Things are looking up

Rat quandary

Angst — if not existential, then circumstantial — afflicts even a rat. When not foraging or bustling about on mundane tasks in the rats' nest (and there's never a shortage), he worries and wonders how best to spend his minutes, hours, days and money; where his energy is most aptly applied; how to respond to the suffering of fellow rats and the degradation of rat habitats everywhere; whether he's better off conjuring fresh rat histories or preparing others' for presentation— or trying harder to do both; then of course, he wonders if these are still pertinent questions when he's asked them so many times before and somehow trundled on, making this choice and/or that, doing (and failing to do) this or/and that; finding that life goes on unfolding whichever way he handles it. He reckons life is a quiet cacophony  of paradoxes that occasionally strike a gloriously harmonious chord.

Thus far, today, the page is blank and Ratty's not even sure what colour he is.

He recommends (remembering his job description) that others in this fix pop over to Rosa Mira Books and choose one to read.

Melissa Green interviewed on Run to the Roundhouse, Nellie.

A marvellous interview with Melissa Green has appeared online: the author of The Linen Way in delving, illuminating discussion with Susan T. Landry on Run to the Roundhouse, Nellie. On the long, tender process of (self-)healing, Melissa speaks of (and her readers celebrate) 'the power that has accrued to my soul through years of work, of therapy and writing, to bring myself up from the burning coals of despair— back to the light of earth.' Please read the whole for your edification and pleasure.

Image by Claire Beynon: detail from 'Shadow and Shimmer', 2013, oil on paper.

Run to the Roundhouse, Nellie is a wonderful resource: 'an online journal about memoir'. With Susan  managing editor, and Melissa Shook contributing editor, it includes examples of memoir and recommended reading, interviews with memoirists and discussion on the art of writing memoir.

Thank you, Susan and Melissa, for sharing this rich conversation.

An online journal about memo

he power that has accrued to my soul through years of work, of therapy and writing, to bring myself up from the burning coals of despair—back to the light of earth. - See more at: http://run-to-the-roundhouse-nellie.com/2013/08/06/the-linen-way/#sthash.YdOLW9rE.dpuf

the power that has accrued to my soul through years of work, of therapy and writing, to bring myself up from the burning coals of despair—back to the light of earth. - See more at: http://run-to-the-roundhouse-nellie.com/2013/08/06/the-linen-way/#sthash.YdOLW9rE.dpuf

the power that has accrued to my soul through years of work, of therapy and writing, to bring myself up from the burning coals of despair—back to the light of earth. - See more at: http://run-to-the-roundhouse-nellie.com/2013/08/06/the-linen-way/#sthash.YdOLW9rE.dpuf

the power that has accrued to my soul through years of work, of therapy and writing, to bring myself up from the burning coals of despair—back to the light of earth. - See more at: http://run-to-the-roundhouse-nellie.com/2013/08/06/the-linen-way/#sthash.YdOLW9rE.dpuf

the power that has accrued to my soul through years of work, of therapy and writing, to bring myself up from the burning coals of despair—back to the light of earth. - See more at: http://run-to-the-roundhouse-nellie.com/2013/08/06/the-linen-way/#sthash.YdOLW9rE.dpuf

the power that has accrued to my soul through years of work, of therapy and writing, to bring myself up from the burning coals of despair—back to the light of earth. - See more at: http://run-to-the-roundhouse-nellie.com/2013/08/06/the-linen-way/#sthash.YdOLW9rE.dpuf

the power that has accrued to my soul through years of work, of therapy and writing, to bring myself up from the burning coals of despair—back to the light of earth. - See more at: http://run-to-the-roundhouse-nellie.com/2013/08/06/the-linen-way/#sthash.YdOLW9rE.dpuf

Formidable! (Fr)

The Linen Way has its first review. Well, rave, actually. By a writer well qualified to rave. Carolyn McCurdie is an author and poet of quiet power. She's just quietly won the NZ Poetry Society's 2013 International Competition with her poem 'Making up the Spare Beds for the Brothers Grimm'. Ratty, managing to read her review as a personal victory, had himself (slightly under-)baked into a mocha cake.

Take it away, Carolyn:
"Here I am, standing on the tallest roof-top, bellowing into the largest megaphone I can find, to rave about The Linen Way by Melissa Green. What adjectives will do the job? I'll try: luminescent, brave, beautiful. I've never read such a powerful testament to poetry. It's as essential here as oxygen, as love.

For her, it was life and death. Suffering from mental illness, living in a cruel, unloving family, Melissa made her first suicide attempt aged eight. Books, words, poetry kept her alive, gave her meaning and passion before the next sucking surge of nothing. There is courage here beyond my understanding.

This is also a testament to gift. Melissa Green's own gift of language declares itself on every line, but she also stands witness to the tenderness, faithfulness of great poets and therapists who reached out to her, pulling her back to life and to her true writing self again and again. She was mentored by Derek Walcott, who gave her tough-love guidance, and his relentless belief in her. The Russian poet Joseph Brodsky sat for hours with his arms around her when she was at her lowest points. I will never read the poetry of these men in the same way again. They gave her the persevering, unconditional love that was so lacking in her early life, making this a soaring song of hope from someone who began with none.

When I finished reading this, I felt I had been given a gift, as if Melissa Green had pressed some small thing into the palm of my hand for my fingers to curl around in recognition. I've read it twice, and each time I've felt a little changed by it. I'll read it again. It will change me further.

MESSAGE TO THE WORLD: BUY AND READ THIS BOOK!"

Exuberant words

Yesterday Melissa and I spoke for the first time, via Skype. What a pleasure that was. We stared happily at one another and in the course of the conversation I was reminded of a marvellous review of The Squanicook Eclogues, by 'Anna Livia Plurabelle', presented here on Amazon: "In The Squanicook Eclogues Green presents four unique poems of such grace, craft and awareness that her particular space and time are swiftly elevated to the universal." In The Linen Way, Melissa describes the extraordinary process by which she wrote these poems described by Derek Walcott as 'one fuckin' great elegy'.

That to whet your appetite. We have the first appraisal of The Linen Way in the wings and it's a cracker. I'll post it in a day or two.