2006
December 2006
There has been much talk of late in Transformationalist circles about the ‘Dark Lady’ issue as it relates to the strange phenomenon of the Transformationalist Postcard. Of course most diehard transformationalists will only accept the classic T.P. and will have no truck with any of the variants or Mr. Dean Hammerlsey’s damnable composites, but I came across the above on a recent visit to the Emerald Isle and found it rather intriguing. Most of the ‘dark ladies’ I have come across are shadowy figures in the background, always facing away from camera. What we seem to have here is a dark lady boldly approaching the camera. In the background, a ‘One Man Variant’ and beyond him two other figures with their backs to the camera. Perhaps the Irish have a different approach to the Transformationalist Postcard, but I do think there is a distinct possibility that this is a rare example of a Transformational Reverse. If one puts oneself on the other side of the street in the background of the picture; if one then imagines the photograph taken from that position; then what you would have is one of Mr. Hammersley’s damnable composites - a Classic in the foreground, a One Man Variant in the middle and a Dark Lady in her traditional position, back to camera, disappearing into the distance. I have sent a copy of the postcard to Mr. Hammersley and await his comments; although he has been so involved in other matters of late that I fear it will be a while before he responds.
***
November 2006
***
October 2006
I can’t resist. There does seem to be another world out there, another dimension wherein the widows of dead dictators seek out my help to launch assaults on the Swiss banking system to retrieve their ill-gotten gains. Perhaps it is all a scam, as the newspapers tell us, but when did you last believe what you were told by a newspaper. Consider the alternative, not that the emails are genuine cries for help, but that they emanate from some other dimension. As proof I offer the following:
“Dear Goodday Sir .
Hope things are fine with you and your family over there, if so thanks to God for his kindness, I desided that I should send you mail to explain things to you properly the way you will understand me.
I am Mrs. Nikki Taylor, wife to the former president of Liberia who is now in prison in neitherland, I am very sure that you most have heard of him.
Before my husband left power there is a trunk box containing some money $9,000.000.00 (Nine million US dollars) wish he saved with a security company for safe keeping here in Accra Ghana pending when he will come for claims. But unfortunately for him he was arrested in Nigeria/Cameron border when he was trying to escape into Cameron, then he was taking to sierra-Leone prison from there to neitherland, where he is at the moment,
It was in sierra-Leone when they where taking him away from the court house to neitherland he reviled it to me and My son that we should come to Accra Ghana and see one barrister Fred Kwame to assist us and take out the trunk box from the security company and travel to any of this Europe country to invest the money for me and my son not to surfer in future wish the document covering the trunk box in the security company are with the barrister for safe keeping for us, I can send them to you for verification if you wish.
What I and my son really needs from you now is how you can assist us to take out this trunk box from the security company and give us letter of invitation to come to your country and start up investment and new life immediately,
I and my son has accepted given you 20% of the total sum, that barrister 5% while another 5% will be set aside for both you and the lawyer incase of any expenses that may accord during this transaction, my husband also made it none to me that the security company didn’t know what is inside the trunk box that he only declared it to them as a family treasure.
If you are interested in helping us, I will send you the document to you and introduce you to my barrister, I also promised you that this transaction is 100% risk free.
The only thing is for you to keep it confidential, let me stop here till I here from you and hope to hear from you soon. My e-mail address is
Thanks.
Best regards
Madam Nikki Taylor.”
“My email address is Thanks.” Where is ‘neitherland’? Why the tautology of the ‘trunk box’? And what about the ‘suspense whare house’ referred to in the following email from Felix Bioh:
“Dear friend
I am Felix Bioh, working with Diplomatic securities and finance company in europe, i have a deal which i want to talk with you.
Our company have assisted some of the african leaders and politicians to move some fund and valuableS through our special arrangments as a consignment. Some of these consignments where not claimed as a result of deaths and some government restriction, therefore sent to suspense whare house.
Presently we have some unclaimed ones ready for suspense whare house,but i have perfected arrangment to claim one the the consigment containing a lot of funds if i have a reiable person to assist me. if you are interested in the matter, you let know through this email adress ( felixbioh@uymail.com for more datails and how to proceed.
Sincerely
Felix Bioh”
Obviously the suspense whare house in neitherland is full of trunk boxes. A veritable treasure trove - now all we need is a map and a Willy to carry the suitcases.
