Christopher Kelly just had his novel published. “I probably won’t be turning up on The Oprah Winfrey Show, and I spent most of my advance while shopping for groceries last week at Target. But the realization of this goal has been tremendously gratifying, especially considering how many times I sank into a pit of despair, convincing myself that the book would never see the light of day. Now I even find myself in an odd and very enjoyable position: People are asking me how they should go about trying to write a novel.”
Tag: 10.03.07
Needed: New London Arts-Funding Scheme
“Change is urgently needed in the way Britain sustains its arts and better coordination between government and grant allocators might be a good solution. But what will become of us? wail chamber ensembles, pottery centres and poetry publishers up and down the land. Who in the new structures will understand our traditions and our needs? Have no fear, little ones. Nothing will happen overnight, but what should emerge by the 2012 Olympics is a method of joined-up arts funding that ought to work better for everyone – except, disturbingly, for London.”
50 Years Later – Even More Fears Of Censorship
Fifty years ago, “a San Francisco Municipal Court judge ruled that Allen Ginsberg’s Beat-era poem ‘Howl’ was not obscene. Yet today, a New York public broadcasting station decided not to air the poem, fearing that the Federal Communications Commission will find it indecent and crush the network with crippling fines.”
File-Sharing Trial Goes To The Jury
Testimony has wrapped up in the first trial of an alleged file-sharing music thief in Duluth, Minnesota, and a verdict is possible as early as today. The defendant, who called no witnesses in her defense, is counting on a jury made up of people who described themselves as not computer-savvy to believe her contention that, despite circumstantial evidence linking her to the downloads, she was not the user who downloaded 1,700 songs without paying.
How Hytner Has Built A Better National Theatre
“What’s the secret of Nicholas Hytner’s success? Cheap tickets, obviously: the £10-ticket scheme in the Olivier is the most radical, yet basically simple, audience-building idea in my lifetime. But Hytner has also realised a fundamental truth: that there is no longer a single, monolithic audience for theatre but a series of separate constituencies, hence his scheduling of canonical classics by Shakespeare, Shaw and Coward for the “brochure” audience. He has also realised that there is a younger group hungering for a more innovative kind of physical theatre.”
Julia Fischer Wins At Classic FM Gramophone Awards
The Classic FM Gramophone Awards are the biggest of their kind in the world, and the classical music awards combine votes from 15 classical radio networks from 13 different countries. “Held at the Dorchester Hotel in London, this year’s ceremony was dedicated to the memory of Luciano Pavarotti, who died last month. German violinist Julia Fischer has walked away with the award for Artist of the Year.”
A Legislative Assault On Imagination?
“New legislation threatens to move us further from the dream of free expression in the arts than we were 50 years ago. When the difference between our fantasies and our external actions is elided, we erase a belief in our own reason. This is bad, bad, bad for literature – for what is it but reason that confronts, makes sense of and articulates the mad transgressions of our individual imaginations.”
O’Brien Wins Third Forward Prize
Sean O’Brien has pulled off an unprecedented third victory in the Forward prize, cementing his place as a Forward favourite by winning the £10,000 prize for best collection with The Drowned Book.
Time To Retire The Turner Prize?
“For years the Turner has held its own as the most talked-about fixture in the art-world calendar.” But a show of past Turner winners comes up empty. “The Turner loses its spirit when the winners are dissected out. The comparisons are the body of the prize, and it is the debate that lends it its soul. These are all missing.”
Has UK TV And Radio Abandoned Kids?
Ofcom, the UK’s broadcasting regulator, has “called for a ‘national debate’ on the future of children’s television after publishing research that found that a generation of young teenagers felt disenfranchised by broadcasters.”