Thesis Snipping

This week is turning out to be tricky. No novel work for me, though I've successfully managed to juggle PhD commitments with some rewriting since Christmas. The work I'm doing at the moment requires my full attention. My characters are battling for head space alongside Wilkie Collins and Edmund Yates characters and, to be quite honest, they're getting a bit muddled up there. The next time I go back to my novel draft it wouldn't surprise me if my placid but sarcastic characters began indulging in some accidental bigamy.

The crux of the problem is my fourth thesis chapter, also known as the thesis chapter of doom/thesis chapter from hell/thesis chapter I'm going to set fire to. I mentioned how much trouble I was having with it in November (here, with Victor Meldrew references). I said I was having 'wild ideas' about hitting the delete button. You know what I did the other day? Deleted over 8,000 words, the entire section of analysis, and went back to the drawing board.

I found that trying to rewrite what was already in there was a nightmare. Plot description mixed up with argument mixed up with quotes mixed up with points I didn't really know I was making - it was all a mess. Hitting the 'delete' button was a moment of trauma but I've started to build it back up slowly with 1400 words written in that last few days. I'm not exactly a self-confident type of person but I'm 90% sure that the words I've put in are far superior to the ones I removed. Then again, at this point, I would say that! To be honest, whether it's true or not, I need to believe it for now. Otherwise I'll just be stranded in no-man's land; safe in the knowledge that the work I had before wasn't good enough and incapable of moving forward. At least I'm moving, that's what I keep telling myself.

I have a supervisor meeting next Thursday. So that's a week to get things into shape while I'm away for most of the weekend... Ouch. Better not think of it in those terms either!

Classic Film Review: Stage Struck (1958)

Stage Struck stars Susan Strasberg as Eva Lovelace, an aspiring actress who has travelled to New York intent on getting her big break, not realising quite how difficult that's going to be. She visits the office of big producer Lewis Easton (Henry Fonda) where she also encounters screenwriter Joe Sheridan (Christopher Plummer) and makes a favourable impression on actor Robert Harley Hedges (Herbert Marshall). Her hopes are repeatedly dented, though, especially because one role she might be good for is already occupied by the formidable Rita Vernon (Joan Greenwood). To add to Eva's problems, she's also fallen in love with Easton...

Unfortunately, the central performance in this film was abysmal. I suspect the intention was to make the character dreamy and flighty but it failed spectacularly - she became irritating, repetitive and the only moment I felt any sort of positive feeling for the character was when she was quoting Juliet. In fact, Strasberg's whole performance reeks of her trying to play Juliet throughout. This was disappointing because my first experience of Strasberg in Picnic (1955, reviewed here) was positive. I just don't think Stage Struck was a particularly good fit for her.

The rest of the cast improved matters. Christopher Plummer, in his film debut, was nothing short of sublime as Joe, the writer who falls hopelessly in love with Eva in a way that doesn't feel contrived. Equally, Herbert Marshall's performance as Hedges is brilliant. He provides a nice, calm foil to Strasberg which takes the edge off some of her more manic moments. Henry Fonda generally works well as Easton, although the love affair with Eva leaves much to be desired. I came away thinking that the Strasberg/Plummer pairing was much more desirable that the Strasberg/Fonda, though I appreciated the ending.

Perhaps the main trouble with this film was the central performance. There are some nice insights into comprising and how the theatre works along with some brilliant supporting performances. However, it lacked, for me, a lead character I want to see succeed. I'll admit, I wanted Eva to fail and go home to the country. Maybe not the effect the writers were going for.

Picking a Rewrite Speed

A little look at at my work diary for the past two weeks tells me that I've reviewed three classic films, two books and written three other blog posts. I've spent four afternoons going through a Wilkie Collins biog for every scrap of information I may ever need to know and a long evening arguing with British Periodicals to get some articles loaded up for a paper I want to write. I've created a 245 point list of terror detailing the changes I'd like to make on my thesis chapters as they stand and I spent one agonising day trying to write the appendix that refuses to be written. I've also finished the last third of a play and added nearly 20,000 words to a novel rewrite. Oh, and I did some babysitting and a Sheffield trip too. No wonder I'm shattered!

The thing about this novel rewrite is that it's one I can and should do rapidly. Effectively, it's another first draft. The characters involved in this novel have been in my head since I was 16. They've been in scripts, they've been in three different locations to date. I failed in 2011 to complete NaNoWriMo with them and then managed it in 2012 - after a location switch and a POV change. The NaNo draft was all from the POV of one character - Lauren - while my previous attempt had been from six points of view. You know what I'm doing now, right? Yep, going back to a structure where all characters get a section to themselves. Six different voices and an alteration in the organisation of the setting.

