William Topaz McGonagall a Scottish poet of Irish descent, writer of roughly 200 poems, including “The Tay Bridge Disaster” and “The Famous Tay Whale”, which are widely regarded as some of the worst in English literature.
ONE……..A writer with a voice that took uniqueness to a whole new level.
TWO….. A true journalist in terms of reporting everything.
THREE…. He self published.
FOUR… He was shameless when it came to self promotion.
FIVE.. Proving there was no such thing as bad publicity. And could you imagine him on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter today?And the use he’d make of it?
SIX…. He was deeply into public appearances in terms of meeting his fans.
SEVEN … He also did literary dinners. And bestowed himself briefly on New York, as other famous authors including Charles Dickens
and Oscar Wilde had.
‘Oh mighty city of New York, you are wonderful to behold,
Your buildings are magnificent — the truth be it told.’
…….’When I go to Ireland, they won’t treat me as I was treated in New York. In the streets there when they looked at my poems with the Royal coat of arms, printed on the top, the Yankies shouted ‘To the deuce with that.’ ………..W McGonagall. ….
EIGHT He was very well read for a man from a poor family quite important for a writer and prepared even more therefore to branch out…
NINE…. He rubbed shoulders with the famous.
TEN….. Like him or loathe him he has not only remained a controversial figure to this day, he has stood the test of time.
ELEVEN.. Before ve open vodka and do cossack dance for you, McGonagall’s Ghost is Track 12 on More Than Seven Wonders. More to follow once the Archie Foundation get the online buy link live, but presently available from Oxfam Books and 13 Records in Dundee.
John Quinn. To answer that question? In a nutshell? NO. The album came from two things. A chance meeting outside a supermarket with a very talented local musician I know, Paul Fitzpatrick, a few years back now, and the fact I am a sometimes poet.
‘I write music,’ Paul said, ‘But I can’t get past June, moon and spoon when it comes to words.’
Me now? Write music? Not for toffee. I sent him a few of my poems fully expecting him to do a runner. But instead he came back with the Ballad of Peter Black. For those who don’t know about Peter Black, he was a local lad from across the water in Newport-On-Tay…….
Anyway, maybe we weren’t Rogers and Hammerstein but that was the beginning. Paul brought a load of Dundee musicians onboard, singers, guitarists, string and accordion players, you name it, all of whom gave their time for free in the hope of putting together an album about the city and its people, past and present that would be sold for charity. It took a while, given the logistics of that AND the fact that yes, we paid for some recording studio time and were helped in this by a local Dundee businessman, but the rates were reduced, so folks came together when they could and when the studio could let us in.
John Quinn That must have been an oversight….. Of course if we had known of Donovan and his great talent…….
John Quinn –-okay guys don’t fight amongst yourselves. Of course I didn’t overlook it but the fact was, there were no Dundee hamsters that..that I knew of. The songs are all about different things. And people, people who were players in the city in some way, for example Jim Maclean, a Dundee footballer and Dundee United football manager, who put Dundee on the world stage, as you can see
Mary Shelley—-who hasn’t heard of Frankenstein, right? William McGonagall the world’s best writer of bad verse. Winston Churchill? Why is he here? Because the last man to take him down before Joe Biden, was Eddie Scrymgeour the phohibionist MP elected by the ‘drunkest city in the British Empire, just to get Churchill, who they also served maggots in kippers to, out. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edwin_Scrymgeour
Mary Slessor, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Slessor. Dundee mill lassie and missionary in Calabar. So far as I know no Dundee hamsters went there or of course, I’d have made the song about them.
Many of these people had been depicted in my play O Halflins an’ Hecklers an’ Weavers an’ Weemin. So much so that this album also includes two songs that Shey and myself wrote the words and music for. Mother of All the People and No Pasaran, Albert Square. But there’s also a song about Kenga Kuma, who designed the V & A Museum here, as you can see from the back cover, with your typical Dundee bairn, more interested in his mobile phone than any stunning vista!
But it’s not only people who were players that these songs are about.’ In Juteopolis’ was inspired by Annie Golden my Irish born great-grandmother. By the time she was ten she was having her boots packed with jute so she was big enough to stand at the loom in a jute mill!! No Passeran is the story of the Dundee men who went to fight in the Spanish Civil War, and never returned. Peter Black I’ve mentioned already. The title and title track are a slightly surreal take on the stunning view of the city and the river from the top of Dundee Law. The Giza Pyramid may be in Egypt but here ‘Gie’za’ means Give me a, so it’s Giza Pyramid, Gie’za V&A.
