Julie really uncovered the humor.
 
I am so grateful and lucky, this show has been supported by so many different companies- New Georges gave us discounted rehearsal space, so did the Interart Theatre.  The first time I did the show in New York was for the terraNOVA soloNova festival in 2006, and we did a lot of rewriting and rethinking during that run.  We’ve taken it on the road. And now this run at 45 Bleecker for Hourglass Group.

Previously, you've said that the show is about "the eroticism of motherhood," and that motherhood changed your ideas about sexuality and your body. How so?
 
Sex and love and intimacy overlap in romantic relationships.  My relationship with my newborn was the most intimate I’d ever had, and it was shocking to me.
 
Sexuality is so commodified these days, and motherhood is so commodified, and now there is the media-ization of the “sexy mommy” as if we have to look like Angelina Jolie when we are pregnant and be a stick six weeks afterward we give birth.
 
This doesn’t recognize the true experiences of many first time mothers: that your body is changed, often injured; that you are often completely in love with your newborns at the same that your relationship with your partners may be floundering, that your hormones are fluctuating.  So I really feel it's important to talk about motherhood and sexuality together without it being part of a media trend that just makes most women feel badly about themselves. 
 
Principally, I’m interested in exploring the in-between moments, the grey areas between love and sex and intimacy.  Where we are all trying to connect.  And solo performance and storytelling has been a vibrant way to explore this: I love the shared experience of the theatre, to find community with an audience that might be shocked by my admissions.  Though I use sexuality as a way in, the work is always ultimately about love.
 
Maternal sexuality is actually an issue that involves us all, as children and women and men and parents. The director Julie Kramer always says it’s like the opposite of Phillip Roth romanticizing or fantasizing about his mother- now we get to see the mother’s point of view!

Let's switch gears for a minute and talk about Hourglass Group. How'd you get hooked up with them?
 
I first met artistic director Elyse Singer at a party at our mutual friend Erica Gould’s in the early nineties. Erica had this huge Chinatown loft and always threw big parties that were lots of fun, and I met Elyse and I had seen her production of Love in the Void (alt.fan.c-love)  which was a one woman play in which Carolyn Baeumler did Courtney Love posting online just after Kurt Cobain died.  I was not a big Cobain fan but I fascinated by Courtney, and I LOVED that they had taken her posts and made them into a show.  It was so great.  And this was when the Internet was still fairly new, I remember I went to see it and I tried to get onto these message boards and couldn’t figure it out.
 
I did some readings and workshops with Hourglass.  When Felix was very young we did a two-week workshop of a very interesting play called 800 Words: the transmigration of Phillip K. Dick by Victoria Stewart and it felt so great being able to bring Felix to rehearsals with a babysitter.  Elyse had had her daughter a few months after I had my son, so there was an acknowledgement of motherhood.
 
And then in 2005 Elyse and I were taking about solo work and she had the idea for a Lab devoted to female writer /performers.  The Lab is the first of its kind, which is very cool and also just a super supportive group of creative and diverse women – together we avoid the vacuum of solo performance.
 
And Hourglass Group is all mothers now: in addition to Elyse, Nina Hellman and Carolyn Baeumler both gave birth in the last year.  And Carolyn was just in Beebo Brinker at 37 Arts, and Elyse is opening Frequency Hopping at 3LD, so I’m happy to be a part of this group of mothers making theatre.

How have you enjoyed prepping the show for Off-Broadway?
 
Christen: I loved it.  I was so happy to get back in a rehearsal room with Julie Kramer, who is just so smart and I love working with her.  We had some sessions with the amazing Julie Atlas Muz and re-did some choreography.  She asked me if I wanted to make it dirtier and I said, “YES!”  So we have even more fun with the dance sequences now.  And Elizabeth Rhodes came in to rework some sound.  Costume designer Melissa Schlachtmeyer met me at maternity stores to find the perfect pair of pants, and made me a new belly. I am so lucky to have such generous collaborators who have been helping me work and rework the show over the years; we’re all in this together.  And we brought in Graham Kindred to do our lights, and had a consultation with a great set designer, Lauren Helpern, and added a Mylar rain curtain.  I love shiny things!
 
Julie: It’s always great to be able to revisit something, to have that confidence that it works in front of all kinds of audiences, and just to be able to really hone in on those areas that we want to be perfect.  It’s the best kind of rehearsal situation really, because there are fewer variables in terms of how or whether something is going to work.  And it’s always the best to be able to move forward with a show and bring it to more and more people, especially when you really believe in what the show is about.

