manchester histories festival, a celebration of a thousand stories...

saturday was manchester histories festival, a day of walks, talks and displays about the city's multiple pasts, or as the organisers put it 'a one day spectacular celebrating the history of our vibrant city. Discover exhibits, talks, films, tours and music, all inspired by the stories of Manchester's incredible past'.


intrigued by this bold claim and the opportunity to wander about in the grandeur of the town hall, i went along bright and early to book myself in to one or two of the events, watch some film footage from the north west film archive and simply meander about aimlessly in search of a society or group that might take my fancy...

there are already several superb reviews of the festival and accounts of its many highlights on some of my favourite blogs, so i wont bore you with my own day, rather refer you to richard barrett and the shrieking violet for their interesting and pertinent tales of a day in the company of dave haslem, keith warrender, clare hartwell, sheila rowbotham and jonathan schofield, not to mention engels, the scuttlers, the chartists, suffragettes, cholera and the evening news intrepid carrier pigeons!

if i havent already pointed you in the direction of these two excellent bloggers, then shame on me, they both regularly inform and delight me on their fabulous pages! between them their accounts perfectly capture the sheer chaos and delight of a day choc a bloc with mancunians eager to share their knowledge, research, enthusiasm and insights about the city. besides, as i opted for the walks i missed all of the brilliant talks, not least my all time history hero michael wood, of 'in search of...' fame. trojan war, domeday book, alexander the great, he's done them all. not bad for a boy from salford...


after my walks, castlefield in the morning and architecture in the afternoon, i indulged in the simple pleasure of mooching about the lord mayors parlour and banqueting hall, taking in the many stalls, local groups and history clubs assembled to meet and talk to. here was rare and wonderful chance to get a real flavour of the countless projects currently going on across the city that generally stay under the radar. if you have ever had a question about just about anything really, here all under one roof was probably the answer...personal favourites include victoria baths, ruinous recollections, dig manchester, friends of platt fields, memories of belle vue zoo, and granadaland television, now sadly plain old itv....

on a micro-local note, a special mention should also go to a beautiful project i spotted amongst the displays from various manchester educational departments on chorlton on medlock (my very own brunswick!) by miriad masters student elizabeth kealy-morris called mapping memory which evocatively records

the memories former residents have of Chorlton-on-Medlock before being cleared. These maps directly represent memory maps drawn by participants in this project and articulate the everyday knowledge of life lived in their pre-clearance neighbourhoods. The style is appropriated from travel maps that offer official views of the explored tourist city; my visual strategy has been to elevate former residents' memories to the level of official recorded memory and encourage engagement with their stories.

do check out her website, its fabulous!

in short, like everyone else who attended the histories day or has since written about it, i was initially dismayed at the crowds, queues and general clamour but perhaps this simply reflects a dirth of such cultural open days to enjoy, and is proof if anyone should need it that mancunians are crying out for more to do on a saturday than go to harvey nicks!!

here's to a regular manchester histories festival, not just annual but perhaps monthly. given the jam packed programme, it seems obvious that there's already enough on offer to fill a dozen such evenings or sunday afternoons - imagine the glamour of a monthly bluestocking type salon in the glorious setting of the town hall, dedicated to diverse walks, talks and conversations on all things mancunian.

now thats what i'd call a cultural city...

an urban fairy story - the new gothic?

never the most prolific of bloggers, february saw the diary reduced to a solitary post rather than the usual four or six. seasoned bloggers normally pop something up to reassure any readers that its soon to be business as usual and to keep tuning in in the meantime. reasons are usually books being edited or fine tuned, art projects and exhibitions being installed, or travels abroad, research for forthcoming projects, books, exhibitions.... all very productive and intimidating!

what was my reason? nothing so glamourous. my life outside of this diary is rather prosaic and not worth the column inch, so its with some apology and sense of absurdity that ive drawn attention to my recent blogging absence at all! february simply saw me attempting to write a fairy story for a magazine whose theme for submissions was fantasy. an unlikely arena for this old flaneur you might think but no. au contraire...

it occured to me that my habit (bordering on obsession) of regaling you dear reader with my romantic reveries of neglected social housing estates such as brunswick, my moated kingdom and home to my coterie of bluestockings, and other modern day ruins and icons such as the mancunian way, the tinsley towers, the umist campus and the holloway wall, is a reimagining or repositioning of the late 20th century as a new gothic, as darkly romantic as the victorian gothic of aubrey beardsley, edgar allen poe, m r james, et al.

