Incurable Romantic Seeks Dirty Filthy Whore

Art i am lusting after... Harland Miller's new penguin prints from Other Criteria. What's annoying is when i first saw one of these and loved it, it was £500. now they are selling for £1,250. Fuck, bugger, bollocks.

10 stories about smoking

Always a sucker for a book jacket that has the wow factor, one that does so by brazenly flouting current social etiquettes is likely to appeal to me even more. And so to Stuart Evers' Ten Stories about Smoking which looks, as you might have guessed, like a rather stylish giant cigarette packet, and which is filled with ten smoky tales metaphorically sucked through the filter of a cigarette, a cigarette that's both tantalisingly tangential and central to each of the plots.


Flicking back the flip top of a (quasi-contraband) giant cigarette packet in an enclosed public space inevitably has its thrills (for me, anyway), and so I did it, not only did it, but loved doing it - right there, on the tube, in plain sight of everyone; I eased out the stories from the packet, and it gave me an illicit buzz. But that's where the gimmick ended...

The stories don't disappoint, far from it - inhaling each story is a hauntingly wonderful experience; each muses with pensive melancholy on life - on love, betrayal, destruction and seduction - and circumnavigates the central tenet that there's a certain empty (and destructive?) hollowness lurking at the centre of human emotion and existence, however intense or robust they may seem. Much like a cigarette itself. Moving and thought provoking, there's a beautiful delicacy to the way these tales of disaffection burn down to the filter, searing to the core of fragile human sensitivity like a butt stubbed out on the flesh.

The book's launch party, open to the public and on from 7.30pm - 10.30pm, Wed 23rd at The Queen of Hoxton, £5, should be an amazing event with artists from the worlds of film, theatre, music and spoken word reinterpreting the 10 stories...

5x15: a mixed bag, but worth it

The last time i went to 5x15 (a monthly storytelling event a bit like The Moth in NYC, and where 5 speakers each stand up and talk for 15 minutes about a subject of their choosing) it was for the launch,and I'm thrilled the project has gone from strength to strength. Happily the second strength has landed them in The Union Chapel on Upper Street, rather than The Tabernacle in Notting Hill which is not only SUPER convenient for me (I live very near) but such a fabulous location - candlelight, columns and stained glass windows certainly lend a certain theatrical grandeur to the proceedings.

Monday night's speakers included the rather ill-prepared Janet Street-Porter who ranted about dining out and waxed lyrical about shower caps; Jay Rayner who treated us to an impromptu jazz performance on the ivories and raved about it's wonders; Paper Cinema staged a paper animation of a sinister Edgar Allen Poe story involving a town overrun with the dead who terrorise then woo the villagers; Tiger Mother Amy Chua, (above, teeny tiny) who agitatedly attempted to defend her rather draconian and exacting parenting methods; and the glorious, inspiring, thoroughly wonderful Judith Kerr, author of one of my favourite books of all time, When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit - a fictionalised account of her own childhood flight from pre-WWII Germany to Switzerland, Paris and eventually London - which is what she talked about here: she was utterly magical to hear, especially with her cut glass war-time accent. 

For more info, visit 5x15.

MORE book shelf porn

In The New York Times today were these seriously cool pictures of bookshelves, which cater to my specialist interest in bookshelf porn. The feature was about some guy in the US, whose job is to make bookshelves in the homes and properties of moneyed, artsy types look uber cool. This might involve wrapping them in silver jackets to match the decor (below), sourcing books along a theme to compliment the location of the house (Westerns and cowboy themed books for the wild west, bottom), or simply making a fucking show-stopping arrangement, as above, which (in case you missed it) is The American Flag. Impressive. 

