Something From The Weekend, Sir? has a facelift

From a cupboard filled with aged items and antique writers, Something For the Weekend, Sir? has evolved, changed, moved on, mutated and done lots of wiggly stuff and come out sort of different. Now we feature the spoken word in our weekly posts. 

Poets of all shapes, shades, sizes and persuasions will feature here, poets from all around the world reading either their own work or that of some favourite poet or indeed poem. 

An ever changing cast of poets reading stuff that blew their mind which will hopefully do the same for you.

Occasional bits of tat will still be seen but enough of Michael.

Poetry was always meant to be heard and here it shall be.

Something For the Weekend, Sir? 

You bet.

Happy new year to all our readers. we hope 2014 will be good for you and for us.

Charles Bukowski Interview by Chicago Literary Times in 1963 (copied with grateful thanks)

When he answered the door his sad eyes, weary voice and silk dressing gown told me that here was, in more ways than one, a tired man. We sat and talked, drank beer and scotch, and Charles finally, like a surrendering virgin, gave in to his first interview. From the window, if you stick your head out far enough, you can see the lights in Aldous Huxley's house up the hill, where the successful live.



Kaye: Does it bother you that Huxley is in a position to spit on you?
Bukowski: Oh, that is a good question. [He dived into the recess behind the murphy-bed and came out with a couple of pictures of himself]
Kaye: Who took these?
Bukowski: My girlfriend. She died last year. What was the question?
Kaye: Does it bother you that Huxley is in a position to spit on you?
Bukowski: I haven't even thought of Huxley, but now that you mention it, no, it doesn't bother me.
Kaye: When did you start to write?
Bukowski: When I was 35. Figuring the average poet starts at 16, I am 23.
Kaye: It has been observed by a number of critics that your work is frankly autobiographical. Would you care to comment on that?
Bukowski: Almost all. Ninety-nine out of a hundred, if I have written a hundred. The other one was dreamed up. I was never in the Belgian Congo.
Kaye: I would like to make reference to a particular poem in your most recent book, Run With the Hunted. Would you happen to have the name and present whereabouts of the girl you mentioned in 'A Minor Impulse to Complain'?
Bukowski: No. This is no particular girl; this is a composite girl, beautiful, nylon leg, not-quite-whore, creature of the half-drunken night. But she really exists, though not by single name.
Kaye: Isn't that ungrammatical? There seems to be a tendency to classify you as the elder statesman of poet-recluses.
Bukowski: I can't think of any poet-recluses outside of one dead Jeffers. [Robinson Jeffers] The rest of them want to slobber over each other and hug each other. It appears to me that I am the last of the poet-recluses.
Kaye: Why don't you like people?
Bukowski: Who does like people? You show me him and I'll show you why I don't like people. Period. Meanwhile, I have got to have another beer. [He slouched off into the tiny kitchen and I yelled my next question to him].
Kaye: This is a corny question. Who is the greatest living poet?
Bukowski: That is not corny. That is tough. Well, we have Ezra...Pound, and we have T.S.,[Eliot] but they've both stopped writing. Of the producing poets, I would say...Oh, Larry Eigner.
Kaye: Really?
Bukowski: Yeah. I know no one has ever said that. That is about all I can come up with.
Kaye: What do you think of homosexual poets?
Bukowski: Homosexuals are delicate and bad poetry is delicate and Ginsberg turned the tables by making homosexual poetry strong poetry, almost manly poetry; but in the long run, the homo will remain the homo and not the poet.
Kaye: To get down to more serious matters, what influence do you feel Mickey Mouse has had on the American imagination?
Bukowski: Tough. Tough, indeed. I would say that Mickey Mouse had a greater influence on the American public than Shakespeare, Milton, Dante, Rabelais, Shostakovich, Lenin, and/or Van Gogh. Which say "What?" about the American public. Disneyland remains the central attraction of Southern California, but the graveyard remains our reality.
Kaye: How do you like writing in Los Angeles?
Bukowski: It doesn't matter where you write so long as you have the walls, typewriter, paper, beer. You can write out of a volcano pit. Say, do you think I could get 20 poets to chip in a buck a week to keep me out of jail?
Kaye: How many times have you been arrested?
Bukowski: How do I know? Not too many; 14-15 maybe. I thought I was tougher than that but each time they put me in it tears my gut, I don't know why.
Kaye: Bukowski, what do you see for the future now that everybody wants to publish Bukowski?
Bukowski: I used to lay drunk in alleys and I probably will again. Bukowski, who is he? I read about Bukowski and it doesn't seem like anything to do with me. Do you understand?
Kaye: What influence has alcohol had on your work?
Bukowski: Hmm, I don't think I have written a poem when I was completely sober. But I have written a few good ones or a few bad ones under the hammer of a black hangover when I didn't know whether another drink or a blade would be the best thing.
Kaye: You look a bit under the weather today.
Bukowski: I am, yes. This is Sunday evening. It was a tough eight race card. I was 103 ahead at the end of 7. Fifty to win on the eighth. Beaten half a length by a 60-1 shot who should have been canned for cat food years ago, the dog. Anyway, a day of minor profit or prophet led to a night of drunkenness. Awaked by this interviewer. And I'm really going to have to get drunk after you leave, and I'm serious.
Kaye: Mr Bukowski, do you think we'll all be blown up soon?
Bukowski: Yes, I think we will. It is a simple case of mathematics. You get the potential, and then you get the human mind. Somewhere down the line eventually there is going to be a damn fool or madman in power who is simply going to blow us all quite to hell. That's all, it figures.
Kaye: And what do you think is the role of the poet in this world-mess?
Bukowski: I don't like the way that question is phrased. The role of the poet is almost nothing...drearily nothing. And when he steps outside of his boots and tries to get tough as our dear Ezra [Pound] did, he will get his pink little ass slapped. The poet, as a rule, is a half-man - a sissy, not a real person, and he is in no shape to lead real men in matters of blood, or courage. I know these things are anti to you, but I have got to tell you what I think. If you ask questions you have got to get answers.
Kaye: Do you?
Bukowski: Well, I don't know...
Kaye: I mean in a more universal sense. Do you have to get answers?
Bukowski: No, of course not. In a more universal sense, we only get one thing. You know...a head stone if we're lucky; if not, green grass.
Kaye: So do we abandon ship or hope altogether?