and im not alone in this new urban gothic, there's something in the air - as my good friend mr hale recently said, concrete and cooling towers are the lost content of a generation. the new cube exhibition, the british landscape, showcases the work of john davies whose large format black and white photographs, taken between 1979 and 2005 show the vast, complex and majestic scenery of industrial and post industrial britain. its not on for long, just until 18 april, so dont miss it, its beautiful.

spurred on by the exhibition, mr hales comment, a rewriting of rapunzel for our times by the ever enticing shrieking violet, and a child's intuitive likening of a tower block to a castle, i am posting my own humble attempt at evoking a moment in the collective imagination before the mood passes...

it didnt make it into the magazine by the way, so dont expect too much of it!

Once upon a time there lived a solitary little girl.

She lived in the high peaks of the eerie Troglodyte mountains, an abandoned world of soaring stalagmites whose weather beaten towers lay beyond the remotest hamlets and villages at the farthest edge of the Far Northern Territory; a forgotten realm, glowering mysteriously from behind the misty White Moss and the wild Clough End, a dark and dangerous wilderness traversed by few and survived by fewer - a gnarly woodland of tangled groves, knotted vines and hazy hollows inhabited by tribes of bloodthirsty trolls, mischievous boggarts and platoons of nameless beasts who lurked behind each tree and roamed every corner of the twisted undergrowth. Few in the outlying valleys ever ventured into these woods, let alone the White Moss in the vale below. These swirling treacherous bogs enveloped the woodlands with unimaginable terrors; a nether world twixt land and water, twixt living and dead, its swamps and marshes haunted by wraiths, spectres and ghostly apparitions, the melancholic spirits of those foolhardy and unwary souls who had lost their footing on its perilous paths. Only the truly god forsaken journeyed into the White Moss, making the Troglodyte Mountains virtually impregnable.

It was said that no-one had lived in these strange desolate mountains, their tall towers huddled atop their colossal peaks like a ganglion of petrified gargoyles, for nigh on a hundred years. But countless fireside storytellers had woven a thick tapestry of dreams around those mysterious inhabitants of yesteryear. Some spun tales of a giant race of fierce and warlike ogres who had dwelled there long ago, chiselling deep into the mountains and hauling endless rocks and boulders to create their lofty fortresses from where they unleashed a reign of terror on the peaceable villages below until at last they were punished and turned to stone. Others swore they were inhabited even today by a ragtag colony of crones and witches, hags and banshees whose calls might just be heard above the plaintive cries of the night, scratching a squalid living amidst the ruined palaces of a vanished race of heroes. Whatever the truth, there was little to draw anyone to such a remote and impenetrable spot and so the white giants in the north remained derelict and unloved, a vague memory, a folk tale, a bedtime story to frighten the little ones, the legend of the Nine ladies who turned to stone for a forgotten transgression.

But this desolate spot, so feared and foreboding, was in fact still occupied by one little girl, the last of her kind. She lived at the top of a perpendicular stalagmite, a towering column of crumbling concrete as high as the clouds in the sky, with views as far as the eye could see. From here she commanded a panoramic view across its four corners and the lands beyond. On a clear day she could even make out the great Metropolis to the south, a kingdom she had read was crafted entirely from a million glittering shards of glass, a translucent spectacle that was the new wonder of the civilised world, a world away from her gnarly, carbuncled mountains, with sturdy rock pigeons the only neighbours of her craggy roost, resplendent in their iridescent blue and purple coats. Together she and they nestled snugly in the windswept crevices and hollows that she called home. Their morning cooing and cawing was her very own alarm call and together girl and feathered friends would stretch and yawn bleary eyed at each dewy dawn and gaze ahead, at a gigantic adventure playground to explore every day. To her eyes this was no failed idyll or forbidden territory but a magical enchanted place, home of her ancestors and she its last guardian.

