New York missive no 47 - The Cambria

Things overheard out and about recently include “he’s a nice, normal guy, but he carries a small pocket knife” (on W11th), “es una bruja, es una pesada” (in Doma), and “if it’s illegal, I’m in” (outside Fashion Institute of Technology on W27th).

**************************************************************

Have been thinking about productivity recently. More than ever, it seems, I’m most productive if I have a tight deadline. So the best sentences I write for my Writers Studio exercises are invariably the last-minute ones that spring up onto the page just before I leave for the class at 5.55 on a Wednesday. Or funding proposals flow so much easier when I just have a couple of hours to work on them. Maybe I should establish a new work-pattern that involves squeezing things I need/want to do into a little last-minute pocket of time where there’s no room for distractions and alternative tasks. Then all the remaining time can be filled with idleness – a place that often births pleasant surprises.

**************************************************************

Ch and I saw a fabulous play at the Irish Arts Center last Friday night. For all the following week I was like a boa constrictor slowly digesting a big meal. Called "The Cambria", it was the story of Frederick Douglass’ sea voyage (on the Cambria) to Ireland, following the publication of his autobiography Narrative of the Life of an American Slave, for which slaveowners had put a bounty on his head. With minimal staging and just two actors playing the full cast of characters on board the ship – from holier-than-thou liberal choirmistress to sneering slaveowner, from Frederick Douglas himself to the Captain, for whom the voyage is one of moral discovery – the audience felt like it had been on board too. What theatre’s all about.