http://www.johnhudson.info en-gb johnhudson.info 2012-9-8T00:00:00Z johnhudson.info http://www.johnhudson.info/page20.htm#124473 Blimey festivals are tiring. Its the being on call on display twitchy on the lookout networking. So often it is not what happens at a festival but what doesnt not who you meet but who you miss and it is demanding. But St Clem went of brilliantly tho I was probably whats new over committed. Roisin McAulay was brilliant Roger Elkin gentle thoughtful and profound Bill Kirton a gentleman with a lovely sparkle of humour and I met Donall Dempsey a fine sexy poet the poetry is sexy that is. And he wears silly Tshirts as did I. For a first festival a smash hit I think. Shame I had to drive south on my birthday but I was glad to get in the quiet and peace of the vineyards and sunflowers. Now days have passed and it is thinking cap on to get the new book promoted ... but I am already thinking about the next one 2012-9-8 15:20:52 http://www.johnhudson.info/page20.htm#123570 Back from St Petersburg and Helsinki and straight into the visit of Shakespeares Globe Theatre to Dumfries. Hardly time to stop there cos then up to Edinburgh for the Book Fair and my first reading from Earth and then onto St Clementin to do the French launch and also two installations the new 13 Souls and showing Toutes Directions... which is enough to be getting on with. Had wonderful weather in Helsinki and St P. V. expensive but my visit to the library of Catherine the Great and seeing the opening night of Aida in Helsinki were highlights... o and visiting the wonderful islands around the Finnish capital and the meal in the Stroganoff Palace in St P where I had stroganoff. What else Looking forward to a quieter period. This morning I went through the MS for Earth before it went to the printers. Still finding typos and still swithering over phrases but all too delkicately balanced to make changes now. You see a rhythmic subltety that you could implenment and then you realise that ... 2012-8-21 17:51:46 http://www.johnhudson.info/page20.htm#122690 Flat out preparing for the launch of Earth and the St Clem Fest where Im reading from Earth and showing Toutes Directions created with Chrys Salt in a new version with French subtitles AND creating a new installation especially for a 12th centruy chapel in the middle of a field just outside the twon of St Clementin 13 Souls in Search of a Light Switch. That features such figures as Marie Curie Coco Chanel John Dalton Carl Sagan Mrs Spock and an incorrectly addressed parcel. What I love about working in France is the access you get to decision makers. I had the idea for 13 Souls when I saw the chapel what a site bang intersecting the timeless and the changing countryside around it. I wanted to write and record some poems to be palyed back through a sound system with some lights for effects. I didnt want people to go in. The chapel will be locked but two small windows will allow sound to get out and the chapel will be dark with an ocassional light effct just coloured luminosity flas... 2012-8-3 11:29:59 http://www.johnhudson.info/page20.htm#117312 Well the rain keeps you working while the nightingales keep you awake. It is as if the birds are trying to make up for lost time when the rain stops the wind dies and the sun finally shines. There is one outside my window as I am writing this at 2pm on Sunday afternoon going for it full volume. Last night it was chucking it down but the night before I slept with the window open heavy showers but no wind and the nightingale in the wood to the East of the house just kept going all night right through till dawn. A lot has been said and written about these birds. I dont have to mention the poems. It is the nearest thing to listening to Bach in the natural world. There are elements motifs that repeat but the combinations seem ever varied and sometimes like a tenor or soprano performing vocal wonders the bird does something that is breathtaking repeated high notes with a subtle sforzando trills and ornamentations all with pauses that speak of a bigger architecture less a song and more of... 2012-4-29 13:35:50 http://www.johnhudson.info/page20.htm#115870 Finishing the MS of my new collection Earth was the easy part. Now I and my publisher Luath have to get it seen. So its head on with design issues launches study aids for readers and students. Not only that I have several other collections and projects on the go. Shed is getting its Scottsih launch on May 26 at the Dumfires and Galloway Festival Big Lit Day httpwww.dgartsfestival.org.ukeventsbiglitday where I am reading with the brilliant Hugh McMillan. Thats a reading and an installation. Then theres A Strange Guide to Places which has grown to 23 poems and is well advanced. The next full collection Kin is on the hard drive but theres no time to develop it at the moment and another sequence Fusion narrative poems that combine genres to comical horror scfi suspense effects is also underway. The sequel to Earth notionally called Astra already has quite a few poems in the file as well including a particularly good one I think about Dalton and an alarm clock. The St Clementin Bilingual... 2012-4-4 12:08:00 http://www.johnhudson.info/page20.htm#115056 Packed off my MS of Earth to Luath and I realised that I had nicked two poems at the last moment from my Strange Guide... and when I took up Strange Guide I really liked the two poems I had moved and wanted them also to be in the footpath sequence. But they had changed after being placed in Earth. They had changed enough I realised that with a tweak they could also go back in the Guide. I felt guilty but it worked.. then I remembered all those composers who just stole from themselves Bach Handel Rossini remember the Barber of Seville overture It was originally attached to a much less wellknown opera and Bach Christmas Oratorio opening is a key transposition of a much more secular cantata as for Handel its knit yourself an opera. But what was really interesting was that the context of working changed the poems completely in each cycle. Drawn from the same experience they change completely as if there are two windows with slightly different tinctured glass onto the same scene. I pani... 2012-3-21 17:10:26 http://www.johnhudson.info/page20.htm#107717 The idea came sitting in the garden thats why gardens are important and the climate to enjoy them. John Adams has written a piece of music called A Guide to Strange Places. Well my places arent strange they occur on a country path not far from Bordeaux but it suddenly occurred to me that each of us have different emotions as we walk along that path and that certain points on the path will have diverse associations for so many people. We so readily reject our personal experience as well purely personal but it occured to me that these intense feelings one has at certain points although peculiar to me or strange are in fact common to everyone. The experience happened to me just here by this bench under this bridge by this tree... it was the arrival of sad news a death of a friend the emotion coloured the scene is forever associated with this event in my life. For someelse it may be quite different happy news a first kiss a joke that made them laugh so much they cried. So by confessing my ... 