If the little girl was solitary she certainly wasn’t lonely, or at least didn’t know it, scarcely remembering human company enough to tell if she missed it. Besides she had the woods, fields, trees and neighbouring towers to clamber, and the company of the foxes, rabbits, birds, bees, butterflies and dragonflies that shared her beautiful wildscape. Gazing out from her bedroom in the clouds she could just make out the vaguest outline of the great highways circling its borders, and nearer, the many winding paths linking the towers to their garden plots and wide lawns with their overgrown flowerbeds. She often whiled away the nights imagining what life had been like once upon a time when the towers had been the heart of a great vision, a utopian dream, a bold rebirth after the devastations of the Great wars. Her bird’s eye view was a living, moving map of the tumbledown geography beneath, the grand creations and perambulations so hidden at street level unexpectedly clear, the familiar routes and daily strolls trodden long ago by her ancestors perfectly revealed.

Back on the ground those paths and flowerbeds reverted to a dense tangle of thorns, bushes and giant weeds as Nature had gradually reclaimed its own. Without constant maintenance the pleasure gardens, spacious dwellings and wide boulevards, once a source of such civic pride, had all too soon returned to bog and marsh, the ramshackle paths, mysterious black circles and thin barren maypoles choking with creeping vines and verdant ivy all that remained of the dreams and aspirations of the vanished empire, its proud ambitions and ideals reduced to pitted potholes and blank eyed citadels. Once upon a time this had been the wonder of the modern world, a dream for a bright new future, its lavish landscape and spacious dwellings heralding a new way of living, a radiant city in which to work, rest and play. The little girl knew nothing of this – it was simply her tangled playground and she alone now inhabited its vast empty spaces knowing its overrun paths, nooks and crannies by heart. And although no-one seemed able to penetrate the obstacles barring the way to the Troglodyte Mountains she had become quite adept at avoiding the many perils, monsters and terrors to enter the world beyond. She had memorized every track and path through the woods and marshlands to the outlying villages – those swirling mosses and fearful forests proved effortless, nimble and fleet of foot as she was, whilst the trolls, wolves and apparitions lurking within them appeared quite tame to her. Eventually she had created her own personal atlas of this deserted realm, a chronicle of her journeys etched into her heart around its edges and boundaries and the routes to the Outer Lands, a personal topography of the terrain that was part cartography, part experience, part identity; an A to Z of her memories, her history, her sense of self.

So the girl lived there, quite at home in the solitude, taking pleasure in its wildness. The Nine ladies, far from being the dark dread of the outside world, were her guardian angels, silent sentinels and keepers of her ancestors’ wisdom. The heart of her universe, a source of never-ending adventure, they fanned the visions of the far beyond that she read about in the books she would pluck from the mantelpieces, bookshelves and libraries gathering dust in her neighbouring cobwebby buildings and apartments. A haven of words and pictures, a vast repository of ideas, thoughts and philosophies, books were her dreaming, where she could hover above the clouds and fly beyond her own horizons. Devouring everything she came across, she would conjure up images of the curious places and strange worlds they described. Books were her friends and confidantes, their absent authors her first brush with human companionship, whose words pierced her heart with linguistic riches, and the legendary Bibliotheca, custodian it was said of all the books ever written, was to become her life’s Quest, her Holy Grail. By day she would forage for new titles, replacing finished reads to their rightful shelves; she was always most careful to keep the books in the same order that she found them! Then in the long summer afternoons when it was just too hot to explore she would settle into a shady nook in one of her favourite wild flower meadows and read in the dappled sunlight. By night she would continue at the top of her turret, her pages illuminated by the immense night skies, the twinkling stars or pale smiling moon….she would gaze out at the distant lights and imagine the adventures awaiting the brave and bold explorer.

Then one day she noticed a small and faded stamp in the corner of a well worn book. She pored over it, curious as to its meaning. It wasn’t part of the title and it definitely wasn’t part of the original print of the book. It was truly a mystery. There was a crest, a heraldic device of some kind and an inscription which read ‘Return to Reading Room, Property of the University Library’. Looking out from her little crow’s nest she was reminded of the legends of the illustrious Libraries of the Ancient Cities of Alexandria and Constantinople and wondered if the magnificent City of Glass to the south might also contain such a treasure. Could this be the location of the University Library embossed into the flyleaf of her book? There was only one way to find out. She determined to set out the very next day on the longest journey she had ever made. It would mean leaving her enchanted home, crossing the White Moss and traversing the whole of Clough End, passing the hamlets and villages beyond to the farthest reaches of the Outer Lands before reaching the mythical City of Glass at the very end of the world, an adventure to match any she had read of, to be sure. She packed only the barest necessities for the harsh journey ahead and most carefully of all the book with the precious inscription in its flyleaf, key to the kingdom of knowledge ahead. As each day passed she looked back encouraged that her gentle guardian angels the Nine Towers were still visible and pressed ever onwards, the pages of all the books still to read urging her on in search of the Great Library.

