BIBLIOGRAPHIES

An essay of sorts--or a thought ramble.  Wrote it when we were in lockdown.

I know during the lockdown I should be catching up with the collected works of Dickens, or finally getting round to a bit of Proust.  No doubt depending how long the lockdown continues carries on I will.  I have them on my to do list-honest!

Meanwhile as an aperitif sort to speak before I embark on the main course, there are bibliographies.

I love bibliographies.  Which is strange as they both inspire me and make me feel guilty at the same time.  Inspire me to write more and guilty that I haven`t.

One of my favourites is about the work of one of my favourite writers Tennessee Williams. His plays were some of the first that made a true impact on me as a writer. Not in the sense of being inspired to write in a similar style, but in his ambition and dedication to get what he felt was the truth of the human condition onto the stage. Not only that but making it truly dramatic.  Using all aspects of the stage:  language, set, mood in an attempt to create those moments where a character is truly revealed. 

I`ve read most of his plays, and not seen enough.

One of productions I did see was at the Lyceum in Edinburgh many years ago. It was the Glass Menagerie , the first play of his that I had read, and also then the first I had seen. 

It is still vividly etched in my mind all these years later. Williams has the reputation of exaggerated characters and full on poetic language.  Neither of which is a negative in my book.  All in the doing as they say!  After a number of years, beginning as I did on the realistic stage, I am moving more and more to the exaggerated and poetic. 

One of the most potent images I remember from that Lyceum production is where Laura and her Gentleman Caller are sitting at the very front of the stage.  Laura talking about the glass ornaments she collects. Laura was shy and mainly housebound with an overpowering mother, and a brother who was on her side but mostly helpless in the path of their mother. That is of course grossly simplifying a series of complex relationships. It does though give enough information hopefully to give an idea of why I was, and still am transfixed by that scene.  Laura like a butterfly hesitantly emerging talking to someone who at least she felt was interested in her. I felt looking and listening that the gentleman caller was interested.  One of those human connections that doesn`t lead anywhere recognizable like an ongoing relationship.  It is about the moment.  One person, Laura opening up, and another the gentleman caller encouraging by his interest, that to happen.  Both might go their separate ways but both will always have that connection.  I remember a comment once, by who that I don`t remember.  It was in reference to cinema.  That films were a serious of moments like life that connect with you separate from the ongoing narrative of the film itself. You might forget the story, the characters, even the name of the film but never those moments. They go deep.

I digress and here I go continuing to digress.

The thing that struck me during this scene and has stayed with me ever since was the stillness and intensity of it.  We had no so called `dramatic`scene ` of shouting, or fighting, or tables and chairs being kicked over or thrown, to hammer home that this was drama.

Loud action or voice does not necessarily mean drama.  People talking endlessly afraid of the silence do not necessarily give insight into character or develop the story. The dialogue between Laura and her Gentleman Caller were punctuated by silences as the butterfly struggled to emerge. The whole theatre including yours truly was rapt at being allowed into this intimate moment.  That`s what it was.   Stillness; true communication; actual drama.  No need for the theatre`s equivalent of car chases, explosions and gunfire that mostly misses its target in more ways than one.

To search and find those moments in drama is the thing.  Of course they`re not always found in the quiet times.  It is difficult to maintain dramatic tension for too long in silence as well as noise, the key is knowing when to change the tempo.

Williams achieved this on numerous occasions especially I feel in Glass Menagerie.

As mentioned he is known for his poetic language and larger than life characters like Big Daddy in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, and Blanche and Stanley in Streetcar Names Desire. Laura`s mother in Menagerie.  I personally don`t think they`re larger than life no more than Falstaff and Othello.  The characters suit the story and language, and vice versa.  The balance between these dramatic elements don`t always, well, balance.  I`ve enjoyed but don`t think it was works so well in plays like The Milk Train Doesn`t Stop Here Any More. 

Another factor is the balance of characters.  Big Daddy and Rick.  Laura and her mother.  Like different instruments, or colours in a painting, juxtaposing.  However you want to name it: noise and silence, confidence and none, thoughtless and thoughtful.  When they come together in a drama, and they don`t have to be in the same scene to have an influence on each other, balance and forward momentum is achieved.  Dramatic tension fills the gap between the two characters.

Now I`m not entirely sure this connects with bibliographies in a direct rather than indirect way. That`s okay though. I`ve decided to let these asides and digressions go where they may. I will get back on point eventually but meanwhile…

Williams is like Dickens to me in that Dickens is also one of my favourite writers, one like Williams who I return to over and over again. They are like the school chimney across from childhood home. I knew where my house was of course, but on a journey home especially after a time away for instance on holiday, the sight of that chimney from our journeying car like perspective in a painting drew the eye and focus to all around.  I emotionally knew where I was on seeing it as well as physically aware.  I took this for granted feeling we were nearly home but not acknowledging how the sight of the chimney was the catalyst for that feeling. Only after moving away and returning to visit my mum and dad did I realize the importance of childhood markers like the school chimney.

It was gone like the school it connected to. A lot of the landscape around my childhood home remained the same. It felt though that someone had had taken a cloth and begin to wipe corners of that landscape away. Gradually over time more and more of that actual landscape was erased.

Another twist and turn back to Dickens.  He like Williams caused me moments of impatience. 

`Come on Charlie, get on with it, enough of the descriptions, I get it. `

Still even in those moments of impatience I am never bored always carried along by the writers` energy and honesty which I don`t think they could have faked even if they tried. Whether you agreed with what they described or the direction of the characters or the story, I believed they believed it when they wrote it.

Even a lie if someone telling it believes it to be the truth it will be to them.  Even if what they are saying has no veracity the power of saying can sow doubt that maybe it`s you that`s got it wrong.  In drama as in life there are many realities.

Back to the bibliographies of a sort.

Now reading the numerous biographies I had a fair idea how many of Williams plays had been performed, and how widely across the globe.  Also how many had been subsequently published some more than once in different versions. Plays alone would have been a daunting achievement but then to add the novels, the abundance of short stories.  To top it all you have the miscellaneous—the articles, reviews and introductions to his own plays. 

Another aside, Williams introductions to his plays in many instances are essays in style, thought, and working practices.  You can trace his creative twists and turns by following these essays sequentially over the years. 

The bibliography details the various versions of his plays which he continued work on even if they had been performed.  He wrote over twenty five full length plays, and forty plus one act or short plays.  Some short plays developed years later into full length plays. I`ve got to have a go at that.  

Developed that is as changed out of all recognition, not just stretched out for another couple of acts.  They were truly new plays.  This added to the numerous short stories, articles, and introductions to his plays made a big fat book of a bibliography.

Flicking through page and detailed page of achievement, evidence of hard work, is of course inspiring.  Each page is also riddled with guilt.  He travelled most of his life and had many a rocky relationship but the constant was the work.  He didn`t believe in writers block.  You sat down and did the work and wrote though it.  Self-doubt, distraction, laziness are the curses of the writer.  So many excuses not to write.  Only one to write—the need to tell the story.

Bibliographies may well be my favourite reading right now and have been for quite a while. For in the end the inspiration always wins out over the guilt

If I ever have enough plays on, in enough productions, in enough places; add in the short stories and poems; maybe even articles about bibliographies, I might stretch to a thin volume of a thin volume.

All you can do is what Williams did--work.

Now what about that short play of mine The Man With The Child In His Eyes?  Always felt there was more to say.

`Well get on with it. ` As Williams would drawl.

So I will.