So I'm treating the rewrite as another first draft. Most of the general structure and relationships is staying the same but nearly all of the specifics are being altered. I've only referred twice to the first draft so far and that was for pieces of dialogue I didn't want to lose. Essentially, it's a different novel, albeit it with lingering and very persistent characters. If I didn't treat it like I do my first drafts (get it down, get it done, get on with something else) I'd be wasting time. The 'second draft' isn't going to be in any kind of decent state, just as the first draft wasn't. I need to get the new structure on the page, play around with the new voices, then fix it later. Just the way it has to be.

After that, there's an entirely different prospect. I've got a second draft currently standing at 14,000 words that requires concentration, precision, thought about every word. That will take much longer. It's all about knowing what different projects require. And, for me at the moment, it's all about working on them without stressing too much about what I'm going to do with them. Writing's enough right now. After all, this is the year of the thesis...right?

A Little Serenity

When I went on a cruise in October, the majority of the entertainment on board was grating to say the least. Cabaret acts and bad classical, not much in the middle. There was one singer and one pianist who captured my heart but, apart from those exceptions, the ship was a mass of noise with people everywhere, people practically coming out of my nose. Even so, I managed to find a little piece of serenity in the strangest place.

The buffet was understandably packed at mealtimes. You couldn't hear yourself think, let alone hear the music they put on in the background - I fail to see why they bothered really. But one afternoon, when I was pretty upset to be honest, I ventured in to afternoon tea. It was quiet, exceptionally quiet. I took a seat (and a few scones), leaned back and closed my eyes. Then opened them again. I could hear the music. What's more, it was Judy Garland and Gene Kelly singing 'For Me and My Gal'.

The beauty of being me is that it usually only takes me seconds to identify the song I'm listening to. From the first bars I knew this was the full-length screen version of the song, not the shorted recording Judy and Gene recorded to promote the film. I started singing softly, tapping along to the music. The way I felt at that particular moment, I couldn't help myself. Judy and Gene were just the tonic I needed and everybody else could take a running jump off the back of the ship.

I became aware, though, that I wasn't the only one singing and tapping. A few tables down to my left there was an elderly gentleman, also sat alone, doing the same thing. For the length of the song, we quietly duetted, both descending into some sort of conducting during the long instrumental. I closed my eyes, picturing that dance in the back of mind, but I was still acutely aware of my singing partner.

The song ended. His wife returned and we exchanged a smile. That was it. I never saw him again. But, for a few moments on a crowded ship, I'd located serenity. The fact that it involved Judy dancing with Gene shouldn't surprise anybody, least of all me.

Classic Film Review: Summer Magic (1963)

Summer Magic stars Hayley Mills as the daughter of a widow who is forced to sell most of their belongings and their house following a disastrous investment by her late husband. Nancy Carey (Mills) remembers this beautiful house they once saw in the country and has written, embellishing a little on their circumstances, to see if it's available. Osh Popham (Burl Ives), unofficially looking after the property while its owner is away, takes pity - without informing the owner. When the family arrive and settle in, Mrs Popham (Una Merkel) keeps threatening to tell the Careys the truth but good-hearted Osh keeps dodging around the issue. The cast is rounded out by Dorothy McGuire as Margaret Carey, Eddie Hodges as Gilly Carey, Michael J. Pollard as Digby Popham and Peter Brown as Tom Hamilton.

With songs by the Sherman brothers, I'm surprised this film isn't more popular. It's a classic Saturday afternoon family film with a mix of childish antics (such as the youngest boy's adventures with his dog) to the more grown-up preoccupations of love and rejection. The songs have slipped out of the popular consciousness for the most part, with only 'Ugly Bug Ball' being instantly recognisable. However, 'Flitterin'' is classic Sherman and it's pretty catchy, along with 'Beautiful Beulah' and 'Femininity'. It's noticeable that Mills is such a big star at this point that no one minds that her singing's below par - while Dorothy McGuire as her mother is dubbed!

With the arrival of a cousin halfway through, the film does feel a little bogged down with people. But, for the most part, it's sweet enough with various little plot lines to follow. Burl Ives is fantastic and Hayley Mills' performance is just what I expected. It's shaky in places but, ultimately, an enjoyable film, made all the better by Ives singing 'Ugly Bug Ball'. However, here's one you may not have heard...