Part of the performance schedule includes "Mommy matinees." What time of day is best for theatergoing mommies?
 
Well, Sunday afternoons are pretty easy to get out get out of the house, you leave the kid(s) with your partner or a friend.  It saves you from having to make a big deal of going to the theatre and getting a babysitter and coming home late and tired.  And the Wednesday matinees are early, at 1pm, so parents can get back to school for 3pm pick up, or see the show on their lunch hour. 

What are some of the challenges (and advantages) you face in balancing motherhood and performing?
 
Well, first of all, I don’t buy into the whole “opting in” and “opting out” of motherhood that makes headlines.  For me, it’s not a choice to work or not.  Personally, I don’t have the option of having a high-powered job and hiring a nanny.  I can’t not be a mother, I can’t not be a writer/performer – these are givens for me. I also just started teaching.  So it’s a challenge for me to make my way in the world and piece it together the only way I know how.
 
When I was getting my MFA I’d be up until 1am writing and still have to get up with my son.  So I stayed sleep deprived long after my son was sleeping through the night in order to do my own work.  It’s definitely a DIY business model.
 
That said, I think coming from downtown theatre makes me scrappy in a way that’s a good influence on being a mother – the whole beg, borrow, or steal mentality makes you flexible and I feel like we can always find fun wherever we are.
 
When Felix was little, he would just travel with me- well partly because I breastfed him for so long!  When Julie and I premiered the show in Ljubljana, the festival there put us all up in an apartment and even arranged childcare for me and paid for it! 
 
I like to bring him to tech rehearsals, he loves the lights and gels, he loves to come to the theatre and explore different spaces.  He loves it and I think it’s important to see me at work, since he can’t see the work.  BabyLove is for adults only; it even came with a warning label in Canada. My son is old enough to really know what theatre is now – I take him to children’s theatre – and he likes to give people the postcards for my show and tell them, “Here’s a postcard for my mommy’s show.  It’s not for children.  It’s only for grown ups.”  It’s so cute!

You're expecting your second child later this year. Congratulations on that! Might we see BabyLove 2 sometime in the future?
 
Thank you. I’m excited and scared to bring another human being into the world.  I don’t see BabyLove 2 in the works; I’m not fond of sequels in general. But who knows: when the new baby comes everything will change again.
 
I’m actually looking at sex from the perspective of a daughter instead of a mother now.  My new solo is called (What I Know About) My Parents’ Sex Life and it explores elderly sexuality.  I’m looking at everything from my father’s Viagra prescription to my mother’s racy letters, from nursing homes to granny porn.  Daniel Fish will direct it, and it opens June 17th at P.S. 122 as part of terraNOVA’s soloNOVA festival and I got an equipment loan grant from Digital Performance Institute so we'll be using video and I’m excited that it will be something I’m not used to.  So I have to get to work making a new show.  And it’s scary, because though it is still a solo with personal stories, I’m consciously moving away from the storytelling form that I’ve been working in for the past few years.  I’m excited to see what will happen.

[audio http://library.christchurch.org.nz/Guides/GoodReads/WritersandReaders/2008/Auckland/audio/DailyFestivalWrapThursday.mp3]

Peter Ho Davies author of the Man Booker nominated novel the Welsh girl spoke to a modest crowd of interested punters this morning. As both Philip and I went along to this session we thought we'd give you a double act on what we heard.

Joyce: So Philip what are your pithy and pertinent thoughts? Give us the guts?

Philip: Well Joyce, they may not be exactly pithy and pertinent but here goes: I had read his novel and was really impressed with it. It's a great read and a fascinating story about varied characters in Northern Wales during World War II and the characters include the girl of the title, a German P.O.W., a young evacuee, and a Jewish interrogator (of Rudolf Hess no less). He gave us a lot on the background of the book which took him seven years to write, longer than the war itself.

Joyce: Ho Davies, a fluent and practised public speaker, was particularly interesting when discussing parallels between the WWII and the post- 9/11 world, he posed the question how responsible as we the ordinary citizens for warcrimes committed in our name by our leaders and administrators?

Philip: He certainly made us think and he touched on a lot of issues. I felt a bit sorry for Paula Morris, who was chairing the session, as he was such an enthusiastic sppeaker that he was absolutely unstoppable once he started. It meant that question time was limited because the answers he gave were very long.

