celticman's blog

Hi Dougie, I’ve had a look at your manuscript. We both know that it’s hard trying to get anything published when we write about people like us, using the language we speak—Scottish dialect. Remember all that fuss when James Kelman, for example, wrote in stream- of-consciousness, working-class dialect and a judge ofThe Booker Prize winner 1994, a Rabbi, no less, resigned because she (it might have been a he) thought How Late It Was, How Late was...

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Britney-Spears-Unbreakable-Louise-Burke/dp/B07T7KSYN1 There’s a new documentary out about Britney Spears revolving around her court-sanctioned conservatorship order that has lasted thirteen years and counting. I Care a Lot described as a psychological thriller shows how these orders really work. They are intended to protect those that need spoon fed and allocated pocket money, but only if they show that they need it...

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x64a7x6 https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x64a7x2 I wrote a story a good while ago (I don’t exactly remember when, because it wasn’t very good) about reincarnation. The plot was simple. This rich guy had found a chemical marker that could be traced and he could leave his substantial wealth to himself. Cut out the middle man, sons and daughters. Win-win. Hokum. I was, of course, aware that of the myths of paying...

Janice Galloway’s autobiographies This is Not About Me and All Made Up begin in the same way: ‘This is my family’. Stylistically, she doesn’t use quotation marks. There’s no standard way of writing in the Scottish language and dialect. I was checking her work out to find some kind of consistency in my writing. Reaching for the musicality of speech mixed with social realism. She’s light-touch and mostly Standard English. Not into writing as we...

https://soundcloud.com/5x15/george-saunders-and-max-porter-in-conversation Chop a Chekov story into pieces. Echo of class at Syracuse. Break up a story, a page at a time. Forces us to ask that question, why do I keep reading? If I read a paragraph I’m in a different place than before, where is it? Granular level. More irritating if the story is really good (cf, working with a shit story). Forcing the pause. Sit there for a few minutes asking,...

Storyville, Whirlybird-Live Above LA, BBC 4, BBC iPlayer, director Mark Yoka. https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000sc9j/storyville-whirlybird-live-above-la Bob and Marika Tur captured the police chase on the Los Angeles freeways and the arrest of O.J. Simpson as he parked up his Bronco. Streamed live, it was watched by over 80 million- largely-America viewers. They were at the peak of their power. They witnessed the highs and lows of the...

https://www.channel4.com/programmes/the-little-stranger All Gothic fiction requires a big house, a crumbling manor, think Dracula or Frankenstein with unruly peasants at the door with their torches. Before they’re invited in, of course, they’ve got to wipe their feet. Here we have Hundreds Hall, and like its master, second world war pilot, scarred and shambling Roderick Ayres (Will Poulter) the centre cannot hold and everything flies apart. He’s...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/brand/p0940193 An ornate key turns up on your pillow, it doesn’t fit anything in the house. You ask other members of your family. Nobody knows how it got there. Did it teleport from somewhere else? You hear knocking sounds. Your neighbours come to complain. It goes on all night. It goes on for weeks on end. Months. Who’s doing it and why? Your Irish granny says it’s the work of the devil. A young pretty girl is the...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000s7hd/darren-mcgarveys-class-wars-series-1-1-identity-crisis Darren McGarvey from Pollock admits he’s lucky, incredibly lucky. And he’s right to do so. He’s on a roll after Poverty Safari . The go-to man when the BBC, or any other media organisation, wants to signal that they’re doing the right thing. Giving the working class a voice. The equivalent of a black woman in the moron moron’s cabinet of his 45...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000s083/circling-a-fox Matthew Zajac is an actor. Acting is a precarious profession. The same old faces crop up with regularity. Trying to make a living from acting is akin to trying to make a living from writing. I’ve did a few shifts as an extra. I’ve no interest in being the next what-ever-you-call him/her. Writing, well, that’s a different story. Writing is my game. I don’t expect to make a living from...