Book Review: Starlight by Stella Gibbons

Starlight is the fourth Stella Gibbons novel I've read (and I still haven't touched Cold Comfort Farm, the most famous). It centres on a run-down house in London where elderly sisters Gladys and Annie Barnes live with the eccentric Mr Fisher - he changes his name every month for variety - in the flat above. They get a shock one day when the house is abruptly sold to a 'rackman' and the residents fear for their survival. However, the new owner simply installs his wife, Mrs Pearson, and her new German maid, Erika, in the house in the hope that it'll improve his wife's health. His wife, we soon learn, claims to have been a medium in the past and the other residents of the house begin to think she's possessed by an evil spirit. Rounding out the cast are the vicar and his curate and Peggy Pearson, the daughter, amongst others.

This was a much darker novel than the others I've read by Gibbons but still comic in tone. The last quarter, specifically, starting with a horrific attack referred to so casually at first that the significance of it is downplayed until it intrudes on the house itself up until the final pages is very dark. It was creepier than I expected, given the light-hearted tone of much of the novel. The flashes of darkness didn't really prepare me for the climax.

In terms of characterisation, Gibbons succeeds once again. Gladys is a chatterbox, the perfect character to follow around, even if you have to reread her speeches a few times to realise what she's actually wittering on about (think Miss Bates in Emma). Her sister, Annie, is much quieter and the soft friendship which springs up between her and Mr Fisher is so slight that it could almost pass the reader by - only one character comments on it, and it's not chatterbox Gladys. Mr Fisher holds his own secrets, walking Hampstead Heath by night with a purpose not fully revealed until the end of the book. Gibbons certainly has an interest in foreigners acclimatising to their new surroundings - Erika is an interesting enough specimen, especially when Gladys takes it upon herself to teach her English and how to do things. As for the rest - Peggy and her employers feel like the most superfluous of the cast, but they do serve a purpose, while the vicar and curate provide a nice contrast to each other in terms of personality and the direction their faith takes them.

The beauty of having Gladys as a primary character is that you go off on tangents without really noticing, as she links one thing to another and talks to the point of driving everyone to madness. Her interactions with the vicar and, especially, the curate are the most hilarious in the book. The actual meat of the plot - the medium and her problems - doesn't take up as much space as you'd assume it would. Starlight is another Gibbons novel that covers life in all its forms and this variety is perhaps why I enjoy her novels so much.

Although I've had issues with her endings in the past, this time I actually thought the finale fitted the book. It brought us back, as it were, from the murky events of the previous chapter, and provided a decent ending for two of the most important characters.

I don't think any Gibbons novel will overtake the fondness I have for Westwood but I found Starlight to be enjoyable and, yet, thought-provoking. A few too many adverbs for my tastes but not to the detriment of the book as a whole.

Classic Film Review: Carnival Boat (1932)

Carnival Boat stars William Boyd as Buck Gannon, a lumberjack frequently at odds with his father and foreman, Jim (Hobart Bosworth). One of the things they disagree on is Buck's relationship with Honey (Ginger Rogers), an entertainer on the carnival boat that occasionally docks nearby. Jim has been told he's to retire at the end of the season and is desperate for Buck to take his place but, apart from Buck's distractions, there's also a human problem in the shape of Hack (Fred Kohler), who wants the foreman job for himself.

This is a lacklustre film redeemed by a few good stunts. The title really is disingenuous when the majority of the action takes place at the lumber camp. The boat is very much peripheral and so too, sadly, is Ginger Rogers. Because we don't see much of the romance between Honey and Buck, it feels contrived and Rogers only really has one scene in this early film where the excellent actress she will become in a few years expresses herself properly. That's down to the script and lack of chemistry between her and Boyd. There's a comic subplot involving two lumberjacks where one is doing all the work and doesn't realise it and the other one repeatedly breaks his pipe by accident. It's a nice distraction from what can be a heavy film.

However, there are two good 'adventure' moments that make Carnival Boat worth watching. When a train is carrying too heavy a load while Jim is driving, the faulty breaks snap and the train goes hurtling down the tracks. Buck, alerted to the fact his father's in danger, uses the yard's machinery to get him close enough to the train to jump on - then has to negotiate his way to the front. It's a very good stunt, obviously a little dated, but strong enough to revive my attention when it was flagging. Similarly, the stunt that forms the finale of the film involves Buck and Hack going to clear a log jam, leading to some nefarious activity from Hack when he realises this is his chance to get ahead of his rival. It's less exciting that the out-of-control train but still enjoyable.

Ultimately, Carnival Boat suffers from not being what it professed to be. There are, though, redeeming moments, and as a specimen of stunt attempts from 1932 it's rather good. There are moments of humour and peril intertwined with boring ones. Really, a mixed bag.