Eventually the solitary girl from the desolate mountains entered the City walls and the magical realm of Knowledge and Learning enclosed under the grand dome of its celebrated library. Bewitched in the endless walkways and colossal stacks of books and journals, many years were to pass before she emerged from her travels in the scriptorium. But subtle signs of her childhood years persisted. She was never able to sleep amidst the everyday noises of the metropolis in their normal two storey houses but instead made for turrets or the highest attics, craving her remote battlements and the plaintive cries of the wolves, boggarts and shadowy spectres that dwelled in the treacherous swamps and misty plains of her homelands. Her peculiar affinity for the urban pigeons always confounded the city dwellers, their grimy blue – grey feathers reminding her of the resplendent coats of the rock pigeons she had long shared her crows nest perch with, whilst her unfathomable affection for neglected concrete architecture in unloved corners of a city in awe of glass and brightly coloured plastic never failed to raise eyebrows. In short, despite all the treasures of the great library, she never felt quite as at home as she once had, alone in her deserted, enchanted towers.

And so at last she began the long journey back to the Troglodyte Mountains. As she drew nearer, it seemed to her that the peaks had diminished and its tall towers looked smaller than she recalled. She wasn’t even sure she was in the vicinity for try as she might she couldn’t count her Nine Ladies on the horizon. In confusion, she stopped at the nearest hamlet, now a busy plaza and shopping centre, to ask what had become of her guardian angels, totems of her ancestors, and learned that most of the ugly old gargoyles had finally been demolished, just one or two allowed to remain, fashionably renovated in bright and cheery facia and fancy plastic fittings. Soon she could see for herself that the entire area had been given a makeover, the tangled forests and knotted paths tidied up and smart new bijoux houses with tiny back yards replacing those wide expanses of unused real estate.

Her brooding mountains, those remote and desolate stalagmites whose tall towers perched atop enormous peaks were gone, their fierce, forbidding architecture, wild tangled gardens, potholed streets and boulevards now vanquished. There would be no more tales on dark nights by the fireside of a giant race of fierce and warlike ogres who had dwelled there long ago, no more nursery fears of swamps and marshes haunted by wraiths, spectres and ghostly apparitions, no lost souls haunting the ancient paths and tracks across the mosses, not in Fresh Fields, the bright, clean and clinical kingdom of the new all conquering Lego people.

Her enchanted realm has a different name and another life now, its wild places, wolves, foxes, dragonflies, birds, bees and butterflies displaced with the clearances and like them she is banished, all that remains an atlas inscribed in her heart - a map of a life lived in the ruins of her ancestors, a personal geography of faded glories, wide boulevards, lofty ideals, a wonder of the modern world, a vision for a bright new future, a radiant city: an A to Z of her identity, her history, her sense of self.

No, this tame new world can never be her home...

brutal is beautiful!

one of my esteemed boffin friends, mr hale, has drawn my attention to an interesting article in the always 'on the button' manchester confidential.

in Lumpy Concrete Art jonathon schofield defends three controversial 60's concrete horrors, including our very own hollaway wall, which i drew your attention to at the beginning of the year, the 20th century society's january building of the month. like me he is keen for the city to take stock of its recent heritage and appreciate the grandeur of a period more maligned than appreciated:

Get up close to the wall and its impressive, ten times better than Tadao Ando’s concrete thingy in Piccadilly Gardens. It’s full of solemn power, and bashed about grandeur. But above all it's simply weird, drawing you in with its stop you in the street, ‘you-what?’ magnetism...

his other two featured highlights are also worth a mention and a visit - the first living right in the city centre near the gorgeous cis building, a modest but attractive screen wall fronting miller street creating a processional way of the entrance to new century hall; the other a series of bizarre totems on the salford campus. here's his piece in full with great pictures. have a quick read, feast your eyes and please support the petition to list the holloway wall from current development proposals.

because, as schofield ends in his homage to the beauty of brutal architecture -

All cities need context. As we walk through them we need to feel the layers of the city’s history under our feet. It’s best if a city provides a visual reminder in odd tucked away corners – Holloway’s Wall – or right in your face – Mitchell’s three giants - of what it was before and how it then looked on the world and itself. These concrete features do this, they’re not only a physical reminder of the time in which they were built, but also of the mood of that period in our history.

