Overheard at a reading...
I was at a poetry reading the other day and just before all the excitement started I was earwigging on the group sitting in the row behind me. They were obviously a poetry group, who swapped poems and went round attending these do's together. The woman who seemed to be the leading light was introducing the members of her group to another set of poets she was involved in. They were sitting in the row even further behind. The woman in charge was showing off the only man in her group.
'Oh, and I should introduce you to my friend Graham, as well. Graham's dangerously experimental, aren't you, Graham?'
I peeked round and saw that Graham was looking stricken at this. He was trying to disappear into his coat. 'Oh, no. I wouldn't say that.'
She wouldn't stop. 'You are, Graham. You're more experimental than most.'
Everyone was looking at Graham by now.
Oh - pictured: the poster for Tarantula! A curious rewrite of The Island of Doctor Moreau. I found it rather touching: the country doctor courting the laboratory assistant. She's come out to stay in the desert, in the middle of nowhere, just to work at the side of the famous scientist who's engaged in solving the world's anticipated food shortages. His experiments in breeding huge animals (rats, guinea pigs, tarantulas) have awful side effects. Each of his lab assistants end up with a rare disease, turning them into Mr Hydes, one of whom almost suceeds in killing his creator and burning down the lab. And that's how the giant Tarantula escapes, eventually to wreak havoc in the final reel. But all the spidery shenanigans seem beside the point and, actually, rather easily sorted out.
I was more caught up in the plight of the scientist. The gruff genius who gradually falls foul of the substances he's developing, turning into a monster and going up in a flash.
Dangerously experimental, indeed.
2 Comments:
We once had two members of a creative writing group in our coffee shop. The woman, a regular, had clearly bitten the bullet and invited the lone stranger to join her for coffee afterwards. He looked respectable enough; well-worn 'good' tweed jacket; steel-grey hair in a comb-over which was a triumph of hope over experience and nicely-polished shoes. Butter wouldn't melt. They chatted away and, as often happens, the coffee shop fell quiet as we all pretended not to listen in. It started innocently enough: he lived with his mother and the writing group was a way of getting out and - sotto voce, but not sotto enough - 'expressing his long-buried desires'. Which he then proceeded to outline in graphic and surprising detail as his companion spluttered, blustered, blushed and checked the exits.
Julie: that's brilliant. There should be an anthology of these writing world horror stories.
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