Palatinate Indigo Issue 717

indigo 16.03.2010

This edition’s indigo Inspiration has been: London Fashion Week Marina and the Diamonds Sandra Bullock’s moving Oscar speech Robinsons’ fruit and veg shop Spotify album: Classical Chillout Tim Burton’s Alice In Wonderland Tell us what you think and get involved at indigo@palatinate.org.uk.

Green Durham?

1. Don’t make lecture notes - Think how many trees we’d save if all of us refused to buy notebooks. If the lecturer questions your lack of committment, stare defiantly and tell him you’re saving future generations and are willing to compromise your degree for this valiant cause. Does he/she not care at all about the environment?!

2. Keep the lights off... - Can you think of any activities that don’t require keeping the lights on? If so, take part in said activity as often as possible.

3. Row/swim everywhere - We have a river for a reason people. Don’t bother with cars or buses, take the fun (albeit less

by Alex Mansell

hygenic) route! Or you could just walk.

4. Only eat at Jayne’s/Patrick’s/Bimbi’s - Healthy as cooking pasta and sauce may be, think of all that packaging: pasta packet, sauce jar, vegetable packets...By eating at these Durham culinary treasures instead you’ll be keeping packaging use to a minimum with only a chip tray and a little fork!

5. Burn things - Stop reading this copy of Palatinate and burn it for fuel. Old lecture notes also burn well to provide a great heating system. You might regret it during exam season, but hey, you’ll have kept warm whilst saving the environment. If that’s not an excuse for failing I don’t know what is.

separate national stations has grown too large, and something’s gotta give.

If you, like us, feel that a little part of you has withered and died like a poor neglected little daisy, visit http://www.petition.fm/ petitions/6musicasiannet to sign a petition and keep the (decent) music alive.

indigo uncut in Eden BOTH PICS: CHRIS WILLETTS

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ndigo would like to thank the University Botanical Gardens for allowing us to roam around their Eden.

Creative Directors: Vincent McAviney and Ally Bacon

Fashion

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grieving over the BBC’s annoucement that it plans to close down its 6 Music station. It may not be the most well known, but it’s certainly not one for the recycling bin. Despite professing a deep love for the station, the Beeb feels that their radio empire of nine

Travel

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Save BBC 6 Music! ndigo is currently

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elcome to the Emerald Edition of indigo. There’s a little Irish lover inside everyone, so here we are, celebrating all things Irish, mingled in with some environmental issues to ensure you get a good fix of your greens.

The Travel section continues its search for the most original mode of transport, whilst Food looks at how eco-friendly veggies really are.

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Lifestyle Features Palatidating: The battle of the bachelors The A-Team continue their search for Durham’s best bachelor; this week they date guys from Hatfield, John’s, Aidan’s and Jo Butler. How did the boys do?!

ALASTAIR BARBER/ELECTRICINCA

Name:LaurenceStanley College: Hatfield

Name: Dom Woodman College: Aidan’s

Mr John’s

We still need guys from Hild Bede, Grey, Collingwood, Mary’s, Van Mildert, Ustinov and John Snow!

How to nominate yourself or a friend: Simply e-mail us with: 1) The name of the applicant.

2) His college.

feature@palatinate.org.uk We will repsond via e-mail to let you know if you’ve secured a date. Good luck !

Mr Aidan’s ALASTAIR BARBER/ELECTRICINCA

NATASHA CORAL

Mr Butler

Name: James Lake College: John’s

mind to meet my date for the evening.

Thankfully, he was far from boring and had an endearingly firm loyalty to his college, despite not holding the religious When reading Mr John’s’ application, views it was built on. He certainly proved the first thing that struck me was the fact to me that John’s people are very much he said he was taking part ‘for the bantz’. normal, that the stigma associated with Now using ‘banter’ in everyday language being part of an ecclesiastical college is is annoying enough, so this shortened unfounded, that John’s people can in fact version seriously made me worry about be pretty damn cool. And cool isn’t a what I was coming up against. Thankword I use lightly. fully, it turned out he was actually being Mr John’s was charming and courteironic, and so followed a swift discussion ous from the start, and insisted on buying of what we dubbed ‘Durhamnyms’, vomy drink in Fabio’s. What was nice, cabulary you can’t go a day without hear- however, was that he seemed to genuing in Durham. inely want to do it This became a rather than trying “John’s people can in fact be running theme to just earn brownie throughout the pretty damn cool. And cool points. Converdate when he sation was easy, isn’t a word I use lightly.” proceeded to ‘banterous’ (note the slip in ‘standirony) and fun; you ard’, ‘I’m not know it’s been a good gonna lie’, ‘chat’ and other such examples night when you can go from discussing of Durham speak into the conversation, Orwellian allegory to Durham gossip in and it was refreshing to find someone the blink of an eye. There were no awkwho actually takes the piss out of this ward silences and Mr John’s constantly specialised languages of ours rather than kept the conversation flowing with confiusing it with the pretentious seriousness dence and ease. The thing is, when guys that many Durhamites do. in Durham are confident, I often find it’s Now when I told people I was going in an arrogant or insincere way, but Mr on a date with a John’s guy, their natural John’s’ confidence was an easy and affable response was “Oh dear, that’s going to one. I was surprised when he told me he be a boring night”. Hoping to smash the was a first year as he carried himself in a stereotype of John’s students as having streetwise way that one wouldn’t expect Bible-reading and scrabble playing as from freshers who’ve only been here a their only past times, I went with an open few months.

Name: Geraint Evans College: Jo Butler

3) A few lines describing hobbies and interests.

ALASTAIR BARBER/ELECTRICINCA

of expressing things , which seemed in large part to stem from what sounded like an Irish accent (though he does in fact hail from Ipswich). Mr Aidan’s in I can’t say that I have ever begun a date fact managed to get away with discussing with a discussion of “fake tits” before. It all manner of things, even assuring me a might be due to my own modest rack or conversation about his “hot cousin” in no the fact ‘tits’ is usually only used ironical- way pointed to incestuous predilections. ly/ by 14 year-old boys, but I can’t say it’s Now throughout the date Mr Aidan’s usually my number one topic of discusteasingly enquired how our date was sion for dates. Yet this was precisely how to end. Well, I think it was something my evening with Mr Aidan’s started. The neither of us bargained for – for it was a greater surprise, perhaps, was that it put little bit surreal, and a teensy bit like being me immediately in a bad rom-com.

“A real self-effacing charm” When my fellow at ease, given he delivered his A-Teamer and her remarks with a real self-effacing charm. date approached our table at the end of Something he demonstrated once our respective meals the good old female again when it came to posing for photointuition kicked in and I realised HELP graphs in Fabio’s. It’s usually the peak of was written all over her face. Mr Aidan’s awkwardness on our Palatidates, but Mr was a little more oblivious, but I soon Aidan’s pulled me into a hug, saving me persuaded him we very much needed to from the stilted stance I otherwise adopt. join the others in Fabio’s and launch a resIt does have to be noted that my choice cue mission. Mr Aidan’s was more than of drink (a mojito) got me downgraded on board with our plan and impressed from “marriage material” right away with his abiliy to save two damsels in (boys who can make light allusions to distress. matrimony without quaking in their Early in the date Mr Aidan’s revealed boots are a winner in my books). Unforhow he had initially pondered whether tunately after discovering I was a veggie, to put me through a series of ‘tests’ on I promptly plummeted further down the date just to see how his review would the scale to “weekend fling”; I suggested turn out. Yet after he helped the A-Team Edinburgh for our getaway, he at least avoid the awkwardness that was Mr upped the game to Paris.

Butler in our post-dinner trip to Fabio’s, I Again, I could have taken offence can only deduce that he was the one who at his mockery of my vegetarianism., was tested after all and, fortunately for us, but he had that easy charm-laden way he passed with flying colours!

Mr Hatfield ALASTAIR BARBER/ELECTRICINCA

students; something Mr Hatfield managed to dispel.

He also cured me of my suspicion that all comedic types are either maudlin in the ‘real world’ or painfully desperThe very prospect of a date with a ate to play the ‘joker’ card. Mr Hatfield Hatfielder certainly had me a little was neither. Despite being a regular on ruffled. The fact is I own no Jack Wills, the improvised comedy circuit, he had pronounce ‘father’ with a ‘v’ and am no desire to turn our date into a sketch. usually found drinking whatever wine He even resisted my challenge to try is the second cheapest bottle in Tescos. and elicit a laugh from our rather glum And I expected whatever Mr Hatfield waiter. His refusal to show off served to I was landed with convince that he really to be a ‘Rah’ with had a natural humour.

“In place of the usual lad He a capital ‘R’, with a was also incredibly healthy amount of ‘banter’ was something down to earth; despite LAD thrown in... I his impressive array of couldn’t have been altogether more hobbies (photography, more wrong. comedy, ultimate frisbee) gentlemanly” Whilst my date I never got the impression was impeccably he was boasting. spoken and certainly something of a The whole date breezed by. I was drinks connoisseur (he tested our bottle treated to an evening in which we manof red with a polite sniff), he also made aged to avoid the potential pitfalls in me incredibly relaxed. And in place of conversation. I have no idea what his the usual lad ‘banter’ was something favourite colour is, but I know that we altogether more gentlemanly – a rare somehow sustained a conversation about treat in Durham! I even received a text at taxidermy; one which became so anithe end of the night to check I’d made it mated he even spilt his glass of carefullyhome safely! selected wine (forgiven, as his manners It was also refreshing to discover a were impeccable otherwise). student whose gap year consisted mostly So cured of all my prejudices about of hard graft rather than dipping into Hatfielders/ comics/ gap year-students/ mummy and daddy’s considerable funds men who discuss taxidermy on dates, to prance about the globe. Hearing the I happily agreed to head to Fabio’s for stories of these rah-types has led me to more conversation after we’d paid our nurse a secret prejudice against gap year bill. And by we, I mean he. Kerching.

girl at the salad bar, Mr Butler turned rudeness into a veritable art form. The zenith of his incivility would probably be what I fondly think of as ‘the phone My date with Mr Butler started on a high incident’. To put it briefly, Mr Butler was (high 5, that is), and went downhill from keen for my friends and I to join him and there. Now I’m all for casual greetings a mutual friend for drinks afterwards, and like this if they’re delivered with a healthy although I professed to having arranged a dose of irony, but this one definitely girlie night that evening, he insisted I text wasn’t. Not the best start. them. He waited for me to type, then out The number of of nowhere tried to wres“Worst date ever?” tle my phone from me to offensive things Mr Butler did during see what I’d written. Did the date was uncountable; clicking at the he suspect I could possibly be writing waiter to get his attention was something something bad to my friends, something I thought was reserved for exaggeratively along the lines of “This is the worst date gauche TV characters: apparently not. ever”? To make matters worse, he then Such social faux pas made me genuinely declared I was being rude for texting embarrassed to be at the same table. whilst I was with him, despite me doing it Not a great indicator of a good date. at his request, and then started to text his And this was only one of a number of own friend to teach a me a lesson, leaving embarassing occurrences, another being me to sit uncomfortably, simultaneously me made to stand in the middle of the losing the will to live and pondering my bar while he tutored me in how to do nearest escape route. a ‘proper high five’ (yes, the high five Unfortunately our meals were served theme continued). The delivery of this ridiculously quickly so I had no choice was not one that could be considered in but to carry on the date in Fabio’s. On the name of banter, nor was it fun, it was seeing a friend there, he waited until just mortifying. he’d discussed his pulling exploits of the Now manners are of utmost imporprevious week before introducing me. tance on a date, and in this arena Mr Just what a girl wants to hear. Thankfully Butler was severly lacking: from grabbing the other half of the A-Team and her Mr my drink to take a sip when he fancied Aidan’s were hot on our heels in Fabio’s to casually inserting swear words into and proceeded to save me from the deevery other sentence, from being inaplights of more alone time with Mr Butler. propriately touchy-feely to being less Do I sound harsh? Maybe. Am I being than subtle in his appreciation of the fit honest? Definitely.

