You Can Laugh at Disability.

I haven’t blogged for quite a while, I know. Life has been rather hectic of late — in a good, my-book’s-getting-published way, thankfully (more about that soon.) So I thought I’d return, however briefly, with a bit of a bang.

It would seem that, once again, people are intent on telling us what we can and can’t laugh at. Physicist Stephen Hawking — a gentleman I happen to admire and respect a great deal — has been featured in a cartoon which shows two people discussing him and referring to the fact that he’s recently been seriously ill. The caption reads: “I wonder if they’ve tried switching him off and switching him on again”.

Now, I know. Bad taste, right? I mean, the guy was ill and, you know, disabled. We can’t laugh about things like that, can we? Well, if The Motor Neurone Disease Association is to be believed, no. It’s taboo. It’s forbidden — it is, they say, distasteful and mocks disability.

Speaking as someone with a severe physical disability, though, what do I say?

Firstly, Stephen Hawking does not need a charity to speak for him. He has a voice synthesiser, and the last I heard it was working just fine. I understand that the charity was, to a degree, speaking for those who cannot represent themselves. But even so, this in itself does not mean that they are right. (Just in case there’s any doubt, I think they are wrong.)

Secondly, it was funny. I laughed. As someone who is, in my own way, rather dependent on technology, it struck a chord with me. This cartoon was actually rather clever. It doesn’t just speak about Hawking and disability. It speaks about how reliant we’ve become on technology and, to my mind, the whole question of where man ends and machine begins.

Thirdly, humour at the expense of someone with a disability does not necessarily mean that they are being cruelly mocked. Yes, humour can, at times, be used as a weapon — but in my own experience jokes about my disability, jokes aimed directly at me by people I know, often have more to do with inclusion than anything else. We rib people in a friendly way to make them feel, at times, special. The friendly leg pull that says “you are one of us”.

Fourthly, is it just me, or are these associations/charities becoming just a little bit distasteful themselves in the opportunistic way they pounce on these stories — in an attempt, the cynic in me insists (or is it the realist in me?), in an attempt to promote themselves? After all, this particular cartoon featured in a regional newspaper and probably wouldn’t have come to the attention of more than a handful of people had The Motor Neurone Disease Association not insisted on speaking out about it and labelling it offensive.

Ultimately, I have to say I find the very idea of being told what I can and cannot laugh at execrable. To say, as has been said, that such a cartoon reduces Hawking to a condition and the technology he uses is, frankly, far more insulting to the esteemed professor than any cartoon could ever be. By all means, defend those who need to be defended — but I very much doubt that Hawking wants or needs this kind of representation. He probably found it amusing, too.

But maybe that’s too much of a leap for me to take so, instead, I’ll simply say this: if any charity out there ever feels the need to come to my defence without my explicitly requesting it, don’t. It’s presumptuous and offensive… one might even say prejudiced.

© 2009 Gary William Murning

Disability on TV.

A couple of nights ago, my friend, Lou, sent me a link via Facebook to this Guardian article regarding the complaints the BBC have so far received about children’s television presenter Cerrie Burnell, who was born with only one hand. At the time of writing, the article reports, the BBC had so far received nine official complaints from parents claiming that they cannot let their children watch because such a sight could “possibly cause sleep problems”, that toddlers find her scary and that — shock, horror! — they are being forced to discuss “disability” with their children before they are ready.

My immediate response was to shrug and say to myself, “Yeah, well, that’s stupid people for you.” My experience of disability (I have Type II Spinal Muscular Atrophy) has, generally speaking, been pretty good. I have always found people on the whole considerate and understanding, but, yes, there are idiots with prejudices and insecurities of their own. The relatively small number of complaints, however disturbing it may be, speaks volumes. The vast majority of parents watching this show, I’m sure, handled their children’s questions ably and got on with enjoying the show.

Which took me in a slightly different direction than some might expect. The Guardian article is entitled “It Is Parents Who Can’t Face Disability on TV” [italics mine]. Parents. Not some parents, it would seem, but if not all of them, a fair few, at least. Nine, in other words.

