Better off Read

As I mentioned in my last post, I am at a really strange moment - without a project, unsure if there will be another one - and in this series, I am speaking to people at various stages of a project to talk process. I’m interested in talking to people about what activities they’re doing and what is useful.

In this episode I get to talk to one of my best friends and someone who inspires me a lot Whiti Hereaka. We talk about Whiti’s latest project.

I’m asking everyone to offer an object that is somehow helping them at this stage of their work. Whiti suggested we use the art works created by a central character in her novel. These works are imagined at the moment, but Whiti is an amazing artist and it wouldn’t surprise me if these don’t come to life in some way.

Whiti sent two photos and said I could use both. I love the way these photos could be ego and alter-ego. Both images were taken the amazing Tabitha Arthur. 

I’m so incredibly grateful to Whiti, for this conversation sure but also for all the time and support she’s given me over the years and for all the work she’s done which has produced such amazing work.

Where I’m up to.

I’ve had a really nice week, book-wise. Yesterday Rebecca Priestly and I got to talk to some folk who are doing MA’s up at IIML. It was really exciting to hear about Rebecca’s new book End Times which launches next week. You can read more about End Times at this link

Also yesterday I got to speak at the launch of Emma Ling Sidnam’s amazing novel Backwaters. It was a really great night with lots of my favourite people in the room. I had a great chat with I. S. Belle whose work, and practice I really love.

Here’s a link to learn more about I. S. Belle’s work

Here’s a link to Backwaters by Emma Ling Sidnam

When I ask people on this podcast what sustains them, they often say community and I really felt that last night. It is really nice to see celebrate other people’s success. I found it really motivating and talking to everyone about their projects was also really great.

I still haven’t written anything. I keep saying this but what I mean is I haven’t written any fiction. I’m actually writing an essay for HEAT about writing violence and I’m writing a list of books for someone. So I am writing - and I’m writing this. I am thinking about the novel. And I wrote an application for some time to work on the novel, so that was a really nice way to think about it and also go over what I have written to send a writing sample.

I’m rewatching VEEP which is blowing my mind. It’s all come true!!!!!

This is a photo of me not writing in my End Greyhound Racing New Zealand T-shirt. You should totally check out this amazing compilation album which raises awareness and support to end greyhound racing - here’s a link

I have been not writing for months now. It is the first time in a long time I have felt like I am ‘not writing’. I am totally surrendered to the fact that I may not write again but also, I really wanted to talk to some writers about writing, some artists about art-ing. A bit selfishly to try and see if I could explore a bit more deeply my relationship with the practice of writing - I kind of want to make any re-entry meaningful. I don’t want to waste this stasis. But also cause the state I’m in at the moment - where writing seems like something impossible and foreign - seems like an interesting one to talk to people about their projects.

So here is the new series. At first I thought it would be a neat series of talking to people at the start of a project, others who are in the middle and others who are at the end of a project. I’ve now recorded an episode and I realise these neat phases don’t reflect the actual process of writing.

I am hoping this series will be quite fluid - maybe as my relationship to writing changes the structure of the series will change.

At the moment, I’m asking guests to bring an object they are ‘using’ at this phase of their work. Then we’ll have a chat about what this phase looks like.

So yes, this is just to let you know this series, with no name, which may change, starts next week with an amazing conversation with Whiti Hereaka.

Thanks again for all your support.

For this episode I wanted to share a story that I’ve revisited recently after a question that Jane Arthur asked me at a recent event at Good Books.

Jane asked:

Even before reading Audition, I’d clocked that your inspiration for it was basically ‘prison abolition’ and you’ve talked openly about this in interviews and in the book’s acknowledgements. 

I am so freaking interested in this, personally, as it is increasingly hard for me to separate out work and values and living and politics and creative work as I go about things. 

Correct me if I’m wrong (please!!), but it seems to me that you haven’t been quite so blatant about your own values in your work before, or at least in the framing of your work. What has changed? Are you simply braver now? Why is (your) art political (mwahaha)?

This question sent me back to this story ‘Zero Hours’ which was published in Overland in 2015. I thought of this story mainly because it signals a shift in my writing toward the didactic.

For years I had been interested in ambiguity. In leaving space for politics to sit there but not overtly. I was obsessed with the idea that fiction was a mirror and if I made my fiction as accuarte as possible people would see society in a new way and it would prompt change. I remember being incredibly angry at the time I wrote this story. John Key’s government had been elected, overwhelmingly, a year before and I remember the morning after the election walking down my street and not really recognising the city I lived in. The election had been so decisive that I was in a very small majority.

I owe a lot to Giovanni Tiso and Jolisa Gracewood who were editing a New Zealand issue of Overland and had asked me to submist a story. I am also incredibly grateful to Overland journal which provides a space for radical literature.