Bukowski: Why these cliches, platitudes? OK, well, I would say no. We do not abandon ship. I say, as corny as it may sound, through the strength and spirit and fire and dare and gamble of a few men in a few ways we can save the carcass of humanity from drowning. No light goes out until it goes out. Let's fight as men, not rats. Period. No further addition.

Postcards By the Bucketful

ANOTHER SHOCKER FROM THE SEAFRONT.

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 aNOtHEr dIp INtO ThE mAGpIE mEMOrY pOOoL.

A Feast of Posters

Ruth Stonehouse was an actress and film director who was active during the silent film era.

She worked for Triangle Film's and Universal Pictures during a career spanning from 1911 until 1928. Her androgynous appearance was most apparent in the role of Nancy Glenn and in the 1917 motion picture, The Edge of the Law. She performed in comedies and dramas such as the patriotic film Doing Her Bit  in 1917.. Ruth died in May 1941 of a cerebral haemorrhage she was just 48.

Harry Houdini was born Eril Weisz in Budapest on March 24, 1874. He was a Hungarian-American illusionist and stunt performer famed for his sensational escape acts. He first attracted notice as "Harry Handcuff Houdini" on a tour of Europe, where he challenged different police forces to try to keep him locked up. This revealed a talent for gimmickry and for audience involvement that characterized all his work. Soon he extended his repertoire to include chains, ropes slung from skyscrapers, straitjackets under water, and having to hold his breath inside a sealed milk can. Harry did not die, as some have suggested while performing a stunt. Houdini died of peritonitis from a ruptured appendix at 1:26 p.m. in Room 401 on October 31, aged 52 having agreed to let a man beat about his abdomen.. In his final days, he optimistically held to a strong belief that he would recover, but his last words before dying were reportedly, "I'm tired of fighting." After taking witness statements Houdini's insurance company concluded that the death was due to the dressing-room incident and paid double indemnity.  Harry was 52

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aNOtHEr dIp INtO ThE mAGpIE mEMOrY pOOoL.

Tiny Treasures

I realised I hadn't added anything to this blog for a while so dug out this snippet from the wonderful EVERGREEN  magazine

which is ideal for collaging as it contains many old photos and illustrations from the past

but sprinkled amongst the pages are intriguing articles about 

long dead music hall stars, stories about old films and other delightful odd items like this

one about a tiny record some lady had pinned to some hankerchiefs!

