Despite the fluster over apparent mouth-mutilation on the poster, Loose Tongues was well received by audiences Upstairs at the Cornerhouse. The project was a co-venture between Nevertheless Productions with Inklings who provided this intriguing collection of related monologues set in the same funeral parlour at the same time - it would have been interesting too to see how these could have combined in dramatic interaction as dark secrets were slowly revealed as the hour passed in real-time. Audience feedback was encouraging: 'thoroughly enjoyed it!' - 'interesting, ambitious with some very good acting' - 'intrigued by the unravelling of the story and the characters' - 'different to anything I have ever seen before'.

There's been a lot of poetry around this week too, what with Bristol Poetry festival ~ which I sadly missed ~ and 100,000 Poets for Change in Bath on Saturday with Frome's class-act bards Rosie Jackson and Rose Flint among poets at a 'concert of readings' at the BRLSI with a focus on our endangered earth.
Danger of a different kind featured in an extraordinary production by Irish company Gare St Lazare of Moby Dick at Bristol's Tobacco Factory. Conor Lovett, who with his director adapted Herman Melville's classic novel, narrated in traditional story-telling style, solitary on a dark stage with only the haunting fiddle of Caoimhin O'Raghallaigh to enhance the intense and eerie mood.
My illusion that this would be a plot-led adventure dispersed instantly and from that famous opening line Call me Ishmael to the incredible climax of the whale-hunter's destructive obsession like the rest of the full-house I sat spell-bound, fascinated by Melville's lyrical & complex language and transfixed by the quiet intimacy of interaction between actor and audience. Descriptions are vivid but the overwhelming imagery is larger even than this epic journey ~ mythic, cosmic... a timeless universal life struggle against elements and gods and the dark destructive energy within us all.

First posting of October starts with a fretful footnote: without option, Blogger has updated my template to a tidy new style which has swept away my collection of fascinating writers' blogs, along with my cherished poem and quote of-the-month spot. I'm annoyed about this as anyone using a free service is entitled to be, viz, to frustratingly little avail. If you were wondering, I was going to quote Apollinaire's wonderful words which I was movingly reminded of (thankyou Tristram) at the Writers' Soiree on the terrace of Atsista ten days ago:
       Come to the edge, he said.
       They said: We are afraid.
       Come to the edge, he said.
       They came.  He pushed them
       and they flew.”