Tag: writing

russian roulette

09.08.2025

At the most, I had twitched my lips as a prelude to a word. Essentially just the moment before the action. Alfonso raised his finger aloft and intoned, ‘Enough of your vileness about love. Perhaps one day…’

‘There is no now, there was no before and there will be no before me.’

‘That’s the positive kind of attitude!’ Alfonso smirked at me. ‘Stop wallowing in pity.’

‘It makes for a good bed.’

‘The bed is precisely what you have to free yourself from. Your late mornings have started again in earnest.’

‘Do you know what the dream is now, Alfonso? While I am awake, I see myself with a black pistol. It is very elegant and very beautiful. Irresistible. And I am sitting at the table with this little fiend. She is inviting me. I stroke her. I love her. It is a seduction that is hard to resist. And there is one pretty little bullet in this sexy little fiend. I open the gun and roll the barrel. Now, no one knows where the pretty little bullet is. Does it have my name on it like I have its name upon my heart? Who knows. I aim the sexy little fiend at my temple. There is an audience. They watch. They have thirsted for my blood from before I was born. I am what they have to kill to survive. Then…’

‘And then?’ asked Alfonso coolly.

‘That is the thing. At first, this waking dream was that it is all over. But then, do you know what my luck is? I have never been lucky in anything. This society is against my luck. Then, perhaps I get the bad luck. Perhaps I survive. Perhaps there is no big BANG.’

‘It is only a dream. You detest guns. You have told me that they are for cowards. It is against your culture to use a gun against yourself. The dream signifies nothing.’

‘Still, it is a pretty dream.’

‘Get a prettier dream. Put some flowers in it.’

‘The flowers are a tired metaphor and a false one. There is no romance. There is no beauty. There is no life principle against the death principle. There is nothing and no one in this world and there are no flowers.’

‘Pull yourself together,’ Alfonso admonished me. ‘You would let them win over you? You would accept defeat on their terms? In the world, there are flowers. You just have to find them.’

‘I have looked my whole life. Even the flowers are impure.’

‘Purity is a fiction. Hence so is impurity. It is the impure that are capable of holding power.’

‘An impure power or a pure powerlessness? What would you prefer?’

‘You want to bandy words around when you should be living life? Tomorrow you could be the happiest man in the world. Tomorrow, it might be impossible to prise the smile off your face.’

‘Who lives in tomorrow? We live in today. Today has always been foul.’

‘What is foul is your mood.’ suggested Alfonso. ‘Did not even the chocolate ice cream I gave you add a moment of joy to your day? Why did you eat it then? Remember,’ said Alfonso, ‘even the cat that gets the cream is not satisfied with its lot. Remember the Hindu philosophy: life is suffering, life is pain, life is a punishment.’

‘Some are punished more than others,’ I responded.

‘Even when you are sad, that troublesome tongue of yours looks to argue and to defy the world. One man cannot defy everyone else. One man cannot argue against the huddled voices of the world.’

‘Let me die in the attempt.’

‘There.’ Alfonso clapped his hands and a brilliant smile lit up his face. ‘Spoken at last like a man. Keep that wild mind in your head and that wild tongue in your mouth. Keep fighting. Die a noble death. Die fighting. You are the warrrior.’

I watched the smile on Alfonso’s face. What a curious thing a smile is. How do these people smile? And almost all the time? What do they have to be so happy about when there is no happiness in the world? Together, they had all decided to apportion happiness across the world. And when it had come to my share, they had decided to scrimp and save, so that I had almost nothing. I was teasing happiness and joy out of consuming scraps of chocolate, inhaling scented bars of soap and an insane clinging to the cultural evenings around London so that I almost was not sleeping any more.

And yet, there it sat. The smile. Alfonso’s belief in me that I would keep on fighting without any victory. Against all. The Indian man’s belief in The Tiger.

where can i go? (microfiction)

07.08.2025

Finally, after several years of not taking a holiday abroad, he had decided to go to foreign shores. However, nothing in life is easy, least of all a journey of ease. He did not know where to go.

His parents had not taken him on holidays abroad when he was a child. He had never booked a holiday abroad by himself or had the decision about where to go.

He lacked any kind of experience and he was stumped.

The first choice had been Japan. Beautiful Japan, the land of inspiration. But what was it that he was actually going to do there? He had a vague impression of nature and local traditions. But how was he going to organise everything?

The second idea was to take a coach trip around Europe and to cram in as much as possible. But then, how much did Europe interest him? Surely it would be pretty much the same as England?

The third idea was Athens. He had always wanted to go there. But then there was that association…

Athens could be had for about seven hundred pounds. A nice hotel with a swimming pool and breakfast. Plenty of archaeological curiosities out there.

Choices. The whole world to be had. And yet, every time he had tried to go abroad, all the plans had come crashing down around him.

