After the reading to promote Zen Cymru, my new collection from Seren, in the round gallery where my voice had echoes and the audience seemed impossible to get close to I am surrounded by punters. This is that part of the literary scene called Q&A where audiences get to question the speaker on whatever they like. This is usually about the work. Although not always. What’s your position on the bomb, I was asked at one event. Do you have any pets? What’s your favourite TV programme? Do you know what time the next event starts? This question asked at a festival by a punter eager to get me done and to move onto Ian McEwan.
Tonight, however, my interlocutors stick to the literary script. Most of them are students of one kind or another, beginners on the literary ladder, keen to get ahead. And there’s a pattern to the things they ask.
Copyright is the big one. Simultaneously the most powerful and misunderstood piece in our panoply of state-managed protective legislation. Copyright is something you need do little gain, I tell them. You just write and the form of the words you choose are your copyright. Automatically. But, unfortunately, not the idea behind them. Did Shakespeare think up the plot for Romeo and Juliet? Probably not. But it’s his words we all remember.
At this point the urban myth of the play someone once sent in to the BBC rears its head. In this tale a play is submitted by a keen beginner only have it either ignored or immediately rejected. Several months pass. The still keen proto-playwright is at home idly listening to the radio when on comes his or her play. It’s beautifully produced, but attributed to another. When you pursue this sorry tale it inevitably turns out to have happened not to the myth recounter but to someone else. My sister told me. It happened to her best friend’s uncle. Chase it and the sorry tale vanishes into the sand. Nothing is ever proved or even provable. Unless you are Dan Brown or J K Rowling, that is. At the level they work claims that you’ve nicked your ideas are legion.
Beyond the worries over ownership are concerns about public presentation. Isn’t performance difficult? How do you stop yourself shaking? I share with them advice given to me by a famous broadcaster. Have a drink beforehand, he advised. One but no more. It’ll take off the edge. Have two and you’ll be on the road to garbling. At the event I was running the famous broadcaster then drank five vodkas straight and did the funniest show I can remember. Practice, I guess.
There were questions about style and substance, publication and plot but none on cash. Chasing fame remains up front. Why else bother.
Tonight, however, my interlocutors stick to the literary script. Most of them are students of one kind or another, beginners on the literary ladder, keen to get ahead. And there’s a pattern to the things they ask.
Copyright is the big one. Simultaneously the most powerful and misunderstood piece in our panoply of state-managed protective legislation. Copyright is something you need do little gain, I tell them. You just write and the form of the words you choose are your copyright. Automatically. But, unfortunately, not the idea behind them. Did Shakespeare think up the plot for Romeo and Juliet? Probably not. But it’s his words we all remember.
At this point the urban myth of the play someone once sent in to the BBC rears its head. In this tale a play is submitted by a keen beginner only have it either ignored or immediately rejected. Several months pass. The still keen proto-playwright is at home idly listening to the radio when on comes his or her play. It’s beautifully produced, but attributed to another. When you pursue this sorry tale it inevitably turns out to have happened not to the myth recounter but to someone else. My sister told me. It happened to her best friend’s uncle. Chase it and the sorry tale vanishes into the sand. Nothing is ever proved or even provable. Unless you are Dan Brown or J K Rowling, that is. At the level they work claims that you’ve nicked your ideas are legion.
Beyond the worries over ownership are concerns about public presentation. Isn’t performance difficult? How do you stop yourself shaking? I share with them advice given to me by a famous broadcaster. Have a drink beforehand, he advised. One but no more. It’ll take off the edge. Have two and you’ll be on the road to garbling. At the event I was running the famous broadcaster then drank five vodkas straight and did the funniest show I can remember. Practice, I guess.
There were questions about style and substance, publication and plot but none on cash. Chasing fame remains up front. Why else bother.
#143
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