These things all came together, my anger and the opportunity to write some for a journal that celabrated the radical and I remember thinking, The time for ambiguity is over. And I remember one very clear question replacing this, How didactic can I get and still be be writing fiction?

It's starnge reading the story now. It's so pre-Trump. Pre-COVID. Roseanne Barr appears as a largely uncomplicated character. I thought about re-writing the story to take her out but I kind of like how hindsight re-writes this part of the story without me doing anything.

What's not funny is how little has changed. Workers are still fucked over. There are still political parties calling for self responsibility.

It’s slightly heart-wrenching revisiting this story, written during a right-wing government, a few days after the desolution of the left wing party with one of the largest majorities of my lifetime and waking up to the fact none of the promise of transformational change thatg majority held was realised.

It’s a good reminder that politics is what we do in our communities away from law and government but also that its a privilege to say, Government doesn’t matter, when it matters most to the most vulnerable.

So yeah, I offer this story because I was thinking about it and thanks largely to Jane Arthur.

This is a recording of an event that took place on a very rainy and cold Sunday afternoon at one of my favourite places, Book Hound book shop, with one of my favourite people, Annaleese Jochems

It was such a wonderful afternoon with excellent people. It was really nice to meet some folk from People Against Prisons Aotearoa who I hadn’t meet before.

Thanks again for everyone who came and thanks to Annaleese for such a great chat and such great snacks and for letting us meet in the wonderful Book Hound.

I’m giving away a copy of Audition so if you’d like a copy just leave a comment here or DM me on Instagram

Also, just wanted to announce that Tara Black is the winner of the Murdoch Stephens books. Woohoo. Thanks Tara and everyone else who entered.

Stuff and Things

The second season of Below Deck Down Under has started and the SpinOff have published this amazing interview with my work hero and life-coach Aesha Scott

I’m very excited to be speaking with Dougal O’Neill and Tīhema Baker on the 7th August. Tīhema’s book is amazing.

Other Worlds

Pip Adam's Audition features three giants: Alba, Stanley and Drew, who are squashed into a spaceship hurtling through space, and must talk to keep the spaceship moving. Tīhema Baker's Turncoat is set on a distant future Earth, colonised by aliens, where Daniel –a young, idealistic Human–is determined to make a difference for his people. These works of speculative fiction are exciting, inventive and compassionate in their exploration of systems of power. Dougal McNeill will talk to Pip and Tīhema about these other worlds in fiction, and the mirror they hold up to our world today.

Also, if you are in Ōtautahi in August, the WORD Festival has lots of very cool events. I’ll be there facilitating a workshop and having a chat.

In this episode I talk to Murdoch Stephens about his writing and in particular about the new Renters United edition of his novel Rat King Land Lord. Murdoch has just returned form a tour around Aotearoa launching this beautiful publication and speaking with Renters United about their plans to improve renters’ rights.

We talk a lot about Murdoch’s worth to double the refugee quota. This week, after our chat Murdoch was part of the group who presented a petition to MPs calling for a new sub-category in the Refugee Quota solely for refugees from the rainbow community. You can read more at this link

I have a bundle to give away of: the Renters United edition of Rat King Land Lord, the original edition of Rat King Land Lord and a copy of Murdoch’s new book Down from Upland. To enter the draw leave a comment on Substack or Instagram. I’ll draw it on Sunday 9 July.

You can read more about Lawrence & Gibson and order books here

Joy Holley’s collection of short fiction Dream Girl published by Te Herenga Waka University Press is an amazing read. I loved talking to Joy about it.

Joy chose as a starting point to talk about laughter and writing the 2022 film Bodies Bodies Bodies. This American black comedy horror film directed by Halina Reijn, in her English-language debut, with a screenplay by Sarah DeLappe from a story by Kristen Roupenian. It stars Amandla Stenberg, Maria Bakalova, Myha'la Herrold, Chase Sui Wonders, Rachel Sennott, Lee Pace, and Pete Davidson.

I really liked how this conversation concentrated a lot on joy and pleasure which is perhaps something that has been missing from these conversations about comedy.

I also loved talking about the way Joy is reimagining some elements of horror and the surreal.

I have a signed copy of Dream Girl to give away. Simply leave a comment here on Instagram or reply to the story on Twitter by June 11 and I’ll do a draw and send it to the winner.

I think this conversation was quite influenced by an amazing book I’m reading by Nuar Alsadir called Animal Joy: A Book of Laughter and Resuscitation. This book is literally changing my life. I can’t recommend it highly enough. It’s ostensibly about a psychoanalyst who goes to clown school and investigates humour in an incredibly inciteful way. The book is also making me feel a bit stupid, so many of the things I say that I think are profound are all described here as the stock and trade of psychoanalysis.

