June 17 2010
Our event went off "like a shot off a shovel" at our preferred venue in Glebe. Our event was promoted via our website and a few newspaper announcement and a radio spot. The upstairs room at the Friend in Hand Hotel was packed with standing room only by kick-off at 7pm. There were only minor changes to the program, with the omission of "The Ballad of Joking Jesus" reading and a change of readers for the 'Wandering Rocks' (comets) reading. Our understudy of choice was contact only hours before the event and read a fine rendition of the excerpt, getting laughs in all the right places, to wit, Lenehan on Molly, "She's a gamey mare and no mistaking it." That reader is a young actor named Zoe Norton-Lodge who will be performing in a one-woman 'Under Milkwood' at the Sidetrack Theatre in July.
Hosty introduced the night with a dedication to her mother who passed away last year, and also to Randolph Stowe, the great West Australian writer who died just recently. I have read a stage adaptation of his book 'The Merrygoround in the Sea' which is moving.
Then Bloomsday began in earnest with two readings based on Stephen Daedalus in those early chapters of Ulysses. I introduced all the readings bar the penultimate which was a duologue drawn from the Washerwomen chapter of Finnegans Wake. With the two of us reciting, it was difficult to use the basic, unidirectional microphone and not treat the performance as a real bit of stage shtick with full projection. Either way the audience responded positively to what Hosty jokingly called 'the easiest bit in Finnegans Wake', which is not far off the mark.
The audience became performers when many took a one-line part in our 'Circe' reading. This is a great bit of fun that we do a different version of every year. My general approach when adapting Circe for a group reading is to focus on Bloom getting himself in and our of trouble, and to explain how the chapter is written in the form of a surreal screenplay.
The night was a roaring success with folk coming from all over the city to celebrate Joyce, Ulysses and literary culture. Most drifted off into the chilly night inspired and contented to have travelled some familar and also undiscovered paths through 'Ulysses' and some also stayed behind to join in a singalong of the usual Joycean tunes, 'Down By the Sally Gardens', 'Love's Old Sweet Song' and 'Danny Boy'.
Hosty introduced the night with a dedication to her mother who passed away last year, and also to Randolph Stowe, the great West Australian writer who died just recently. I have read a stage adaptation of his book 'The Merrygoround in the Sea' which is moving.
Then Bloomsday began in earnest with two readings based on Stephen Daedalus in those early chapters of Ulysses. I introduced all the readings bar the penultimate which was a duologue drawn from the Washerwomen chapter of Finnegans Wake. With the two of us reciting, it was difficult to use the basic, unidirectional microphone and not treat the performance as a real bit of stage shtick with full projection. Either way the audience responded positively to what Hosty jokingly called 'the easiest bit in Finnegans Wake', which is not far off the mark.
The audience became performers when many took a one-line part in our 'Circe' reading. This is a great bit of fun that we do a different version of every year. My general approach when adapting Circe for a group reading is to focus on Bloom getting himself in and our of trouble, and to explain how the chapter is written in the form of a surreal screenplay.
The night was a roaring success with folk coming from all over the city to celebrate Joyce, Ulysses and literary culture. Most drifted off into the chilly night inspired and contented to have travelled some familar and also undiscovered paths through 'Ulysses' and some also stayed behind to join in a singalong of the usual Joycean tunes, 'Down By the Sally Gardens', 'Love's Old Sweet Song' and 'Danny Boy'.
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