Peter Kenny
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Time to shine
After a six hour rehearsal, a snap taken last night in The Duke of Wellington whose rehearsal room we are using. Left to right, James Kuszewski, Dylan Corbett-Bader, Kitty Underhill and Beth Symons all with well deserved cookie accessories. I think their performances are peaking at just the right time. Beth has struck the balance of ensuring the cast is well…
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A Glass of Nothing & We Three Kings
The, ah-hem, sophisticated Brighton Blonde marketing machine is grinding into action. Here is the flyer for my plays at The Marlborough Theatre (tweaked for the interweb). Tickets are available at The Marley’s website here. I am very proud of A Glass of Nothing. I am not someone who lovingly strokes my old work. But plays…
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A poet between worlds
Touchpapers by Tess Jolly, published by Eyewear Aviator 2016 Series There is a magic and darkly fairytale quality in Tess Jolly’s work which I greatly admire. The poetry is the product of a powerful imagination. In several poems a brother is depicted as a magical other, and their sibling relationship seems closest when dressing up, or playing imaginative games. my legs swinging,…
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What place has poetry in a post-truth world?
In a post-truth world, poets can be superheroes. We have special powers to illuminate the truth, and prick the bubbles of lazy fiction. We can bend words to say the right thing. This week, ‘post-truth’ was declared international word of the year by Oxford Dictionaries. I like new words, so I doff my cap to folks like Oxford-educated Michael…
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He who saw the deep
I listen to half a dozen podcasts every week. One of these is from BBC Radio 4 In Our Time, which is hosted by Melvyn Bragg, takes a scholarly subject (from the sciences and arts) every week and discusses it with experts. I learn lots from these podcasts. The recent episode about The Epic of Gilgamesh particularly inspired me. It featured the translator…
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The US Presidential election viewed as marketing
So following my look at the marketing slogans used in Brexit back in June, it came as little surprise that the Make America Great Again, message trumped the Stronger Together message. Once again, the learning is this: PUT A DAMN VERB IN YOUR SLOGAN IF YOU ARE ASKING PEOPLE TO TAKE ACTION. Every copywriter knows people need to be…
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Nostalgia, and other news
This time last week I was in Guernsey. I loved every moment of it. As soon as I set foot in my home parish of St Martin’s I feel surrounded by magic, and weirdly rebooted. The lanes are sedimented with decades of my memories, which provides the illusion that this is somehow my place. And I…
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Nina Conti on the edge of darkness
I saw Nina Conti’s In Your Face tour at the Brighton Dome last Saturday. The climax of her show, when she had seven people up on stage, wearing her masks on demonstrated her sheer bravery, improvisational skill and speed of thought in remembering all the accents and attributes she had given them. She had three moments…
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A portrait shot by Innis McAllister
The day before my 57th birthday last week, I had a photo session with the photographer Innis McAllister. Well known for his photography of beautiful models, Innis occasionally can be tempted to photograph the more aesthetically challenged. Frankly, I was rather pleased and amazed at his ability to turn a pig’s ear into a silk purse… Due to self-consciousness…
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Jessica Mookherjee’s ‘The Swell’ – hear her with Judy Brown, Siegfried Baber and Michaela Ridgway 19th Oct in Lewes
Gillian Clarke’s remarks on the pamphlet flap for Jessica Mookherjee’s Telltale Press pamphlet The Swell are spot on. Among them she says Jess’s poems are ‘Bold, fiery, truthful, they tell an original story with power’. Other than reading The Swell at a fairly late stage before publication, I had little to do with Jess’s pamphlet. Sarah Barnsley, who along with Robin…
Peter Kenny: a writer's notebook 