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Features Undercover Agnostic

Our undercover agnostic is attending Student Alpha at the Appleby rooms, Church Street, Durham. For more information, contact alpha@kcd.org.uk.

Daniel Dyson

P

retty much anybody who has ever met me knows that I am very environmentally friendly. I’m vegetarian, use public transport religiously and have never even been in the front seat of a car, (but trust me, that’s for your safety as much as mine). Needless to say then that like most people, I know what I need to do when it comes to keeping the environment alive and doing my share to reduce my carbon footprint. I do not need to hear that panic stricken note of hysteria that so easily accompanies climate change. TURN OFF YOUR LIGHTS NOW! scream way too many posters, adverts and campaigns as if the entire history of the world will alter if I don’t take my TV off standby this instant and resort to working by candlelight.

Whilst I appreciate that big changes can come from small adjustments, too often are people treated patronizingly when it comes to green issues.

To be fair, panic when it comes to global warming is somewhat justified. If we don’t adjust how we live, we can pretty much say goodbye to life as we know it.

But the epic panic that seems to be seeping through society is both stupid and borderline offensive because everybody does know it - we need to change and most people really don’t need the message rammed down their throats anymore.

Partially now, it’s even become counterproductive. By insisting one simply must unplug every electrical appliance as soon as you’ve finished using it or else the planet will immediately shrivel up, it’s hard to

resist that small voice whispering ‘leave it on’ in your ear, in a form of little triumph against the overly eager environmentally concerned. Too much evangelical environmentalism can easily tip you into a gleeful, sweet rebellion.

The thing is that the media (shockingly) loves bad news and the fact that our planet is essentially screwed is a topic that can get the most mild-mannered journalist foaming at the mouth. The chance to paint a vivid picture of an impending cataclysm is something that is irresistible (especially when news is slow) and it is this hysteria

Until then, telling the weary what they already know but in a shiny new disastrous manner is just a way to sell newspapers, ironic when newspapers probably have a higher carbon footprint than the internet.

It has actually come to the point though where the environmentally friendly aren’t actually so friendly but are more akin to being environmentally hostile; anybody who doesn’t take the labels off their bottle before throwing it away should be shot. Of course, it is hard to take the word

“It’s hard to resist that small voice whispering ‘leave it on’ in your ear” that gets most people annoyed about environmental issues.

Panicking middleclass England is all very well and good, it is essentially the bread and butter of the media world these days – remember SARS? Bird flu? Super- JASON CARTWRIGHT volcano? Any other related disaster that would change life as we know it? - but it all gets pretty boring because in the end, the environment will be sorted out, simply because it will get to the point where it has to be. True, this solution may not come quick enough to save various cuddly animals or preserve geographies, but that’s unfortunately a matter for politicians to decide.

just a form of moral and social betterment – a chance to brag about how superior a person is. Needless to say hypocrisy is everywhere: the very same people who insist on buying only free range meat and dairy products are usually the very same people who drive massive oil guzzling cars, proudly beaming like planet-protecting greens as they load up their BMW four-by-four and snort toxically away. It’s also this group who will happily preach about damaging ‘food miles’ on the supermarket’s stock of exotic fruits and out of season goods, while they think nothing of taking a small trip to the Caribbean to visit their holiday home or some nonsense.

Whilst I’m obviously not saying that we should actively search out ways to avoid being green – if anything, the opposite, stressing out about the fact you’ve

“It is hard to take the word of anybody who insists that a person should be made to wash out their Nutella bottle ”

of anybody who insists that a person should be made to wash out their Nutella bottle (a task of Olympic proportions, let me tell you) and throw it in the correct bin lest they be damned to hell or something, but that is what some groups have come down to. It’s hard to avoid the feeling that being overly conscious about the environment is

not put your vegetable trimmings in the correct bin is not the way to go, especially when even the most zealous, British converts are effectively rendered powerless by the persistent polluters-in-chief of America and China. So relax.

We’re probably doomed anyway…

Does the plastic bag deserve the sack?

Madeleine Pitt

‘And will you be needing a plastic bag with that Madam?’…

‘Urr’. It’s a loaded question. You scan around to see if there’s anyone you know looking, judging.

And as the queue mounts behind you try to make a hasty assessment of your available pocket space, all the while dreading a walk home, arms laden down with a loose block of chedder, leeks, facewipes, a carton of milk hanging off your little finger.

‘Urr…yeah go on then.

Just one.’

But the interrogation continues…

‘And will that be the 4p bag, the 9p bag or the bag for life madam?’

Once upon a time plastic bags were new and exciting - a symbol of modernity. They lay in a bountiful pile at the end of the Tesco’s

checkout counter and you could take as many as you wanted, no questions asked.

They were all but encouraged.

But times have changed and plastic bags have gone high profile. Modbury in South Devon became

you still get extra points on your club card if you bring in your old Sainsbury’s bags to Tesco’s? What do you score for buying a pricey ‘bag for life’ if you buy a ‘bag for life’ every time you go and they’re all lying at home in a pile with the other bags which aren’t for life? And are you judged for being an extravagant student if you take your M&S bag for life with you to “Are we being conned into Iceland?

It was only when thinking that plastic bags are I got stuck behind an elderly gentlesingle-handedly destroying man walking through Durham our planet?” that I realised that there was a whole the first plastic bag other dimension to this dilemma… He free zone in 2007 and was overloaded with five or six canvas bags September 12th 2009 full of food. Tick. This man was definitely saw the first Internaeco friendly. But then another wave of tional Plastic Bag free inferiority swept over me as I realised that day. each bag represented another worthy cause The domain of the – plastered across each hessian carrier was plastic bag has become a politi- Save the Panda, The Marine Conservacal minefield and a level head is crucial for tion Society or Tribes in Kilimanjaro. So navigating it with success and emerging apparently it’s not just about saving the with your eco reputation still intact. Do planet- the ‘non plastic bag’ has become a JAMES KI NG

I’d been invited to go along to Alpha by a close friend – an active Christian who’d often challenged me about my beliefs.

Deciding that it’s something too important to leave in doubt, the Alpha course seemed like the perfect way to get an answer to those difficult questions.

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been asking “why?” If Jesus existed, why does he matter to Christians? Why is his death on the cross so important, and why is his resurrection enough evidence for the existence of God? Then Alpha changed direction: we started asking “how?” If the Bible is so important, how should we go about reading it? If God’s listening to us, how should we pray to him? If we believe in the claims made by Christianity, how can we reflect this in our day-to-day lives?

The answers to these questions provide the nuts and bolts through which Christians construct their spiritual climbingframe. I hadn’t really heard anyone pray since the dutiful days of primary school: “For what we are about to receive...”. The ability to finish this off with a crude ending won instant dinnertime popularity for the author: “May the lord make us wee a tankful, amen”. A decade later, and I’m still struggling with the concept of saying a prayer.

“How do I know when God’s listening?” The answer is clear – he’s always listening. At any time of day, in any place in the world, you can close your eyes and speak to the creator. Unlike more prescriptive religions such as Islam, Christian prayer has very few prerequisites. It comes with no real rule book, is unique to each individual, and is described as the most deeply satisfying activity a human can take part in.

“Why aren’t prayers always answered?” This was a more challenging question, and one which provoked a variety of responses from the Christians sat round my table. One claimed that prayers were often answered in the most earthly sense imaginable: “I’ve had money pushed through my letterbox”, she said, “I asked God for financial help and he delivered it.” Others were more tentative: “I keep a diary of my prayers so I can look back to see if they were answered.” And if they weren’t? “It must be because God just doesn’t think that’s the right path for me to take. Talking to him lets me find that out.”

Over the past term, I’ve found out that being a Christian isn’t easy: it’s a challenging spiritual experience, with profound implications for everyday life. But if it’s a struggle, the end result is worth fighting for: a place in the right queue on judgement day, and the prospect of eternal life in heaven. For the record, Alpha didn’t convert me. But it did convince me that leaving God as a “don’t know” isn’t good enough. For that reason, perhaps it’s fair to say that Alpha achieves everything it sets out to.

Environmental hysteria: not such a bright idea...

vessel for letting everyone know just how charitable you are.

‘I’m not a plastic bag’ bag’s became huge fashion statements in 2007 when a limited 20,000 went on sale in Sainsbury’s and were shortly for sale on ebay for £200.

What people didn’t realise is that while they were raising the profile of the plastic bag debate they were in fact being shipped over from China at a huge environmental cost.

So have things got out of hand? Are we being conned into thinking that plastic bags are single-handedly destroying our planet and is it really social suicide to be spotted walking up North Road laden down with blue and white Tesco’s bags?

The reality is that 3% of waste in UK landfills is packaging and only a 10th of 1% is carrier bags. Of course we should do our best to bin the bag in 2010 (‘Every Little Helps’) but we shouldn’t let all this hype leave us thinking that we’ve done our bit for the environment just by wielding a wicker basket at the supermarket checkout.

And until someone comes up with a sound alternative to the humble plastic bag as a tool for dealing with dog messes, I’d hate to see them go entirely extinct…

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Travel

A guide to Dublin for the thrifty

StylishTravel

Palatinate takes a look at how to get by in the world’s most expensive city on a shoestring

O

ne procrastination session last year involved us finding the cheapest plane flight in Europe.

This flight ended up being to Dublin, one of the most expensive cities in the World.

With maxed out credit cards and at the limits of our overdrafts the trip needed to be as cheap as possible.

