6.1.11

Re-Visiting John

Tonight, with a cup of tea and a biscuit on a plate in one hand and John Stienbeck's wee novelette "Of Mice and Men" (A book I haven't even peeped at since Secondary School!) in the other, I took a seat and started reading and it only took the first paragraph to smother me in nostalgia.


I started to think back to being sat in an English lesson next to Frec, Scott, Rich and Rob Heaton drawing knobs all over each others copies of the book, and almost throwing up with laughter every time Rob managed to move Scott's chair away seconds before he sat down. Remembering Mr Hedge the Headmaster covering lessons whilst Miss was on maternity leave, and him being susceptible  to the class lie that we'd actually finished reading the book and she wanted us to watch the film again. Gary Sneeze!


But this time, lying on my bed, six or so years on, reading it harboured a different experience, it made me realise that all that dicking around, blushing in front of girls and taking the piss out of Tim and Emily (the only people in the class who actually wanted to read the book... nerds) made me miss out on a really awesome book.


Why couldn't our teacher of made us realise what a ground-breaking and inspirational artist John Steinbeck was? Mind you, if she'd have said that to a room full of teenagers she would have seen expressions similar to a subdued zombie horde starring back at her, so I don't blame her. 


She should have told us that John Steinbeck was this awesome, motley, working class-come-novel writing hero bloke who re-invented the boundaries of his art. Explained how he filled his book with some of the most profound ideas and "hush now" taboo's of his time.


The play is a parable about loneliness, and in a strange way hope coupled with greed, and the really heart breaking thing about the whole tale is that the DREAM is so simple.


That's what I want to make the young people we perform to realise. So maybe they wont lie on a bed 6 years later and realise what an amazing book they missed all those years ago.


J.

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