Now don’t misunderstand me, Lucy Mangan makes some excellent points — and the article is definitely worth reading — but there are a couple generalisations/inaccuracies that I feel need to be addressed.

Firstly, to reiterate the point I’ve already made, this was a very small number of parents. Lucy mentions that there were “many more blog postings” regarding the story, none of which she provides links to, and none of which I’ve read. Knowing the blogosphere as I do, however, I’m quite certain that those complaining about this television presenter will have been in a very small minority. There will be plenty of people shouting them down.

Secondly, on the point of parents not being able to “face disability on [children's] TV”… well, frankly, this is actually quite inaccurate. In the early 1980s I, in my electric wheelchair, wearing my Milwaukee spinal brace, appeared for eight weeks on the Yorkshire television children’s programme Book Tower. I was very visibly disabled, and the spinal brace in particular will no doubt have raised a few questions in some households. Yet, as far as I know, there were no complaints.

More to the point, the producer of Book Tower at the time was a very talented lady called Anne Wood. Anne went on to form her own production company — Ragdoll Productions, the company behind, amongst other things, the Teletubbies. Anne’s work in the intervening years has quite often focused on preschool children’s television, with programmes such as Rosie and Jim, Brum and others, and a number of times that I know of (and, not having kids of my own, I’m not exactly an avid watcher of her programmes… no, really!) children with disabilities have featured.

Disability is not something that is new to children’s television. In fact it seems to me that disability is featured more on children’s television than any other area. Even many non-Ragdoll Productions shows for children have and do feature people with disabilities (Balamory springs to mind.)

So, in conclusion, yes — there are stupid people who will try to inflict their stupidity, bigotry and insecurities on others. The best thing we can do is shame them, talk about the ridiculous statements they make and, even, I would suggest, heap ridicule upon them. But when we respond to such comments/complaints we really need to be careful that we don’t inadvertently alienate the very people who are on our “side”. The vast majority of parents are intelligent and responsible, and whilst television could do a much better job with regard its representation of disability, children’s television has been at the forefront for a number of years, without a complaining parent to be heard.

© 2009 Gary William Murning

Looking Back…

It seems I’m pulling in quite a few new readers at the moment. My daily page hit count has been around 184 over the past week or so, jumping up to 233 on one occasion. Not exactly in the same league as some out there, but a definite improvement and rather gratifying nonetheless.

So, I’d just like to take this opportunity to thank you all for helping my blog to grow. Your comments are always welcome (in fact, if you’re a new reader, please feel free to treat this as an opportunity to say hello — pimp your own blog, even, if you wish!)

Because so many new people are dropping by I thought it might be fun to look back at some of my earlier articles. I’ve picked five of my personal favourites. If you’re a regular reader and there’s an older article of mine that you like which I haven’t mentioned, please feel free to shout up!

Five of the Best.

1. Drawing the Line. February 25, 2008. I like this piece because it gives an insight into how I write and, in particular, how I wrote Children of the Resolution. It was good for me to read it again. Especially at this “between-projects” time.
2. Disability in Fiction. February 16, 2008. Another writing-related piece concerning expectation in writing.
3. The Pleasure of Finding Things Out. November 26, 2007. The Richard Feynman Horizon interview — with a short introduction by me.
4. You Can’t Say That. June 23, 2008. A rant on our ridiculous fear of causing offence. In part a tribute to the late George Carlin.
5. Elvis, Marty Lacker… and Me. August 3, 2008. This is one of my all-time favourites because it provided me, quite unexpectedly, with the opportunity to exchange emails with one of Elvis Presley’s closest friends, Memphis Mafia member Marty Lacker. I may have a further update on this story in the not too distant future.

Well, I think that’s all for now. Take a look when you have time and enjoy. These five post probably epitomise pretty well just what I am about — or what my blog is about, at least!

© 2008 Gary William Murning

Human Decency — Teachers Exempt?

