Saturday 30 January 2016

Is the pen mightier than the electricity?



I've started my first petition ever. I've signed a lot a petitions (usually the 'black and white' rather than 'grey area' ones), but the reason for this one is simply because I think it deserves to be in the news agenda. A lot of agenda-setting is fairly arbitrary and based on whatever news editors think is relevant. When I've spoken to editors they always say: "You just get a feel for the news." It really is arbitrary.


And that is always it. Our popular news tends to be down to the instincts and hunches of a few people who decide what the news should be. If I ruled the world, the news agenda would not be the way it is - but I don't and that is probably just as well.


So, I wanted to sign a petition against ECT - Popularly known as electro-shock therapy. The reasons for this were not because I have experienced ECT myself, but I have encountered people who have and from what they have said, it has largely been a very negative experience. They have described it as invasive and life-changing (in a bad way).


I couldn't find many petitions against it, so I've made my own. I've resisted doing so before now because I'm not a leader. But someone has to do it.


As Sondheim says in his lyrics: 'If you have no expectations, you will never have a disappointment'. And I'm not really expected any great results from this. Call it an experiment - in the same way as ECT is simply an experiment - because no-one knows what it does. And it really is barbaric and shouldn't happen.

The only other time I've gone all-out on a petition was when I took a petition against the Iraq war (just before it started) around.

Please don't send me to 'chokey' just for hoping that the pen is mightier than the electricity.


Here's the text of the petition and the link:


'Ban ECT - electroconvulsive / electroshock therapy in the UK


Electroconvulsive therapy remains highly controversial. It is also largely ineffective - it damages the human brain. It doesn't work. Those who experience ECT often talk about how it feels like a kind of torture or punishment. Many people with mental health problems feel compelled to undergo ECT as a last resort and yet they often come away from the experience feeling worse than they were before. They can also experience significant brain damage.


It is like playing Russian roulette with the human brain and is even used as a threat in some instances and contexts. It is a barbaric and ineffective treatment for mental health problems.

Academic studies which defend ECT are often influenced by those with a vested interest in the treatment. But it is the vulnerable who suffer as a result. Government is complicit in this procedure and there are many other less invasive options for those who suffer mental health problems.

Basically, it stinks.'

https://www.change.org/p/jeremy-hunt-mp-rt-hon-david-cameron-mp-david-cameron-mp-jeremy-corbyn-mp-ban-ect-electroconvulsive-electroshock-therapy-in-the-uk?recruiter=9284199&utm_source=share_petition&utm_medium=copylink

Monday 4 January 2016

Review of Destiny and Dynasty



destiny and dynasty cover


I am very proud of this review of Destiny and Dynasty kindly given by the academic, playwright and writer Dr Gëzim Alpion.



__________________________________________________________________

Destiny and Dynasty

By Nick White

Amazon.co.uk, Ltd., Marston Gate, UK, 2015, pb, 179 pp

ISBN: 978-1-5023-31271-6

__________________________________________________________________

Reviewed by Gëzim Alpion

Birmingham, 31st December 2015


Destiny and Dynasty is Nick White’s first novel. There are a couple of books by established authors which I must confess I have not had the patience to read through to the end. White’s debut is a literary gem any serious writer would dream of starting their career with.

A good book tells an interesting story; a great book makes you feel the story is written for you. I initially came across the latter type of storytelling some thirty years ago when as a student in Cairo I discovered D. H. Lawrence, James Joyce, James Baldwin and Joyce Cary. What I admired most about their first literary attempts as novelists was their courage and talent to turn some of their own life experiences into art. I was equally impressed by the attention they paid to their early formative years thus showing that there is method in the Wordsworthian maxim ‘The Child is the father of the Man’.

This is not to say that White’s novel is semi/auto-biographical. Nor is the book’s main character Michael Sumner a doppelganger of sorts for some of the early heroes – Paul Morel, Stephen Dedalus, John Grimes or Evelyn Corner – penned by the above-mentioned writers. Rather, he has a life and originality of his own which explains why he is such an unusual and yet entirely believable character.

Michael emerges from the start as someone who stands out, even as a child. He has more than his fair share of misfortunes since he is twelve. This is not what makes him unusual or special, though. Misfortunes do not make those who are at the receiving end interesting figures per se. In life, as in fiction, many suffer but few overcome the harsh trials and tribulations of capricious fate that often defies logic.

Although often vulnerable, Michael is fundamentally a survivor. And he chooses to survive not by following the easy options in life. On the contrary, he takes risks even when it is almost certain that he will be hurt, at times seriously.

