Social media finally came into its own for me recently, when, as a result of a Tweet by Sheffield University I ran to buy a last minute ticket to Jeanette Winterson at the Off The Shelf Festival. I was on my lunch break, and the Students' Union box office was just a 5 minute walk away.
Jeanette has been a heady presence in my personal literary psyche since I was in my teens and she crashed through our living rooms with 'Oranges' (everyone including Jeanette herself gives it this abbreviated name). Through my student days and onward I read and loved her writing, 'The Passion' being a favourite. But it's now perhaps 10 years since I read any of her work.
I'm generally not one to travel about to book signings or author readings, and work and family commitments make it very difficult for me to attend festival events...but magically, this one was on my doorstep!
I didn't even know she had just published her autobiography, or that this was what she would be reading from and discussing at Off The Shelf. I knew she had had a difficult time recently, but had no idea of the extent of it. In that sense, I was very fresh to all that I was hearing as the evening unfolded. Once the Uni Women's Officer had paid a youthful tribute to Jeanette's achievements, in came the woman herself.
Of course, I have seen pictures of Jeanette, and heard her voice in audio media I've listened to from time to time. But the complete package in front of you is a much more rewarding experience. She's certainly got the aura of someone who's fought to be herself and won. What she's had to fight with became apparent as she read from the beginning of 'Why Be Happy, When You Could Be Normal' .
Jeanette was warm and funny, and astonishingly open and generous of spirit. I think I have the expectation that all such famous authors will be aloof and a little weary of the 'followers' - which is perhaps why I have hesitated to attend such events. But, rather than feeling at a further distance as one might when the intimacy of private reading is brought into the public domain, instead, I felt I'd made a friend. At least, I'd come to know her idiosyncratic habit of rolling her unruly curly mane around her head like a ball of tumbleweed.
Later, I did the daft thing, and joined the queue to get a signature in my copy. I was near the end of the queue, and Jeanette had already told us she didn't come up north very much, and how she hated it in Accrington. I wanted to tell her that Sheffield is really great. Instead, I just said that I hoped we weren't wearing her out. I know she really meant it when she replied 'no, not at all' because she gave me a wonderful beaming grin that I shall never forget. She's got such a twinkle in her eyes - and I'm so glad she's staying with us on this life journey, because, if you get round to reading the book, you'll hear how she very nearly chose to leave behind this savage parade.
It's a compelling read...
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