Whilst catching up on my feeds yesterday, I came across a disturbing article (disturbing because of the appalling events it reported) from my friend and fellow blogger, Lottie. The piece tells of the treatment received by a kindergarten pupil, Alex Barton.

Alex is five years old and is in the process of being diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome — a high functioning form of autism. A child with what is described as “disiplinary” issues, he was recently “voted out” of his class by his fellow pupils, at the instigation of his sorry excuse for a teacher.

Whatever behaviour problems the little boy might have, there is no excuse for someone in a position of authority and acting in loco parentis to resort to what can only be described as one of the cruelest acts of victimisation I’ve heard of in a good while. He’s a child — a child with what seems to be a very real and diagnosable disability.

Shame on you, Miss Portillo.

For more on this story and relevant contact information, click here.

Disability in Fiction.

I’ve never considered myself a “disabled writer”. The obvious jokes about a disabled writer being a writer with his computer unplugged aside, it’s always seemed an especially ridiculous concept. I don’t define myself or the scope of my work so limitingly, and I find it more than a little odd that others (especially artists/writers with “disabilities”) should feel the need to do so…

But that’s not what I really want to discuss today. Instead I want to talk about expectation — more particularly, the special case of expectation regarding disability in fiction.

I don’t always feature characters with disabilities in my novels. Looking back, I’d say that, roughly, sixty percent of the novels I’ve written haven’t had a disabled character in them (although this depends on how broadly one defines one’s terms!) When I do, however, their disabilities are only a small part of who they are — not because I have a political point to hammer home, but simply because that’s just the way it is. I treat them the way I would any other character. Why on earth wouldn’t I?

All of which leads me to a story concerning a literary agent I submitted to many moons ago — a reputable agent with some highly notable clients (no, I’m too discrete to name her.)

I’d written an especially awful horror novel called Transfuse. It was a ridiculous story, so I’ll spare you the details, but one thing it did have going for it was an especially bitter and twisted protagonist — a bitter and twisted protagonist who just happened to have a severe disability. I was tired of all the smiley, PC representations that were becoming popular and I wanted to write someone who was just… not nice. Someone, also, very removed from me and my experience. Circumstances that had absolutely nothing to do with his disability had led him to his vengeful state of mind, and I made no special dispensations.

The novel was rejected, of course. I expected that. But what left me utterly flabbergasted was one comment from the agent it question. She strongly objected to my disabled protagonist being so bitter and twisted because, well, disabled people tend to be well adjusted individuals who live fulfilling lives et cetera, et cetera! And she knew that I had a disability and that I was, if my earlier correspondence with her was anything to go on, actually very well-adjusted myself.

None of which had any relevance when it came to the creation of my character. He was not a politically correct “type”, he was a character whose personality had been shaped by a back-story that involved both of his parents being murdered. Wheelchair or no wheelchair, he was going to be bitter.

These are obstacles all writers, disabled or not, face in one form or another. Ignorance from those who really should know better. It isn’t the norm, but it is more common than might be expected.

File it away and move on. Then blog about it years later. My advice.

Into It.

The first few days of the new project are behind me and I’m now feeling all the more confident about pulling this one off. My prose is sparse (for me!) and carefully measured, and I believe all I have to now do is continue as I’ve started (for the next nine to twelve months or so!)

My characters are there and, thanks to lots of preparation (twenty-five single-spaced pages of outlines), I almost feel as if I can leave them to get on with it. I won’t, of course. As anyone who’s written will tell you, give your characters too much rope and not only will they hang themselves, they’ll hang you, too. I’d advise against it

Time to give my eyes a well-deserved rest.

Ponderings of the Brain-Dead.

Well, after digesting my lunch with a quiet read of Steven Pinker’s How the Mind Works, I’m not wholly convinced that it any longer does. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a fascinating, informative and witty book — and by and large, I can grasp it. The whole “computational theory of mind”-thing feels, in fact, rather natural to me (but, then, I did spend my mid-teens poking away at the squishy keyboard of my ZX81.) What I find a little difficult to cope with are the arguments against it — especially Searle’s utterly ridiculous Chinese Room thought experiment (note to potential commenters: don’t even think of telling me it isn’t — you’ll only make me angry and, in the words of David Banner, you wouldn’t like me when I’m angry )

But that isn’t what I want to blog about today. In spite of feeling a little lacking in metal capacity, I want to bring my faithful readers up to speed with the progress of the chapter outlines for Children of the Revolution and generally… well, discuss a few of my thoughts on attitudes to “disability” in education.