The intriguing thing about Michael is that he can easily lead the people he associates with and cares about as much as the reader to believe that he is an easily manipulated character. White never makes a statement that his main hero is on a quest. The reader is expected, and rightly so, to realise this for himself. What makes this realisation rather difficult at times as well as an entertaining challenge is the fact that Michael himself does not seem to have a clearly stated goal in mind. He is haunted constantly by something although we do not know what exactly from. He wants to go somewhere but we are none the wiser at any stage in the novel about his ultimate destiny. He does not want to run a church like his love interest Naomi; nor is he tempted to run away from civilisation and be a hermit like Ian. On the contrary, ne never wants to be in control and is eager to remain in touch with people even when it is clear that this more often than not will bring him trouble and sorrow rather than satisfaction and happiness.

It is clear that Michael tries hard to make sense of the senseless waste of life, which he experiences first hand with the sudden loss of his family. Nothing could have prepared him for this; not even the fateful meeting with Madame Indigo, the fortune teller, whose words, in hindsight, take a complete new and sinister meaning for this indigo child.

What makes Michael an intriguing psychological character is that he speaks through his silence. White spares us tedious psychological monologues that a less scrupulous stylist could have been tempted to employ at the detriment of the inferred aesthetic reticence.

After the family tragedy, Michael is haunted by the nightmare of falling. His challenge from then onwards is to clutch at something, anything, in the hope that his life would assume some semblance of normalcy. This never happens, but he tries constantly nevertheless.

What is intriguing about Michael, a sensitive soul as he is, is that although he creates the impression that he is impressionable and can be easily manipulated, he is always his own enigmatic self. This is apparent at various stages in the novel, even when he leaves the impression that he is under someone else’s thumb. One such case is when, against his Aunt’s expressive advice, he follows Elizabeth Ravenscroft’s counsel to get rid of his mother’s diary and his brother’s teddy bear. This more than anything else indicates that he will not be held hostage by the memory of the departed loved ones, at least not to the extent to prevent himself from enjoying life or at least keep trying. Even his infatuation with Naomi makes more sense if it is seen in this light. Rather than apparently being besotted with Naomi, Michael is in love with the idea of being in love.

While Michael obviously craves to connect, the tragedy is that he can find no trustworthy people or institutions worthy of connecting with. His manager is a heartless creature and he is not the only cruel employer in the novel. Even a religious institution like the Triumphant Life Church (TLC) is void of true feelings and solidarity. The church lacks soul. Rather than a place of worship, the TLC is in essence a business venture that was started by a crook and inherited by a knave, and which most likely will end up in the hands of an equally unscrupulous fake shepherdess. The vivid depiction of the state the TLC is in, how it operates, and how it manipulates its flock, is a heartfelt condemnation not so much of religion per se as a courageous effort to highlight the failure of institutions to fulfil their responsibility, bring people together, and forge social cohesion at a time when we continue to leave an increasingly fragmented existence.

James Ravenscroft, the head of the TLC, is a religious hypocrite and a misogynist. He is the reason why his daughter has turned into such a troubled soul, almost a Heathcliff-like creature.

Michael appears to understand from the first encounter with Naomi that something is fundamentally wrong with her. The fact that he is drawn to her to the end, however, as mentioned earlier, does not mean that he is an emotional dupe. Likewise, partly because of his own observations and partly because of the nature of the three tasks Naomi asks him to perform for her in exchange of wining his affection, it is clear that Michael is under no illusion as to what kind of church the TLC is. The fact that he falls in love with and follows doggedly a girl he knows is incapable of loving him back, and starts attending a church that is anything but a pious spiritual centre makes him sound at times like someone who does not know what he is after.

The choices Michael makes, however, odd as some of them obviously they are, are indicative of something crucial about him, something that is beyond corruptibility. He may have not found for the time being a girl who can reciprocate his love or a church where he can find solace for his troubled soul, but he will never apparently turn into a manipulative and killing misanthrope of the James and Naomi type. Nor will he apparently end up being a runner like Ian whose failure as a spouse and a father as well as the disappointment he experiences with James turn him into a quitter who escapes into the Welsh wilderness only to return back to the fold of civilisation to confront evil unsuccessfully and die an anonymous death.

Notwithstanding Michael’s importance as the main protagonist, the novel is a gallery of several memorable charters. This is mainly as a result of the original way the novelist employs the narrative which is economical and rich in its suggestiveness. The author is an astute observer of humans, nature and their interaction. This is a literary work as much as a sophisticated study on how complex, vile and lofty human beings can be. The narrative is often peppered with witty observations and humorous asides which make the novel enjoyable to read even when describing awkward moments in the characters’ lives.

Nick White has not made it easy on himself by writing such a delightful first novel.