On arrival in Dublin, we approached the information desk to ask Mr Information for cheap activities to undertake on our

DAVID SMITH

Martha Wright & Mhairi Adams

STEPHEN GREEN

break. He laughed. Not disheartened by his laughter we set out to enjoy Dublin on a student budget. We are now ready to share our top travel tips for saving on the euro and cashing in on the fun.

There are many cheap and charming hostels located around Dublin. Furthermore, sneaking members of your party into your hostel room is a great money saver.

For example if you are travelling as a trio but can only find a two bedroom dormitory, it is possible to sneak the third member past security with the aid of a large hat and sunglasses. Another good way to save on accommodation is airport sleeping. This is possible if you have booked early flights.

However, there is no reason not to sleep here on other nights of your stay, as Dublin airport offers a variety of seats (beds). PilObserve and imitate this sculpture at Trinity College for the bargain price of nothing lows can be handcrafted using luggage and this sleeping arrangement protects them atmosphere. The prices in Dublin have a not see any of them. Instead Dublin can be from theft. reputation for being expensive, with the observed via the streets and statues. A recaverage pint at £6; extortionate compared ommended way to enjoy Dublin’s statues is to the college bar drinks we have grown to through statue imitating, which incidenknow and love. Obviously this was an issue tally is also a great way to identify with on our funds. We realised that in order to Dublin’s finest historical figures Ireland appreciate Dublin’s finest brews it would is famous for its Stew, and Dublin does be necessary to make use of supermarket well to provide a wide range of cuisines. deals and indulge on these beverages However, our recommended cheap and within the comforts of the hostel. Whilst cheerful choice when fine dining (for those this may not provide the same experience on a budget) is the popular food chain you would find in an Irish Pub, hostel com- Ronald McDonalds. munal areas can be the perfect set up for So although our experience was not meeting fellow budget tourists. your average tourist adventure, we certainly There is a vibrant nightlife in Dublin There are a number of attractions to gained a lot from the Dublin break in terms with pubs right across the city centre. visit in Dublin including The Guinness of enjoyment. We managed to prove Mr Temple Bar is one of the most popular factory and Dublin Zoo, all popular yet Information’s laughter to be unjustified and with tourists well known for its lively money grabbing activities. Hence we did enjoyed Dublin, on a budget.

“Sneaking members of your party into your hostel room is a great money saver”

Free: a trademark green postbox

Each edition we test out one of Durham’s many forms of travel. This week our volunteer Martha Wright tries out the carbon footprint friendly mode of space travel known as space hopping.

Space hopping is...

When you sit on an inflatable ball and jump.

Did you enjoy your space hop?

Yeah I felt like I was in outer space, hopping.

Do you prefer space hopping or walking?

Space hopping because you get to bounce more.

Any advice on staying safe?

Only hop on smooth surfaces.

Best thing about space hopping?

The speed of travel.

How would you rate hurdling out of ten? a lot/10

A Beginner’s Guide to Space Hopping Step 1: Locate a space hopper

Public transport: the good, the bad and the ugly The prospect of a holiday on England’s public transport networks is not immediately appealing, be it a journey in a stuffy train carriage packed with commuters, or a baking summer afternoon spent stationary in a Megabus next to an undesirable on the M25.

But do the continentals experience similar problems? The answer, on the whole, is no. I spent a spontaneous summer holiday with a friend sampling the methods of movement around Spain and Morocco. The only definite certainty was a flight booked to Barcelona, and another back from Marrakech a month later.

The unplanned nature of the adventure may have added to our sense of freedom, but it also proved to be significantly more costly. A ticket for a sleeper train between Barcelona and Granada cost €80 when purchased on the day, compared to €22 had we booked in advance. The experience was not improved by the fact that we shared our compartment with two Argentinean ladies who, for the brief space of time we coexisted awake, seemed quite charming, but proved to be snorers on a

monumental level once the lights were dimmed. Our tour of Morocco consisted of an exhausting schedule jam-packed with sightseeing, and a grumbling guide who looked as if he was chewing a mouthful of wasps as he begrudgingly gave us a cultural commentary.

Rather than enduring sweltering temperatures at teeming stations, our transport was a private minibus: a vacuous air-conditioned box which carried us from one “panoramic view” to the next. At each stop-off point we were instructed to “take nice picture, back in five minutes.” By the end of day two, I was desperately planning my escape.

Public transport, then, is significantly better in allowing the traveller to move at their preferred pace. Although more of the holiday is spent queuing at ticket offices and perusing foreign timetables, it ensures a greater degree of independence and significantly more

interaction with locals.Instead of eating at “authentic” overpriced eateries, where for some reason only tour groups are taken to

THOMAS WELCH

Lucinda Rouse

and relinquishing the necessity to keep my possessions strapped to my body at all times for fear of theft. But the moments of hilarity certainly made up for the minor inconveniences.

My five-hour conversation with a local on

“Public transport ensures a greater degree of independence” dine, true authenticity is found at food stalls on the street.

My experiences revealed disadvantages at both ends of the transportational spectrum. It was a delight returning home

the train from Tangier to Casablanca will remain with me forever more. He spouted a stream of absolute nonsense as he helped himself to my toasted cashew nuts but proved to be significantly more entertaining than any occurrence on the sheltered tour.

Step 2: Mount space hopper

Step 3: JUMP

Photography: Kathryn Balls

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Food & Drink

To bean or not to bean?

Irish Cream Liqueur

Is vegetarianism really more environmentally friendly?

Daniel Dyson

Lydia Ashby

Serves 12: Biscuit Base: 100g Digestive Biscuit Crumbs 75g Ginger Biscuit crumbs 100g Butter Cheesecake filling: 675g Cream Cheese (at room temperature) 200g Caster Sugar 2 tsp vanilla extract 250ml soured cream 80ml Irish Crème Liqueur (eg. Bailey’s) 4 eggs (at room temperature) Method: 1) Melt the butter in a pan. Combine with the biscuit crumbs, then press into the bottom of a 23cm ‘springform’ tin with 7cm high sides.

2)Bake at 180C/Gas 4 until brownabout 8 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack to cool.

3) With an electric mixer, beat the cream cheese, caster sugar and vanilla in large bowl until blended. Beat in 250ml soured cream and the liqueur. Add eggs slowly, one at a time, beating just until combined.

Pour filling over biscuit base.

4)Bake until edges are puffed, and centre is only slightly wobbly when pan is shaken, about 1 to 1 1/2 hours.

5) Transfer cheesecake to rack to cool for at least an hour before moving.

6)When cold, cover and refrigerate overnight. Release tin from cheesecake.

Cut and serve.

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Delicious served with a butterscotch sauce, this Irish Cream cheesecake will make St. Patrick’s Day celebrations go off with a bang. Because it needs time to chill and set, this is the perfect pudding to make in advance. Make sure your eggs and cream cheese are at room temperature to avoid lumps in your mixture.

Naturally, every food has an environmental impact. Even if you are environmentally savvy by growing your own fruit ating is a simple fact of life. Anand vegetables, the seeds you use will have other simple fact is that our planet been transported by some means. Oranges is gradually getting hotter. Whilst it may not feel like it, if we don’t change small from Spain will have a much lower carbon footprint than their equivalents from the things – how we travel, what we do, how Caribbean. Therefore, no matter how we entertain ourselves, then in the long good (or not) tofu is for the environment, term we are fudged, to be polite.

Of course, one of the easiest ways to re- there will be some unavoidable negative consequences. duce your carbon footprint and be kinder Not all meats to the environment is have the same level by going vegetarian. I “One of the easiest of negative impact need not bestow the on the environment. ways to be kinder to the For example, the virtues of deciding to go green in a culinary environment is by going amount of carbon sense and swapping produced by chicken the pork sausages for vegetarian.” is a fraction of that Quorn ones. Despite compared to beef, popular misconcepdue to the differences tions, vegetarian dishes are jam-packed the animals have in terms of diet, size, and full of flavour, texture and energy. Most methane production.

When it comes to importantly, veggie dishes take a fraction of tofu, Dutch researchers have found that the time to cook than their meat counterparts and taste just as good.

There seem to be no downsides to going vegetarian (other than the occasional pang of a meat craving). However, recently the environmental benefits of vegetarianism, and of tofu in particular, have been called into question. Could it be that everybody’s favourite bean curd is more environmentally unfriendly than they thought? Needless to say, such an accusation hits hard at the heart of any committed vegetarian.

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the meat-alternative has a carbon footprint the plants in the first place, the Amazon of 2kg per kilogram of tofu compared to rainforest, (ecology’s biggest victim) has chicken at 3kg per kilogram of chicken. been further deforested. Whilst this deUnfortunately, American production of forestation is much kinder than turning it tofu isn’t quite so green. into land used for beef The carbon footprint of this is still “Tofu may not be the production, American tofu is closer less environmentally most sensible option beneficial than leaving to 7kg per kilogram of tofu. Evidently, tofu the rainforest alone. for environmental hasn’t got quite the So, with regards to squeaky-clean reputatofu, where does this purposes. ” tion for its positive leave us? environmental effect as The simple fact it’s supposed to. is that there is no food we can eat which When we consider the bigger picture, has no environmental impact, but we tofu runs into more trouble. According to should begin to eat in sensible ways that the BBC, Brazil and Argentina in particular help reduce our carbon emissions. Whilst have increased their role in tofu production choosing tofu is fantastic in terms of moral via the growth of soy beans by 236% from senses, it may not be the most sensible 1982 to 2004. This is all very well, tofu has option for environmental purposes. It may provided a massive boost to the economy be undeniably cleaner than animals such as and the soy bean plants growing will beef but there is no real evidence that one doubtless help lower carbon gas emissions. should pick tofu over meat.

Unfortunately, in order to make room for On the whole, vegetarianism is much kinder to the environment than a heavily meat-based diet. However, much like meat, certain types of vegetarian products are friendlier than others. Processed foods such as tofu perhaps ought to be swapped for locally produced vegetables, much like beef could be swapped for chicken and fish. In short, a strict vegetarian diet is not required for a person to eat in an environmentally conscious way, but along with everything in our diet, what we eat should be a very careful choice.

Is it Peri Peri spicy at Nando’s?

Matthew Robinson

seem little more than a paean of praise, a dithyramb of quirky delight to a cheap, plasticy roll-on-tanned Europeanism. This At first blush the Gala complex seems is Nando’s. The décor consists of crinkling unlikely ever to compel the tongue into a neon-lighted palms and various tree-like tingle. It is the flashy, gussied up armpit of Durham. There’s the damp, sweaty throng extrusions flapping their green, leafy haircuts. It seems odd. Worrying. The very of the coffee house steaming at its ears. thing to make any discerning food-crunchAnd then the cinema dovetails in politely across the street as the ones and twos drip- er salute the Yorkshire pudding, St George and all things dignified. drop in to the palmful of screens.