The further I’ve progressed with my outlines (which are almost complete), the more I’ve seen that the integration system I experienced in the ’70s and ’80s failed on so many levels that it was, frankly, utterly ridiculous to ever call it a success (which, in my case, I’d always considered it to be.) It was new, of course, “experimental” in a most literal way (I made a bloody cute Guinea Pig, if I do say so myself!) — but that doesn’t alter the fact whilst my experience was definitely one of the better ones, it was badly applied at the outset, clearly underfunded as time progressed and enthusiasm waned, and unlikely to succeed when underlying problems in maintainstrean education (such as over-large class sizes) were not even being addressed. Examples of the failings in my particular case were:

1) I had recurring problems throughout my education with desk-height/positioning in relation to my wheelchair. Two or three teachers tried to address it, but by and large with little success (it became a more difficult problem to fix in secondary school — having to move from classroom to classroom — so I just kept quiet and made do.)
2) In sixth form college, I was assigned an auxiliary assistant. A lovely lady who became a friend. Unfortunately, “they” only employed her to work half-days. (With no one else covering the times she wasn’t there.)
3) In 1984, I was still meeting careers advisors who were happy to suggest that my career options included weaving wicker baskets. Which was just what I was studying Physics, Computing and Mathematics for!

I could go on. The more I revisit those times, the more I find in among the laughter and tears a greater sense that this novel needs to be written. I know I’ve said that before, but it remains true. It’s valid from a social history point of view but I also believe it’s valid in the contemporary sense — because I don’t see all that much evidence of improvement. Children, whatever their needs, are still being failed by our education system. And after thirty years of “integration”, that’s bloody unforgivable.

Please feel free to share your thoughts on this.

Outline for the First Five Chapters of Children of the Revolution.

It occurred to me that this might interest those of you who are intrigued by the process of writing. I intend on posting the progressing first five chapters in Samples, once I begin, so you can compare the outline to the first draft. Thoughts and questions welcome.

Chapter Outlines for
Children of the Revolution.

Prologue –

Scene-setting. From pov of Marisa Donne (32). She is interviewing Carl Grantham (41) for her dissertation on “educational reform”. Mature student. Description of him and his surroundings. In hospital undergoing psychological assessment after an attempted suicide. Carl is not uncommunicative. He is polite, quick to smile but, also, somehow “removed”. His smile sometimes suggests he knows things no one else does.

Opening paragraph: “During those weekly visits to Carl Grantham I learnt more about humanity than I ever thought possible — not in any way so well-formed that I might readily articulate it. No. My time with him was more subtle than that. Nonetheless, between his lines and sometimes on them, I found an understanding of what it was to be apart, to be within and absorbed… to be included and yet, as we all are, I suppose, ineffably alone.”

Chapter One: In the Place of Old Times –

From Carl’s pov. Carl tells of his arrival at Sunnyvale School. His parents take him in and, after being shown around, leave him with a young teacher called Miss Porter in a classroom of red-, blue- and green-painted tables and strange-looking children. A sense of abandonment, but not by his parents. It was more profound than that, and nothing he could have articulated at the time. He didn’t like the place.

Spends most of the morning crying. Miss Porter is kind and patient, however, telling him that he’ll be going home soon. “Forever?” he asks. “No, not forever, Carl,” she tells him. “You’re a big boy, now, and big boys go to school during the day time.” He asks her if he’ll be coming to school every day and Miss Porter gets the calendar from the wall and shows him the days he will and won’t be at school. “Not so bad, hey?” Miss Porter says. Carl starts crying again.

Lunch time is a battle of wills. He eats a little mashed potato, but that’s all.

