Wild fancy...

Ooh look! The perfect winter piece for my lounge. I love this polar bear bookcase...Soho cool. Spotted in the reception of New York's Crosby Street Hotel.

Spiral staircase

Wow. A different angle on books by artist Tom Bendtsen in his Arguments series. Tom crafted this tower using 10,000 books.

First impressions

Last Saturday, in my first writing session with the class I've joined, we were asked to write a first line and/or paragraph for our novel. Among our group are people at varying degrees of 'readiness' to launch into a full blown novel. Some know that they want to write, but haven't honed in on a specific story yet. Others, like me, have developed characters, perhaps a plot, context, style, and are partway through.
I first blogged about first lines last year.
The first line possibly carries the most weight of any sentence in a novel. I haven't had to suffer the terror of crafting my first line yet, for the simple reason that I'm still not sure where my story starts. I have any number of scenes that could possibly be the opener, depending on which character I choose to introduce my story. And judging by the amount of times I've moved my characters and scenes around so far, I'm unlikely to settle on anything concrete just yet. I figure the further I get into my story, the more my characters will reveal the flow.
Interesting then, to read in the Sydney Morning Herald's supplement, the (sydney) magazine, this week, a number of favourite first lines from some of our own publishing types.
There are two that stand out for me. 
Shona Martyn, Publishing Director Australia and NZ, Harper Collins, chose the opener from the wonderful book Little Women by Louisa May Alcott:
"'Christmas won't be Christmas without any presents,' grumbled Jo, lying on the rug."
Succinct, authentic, intriguing, resonant. It conjures up a thousand plot possibilities in the mere seconds it takes to read the sentence, hooking you right in.
And Julie Gibbs, Publishing Director Lantern, Viking, Penguin Group (Australia) chose a cracker. From Vikram Seth's A Suitable Boy:
"'You too will marry a boy I choose,' said Mrs Rupa Mehra firmly to her younger daughter."
Horror, indignance, resilience, suspense. Like a life flashing before your eyes, you want to know what happens next.
I'm not ready to test out my first lines on a live audience yet, but it's fun (not to mention frustrating) playing around with possibilities.
Try it. It doesn't matter if you have an idea for a story or not. Go on - what would your first line be?

So lovely days...

I remember as a kid, reading with friends a book called Fractured Fairytales, in which some joker had irreverently re-written a stack of classic bedtime stories. The words cheeky and bawdy spring to mind. We laughed ourselves silly.

That dusty old memory popped into my head when my mate Spearmint Leaf and I snapped these fractured phrases in Japan. We laughed ourselves silly.

Hungry? Fancy a long leek?

Perhaps some tasteful living with your beer?

Nihon bathrooms dispense soap as well as wisdom.

A broken toilet? Or an epitaph for the legless antipodeans stumbling out of sake bars on your average Niseko night.

le cahier

I found this notebook a while ago at Peter Alexander (yes it's a pyjama shop...go figure). It's perfect for the writing class I joined last Saturday. I'm hoping being surrounded by others with a penchant for pushing pens will help etch out my story. Stay tuned.

The Discovery that Changed the World

Agree. Genius!
Wondermark. 5 March 2010

A short list is a good list. Discuss.

I was reading extracts from some of the letters of Miles Franklin the other day, published in a curious collection called Creative Lives: Personal Papers of Australian Writers and Artists.
More on her later. For now, I'm interested in the Shortlist for this year's Miles Franklin Award. Here it is:
Lovesong, Alex Miller
The Bath Fugues, Brian Castro
The Book of Emmett, Deborah Forster
Butterfly, Sonya Hartnett
Jasper Jones, Craig Silvey
Truth, Peter Temple
I've only read Jasper Jones so I need to read some of the others to have an opinion. Have you read any of the contenders? What do you think?

Do you haiku?

There's nothing simple about the haiku. Have you ever tried to write one? 
17 syllables in three metrical phrases of 5, 7, 5, usually containing a defined word or phrase that implies the season of the poem.
Gavin Ewart once said 'good light verse is better than bad heavy verse'. Agree. This haiku he wrote... with a distinctly Grecian-autumnal theme... made me laugh:

Haiku: After the Orgies

All the Maenads had

terrible hangovers and

unwanted babies.

Pure alchemy

Rapture. Desire. Lust.

Friends, I am beside myself with excitement! I want one. 

Mine would be crafted from either Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights or a book of poetry by ee.cummings. Combining literature with wearable design in perfect synchronicity, Jeremy May of Littlefly custom-makes books into exquisite literary jewels. He may just get an email order from me very soon.

What treasured book would you choose to wear?

