OFF THE BOOK - BEYOND FICTION IS BACK!!

Off The Book — Beyond Fiction…

RELOADED!!!!

2013 has so far been a fantastic year as far as literature affairs are concerned. I’ve been able to finish a novel I hadn’t been able to read when I bought, I’ve managed to add some terrific pieces to my (loved and hated) improvised bookshelf, I’ve finally found what I needed in order to start writing my first novel.

There’s also a project that was postponed for too long, due to… well… agenda issues mostly. My agenda, of course, but also the cram packed agenda of another essential 33,33%: my iron-strong, genial co-presenter Dee-Dee! (Sorry Dee, but we all are percentages some time or other. The thing is not to be just a number, which of course you aren’t.)

I’m referring, you must surely have guessed, to the amazing “Off the Book – Beyond Fiction”!

Ups and downs... They mean nothing eventually

It could be a metaphor of how, if you struggle for what you want, you’ll surely get it. But, please, let’s not wax self-help. We were busy like hell, we couldn’t find a proper date to record the show, that’s all there is. It’s ordinary students’ lives, people… Holidays were the right time, obviously, and that’s why we could finally record it then. There’s no magic energy in the universe “conspiring in our favour,” it’s just outright common sense.

Mind you, it’s not that we don’t value the project and deem it a summer thing. It’s just that we have more time to organise, prepare, read, search and so on during the summer. Therefore, and as we want it to be as good as possible, we thought it best not to do it during rush-hour. Or, rather, rush-part-of-the-year.

James, Henry James

So, and as we had promised, we finally began with our season on American authors. The first one, we agreed, had to be Henry James. We both knew him, had read some of his works and there was plenty of material (by and about him) to analyse.

Dee-Dee designed our script and, off we went… Off the book, through a microphone, non-stop beyond fiction.

As far as a main corpus of works is concerned, we chose to concentrate on one piece each.

Dee-Dee, a self-acclaimed admirer of Jane Austen’s literature, chose James’ “Washington Square,” a piece many times compared to the former’s way of writing. James himself was not very fond of Austen, or so he said. Yet the novel, you will notice in the analysis we make, has many elements in common with “Mansfield Park,” “Northanger Abbey” or even “Pride and Prejudice.”

I myself chose what seems to be the most critically discussed work: “The turn of the screw.” I had read it and it struck me as a very skilful piece of writing. And I’m not referring to the florid, somewhat pompous, style that he uses (which to me, and for the show’s purpose, is of no consequence.) What I mean is that I find it admirable how he was able to write in such an ambiguous way as would keep generations and generations of readers wondering.

Then there are the spice-it-up sections: we had previously said the show was an example of how much fun literature can be. So we decided to go on doing what we did with Oscar Wilde’s episode and act out some excerpts from the chosen novels. You will hear me as a coxcomb and an ambiguous child and Dee-Dee as a governess, an ugly, stupid lady become wiser and an oldie. Please let us know what you think of our performances!

We also added a ‘surprise’ part, for which we prepare something to read to each other on the spot, without previous preparation. Dee-Dee’s jokes were really witty, don’t you think? As for me, well… I think the quotes I chose, out of context, sounded rather ridiculous. Maybe that’s how James wanted them to sound. That cats and monkeys thing, come on…

What the future holds

Now, for sure we have to record at least two more episodes on American authors. As discussed in the show, the most likely one is Louisa May-Alcott. But there’s always Mark Twain calling our attention, like a traffic warden blowing his whistle and waving up and down, left and right. We’ll see.

We cannot promise to do it in the near future, and I confess a detail: we have agreed to do it “God knows when.” Again: it’s because we want to do it as well as possible. And, to be honest, what could be better than “When God wants?”