Tracey Emin @ Louis Vuitton

I braved Louis Vuitton's new(ish) shop on Bond Street yesterday to have a snoop at the Tracey Emin  curated book shelf  in the 'Louis Vuitton Librarie'. To be honest it's a thoroughly intimidating experience, with about 702 staff greeting you emphatically as you enter the vastly spacious shiny, glitteringly gold and twinkling 3 floor store - light bounces off seemingly every surface: the floor to ceiling mirrors, gold chains, polished-to-within-an-inch-of-their-lives surfaces - buckles, glass cabinets, patent shoes and bags, watches, sparkling jewellery. It's the epitome of indulgently luxurious retail heaven, a sort of cloying, claustrophobic, decadent shopping overload that attacks you from every angle an inveigles itself into your soul. on the first floor though is the fabled Librarie, where there are a series of shelves that act as an art installation cum cultural shopping experience... artists curate a wall of books that have helped shape their lives, influenced their work and that they've written. It's a curious creation that works surprisingly well. Tracey Emin's books include, amongst others, a healthy smattering of Amistead Maupin, Graeme Green's The End of The Affair, Raymond Carver's What We talk About When We Talk About Love; A.A.Milne's Winnie the Pooh; Breakfast at Tiffany’s by Truman Capote; Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky; Laughter in the Dark by Vladimir Nabokov, plus a few of her own books. You can buy any of those on display. Sort of beats 'Waterstone's recommends', at any rate.
TRACEY EMIN AT LOUIS VUITTON LIBRAIRIE
12 October - 30 November 2010

The New Yorker Festival

The New Yorker has a festival; a weekend literary one. In NYC, obvs. anyway, by luck (the luck of the Icelandic volcano that postponed my trip by 6 months), I was in town for this year's one. Obviously i didn't go to all the events, but i did go to a few, my favourite being The New Yorker teaming up with The Moth. The Moth organises storytelling nights where speakers come and tell a story, a true story: no notes, lasting no more than 10 mins. We have something similar in London 5x15 (the one on the 18th Oct has a great line up), but it's less storytelling than a talk, still good though. The Moth nights also generally have a theme... this collaboration with The New Yorker saw New Yorker writers tell a true story about working at the New Yorker. It was completely fascinating as the stories behind the stories emerged - the luck of the first OJ trial expose by Jeffrey Toobin, Jane Mayer's story behind abuse at Abu Graib. they were completely engrossing - truly brilliant - and all without notes... no hesitation, repetition or confusion.

At another event I also heard Zadie Smith and Michael Chabon talk about their work - here's a video link to them discussing their preferences for writing fiction/non-fiction. Zadie Smith seemed on edge. Michael Chabon, well, i think i might just be in love.

Bookshelf Porn

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I have fallen HEAD OVER HEELS in love with a blog... Bookshelf Porn; images of piles and piles, row upon row of books - in shops, houses, on the streets, as art installations, as pictures... anyone who has been into my flat will understand why i love it so much. below are a few pics from the site. Above is my personal favourite image of books; it's a photo taken by my friend Jo, of a picture she saw for sale in a gallery, and which she thought I'd like (correct) and which takes the blog's title perhaps a little too literally. Actually, probably not literally ENOUGH, but illustrates how much i was predisposed, nay preconditioned to love this blog.
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Apects of Love

Ok, so i thought it was about time that a pair of pneumatic, grossly inflated breasts were no longer the first thing anyone clapped eyes on when they clicked on my blog... it's time to finally post something new after AEONS.

And so to Andrew Lloyd Webber's Aspects of Love, currently showing at The Menier Chocolate Factory, on Southwark High Street. a few things we should probably clarify. i was brought up on Andrew Lloyd Webber. Starlight Express, Phantom, Cats, Jesus Christ Superstar - the lot. if you'd ever like anyone to break out into an impromptu out-of-tune rendition of Jacob and Sons (from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat), I'm your woman. Whilst other, cooler parents, were playing Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen to their sprogs, my sisters and i had Don't Cry for Me Argentina blaring out of the car stereo thanks to my mother's involvement with 'The Really Useful Group', a financial team behind ALW. Secondly, after several years of trying to deny my love of all things musical (which clearly i deemed an affliction forced upon me), i surrendered to the inevitable, and now wholeheartedly love them. Fiddler on the Roof, Oklahoma!, My Fair Lady - the whole raft. not all of them, it has to be said, but lots. most. arguably too many. Still, Aspects of Love is a corker if you ask me. It's much more operatic than a usual musical - it's definitely not made up of pizazzy show tune numbers or huge song and dance extravaganzas in the way something that Guys and Dolls is. And the story is exceptional.