Yet pleasure lies beyond the made-up Food-wise things seem equally as sparse. and mascaraed surface. Yes, it is slightly A staircase away spangled and tastelies the overgrown less and the trill and “Steam seemed to rise bulk of the Slug bounce of the strong and Lettuce with its and belch from the plate Portuguese accent sleepy-eyed wooden can be unnerving. panelling and creaky, like Vesuvius having a But scrape away the decaying chairs and ghastly gaud and tables. pre-eruption fag.” blusher and beneath Nearby is Ask, the a pearl awaits. rather more costly Because Nando’ s genuflects at the throne noshery. And for good reason. Far from the of spice, constitutional monarchy has sticky leather and wastelands of the Slug and Lettuce, here the place is polka-dotted yet to colonize: this is an autocratic ruler.

No piece of meat, no matter what size, with the suited and shirted, the middleranking business execs on a business lunch. body-weight or fearlessness, is excused a thorough spicing. And the final question a But, sashay to the right a few steps, and this unremarkable bubblegum of buildings diner has to face as they lock in eye-to-eye produces a rare surprise. The exterior looks with the server is: ‘What level?’

It’s like taking a surgical incisor to a man’s like the film set of a spoof Portuguese soul. It seems to question one’s very right movie. The interior looks like the film to exist. You can see the chefs machineset of a spoof Portuguese movie. In fact, gunning spice onto everything that moves the entire culinary experience can often

and then there’s that mocking twinkle in shimmered over towards me with the dish. the eyes of the perky young server as if Steam seemed to rise and belch from the to say, ‘You couldn’t handle that. That’s plate like Vesuvius having a pre-eruption EXTRA HOT. We all know you’re a fag. The smell alone could stun a weaker MEDIUM man. man.

And it was then, dear reader, that I made a ‘Enjoy,’ she said, placing it down with a life-decision. It was what therapists would smile that hinted at everything yet nothcall a ‘turning point’. When the film of my ing. I nodded stoically. Five full glasses of life is made, it’s the cool beverage arced part where ‘Eye of the “I’d just finished faxing umbrella-fashion Tiger’ starts building around the plate. in the background Half the restaurant over a quick prayer to while Robert Patwas looking. Excuses tinson thrashes a palm were over. It was time the heavens when the indignantly on the to totter up and face voluptuous server serving counter. ‘Extra the music. I reached hot,’ I said. ‘Give me down to try and assize shimmered over.” everything you have!’ an entry point, a firstImmediately that bite loophole in the pitying look was rubbered out from the spice-bedizened bap. There was nothing. server’s eyes. She appraised me in a differTrembling, I rashly seized the thing by its ent way. ‘Right away, sir,’ she said, relaying haunches, sellotaped my eyes closed and my order to a moustachioed chef who took chomped… a quick glance at me and broke into a look The next thing I remember is comof surprise. ing round to the drab greyness of the I shivered back to the table and limbackroom. The sparky young server was bered up my digestion muscles. Flexed lever-arched over me, mopping my brow the trachea, hair-dryed the pharynx and with a damp tea towel. Shadows of memoreinforced the epiglottis. All colour drained ries tangoed inside the foggy dance hall from my dining companion as he heard of the psyche. It had all been for nothing. my plan. Minutes began thawing. I’d just The only sound I could hear was my dining finished faxing over a quick prayer to companion shaking with laughter by the the heavens when the voluptuous server door.

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Fashion I don’t understand how...

Being ‘eco-chic’ is bang on trend. From the humble knitter on her way to work; to the trendy fashionista scouring her local charity shop; right through to the glamorous ladies swapping their clothes at ‘swishing’ parties. The term ‘vintage’ is so now, with highstreet stores such as Topshop and Urban Outfitters stocking vintage pieces, vintage is infiltrating mainstream fashion. Celebrities are also jumping on the ‘ethical bandwagon’, including the likes of Jason Mraz who caused excitement amongst the ecofashionistas when he turned up to the Grammys wearing a suit made from recycled plastic. Harry Potter star, Emma Watson, also recognises that young people “are becoming increasingly aware of the humanitarian and

environmental issues surrounding fast fashion”, as she launched her clothing line last year in collaboration with ethical fashion

label People Tree. The changing demand for ethically aware fashion is also apparent in the recent London Fashion Week; from just 16 participants in 2006, to 28 innovative designers showcasing at Estethica’s A/W Collection 2010, it is clear that change is coming slowly but surely, as seen in the pictured dresses made out of newspapers and hawaiian shirts.

There is a craving for both fact and innovation in fashion, and as such, ethical fashion has begun to lay its roots.

But ethical fashion has to become more than a passing trend. It must become a pressing issue. The fashion and textile sector is deemed to be among the most environmentally damaging industry. The fast-changing trends induce a frenzied need to buy and spend more than we need. Although the fashion industry has glamorised ethical fashion it seems we are missing the real problem underlying the fact we throw away one million tonnes of textiles every year in the UK alone. There is still a real conflict between fashion and environmentalists. On the one hand, “fashion”, in the words of Coco Chanel, “is made to become unfashionable”; fashion is in constant flux, designers are constantly designing, playing with trends

of times-past and adapting them to the consumers of the day. Whilst on the other hand, environmentalists want to create a sustainable future in which we buy less, waste less, and create clothes that are both environmentally friendly and respect worker’s rights. It is reconciling this conflict between fast fashion and environmental concerns that has become an increasingly important mission.

Eco-fashion must no longer be a trendy sub-culture of the fashion sector; instead ethical concerns must frame the fashion industry. A recent report conducted by trend analysts Forum for the Future and denim brand Levi’s, depict four possible scenarios of what the trilliondollar fashion industry could look like in 2025 in relation to climate change, resource shortages and population growth. In one of the four provocative scenarios, “owning stuff is out” and instead we will buy vintage clothes, swap our clothes with each other, or rent them from ‘clothing libraries’ as new clothes become astronomically expensive to make. Alternatively we could be living in a prosperous, high-tech utopia where fashion is fast, lightweight and inexpensive. Clothes are made from low-impact materials that incorporate

“Eco-fashion must no longer be a trendy sub-culture...”

nanotechnology and lab-grown components, and once the clothes no longer suit our needs they are composted, disassembled or remanufactured. The report is designed as a tool to challenge companies’ strategies, inspire and help them to create a sustainable future.

Fashion must be a system of balance; designers and companies must reconcile the beauty of fashion as a constantly changing phenomenon, whilst responding to pressing demands to create a sustainable future. As we embark on a new decade the superficial interests in ethical fashion must be taken to a deeper and more technical level. Ethical fashion isn’t a passing trend –it has to become a way of life.

Whilst fashion and textiles will become increasingly sustainable, beauty can be found in swapping our clothes, embracing a “make-do-and-mend” attitude to our cherished pieces and maximising clothes made with care to their fullest potential. It is time to get serious about the beauty of a sustainable future.

The ‘Dollar-a-Day’ Dress

Illustrating the symbol behind the destructive nature of our consumerist society Christina Darmanin

In 2005, a group of top fashion design students from London College of Fashion worked with Steve Bradshaw, who came together to expose the destructive nature of the fashion trade. They used fabrics from the developing world to create a dress that takes us on a thought provoking journey, leading us to question our actions in attempting to alleviate the lives of the world’s poor.

The dress gained its title by the labourers from Timbuktu to Peru, who earn a dollar a day making the fabrics for us to enjoy in the West. The collections of these strikingly gorgeous fabrics made for a ‘dollar a day’ does not only take us to three different continents but exposes us to the many harsh facts about how trade can harm the world’s poor.

In Mali, for example, farmers are encouraged to grow cotton as cotton prices on the world market drop, making these farmers face unfair competition from the heaily subsided US cotton industry. The developing world faces

unfair competition, as farmers of the West receive three hundred billion dollars in subsidies to its own farmers.

In Uganda, most people wear secondhand clothes originally donated by the rich countries. Although these clothes are desperately needed by the locals, this trade does not only jeopardise the countries chances of growth within their local textile industry but minimises the very idea of a distinguishable unique counter-culture to the West.

In Cambodia one in five people depend on the garment industry for their work, making clothes that fill the Western high street shops. Similarly, in Vietnam, children as young as 14 work to produce high street fashions which we are unaware of its’ corrupt provinance.

Modelled by Tamzin Outhwaite for Comic Relief, the ‘Dollar- a - Day’ dress aims to make us reconsider our purchases and reveal the corrupt truths behind the textile industry.

For more information visit the youtube site for “dollar-a-day.”

Christina Darmanin’s illustration of the dollar-a-day dress

WWW.CELEBRIFI.COM

IMAGES COURTESY OF GARY HARVEY AT WWW.TREEHUGGER.COM

Milly Youngs explores the need for a sustainable, environmental future for fashion

Anna Wintour riding her bicycle around Manhattan

Antonia Thier

The likes of Gisele Bündchen, Chloë Sevigny and Naomi Watts manage to save the environment one bicycle ride at a time whilst simultaneously looking as stylish and chic as ever.

Whatever happened to the hardcharging, spandex-wearing athletes we associate with bicycle riding? They have disappeared, with the use of plastic bags and non-hybrid cars.

Meet the beautiful bicycle girls. Ecoconscious and ethereal, they wear flowing frocks and gigantic sunglasses but never helmets. Their hair flutters in the breeze as they leave a trail of swooning male pedestrians in their perfumed wake. Whilst perched on their Pashleys, with not a bead of sweat in sight, they chomp on nuts and text on their Blackberries.

Since Cynthia Rowley’s legendary show when she sent models riding down the catwalk with bicycles in heels, fashion designers have been taking note on the explosion of the bicycle culture, transforming sportswear into the current trend. Major players in the industry such as Prada, Gucci and Dsquared² have adopted a more modern stance, introducing neon PVC; transparency with a touch of colour, whilst some have chosen a classic appreciation of sportswear with a twist.

Take for example the Hermés leather accessories range, inspired by the gymobsessed yummy mummy types, or even the Vintage Chanel tennis racket, at £320. With cyclist chic as the new ‘black,’ indulge in a pretty pastel floral frock and imagine yourself with the wind in your hair and peonies in your basket.

So what do we do if we do not have the genetic gene-pool of the Hollywood glitterati, or their budget for that matter? Well Durham seems to be one-step ahead of the game, with stash and tracksuits as the uniform. And Emma Watson’s new eco-friendly line for People Tree seems to be affordable and just “Abercrombie” enough to have a shot of success here. So whip out those “lightly loved” bicycles from the pre-teen years and jump on the environmental bandwagon; if it’s good enough for Anna Wintour, it’s good enough for us.

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Fashion Bridging glamour and grunge Distressed military, studded heels and pastel silk: a softer approach to tough dressing

Set on Prebends Bridge, the perfect location for the clash between beauty and fortitude, we amalgamated this season’s current trends. Combining nude hues with utility jackets and statement trousers, we created a new take on female power dressing. Toughen up staple pieces with zips, studs and rips to create a directional and innovative approach to grunge.