i couldnt have put it better myself...

in praise of contemporary bluestockings...

it seems that my recent homage to forgotten females struck a chord with many friends and acquaintances, some of whom have subsequently suggested their own icons, including louise bourgeoise, charlotte perriand, vivienne westwood, marie du plessis, edie bouvier beale, bette davis, virginia woolf, marlene dietrich, coco chanel, elizabeth 1, angela carter, angela davis, martha gelthorn, alice b toklas. thank you lisa, anne, hilary and mysty mary!

meanwhile over at the bluestocking, that veritable headquarters of female erudition and scholarliness, international womens day has also led to a little list making and contemplation of heroines who deserve our admiration. this is a splendid resource for all budding spinsters and learned ladies with links to journals, archives, worldwide sisterly bloggings and is in short a jolly good read - do visit them for a total immersion into the history and future of the bluestocking and her postmodern offspring, the geekgirl and feminista. there’s even a name generator to play with, though they rather gave up on me, naming me a somewhat disappointing euphemia p baptista!?

of course bluestockings don’t only exist in the past nor are they merely consigned to the pages of history; women continue to inspire in the contemporary and everyday world invariably under our very noses. it’s just that now as then these thoroughly modern heroines tend to remain unidentified, their achievements and stories overwhelmed by the sheer clamour of the wags, it-girls and reality stars vying for our attention. so to complete this celebratory theme of female endeavour, adventure, notoriety and achievement, here's my humble offering of a few of today’s femaletastic endeavours, all within hailing distance!

where better to start than right here in brunswick? i have sung the praises of my small coterie of bluestockings elsewhere in these pages but i can surely be forgiven for reiterating them here…

the gorgeous and rather terrifying lonelady - just signed to warp records, her first album is being recorded at a secret location in the northern wastelands right now….listen to nerve up here, for a flavour of what’s to come.

artist, urbanist and cube (centre for the urban and built environment on portland st, manchester) open winner andrea booker should be revealing more of her haunting urban rescue work during her residency at cube this summer. i've long been a fan of this brunswick belle - read and see more about her work here.

apartment in the heart of brunswick will be sorely missed when it closes its doors for good at the end of its current show, not only for its support of hundreds of international artists and innovative curatorial projects such as artranspennine08, but also for the dazzling presence of artist, curator and co-founder hilary jack. some consolation however might be found at her blog , where we can keep up to date with her future projects, or at axis where she regularly contributes articles on pertinent issues in the contemporary artworld.

of course, no review of brunswick or indeed manchester would be complete without a mention of the legend and megastar that is the ‘acid tongued glamazon’ coco laverne. her astute cultural commentary, film reviews and all round fabulousness can be found on her blogsite, ms coco la verne, including todays sharply written assessment of women, domestic violence and spinsterhood.

widening the scope outwards slightly from my own enchanted corner of the city, i have been most privileged since my emergence into the 21st century to be befriended by an extraordinary array of artists, activists, loiterers, drifters and dreamers - magnificent women writing, exploring and creating their own city, situationists and flaneuses all.

morag rose and jane samuels. where to start? these two urban loiterers, flaneuses and adventurers really are the epitome of iconic. i’ve enthused about them both many times before but really one cant praise them enough – for more about the lrm in manchester and the abandoned buildings project visit this inspiring blogsite. better still join in; you'd be most welcome!

an intriguing message popped into my inbox on facebook recently and got me hooked immediately, drawing on the history of cycling clubs, female emancipation, but bringing it right up to date. here's what it said. ride like a girl;

Wednesday 8th April (and monthly on 2nd Wednesday of the month). Meet at 6:30pm outside the Pankhurst Centre. We shall ride, mostly off road routes for about an hour. (the ride will be lead by a qualified cycling instructor who can give advice on assertive/ confident cycling during the ride). After the ride we shall go to The Deaf Institute where we can celebrate the first of the new monthly women's rides with female DJ's playing ace music all night!!!!Boys welcome to the afterparty…

look out for me on mabel, my trusty penny farthing!

if green issues, allotments or community activities are your thing, then look no further than latterday land army girls, odette o’reilly and louise allen, project co-ordinators of GROWTH, a “grow your own scheme” that will meet every two weeks in whalley range to share skills and enable people to grow their own vegetables in an urban plot. find out more at the lovely shrieking violet blogsite, a mine of mancunian activity and information.