There was nowhere to go. There was no place for him.

And at the same time, he could not rest where he was.

In the universe, we are a space. Our body is a space. A tiny little space in what is almost an infinity of space. And that space of the body relates to the spaces of the bodies around it. His space, his body, it had no relationship to the bodies around it. So it did not matter what country he went to or what he did, he would never have a human space around him. So why try? Why imagine being in a different human space? It was all very well saying that no man is an island. But an island he was. He would be an island in Japan, Europe, Athens or Africa. It was not what he wanted, but what he was.

This holiday was already stressing him out.

Jiggling the Jelly (microfiction)

06.08.2025

After a promise to write in the night, I sat there at my desk in my boxer shorts scratching away idly at my inner thigh as I endured a severe writer’s blank. I tried the usual methods to break the blank. A feverish search in my vocabulary of words. Reflection on an experiences that would inspire something. Themes.

Nothing worked.

There were certain things it was now best to avoid. That was not helping. Because it was those things that were on my mind the most. The unfinished business…

Suddenly I felt tired so I grabbed the laptop and lay on my bed. And, immediately when I done so, all the words and ideas came flooding in.

Curious. Had it been the change of scene? But why? I am comfortable at my desk and habituated to writing there. Then I realised. I had laid down. Which had changed the orientation of my brain.

I had jiggled the jelly.

That was what had sparked off the creativity. All I needed to do was to change the orientation of the mass inside my head. Maybe if I leant to the left, that would mean that I would produce poetry or soemthing like it. Then, the right might produce prose and non-fiction. Maybe if I leant my head back while it was straight, I could produce some good erotica.

So simple. All I had to do was to introduce different movements into my routine.

I tested it out. I lay down and tilted my head to the left. Failure. I started thinking of they, all the moments. They were on my mind frequently.

I tried the other side. It was worse. I started thinking of the big C word. My career. And out of work time too. I shuddered.

Why was the writing impulse so elusive today?

But if it was the jiggling of the jelly…

‘Eureka!’ I cried. The solution was so simple. I slapped myself on both cheeks and on my forehead. That would move it.

I pummelled away at my face with my open palm. Unfortunately, however, you can not get much writing done when you don’t have any free hands. The jelly was jiggered and not jiggled. And in all the experimentation, I had forgotten the idea I had when I laid on the bed. There was not going to be any story tonight.

My discerning, demanding readers would be most displeased.

Review of Hugh Fox Photography Gallery: A Day in the Life: People and Places of the Old Royal Naval College

11.06.2024

Dr. Suneel Mehmi

Please note: The views in my personal review do not reflect the views of any organisation in which I work and do not reflect any kind of consensus within any organisation in which I work. This is an independent review for my non-commercial personal blog written in my free time in which I am at liberty to think and say what I want. And nobody is compelled to read what I write – I can only offer an invitation.

In the atmospheric bowels of the King William building, Hugh Fox’s photographs document the interactions of visitors with the space at the Old Royal Naval College, as well as portraits of staff and brief interviews. Visitors are thus able to learn more about what happens behinds the scenes at such a grand historic site, the tales of protection and conservation.

The first photograph is of one of the entrance gates to the attraction, the first glimpse of the beauty inside. Fox has chosen an angle which hides the building behind the trees. So there is a mystery created, a veil between the viewer and the site. There is an idea of an inner, hidden core within the building that is to be investigated. Is this an invitation to penetrate the veil? The allurement of concealment? The lamp in the middle of the archway of the entrance floats over the veil of the trees suggesting the enlightenment of obscurity. Perhaps it is also a reflection on the nature of photography which is writing with light, which promises to go deep within the exhibition.

The fact that there is a tussle between the trees in the archway and the man-made building suggests a fight between humans and nature, culture and authenticity, perhaps even the life of the trees and the stasis of stone. Does nature – and the representation of nature – win? One of the trees appears as though it is bigger than the Baroque dome of the building.

Actually, this entrance (The West Gate) was photographed by the inventor of the photograph in Great Britain, William Henry Fox Talbot in about 1839. So this photograph could possibly be a modern update of that historic photograph – particularly as Hugh Fox also has the name ‘Fox’ in his name.

The theme of enlightenment is continued in the photograph of a mother with a pram who is walking beside her daughter in the shadows. They are walking towards the lamp to the right of the image in one of the colonnades in the site. Because there are two children, perhaps we can assume that they represent the curiosity which the photographer is to kindle in the audience that are following the light of photography and its writing. Illumination is manifest in the image – the three bodies are to move from the sphere of darkness into the light just in front of them. And there is a subtlety too – the mother has one foot behind her in the pool of light. She is leading her daughter into the path of light. She is a being of light herself. The lamp itself is situated over the skyscape of the London Docklands – it represents modernity and the future rather than the Baroque of the Old Royal Naval College.