With thanks to...

Stylists: Antonia Thier Emma Spedding Photography: Quin Murray

www.quinography.com

Models: Alison McArthur Ellie Cook Emma Williams Jessica Reagan Clothes: New Look Dolly Rocks Oxfam Boutique

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Time to reflect at the end of the Tennant-cy

As Matt Smith takes over the TARDIS, we look back at how David Tennant’s new Who regenerated the BBC BBC

Vincent McAviney

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The Doctor will see you now: Matt Smith is the eleventh actor to play the iconic role

et’s take a trip back in time five years ago. Doctor Who was a vague spot on our cultural spectrum reconciled to late night re-runs in the doldrums of Sky, Billie Piper was a newly-divorced faded British Britney facsimile and the BBC was in trouble for not producing enough quality output to justify the licence fee.

Back to the present day, Doctor Who has won every award going and was the centre piece of the Christmas television schedule.

Billie Piper is an in-demand actress currently fronting her own ITV show thanks to her breakthrough role as the Doctor’s assistant. Two successful spin off series, Torchwood and The Sarah Jane Adventures, have been spawned and the BBC is as ever in trouble, but this time for spending licence fee money too well on quality programming, stifling the competition by producing too much fantastic output.

The two fortunes of the mighty Beeb institution and its flagship Saturday night programme have been heavily tied. In 2005 the BBC was demoralised, the 45-minute Iraq WMD claim had toppled its very popular Chairman Greg Dyke and Auntie was suffering. Back to the future again and beginning 2010 the Corporation’s output is across the board both critically and publicly adored. Strictly Come Dancing, Planet Earth, Lark Rise to Candleford, Gavin and Stacey are just a few of the award-winning shows that have helped recapture the

primetime crown for the BBC. But the real success story has been Who. Whilst Channel 4 overdosed on cheaper to produce reality TV, bringing us Big Brother, Wife Swap and How Clean is Your House (all of which have now been axed leaving a very large hole in its schedule) and ITV debased itself with constant “celebrity stuck in a cesspit” gimmickry the Beeb took risks, investing in high quality drama starting with Who in 2005.

The winning team of lead actors Christopher Eccleston and then David Tennant with series honcho Russell T Davies revived a show which the Corporation regarded as a grim, geeky pubescent phase in its past. When Sci-Fi shows are good they are good, but when they are bad they are painful to watch.

So when the Doctor returned to the airwaves in 2005 I, like many, was sceptical.

Not until the first acclaimed series was almost finished did I actually consider having a watch, and I have been hooked since.

But the odd thing is, I’m not embarrassed by it, and neither is most of the nation it seems.

Great television should be for everyone.

The best things are popular because their quality merits the adulation of a massive audience. For children there was adventure and fun, for teenagers there were emotive

relationships, and for adults subtle jokes and ethical dilemmas.

What the new Who has done fantastically in a decade of seemingly resurgent prejudice is to tackle issues by simply not acknowledging them as being issues. For instance race - not aliens, but different ethnic minorities - there were many mixed marriages, and the Doctor even had his first black assistant Martha Jones, played by Freema Agyeman, without fuss.

In terms of class, Billie’s radiant Rose Tyler put humanity into the overstereotyped council estate girl. Gay and bi-sexual characters like John Barrowman’s charismatic Captain Jack were present throughout the program but without being made an issue of. For once, old people weren’t confined to being the butt of jokes, but were engaging and valued.

At times the plots were a bit too silly and stretched a little thin by having to please all ages but overall the cross-generational, family viewing formula worked.

With the future of the licence fee in doubt post-election, the wave of top quality Saturday night drama which the BBC invested in following the success of Doctor Who, such as Robin Hood and Merlin, stands the Corporation in good stead for justifying its continued funding.

Doctor Who returns to BBC One this Easter. See the Palatinate website for Vincent McAviney’s interview with Jonathon Cook, the author of the latest Dr. Who companion.

PARAMOUNT/EVERETT/REX FEATURES

The Unlovely Remains

Jackson’s adaptation mutilated the remains of The Lovely Bones The Lovely Bones Peter Jackson DreamWorks Pictures

««««« Alison Moulds

Given the burgeoning number of negative reviews it’s attracted, I really wanted to find something positive to say about The Lovely Bones. Peter Jackson’s adaptation of Alice Sebold’s novel was perhaps eagerly anticipated and feared in equal measure.

There was the hope that a genuinely beautiful novel (albeit one in which the heroine is brutally raped and murdered) could be given some sort of cinematic justice, coupled with the anxiety that all the integrity of the novel would be dispensed with, in a desire to produce the standard box-office fodder.

Unfortunately for Sebold fans, it was most definitely the latter. Her novel, for those who have been living under a rock for the last few years, tells the tale of Susie Salmon, a 14-year-old girl from Pennsylvania who is murdered in December, 1973.

The narrative follows Susie as she settles into her new home in a sort of secular purgatory and casts her gaze upon

the family, friends, acquaintances and murderer she has left behind.

These earth-bound sequences are handled competently enough in the film, especially if you’re willing to overlook the fact they could easily be inserted into any crime thriller from the last decade or so.

There are some consummate set pieces to be found - such as when the detectives visit rapist George Harvey’s house and he seeks to hide incriminating evidence, or when Susie’s sister (beautifully played by Rose McIver) breaks into his home and must attempt a daring escape – but the tension elicited from these is nothing new; it’s clearly indebted to Hitchcock and his band of imitators.

The same can be said of the acting – the characters are finely portrayed but nothing particularly novel is attempted. Stanley Tucci’s George Harvey has attracted well-deserved critical attention and a slew of award nominations, but whilst his sinister personality is expertly portrayed it’s also presented as an absolute. The audience does not hesitate to let their skin crawl as soon as he enters a shot.

Susie’s parents are played by Rachel Weisz and Mark Wahlberg, whose very presence in a film alerts the audience to the fact we’re in standard box-office production territory. They do their job nicely enough, but it is Susan Sarandon as Susie’s alcoholic grandmother who helpfully comes along to spike the punch and add a little bit of taste to an otherwise slightly unpalatable film.

That Saoirse Ronan was cast in the leading role should have been enough to sew the fraying pieces of the movie back together. She is a competent young actress and more than adept at handling heavy subject matter, as any one who has watched Atonement should be able to testify. Although she does not falter here per se she seems to have been directed towards a characteristic picture of bright-eyed adolescent innocence, with no edge whatsoever, which is exactly what made her such a rare gem in the Ian McEwan adaptation.

That during most of the filming she would have been accompanied by little more than a green screen should be acknowledged in her favour, for she masters

“the temptation to snort derisively remains”

Atonement star Saorise Ronan stars as The Lovely Bones’ deceased heroine Susie Salmon

the challenge well. But as soon as one of these CGI-generated scenes is shown to us, there is a palpable tension amongst the audience. We want to find it beautiful, heart-wrenching. But the temptation to snort derisively remains.

The visual effects are, well, interesting, but it’s difficult to think of any other adjective that would so accurately convey the kind of appeal they offer. The use of CGI simply begins to feel laboured, as if the film wanted to attempt every possible visual effect in the book.

There’s certainly no subtly in the depiction of Susie’s purgatory. And whilst the use of candyfloss colours could be forgiven as an accurate reproduction of a young girl’s fantastical afterlife, they become increasingly more distracting and apparently superfluous as the film progresses. Ben

Kenigsberg for Time Out Chicago even suggested “Jackson badly needed a greenscreen sabbatical”. Perhaps unsurprising for a director responsible for such bigbudget films as King Kong and the Lord of the Rings franchise, it’s still disappointing to see such a consummate director delivering something so unnecessarily heavyhanded.

A film that should have attracted widespread appeal is ultimately reduced to saccharine schmaltz. The fact that Susie Salmon has been a victim of rape isn’t even made clear to less astute members of the audience and the horror of her ordeal is soon obscured by images of her skipping about in heaven. I’m not surprised the group of teenage boys sat before me were sniggering. I wanted to snigger, and I had arrived at the cinema eager for an indulgent sentimental sob.

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A breath of fresh Éire

One writer explores the diverse street art scene in Ireland as youths convey important socio-political messages

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and patterns one would expect to see. This combined with the simplicity of the knife design that gently hovers to the foreground of the setting, chillingly reflects the poignant regularity of knife crime which cities have become

“in Ireland... street art is acting as a social movement among the youth”

Saint Leger reconstructs an ordinary city housing scene that characterises the older quarters of Dublin, composed of the usual bricks

within its own streets to truly understand urban troubles.

The Irish embrace of street art has even spread to the south-western tip of County Kerry, where Vango brings the War on Terror to the sleepy Irish town of Killarney. Vango draws his inspiration from Banksy and has also adopted an anonymous approach to his art. By similarly using the stencil approach that epitomises street art, Vango is an example of the Gaelic generation who amplify their voices at the issues confronting society on a local and world wide scale.

The use of stencilling and the simple colours used produce a striking image that paradoxically blends into the greenery and regular background of Killarney. This creates a lucid figure that is immediately recognisable as Osama Bin Laden, a figure so central to 21st century politics.

His depiction of Osama Bin Laden clutching a Tesco bag illustrates the essential problem that has dominated current affairs and world politics: the clash of civilisations between East and West.

The stencil brings to life the conflict of two forces fighting for power and vigour, but what is so inspiring about the ‘graffiti’, is that there is no identification as to who is right or wrong, just an illumination of the innate differences between two cultures.

ADW deserves a Palatinate mention due to his enviable use of spray paints, where he opens Ireland’s eyes to their domestic and foreign affairs. The street artist’s tagline of ‘Bad Times’ leaves nothing to the imagination, as his message to the Irish people is often honest and frank. The image of Ireland’s much loved leprechaun holding out empty pockets is an ironic depiction of the global recession, transforming a symbol famous for guarding treasures and fortunes.

Despite the gloom of the economic situation that is mirrored in the leprechaun’s face, ADW’s discreet four leaved clover offers a glimmer of hope to the Emerald Isle, and indeed us all.

Street art has stepped out of the Irish shadows by creating, inspiring and motivating a generation to explicitly express themselves. Street artists adopt the most simplistic of practices and use the city as a blank canvas; however their resonations have no limits. The provocation of socio-political responses through art is nothing new, but street art symbolises a 21st century tool in the communication of attitudes and values amongst youth.

Whether one perceives the form as graffiti or street art is arguable, however what is certain is that the youth have finally raised their voices to the issues of the 21st century, and more importantly, their voices have been heard.

“street artists... use the city as a blank canvas; their resonations have no limits”

FLICKRID: INFORMATIQUE

reland’s urban scene is alive with energy and esprit as street art thrusts the Gaelic cities of Dublin and Killarney into the international spotlight.

