there are still the strains of the piper to be heard on the winds.
The Haunted Realm is full of such stories, and not all so comfortably steeped in the mists of time. Marsden himself is blasé about the strange happenings that have beset him. ‘There were endless coincidences. You’d go to a house and be told a story by a person who didn’t know the name ofsomebody, then two days later in another county, a book would fall open with the name you wanted. But it didn’t feel sinister; it was more like having a guardian angel.’
In a fascinating introduction by Colin Wilson, critic. and author of The Outsider, we learn more about Marsden’s experiences. When he was seven he was scared by a picture in a book of a tidal wave about to break over a man and woman running on a beach. For years he had nightmares about himselfon that beach running from the wave, until he came across a deserted mine and building at Yarnbury in Yorkshire. In one ofthe empty rooms he found a copy of the book lying face down on the floor. When he picked it up. it fell open at the picture ofthe tidal wave — ‘a peculiar shock’. but one which cured the nightmare. The photographer’s childhood took him from the haunted Thorpe Hall in Louth, to a sinister monastic boarding school in Yorkshire. His first ever photographs were not so much cut-out fairies in the garden, as
cut-out ghosts.
Years later and Marsden’s photographs of Borley rectory in Essex contains something hard to dismiss as trickery. ‘There is a shape in the sky for which I can give no explanation. I do all my own developing and it seems odd to me. It is quite sharp, which puts the mocker on it being a mark on the negative or on the camera lens, in which case it would be out of focus.‘ Dare we presume that it is the ‘floating nun’ regularly sighted by villagers?
All this, and other tales. like Marsden’s camera being knocked out of his hand on one occasion at a churchyard in Oxfordshire, clearly disturb Colin Wilson, who outlines a lot of scientific theories before reluctantly accepting the supernatural for what it is, unexplained. But whether or not you believe it, this is an arresting collection, clearly demanding a Haunted Realm I] once Marsden has laid to rest his next project, Visions of Poe. (Stephanie Billen)
The Haunted Realm by Simon Marsden is published by Webb & Bower/Michael Joseph at £12.95. An exhibition of Simon Marsden ’3 photographs is at Hamilton’s Gallery, Carlos Place, London (3—8 Nov) and at The Royal Photographic Society, The Octagon, Milsom Street, Bath (27Nov, 1986—101an, 1987).
HEADLINE ARTIST Conrad Atkinson (photo) who has been described as the founder of the political art movement in Britain, took up his new post as Artist in Residence at Edinburgh University last week.
Jointly appointed by the University and the Scottish Arts Council, Atkinson’s inaugural exhibition in the Architecture faculty ends Friday 31 Oct. See Arts listings. It offersa foretaste ofwhat is no doubt to follow — huge oil paintings depict newspaper front pages with headlines that shout from the grave, art masters’ indictment of the modern world; ‘Reagan Tax Plan At Odds With Divine Spirit, alleges William Blake’ ‘Matisse Says Thatcherism Fails To Recognise Pleasure Principal’.
During his six-month residency, Atkinson can be visited in his studio in West Richmond Street, Edinburgh (Tel 031 667 7467 first for an appointment).
CHINA WEEK
In the wake of the Queen’s much-publicised tour of the East, attention is this month drawn to Edinburgh’s Assembly Rooms Chinese Week. Organised with the help of the Scotland China Association and the capital’s Chinese community it includes an exhibition on Contemporary Arts and Crafts of China, receiving its first British showing as well as music, films and lectures (see Listings). There will also be workshops where the public can turn their hand to such traditional Chinese crafts as Noodle Stretching.
Chinese Week is at the Assembly Rooms, 54 George Street, 3—8 November. Details from Kate C raik, 225 3614.