Joyce: Poor Paula had the cold so her vocal chords were strained already. Ho Davies currently teaches a small scale creative writing programme in Michigan. He moved to the US after doing both Physics and English at Cambridge and attributes the move to the US as giving him the anonymity to write.

Philip: One theme I found interesting was his take on the old good things take time. Not cheese but books and he quoted Flaubert as saying that "talent is long patience". In our present culture of being fast and busy all the time and writers pounding out work "fasterthanthis", it was interesting to hear about work that was so carefully and meticulously written. Eat your heart out Joyce Carol Oates (and Mr James Patterson) who have probably turned out another book while I wrote this paragraph.

Joyce: Flaubert eh?! Oooooehh!! Ho Davies also spoke about the art of the short story versus the crafting of a novel; comparing the short story with a small cube or sphere which can be held up and examined while the novel he considered felt more like a huge boulder. He also lamented the anti-climatical endings or falling away of many modern novels.

While we'd have liked a bit more from Paula Morris, herself a seasoned writer, and perhaps a few more questions from the floor Peter Ho Davies gave us some interesting ideas on the nature of identity, the Welsh global profile and the craft of the short story and novel.

Today sees one of the best line-ups at the festival, but a few of our highlights are:

• Addicted to the dark – Donna has this on her must-see list. It brings together Duncan Sarkies, Luke Davies and Heather O’Neill with Festival creative director Stephanie Johnson chairing the session. “Like any good drug, dark literature makes you laugh and cry, makes you fly and pulls you down.” Event details
• Joyce is looking forward to An hour with John Burnside, who she says is one of Scotland’s finest poets and novelists, and who recently published his first volume of memoirs A lie about my father. As well as attending the session, Joyce will also interview Burnside today. “We’re from the same part of the world,” says Joyce, “so I’m keen to catch up with his news and views on the Scottish literary scene, plus discuss his latest novel Glister.” Event details
• Aucklandness – the team have instructions to go this session and try to understand what it all means, as Stephanie Johnson, Derek Hansen and Paula Morris discuss their love for Auckland through their writing, with chair Paula Green. Event details
• Then, to make our Garden City folk feel more at home, Lytteltonian Joe Bennett will ask Where do underpants come from? Here are some helpful links if you don’t know where Lyttelton is or where underpants come from. Event details.

As if that wasn’t enough for our loquacious litter of librarians today, they’re also planning to interview Thomas Kohnstamm, Karlo Mila and Junot Diaz, among others. We’ll have the transcripts here for you soon, but in the meantime, have you read our festival interviews with Tessa Duder, Sarah Hall and Mo Hayder? And don’t forget our festival webpage is a useful one-stop shop for everything about the Festival.

So, back to your feedback. It’s been great to receive all your comments, both via the blog and sent directly to us. Here are a few we’d like to share with you:

mingle76 says of Wednesday’s Daily Festival Wrap: “you all sound great on ‘tape’. I really enjoyed the conversation between the three of you. And very impressed that Joyce’s first interview with Mo Hayder went v. well - am very envious that you got to meet Mo, and are now ‘part of the family’ *grin*.”

I.T. Commentator Paul Reynolds heads a post to his blog “Christchurch comes to Auckland for the Writers Festival” and says of us “I reckon they are going to be the media stars of the event… sounds like best library practice to me.”

Festival Publicist Angela Radford says “You guys are too much! Thank you very much. Richard is an absolute trooper.”

NZ Book Month website says of our festival blogging “an amazing up-to-the-minute reportage of events as they happen!”

OK, back to being media stars… ;)

Along the Avenue of the Saints lies Henry County Iowa.

Copy and Paste into your browser to view video: http://www.wgem.com/News/index.php?ID=24710A destination where families can get back to nature and learn about our past in an area rich with history.

Our first stop takes us to Salem and the Lewelling Quaker Museum.

During the anti slavery movement, the home was a stop along the Underground Railroad.

It's a glimpse of what life was like for those who passed through the trapdoor in the kitchen and hid in the home's secret passages.

Faye Heartsill of the Lewelling Quaker Museum says, "They would usually hide them here for a day and at night take them a days distance north so they could continue their travel to Canada."

Faye tells us 2000 people a year visit the home and many walk away with a greater appreciation of the sacrifices many made for freedom.

Another historical home from the mid 1800s is the Harlan-Lincoln in Mt. Pleasant.