Often perceived as graffiti and a product of anti-social behaviour, street art has become popularised due to such figures as Banksy and Brek Le Rat, who have pioneered the art form by transforming public spaces into blank canvases.

Now the world of art is finally turning its attention to Ireland for inspiration, where street art is acting as a social movement among the youth. With an intention of ‘we can create’, Irish street art is an inspiring force due to its sociopolitical messages that have the power to build bridges with governments, who are often out of touch with the world of our generation.

By using stencils as a means of communication, ADW, Will Saint Leger and Vango are just a few of the many Irish artists pushing the boundaries of art, bringing with them a welcome breath of fresh Eire.

To exemplify Ireland’s artistic flare, Will Saint Leger has dominated the streets of Dublin by publically confronting urban

troubles, which has rightfully earned him a place at this year’s Dublin Fringe Festival, running from mid September.

‘Cowards Carry Knives’ is clearly an emotive example of Irish street art in response to spiralling knife related murders.

accustomed to.

Effectively, the artist sends a clear message to the knife culture that plagues not only Dublin, but cities almost universally. The image is more effective than any government message could begin to impact. Saint Leger illustrates the merging of artist and activist, by powerfully questioning whether it is time politics looked

Eco-art: a visually appealing way to save our planet?

Palatinate explores the use of Mother Nature as an exciting medium in the visual arts Rosanna Boscawen

Is it ecological art, eco-art, land art or environmental art? It may just sound a bit too scientific to have anything to do with art at all. But beneath the unglamorous title, the acorn of an idea (excuse the pun) planted towards the end of the 20th century has grown into a many-branched tree. Whichever of these names you prefer to give to the work of artists who use nature as their raw material to proclaim the precarious majesty of the natural world, its glory is inescapable.

From Japan to the USA, from Western Europe to the Poles, artists across the world have created exquisitely delicate pictures from leaves; they have ridiculed our attempts to restrain Nature’s terrifying strength by emphasising her enormity; they have tried to deepen our links with the earth.

Isn’t all this a little too late, if the aim is to increase environmental awareness and prevent further damage to the planet?

If politicians and environmentalists are struggling to get through to one another and to the rest of society, then how can we

expect artists to do it? At first their cause certainly seems hopeless, especially as the more obviously propagandist pieces, such as the cubes with a volume equivalent to the average carbon footprint installed in Copenhagen last year, aren’t made of the aesthetically appealing stuff that would sway those whose preferred perch is on the fence. You might say they’re nothing more than a new way of representing the statistics we’re all too tired and guilty to read anymore.

But eco-art is not just about fighting for the conservation of the planet. It is about understanding and respecting the world in which and with which we live, and constantly readjusting accordingly. And it is exactly because of there are so many motives behind it that eco-art has such a profound effect.

Take Andy Goldsworthy’s ‘Hanging Tree’. The piece, found at Yorkshire Sculpture Park, is a rectangle in the earth, bordered by a traditional dry stone wall,

with the skeleton of a dead tree inside. It is an open-air coffin which commemorates the now dead tree in an artistically exciting reversal of power between man and nature. Or so it seems, until you notice the branches pushing into and through the edges of its enclosure as if trying to break free, to return to nature in a sort of regeneration or reincarnation.

Because the sculpture is primarily a piece of art, rather than environmental propaganda, the sublimity of nature appears greater. I’m no eco-warrior, and I don’t suppose most of you are, but you can’t deny that when you see something beautiful, you don’t want to act to prolong its life – and in the process you can trample on the ugliness and mundanity that is statistics.

The ephemerality of much eco-art has to be one of its most enticing charms. Built near the sea so that it will eventually be washed away or constructed from leaves and petals that will rot within days, the

“the ephemerality of eco-art has to be one of its most enticing charms...”

images and sculptures reinforce the brevity of both their and our stay on the earth, and so generate reverence for our habitat, and a curiosity about unknown parts of the world.

It would be stating the obvious – but I’ll do it anyway – to say that Mother Nature is, and always has been, one of the most talented artists around, and if its underlying meaning is something with the potential to really change the way we live, so much the better. It may seem like an exaggeration to say that without the eco-artists of the 21st century the plethora of visual possibilities and the streams which tentatively trickle out from them will disappear into nothing. But just open a paper tomorrow morning and look for the story about the tragic demise of another natural beauty, big or small, then tell me I’m being melodramatic.

To find out more, search for ‘eco art’ or ‘land art’, or go to www. greenmuseum.org

Anthony Goldsworthy’s ‘Hanging tree’

FLICKR ID: POLANDEZE

Ben Kasstan

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Sex, lies and incest run rampant in The Assembly Rooms

DotDotDot Productions twist of the Sophocles tragic classic shows modern interpretations are just as powerful DELANEY CHAMBERS

Oedipus Rex DotDotDot Productions The Assembly Rooms ««««« Lyndsey Fineran

O

edipus Rex is a tale of the darkest side of human behaviour. The classic example of the “tragedy of fate”, it famously deals with patricide, suicide and not forgetting an (un)healthy dose of incest. DotDotDot’s production of Sophocles’ most affecting Theban play proved exhilarating, disturbingly dark and impressively innovative.

Updating Oedipus’ world with sharp contemporary dress, bleakly bare set and unbreakable shadows, the production succeeded in creating a setting that proved at once contemporary yet timeless. Directors Flo Vincent and Amy Higgins succeeded in taking an ancient tale and making it poignantly relevant to the contemporary – and with an impressive creative twist.

“A visually amazing production with laudable creative energy”

“disturbingly dark...”

Opening to a white-lit bed of incestuous writhing and accompanied by searing music, Oedipus Rex aimed to shock, disturb and unease its watcher. Using a chorus which emerged from hidden within the audience, the ensemble’s haunting presence was maintained throughout. Dressed entirely in black and supplied with the most simple devices; a mask, a torch or a distorted physical motif, the chorus added

Oedipus (i.e. the act of incest and patricide) but rather around the process of him discovering his terrifying truth.

It is thus a play which relies entirely on its characters’ reactions for its power. For the most part, this was artfully achieved.

Serena Gosden-Hood as Jocasta was heart-wrenching in her beautifully tragic realisation of incest while Charlie Warner exhibited an impressive balance of power and poise as the upstanding Creon.

Oedipus (Joseph Terry) finds out that jocasta (Serena Godson-Hood) is not only his wife but his mother in this quintessential tragedy

powerful depth and striking visual energy to the play.

Notably impressive was the production’s use of lighting in which the manipulation of darkness and cleverly cast shadows gave stirring emphasis to moments

of moral myopia, with some moments of brightness accentuating the dynamics of his revelation. By shifting regularly, the varying lighting contributed to the feeling of never feeling secure in one’s knowledge or place, a feeling compounded by the un-

nerving music as an interlude between scenes.

The simplicity of dotdotdot’s staging is also an apt reflection of the action of the play itself. In Oedipus Rex, the action revolves not around the famous actions of

Joseph Terry however, while an impressive lead figure, at times seemed to lack the passion and tragic intensity necessary as the eponymous Oedipus. Appearing somewhat restrained, it often felt that his character never seemed to fully warrant the despair of those around him as he moved towards his tragic end. However, it must be said that this was the production’s first night and Terry’s performance undoubtedly strengthened as the evening progressed and cast a powerful final presence as the pitiable, fallen King.

A visually amazing production with laudable creative energy, Oedipus Rex proved an exciting and highly promising first offering from one of Durham’s newest theatre companies.

Spring is not always so joyous, but it’s definitely a spectacle Spring Awakening Bailey Theatre Company Leech Hall, St. John’s College ««««« Alison Boyd

Having never seen Frank Wedekind’s Spring Awakening, and knowing little about it other than its reputation as being highly controversial, I was expecting an evening of sex, lies and scandal. I was not disappointed.

Entering Leech Hall, I was struck by the intimacy of the venue. Directors Ben Salter and Hannah Shand made excellent use of lighting and staging.

Oscar Blustin’s very basic lighting design prevented the drama from overwhelming the small venue, always allowing the audience to feel close to the characters.

This feeling was enhanced as the play was staged in the round. The cast not only coped with this very challeng-

ing set mimicked the claustrophobic community of provincial life in 19th century Germany, but also allowed the audience to watch the drama unfold from many different perspectives.

The cast were all highly convincing and, although the momentum did appear to slow down in the play’s second half, they gave a truly moving performance. Callum Cheatle stole the show as Moritz Stiefel, a young man unable to cope with puberty and his own sexual awakening. His performance was never sentimental, and he moved from comic to tragic so smoothly that the audience couldn’t help but believe in him. His suicide at the end of the second act was so emotional that I received my own awakening when the house lights came back up.

Similar praise must go to Greg Silverman playing Melchior Gabor, a schoolboy who rapes a young girl with whom he is in love. Despite the awful nature of his crime, Greg’s performance brought across the

“I was expecting an evening of sex, lies and scandal...”

true complexity of his character’s psychology, to the extent that the audience felt genuine sympathy for him.

Tash Cowley, playing Wendla Bergmann who is raped by Melchior, acted her similarly formidable role with great talent. She portrayed the childish naivety of Wendla realistically and movingly, particularly in her monologue following Melchior’s assault. Both performed with such maturity that it was difficult to believe that Tash and Greg are only freshers, and I look forward to seeing more from them in the future.

Several roles were double cast and Nikki Jones, playing both Frau Bergmann and Frau Gabor, carried this off well. Her performance as Frau Gabor was especially emotive yet her use of voice as Frau Bergmann could sometimes render her hard to understand, detracting from an otherwise excellent performance. Matthew Urwin was cast as both Herr Gabor and Herr Steifel and, whilst these were smaller roles, gave a very memorable performance, particularly as the former. Niamh Murphy was also granted two roles, those of the nymph Ilse and the mysterious Masked

Man. Whilst her performance as Ilse was delightfully seductive, I felt that her portrayal of the Masked Man lacked enough real flavour.

Jonathon Bowers and Harry Bresslaw played Ernst Robel and Hanschen Rilow respectively, two schoolmates discov- Innocence is sadly soon lost in this play based on the darker side of sex ering en to Catherine Good and their homosexual feelings for each other. Despite relatively little stage Liz Smith respectively. Although smaller roles, Liz’s use of humour and Catherine’s time, their performance was convincing, memorable soliloquy on her parents’ abuse although their kiss could have had more of her meant that they were by no means passion. The roles of Martha Bessel and Thea, school friends of Wendla’s, were giv- overshadowed.

DAN JEFFRIES

The Bailey Theatre Company goes serious with this show, and doesn’t disappoint

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Does Durham think it can dance?

