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| | | Sebastian Barry: 'I'm still not over Oliver Twist' | | by Sebastian Barry Apr 1, 2022 | | The writer on growing up with Puffin books, his changing attitude to Conrad, and the punk sensibility of Elizabeth Bowen My earliest reading memory
I was eight or so before I was finally able to read. Then I was away. I usually went up to Eason’s in Dún Laoghaire on a Saturday with my pocket money and bought a Puffin book. One was a story about a boy living in London in a cul-de-sac, and there was a poignant subplot about a mother who had been a ballerina. I don’t know who wrote it or what it was called but I would love to be told. My favourite book growing up
As a little boy I went with my father to see David Lean’s Oliver Twist at the cinema, and I thought it was something real happening in front of me. When Oliver is brought in to see Fagin at the end, and Fagin thinks Oliver can free him – well, I am still not over it. Then, much later, when I was off sick from school in Dublin, I read the actual novel, mesmerised, traumatised. Continue reading... | | | | | 'I'm living for the ones who didn't make it': Bonnie Raitt on her unquenchable thirst for music | | by Kat Lister Apr 1, 2022 | | As she wins a lifetime achievement Grammy at 72, the US singer who crossed blues with pop is still determined to support artists who never got their dues Bonnie Raitt’s story begins in a childhood bedroom in Burbank, California. By 16, she had already taught herself the guitar by listening to Joan Baez and Bob Dylan. Now, the Newport folk scene was turning her on to Muddy Waters, John Hammond Jr and Robert Johnson – and to the bewitching sound of the slide guitar. She soaked the label off a medicine bottle, placed her middle finger inside the glass and started to play. “I’m just one more kid who learned how to play the blues from being a fan,” the 72-year-old tells me on a video call from her home in northern California. It is a modest statement for the first woman to have a Fender guitar launched in her honour. On Sunday, Raitt will receive a lifetime achievement award at the Grammys – a far cry from her DIY beginnings in the mid-60s, and a long overdue accolade. “My gameplan was just to follow my blues and jazz exemplars. Stay true to your art, do the best shows you can, keep going, don’t worry about commercial success, and when you’re 70 years old people will still want to come and see you,” she says. Continue reading... | | | | | |
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