Based on the novel by David Garnett, it tells the story of young and impressionable Alex, a coltish lad who, at 19, falls in love with Rose - a beautiful French actress - older, brazen, wild, ballsy, impetuous, demanding and with a taste for the theatrical - as much off stage as on. His puppyish adoration sweeps her off her feet (eventually) and they decamp to his guardian's house in Avignon where they spend a few blissful days basking in the golden, melifluous, summery rays of love. Hearing of Alex's occupation of his home, Alex's guardian leaves his lover Julietta in Venice and hotfoots it back to Avignon... and so begins a 'love quintet' that weaves between generations and propels the story forward with its sexual vigour and lusty voraciousness. Literally not more than five minutes go buy without somebody unexpectedly jumping into bed with an entirely unsuitable lover, or generally behaving in a lunatic way that can only be attributed to being driven mad by love. It's completely compelling, even more so when you know the story behind the novel/musical.

David Garnett was part of the Bloomsbury set, and as a young man was the lover of Duncan Grant. Grant later went on to have an affair with Vanessa Bell, sister of Virgina Woolf and married to Clive Bell. They had a child, Angelica, over whose cot David Garnett stood and vowed to marry her. 20 years later he did. Aspects of Love is a thinly veiled dramatisation of this history, with a few gender switches. It's nothing if not histrionic. in the best possible way. as if there was any other way.

Trevor Nunn's production at this former chocolate factory (such a cool venue, both for plays and dinner... despite permanently Saharan temperatures; every time you go it's sweltering and you see audience members pealing off layers like stars of the Burlesque stage) is truly wonderful. Despite universally terrible wigs and the chronic misjudgement of a scene-stealing dress (think of a dress that has the significance of Rebecca's dress that the new Mrs de Winter wears by mistake), which was more belly dancer than belle of the ball (totally extraordinary) - it was pacey, moving, wholeheartedly emotional - the song 'Seeing is Believing' literally made my hair stand on end. Loved the whole thing.

Set in the inter war years, the fashion was utterly glorious, and given my penchant for 1940s/50s clothes, i sat there desperately wanting to rip the clothes of Rose - fabulous 1950s dresses, plus a rather cool high waisted-turn up-trousers-and-braces look on one of the extras.

But what really made the show was the chemistry between all the leads - it crackled between each one, but was totally different depending on who was involved - playful and naughty, sensual and artistic, puppyish and devotional - there really were languages of love spoken through their bodies as well as in the songs they sang. and also the singing was superb - none of the OTT 1980s stuff; thoughtful, moving, intense - but not ridiculous. cringe factor was low, in other words. the Menier is so intimate, cosy and unflashy, it was perfect for a toned down production of what up until now has been a bells and whistles West End musical. I'm not sure it'll wholly convert a non-musical lover - but at £35, it's worth a try, I'd say. the two people who i invited (read partially dragged) - one of whom edited Angelica Garnett's most recent book, The Unspoken Truth - loved it, despite one of them jokingly (only half i suspect) threatening to walk out at half time even before curtain up.

The Killer Inside Me

It's rare that i'm so deeply affected by something that i'm virtually incapable of actually reacting to it for a while. stunned, in other words, is not something i'm familiar with. still, i was reminded of how this feels in a supremely visceral way yesterday afternoon when i watched The Killer Inside Me, a Michael Winterbottom film that's an adaptation of a Jim Thompson crime novel. It really took me until today to begin to understand how upset i was by it.