John Quinn. There’s every style, rock, pop, folk, Spanish, quite a bit of metal in McGonagalls’s Ghost. Paul’s son Michael, did an acoustic version of the title track, recently at home, just to keep things ticking over, given that like everything else right now, this has been delayed by Covid, and put it on Facebook. Bear in mind it’s not the official recording.
John Quinn. Well, believe it or not, it was quite hard to get a charity onboard and we didn’t want NOT to have them named on the cover.
Yeah, but finally we did and a very good charity it is at that.
In fact the Archie Foundation is the official charity of Tayside Children’s Hospital at Ninewells, who look forward to the pressing and to selling the CDs online.
I have set up a Just Giving page to which many of you have already very kindly donated, so we can go ahead and get the pressing done. But if anyone else feels like putting in any sum at all, believe you me, it’s hugely appreciated.
John Quinn’s Twitter profile tells him he’s a persistent Dundonian, left footer, ex-teacher, global justice worrier and “wid be scriever.” His poetry has appeared in numerous publications including Poetry Scotland, Northwords Now, Mind the Time, and Lallans. He has performed his work including slam poetry in various places ranging from public parks to coffee shops and pubs. However, unlike his Dundonian predecessor, Oor Wullie McGonagall, he has found that to date, people have only thrown words at him. He is also the author of the play ‘O Halflins an Hecklers an Weavers an Weemin’ about the history of Jute and its impact on the City of Dundee. In 2017 and 2018 the play was performed in the High Mill at Verdant Works Museum accompanied by the music of Michael Marra. And again in 2019 at the Hamish Matters Festival (The Hamish Henderson Festival) in Blairgowrie, Perthshire. His book, The Eyes of Grace O’Malley is published by Black Wolf Books.
John Quinn lives above the River Tay with his wife.
Ken : – In 1942 Annie’s grandson is in the North African desert. Near a place called El Alamein. He’s never been abroad before… (Exit put on Churchill hat.)
Em : – … unless you count a summer holiday to the seaside…at Broughty Ferry! Now in the North African Desert Boab’s future career plans don’t involve jute. ( Three WW2 soldiers kick ball.)
Boab : – What a goal! When the war’s ower I’m gonna be a professional – I’m no goin back to work in a mull an deh afore meh time like meh granny.
Tam : – Deh afore yir time? Yir in a war!
Boab : – Hope an faith! Besides jute’s on the wey oot.
(Kick the ball again. Enter Officer.)
Officer : – (Bellowing) Get that ball away and get fell in. On parade now!
Boab : What’s this aboot, Sir?
Officer : Yours not to reason why soldier!
( Churchill enters.)
Officer : – The men are ready for your inspection now Prime Minister (Churchill stops to speak to Dan )
Churchill : – Where are you from soldier?
Dan : – Dundee! (Churchill shudders and turns to Tam)
Churchill : – Where are you from soldier?
Tam: – Dundee!
(Dan walks round Tam so he is next in line.)
Churchill : – Where are you from soldier?
Dan : – (Cheeky.) Dundee.
(Tam walks round Dan.)
Churchill : – (Horrified) Where are you from soldier?
Tam – Dundee…..
Churchill : – (To Boab.) Where are you from soldier?
Boab : – Dundee. Got flung oot o’ the mulls– but you got flung oot o’ the toon!
(Exit horrified Churchill.)
Officer : – It’s the guardroom for you soldier! OOT. (Exit. Dragging.)
Em : – Bob, from a heckling tradition was sentenced to fourteen days in a military jail for insulting the Great War Lord and the leader of the Nation. Bob never became a professional footballer but…he had a story to tell his grandchildren. (End of scene. Song. ‘If Dundee Was Africa’)
Playing Space
Shey’s guidebook and bag
The Indian servants get ready to deal with the jute wallah. Today Shey’s the only one here handing all the props to herself.
Our stage and property manager takes a permanent break from acting by joining the management instead.
