Google-researching new novel. Progress so far:
TITLE (provisional) The Love Problem. TIME Now, especially re. Afghan war. HERO US-born woman with facial port-wine stain (PWS), commercial pilot in a small way, has left US (“No country for a woman with marred looks”) to live and work in SW France, near Biarritz. FIRST NAME She’s sexually straight but I need something slightly gender-ambiguous, hence (From Top Thousand US Women’s Names): Kristen, Karen, Robyn, Erin, Dana, Cass, Jodi, Jana, Reba. UPBRINGING Arizona, good flying state. Born/raised Flagstaff, town with decayed centre. Failed to make jet pilot with USAF; wonders about PWS. WILL MEET Divorced Brit, once making a living helping other Brits buy French homes, now on his beam ends. FIRST SCENE Driving US male pilot (who first suggested France to her) to airport as he flies back to work in US and leaves her alone.
AIMS: (1) Aspects of disfigurement, (2) … homesickness, (3) … US-France relations against Afghan war background - does French working-class favour what US is doing to Taliban.
MEANWHILE Break off to pick out Lady is a Tramp but can’t figure last eight notes of first eight bars. Email Julia who sends link to Sinatra plus note sequence:
That's -Why- the -La-dy - is - a tramp
D - D - Bflat-D-Bflat- D -Bflat
TITLE (provisional) The Love Problem. TIME Now, especially re. Afghan war. HERO US-born woman with facial port-wine stain (PWS), commercial pilot in a small way, has left US (“No country for a woman with marred looks”) to live and work in SW France, near Biarritz. FIRST NAME She’s sexually straight but I need something slightly gender-ambiguous, hence (From Top Thousand US Women’s Names): Kristen, Karen, Robyn, Erin, Dana, Cass, Jodi, Jana, Reba. UPBRINGING Arizona, good flying state. Born/raised Flagstaff, town with decayed centre. Failed to make jet pilot with USAF; wonders about PWS. WILL MEET Divorced Brit, once making a living helping other Brits buy French homes, now on his beam ends. FIRST SCENE Driving US male pilot (who first suggested France to her) to airport as he flies back to work in US and leaves her alone.
AIMS: (1) Aspects of disfigurement, (2) … homesickness, (3) … US-France relations against Afghan war background - does French working-class favour what US is doing to Taliban.
MEANWHILE Break off to pick out Lady is a Tramp but can’t figure last eight notes of first eight bars. Email Julia who sends link to Sinatra plus note sequence:
That's -Why- the -La-dy - is - a tramp
D - D - Bflat-D-Bflat- D -Bflat
Doesn’t fit. But that’s because I’m in C-major and Old Blue-eyes is in Bflat. Start practising Bflat scale – hey, it’s nearly all black notes. Time to brave the snow; off to Birmingham for LVB pnop cto 4 and Mahler 4.
5 comments:
A sucker for stories, I already want to know what happens. A long way to go yet, I do not doubt.
How was the concert?
hmm... I'm thinking Erin or Yana with a Y.
Plutarch: A fascinating possibility re. disfigurement occurred on the way to French this morning. Will post details.
Julia: Very accomplished but violent - almost savage - and restless account of pno cto 4 by Stephen Osborne. Hard for us to accept since we are both conditioned by the first version I owned by Solomon, a master of slow movements. The Mahler 4 was a delight and was one reason for going out to the concert-hall on a bitterly cold night - CDs can never match the range and depth of the real thing. So many oddities: the leader alternates between two violins, the one not in use being left on the piano stool now vacated by Osborne. For one sharp-edged passage the clarinets raise their instruments so they are pointing slightly upwards, producing sounds akin to trumpets. Not the most serious Mahler but good fun and virtuoso orchestral playing by the LPO conducted by Jurowski. How do conductors manage coherent rhythmic control of such a fragmented score?
RW (sZ): I think Erin is a non-starter given Erin Brokovitch (back in the news this week with more of the same). I'm fascinated about the distinction between J and Y with the other name. It sounds as if we're on the same path. Have you any explanation why one works better than the other?
BB, I didn't know that Brokovich is back in the news, but you're right. That's why I think Yana with a Y might work, because how many people know or have known a Yana with a Y?
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