James Harlan, a friend of President Abraham Lincoln lived here. He was a U.S. senator and an Iowa Wesleyan College president.

in 1898, Harlan's daughter, Mary, married Lincoln's son, Robert Todd.

A piece of the coat the President was wearing the night he was assassinated and mourning veil worn by Mary Todd Lincoln are among the artifacts on display.

If machines from the past gear you up, check out Midwest Old Threshers' Museums.

A key attraction is the Midwest Old Threshers Reunion held for 5 days over the Labor Day weekend.

Lennis Moore, Chief Executive Officer of Midwest Old Threshers says, "When people come to the museums at Midwest Old Threshers is a nice collection of the machines and the artifacts that relate to the early farming culture that we had and still do all over the Midwest."

Nearly 50,000 people converge on the site during the 5 day event.

Moore says, "It's one of the best places I can think of to come and eat and look at exciting demonstrations to see some really unusual machines and other demonstrations that are available.

From cultivating the land, to conserving it. A trip to the Oakland Mills Park and Nature Center is a great outdoor adventure for your family.

Campgrounds and rental cabins are a stones throw away from activities on the Skunk River.

The park's main attraction is the nature center.

John Pullis, Executive Director of the park says, The Nature Center features plants and animals that are indigenous to the area--mounted specimens are featured in what we call dioramas or their natural habitat.

A staff naturalist holds wildlife programs and camps for adults and kids.

You can even get up close and personal with local residents like this Bobcat in the outdoor classroom.

If all this has you hungry, you can bring your appetite to Pork's Hometown Restaurant in Winfield for a tenderloin as big as your head and an all you can eat fish dinner that packs the place.

For more information on Pork's Hometown Restaurant, call (319) 257-6648
118 S Locust St, Winfield, IA 52659-9586

Click on the links below for more information on the places we visited!

http://www.henrycountytourism.org

http://www.henrycountyconservation.com

http://www.iwc.edu/

http://www.mountpleasantiowa.org

Jake Miller WGEM News

]]> http://thebrewster.wordpress.com/?p=649 Thu, 15 May 2008 15:24:29 +0000 brewster http://thebrewster.wordpress.com/?p=649 We are launching this campaign this summer at the festivals. Here is the cover of the sampler and a link to our new ItsAllWorship.com site. this site is created to be a resource for worship leaders, youth pastors, and worshippers to help share the music they love and learn more about new artists, new sounds, etc....

http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/SaveOurSoho/

Soho's move towards becoming a sanitized, corporate hellhole appears to be moving forward with the news that Westminster Council intends to ban people from drinking outside.

Whilst police already have the powers to confiscate booze from anyone they don't like the look of it now seems that this ban will extend to pubs and bars as well.

Whilst we can't find any proposed legislation on the Council's website as yet their 'One City' programme includes this objective:

"Objective: To tackle communities’ fear of crime caused or aggravated by the visible activities of people engaged in alcohol and substance misuse."

Westminster Council is dominated by Tory buffoons, several of whom have now joined Boris' team. It seems it's not only Labour who are intent on removing any enjoyment from life.

Meanwhile it's looking increasingly likely that our festivals are under threat as exclusively revealed in the void yesterday.

Boris has apointed, Asian but still Oxbridge, Munira Mirza, as London's 'Culture Director' and she's already spouting that she intends to review the capital's free events programme.

After leaving Oxford Mirza has worked for a variety of think tanks and Arts Foudantions, in other words she's never had a proper job. She has a bee in her bonnet about Arts Funding being given to ethnic groups so it looks likely that the anti-racist Rise festival could well be on the way out.

We did manage to dig out an email address for her, so you can tell her what you think - muniramirza@yahoo.co.uk

With Boris having already argued that the fourth plinth at Trafalgar Square should be occupied by a statue of war hero Sir Keith Park it looks like art in London is set to reflect the stuffy blue rinse Tory brigade who now laughingly call themselves our leaders.

Alex Fitch talks to Virginie Sélavy about this year’s Sci-Fi Festival, held over the May Bank Holiday in London. This year’s festival sees premieres of award-winning Argentinian film La Antena, Marc Caro’s directorial debut Dante 01 and a variety of other intriguing cult films

Links: This year's festival programme
Wikipedia page on Sci-Fi London
Listen to the interview that Alex conducted with Louis about last year's festival

In association with:

1. Cine scrie brief-ul de eficienţă la voi în agenţie?

nu neaparat plannerii. si nu e un efort individual, scrierea brief-ul implicand si account-ul senior pe cont si clientul. in cazul gmp, brief-urile de eficienta au fost scrise fie de planneri, fie de account directori.

