A. L. Kennedy is no stranger to the Edinburgh International Book Festival, or indeed to other such events. Her new book, a collection of previous blog entries, articles and other pieces along with some new material on her craft was introduced by the author as part of an event chaired by Stuart Kelly.
This felt slightly like a morning of self-promotion, as Kelly used the opportunity afforded by his chairperson position to mention his selection as Director of the new Glasgow Book Festival, successor to the city’s Aye Write!
Kennedy’s public persona is always an interesting watch, being a careful balance between revelation and discretion. She offers that always-fascinating spectacle of an intensely private individual opening up in public, yet somehow managing to retain control of both herself and her audience. Her career diversion into stand-up, at one time discounted as aberrant by this reviewer, is explicable as a learning exercise in ‘working the room’.
As a taster of what is to be found between the covers of ‘On Writing’, Kennedy offered us three divergent extracts from this ensemble of her otherwise uncollected non-fiction prose – the first of these, recounting her experience of her grandfather, was for this reviewer the best of the bunch.
Talking of his only professional boxing match, Kennedy’s clearly much-loved grandparent observed ‘If you’re scared, they don’t beat you, you beat yourself’. Which is about as economical a description of self-sabotage as may be met, and a thought applicable to much more than boxing or writing.
Sadly, after such a fine start, it felt as if the brakes were slowly applied to this event, particularly when, after a couple of other extracts from ‘On Writing’ and a brief discussion with Stuart Kelly that kicked off with an enquiry as to Kennedy’s thoughts on Peter Capaldi playing Doctor Who, questions from the audience failed to bring forth any fresh perspectives.
Kennedy’s observations on self-publishing in her final extract seemed to contradict much of what she had said before on the value of both art and writing. The self-publishing ‘phenomena’ she seems to dismiss has been a part of the publishing scene since at least the mid-seventeenth century and it’s easy enough to cite many ‘established’ authors who have chosen to self-publish for perfectly sensible reasons.
To disparage an outgrowth of the publishing industry merely because its existence is perceived as a threat to more conventional models, is at odds with the promotion of creative writing that Kennedy herself argues for.
Event: Edinburgh International Book Festival, Charlotte Square, 12th August 2013.
A. L. Kennedy, On Writing, Jonathan Cape £18.99
Read Bill Dunlop on "A.L. Kennedy: The Pressure To Write", Edinburgh Book Festival 2012