Steve_Bamlett_blog

‘“Nothing changes. …” /// “…. If they had their way the entire country would be pebble-dashed, …”/ “Who are they?” I asked. / “…The janitors of mediocrity. The custodians of drab … . Men mainly. Where once we built towers to heaven, now we build frumpy sweatboxes for pen-pushers. After nine hundred years I do … More ‘“Nothing changes. …” Reflecting on ‘The Offing’, a dramatisation of the novel by Benjamin Myers of 2019 at the Stephen Joseph Theatre and the Live Theatre, Newcastle.  Citations from paperback edition of novel: Myers, B. (2020) ‘The Offing’.

‘Penelope’s scepticism is my invention, …’.[1] ‘I follow Apollonius in having Jason tell Medea about her cousin Ariadne – in fact I have made Jason’s economy with the truth much more obvious than it is in the original’.[2]  This is a blog on some of the reasons why writers and artists who are also women … More ‘Penelope’s scepticism is my invention, …’. ‘… I have made Jason’s economy with the truth much more obvious than it is in the original’.[2] A hymn in praise of Charlotte Higgins’ [2021] ‘Greek Myths: A New Retelling’.

From a rebellious Northern Powerhouse to a pillar of the establishment – the echoes from Raby’s rich past.  This is a blog on a trip to Raby Castle on Sunday 31st October 2021 (Halloween) provided for my husband Geoff and me for my 67th birthday (which was actually last week 24th October) by wonderful friend, … More From a rebellious Northern Powerhouse to a pillar of the establishment – a trip to Raby Castle on Sunday 31st October 2021 (Halloween).  

‘“…Whoever told you he was a faggot is lying …” … “Or Crazy” / Crazy. Yes you’d have to be crazy to think that. And we all remember what happens to the crazy.’ ’Re-(Queer)-Positioning the literary question of who writes and what is gay writing.[1]  This is a blog reflecting on the appropriation of discourse … More ‘  “…Whoever told you he was a faggot is lying …” ‘ Re-(Queer)-Positioning the literary question of who writes and what is gay writing. On Harper Jameson’s (with W.A.W. Parker) [2020] ‘The Waste Land’ and William di Canzio’s (2021) ‘Alec’ .

‘The world calls ‘evil’, and has always called so, whoever rejects labels and methods and systems, even nominal rights and privileges, in order to create its own individual good’.[1]  This is a blog reflecting on the achievement of a queer modern idiom and ethic  on the meaning of ‘love’ in Charles Henri Ford and Parker … More ‘The world calls ‘evil’, and has always called so, whoever rejects labels and methods and systems, even nominal rights and privileges, in order to create its own individual good’.[1]  This is a blog reflecting on the achievement of a queer modern idiom and ethic  on the meaning of ‘love’ in Charles Henri Ford and Parker Tyler’s (1988 reprint of the 1933 book) ‘The Young and Evil’.

‘… the importance of rescuing the defeated, the silenced and the dispossessed from the “enormous condescension of posterity”’.[1]  This is a blog on reading local histories in the context of modern constructions of global economics. It tries to understand what is added to understanding  the complexities behind terms like ‘class’ and ‘community’ in contemporary political … More ‘… the importance of rescuing the defeated, the silenced and the dispossessed from the “enormous condescension of posterity”’.[1]  This is a blog on reading local histories in the context of modern constructions of global economics. It reviews (although with an autobiographical stress) Huw Beynon and Ray Hudson’s (2021) ‘The Shadow of the Mine: Coal and the End of Industrial Britain’.

 ‘Does size matter?’ And other questions raised by the lack of cognitive scripts in genderqueer queer lives: Why we need to look again at a lost queer American novelist – Glenway Wescott, with a focus on the then unpublished story A Visit to Priapus in Wescott, G. (ed. Jerry Rosco with Wendy Moffat foreword) A … More ‘Does size matter?’ And other questions raised by the lack of cognitive scripts in genderqueer queer lives: Why we need to look again at a lost queer American novelist – Glenway Wescott, with a focus on the then unpublished story ‘A Visit to Priapus’ in Wescott, G. ‘A Visit to Priapus and Other Stories’ (2013)

‘What’s Spanish for “Stottie”’? This is a blog about our first visit to the overwhelming riches of, and in, The Spanish Gallery at Bishop Auckland, County Durham. With reference to Jonathan Ruffer (2021) [with Factum Arte and Factum Foundation and Skene Catling de la Peña] The Spanish Gallery: A Guide to the Works of Art, … More ‘What’s Spanish for “Stottie”’? This is a blog about our first visit to the overwhelming riches of, and in, The Spanish Gallery at Bishop Auckland, County Durham. With reference to Jonathan Ruffer (2021) ‘The Spanish Gallery: A Guide to the Works of Art’.

‘This book contains dead people. / …/ Caution: This work contains traces of eulogy. / …. / This book cannot change the ending or your ending or its own ending. … This book will not confirm if there is an afterlife or an alternative universe’.[1]  Thoughts about Salena Godden’s book in which symptoms like ‘grief, … More ‘This book contains dead people. / …/ Caution: This work contains traces of eulogy. /[1]: The artistic triumph and psychic conversion of the psychological ‘symptom’ in  Salena Godden’s  ‘Mrs Death Misses Death’ (2021). Will change @salenagodden if requested.

‘The teeming commercial life of the street had its own sensuality. … most people in these streets were men. Thomas derived such pleasure from observing them …/ …. he was like a child surrounded by things he dearly wanted, an almost unimaginable richness of them’.[1] The resurrection of imagined queer lives of famous writers of … More ‘The teeming commercial life of the street had its own sensuality. … most people in these streets were men. …/ …. he was like a child surrounded by things he dearly wanted, an almost unimaginable richness of them’.[1] A blog on critical treatment of  ‘The Magician’ (2021) by Colm Tóibín,  London, Viking (Penguin Books).

‘It’s not that easy being green.’[1]  (Kermit the Frog) This is a blog on why it is not easy to un-obscure the meaning of and story of David Lowery’s The Green Knight. It is incidentally also about how, why and how we saw the film at the Everyman Cinema in Liverpool, on Wednesday 29th September … More LIVERPOOL VISIT 5: ‘It’s not that easy being green.’[1]  (Kermit the Frog) This is a blog on why it is not easy to un-obscure the meaning of and story of David Lowery’s The Green Knight.

‘They narrate fragments of a psychic life we cannot reassemble for ourselves. It is hard, sometimes impossible, to figure out what kind of life Freud is painting slices of’.[1]  This is a blog on a visit to the Tate Liverpool, on Thursday 30th September 2021. The primary purpose was to see a retrospective exhibition Lucian … More LIVERPOOL VISIT 4: ‘They narrate fragments of a psychic life we cannot reassemble for ourselves. It is hard, sometimes impossible, to figure out what kind of life Freud is painting slices of’.[1]  This is a blog on a visit to the Tate Liverpool, on Thursday 30th September 2021. The primary purpose was to see a retrospective exhibition ‘Lucian Freud: Real Lives’.