Amy Wack's Blog (5)

Notes from the Pop-Up: The Lizard King

Jim Morrison, iconic singer of the band, The Doors, would have been 70 years old this week. The film clips of his performances are still compulsively watchable: he writhes onstage, his thighs encased in leather trousers, his hair a corona under the lights. There is no denying the power of his voice which ranges from a seductive croon to a throaty roar. There is no denying the invitation into his song-scapes, apocalyptic realms where one may be incinerated by rage or desire. He was beautiful…

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Added by Amy Wack on December 17, 2013 at 5:13 — No Comments

Notes from the Pop-Up: Fear of Poetry II, The Poetry of Fear

Notes from the Pop-Up: Fear of Poetry II, the Poetry of Fear

The power of art to scare us is something our friends in National Theatre Wales can perhaps more easily understand. Actors often relish the opportunity to play a subtle villain. Set and costume designers heighten a dark ambiance. NTW use of locations in Wales is particularly striking. I saw a rehearsal of ‘Coriolanus’ on the steps of the Assembly Building in Cardiff Bay, one cloudy afternoon and the cold, the dark slate…

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Added by Amy Wack on December 15, 2013 at 2:00 — No Comments

Notes from the Pop-Up: Nelson Mandela's reading habits

Of recent days, we’ve had a number of requests in the Seren Pop-Up Shop for ‘The Long Walk to Freedom’ by Nelson Mandela. I usually say, ‘Although of course he was secretly Welsh, we don’t stock his book.’

Plucking the title off my own shelves at home, I am reminded of how an early version of this memoir was smuggled out of Robben Island prison camp, where Mandela was…

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Added by Amy Wack on December 9, 2013 at 23:30 — No Comments

FEAR OF POETRY

Why is it that so many people these days don't like poetry? I've seen you! The blank stare. The visible wince. The outright sneer. 

I sometimes unearth a primal trauma. The sadistic nun who would whack your wrist with a wooden ruler when you failed to memorise Wordsworth's 'Daffodils'; the GCSE question on Carol Ann Duffy that utterly flummoxed you out of the A*, the annoying boyfriend at Uni who could recite Shakespeare's sonnet 'Shall I compare thee to a Summer's Day' who then…

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Added by Amy Wack on December 6, 2013 at 8:04 — No Comments

Greetings from the Pop-Up Shop

One early evening last week, I was walking through Cardiff City Centre to meet a friend when I heard an obviously harassed young mum lean over her fractious toddler and warn some people nearby, "you have to watch this one, he'll create". I've never heard this expression before and I wonder if someone out there in the community can tell me if this is a typical Cardiff, or south-Walian, or just British bit of slang? As a euphemism for mis-behavior it is both funny and apt.

It has always…

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Added by Amy Wack on December 4, 2013 at 7:01 — 1 Comment

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