ArtYarn is a collaborative fibre arts project coordinated by visual artists Rachael Elwell and Sarah Hardacre, who use traditional knitting and crochet techniques in contemporary visual arts projects. its part activism, part socially engaged art - crafty, subversive and fabulous. catch them at the kings arms in salford on mondays to get involved, find out all about yarn bombing or just knit a scarf!

this mini review is clearly only the tip of the iceberg, dear reader. it doesnt pretend to be definitive or exhaustive. as you know, part of my self appointed mission in this brave new world is to uncover practices of everyday life, celebrate stories of quotidien adventure and investigate tactics of resistance to the often stifling narrative of the corporate cityscape, surviving and even thriving in the cracks and gaps of the mainstream. all we have to do is look...and join in with some mischief of our own, however small!

this little homage is proof indeed, dear reader, that you really don’t have to travel very far to find the modern day bluestocking out and about in all her glory. vive la postmodern femme!!!

in praise of bluestockings past and present...

joan of arc, made gorgeous by jean seberg in her 1957 portrayal...

8 march has long been celebrated throughout the world as international womens day so it seems fitting that today i should continue this mini theme of ambivalent attitudes to women with a personal homage to just some of the inspiring, fearless, daring, brilliant and notorious females that have stalked the edges of the history books.

the names most familiar to us now are almost more myth than reality as if their activities so disturb the expectations of what should be achieved by women that they have become caricatured as witches, savages or lunatics.

boudicca, portrayed here by alex kingston, leader of the infamous rebellion by the iceni against the romans in 61AD, defeated the Roman 9th legion and destroyed the capital of Roman Britain, then at Colchester, as well as london and Verulamium.

but all too often they have simply slipped from the public consciousness, relegated to footnotes in obscure theses or so-called feminist book shelves in libraries and bookstores that doubtless marginalise them further. nothing the matter with feminism you understand - i rather regard myself as one - but i do wonder how many people wander into such sections unless they are already converts to the cause.

instead, i'd quite like their heroic, literary or scientific adventures to be the stuff of genderless interest, alongside the well known and well loved figures that school children read about and hold in high esteem and which invariably tend to be male.


so forgive meif today i rather shamelessly promote the daring deeds, exploits and inventions of the female of the species - take it good naturedly in the spirit of modernity, equality and egalitarianism with which it is intended.

vive la femme....!!

isabella eberhardt, writer, traveller, orientalist, she lived much of her short life posing as a man in the Algerian desert as a nomad and disciple of Sufism.

simone weil, sister of the better known andre, philosopher, ascetic, mystic, social and political activist. precocious student, she learned greek and sanskrit before her teens, and despite her pacifism fought in the spanish civil war and later joined the french resistance.

gertrude bell, archaeologist, linguist, cartographer, arabist and the greatest mountaineer of her age. the only female political officer in the british forces during ww1, her work in the middle east alongside laurence of arabia led to the formation of present day iran and iraq from the borders of ancient mesopotamia. no stranger to controversy or contradiction, she was also a member of the anti-suffrage league!



katherine stinson, dubbed the flying schoolgirl by the press, was the 4th female in the usa to receive a pilots licence in 1912 and the first woman to perform a loop. she flew a Curtiss JN-4D "Jenny" for fundraising tours for the Red Cross during World War I & was an ambulance driver at the front!


olympic fencer and pilot, joanna de tuscan was the first woman to fence sabre, the first female fencer to compete in pants, was captain of the 1936 US olympic team, AND fought as a WW2 pilot!

katherine hepburn, elegant, androgynous, effortlessly portraying the modern woman, she is most definitely a classic bluestockings style icon...