The film is an unquestionably disturbing noirish thriller centering on the character Lou Ford, a chirpy, unassuming small town deputy sheriff: a man seemingly preoccupied with being polite, gentlemanly and doling out inane platitudes and aphorisms, but whose run-in with a local prostitute (Jessica Alba) unearths repressed child molestation memories, subsequently unleashing sado-masochistic sexual desires and ultimately serial killer brutality. brutality which is mainly inflicted on women. ones he loves. this is where the problems lie for me.

Now, it has to be said, the performances are exceptional, even when what they are doing is virtually unwatchable. Casey Affleck's portrait of the deputy sheriff is the film's centrepiece: apparently so sweet and harmless he is in reality deeply, cruelly vile - Affleck pulls off nothing short of a coup, avoiding all serial killer cliches. Stanley Tucci in the abysmal The Lovely Bones should have ditched his comb over and NHS glasses and taken a lesson from his book. Jessica Alba and Kate Hudson as the virtual doppelganger good/bad girl lovers utterly convince with their blinded-by-love devotion, despite knowing the extent of the evil which is the object of their affection. the supporting cast of semi-curious small town oddballs manage to be both quirky individuals yet they never really make you shift your focus from the lead - which is pitch perfect as really it's all about him. his brazen, uncompromising, chillingly breezy brand of heinous, brutal savagery.

It's a fascinating portrait of a emergent serial killer, and it wasn’t the violence per se I had a problem with (though i found it unwatchable and spent a good deal of time hiding behind my fingers), but the sexualised nature of the violence. It seemed that there was a sexual nature to the brutality of the killing of the women (that you didn’t get with the men who were killed), in that there was a certain enjoyment in the killings, in sexual terms, which went beyond the actions/thoughts of the murderous character and transferred to the audience as a kind of sexual voyeurism. That I had a problem with. I rarely get up fired up about feminist things but I really found this aspect of the film so disturbing because it felt like a function of the direction, not simply the plot.

Had i read these articles before i went in, i might have been somewhat better prepared... though no less upset.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/filmblog/2010/jan/26/the-killer-inside-me-sundance

http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/movies/2010/01/26/2010-01-26_jessica_alba_leaves_screening_of_the_killer_inside_me_stirring_outrage_at_sundan.html

MY KultureFlash Recommendations this week

KF recommendations - click to read why :

Micmacs - Jean Pierre Jeunet's latest cinematic outing (above)

Jewish Book Week - especially the following:

27th Feb, 8.30pm Sex, Lies and Regal Japes; The story of Esther, the sex-crazed king and his evil counsellor - David Aaronovitch, Katte Lette and Simon Schama amongst others Chaired by David Schneider
28th Feb, 2pm A Beginners Guide to Jews on the Edge – Adam Thirlwell and Will Self
28th 6.30pm Clarice Lispector - Benjamin Moser on the glamorous Brazilian woman who “ looked like Marlene Dietrich and wrote like Virginia Woolf”, chaired by Ed Caesar.
1st March 7pm Voodoo Histories - Davis Aaronovitch and Frances Wheen
1st March 8.30pm Judeities - Helene Cixous, Chair Nicholas Royle
5th March 1pm Chez Elles - Agnes Desarthe and Claudia Roden
6th March, 7.30pm 36 Arguments for The Existence of God – Rebecca Goldstein and Steven Pinker
6th March, 9pm True Tales - John Canter, Esther David, Rachel Holmes, Ed Kritzler and Irma Kurtz, hosted by Lana Citron.
7th March, 12.30pm The Human Condition - Lionel Shriver and Amy Bloom

