What fools these mortals be! existentialist angst and funky romps

TS Eliot regarded The Four Quartets, written over two years in four different locations, as his masterpiece: they secured his Nobel Prize, yet over half a century later their meaning seems as abstract and complex as ever. They don't have the vivid, witty, characterisation of The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock, or the epic storytelling of The Waste Land, and while his stage work like Murder in the Cathedral and The Cocktail Party (not to mention Cats!) is readily accessible, these four long reveries. Burnt Norton, East Coker, The Dry Salvages and Little Gidding are obscure, disturbing, questings about existence and time in a world where Humankind cannot bear very much reality. 

Ralph Fiennes, who delivered and directed this performance at Theatre Royal Bath, found nuances of mood in his mesmeric presentation, and the subfusc lighting by Tim Lutkin and monolithic imagery on set (design by Hildegard Bechtler) support this sense of elemental isolation. The recitation lasts over an hour but Ralph Fiennes has such a strong affinity with the poet's words he might have been simply speaking aloud his own musings.  It's an extraordinary performance, forensically demanding yet ultimately emotionally unyielding.  Ralf Fiennes image by Matt Humphrey, set as seen by my phone.

At the other end of the performance spectrum, a splendid romp from start to finish - which was 2⅓ hours later:  Sean Holmes has directed A Midsummer Night's Dream at The Globe as if everyone in the audience either knows the play backwards or simply doesn't care as long as it's funny. In these trying times, perhaps chiming with national bewilderment, it works absolutely brilliantly. 

Everyone in the cast seems to play every part at some time or another - fairies, lords, ladies, and mechanicals all so mixed up that you can only tell who's playing Puck now by the labeled teeshirt.  Bottom's scene with Titania is played like a couple of tipsy landladies at a fancy-dress party, one of the mechanicals is played by an audience member (who is enticed by the cast to interrupt proceedings for a selfie) and the lovers in the woods keep morphing into fairies. 

It's hard in this medley to pick out a man-of-the-match, but if there is, it's definitely Peter Bourke mesmeric as Oberon, the ultimate magician in the crazy mess-up summer dream. He brings overtones of Prospero to the drama, which is quite some feat when everyone's dashing about looking like a party popper. Director Sean Holmes has done something quite amazing here: it trampled over all my preconceptions, and deeply-held interpretations & I loved every minute of it. images my screenshots.

Another highlight of the week was a trip to Salisbury to discuss the front cover of my upcoming collection of short stories with the commissioned artist, Helen Look. This level of involvement in the finished product is a rare treat for an author, and also became a chance to look around this historic city which I've previously explored little further than the Playhouse. Even more impressive than the cathedral, set amid long green lawns with intermittent sculptures and bordered by enormously tall trees, is the nearby church of Thomas a Beckett. After his martyrdom in 1170, Thomas became a cult hero and the city's first church in 1220, predating the cathedral, was dedicated to him. It subsequently fell down, and the 15th Century replacement has splendid stained glass windows which are upstaged by the enormous and detailed painting of Judgement Day, showing the souls found unfit to enter the pearly gates being dispatched by devils to Hell. Several appear to be clergymen, with a bishop clearly evident at the bottom. 

Back in Frome, sunshine and the relaxation of national regulations have allowed live music to return, and open-air gigs are already anticipating next month's festival. The Tribe, an amorphous group fronted by Paul Kirtley with David Goodman, took their rock medley to the beautiful grounds of Rode Mill on Saturday, and played again in Frome's Victoria Park on Sunday, joined by the brilliant Original Barn Finds. Here's the venue at Rode, and the bands in the park - with fingers crossed for more days like these.

Poems, books, blooms - top-&-tailed with Shakespeare

Culture in Quarantine! With the encroaching sense of quasi-normality I'd forgotten about the streamed theatre promised throughout the summer.  It's now nearly September, so these magnificent productions by RSC and the Globe will all disappear like the sprites in a Shakespeare play very soon, so check them out here. My pick this week was The Tempest from 2013, directed by Jeremy Herrin. It's the bard's last work, so the bawdy intrigues and innuendo that Queen Lizzy had enjoyed are replaced by the fantasy theme preferred by his new patron James I, and the breaking of the magic wand at the end, signalling Shakespeare's own creative finality, has been seen as the writer's formal resignation. Performances are all good, of course, and so are the renaissance costumes, and there's a big emphasis on magic and illusions.

The two non-humans indigenous to the island, Ariel and Caliban, are always a challenge: sometimes they're played as opposite aspects of the same mysterious energy but in this production Caliban scampers around like a little red rooster while Ariel wearing a long white coat and quiet dignity seems more minder than servant to the extravagant frenzies of his overlord. Programme notes suggest this is a story of 'forgiveness, generosity and enlightenment', but Roger Allam's hot-tempered brooding Prospero reinforces that it's more about revenge than redemption: even though the lords sail off with honours restored, the servants all suffer for their brief aspirations. But Shakespeare does compensate poor abandoned Caliban by giving him the most poignant speech in the play: 'Be not afeared, the isle is full of noises: sounds and sweet airs, that give delight ....when I waked, I cried to dream again.