Sadly I have no sound file of the record to share but would love to find this one or one like it on my 

boot sale and charity shop trips. I can only hope!

Ziba Karbassi - Poet

Ziba Karbassi was born in Tabriz, northwestern Iran in 1974. She fled her country in the 1980's and, accompanied by her mother moved to London. She commutes between London and Paris where she now lives. She has published ten books of poetry in Persian, Ziba is widely regarded as the most accomplished Persian poet of her generation. Her poetry is tough, uncompromising  dense and challenging. It is edgy stuff and even if you are unable to understand the words the emotions they carry have a weight that resonates. She is new to me but has been read widely across Europe and America. Her poems have appeared in many languages throughout Europe, the UK and US and have that quality shared by the old beat poets and punk. It is visceral stuff.

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Indeed
By: Ziba Karbassi
Translated from Persian by Shirindokht Nourmanesh

And you—the innocent, virtuous, and chaste ladies
with your bent necks
and your effeminate walk
with your precious thousand-year chokers of stillness,
you are indeed right,
I am a whore.
And certainly this sun too
is peeking out from underneath your skirts
here
on my paper.

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Love Is The Colour of Lemon
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If you take away this pink veil from my face
love is the lemon colour that lemon-limps its
way to the tangerine sun

Eyelashes and neck
Eyelashes cockeyed and neck skew-whiffed
Crooked into your shoulder-nooks
That seem like children’s doodle-drawn homes
My head is craned down to your cranny bone
We are stood two crazed souls in each other
Stood neck to neck
Shoulder to shudder

Eyelashes and neck just there
Craned round again in the whorl of hot bone
And your eyes that kissing-kissed wet my lips
And your eyes that wet the kisses of my other lip
Your eye that plunges its furrow until we can’t see
Fused in the voice and rapture of it

Come, come if you take the pink slowly from here
Love is this lemon colour that oh lemon-limps bitter
then leaps to the tangerine womb

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aNOtHEr tWo fiNGerS tO THe bIShoPs oF biGOtrY.

Archie Leigh-Jones - Sculpture

Archie's latest creation is the improved super de-luxe Party Popper Gatling Gun prototype No. 2 made in his 1st year at the sculpture department of the University of Brighton.   Check out his other work at his blog -  Archie's Art.

Words From The Wise

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“You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.”

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Mae West

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. aNOtHEr dIp INtO ThE mAGpIE mEMOrY pOOoL.

Death by Absinthe

They say Absinthe makes the heart grow fonder. At least I think that’s what they say. There has been a lot of nonsense spoken about the drink in the past. Some have said it is such a lethal drink that you can only take one glass for more might kill you. It is of course a myth. Absinthe is no more potent, no more dangerous than any other drink.

It is commonly referred to in historical literature as "la fée verte" (the green fairy). Although it is sometimes mistakenly referred to as a liqueur absinthe is not traditionally bottled with added sugar, and is therefore classified as a spirit. Absinthe is traditionally bottled at a high level of alcohol by volume is normally diluted with water prior to being consumed. It has a taste of aniseed. It is one of Vicar Linkthorpe’s favourite drinks.

Here are two posters featuring the drink that I find charming. 

 

Bon appetit!

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aNOtHEr sIp FRoM ThE mURkY gREeN bREw.

Practical and Pithy the Quotes from the Posh

 

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"The people sensible enough to give good advice are usually sensible enough to give none."

  Eden Phillpotts

mOtHEr dIp IN ThE mOoDy mEMOrY pILE.

Texas Kitty

A friend sent me a cassette of Texas Kitty ripped from a Dutch LP some years ago. Recently found some new tracks on YOUTube including this great Spooktrein song. Not much found out about her on the interweb.................................................................................................................. Luckily a Dutch friend Jan managed to track down a short biography on a dutch website. Her real name was Kitty Prins. "She was born in Groningen, The Netherlands. She was not only a singer, but a professional painter as well. However her carreer in our country never really got from the ground. She was more succesfull in Vlaanderen (the Dutch speaking part of Belgium). She also had a fan-club in South Africa and she had contacts with the Country Music Assocation in the VS, where she perfromed in the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville. After being seriously disappointed in The Netherland by people breaking contracts and so on, she decided to move to Vlaanderen permanently. Untill 1981 she presented a country show on Belgian radio. The last years of her life she spent painting. The website isn't clear about her birth and death date (1900-1900?)." Thanks for that Jan.