5ever is an underground publishing house based at Rebel Press, Trades Hall in Te Whanganui-a-Tara. We print, splice, bind and chop pesky dank little books. Our scope is nebulous. Form and sense of disciplinarity remains plural. But our target is clear: to publish punchy, intense and interdisciplinary work, woven together by a shared transformational kaupapa. We recognise the collective necessity of actively infiltrating and affecting our playground and home, Wellington. As we balance our vision with pragmatism, we are committed to realising a post-capitalist vision that honours Te Tiriti O Waitangi in Aotearoa. We are serious in our playfulness.

- Sasha, Achille, Max and Olive.

In February I had the opportunity to speak with Achille and Sasha on the Wellington Access Radio Community Drive show. This is an edited version of that conversation for those who missed it.

Here’s a link to the 5ever website

Achille and Sasha talk about an event that took place in February - I thought it was impor`tant to leave this part of the conversation in because it explains the type of work 5ever is doing.

During this programme we played three songs and due to to copyright, I’ve removed two of these. Because I think it’s important to here this song at every opportunity, I’ve left in Shervin Hajipour’s For Woman, Life, Freedom شروین حاجی پور

Here are the songs we played:

https://youtu.be/Q4Rb5_kjS2M

https://youtu.be/h_gA0yxKPKI

https://youtu.be/lP3PZrr-iOg

 

 

I’m really grateful that James took the time to talk to me a few weeks ago. James is really busy - in ways that make it very enjoyable to be a fan of his work.

His podcast Fair Game: Pacific Rugby Against the World which he made with John Daniell is nothing short of stunning. I can’t recommend it highly enough.

James has also been performing in Aotearoa and Australia. You still have time to see him at the New Zealand International Comedy Festival where he’s be performing his show Right About Now

This podcast was an amazing conversation for me. James has some amazing things to say about his performance at the Verb After Hours event, imperialism and paying artists.

Eamonn Marra was another amazing person who agreed to perform at the Verb After Hours event which was run last year. Eamonn is a person whose work has made me consistently laugh and cry since I first encountered it a few years ago. He’s an incredibly talented write but also a keen observer and documenter. He captures acutely stuff that is going on - and often going wrong.

This comes out just after the third anniversary of the publication of Eamonn’s amazing book 2000ft Above Worry Level

This conversation like many Eamonn and I have had went so much further and more interestingly than I expected. We cover so much. We start with a conversation about his performance at the event but we end up talking a lot about living in a world of algorithm, distance and closeness, choosing slowness.

Eamonn talks about an article by Nate Rogers called ‘Why Is The Obscure B-Side “Harness Your Hopes” Pavement’s Top Song On Spotify? It’s Complicated’.

We also talk about an amazing project Eamonn has undertaken to write about every record he owns. The series is called Every Record I Own I really recommend reading this.

In the latest post, Eamonn talks about one of my favourite albums ‘Glass Vaults – Sojourn’ accompanied by this beautiful photo

Eamonn and I are almost done with our chat when Eamonn mentions an astounding artist, who I have just discovered and have fallen completely for.

Here’s Maxine Funke singing ‘Room in the City’ https://youtu.be/F4JmlgbODjU

 

I was so grateful when Gabby Anderson agreed to be part of Verb After-Hours Beyond a Joke. 

In this episode, Gabby and I talk about her performance at that event. The episode starts with a recording of that night.

Gabby and Orine Ruaine-Prattley appear in Truth Be Told at Fringe in February.

The best way to keep up-to-date with Gabby’s events is at Gabby’s Instagram

 

During this chat I noticed I mention Janeane Garofalo a couple of times. Over summer I read this amazing essay about Garofalo by Jason Zinoman, called Janeane Garofalo Never Sold Out. What a Relief It was an incredible piece of writing about Garofalo for sure, but also so interesting to read about the concept of ‘selling out’ and defining your art on your own terms. It reminded me of this amazing Marc Maron quote that goes something like, ‘You can do comedy about whatever you want, but just remember your audience will be the people who think what you’re saying is funny.’ I’m sorry but I think it’s behind a paywall but it’s well worth hunting out.

This essay linked to a quite famous essay about Saturday Night Live which is fucking heartbreaking to read in the context of Garofalo’s career.

One thing that isn’t behind a paywall is this interview with Garofalo on Letterman which was meant to be a promotional outing for the film Reality Bites. All the Gen-Xers, stand up.

As well as Janeane Garofalo, I also make noises a couple of times about Kate Berlant’s Cinnamon in the Wind (which was directed by Bo Burnham). I think I rate Berlant as my favourite comedian at the moment. She’s a genius of the awkward and absurd and I love her. Her episode of The Characters is also worth seeking out.