Journey home on bus. Cigarette smoke, making a friend called Tommy Blackbird. Tommy has a useless, malformed left hand and a weak left leg which gives him a “bouncy” limp when he walks. Tommy likes school because “it’s warm.”

Present Day Interlude –

From Marisa Donne’s pov. Carl fills in, tells her how he settled. Came to an autumn fete at the school with his parents, which he hated. “A coming together of two separate worlds” is how the adult Carl describes it.

He is tired. Marisa suspects he’s medicated a little. He asks for a drink and she helps him, before leaving to let him rest.

Continuation of Carl’s narrative –

Christmas is approaching. Carl and Tommy are excited. Tommy wants a duffel coat for Christmas (because they are warm) and some marbles, Carl wants some clackers and a spud gun.

Whilst on a make-believe “adventure” at playtime, they encounter the able-bodied kids from the school next door. There is a childish argument about not being “normal”. Carl feels more displaced than ever. The conversation almost spoils the Christmas party for him.

Chapter Two: The Ghost of Emiline Brown –

Present Day Interlude –

The following day. Marisa listens as he tells her about Christmas of that year (1972), the family parties, his teenage aunt playing T-Rex records for him, watching Laurel and Hardy on A Stocking Full of Stars, the banal Black and White Minstrel Show and the wonderful Morecambe and Wise Christmas Show – all so perfect, in his opinion, when compared to school. Marisa pretends to make notes, but really she’s thinking about Carl – about his reasons, whatever they were, for trying to kill himself. He seems so intelligent. Has treated her politely from day one. He seems to care that she gets all the information she needs to do a good job, but maybe that’s the problem. He cares. Perhaps too much.

“But you had to go back after Christmas,” she says. Carl nods.

Continuation of Carl’s narrative –

School assembly. Carl and Tommy sit at the back, whispering. Tommy is talking about Christmas – didn’t get his duffel coat, just a “poxy powder blue bomber jacket” that makes him look like a girl. Carl feels “funny”. Something’s wrong. The headmaster (Mr. Dixon) is subdued, uncertain of himself. He welcomes them back, they sing Give Me Oil in My Lamp, say a prayer, teachers looking at one another furtively, and then return in the frosty January morning to their classrooms.

Miss Porter is uncharacteristically sullen as they go to their places. She smiles and says hello to the children, but it’s an obvious struggle. Carl notices that one of the school nurses, Mrs. Wallace, has joined them and worries that they all might have to have an injection or something. Tommy looks at her and mouths “uh oh” at Carl.

Miss Porter eventually tells them that there classmate, Emiline Brown has died over Christmas. Carl looks round at where Emiline normally sat. He hadn’t even noticed she was missing – because she’d always seemed to be missing. She’d been such a quiet girl.

A few girls cry. Mrs. Wallace comforts them whilst Miss Porter briefly turns her back on the class and dabs at her eyes with paper tissue.

Playtime. Tommy is talking about ghosts. He reckons Emiline’s ghost is already haunting the school. “I saw this shadowy thing in the window.” They discuss what they should do and arrive at a suitable conclusion; tell the girls.

Present Day Interlude –

“A bit cruel,” Marisa says, smiling.

“We were six.”

Continuation of Carl’s narrative –

We find Carl and Tommy sitting utterly dumbfounded, watching as one of the girls, Jenny Jennings, runs around the playground in hysterics. Miss Porter grabs her, kneeling down and doing her best to calm the hyperventilating girl. Finally, Jenny hiccups an explanation and points at Carl and Tommy.

Carl and Tommy sit/stand before Miss Porter’s desk. They are the only ones in the classroom apart from the ghost of Emiline Brown, who seems more present than ever before. They get a telling off, but it’s a gentle one. Miss Porter seems to understand how difficult a situation this is for them to grasp. She tells them not to do it again, and makes them say sorry to Jenny.

Tommy to Carl: “I still saw her.”