The back o’ Shey’s book
The official tour guide takes charge
Our sound guy from last year smiles with relief that this year he’s got a gig elsewhere
As we set up for the Indian rammy, it looks friendly
Get up the road ye young ****** ……
An American visitor is selfie daft where the official guide, Ken the Irish famine contingent and the Dundee jute workers are concerned.
Shey struts it as a singing suffragette, belting out Vote, Vote, Vote for Neddy Scrymgeour. Broad Dundee words BUT with a post accent….
one of the new crop of placards after a few of last year’s bloopers….
Mary Brooksbank and Susan Devine, the mysterious woman in the green felt hat. From ‘O Halflins and Hecklers an Weavers an Weemin,’ by John Quinn.
Susan Devine : – Mary Brooksbank! What are you daein here – you’re still a lassie!.
Mary : – Eh’m here tae learn fae you Susan Devine how tae fight back against the brutality o’ Capitalism and the Jute Barons!
Susan : – Well said. We’ve got a good crowd today.( Policeman appears. Susan gives him the finger. )
Policeman : – What’s going on here?
Susan : – (Ignoring him) Cox Brothers have decided to cut the number in a squad fae ten tae eight and lay off thousands. For the people that remain that means mair work for less money!
(Chants from everyone onstage. ‘Everybody Out! Everybody Out! Everybody Out!)
Susan : – Right you are – and we’re staying out until everybody’s re-instated. (Starts chant. All join in ) ‘March doon the Lochee Road girls. March doon the Lochee Road!’
Policeman : – You can’t do that without permission – you need a licence!
Mary Brooksbank : – Is that so? Well there’s a lot o’ women here and no many men…..
Policeman : – I’ll need reinforcements!(Blows whistle. Exit.)
Susan : – Roond tae Cox’s hoose at Clement Park. An we’ll tour the ither mills fur support. (All chanting and marching round) ‘We’re gonna win an we’ll pit their windees in. We’re gonna win an we’ll pit their windees in.. .fur we are the weemin o’Lochee! (Takes off green felt hat and throws to Em. Marches off brandishing shuttle.)
Mary Brooksbank : – And they didnae go back until the fowk that had been laid aff were re-instated. There were major disputes elsewhere such as the Carters’ Strike. The spirit of revolution was in the air. But of course the Jute Empire struck back. Black Watch soldiers were brought into the City of their heartlands to keep order. Early in 1912 Cox Brothers sanctioned the purchase of revolvers for their foremen. And Susan Devine? She melts back into history. Me? I’ll let you draw your own conclusions.
(Exit.)
Em : – Susan Devine didnae quite melt back into history. (Brandish hat.) This is still remembered round here sometimes. (Get Suffragette hat and shawl.)
Ken : – As for Mary Brooksbank she was quite a woman – mill girl poet orator revolutionary family woman and voice of the poor. She was blacklisted and jailed for standing up to be counted. What can never be jailed though is her legacy
. was the story of jute in Dundee. How it got there, how Dundee came to be known as Juteopolis and how the mills are all gone now, how the Irish came during the famine in their droves, quadrupling the population in no time at all in a city which was unprepared for the onslaught, how they joined Highlanders being cleared off their land, courtesy of the Duke of Sutherland.
But it was also the story of weaving in the city and how the city and its people, who are not an easily impressed people, have always kept their story moving forward.The title says it all.Halflins were children who did half a day at school and half a day in the mills. Hecklers? Well, Dundee gave the world the word.
Weavers speaks for itself. As for the Weemin? To quote poet Dundee poet Ellie Macdonald… and I did get to quote these lines in the play and boy did it give me a thrill to deliver them.
‘For any woman brought up in the Dundee tradition there should be no straining for equality no, need for a new consciousness of the power of women. We have inherited a freedom which seems unnecessary to verbalize. We are just waiting for the world to catch up.’
Why did the women have this freedom? Because they were the family breadwinners.
Shey…Well…..talking that… because there’s a story that William Wallace went to school in Dundee and got in a ‘rammy’ –a row–with the English governor’s son, Selby, killed him,
thus becoming an outlaw but not before being hidden by a weaving woman just outside Dundee who sort of suggested he disguise himself…..
Shey. Indeed. Dundee has quietly furnished the world with one or two weel ‘kent’ folks, or folks who were inspired by their stay in the city.