The Bride's Fate, by Emma Southwark

Oliver Twist, by Charles Dickens

Dramatic Works (author unknown)

Love Poems (author unknown)

Our Mutual Friend, by Charles Dickens

Art gallery's starry starry allnighter...

I love this! In a cultural coup for the land of Oz, the National Gallery of Australia was open for a record 32 hours straight this weekend to allow as many people as possible to catch the final days of the fantastic Masterpieces from Paris exhibition. Meaning people could pull an all nighter at the gallery on Saturday, gazing at the works of Cezanne, Gauguin, Van Gogh et al, champagne in hand with the magical night to imbue their impressions of the post-impressionists... then wake in the morning with Monet and enjoy a little Seurat with their sausages and eggs.
After a season that broke all attendance records (we are indeed a cultured mob) the exhibition closed at 5pm today. Tomorrow the packers will rip out their masking tape and start bundling up the priceless treasures for a trip across the seas to Japan.
Tracy Chevalier's best-selling novel Girl With a Pearl Earring was inspired by intrigue. Who was the girl in the famous Dutch artist's painting? Why was Jan Vermeer enchanted by her? How did she come to be there? What happened to her after he immortalised her on canvas?
Looking at the artworks in the Masterpieces exhibition, commonly recognised yet so rarely studied by your average gallery-goer, made me think about the paintings as story stimulators.
Who are the people in the images? Are they happy to be there? What's their relationship to the artist? What are they really thinking behind the poses? What secrets do they hold? How did their lives unfold?
So many questions....so many untold stories...
Test your imagination on these beauties:
Van Gogh's self portrait. Was he repressing a jovial personality behind that intense and penetrating stare?

Was Paul Signac's galleon arriving at Marseille concealing a band of pirates below decks, poised to pillage and plunder the unsuspecting port?

Are Gauguin's womenfolk discussing the poor state of their hands after toiling in the fields all day and cooking up a career move into the as-yet untapped organic moisturiser market that will propel them from peasants to palace-dwellers?

What sumptuous feast will Cezanne's onions flavour? Why did the cook forget to peel them; whose garden were they pilfered from; who is the feared and revered dinner guest; and what life-changing news will she deliver to her host?

Why is Emile Bernard's Madeleine in the woods and of what, or of whom... is she dreaming?

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's...a library

For the princely sum of £1 a blip on the British map built itself a library. 
The parish council of Westbury-sub-Mendip, Somerset, bought a red phone booth, the village residents hammered in a few wooden shelves, donated some books and voila - there you have it. A fully operating library. Open 24 hours a day (complete with light switch), titles from the Classics to cookbooks to kids books, and a reputation that has earned a following far and wide across England's greenest pastures.
After the county grapevine went into overdrive, Pommy telecommunication company BT received 770 applications from communities wanting to 'adopt a kiosk'.
Not since Superman has the humble phone booth promised such magic.


* Photos from The Daily Mail

Silvey goes for gold

Is writing the new black? Are brains the new brawn? And the almighty question on everybody's lips...: [Insert drumroll here] Who will beat the muscle-bound competition to a pulp and win the puissant title of Cleo Bachelor of the Year 2010?
This is newsworthy only because for the first time ever (I think, this is new territory for me) there is a true man of words among the pumped, preened, hair gelled, waxed and buffed parade of boofheads routinely nominated for the award. 
Vote #1 Craig Silvey. The 27-year-old from West Australia and author of 2009 Indie Book of the Year, Jasper Jones.
Apparently sports are out this year and smarts are in. Who'd have thought? For that alone Mr Silvey deserves to take the title.
And once the froth and bubble of the bachelor business blows over he can turn his thoughts to that other mighty and potent prize... the Miles Franklin Award, Australia's major literary gong for which he's made the Long List. The Short List will be announced this month. 
I've just started on Jasper Jones. Have you read it? Do you think it (...or its author) will be victorious?


*Photo by Marco Del Grande in the SMH

Books + birthdays = bliss

On the 10th of April 1791 the poet Robert Burns' third son was born... a few days before his illegitimate daughter was born.

On the 10th of April 1794 the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge was discharged from the Army as 'insane'.

On the 10th of April 1818 the poet John Keats wrote his Preface to Endymion. You know the one - it starts with: 'A thing of beauty is a joy forever: Its loveliness increases, it will never pass into nothingness...' In his Preface, Keats warned readers that they 'must soon perceive great inexperience, immaturity, and every error denoting a feverish attempt, rather than a deed accomplished' in the poetry that followed. Reviewer John Gibson Lockhart agreed, saying the poem was one of 'calm, settled, imperturbable, drivelling idiocy.' (I, and millions more, disagree with both of them.)