***
September 2006
Babies being arrested at birth to curb their anti-social tendencies, spy cameras in wheelie bins to check we’re doing our duty for the environment, and all in the name of Transformational Government. It is all getting rather Dickian. Strange how that can never enter the lexicon. Nor will Dickite or Dickesque. Maybe it’s the smutty connotation, or maybe Philip K. (a vague echo there) needed an extra syllable in his name. So we are stuck with Orwellian and that does not quite fit. Too dark. No humour. It’s a world gone mad, not miserable. Although there is the transformationalist click - that Orwell changed his name from Blair in some precognitive flash of inspiration.
***
August 2006
I received a missive the other day from Dean Hammersley. I gave the boy thruppence and a sherbet lemon, opened the envelope and the following dropped out. It was a script for a short film which Dean had hoped to make, but then Unity House was demolished and he lost interest in the affair. According to the attached letter, when the news of the demolition was announced he did get quite excited at the prospect of ending the film with a wonderful shot of the tower collapsing (filmed from atop Hanley Forest Park) and he redrafted the script accordingly. However, the spoilsports decided to take Unity House down brick by brick and it was at that point that Dean abandoned altogether his plan to become Stoke’s answer to Godfrey Ho. Pity.
He asked if I wanted to place it on the site, and ordinarily I would have declined the offer - let him seek out his own site for his cast-off rubbish - however, I was walking past the hole that once was Unity House last week and I noticed a curious thing. The cleared site did not seem big enough to have once supported the mighty tower and accompanying ziggurat of Unity House. It set me pondering and, although I do not wish to give it any more publicity - since it is rubbish and not in any way ‘cool’ (unlike the excellent series ‘Supernatural’) - it did put me in mind of the Tardis of Dr. Who. Unity House stood idle and, as far as we, the good citizens of Stoke, knew, empty for so many years, who knows what secret experiments involving the space time continuum could have been going on behind its locked doors and smashed windows? Perhaps it really was larger on the outside than on the inside, in a curious, transformation- alistic way. The hole should be preserved along with our memories, but no doubt they’ll build summat else on it.
Anyway, for that vague reason I have agreed to give a good home to Dean’s abandoned screenplay, and here it is:
THE BIBLIOPHOBE
Open on blank white screen.
The Bibliophobe - typed with sound of typewriter appears on the screen.
Sound of paper being torn and crumpled.
Screen is torn and crumpled to reveal George, a man in his fifties. He is standing in a small kitchen. He is emptying a carrier bag of shopping. He takes out cans of food and removes the labels, then draws a picture of the food on the tin with a marker pen. During the following speech he continues to remove the labels from his purchases, or empties the contents of packets into plastic containers. He throws the labels and packets into a black bin bag.
GEORGE
Prob'ly think I'm cakey, soft in the yed,
but better to be safe than sorry,
that's what me owd grandad always said.
It's books really, not just words, then again
what they all made of, eh? Them stories,
all them made up places, all the folk
walking about, doing what they please.
What they told to anyroad up.
That's what you think inner it. Written down.
Carved in stone. Printed in ink and stuck there.
Nowt moves. Nowt changes. Writer thinks it up
then the writer writes it down and all's fine.
Dandy even. Comics. Think that's funny?
Little kids they start with. Get em reading,
before you know it they've caught the bug.
Harry fucking Potter wonder how many
he's dragged off screaming into the night.
Think I'm daft dunner yer. Cakey, mad.
True I should be taking me tablets
but then I chucked bloody packet away.
All that writing. What's that for. Instructions.
It's books though really. Them you have to watch.
Stories. All made up from words. All made up from
[pause]
Shouldn't say it. Words. Letters making words.
Olden days they kept the secrets hidden.
Dinner write nowt dine. Kept it up here.
[taps head]
Told the stories round the fire in the cave.
Drew the pictures on the wall, not the words.
Only spells were written down. Runic way.
Spells and curses. Knew the words had power.
Gyptians never dared use letters, just pictures.
Little birds and fellers with dogs’ heads.
That's the way you s'posed to do it. Safely.
Then some silly bugger comes along
and starts writing stuff down. Hands it around.
Before you know it you've got Gutenberg.
"Want a book? This one's about God. Here have it."
Bloody printing press. That was a bright idea.
Black death's got nothing on plague he began.
Rats, little furry friends compared to books
and damage they can do. I've seen it.
Know how many people disappear
Year in year out, just in this country?