Mary Shelley said Dundee was where she got her idea for the famous ‘unbeast.’ Ian Fleming’s grandfather worked in the jute mills here. We also had a scene involving from mill girl, to missionary to magistrate Mary Slessor.
She was also known as the Mother of All the People. So we had a wee song about her too , one of two we wrote especially for the show, here sung by the most fabulous choirs, Loadsaweeminsingin and The Lochee Linties. In the middle of the first proper utterly chaotic run through, what they had done from scribbled music with Mr Shey’s words had my jaw on the deck.
We had the world’s best known writer of bad verse,
William McGonagall … with two of his drunken hecklers….
and an enactment of the only known instance of the famous Scottish play where the lead character refused to die.We had a wee onstage riotcourtesy ofDundee woman Mary Brooksbank who wrote the Jute Mill Song, a visit from Mary Queen of Scot’s ghost, . And did I mention Winston Churchill, famously served a maggot in his kipper here
and flung out the town which, despite being the drunkest city in the British empire elected a prohibitionist instead.
We also had a scene featuring Joseph Lee, Dundee’s fighter writer and forgotten WW 1 poet. Michael Marra’s daughter Alice, also a professional musician, sung her dad’s amazing Happed in Mist as a solo at this point. It was stunning. Here’s his version.
and then Mr and I recited one of the poems before the scene started. Alice was so stunning I could hardly speak. For once.
‘I dreamed that a man went home last night, from the trench where the tired men lie.
And walked through the streets of his own, old town. And I dreamed that man was I.’
Shey…I played tour guide Em Fae Dundee,opposite Mr who played Ken O ‘ Dundee,the sort of keeping everything together hardly off the bloody stage, parts, William Wallace, A singing Suffragette, and on the Sat night cos we were two members of cast short, Mary Brooksbank, mill worker Jeanie
and an American tourist. Oh and on opening night I do believe I also played an unscripted football fan…don’t ask……….A certain blond wig was on the wrong props’ island at that stage…
Shey. Pretty difficult because none of the stellar cast ever intended to be on this play and so far as I was concerned my directing days were done. Five weeks before the play was due on the theatre company who had been involved pulled out. Meantime the fabulous choir run by Alice Marra, had learned all the songs, several of which were written by her late father, Dundee musician Mike Marra. Tickets had been sold. It took two weeks to put together this cast under the name of a theatre co Mr and I once ran.
Oh and of this cast, if we now add in the sound technician, there were four originals. Lol, here’s an oldie. Anyway of our ‘new hastily constructed’ cast, only five had ever done any serious theatre work. And two who had, could not do the Saturday night. I had to think about the overall look of the play–hence the tee shirts and the cast never leaving the playing space, I had to think about the difficulties of that nonetheless wonderful playing space the High Mill at Verdant works, a former mill now a museum, about working each scene in a way that would let folks who had never been on a stage, shine–for example rather than cluttering the Highland clearance scene with a cast of thousands, why not just have the whole thing read, even the ‘Be off with you’ bit from the proclamation, as if it was part of it. I also divvied up the parts in a way that might allow them to rehearse together where they were related to one another. We had the mill during the day but that was no use to some of the cast. There was no time for blocking rehearsals going on for weeks, or technical or props ones either. This play went out there on opening night having been run start to finish twice. There were bits that had been talked through, in terms of business and props at a meeting and then only had one rehearsal. I have to say the cast were wonderful. LOL and I am not saying that cos more than my Mr were family.
And it’s not easy being right up against an audience, although, the audiences were wonderful, it’s not easy never going off stage either, although okay…we did have a slogan, ‘Every night a different show.’ That was in terms of the ad libbing Mr and me did after he did little things, like start the wrong scene, not know what scene we were meant to start.
Shey…No doubt, all down to the fact that on opening night, I spoke the word you never EVER say onstage or off…….
When, in a noble moment as Mr wandered up and down waiting to hear the immortal words ‘Turn Hellhound, Turn.’ and would be waiting yet since he’d cut the speech that made scene of the entire scene, and my older girl who had taken the sword fight scene off me the night before, stood saying, ‘ What do I do Mum?’ and she is trained, I stepped forward and spoke. I also had McGonagall escaping the killing fields not floors. Oh well. You know, a fabulous time was had by all. Mr Shey loved us for putting on a different play from what he wrote. And yep, the cast were so good, I’m glad they all said at the after show party, they are well up for another run.. ….