...alongside that other glorious example of non-conformist female of the silver screen, less graceful perhaps but every bit as beautiful to me at any rate.

margaret rutherford, comic actress and national treasure, her joi de vivre and exhuberant performances in blithe spirit, the importance of being earnest, passport to pimlico & her classic miss marple, belie much sadness in her personal life.

lets end this little homage with forgotten surrealist painter and novelist leonora carrington, rebel, maverick, author of the fabulous 'the hearing trumpet', and last i heard, still alive well into her 90's!!

leonora was a british debutante who ran off with max ernst, hung out with picasso, fled the nazis and escaped from a psychiatric hospital via a submarine rescue by her nanny.

an inspiration to us all....

in defence of the bluestocking...

as some of you might recall, i've been a little out of the social loop for the last 70 years or so, locked inadvertently into the basement of the manchester museum whilst archiving my excavation reports. and whilst so much about the world has changed beyond recognition during this long absence, it seems that one thing that has not diminished in this country is a distinct suspicion around intellectual aspiration or attainment. britain it seems has never had much time for a 'clever clogs', the rampant anti intellectualism long discernible in the popular press slipping dangerously over to loathing when it is attributed to women. when i was a girl the term bluestocking was a universal pejorative with women not allowed to graduate from universities until early in the 20th century. such women were unnatural, a disgrace to their sex, scorned, unmarriagable and doomed to spinsterdom as a result, and whilst the term itself might be less prevalent in common parlance, the idea that a woman should be strive only to be decorative to the eye sadly is not…

so just what is it about a display of intelligence by a female of the species that still manages to provoke such apoplexy?

i must admit to being caught completely off guard by the recent furore surrounding university challenge, that old war horse of a programme tucked away innocuously on bbc2 alongside other gloriously unfashionable dinosaurs such as sky at night and the now sadly departed open university late night geek fest (bring it back - it's a national treasure!). almost part of the wallpaper, uc is something of a broadcasting relic, an outmoded survivor of a long departed era - watched by insomniacs and retired classics teachers, it's occasionally wheeled out for gentle nostalgic mockery but rarely makes the national news or provokes the venom of the tabloids.

and whilst the latest revelation that one of the contestants was no longer a student by the semi-final recordings, but had graduated and already secured a job, might currently be overshadowing the original story, trimblegate, as its hilariously being dubbed, disturbs and dismays for a raft of all too predictable reasons. as becomes patently clear with a quick peruse of the newspaper coverage surrounding the high scoring performance of the mighty corpus christi team, most of the media attention has focused rather heavily on the capacity of the team captain, one ms gail trimble, to know so many answers. (such timerity - am i alone in supposing knowledgeability to be the foremost task of a team captain?)

here are just a few of her detractors foaming at the mouth on the web this week:

"hate her hate her hate her!! what a smug b*tch. i found myself willing her to lose! i don't get how anyone didn't feel the same rise of boiling angry hate"

"this horse-toothed snob ruins university challenge every time she is on it with her 'better than thou' attitude"

"...a display of self appreciating arrogance in intelligence"

"i became completely enveloped by my hatred for the captain of Corpus Christi"

broadsheets, tabloids, cyber space and the blogosphere alike have been drowning under the sheer weight of this unseemly invective, with inevitably rather too much made of poor miss trimble's appearance, in particular an unfortunate hair tossing habit which seems to have provoked column miles of boiling rage, leaving her defenders feeling forced to resort to sadly more sexist cliches such as those weary old librarian chestnuts,

“attractive in a blue-stocking sort of way" or "beautiful in a scholarly sort of way",

all of which are not only rather back-handed compliments bordering on apologies but are noticeable in their absence regarding the physical attributes of the hundreds of unkempt, disshevelled and otherwise sartorially inept and cosmetically challenged young men who routinely appear on the programme. as one lone voice timidly piped up,

"it makes me sad how much attention here is focused on how sexy she is or isn't. God forbid a woman be allowed to just be clever"

the whole episode has certainly provoked strong reactions all across the board and political spectrum. an unlikely defence comes from the daily mail via melanie phillips who offers this revealing, bitter assessment;

People would rather see someone who is broken, flawed, a wreck, one of life’s victims. That’s because they themselves feel like that....anyone who embodies demureness and orderliness is jeered at as either frigid or stuck-up. With self-restraint and decorum now a distant memory, what has been unleashed is a culture of bullying, the baying of a mob which will turn not just upon middle-class victims but also upon on its own when offered the opportunity to mock and jeer.