Two hundred thousand, give or take a few.
They dunner all end up on streets of London.
Wunt have nowhere put your feet for beggars.
No, that's just the story they put about
for stop the panic if the truth got out.
It's the books what gets em. You can laugh.
I've seen it. Seen it happen. Me own eyes.
Hitler had the right idea, burn the buggers
'Cept you not s'posed say that these days, are yer?
Hitler and them blokes what burnt the library
at Alexandria all them years ago.
They knew what books could do, how some could spread
their words about and drag you inside.
Not all of them I grant yer, but there's a lot
what can suck the life out of a man
and turn him into tales. And so they change.
Books change when you onner reading them.
Bits get added. Things fall apart. Centre
dunner hold. And nobody notices.
Where's it all come from, where's it all go,
that's what I'd like know. They dunner tell yer.
That's secret that is. All them stories
Flying about. All made up with words.
Words, what's them? Letters joined together
patterns on the paper, making ideas
come in yed. How's that work then, eh? What think?
Talking's as bad. Making the sounds. Shut up.
Should shut up. Not say nowt. Stop it. Shut. Up.
[long pause he stares intently into the camera]
Then you'd be buggered wouldn't yer, eh?
Cut to exterior Hanley Library. George is framed so that the Library sign is clearly visible.
GEORGE
That's the place, that's where they keep 'em all.
Camera moves away from George to Library entrance. George pokes his face back into shot.
GEORGE
No, not there, that's where rest are kept away,
All safe and sound, no contamination.
No, that's where the bad ones are stored.
Points up to the building behind the library. Pan and zoom to the tower of Unity House.
GEORGE
That's where we took 'em that day, me and Lou.
Funny feller he was, bit of a card,
always having a laugh, pissin' about.
Making fun of librarian all time.
[On word, 'librarian', insert flash of the Librarian]
Not that he did it in front of his face.
Wunner dare do that, he'd be out on his ear.
Bet he wishes he had done now though.
Be alive at least, still walking around.
Cut to shot of Lou walking down the path from the Library to Unity House. This is a flashback to 'the incident' and should be filmed in a distinctive manner. Either black and white, or some distorting effect added later. Lou is carrying a large, heavy cardboard box. As he walks he turns round occasionally, and grins at the camera (at George, who is following him).
Cut back to present. George in front of the Library.
GEORGE
We did as we was told, down to the letter.
Followed Librarian's instructions.
[On word, 'librarian', insert flash of the Librarian]
Did exactly what he said, way he said it.
Cut to interior of Librarian's office. The Librarian stands in front of the window with the sun streaming in so that he is obscured by the light. He speaks very clearly but very quickly.
LIBRARIAN
The lifts do not work. Take the stairs. Walk to
the fifth floor. Take care not to touch the walls.
Remember the lifts do not work. You must take
the stairs to the fifth floor. Do not touch the
walls. Open the door and enter. Do not tarry.
Do not procrastinate. The lifts do not work. Take
the stairs and enter the room. Place the boxes on
the floor in a convenient space. There will
be convenient spaces. Do not dawdle. Do not
waste time. Find a space and place the boxes
there. Remember that the lifts do not work. You
will have to take the stairs. Do not touch the walls.
Leave the boxes and leave the room. Do not
examine the other boxes. Do not look at the walls.
The windows are not for looking. The stairs are for
walking up and down. When the boxes have been
deposited you go down. The lifts do not work.
You must take the stairs. Do not touch the walls.
On no account must you look inside the boxes.
On no account must you look inside the boxes
which have previously been deposited on the
fifth floor. Which is not accessible via the lifts.
Which, need I remind you, do not work.
Cut to exterior, present. George in front of the Library.
GEORGE
Well, up to a point. I dinner touch owt.
But Lou. Well, he was always mucking about.
Cut to exterior of Lou at the entrance to Unity House. He drops the box of books and fiddles with a key.
Cut to interior. Lou is walking up the stairs. Occasionally he looks round at George and grins.
Cut to corridor. Lou opens door and walks in.
Cut to interior of a room on the fifth floor. Nothing can be seen except boxes of books. The floor is littered with torn pages. There is no clear space for the new boxes, so Lou puts his box down then pushes at a pile of boxes. The pile collapses and a stew of books and rotting paper fall onto the floor around Lou's feet. He tries to tidy the mess but the pages stick to his hands, stick to his body, gradually engulfing him. Lou is absorbed into the pile of books. The camera zooms in on one book, as the cover blows back to reveal the title page, which reads
'The Bibliophobe'
by
Dean Hammersley
Credits
for Frances Haslam
The page fills the screen, then the paper is crumpled to reveal a blank black screen.