Still with words:   Poets Prattlers and Pandemonialists, who must be among the most hardworking wordsmiths in the country, offered no less than three zoom performances on Sunday. 

In the 7pm slot Emma Purshouse introduced us to a selection of characters from the Black Country, where this entertaining posse are all based,  while Steve Pottinger interspersed his local-character pieces with poems from lockdown. Poignant, witty, and even hopeful, these affectionate glimpses all have a warm humanity - I especially liked The Glass Collector, which you can read here - among other powerful poems by Steve. 

Also zooming: Hunting Raven Books's manager and Frome's shimmering star of literary conviviality Tina Gaisford-Waller chaired another meeting of Proof Pudding Club, the monthly event for avid readers to enjoy discussing book previews over dessert, though camera clips showed more glasses than spoons on this occasion. An entertaining couple of hours, with main recommendation of the night going to Small Pleasures by Clare Chambers, commended as a contrast to sombre times too often reflected in book lists: "The Booker long list this year is the most depressing I've ever seen," as Tina put it. Here's Tina with her pick of the month: Dear Reader - a book about the comfort and joy of books by Cathy Rentzenbrink.

Hauser and Wirth's famous gardens are notoriously impressive in late summer - there's an interview with the garden's designer Piet Oudolf here - so a trip to Bruton seemed a great idea when the sunshine returned on Monday. It turned out that's the one day the gardens are closed, but the floral displays in the allotments on the other side of the path also provide sensational 'drifts of rich late-colour summer in climactic display' - and the town itself is full of quirky lanes and skylines - including the famous dovecote.  

Ending this post with the careful return of live theatre. Billed as outdoors on ECOS but transferred within the Merlin on Friday night due to blustering gales: Shakespeare Rattle and Roll from multi-talented musician & performer Martin Dimery in the guise of a lecture on the bard's lyrical stylism but actually a fantastically entertaining romp through the key musicians of our times. From evolving Macbeth's witches' trochaic tetrameter into rap, to creating Mick Jagger as Puck,  this is a vastly entertaining - and very informative - survey of our major music icons - including Elvis, Dylan, Sex Pistols, Sting, and obviously the Beatles -  in a fantastic tribute to not only the bard but every music trend this century and the last. This is the third time I've seen this show,  it's that good.

-

as the glitter-dust settles

So how do you avoid that post-production comedown? A trip to London's Globe, of course! I've had the groundling tickets for months, and on Tuesday Rosie and I headed off to see Richard II with Charles Edwards as the fatally flawed hero-king. This play was a dangerous one for Shakespeare, as it raised the notion that monarchy has no 'divine right' and an unpopular ruler can be deposed without the wrath of God ~ a radical idea that his patron Elizabeth detested even more than our current leaders dislike any opposition to imposed austerity: it was easier to grab power from abusers in those days.
Richard II has long been my favourite play: as an emo teen I related totally to the rejected king's self-pitying speeches ~ I still have my tear-stained 1955 Penguin edition ~  and I've seen some brilliant productions. This one was the best. From the marvellous opening, when the child king is promised unimpeachable power amid showers of golden glitter, to the fantastic ending of ultimate betrayal (a bold decision to change his murderer to the one he most loved) the performance was superb. Every line seemed thought in that moment, and the traumatic meltdown as the king realises his delusion is unforgettably shocking in its quiet understatement.
So when Rosie & I noticed, while sharing a veggie platter & bottle of wine after the show, that the cast were in the same bar similarly refreshing themselves, I accosted the mufti king with camera and stammering groupie speech, and this snap is the result. Taken I think by the Earl of Mowbray. And I can report the actors are as lovely as their characters are duplicitous. Awesome day all round.

Back home, the review is out for Midsummer Dusk ~ you can read it on our Nevertheless Theatre webpage or the Frome Standard website. Thanks John Payne for your appreciative words (brilliantly crafted... magical... unexpected gem of the festival...) and thanks to official photographer David Chedgy for yours too ~  and for sharing the 'Last Letter Home' as your personal favourite picture of the festival.

Photographer Alan Denison sent me this picture of the Short Story Competition winners, with organisers Brenda Bannister and Alison Clink, to supplement my images on the Words at Frome Festival page. There will be details of their names & winning stories, eventually, on their Festival Short Story page here.

And over in Bath there's a Canaletto exhibition at Holburne Museum: a small but fascinating & informatively displayed collection of the 18th century Venetian landscape artist's perception of London ~ including the promenade in Vauxhall Gardens with its 'supper booths' and public entertainment, showing that pop-up bars & open-air theatre have long been part of our culture.

Canaletto was in London on a commission to promote Waterloo Bridge, newly opened in 1750. His images were used for guidebooks, although the manipulated perspective, with buildings shifted to enhance views, gave an idealised version of reality. But then I suppose so did Wordsworth, with his eulogy to Westminster Bridge... which brings me nicely back to London bridges, and crossing the new Millennium Bridge to come home after our big Day Out.