Despite putting a step or two wrong, InStep really delivers the moves when it counts in this dance production

easily be put down to first night

forner

So We Think We Can Dance InStep Fonteyn Ballroom ««««« Daniel Dyson

D

uring my time at Durham, I have been fortunate enough to review a lot of theatre shows but never a dance show before. It was with pleasure then that when the oppurtunity arose, I leapt at the chance and for the most part I was certainly not disappointed.

“For the most part I was certainly not disappointed...”

The show started well, with some impressive solo performances by Alanna Orpen and Samantha Shone respectively and on the whole, the solo performances, whilst short, often gave a lot of bang for their buck. Group performances were also solid; the Jazz ones in particular were highly enjoyable, but some of the later dances were unremarkable which was a shame as it was evident even in these weaker performances that a lot of love and attention had gone into choreographing and producing the routines. Sadly though, a proportion of them simply failed to do it for me.

When they did work however, the group performances were the highlight of the night. I was impressed at the consciousness of effect when it came to colour in the Modern Jazz performance choreographed

by Gemma Gillie who used green and white in a subtle but effective manner to help tell the story of the dance. Whilst it was undeniable that a foot or two went wrong throughout the show, this could

nerves and Best New Writing: Callum Cheatle for The Photographer any mistakes Best New Play: The Night at the Countess’ by Ben Whittle which were Best Director: Donnchadh O’Conaill and Adam Usden made were soon forgotten for Attempts by the audience thanks to Best Actor: Ollie Lynes in The Night at the Countess’ Best Actress: Clare Reavey in Attempts some incredibly graceful Best Musical Number: Maybe Next Time, Sarah Baillie movements and Best 24 hour play: Forever and Never motifs such as a flower bud open- Judges’ Discretionary Award: Oscar Blustin, Festival ing or a ring, Organisation which were a real joy to watch.

Whilst dance is often associated with has certain idiosyncrasies, some were the feminine, the best performances of the immensely distracting such as an incrednight tended to be from the guys which ibly irritating arm which flailed around by was a real surprise. Comedy was present one of the dancers in the Beginner’s Tap or with Alex Eccles’ cheeky solo to the song the utter dourness of one of the gentleman ‘Banana Phone’ but special mention has to in the Salsa who looked utterly bored at go to Derek Addai. His moves were simply the prospect of dancing with a charming phenomenal in their cleanness and quickyoung lady - hardly the spirit of the dance. ness - that boy can certainly dance! Addai The Salsa performance also committed was a real crowd-pleaser and it doesn’t take another crime, that of talking on stage. I much to figure out why - during his later found myself following a conversation dance with the Phoenix Crew, the pleasure rather than focusing on the performance and joy of performing was written all over which was a real shame as otherwise, the his face and it was physically impossible Salsa added some spice and it would have not to smile along with him - the mark of a been nice if there had been more Latin true performer. dances or some ballroom added to the Obviously, the girls didn’t let their side mix. down either. Jo Wright’s solo performance was simply enchanting in its expression of beauty and grace; you almost held your breath when watching her. Wright’s choreography too was superb; one of my favourite performances of the night was the Advanced Ballet who weren’t quite walking on air, but certainly weren’t far off.

It was hard not to feel calm when watching their serene movements and they were Overall, the show was definitely worth helped by a very smart music choice by the watch. The range of performances was Wright whose self-awareness of how music impressive, from ballet to a deliciously and dance coincide bodes well for any dirty Hip Hop performance. Whilst flaws future performances she may do. were evident and an overall story or proWhilst on the whole, the show was satisfy- gression would have been nice, I sincerely ing, there were some moments that were hope that InStep will grace Durham with downright frustrating. Whilst every peranother show in the near future.

“Overall, the show was definitely worth the watch.”

DELANEY CHAMBERS

The 35th Durham Drama Festival Awards

Students from InStep more than prove that actually, they can dance...

What’s On? Tuesday 16th March - Friday 19th March Complete Works of Shakespeare (Abridged) - Castle Theatre Company - The Assembly Rooms Leave the textbooks at home and prepare to laugh out loud at this comedic attempt to cover all of Shakespeare’s plays in an evening. £4.50 NUS, £4.00 DST - 7:30pm Tuesday 16th March - Saturday 27th March Swan Lake - Back Row Productions - Newcastle Theatre Royal One of ballet’s most beloved shows pays Newcastle a visit in a show that is sure to be unmissable. £9.50 - £35 - 7:30pm, matinee 2:00pm Wed. and Thur., 2:30pm Sat. Thursday 18th March - Saturday 20th March Copacabana - Durham High School for Girls - Gala Theatre Music and fashion will doubtless be the passion in this local school’s production of the camp musical classic. £12, £9.50 concession - 7:30pm, 2:30pm matinee on Saturday

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Yeasayer: there will be blood....

...and that’s just the start of it. Bassist Ira Wolf Tuton discusses the new album and turning people on FLICKR ID: THEOGEO

George Warshaw

F

rom his Brooklyn home, on the couch with his mutt (“she’s a stonecold killer”) occasionally yapping in the background, Ira Wolf Tuton sounds remarkably well at ease. Yet the relaxed tone of the Yeasayer bassist could well be the result of extreme fatigue; it’s been a busy few months with rehearsals everyday throughout the months of January and February ahead of their upcoming world tour to promote their sophomore album, Odd Blood...

How does the new album progress on from All Hour Cymbals? Many people seem to think you’re heading in a more poppy direction.

Well that’s what we talked about from the outset, we wanted to give this album a more contemporary feel, with a lot more variation in the production of song to song and get our point across. We’re trying to embrace modern recording techniques and be creative.

Your album leaked almost two months before the release date, has this affected you in any way?

I don’t really let it bother me and it’s not gonna get in our way. More people will hear it and hopefully out of those people some’ll get turned on by it, come support us on our tour, and also be interested in owning the album artwork too. For me, I get off on that… I like having that physicality. In terms of the artwork and design, I

think it represents an important connection between the band and the particular album. In terms of Odd Blood’s artwork, we worked with a guy named Ben Phelan who does a lot of our visual stuff-there are a lot of futuristic elements, which are linked with what we’re trying to do on this album.

You released Odd Blood’s first single, Ambling Alp, as a free digital download.

What made you do this?

In terms of releasing the free digital download, we’re in a place in our careers where we’re still trying to get people to hear who we are, and trying to turn people on to us. There’s a promotional aspect, but I can’t imagine that if we ever get to a point where we are successful, that our music becomes tailored towards that financial goal.

If I’m making a living then I’m happy.

That song made sense for us to put out as a single, because although it’s pretty different from our first recordings, we felt it serves as a bridge; there are certain elements that we carried over from our first record to that song. But that being said, the production techniques and interests are much more akin to Odd Blood.

“I enjoy playing European festivals, they have a fun atmosphere” The accompanying music video to Ambling Alp is quite… elaborate. Will we be experiencing anything like it in your upcoming live shows?

I don’t know if there’ll be any naked people running around! We put a lot of

work into the visual aspect of our shows, we work with Ben [Phalen- who also did the album art] and he creates custom light shows and sculptures to tour with us.

That’s very important. When I go to a live show, I want to be “taken over” and that’s what we’re trying to do. As we progress and the more resources we get, we’re gonna put them into our live show. That’s what excites me- playing bigger venues in front of more people really gives us a chance to put more into our live shows. We’re trying to create our own environment and take control of it.

Have you changed the way you play live over recent years?

Not on a personal level, but when you play as a band yeah, it’s a pretty intimate thing. Every time you add and detract players it’s gonna change the dynamic. That’s kinda why we did that- why Luke [Fasanotheir former drummer] is no longer in the band and why we have the two new guys.

We wanted to change the dynamic. It definitely refreshed the creative process, our drive and our excitement of the live shows and working on it.

Your first gig of the current tour is at the Natural History Museum in LA- a pretty interesting venue! Have you played any other interesting venues in your career?

A lot of places we played in Europe were fantastic. We played the Guggenheim recently, and although sonically pretty bad, it was a really surreal experience, which is the type I enjoy. We were playing this festival in Norway right on the water... It’s still light at ten o’clock at night, and you’re looking out over the ocean. That’s gonna be a drastically different experience to a

dark club back here. I think the environment has a huge part in the way somebody experiences a show and also in the way that the show ends up coming off.

“We’re trying to embrace modern recording techniques and be creative” Will this festival season be a busy one for Yeasayer?

I imagine so! But we’re ready for it to be a busy one. I’m really excited, I enjoy playing festivals, the European ones especially, because I think we get a good reception and they have a fun atmosphere. Travelling around them can be fun, because I’m playing with a lot of bands whose members I live with here in Brooklyn. I don’t get to see some of them much, but during festival season I’m able to catch up with them. It’s gonna be a hectic schedule, but this is what we do for a living- I think you always have to be appreciative of that fact. I think we’re very fortunate that people actually care about seeing us live… that’s pretty lucky.

With the release of Odd Blood to a largely positive critical reception, Yeasayer’s bold move into new musical territory has largely paid off; fittingly, the track Strange Reunion seems to be the only linkage to their psychedelic, Afrobeat-tinged debut.

But Ira reveals the cards are to be shuffled once more…“This stuff has been in our paths for so long, mentally and physically.

We’re trying to move on to the next phase, whatever the next phase may be”. I’m already looking forward to it.

Are the thousands of internet blogs killing music criticism?

Gone are the days of paying the seasoned rock critic for their opinion, all we need do now is enter the blogosphere to find out what anyone thinks about a new band, gig or album. Is this tidal wave of free-criticism shining a light on the cream of the crop, helping us choose only the best and most worthy bands to listen to, or is it creating a whirlwind of undeserved hype around new bands?

The thing is we now expect any band getting a lot of attention on the internet to replicate what few bands can do, which is

release a definitive and trend-setting debut album, like the Arctic Monkey’s debut.

And the blame for this lies with the blogger. With everyone so keen to find the ‘best new band’ and to be the one that found them first, a blogger will tell us that this band is the ‘new’ whatever and the music journos follow suit. Unfair predictions of grandeur and comparisons with previous successes can destroy a band at the first hurdle.

Onto the pile of other disappointing ‘great new bands’ you go, discarded by the blogger who’s already found the newStrokes to flirt with in the blogosphere.

Some bands, however, do deserve the

What’s On? 18 Mar- Thyrd Eye @ Hild Bede Undercroft (Profits to DUCK) th

18 Mar- Steel Panther @ O2 Academy, Newcastle th

19th Mar- Wild Beasts @ The Cluny, Newcastle 31st Mar- The Joy Formidable @ O2 Academy 2, Newcastle

hype that they get, and this shows largely in the reviews. The XX, Wild Beasts and These New Puritans have all been hyped to high heaven, but justify it with distinctive and forward-thinking albums. Then again, the backlash to hype can prove almost fatal, as seen in the case of The Twang, once hailed as the new-Stone Roses by the NME and looking likely heirs to Oasis’ throne at the top of the lad-rock kingdom in 2007, now damp-squibs at the bottom of a tired and tedious scene, releasing a second album last year that went by unnoticed.