____________________
***
July 2006
For the first time in a long time I can announce the addition of a new section to this site -
At the moment there’s only one, The Art of Transformationalism, by local historian, Fred Hughes, but hopefully more will be added during the coming months.
***
June 2006
I did intend to do another piece about my increasing good fortune - I recently received an email from Mrs Hanna Milosevic, the widow of the former Yugoslav President, Slobodan, promising me riches beyond my wildest dreams if I helped her with a small financial matter - but then I decided that such things, though fascinating to me, are not in any way transformationalistic and have nothing whatever to do with art. And neither does this:
Hirst's diamond creation is art's costliest work ever
***
May 2006
There are plans afoot to prettify the Potteries, or Hanley at least. Luxury apartments and canalside walks, private arbors and new-planted orchards, on this side Trent, to walk abroad, and recreate yourselves. The plans are doomed to failure for the drawings of the architect are never to be trusted. By chance I happened across a biography of George Moore the other day in a bookshop in the pleasant town of Worthing on the South Coast. In 1885 Moore’s novel A Mummer’s Wife was published. The first part of the book is set in the Potteries and it had a great influence on the work of Arnold Bennett, as these passages from Frank Swinnerton’s biography of Bennett show:
“He became a writer. At first his efforts were slight, the humorous condensation into a couple of thousand words of a long novel by James Payn, and some popular articles about legal details; but his experiences of free-lance journalism were not happy, and he was soon glad to obtain the sub-editorship of a weekly journal called Woman. He became editor of this journal, wrote a short story which, rejected by Tit-Bits, was accepted by The Yellow Book; and resolved to write a novel. It was to be 'unlike all English novels except those of one author' (George Moore); and, 'life being grey, sinister, and melancholy, the novel must be grey, sinister, and melancholy'. His own life was by no means, he later remarked, grey or sinister, or melancholy; but he was in the grip of French realism, and the fact that Moore had set the scene of A Mummer's Wife in the Potteries had a great effect upon Bennett's mind. It proved in the end to be crucial.
.....Realism, however, was not abandoned. A Mummer's Wife had impressed him very much with its power and its Staffordshire setting; and he had seen how well fitted he was by experience to become the historian of life in the Potteries.”
In Joseph Hone’s biography of George Moore I came across the following passage:
“We read in A Communication to My Friends that Vizetelly advised Moore to set out with notebook in hand in search of a suitable town, the uglier the better, a town without amusements of any sort, wherein to lay the opening scene of A Mummer’s Wife, and that Moore then applied among his friends at the Gaiety Bar for introductions to some touring players who were bound for the town of Hanley.”
So, an initial search for ugliness, in time produced that thing of beauty, The Old Wives’ Tale.
*
A Trick of the Scanner
Frank Swinnerton’s biography of Bennett, referred to above, contained the following error in its online transcription:
“And so Anna of the Five Toucans, which it had taken him five years to write, was finished in 1901, in time to be published in book form almost simultaneously with The Grand Babylon Hotel.”
The ghost of Borges strikes again and now I am desperate to read Bennett’s Anna of the Five Toucans, imagining a tale of mystery and adventure in tropic realms.
***
April 2006
I received an email from George Hycent the other day, informing me that I was the sole beneficiary of the fortune of the late Mr. Morris Thompson, well-known Alaskan businessman, who had tragically died in a plane crash (Alaskan Airlines Flight 261) on January 31st., 2000. Strange. I seem to have touched so many lives without realising it.
The fact that the email was addressed to ‘Beneficiary’ and did not mention my name is of no matter - according to Mr. Hycent all the necessary checks have been done and the money is mine. I am cock-a-hoop.
Mr. Hycent’s writing style is a little odd however. Perhaps he is a foreign gentleman and not used to the intricacies of the English language. Here is an extract:
“He was one of the state of Alaska most wealthy businessmen and prominent native.
Late Thompson had in a domiciliary account with LACIAXA BANK Spain a certain amount totalling eight million, nine hundred and seventy-five thousand, ninety-five cents ($8,975,000.95)
It would interest you to know that late Thompson had appended the name of Sheryl and yours as his next of kin and for whatever reasons late Thompson may have had to include your name as next of kin no one can question.
