"Last Post" by Carol Ann Duffy

Hey Readers!

 Today marks 100 years since the beginning of the First World War. On reading Fleur's post I was reminded of one of my favorite poems by Carol Ann Duffy, which was written following the death of Henry Allington and Harry Patch, two of the last surviving soldiers of The Great War.

Last Post

In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,

He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning. 

If poetry could tell it backwards, true, begin

that moment shrapnel scythed you to the stinking mud ...

but you get up, amazed, watch bled bad blood

run upwards from the slime into its wounds;

see lines and lines of British boys rewind

back to their trenches, kiss the photographs from home -

mothers, sweethearts, sisters, younger brothers

not entering the story now

to die and die and die.

Dulce - No - Decorum - No - Pro patria mori.

You walk away. 

You walk away; drop your gun (fixed bayonet)

like all your mates do too -

Harry, Tommy, Wilfred, Edward, Bert -

and light a cigarette.

There's coffee in the square,

warm French bread

and all those thousands dead

are shaking dried mud from their hair

and queuing up for home. Freshly alive,

a lad plays Tipperary to the crowd, released

from History; the glistening, healthy horses fit for heroes, kings.

You lean against a wall,

your several million lives still possible

and crammed with love, work, children, talent, English beer, good food.

You see the poet tuck away his pocket-book and smile. 

If poetry could truly tell it backwards,

then it would.

Gwendolen

Book Review: 'A Dead Man in Deptford' by Anthony Burgess

Hey Readers!

 I guess I am now on my summer holidays. But I won't do my end of year post just yet due to the way school ended: it kind of dissolved into nothing. Technically the last day of school is tomorrow, so I shall do that post at the weekend. For now, I shall do a quick book review (my laptop has 17% battery).

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 As none of my friends (or indeed anyone who has mentioned anything to do with books near me) have been able to escape my gushing speeches of love for Burgess, it doesn't seem right that you, my Fair or Foul Readers (but where's the difference?), should either. However I must admit I have only read two of his books - A Clockwork Orange and A Dead Man in Deptford - but I shall be doing a Burgess Binge (dat alliteration) this summer. And when he titles his books like "Mozart and the Wolf Gang" or "1985" (which is a tribute to Orwell's 1984) I feel I can be pretty sure the rest of his writing shall live up to wonders I have already read.

 A Dead Man in Deptford is an re-imagining of Christopher Marlowe's life. Marlowe was a playwright who grew up in Canterbury and studied at Chorpus Christi College, Cambridge before becoming a playwright, who many critics feel would have outshone Shakespeare, had he not died in a pub brawl with a dagger to eye (don't cha just hate it when that happens???). The image of the eye recurs throughout the book and often sparks musings on solipsism. However Burgess' real point of interest in regards to Marlowe is the more dubious aspects to his life: his addiction to sex and potentially working as a spy for Queen Elizabeth I. 

 Although the book is about Marlowe, it is told through the eyes of an unnamed narrator who didn't witness many of the events in the book. The way Marlowe drifts in and out of his life is sometimes unclear, but I quite like the tone of confused memory this gives the book. The narrator is one of the most interesting aspects of the book, and I feel it places the role of the author as one of the central questions of the book (Barthes would not be happy), especially in terms of how historical fiction influences our understanding of past events. And then there is the last paragraph, but I don't want to give away the ending because you are all going to go and read this book.

 As always the Burgess, his use of language is simply divine. He writes in a way that forces the words off of the page and into your imagination. You have to sit up and take notice. The opening paragraph is more opaque than the majority of the book, so don't be put off. Instead, spend some time just admiring how he mingles poetic techniques with prose. Burgess also presents speech in a different style to that which we may be used to: speech always begins on a new line, is indicated by a '–' and it is not clear when the speaker finishes. This was alienating at first, but in true Burgess style, this alienation makes you part of the book's world, by clearly differentiating it from our own.

 In short, this is a truly fabulous book by a truly fabulous writer. Probably not that great if you're a raging homophobic as a lot of the sex takes place between Marlowe and other men (sometimes in Latin which led to a fun hour of translation). However you do have to pay attention when you read it, there are a lot of characters and the relationships between them are not entirely clear if you zone out for a moment. But if you are zoned in, as you should be you diligent reader you, then I promise you will have a most pleasurable reading experience when reading this book. 

Rating: *****

Gwendolen

May/June Disposables

Non-smoking, tee-totaling, celibate stoner

Hey Readers!

 It has now been a week and half since I returned to the scholastic establishment post-fucking-up-my-future-exams. I did want to do a post last weekend however that was all taken up with seeing friends from my old school, Kings' College Open Day and zine making workshop. Then my week was taken up homework/Extended project research/Head Studenting/a silly amount of UCAS and University talks (I'm mean like shit yeah I get the point I should probably go to University next year and let's be real it's only Oxbridge not frigging WW2).