2011-11-28 18:00:43 http://www.johnhudson.info/page20.htm#92142 2011-4-20 14:16:22 http://www.johnhudson.info/page20.htm#80727 Back in Scotland a month and I read an interview with John Cleese. He says he cant take another British winter all gloom a spluttery coughs and colds. Yes I ache from lack of exercise. Every time I look out the trees are bending through a contorting lens of windows lashed by rain. I step out of my work room at 2pm and the outside halogen lamp flashes on to guid me to my car. Maybe if I didnt need to earn a living I would be able to write poetry but this gloom and gurgling gutters is too much on top of writing articles. I am brain dead and depressed by 4pm and in the dark. 2010-11-19 14:14:45 http://www.johnhudson.info/page20.htm#79101 Somebody asked me a question about the opening poem of my new collection which sparked the usual torrent of ideas in response from me. I suppose the excitement generated is due to someone anyone taking interest but something always comes from these sudden explanations and it often comes down to the fact that you didnt realise what you meant when you wrote it. It is as if someone elses gaze offers new interpretative possibilities and you end up thinking Wow did I mean that Of course sometimes anothers gaze shows the weaknesses the possibilities for misinterpretation. That is why reading in public is so good for poets. They see their work through others eyes or should that be hear it through others ears probably both. You can often be recomposing the 10th line when you are reading aloud line 5 because you are suddenly painfully aware that line 10 is a dud even though you spent hours working at it a couple of weeks ago I might add at this point that I have been dipping into others work ... 2010-10-30 11:05:58 http://www.johnhudson.info/page20.htm#78024 I rarely get lines of others poems jumping into my head it is usually music that swirls around my brain uninvited but over the past few days lines from Keats To Autumn keep pressing their attentions on me. Why The season I guess. However I am currently in the Sud Charente which brings me to my point. Since visiting this region regularly to write I have seen every season. The movement through the year chimes with something fundamental in the English psyche regards our idealised vision of the seasons much more so than in Britain itself. Summers are warm and long Spring is colouful and fresh Winter crisp and clear with enough snow and frost to keep the romantics happy and Autumn is well a season of mists and mellow fruitfulness. Whereas in Britain the seasons are often confused especially in Scotland which can feel like Winter in June here there are definite periods or phases. The whole procession connects with us deeply. I wonder why Farfetched but the Hundred Years war did spring t... 2010-10-16 11:31:50 http://www.johnhudson.info/page20.htm#77886 Reading Onegin in translation good to return to the real story rather than the handmedowns. Struck by the difficulty of the rhyme scheme in English especially in 4 beat lines. Used to love doing this kind of thing showing off I suppose. Its hard in English easier I believe for Pushkin in Russian and the odd French import. However now I am coming round to Miltons POV. English doesnt sit happily when being contorted to land on a rhyme. Naturalness goes and with it emotional truth. You can achieve effective rhymes in shorter poems say a sonnet but sustaining it is just too baroque. I have to say tho that Onegins translator does a great and ingenious job. Seem to be in the middle of Lizst fest which again is a bit florid for my tatse. Lizst always impresses but you come away feeling as if you have just read eloquent advertising copy. Fortunately the concert I was at on Tuesday last also had the Mozart C Major K330 and Chopin. Tonight in Bordeaux its Bruckners 9th prefaced by guess wh... 2010-10-14 10:44:29 http://www.johnhudson.info/page20.htm#77634 After 25 years of living in rural Scotland I am still a townee so a mouse in my kitchen in my digs in France where I am working on my book warranted poison laid for my peace of mind. However am I supposed to be feeding it and a family It got through a yoghurt tub of the stuff last night. Dont know whether to feel guilty relieved or concerned that Ill be victim to an angry army of dehydrating drunken mice before dawn... not much poetry getting written... 2010-10-11 20:04:21 http://www.johnhudson.info/page20.htm#77519 Trying to finish off the next set of revisions to my collection Earth. Distracted by huge spiders and a mouse that find the oncoming cold season no fun and want to hare my work room. 2010-10-10 17:11:02 http://www.johnhudson.info/page20.htm#77527 Arrived in Poitiers before heading south. What an evening. Balmy sunny so relaxed. Foggy Stansted left behind and rainy windy Scotland. Hoping to get some head and spirit space to roam around in to advance Earth. Didnt really work out last time as managaed to get a toothache not good for poetry as Im sure Mr Burns would have agreed. 2010-10-8 17:16:36 http://www.johnhudson.info/page20.htm#77534 Saw a performance of Onegin Crankos ballet at the ROH. Recommended. Went straight back to the hotel and downloaded Pushkins poem onto my Kindle god dropping tech names again. Read before falling asleep. Good intro in the penguin edition. 2010-10-7 17:21:02 http://www.johnhudson.info/page20.htm#77522 Back from a quick hop over to New York City. Still love the place. Had a great line for a villanelle jump into my jetlagged brain. Problem is you need two great repeatable lines for a villanelle. 2010-10-4 17:13:32