I can confirm Shehanne Moore is no Miss Barbara Cartland.
Now there is two ways you can take this news. If you are anything like me it will be with a lusty huzzah and an air punch. I was never one for simpering virgins and sex scenes discretely ending outside the bedroom door.
Shehanne Moore writes historical romance with a sci-fi twist that’s unapologetically smexy. For those who don’t know, smexy (her word, not mine) is a cross between smutty and sexy… raunchy romance in the raw… or is that with a roar? Cos, boy, does the gal deliver!
If you want a complex heroine, so feisty she could bitch slap you in a stand-up row, meet tough but vulnerable Brittany Carter – ‘brittle as porcelain and deadlier than shattered glass. An irresistible combination.’
If you like a ruggedly handsome man, oozing animal magnetism, you can’t go far wrong with Mitchell Killgower. He’s not so tough. Underneath them smouldering looks and icy demeanour beats a heart to make you melt. At least something will be wet by the end of the novel.
By that I mean if a ‘good man who needs saving from himself’ don’t bring a tear to your eye then you are no Brittany Carter – not matter how smexy and gorgeous you are – ‘darling!’
Brittany is a struggling historical romance writer and no simpering virgin. Like most good-looking modern women in their mid-twenties, she’s had her fair share of men; all of them disappointments.
The book opens when a stranger called Morte stops Brittany for her autograph. Or so she thinks.
To be honest she’s not taking much notice. The girl’s got a lot on her mind. Off to straighten out her finances with some crap-head she used to date – he took everything but somehow managed to leave her name on a mortgage he’s not paying.
Morte’s weird, more stalker than fan. As his ominous warning about making the right choice rings in her ears, lightning strikes him. Brittany does the decent thing: calls an ambulance; helps Morte live.
Wrong choice!
Next thing Brittany wakes up in a sixteen year boy’s dusty bed. Wound tight as a cheese wire garrotte, she desperately plays it cool, frantically struggling to keep herself together while figuring out what the hell happened?
The boy’s furious. Handsome dad’s furious too. Not with her; with each other.
All the while she’s praying it’s a nightmare and she’ll wake up. Gradually it dawns. She’s somehow travelled through time, back to 1765 to be precise. To a crumbling stately home in Georgian England and the middle of a bitter inheritance feud between handsome rakish father and puritan unloved son, and with a cow of a sister-in-law holding the purse strings and fuelling the whole debacle.
The Writer and the Rake starts at 100 miles an hour and never flags. It is an unrelenting tour de force; a dazzling pas-de-deux of searing wit and laugh out loud moments between Brittany and Mitchell. The frisson between them is tangible, popping and fizzing across the pages as they slog it out to gain the upper hand, only to have the other snatch it back.
Despite wanting to return to her own time Brittany can’t take her eyes off Mitchell; while he can’t keep his hands off her behind. So, what about Morte? Don’t worry, he’s there too. Intent on sealing his Faustian bargain.
When Mitchell sees Morte with Brittany, he’s jealous as hell of her secret lover. It’s just the spark they need for scorching emotions to boil over into reckless sex. Even if you don’t smoke, you’ll be reaching for that post-coital cigarette Brittany can never have because she ran out in the first few days.
Casual sex has consequences. Hell, Brittany knows that. But she’s not prepared for what they are. Ok it’s not the first time she’s woken in a strange bed. But this one’s oddly familiar. She’s leapfrogged forward to her own time to find she’s been missing for weeks, presumed kidnapped, and her books are now best sellers.
Bingo!
Morte picks his moment to explain it all; a drunken night out with the girls. Apparently she’s a time mutant – the mother of a dynasty. Shame she’s too pissed to take it in.
Talk about sealed with a kiss. One drunken snog with some bloke in the club and Brittany’s back to Mitchell’s crumbling house. Only one thing for it, seduce Mitchell and use the ride of her life to hitchhike through the centuries back to her duly deserved fame and fortune.
Here lies the rub.