5x15

Last night was the first in a series of literary soirees called 5x15, an event organised by Rosie Boycott and her daughter and held at the Tabernacle, in Notting Hill. The idea stemmed from a conversation held over a glass of wine at The Tabernacle about how nice it would be if someone would tell them a story while they sat there and drank; a short, punchy story. And so 5x15 was born, where five thinkers stand up and tell a story in 15 minutes to the assembled drinkers. The effect is a bit like a 'thinker's cabaret'. It's an ideal set-up; if you like the story you can buy the extended version (their book) from the makeshift Lutyens & Rubenstein stall in the hall after the event, if not, you only have to suffer the boreathon for 15 minutes. the opening storytellers were Rupert Sheldrake talking about morphic resonance - more interesting than it sounds, trust me; Hannah Rosthchild talking about her idiosyncratic and eccentric aunt's fascinating relationship with Thelonious Monk, Jack Klaff's quite frankly incomprehensible story about, well, actually i still don't know, and don't care for that matter so long as it came to an end; Hanan al-Shaykh chutzpah tale about her rebellious, impetuous mother, who bucked the system in 1930s Lebanon; and Sara Wheeler who regaled us with stories from her intrepid trip round the arctic (so good i bought Magnetic North following the talk).

I thoroughly recommend the eve - £15 well spent. the next one is on the 22nd, i can't go, but i'm definitely going on the 13th March i think (or thereabouts) - speakers include Beth Orton and Deborah Moggach - two people whose work i adore.

Important Artifacts...

Important Artifacts and Personal Property from the Collection of Leonore Doolan and Harold Morris... When i say this is the most incredible book, i really, REALLY mean it. I've been giving it to everyone - for Christmas, birthdays, as just a general outpouring of love.... you name it - if i like you, you'll be receiving one soon. Everyone MUST read it. It's a sort of novel-cum-art exhibition set out in the form of an auction catalogue, showing the possessions of a couple, collected over the course of their four year relationship. the first two entry lots are photographs of the protagonists - Leonore, a 26 year old, rather neurotic (as it transpires) food columnist for The New York Times and Harold, 39 year old photojournalist and emotional commitmentphobe. the third lot is an invitation to the Halloween party where they first met, and lot 6 is the scrumpled napkin with Leonore's email address scribbled on it (presumably which she gave to Harold at teh party). the story progresses thus, with the explanations for each lot filling in the gaps where necessary - the visual and written-through walking comfortably hand-in-hand. Collected items include mix tapes they make for one another, books with inscriptions, presents given, notes scribbled on theatre tickets, clothes, junk shop finds, love letters, work emails, photographs, newspaper clippings... it's both heartwarming and heartbreaking, and always inspiring to read as their love first blossoms, then falters, thrives, stumbles, trips, picks itself up - all chronicled through the weird, wonderful, mundane, creative and bizarre ephemera they collect.... . I cried, i laughed, i WANTED their life, i was really glad my life wasn't like theirs. Buy it, honestly, it is so completely brilliant it is almost criminal. plus they are ruining it by making it into a film with Natalie Portman and Brad Pitt which is SACRILEGE.

Bad Sex

My most favourite bookish party of the year was on Monday; Bad Sex, thrown by The Literary Review at the In and Out Club on St James Square. I started going when i used to work at The Erotic Review, and now go (well, gatecrash) every year. it's such fun. anyway, the prize is supposed to be for a bad sex scene (a sex scene written badly as oppose to a scene about terrible sex) that has been needlessly inserted into a good book, and this year's winner was the above - Jonathan Littell's The Kindly Ones. And indeed, the excerpt that was read out was indeed rather odd... (though not the worst of the selection if you ask me: see Amos Oz's Rhyming Life and Death).

"Her vulva was opposite my face. The small lips protruded slightly from the pale, domed flesh. This sex was watching at me, spying on me, like a Gorgon's head, like a motionless Cyclops whose single eye never blinks. Little by little this silent gaze penetrated me to the marrow. My breath sped up and I stretched out my hand to hide it: I no longer saw it, but it still saw me and stripped me bare (whereas I was already naked). If only I could still get hard, I thought, I could use my prick like a stake hardened in the fire, and blind this Polyphemus who made me Nobody. But my cock remained inert, I seemed turned to stone. I stretched out my arm and buried my middle finger into this boundless eye. The hips moved slightly, but that was all. Far from piercing it, I had on the contrary opened it wide, freeing the gaze of the eye still hiding behind it. Then I had an idea: I took out my finger and, dragging myself forward on my forearms, I pushed my forehead against this vulva, pressing my scar against the hole. Now I was the one looking inside, searching the depths of this body with my radiant third eye, as her own single eye irradiated me and we blinded each other mutually: without moving, I came in an immense splash of white light, as she cried out: 'What are you doing, what are you doing?' and I laughed out loud, sperm still gushing in huge spurts from my penis, jubilant, I bit deep into her vulva to swallow it whole, and my eyes finally opened, cleared, and saw everything."