It is the pathological reaction of a crude, vulgar, de-educated and debauched nation, which has so badly lost its own self-respect and sense of itself that it viciously lashes out from the anonymous safety of its collective sofa in order to feel better about itself. It tells us that Britain - that once lion-hearted nation for which humiliation has become its national pastime - is now in trouble.

yet others have noted that there is rarely such sniping at the achievements of an athlete or footballer, excellence in these fields being a source of national pride and much handing wringing whenever we collectively fail to attain such olympian heights at international events and championships. the mantra of successive governments might well be education, education, education, but woe betide anyone who commits the sin of pride that is answering a random collection of arcane questions correctly - and as for women, we appear to be right back where i started, in the 19th century....

cultural contemplation or art and the new monasticism...

whether its abbeys offering Monastic Taster Weekends or museums advertising for live-in hermits, its seems the whole country is in contemplative mood.

perhaps its the effects of blizzard britain with the heaviest snowfalls since 1991 paralysing much of the country this week, the transport system and road networks grinding to a halt and whole counties north and south snowed in and cut off in whats being called The Whiteout.

but for some of us (call us foolish romantics if you must) bemoaning the distinct lack of fluffy white stuff in our perpetually damp city, at least there are plenty of openings, exhibitions, events and cultural activities finally auguring in the new year. if we cant join the rest of the nation in frolicking about in cath kidston wellies building snowmen and sledging down hillsides on old teatrays then we can at least gather together in warm art galleries to admire the latest shows....and after the doldrums of january, god knows we need it. there's so much happening the next few weeks i can barely keep track of it all so here's a little overview for our calendars so none of us miss out. and who knows maybe i'll see you at some of them!

we are spoilt for choice this weekend with three big shows currently dominating the city – interspecies at cornerhouse explores the relationship between humans and animals and challenges the authority of the human species over all other animal species. promoted by the arts catalyst as part of the 200th anniversary of darwins birth interspecies is peculiar, unsettling and instructive. dont miss it...

castlefield gallery launched Private Party. Keep Out on thursday evening, a solo show of new and existing work by Manuel Saiz. his work addresses the identity of the artist and the way in which they interact with the institution, the audience and society at large, a subject that constantly puzzles and intrigues me. there's an interesting programme of screenings and events supporting this exhibition which definitely warrant closer inspection. private party can be seen from 06 February 2009 to 22 March 2009.

subversive spaces previewed last night at the always wonderful whitworth art gallery and what a glamorous night it was too, stuffed to the rafters with art types, bigwigs and hangers on of every description. viewing a labyrinthine show of this kind is nigh on impossible at a preview but the show continues to May 4 so you might well spot this sprightly spinster lurking around its many nooks and crannies over the coming weeks.

if a brisk walk sounds just the ticket then tomorrow’s ‘ardwick heritage trail’ might be up your street. organised by the ardwick history project it echoes my own recent tour of brunswick but with the added attraction of a fully trained official blue plaque guide. it is sadly already fully booked. if anyone managed to get a place on this do report back, as i’m disappointed to have missed out…more are promised so i shall keep you posted.

or if you are looking for some urban contemplation and hauntingly beautiful modern gothic with your sunday brunch there is still time to catch two exhibitions at either end of northern quarter, with reality hack hidden manchester showing at urbis, and jane samuels beautiful abandoned buildings project at nexus arts on dale st, just off Oldham st. it has a great cafe too, welcoming and independent...

i don’t often do theatre but im plugging two upcoming events at the contact. Song of Songs by sonia hughes opens on wed 11 Feb at 8pm, showing until Sat 21 Feb. if my personal recommendation does not tempt you (and if not, why not!?) then take lyn gardner’s word for it in the guardian;

"this is not so much a performance as a gift - one that comes straight from the heart. It is not often, at the end of a show, that you long to rush up and hug the performers, but I had to resist the urge after this piece… beautiful, fragile and authentic work, which finds the extraordinary in the ordinary lives of real people"

and contact later in the week hosts a wickedly counter revolutionary valentine day special by the daunting and demonically delicious in David Hoyle: Love For All: 'Truly. Madly. Deeply. A night of unconventional love...'

in fact february 14 is an essential date for your diaries, and not for the tediously predictable clinton cards industry. celebrate your personal love affair with the city starting at 2pm at pavement gallery, in the old drapers window of manchester mets righton building, for the launch of kamera kinetics, 3 short films by william raban. follow this with kiss of a lifetime at 7pm at rogue gallery, giving you enough time to pop over the mancunian way to delight in the aforementioned truly madly deeply with the divine david hoyle at the contact at 9pm!

finally don’t think of missing the preview of Giorgio Sadotti at apartment, 6pm- 9pm on thursday, 19 february. this is apartments final show so its bound to be extra special and just a little bit emotional. details of subsequent viewings on their blogsite as usual.

happy contemplative february...