2. Cine ar trebui să-l scrie şi de ce?

ideal e sa fie scris de cineva care a fost foarte implicat in proiect si care poate sa imbine fericit rationalul cu emotionalul. altfel spus cineva care stie sa scrie, dar stie si sa interpreteze date...si are si maturitatea necesara de a judeca un caz din perspectiva juratului. de regula aceasta persoana este un planner, dar nu neaparat. sunt si accounti sau copywriteri care o fac foarte bine. de altfel nu toate agentiile inscrise la effie au planneri, iar acum cativa ani majoritatea agentiilor nu aveau planneri....

3. Un exemplu de premiu EFFIE luat de agenţia voastră, pe un brief de eficienţă care n-a fost scris de un planner.

Rosia Montana - gold effie si Monte Banato silver effie in 2007

An appreciative crowd listened to readings and explantions of how the works came about, where they were written, inspirations for characters and really got the chance to appreciate the many facets of Farrell's writing plus a sneak preview of her next work.

Farrell has been struggling with a novel for a year and a half, but says the work in in its “death throes” and is going to be finished in a month. After that she plans to write poems again.

“I discovered how much I like writing poetry. They have a different speed.”

Book Book – her fictionalised account of her life - is now in its fourth edition. She wasn’t worried about writing about people and places she knew. Quite the opposite: “I launch blithely into writing without thinking that anyone’s going to read it,” she said.

Fictionalising the book gave her freedom, she said.

“It’s not quite my life. My mother’s funeral was nothing like the funeral in the book.

I wanted to write about themes. I didn’t want to stick to the facts of my life. I wanted to be able to exclude things, tidy things up.”

Her next novel is The Autobiography of Limestone, something she’s “always been fascinated by”. The creatures that form the limestone around Oamaru and the Waitaki have the “knack of resurrection” and millions of tiny creatures make up the massive deposits that abound in that part of the country.

I really enjoyed this session and am appreciating more and more how much dedication and effort writers put into their work.

Donderdag 3 juli gaat Rock Werchter 2008 van start. Het festival kreeg onlangs op de International Live Music Conference (ILMC) opnieuw de titel van beste muziekfestival ter wereld. Een blik op de namenlijst van verwachte artiesten maakt al snel duidelijk waarom.

2MANYDJS  AIR TRAFFIC  BABYSHAMBLES  BAND OF HORSES  BECK  BEN FOLDS  BEN HARPER & THE INNOCENT CRIMINALS  COOL KIDS  COUNTING CROWS  dEUS  DEVOCTHCKA  DIGITALISM  DONAVON FRANKENREITER  DUFFY  EDITORS  ESTELLE  GALACTIC  GNARLS BARKLEY  GOSSIP  GRINDERMAN  HERCULES AND LOVE AFFAIR  HOT CHIP  JAY-Z  JOHN BUTLER TRIO  JUSTICE  KAISER CHIEFS  KATE NASH  KINGS OF LEON  KT TUNSTALL  LENNY KRAVITZ  MARK RONSON  MGMT  MIKA  MOBY  MODERN SKIRTS  MONZA  MY MORNING JACKET  NEIL YOUNG  NIGHTWISH  PANIC AT THE DISCO  PATRICK WATSON  R.E.M.  THE RACONTEURS  RADIOHEAD  ROÍSÍN MURPHY  SHAMEBOY  SIGUR RÓS  SLAYER SOULWAX  THE HIVES  THE KOOKS  THE NATIONAL  THE VERVE  THE WHIGS  THE BLACK BOX REVELATION  THE CHEMICAL BROTHERS  TIM VANHAMEL  UNDERWORLD  VAMPIRE WEEKEND  ZITA SWOON

Downsides zijn de gestegen prijzen van de drankjes op de festivalweide die deze zomer een halve euro duurder worden en de pijnlijke 165 euro voor een combiticket. Organisator Herman Schueremans verdedigt zich tegen kritiek over de prijsstijgingen door erop te wijzen dat het artiestenbudget van het Rock Werchterfestival de laatste zeven jaar met ongeveer 500 procent gestegen is.

http://www.rockwerchter.be
http://www.myspace.com/rockwerchter