Charles Dance presented the award. He is HOT. i have had a major crush on him for years and it went stratospheric.

The New V&A Bookshop

I am obsessed with the shop at the V&A. The postcards, the knick-knacks, the jewellery, the scarves... well, just about everything, especially the books. The V&A's in-house publications are amazing - by my bed i have Shocking Life, Elsa Schiaparelli's autobiography, From A to Biba, Barbara Hulaniki's autobiography and The Surreal Body: Fetish and Fashion, by GhislaineWood; all published by the V&A. So i was v excited to hear that they've extracted the books dotted around the museum shop and consolidated their collection in one, big, shiny, ubersleek Bookshop, thus also leaving more room for glorious exhibition ephemera on the mainshopfloor (BTW the Stephen Jones curated Hats exhibition at the mo means there some fabulous hats on sale). The bookshop's opening was on friday, and i went along to kick start my night of generally careering around town trying to do too much in one evening. It rocks: it's cool and bright and airy with a design minimalism that lets the books speak for themselves. I mainlined the books posters on sale... coming away with Vanessa Bell's illustration for the cover of Mrs Dalloway - which i've had my eye on ever since i featured it in my Christmas gift guide last year for work. actually, i subsequently worked out that even with my discount it would have worked out cheaper if i'd bought it online, but anyway, i really enjoyed carrying it into the various parties i went on to. not. especially as one was a birthday and there was an awkward moment when the birthday girl might have thought it was meant for her. that was fun. still all worth it in the end, now it's safely home and waiting for a good seeing to by the framers.

Wetlands

Utterly repulsed, slightly sullied, but weirdly impressed is pretty much how i feel having just finished Charlotte Roche's Wetlands. Repulsed because on the first page i was already on familiar terms with the rosette of the heroine's anus, and by the last page i felt like she'd made me do a shot of a cocktail of all of her bodily fluids. ALL OF THEM. from tears to things that the thought of drinking make my stomach twist, nostrils flair, shoulders hunch forward and eyes squeeze shut. and YET, and yet... i was pretty impressed that someone had the balls to write something so amazingly shocking, something that basically says 'fuck you' to our ideas of sanitised sexual and physical perfection. I have to say, that the moment i read about Wetlands in the Sunday newspapers last week, how people had fainted at readings, but how it was a bestseller in Germany and how basically sick it was, i dug it out from my pile of review books at work (HOW the fuck had i missed it??? no idea) and by about paragraph three knew i wasn't going to be disappointed by the hype. But my GOD. i honestly hadn't envisioned having to read it pressed up again my face on the tube because i was terrified someone might read it over my shoulder. or that my face would contort in disgust so much as i read it, my facial muscles actually HURT. or, indeed that i would laugh out loud when i read it (which i NEVER do. smirk appreciatively, maybe, never actually make a sound). I should probably say at this point that it's about an 18 year old girl called Helen who ends up in hospital after cutting herself when shaving her arse, and because she has hemorrhoids, it all gets infected and they have to operate. for the entire duration of the book she's safely ensconced in the proctology unit in various stages of recovery. she is OBSESSED with her body and its fluids and that's all the book is basically about (i mean there's some tangental stuff about getting her divorced parents back together but, pretty it's much 'whatever'on that front). and the avocado on the cover relates to her pet hobby, an elaborate rebirthing of avocado stones - i'll leave you to imagine how that works. and basically i loved it. and hated it. but loved it more.