Chapter Three: Leaving, but Not On a Jet Plane –

Present Day Interlude –

Marisa wants to move things along a bit. Her main area of interest is Resolution School, to where Carl ultimately moved, and its cutting-edge, quasi-experimental policy of “integration”. She’s wary of rushing him, however, aware of the way in which he seems to be benefiting from talking to her (looks pleased to see her when she arrives, smiles more readily etc.) Nevertheless, she asks him when he first found out that he was going to be moving to a new school.

“It must have been early seventy-five…”

Continuation of Carl’s narrative –

Carl is in another classroom with Tommy. Mrs. Aspel, his current teacher, is telling them that in a few minutes, they’ll be getting some visitors and that she wants them all to be on their best, most polite behaviour. “As you all know, Carl is leaving us at the end of term and starting a new school in September…” First he’s heard of it. Looks at Tommy and shrugs. Carl’s new teachers visiting.
They arrive. Carl is introduced to Mrs. Shires. Tells him all about Resolution. Asks about his interests etc. Carl likes her.

At playtime, Tommy is annoyed. “You didn’t tell me.” “I didn’t know.” They argue, Tommy calling Carl a liar etc. Tommy wants to go with Carl but he can’t. Carl is sorry for him, but is nevertheless pleased that he’s the one going rather than staying.

Last day at Sunnyvale School. Tommy has just about forgiven him. It is a bright, warm day. Mrs. Aspel has arranged for them to have a picnic on the school field. Tommy is eating a fistful of cake. Carl isn’t hungry; he is afraid and excited, looking forward to the summer holidays but also worried about what is to follow. Tommy tells he’s going to Butlins for two weeks in August. It’s always cold, but he doesn’t mind. Carl doesn’t answer so Tommy gives him a nudge.

“We can be pen pals,” Tommy says, and Carl nods.

On the bus home, driving out of the school gates, his mood lifts. He remembers Mrs. Shires telling him on her visit that Resolution had a swimming pool and was named after a famous explorer. It was an adventure, she had told him. They were sailing into “uncharted waters” together. Doesn’t sound so bad. Sounds good, in fact dead good.

And he will write to Tommy.

Present Day Interlude –

“Did you?” Marisa asks. Yes. Once or twice. Tells her that he saw Tommy a few years later at a county sports event. He seemed to be doing well. Sunnyvale had moved to another location by this time. Tommy was being integrated, too. Carl had asked him if his new school was warm. Tommy didn’t get the joke.

Chapter Four: Poppies –

Arrives at Resolution. Brand new wheelchair with his name on waiting for him. A friendly nursing auxiliary (plain-clothes, no uniforms) called Mrs. Alexander shows Carl around. Hundreds of poppies in the grounds.

Assembly. His first look at Mr. Johnson – his new headmaster. A scruffy little man, nothing like Mr. Dixon. Mr. Johnson stands a little too erect. He likes people looking at him. Gives a welcome speech, then assigns individual pupils to their respective teachers. Carl is finally with Mrs. Shires. “Ready for that adventure?” she asks him.

The classroom is recessed from an open plan area. No doors on the classrooms. It is bright outside, but it’s cool over this side of the school (north-facing windows.) Mrs. Shires takes the register. Belinda is missing. Anyone seen her? Johnny Jameson speaks up for the first time. “Sher-sher-she’s snuffed it.”

Johnny is G. Describe in detail. Also other classmates: Andrew [Allen] (partially sighted), Louisa Kent [Louise Clark] (partially sighted), Patrick Bond [Peter Fleming] (very bad eczema/asthma), Ananda [a perpetually cheerful Asian girl who’s name escapes me], Jim Edwards [John Elwood], Peter Holmes [Paul Watson] (brain-damaged as a result of being hit by a car), and Kelly Karn [Karen Kelly] (cerebral palsy?)

Mrs. Shires explains to them what Resolution is all about. Integration etc. Tells them about Cook’s ship, HMS Resolution. She began her career as the North Sea collier Marquis of Granby, launched at Whitby in 1770. Cook said of her that she was “the fittest for service of any I have seen.” Explains the meaning of the word: being determined. “That’s what we are going to be,” she says. “Determined to make this new way work, for each and every one of you.”

