Cyborgic Duck Dilema

As I sat down this afternoon with a cup of tea in one hand, and a notepad of scribblings and doodles of robotic ducks in the other, I began to reflect on my life. Clearly, although beautiful, drawing cyborg ducks is a sign that I need to make better use of my time. Enter 'Pinfold Broadcast'.

This is my first proper attempt at blogging and with the 'Pinfold Broadcast' I hope to entertain your eyeballs with balls to the wall blogging. Here I will capture my experience as a writer, post videos of me performing my poetry, review anything remarkably reviewable, rant about injustices in the world and hopefully string it all together in a form that's worthy of you clicking away from Facebook for the brief few moments it takes to read.

So where to begin? Well my name is Steven and I'm currently studying on a Ba in literature with creative writing. I write mostly poetry and am currently putting together a chapbook with two other writers which we hope to call Christian Hymen- classy I know.
I work as a poetry editor for the Black Market Review- an online journal which you can check out at: http://blackmarketreview.com/

Currently I am reading Affinity by Sarah Waters. I have about 150 pages left to read of it, and admittedly it isn't my cup of tea so far. Waters plays with some interesting ideas but the Neo-Victorian style which she adopts doesn't entirely work. Although she has clearly done her research, there seems to be a mismatch between the language and the context she writes in. Grammatically, yes, she uses the long Victorian sentences akin to Henry James, but aside from this she never really sounds like a Victorian writer. Personally, I think that other contemporary authors such as Susan Hill have emulated the Victorian style more convincingly. Still Affinity has sold quite well- I mean- it's got Victorian lesbians and the supernatural in it! How couldn't it? I'm not going to be too hard on Waters all the same as I have yet to finish the novel. I may post a more in depth review later.

Music-wise, I've been listening to a bit of a mix as of late, including:

Bring Me Your Love- City and Colour
The Dark Third- Pure Reason Revolution
Disco Volante- Mr. Bungle
Chinese Democracy- Guns N' Roses (yes it's still Guns N' Roses without Slash)
O -Damien Rice

May post more about some of these albums later in the week. City and Colour are particularly frequent on my playlist at the moment and I highly recommend you check them out on spotify or itunes.

Been reading Jenn Ashworth's blog recently and I would recommend checking it out. You can find it here:Every Day I Lie a Little
I attended a great reading by Jenn and also participated in a workshop she ran. I'm also enjoying her debut novel- A Kind of Intimacy although I haven't quite had the time to sink my teeth into it just yet.

Other than that not much else to share with you. Next post I may write a review or something. If I'm at a loss for material, I may share my pictures of my cyborg ducks instead.

Until then,
Steven.