CAREERS CONVENTION
OK. Be honest. Who’s never seen himself as a pop star? Up among the glamour and the glitter, whether softly crooning or pounding it all out, surely everyone’s imagination has led them this way some time or
CHRIS HILL
other. But seriously, if you really did want to join the snakes and ladders of the music business, what do you do? Or even if your heart’s set on being a recording engineer, or an orchestral manager? Edinburgh’s Music Library provides the answers to all these questions plus many more with its first Music Careers Convention. Representatives from colleges, bands, local radio, BBC, music therapy, video companies and everything else in the music world will be there. It’s for everyone, informal and free. (See Classical listings). (Carol Main)
LETTERS
RESTORING ACCURACY
I notice in the Glasgow Style back page under Architecture a paragraph (75) on Charing Cross Mansions, the final sentence reading ‘The building was restored recently (1980) by Stewart MacPherson Associates).
You may not be aware that the 1980 restoration was only a front elevation stone clean and that the major restoration, costing over £500,000 was carried out during 1984 by Building Design Partnership.
[should be grateful, therefore, if in future editions of Glasgow Style the credit could be amended accordingly.
Yours faithfully
R.D. Coulthard
Building Design Partnership Glasgow
IPSO FACTO
I am sorry Steuart Campbell objects to my favourable, if lighthearted, review of his book The Loch Ness Monster. At least his work is getting a second airing— for free.
Mr Campbell confesses to , ‘eocentricity’ on page ll of The Loch Ness Monster. He writes, on page 15, ‘there must be sufficient evidence to satisfy a physical scientist, preferably a zoologist’. By removing sources of deception and getting rid of otters etc, from the list of Loch Ness phenomena, Campbell leaves what? Precisely nothing that can be described as an animate monster.
‘Adamnan’ was a Iapsus calami on my part, though Chambers ‘ Biographical Dictionary backs me up there. My algebra came adrift on a typesetting error: for H = 0. . . read ‘Hn = Oor, ifyou like, H0 wins the day’. And lastly ‘that N exists’ is, I admit, a paraphrase rather than an exact quotation from page 15, and ‘doesn’t’ should read ‘does not’. But I don’t call that twisting the facts. Yours sincerely,
Andrew Bethune. (That’s enough algebra, Ed.)
wusr
Issue no 28 31 Oct-13 Nov1986
Cover Lenny Henry. Photo by Trevor Leighton.
1 Guest List.
People in the news this fortnight.
2 Short List.
Column by Owen Dudley Edwards. News.
4 Theatre de Complicite.
An itinerant Peter Nichols meets the cosmopolitan group.
5
Julie Covington and Jonathan Hyde. Up here to play Macbeth. they talk to Sarah llemming.
6 The Good Father
The List meets Anthony Hopkins and Mike Newell.
LENNY HENRY
Graham Caldwell says Lenny's Okaay.
Listings Full guide to events this fortnight.
Film 8 Classical Music 2‘) Theatre l5 Folk 32
Dance 18 Jazz 33
Media 19 Rock 35
Open 20 Kids 37
Art 25 Sport 38
39 Backlist
Alternative Med icine explored by Sally Kinnes.
CONTRIBUTORS
Publisher Robin Hodge.
Editors Nigel Billen. Sarah
Hemming. Glasgow Editor Graham Caldwell. Associate Editor Allan Hunter. Design Simon Esterson. Advertising Bill (iordon. Accounts Georgette Renwick. Richard (iray. Typesetting Jo Kennedy. Aileen Jardine and Hewer Text. Production Editor Paul Keir. Production Assistant ; Jane Kennedy. Art Alice Bain. Books I Alan Taylor. Classical Music Carol Main. Dance Alice Bain. Film Allan Hunter. TrevorJohnston. Folk/Jazz I Norman Chalmers. Kids Sally j Kinnes. Media Nigel Billcn. Sally : Kinnes. Rock (Edinburgh) Alastair A Mabbott. Rock (Glasgow) John
l
’ Williams. Sport Graham Caldwell.
Theatre Sarah Hemming. Ottice Lynn Spowart. Camera Darien Printing
TheList3lOct-13Nov3v