What is peculiar about the mother is that she wears a yellow coat. This was the coat that the Naval Pensioners wore as punishment in the days of the Royal Hospital for Seamen. This incidental detail may seem to complicate the image in one sense. And then, there is a further complication. Because the staff at the Old Royal Naval College also wear yellow T-shirts. Therefore, the yellow is split between goodness and badness and is ambiguous in its suggestion of the role for the mother.

Particularly interesting to someone with some familiarity of these figures is the portrait of Natalie Conboy, Collections Manager. Obviously the scholarly aspects of her work persona are emphasised and she holds a pencil in her hand. Her personality shines through in her smile: we know that she is a warm person. At the same time, she blazes spectacularly in blue, like a blue fire. Because her hair is blue and she is wearing a blue outfit. In the photograph of the mother leading her daughter into the light, the mother was wearing a blue rucksack. Is this a thematic resonance within the series of photographs here, the breaking down of the barrier between visitor and staff, like this exhibition which presents them both side to side?

But there is also a theme of blackness here. Because the blue has black tiger’s stripes pulsating through it and Natalie also wears black gloves. And there is a mirroring of the black gloves in her necklace that she wears, in which a black hand dangles as a pendant, pointing downwards so that the black hand is gesturing to the black hands below. The photograph is there a symphony of colours and hands. That portray and point to the act of writing, research. And that point to something else: a transformation of the white body into blackness with the black hands of the writer: maybe an allusion to the act of writing where the white body transmutes into the black ink which then relays personality and identity.

But again, there is the pointing towards what is concealed: the concealed hand behind the hand that writes. The hand behind the scenes. We have a meta reference to what is being portrayed in the photograph: the work that is going on behind the vision of the visitor. It is what is concealed that is the object of attraction.

And then, there is an insinuation of precarity here. Because the focus is on writing and the most visible writing in the photograph is the word ‘FRAGILE’ in capital letters on the box above Natalie’s head to the right. The gloves, of course, are to protect the collection, our precious history. They need delicate handling. So Natalie’s role as protectress is emphasised. But at the same time, she is positioned in the shot as fragile herself: she is amongst the shelves which form the background, as one of the objects in the collection…

One photograph of a man looking upwards in front of the West Wall in the Painted Hall and who is directing his smartphone as a camera has a game of arms. The figures behind him are touching his outstretched arms: the nude woman and the King. The relationships between photography, femininity and power are perhaps being explored here as the photographer reflects upon his craft. Photography here appears to be a joining with woman’s body and the photographer gives ‘the elbow’ to male power. It is indicative that all of the staff that he has photographed are women….

The torch and the image of the light makes its way again into the image of one of the friendly Volunteer Tour Guides, Chenda. She is directing the gaze of the visitors upwards with her torch. Once again, the educative mission of the charity and the site is highlighted, its leading of the viewers and the visitors to Enlightenment. It is the gaze upwards towards the heavens…

Does the posture of Chenda imitate the photograph of the mother leading her daughter to the lamp? The mother who was also wearing yellow? Because Chenda is holding her stomach as she points the torch, the place where the babies come from… The action of holding her hand there also obscures her name tag and therefore her identity as she becomes the anonymous purveyor of truth, knowledge, art and culture.

An interesting exhibit with some interesting photographs. A perspective on the site and the people that make it what it is that is well worth exploring. And, furthermore, with the use of framing devices around the site, some of the photographs were quite visually striking.

About the Author

Dr. Suneel Mehmi holds a PhD in the history of photography which was published as a monograph by Routledge – Law, Literature and the Power of Reading: Literalism and Photography in the Nineteenth Century. He is currently in the third year of an Open University Degree in Art History and Visual Culture.

The Artistic Failures of a Mr. Nobody

02.02.2018

A little while back, I read an article in a newspaper, possibly the Guardian, about a writer who had never made it and had never been published. The novels that this man had dedicated his life to, forgoing employment and the material things of life, were described as “execrable”, or some such choice word. Here was a Mr. Nobody who produced “artistic failures”. No one wanted to publish his writing. No one wanted to read his writing. Yet, day after day, Mr. Nobody sat at his desk and pushed out the words.

Mr. Nobody could be anyone. There are thousands of people in the same position: writers, poets, artists, singers and musicians. Certainly, Mr. Nobody is myself. One wonders, though, how Mr. Nobody can bear his numerous disappointments and the miscarriages of his babies in the world. Today I want to write a little piece about this artistic failure and disappointment. I regard artistic failure as a lack of recognition. The reader will forgive this narcissistic exploration. Chekov wrote that it is only a mediocre novelist that goes on and on about writing a novel, not the successful writer. So be it, yet even the mediocre novelist must have an opinion and reflect upon his or her failures and successes.