Carl is excited by this. It is going to be an adventure. Just like Captain Cook’s. Johnny sniffs derisively.

At break, Carl is stunned by all the kids on the playground – kids in uniforms from the Almsby Comprehensive and younger kids from Overfields, the primary school. Everyone is curious about everyone else and Carl is soon surrounded by girls from the two adjacent schools. Mrs. Shires, on duty, gives him a wink.

Present Day Interlude –

“You were popular with the girls,” Marisa says. Carl shrugs. For a while. It was all part of the “new frontier optimism”. We – some of us, at least – thought anything really was possible.

Carl becomes introspective. Marisa realises that she knows hardly anything about him. Introduced by a mutual friend who had believed that, as well as helping Marisa out, the whole process might benefit Carl, she explicitly avoided asking for background info, wanting to hear of Carl’s experiences firsthand and draw her own conclusions.

“The optimism was misplaced?”

“Isn’t it always?”

Chapter Five: Johnny on the West Cliff –

Carl is writing a composition about “what it would be like to have been Captain Cook”. He is physically struggling because the desk height and positioning isn’t quite right for him. He writes a couple of lines and then repositions his book, writes a couple more and then repositions it again. He feels Mrs. Shires watching him and feels self-conscious.

Johnny is telling Patrick in a whisper that Evel Knievel can jer-jump just about er-anything. What about the Wembley crash last May, Patrick says. He might have crashed, Johnny insists, but he ster-still cleared the buses. He crashed after the jer-jump.

Carl tries to concentrate on writing less conspicuously, but it’s difficult, and soon Mrs. Shires comes over and kneels by his table. “You’re not comfortable, are you? She says. Carl shakes head. Mrs. Shires asks him what will help and they try a few things. Ultimately, she goes to see Mr. Johnson and brings him back to the classroom to show him the problem.

Mr. Johnson arrives with Mrs. Shires, listens to the problem with an evident lack of patience and, when Mrs. Shires is done, turns one of the grey storage trays over on the table top and says, “That will do.” He walks away while Mrs. Shires is still talking. She follows.

While she is away, Johnny talks to Carl about an upcoming school-trip to Staithes and Whitby. Johnny is looking forward to it, not because of the Cook connections but because of the “Draclia” Whitby connection.

Ultimately, Mrs. Shires returns looking angry and frustrated. She says something to Mrs. Alexander, the auxiliary, but Carl doesn’t quite catch it. When she’s calmed down, she puts the storage tray away and tells Carl she’s getting him a new table.

Present Day Interlude –

Marisa is wondering if it all really did start going wrong as early as Carl is suggesting, or if Carl is mixing up his dates. Carl senses her doubt and smiles, telling her to go ahead and say it. She does, and he nods, telling her the cracks did indeed start to show very early on.

“I spoke to her a few years ago and we discussed it in great detail,” he says.

Major points of his conversation with Mrs. Shires:

• · One of the original 8 teachers recruited to set up the school.
  · Teachers would be provided with what was needed for each child so that they could then say – no excuses – get on with it and treat the children the same as they would be in mainstream education.
  · The furniture for the children was issued using the same criteria as that for able-bodied children in mainstream schools. The table heights had no reference to the needs of many of the children.
  · All the cupboards were fitted floor to ceiling – out of Mrs. Shires’ reach so the children had no chance of reaching them. She decided to bring down some of the top cupboards and use them for low storage the children could reach and use the tops for low level displays and access to equipment. Almost caused a strike when the council joiners saw what I had done – not in the union – job demarcation.
  · Angry and disillusioned. Just the start of this new concept school.