Mitchell’s the man she wants, the one she’s been waiting for all her life. She knows it from the moment he sweeps her up in his strong arms and drops her on his big old bed. From the second he unbuttons her bodice, and she his breeches. If only he was from her time. If, if, if…
If this is her last kiss; the last time she can make love for fear of ricocheting through the ages with every orgasm, then there is no one she would rather do it with.
Life’s never that simple, is it Brittany? Not with destiny calling… loud and clear.
The Writer and the Rake is a genre-bending adventure. It confirms Shehanne Moore as an author who know today’s woman is as likely to be into science fiction, playing computer games or watching light porn as reading heavy romance. And Moore’s not afraid to give her readers what they want … without ifs, buts or apologies.
The dialogue is racy, witty and thoroughly modern. This is no cod 18th century comedy of manners. That would get in the way of the lust and punishing pace. Her characters are real: gritty, decent and flawed as the rest of us. And ultimately, as redeemable by love we all are. Though it’s bloody hard work for them sometimes!
And in case you are thinking this is just for the girls, I’d advise you to give it a shot, lads. Cos let’s face it… it does no harm knowing what your woman wants.
I totally loved everything about this time-travel romance and would give it ten stars if I could.
Brittany Carter is an author, who drinks, smokes, and parties too much. After a surreal encounter with a character called Morte, she’s transported to the Georgian era and meets bad boy Mitchell Killgower, who is locked into an inheritance dispute with some hateful relatives of his deceased wife. When Brittany materialises out of nowhere, he hopes she can prove useful by pretending to be his obedient and mousy wife for long enough to hoodwink those who hold the purse strings and stop his son getting the inheritance. The only trouble is that the feisty Brittany is incapable of fitting into this role and Mitchell has truly met his match on the impossible person’s front.
I don’t want to give too much away, as this will spoil readers’ fun; and the novel is such great fun, in a quirky sense of the word, always sustaining a great forward momentum with wonderfully entertaining dialogue. Come to think of it, I don’t recall the author using any dialogue tags at all and, if she did, they weren’t intrusive.
Brittany is often insufferable, but also pretty cool in a chaotic way. Mitchell is a Mr Darcy type: dark, handsome, brooding, stubborn, hard to impress, and master of his heart, but decidedly sexier than the original. His relationship with Brittany is meant as a short-term arrangement of convenience and nothing more. And the feeling is mutual …until it isn’t.
Speaking of the raunchy scenes, Shehanne Moore knows how to write about sex in a way that’s humorous, playful, erotic and, at times, intense. It’s never explicit, because it doesn’t need to be; the subtle interplay of all the human senses is sufficient.
On the hilarity front, the crowning moment for me is when Mitchell rifles through Brittany’s bag and puzzles over its contents from the future, and then questions her about one of the items in particular.
If you haven’t already guessed, I fell in love with Mitchell and felt really sorry for him when Brittany kept appearing and disappearing. A rake like Mitchell does not give his heart easily to a woman, preferring the casual company of floosies when needs dictate.
The Writer and the Rake can be read as a standalone novel, even though it’s the second part of a series. One reviewer has suggested that, in order to understand the time mutants better, it’s an idea to read the series in the right order, starting with The Viking and the Courtesan.
As you can imagine, Time Mutants #1 is near the top of my reading list, as I can’t get enough of Shehanne Moore’s writing and am delighted to have discovered someone with such a fresh and original voice.
AH and aw in equal measures. Firstly AH because this the long awaited third book in the Hard To series featuring Incy Black’s own special Black ops. Aw, because she says trilogy although I hope that the exciting Freya Dervish will feature somewhere along the line in another book. No pressure there now Incy, just saying. Although I’ve read the other two books in the series, in many ways this book is a standalone.
In true spy honey trap tradition, Will Berwick, secret agent hot and complicated, is asked to seduce the secret of her brother’s whereabouts, from Dr Treherne, ice angel extraordinary. Not the best thing to ask him to do when she’s been evaluating him for months re his suitability to return to service. Trust me when I say that you just know that in the not too distant future Angel will be evaluating other aspects of his suitability because it’s plain they are under one another’s skins. However, Incy Black’s skill lies in keeping them at one another’s throats. This couple don’t give an inch for very personal reasons and it makes for great chemistry. You want to know they will heal one another’s pain. A pain they don’t admit to. Add this to a plot full of twists and turns, Incy Black’s own unique voice, and the result is explosive.
shehanne moore 