 Friday could have been an episode of My So-Called Life/Freaks & Geeks etc. I guess it all started with a lunch of erection talk and Brian Krakow crushing. All beautifully summed up in that photo.

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I am now writing about a week after I started this post and that Friday night is slowly dissolving into memories of snatched moments. Moments sitting behind beach huts, hugging a friend when they/I most needed it most // Sitting on a beach and feeling completely happy with the people I am now socialising with in a way I've never really felt before // Gossiping and spying on future lovers // Chatting with police (it was nothing serious Dad) //  Straddling cannons // Dancing in the road and making jokes about the World Cup with some Spanish tourists // Breaking down on curbs and on friends beds // Finally been honest with people through anger, empathy and exhaustion.

Gwendolen 

PS I'm sorry I didn't stop you texting him 

Friday 30th May 2014; Reflections on myself

Hey Readers!

 I am in a state of permanent tiredness. I am going through moments of overwhelming insecurity and all-consuming not so much joy but like I'm-so-happy-that-I'm-living-this-moment kind of feeling. I don't seem to be able to stop thinking and analysing every part of myself and other people but it all seems to be a waste as I've generally messed up my ASs (i.e. not done as well as I would have liked which is really shit because I know when results come out everyone will tell me that I'm wrong to be sad but an emotion can never be described as 'wrong'; emotions are not true or false, they only are).

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"They [Women] cannot love each other in this easy, innocent, spontaneous way because they cannot love themselves"

                                                                                   -Germain Greer, The Female Eunuch

 Of course she's not the first person I have ever heard to say that, but she's the first person I have heard to say in that way. Reading that made me realise I am making my reactions to people overly complex. I could write like a fucking book on what I think and how I feel about each of my friends/family/people-paid-to-be-near-me. Yet a lot of is entirely false. Well not false, just overly complex - probably because that's my reaction to myself. I have this constant desire to change my three worst personality traits (competitiveness, defensiveness, pride) unfortunately they are rather hard to change as quickly as I/other people want them to change because a) they feed each other in an uncontrollable and destructive manner b) It makes all criticism not necessarily more hurtful but it builds up more easily without me confronting it, and when do confront I end up over-complicating my confrontation to the extent I can't actually remember what I have discovered about myself and it's physically impossible to manifest itself c) I genuinely do not talk about some stuff that I should talk about (and sometimes want to talk about) because I have the irrational feeling that people probably already know and even more irrationally I feel that this somehow invalidates and takes away from my thoughts d) I recognise that I'm probably over-complicating stuff to skirt the issue and appease these traits.

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 I do not know what I want to do with my life. Plan A has basically gone and made me realise that Plan B is probably better, but even so there are plenty of people who view Plan B as a cop out and it's hard not to find yourself invalidating it as a decision. 

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Before you have had your first moment of semi self-realisation you automatically assume you are the good guy in the story of your life and it's pretty crap when you realise that to many extents you probably aren't. And also that everybody is a victim and therefore everybody is perpetrator.  And people seem particularly keen lately to point out my flaws with various motivations, yet I never point out theirs because I don't know a) I hate emotional talks when I feel either I'm attacking/being attacked b) feel it's petty and pointless to point out other people's flaws, because often they are symptomatic of something else that that person may or may not be dealing with and it makes it even worse when somebody essentially goes oh you know that thing about yourself that you really hate well I hate it too. But then I also realise that there is probably a reason why people tell me my flaws. Also the phrase "I will always like/love/have affection for you not matter what anybody else says" suddenly curveballs at you what other people think in a way nobody really wants hear.

What a sickening load of self-pity.

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 I don't really want to socialise at the moment. I think it's more than just being antisocial but not as far as having a social anxiety. I can't really explain it as it is very much a feeling. A feeling that is a mixture of 'ach nein' and vulnerability at the thought of socialising with specific types of people. This is probably a projection of how I feel about myself.

I'm glad I have written this. I'm sure some people are going to read too much/too little/the wrong thing/the right thing into it. I've been wanting to write something like this in my diary but this is much quicker and I've been too tired to spend copious amounts of time on self-pity which is probably more destructive than helpful. But yes, my life hasn't been entirely like this recently, but it has been too much like this. I'm not sure why I've actually written about this publicly instead of writing to the individuals who most people would write to or talk to*. Anyway I'm really tired. I could quite happily write another post on everything I don't like about this post.

Gwendolen

*By the way, that is not an invitation for people I know irl to speak to me 

SHOUT OUT TO ALL MY FELLOW EXAM SUFFERERS

HEY.

Title says it all basically.

{pictures from visiting Cecily way back when and experiments with biro and film}

Gwendolen

P.S. 100th post wooooooooooooooooop

I should stop caring about some stuff as much as I do.