“Unfair predictions of grandeur can destroy a band at the first hurdle” It’s the easiest thing in the world to rubbish a band that clearly doesn’t warrant the hype that engulfs them. But it’s not really the bands fault that they’re a blogger’s wet dream is it? Look at new internet-darlings The Drums, dubbed by NME as ‘New York’s official Coolest New Band... the most contagiously energetic NYC band of the past 10 years’. Ridiculous hyperbole

THOMAS WELCH

Nico Franks

certainly gains attention, but how can a band expect to live up to that kind of introduction? It’s pretty clear that The Drums won’t live up to the expectations that the bloggers and music press have set for them, and for this they might even face a backlash of Twang proportions, with music fans eager to do as much as possible to avoid another product of the hype-machine.

There’s no doubt that the internet means bands can get their music out faster

and to more people than ever before, and we’re the ones that benefit from this. And maybe the hype being spread through the blogosphere is helping great bands get noticed and exposing the shit bands for the pretenders that they really are. But we should start taking the hyperbole with a nice handful of salt and, in the words of someone who has survived the blogger’s curse, Alex Turner, make sure, whatever happens, we ‘Don’t believe the hype’.

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P.S. I think you’re rubbish

Poetry Corner

As Cecelia Ahern churns out another one, Palatinate sees through the mawkish mush The Book of Tomorrow Cecelia Ahern HarperCollins

“C

ecelia Ahern has written another book,” I tell my mother. (You know, that girl who most famously wrote P.S. I Love You which sold millions of copies and unfortunately resulted in Gerard Butler adopting a dodgy Irish accent). Our mutual silence might speak of jealousy brewing within two aspiring novelists (who does not want to be a novelist, these days?), but it also communicates a deep sense of unease: I did not expect to be given this book as a Christmas present.

The blonde, shiny daughter of former Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern has been allowed to share her fictional thoughts with the world and has had them circulated like free jelly beans as she wins literary awards left, right and centre. If we continue to endorse this market of money-spinning chick-lit, how will we ever expand the budget for real, well-written, thoughtprovoking fiction? What will happen to talented, experienced literary agents and editors while businessmen desperately search for the next bestseller?

I am sitting opposite an elderly gentleman in a launderette as I examine the lurid pink cover of Cecelia Ahern’s seventh novel, The Book of Tomorrow.

I scan the first page and cannot help but sneer at her formulaic prose: “Tamara did this because she needed to do this, and as Tamara knew, she couldn’t do that unless she had a sigh and looked around her ensuite bedroom.” I flicked through a couple of chapters, hoping that the dirty scenes might at least be worth a glance: I was hid-

like me, actually – those who pine for the next instalment of Bridget Jones’ Diary. Or those who buy a John Grisham novel from an airport vending machine. Or even those who spot

who churn out trash at a more alarming rate than a McDonald’s Drive Thru, and who have a more central focus on their supposed target audience than the integrity of their work.

Despite having the strong presence of literary genii such as Ian McEwan, Alice Sebold and Lionel Shriver in today’s society, the majority of authors have come to resemble cheap spin-offs to Helen Fielding, Irish Marian Keyes and other original trend-setters.

My intention is not to criticise successful authors; however, it appears that when of course, unhappy. the agents pile on the pressure, writers But then, Tamara tend to spew literary vomit. Lee Child discovers a special and Jodi Picoult are famous examples; book! “Tamara finaltalented but past their peak and running ly manages to open out of ideas. Short, snappy sentences the book. What she such as “he punched in the number” discovers within the are starting to wear thin; stating a cliché pages takes her breath followed by “excuse the cliché” is worse away and shakes her than not apologising in the first place; and world to its core.” The finally, ending every paragraph with Bible perhaps? The a cliff-hanger sentence latest edition of Cosmo? like “She looked up and As early as the first page smiled, hoping everything my intuition tells me was going to be alright”, that self-discovery will be tends to turn our brains closely linked to fortune: into slush. These tired, over-rehearsed and quite frankly lazy prose styles, married to a recycled, tatty emotional gaudiness makes for poor and frankly uninspiring reads. Ultimately, the title The Book of Tomorrow is enough to simultaneFormula for a best-seller: pastel pink and Cecelia Ahern ously sour any grandmother’s expression and disappoint the twelve year olds who Tamara a saucy Douglas Kennedy billboard on believed to have stumbled across a comewill even- the motorway and consequently hasten back of The Babysitters’ Club. tually ditch into Waterstone’s. Think of the editors and After watching a couple of interviews, the silver spoon (or rather the four-poster publishers who are, at this very moment, Ahern’s accent and friendliness making bed, this crucial item of furniture being scratching their heads in the office, arguing me melt from within, I felt slightly guilty mentioned in the jacket blurb) and voilà, which pastel colour to use for the cover of about my venom. She is certainly not Ahern has created her another internathe next Sophia Kinsella. Finance before the only culprit in this crazed culture of tional bestseller. any hope of literary finesse.

Richard and Judy book clubs. However, I presume that the target audience is a This is what we want, apparently. I am the Irish Independent and, indeed, her fabored, average-educated, comfort-seeking describing a relatively new wave of comther might disagree with me, but my own section of the female population – kind of mercial authors such as Stephanie Meyer review of Ahern’s literary works remains LLINS PUBLISHING LTD

“...I flicked through a couple of chapters, hoping that the dirty scenes might at least be worth a glance...”

Word of the Week “alexithymia” Jess Denham Difficulty in experiencing, expressing, and describing emotional responses.

Recommended by Daniel Dyson

Short Story Contest RESULTS!

See p11 of Palatinate for the winning stories!

R COURTESY HARPERCO

“...formulaic prose...”

FLICKR: CHEALSE_8881 3 / COVE

««««« Rachael Revez

eously disappointed. The Irish Independent declares this novel to be “A heavenly gift that speaks to the heart”. At £14.99?

Ahern’s central character begins as an unbelievably rich girl from Dublin, but all is to change when her father dies, leaving them poor and,

“...mundane, infantile, mindnumbing and frustratingly predictable.”

A Vision of Ireland’s greatest poet

Alice Graves explores the wild and wonderful work of W.B. Yeats

T

he indisputable Godfather of Irish Poetry, William Butler Yeats, stands in the transitional turning point between the Victorian era and Modernism. His early work in collections such as The Rose had firm roots in the traditional folk songs of Ireland, creating a misty aura of wistful, haunting poems such as ‘The Lake Isle of Innisfree’, and also demonstrated the key themes that would remain central to his entire work: Spiritualism, Ireland and love.

His early work was highly influenced by the Romantics and the paintings of the Pre-Raphaelites. The devastating femmefatale of paintings such as ‘Lady Lilith’ by Dante Gabriel Rossetti would become an actuality for Yeats as he fell spectacularly for the incandescently beautiful nationalist Maud Gonne. She did not return his senti-

ments, but inspired poems such as ‘No Second Troy’ and ‘Adam’s Curse’.

Yeats became increasingly involved with nationalist politics, and also fell under the influence of early Modernists such as Ezra Pound, a result of which was a tightening and hardening of his style. As the events in Ireland took a turn for the worse, his poems dealt increasingly with public themes, such as ‘Easter 1916’ in response to the Easter uprising, and he created some of the most harrowing and damning poems ever written in English.

Yeats’s unorthodox beliefs as epitomized in the often quoted, seldom read, A

Vision, included a belief in fairies. His later collections, such as The Tower, consolidated this strong feeling into poems that were powerfully visionary.

Yeats is undoubtedly one of the most important poets to have ever walked this earth. I defy anyone reading ‘The Wild Swans at Coole’ not to feel moved by the beautiful, lilting, trailing cadences or not feel a pang of pure sympathy at the beautifully controlled yet heartbreaking closing lines of ‘In Memory of Major Robert Gregory’. Go, read him right now, and you’ll find that all, all’s changed, changed utterly for the better.

“...beautiful, lilting trailing cadences...”

Disposals I imagined as I watch you throw your cigarette butt on the railway track all the disposals of a life in a sedimentary layer, crushed flat: the cellophane that loses shape when the box it wraps has been removed; an odd shoe; an umbrella’s skeleton; outs- and insides of the world we use.

Then I pictured us entering the earth, our last disposal in a final box, and how our litter, landfills, dumps, would form a ceiling, one that mocks the floor we’d made of them beneath ourselves, on which we’d once claimed higher ground.

Faded carriers of wet napkins and gnawed chicken bones would hang down like stalactites above us, and a slow rain of train tickets, cigarette butts, single gloves gather at their tips and drop on us, our own, earth-delayed disposals from above.

Matthew Griffiths

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1. Gizmo (6) 2. Raffle (7) 3. Urged on (8) 4. Mature (4) 5. Half-wit (5) 6. Betroth (6) 7. Jester (5) 13. Nice (8) 16. Occupy (7) 17. Goad (6)

19. Allow (5) 20. Stick (6) 22. Overweight (5) 24. Revise (4)

Combining the central letter and at least three other letters, find as many words as you can! There is at least one nine-letter word.

10 Words - A-Okay 20 Words - Average 30 Words - Awesome

Photography Competition Winner Sam Gunter

Theme: A Splash of Colour I had always assumed that the often photographed rail tracks at Birkenau (The Auchwitz death camp) were leading into the camp, and was shocked to find that they are actually the rails of the main unloading area and are inside. The fact the rails disapear into the distance helps to give some idea of the size of the site - huge.

Even though it was a cold winter’s day, the sun was shining bright making the site look quite green and beautiful, something

George Critchley (Right) Camera: Sony Alpha 100 Lens: 70 - 210 mm Exposure: 1/125 sec @ f/13 (ISO100)

Next Theme: The Joys of Spring Deadline: Sunday 18th April. Entries to photography@palatinate.org.uk

“I took this photo on a family walk last spring.

The way the light was reflecting off this murky forest puddle made an interesting and colourful combination with the plants in the water. I used my zoom lens to get right in on the action and capture the image.”

which didn’t feel right considering the unimaginable horrors that took place here. I decided to convert the image to black and white to emphisise the flowers and perhaps bring out the emotion of the scene, location and history.

Camera: Canon 450D Lens: Canon 28-135 mm Exposure: 1/80 sec @ f/5.6 (ISO 100)

Anna Leon (Above) Camera: Canon Ixus 8215 Lens: Canon 18 - 70 mm Exposure: 1/2000 sec @ f/4 (ISO 400) “I loved the contrast of the steely blue of the water, sky and mountains alongside the piercing scarlets and yellows of the flowers.”