Consequently, Sheryl Thompson demise now leaves you as the sole beneficiary and next of kin to the said funds in the account of Late Thompson.”
Perhaps Mr. Hycent should invest some of his finder’s fee in a language course. Although, personally, I like the stark poetry of ‘Late Thompson’, I feel it might deter other, less refined souls, from pursuing the matter. As would the signatory of a follow-up email which emanated from someone styling himself ‘Barrister Bob Adams’. I don’t think ‘Barrister’ is ever used as a title these days - although Robert Buchanan’s grandfather was called ‘Lawyer Williams’. Barrister Bob’s email was also addressed to Beneficiary, although this time in capitals, with exclamation marks. Barrister Bob seems a far more flamboyant character than Mr. Hycent - which is probably due to his calling.
Seeking some clarification of all this legal activity, I repaired to google and discovered that it was, after all, merely a variant on the old Nigerian scam. My cock was no longer hooped. Although, there was a transformationalistic end to the affair. I visited the website of Loss Prevention Concepts Ltd., which lists the variants of the Morris Thompson scam, and I noted their address was:
Loss Prevention Concepts, Ltd.
17195 Silver Parkway.,
"PMB" # 407
Fenton,
Michigan
U.S.A.
The Fenton of Borges’ ‘Forking Paths’, the void of Arnold Bennett, the transformationalist link which connects time and space, Late Thompson and Barrister Bob. I was watching a programme on TV the other night, a round table discussion from Oxford College, chaired by Mark Lawson, on the subject of Art, its meaning, its purpose. “What is Art?” asked Mark and the panellists wrestled with the problem until I went to do something else. “What is Art?” Late Thompson would know. And Barrister Bob. For are they not it?
***
March 2006
And there they go again...
In the current issue of that estimable Science Fiction journal, SFX, there occurs the following throwaway line at the end of a review of Terry Gilliam's film, The Brothers Grimm (now available on DVD):
“While The Brothers Grimm is far from being a disaster - Gilliam’s too good a filmmaker for that and some of the cast are first rate - it’s so very far from being the film we wanted it to be. Another Brazil ? Nope, not even Stoke-on-Trent.”
What is particularly galling in this case is that Stoke-on-Trent was the partial inspiration for one of the greatest science fiction novels of all time - H.G. Wells’ The Time Machine. Wells spent some time in the Potteries (as it was then) and the area made a huge impression on him. Arnold Bennett wrote to Wells in 1897 enquiring about Wells’ connection with the area since the town of Burslem is mentioned at the beginning of The Time Machine. Wells replied as follows:
“About Burslem - I’m not a native. But years ago I spent two or three months at Etruria and the district made an immense impression on me. I wish I knew the people. I felt dimly then and rather less dimly today vast possibilities there. Think of Trentham, white Newcastle, and that Burslem Hanley ridge jostling one another - the difference in the lives and “circles of thought” there must be! And I’ve sat in ’Trury woods in the springtime, bluebells all about me, and seen overhead the smoke from Granville’s (I think it’s Granville’s) Iron Works streaming by under the white clouds.”
In Wells’ The New Machiavelli there is the following passage:
“I took myself off for a series of walks, and acquired a considerable knowledge of the scenery and topography of the Potteries. It puzzled my aunt that I did not go westward, where it was country-side and often quite pretty, with hedgerows and fields and copses and flowers. But always I went eastward, where in a long valley industrialism smokes and sprawls. That was the stuff to which I turned by nature, to the human effort, and the accumulation and jar of men’s activities. And in such a country as that valley social and economic relations were simple and manifest. Instead of the limitless confusion of London’s population, in which no man can trace any but the most slender correlation between rich and poor, in which everyone seems disconnected and adrift from everyone, you can see here the works, the potbank or the ironworks or what not, and here close at hand the congested, meanly-housed workers, and at a little distance a small middle-class quarter, and again remoter, the big house of the employer. It was like a very simplified diagram—after the untraceable confusion of London.”
Wells stayed at Etruria in the spring of 1888. The Time Machine was first published in 1894. The Eloi and the Morlocks were born in Stoke-on-Trent.
***
January 2006
Happy Transformationalistic New Year.
I put the late arrival of this greeting and the dearth of transformationalistic news down to my current feeling of ennui. Hopefully things will improve in the months to come.
***
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