Continuation of Carl’s narrative –

School trip. Carl, Peter Holmes, Patrick Bond and Johnny at the back of the bus – Carl and Johnny in their wheelchairs. Mrs. Alexander driving, Mrs. Shires a few seats ahead of Carl et al. Johnny, his stammer minimal today, is telling Carl, Peter and Patrick all about vampires and Captain Cook. He talks in hushed tones, mixing history and myth shamelessly – as only a 10-year-old boy can. Cook was a vampire. That’s why he acted “funny” on his last voyage. He was drinking too much of William Bligh’s blood and it was “fer-fucking his head up.” Patrick asks how come, then, Cook could survive in daylight. Because real vampires can, Johnny insists. Even the real “Draclia” could, but Ber-Bram Stoker had to give him weaknesses for the story to work. “Worst ther-thing they ever did was name our school after his ship. We’re the fucking ler-living dead. Trust me.”

After a brief stay in Staithes, Johnny unimpressed (“An apprentice shopkeeper?”), they arrive at Whitby and head straight for the Abbey and St. Mary’s church, where the majority eat their packed lunches on the bus – it’s raining lightly. Mrs. Shires, Carl, Patrick and Johnny have a look around the graveyard, however, feeling adventurous. Headstones in the path. They take their lunches with them and eat them on a bench behind St. Mary’s, overlooking the harbour. Rain stops. Sun comes out.

Patrick tells Mrs. Shires about Johnny’s theory re Cook being a vampire, and the school being a ship of the living dead. Mrs. Shires admits it wasn’t the best ship to name the school after. She’d have preferred Endeavour. But she adds, a little unconvincingly to Carl’s ears, that the school being a ship of the living dead is a bit far-fetched.

Johnny shrugs. And sniffs. Mr. Johnson is Cook on his last voyage. “If he starts kidnapping natives, I’m going ber-back to my old school.” Even Mrs. Shires smiles at this.

The Value of Confirmation.

It’s been an interesting and thought-provoking few days in my little corner of the world.

Having finished draft two of If I never and got it over to Emma at Legend Press, my old, familiar restlessness kicked in at full force and I went to work on the preliminary outlines for Children of the Revolution. The prologue and chapter one sketched out, I realised I needed a general chronology of my own school years (on which the novel is to be partially based… at least) in place, just to ensure that everything “fit” the way I remembered. I quickly knuckled down and got a couple of pages behind me before a little lightbulb went on and, on an impulse that stemmed from the realisation that I needed a fuller understanding of events from the opposite end of the educational spectrum, I googled the name of my favourite and most influential teacher from that period.

And ultimately found her.

A few emails into our correspondence, I’m already finding the confirmation I’d hoped for in her frank and intelligent expression of the events and missed opportunities of those times. And, as you might imagine, I’m more excited than ever about Children of the Revolution. Mrs. S. has already helped me see just how valid and, possibly, important this novel could be. This makes it a weightier responsibility, of course, and I have no doubt it will cause me a few nightmares over the coming months, but I’m already thoroughly enjoying the process and looking forward to the actual writing of this novel.

Why Do We Write?

The above question has both fascinated and confounded me for most of my twenty-one years (that’s just over half a lifetime for me!) as a struggling in the extreme novelist. What is this peculiar urge to make up a bunch of people and put them through one kind of hell or another just to bring them out the other end “changed”? Do I harbour some crudely realised wish to promote myself to god-like status, however briefly (twenty-one years is brief, when you’re a god)? Or is it just, as I have so often thought, merely an extension and refinement of childhood play?

I don’t know. On the surface, I now write because it’s what I do — and however difficult publication seems to be to achieve, the feedback is always just good enough to keep me going. It’s also something that gives a little order to my day; I’m severely disabled and don’t work in the classic sense, so writing prevents me from falling into that mind-numbing, body-bloating routine of daytime TV and tea and biscuits. On a deeper level, though, I’ve always suspected that there’s more to it than that. A psychological trait or some evolutionary relic that misleads and drives me (a twisted version of the selfish meme!) Do my ideas belong to me, or do I belong to them? The writer as vehicle. And there I was thinking I was a creature of Free Will. Ho hum.

It’s a question I’ve asked of myself numerous times, as I’ve already said — and I’ve also asked it of others. That isn’t about to stop me asking it again, though.

Why do you write? (If you do!)