And on the 10th of April 2010 it was my birthday. Yay! Booklovers must be the easiest people to shop for. Here's a glimpse of the bookish treasures I gleefully unwrapped... Van Gogh, Gauguin, Cézanne and Beyond (the book from the Musée d'Orsay collection at the National Gallery of Australia); Shakespeare's Sonnets; Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger; a pair of crisp white bookends; a dreamy Camille Pissarro bookmark (also from the exhibition) and a delicate metal mandala bookmark all the way from a bookstore in New York. Lucky me!

Newsflash

The program for the Sydney Writers' Festival was released today and tickets go on sale tomorrow. I plan to catch Alex Miller talking about his latest novel, Lovesong, and former broadcast journalist, Jana Wendt at the Opera House on her new book Nice Work. US writer Lionel Shriver, author of the harrowing We Need to Talk About Kevin, turns her hand to homeland affairs in a discussion session tagged We Need to Talk About America, which is bound to be lively (and hopefully less depressing than the book). Also keen to get along to one or two of the Reading Musters which have a line-up of local novelists.
Check out the program here.

Team extreme

Extreme literary lovers fact #1: some people love literature so much they ink it permanently onto their skin.
Extreme literary lovers fact #2: someone has created a blog devoted entirely to literary tattoos. 
Wow.
Check this out. From Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are.

A Latin palindrome...apparently a piece of graffiti dating back 2000 years which translates to: "The sower Arepo holds the wheels at work". Whatever that means. According to www.contrariwise.org it's "the only sentence in any language that can be arranged in a grid to read identically in any four different directions."

And I bet James Joyce never expected anyone to stamp Molly Bloom’s breathless climax in Ulysses onto her body. You'll see why the bearer of this tattoo just went with the end of the sentence: 
“…I was a Flower of the mountain yes when I put the rose in my hair like the Andalusian girls used or shall I wear a red yes and how he kissed me under the Moorish wall and I thought well as well him as another and then I asked him with my eyes to ask again yes and then he asked me would I yes to say yes my mountain flower and first I put my arms around him yes and drew him down to me so he could feel my breasts all perfume yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes.” 

If tattooing was your thing - what piece of literary genius would you have tattooed on you... and where?

I wish...!

I don't know where this home is or who it belongs to but look how beautiful it is with its tactile wall of books (colour co-ordinated no less!) and dreamy reading window...love love!

Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's imagination...

Last night I listened to a story written by my childhood friend A's nine-year-old son, let's call him King James of the Highlands. King James of the Highlands is, naturally, currently fascinated by all things royal.
In one page of bold and sloping handwriting, his imaginary 'autobiographical' tale plunged us deep into 1800s English regency, detailing with startling precision, clarity of voice and a cheeky wit the story of his life. 
His King James, we learnt, lived beyond the bounds of 19th century royal custom, siring three children to an American lady he chose not to marry, before his death (presumably as a bachelor) of a heart attack at the age of 65.
Now if only I could figure out how to get inside his head and learn the secrets of his gift for storytelling, my novel could virtually write itself.
Most of the 'how to write' books I've read (which isn't many to be honest) at some point talk about tapping into your childhood mind to access the imagination. They suggest exercises where you take yourself back to moments in remembered time as a child, where the rigidity (anality?) of adult thought doesn't exist and, creativity unfettered, words fall off the pen in a stream of consciousness that will, hopefully, unlock your literary genius.
Not surprisingly, it's difficult to do - cast asunder a lifetime of learned thought processes and subconscious self-censorship - but it's fun to try.
Even more fun, would be to hang out with King James of the Highlands for a spell and tap into his mind-boggling inventiveness. Who knows? Keep it up and he just may knock JK Rowling off her throne. 

Stairway to heaven...

It's Good Friday so this seems appropriate. Not a Dan Brown, Stephanie Meyer or Virginia Andrews in sight...it must be heaven up there.

Cover me beautiful

Recycled paper has never looked so good. I love the idea behind New York's Book City Jackets - its fold-to-fit book covers featuring original artworks are a great (aesthetic and economical) way to update a bookshelf or set off an interior with a touch of book magic.
As they say on their website: "A Book City Jacket isn't just beautiful - it also protects from spilled drinks and prying eyes and provides a convenient space to doodle and jot down notes... We turn books into a new kind of affordable art that can be displayed on bookshelves and coffee tables, in cafes and classrooms, on planes and trains...anywhere people bring their books."
Check out these beauties:
1. 'Whale Whisperer' by Evaline Tarunadjaja
2. Nick Kuszyk
3. Selection from Artists Edition 2
4. Michael C Hsiung