The story is a common one. After years of publishing creative work in student newspapers and magazines as a young man, I thought, optimistically, that the next step would surely be publication with a serious publisher. I expected the wider world to take note of what I had published in the student publications. I sent off my poetry to magazines and publishing houses like Faber and Faber. I tried to get my short stories published in American magazines. I applied for book reviewing and journalistic positions. The result? Rejection after rejection. Gradually, I stopped sending my stuff out to companies and applying for work. I published online, thus cutting off any potential revenue from my work. Now, my poetry was up on my blog and I found out that poetry publishers wouldn’t publish work that had already featured online. The amount of readers that I had could be counted on one hand. It was the same thing with my short stories and book reviews. I put the music that I had composed and sang to online. When it was my own original music, perhaps twenty people would listen to my songs at most. I took up art about two years ago and post work on my Instagram account. The work has generated zero income and I have never managed to go over seventy likes on a picture.

Having reached middle age, it is clear that I am an artistic failure. Like Mr. Nobody, my creative work has never been published, has never generated any revenue and is read, listened to and seen by only a small handful of people. I have not received real recognition for my work. Producing this creative work, which costs money and takes up time when I could be earning money is therefore something of Sisyphean enterprise. Like the Ancient Greek character, I push the boulder up the mountain every time I sit at my desk to produce anything and it never gets anywhere. How does a person bear the constant disappointment and frustration? How does he or she bear the indifference and apathy of the general public which would tend to suggest that these cultural productions are worthless?

These questions have been considered by creative thinkers in the past. I recently read a short story about the issue called “Enoch Soames” by Max Beerbohm which was first published in The Century Illustrated Monthly Magazine (May 1916). Enoch is a poet who does not get the attention that he feels he deserves. His belief in his work, however, is undying. He therefore makes a pact with the devil to travel into the future because he is convinced that his work is ahead of its time and will be revered by future readers. He thus stakes his soul on his belief in his work since this is the devil’s fee. However, on arriving into the future, Enoch finds that he is still a Mr. Nobody. Beerbohm’s story reflects a somewhat delusional belief which keeps a Mr. Nobody going. Mr. Nobody believes that, if not today, then maybe tomorrow there will be the attention and the notice. Mr. Nobody lives in a strange world of time, chance and happening, much like the lottery ticket buyer. After all, Mr. Nobody has read the rubbish which is published everywhere and which is popular. He’s seen the hacks claiming the prime place in the affections of people. Mr. Nobody knows that it is a just a question of luck and the capricious and fickle whims of the public. It is not what is of value that is valued. What is of value is frequently discarded to the rubbish pile of history while that which is worthless is heralded as brilliant and daring. The darlings of the public are not infrequently mountebanks and monsters. Mr. Nobody therefore, irresistibly, inevitably, sets himself at defiance to the world. He stands in contempt of this world. This contempt hardens Mr. Nobody’s strict belief in himself. Mr. Nobody says to himself each and every morning “It does not matter if none believe in me. For I am only to believe in myself and everything will follow”.

After all, Mr. Nobody does not just model himself on Sisyphus, but also models himself on Cassandra. Cassandra was cursed to speak words of truth that none would believe. If her words of prophecy had been listened to and followed, Troy would not have fallen to the Greeks. Mr. Nobody believes in the value of what he expresses. If, one day, Mr. Nobody is to be recognised as someone who was saying something of value, then he believes it is the misfortune of others not to have heard his voice. Mr. Nobody believes that in frustrating his expression and his voice, which is only fully expressed in the presence of an audience, the public is hurting itself.

Such is the ego and the arrogance of a Mr. Nobody. Ego is the apt word because one thinks of how Sigmund Freud divided up the work of the different components of subjectivity. Ego would produce and produce. It had a limitless creativity and spontaneity. However, the superego guarded the gates of expression. It would sit in judgement of what ego had written and censor the material, not allowing certain things past the gate. Mr. Nobody is the ultimate version of the ego while the public, as ever, is the superego. Mr. Nobody wants ego to prevail and burst through every attempt at resistance. Mr. Nobody does not believe in “compromise”, the word that Sigmund Freud picked out for the repressive mechanism of the superego. And, one wonders, without the arrogance of the ego, would creative work be possible? In the creative work, the human being says “I am and I am beautiful”. The creative human being is not just arrogant but a narcissist. And where the creative being does not assert that claim, then, says Mr. Nobody, that creative being has failed. If creative work is not the expression of self, it is nothing. But what of it? For, of course, Mr. Nobody is neither published, read, or listened to. Where Mr. Nobody is concerned, the world blind and deaf. And these are the artistic failures of a Mr. Nobody.