June 25, 2012 • 8:19 pm 1
Tickets for The Bookshop Band only cost £5 – they are performing in the shop on the evening of 3rd July and will be unveiling two new songs, one inspired by Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and one inspired by New Finnish Grammar. Psst…pass it on!
Filed under: Bookshop news and events, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, New Finnish Grammar, Norrington Room, The Bookshop Band
June 21, 2012 • 11:54 am 0
Firstly, a confession. I’m not actually Welsh – in fact I come from Northampton which isn’t a million miles away from Oxford. However, after living in Wales since the age of six, it can be a struggle to remember what it’s like over the border – particularly with Wales luring me back with rarebit and welsh-cakes (if you’ve never tried either of these, you’re missing out). I’ve been working as a bookseller in the Cardiff branch of Blackwell’s for the last four years, but I never really got a sense of what happened outside of our little Welsh bubble.
In order to remedy this, I decided to go for the Events and Marketing Internship offered by Broad Street. Having been here for a grand total of three days, I feel qualified to say that it is a much more challenging experience than I might have anticipated. For example, picture the Norrington Room – those of you that have visited it, if not, get yourselves down there immediately!
The Cardiff shop could quite easily get lost, never to be seen again in this one ‘room’. On my first day here, I was introduced to about twenty different people. The Cardiff shop has a grand total of seven staff members. It was clear that my two greatest challenges would be not getting lost in the five whole floors of this amazing building, and also remembering about eighty names.
After three days, I’ve just about got seven people’s names down, and I can now find my way to my desk without accidentally wandering into the manager’s office. (I don’t think anyone saw me…) Fortunately, my colleagues have been unfailing friendly and willing to repeat the codes for the staff door at least four times – I had worried that I would find such a large and close knit group of people rather unreceptive to a newcomer.
Coming to the end of my first week as an events intern, I’ve already written a magazine feature, been shown around Oxford on the Inklings walking tour by Peter – the fount of all Oxford knowledge, I’ve researched things I’d never really even heard of before and had the chance to start revamping our publicity materials. There has been a great deal of debate around internships, and I do maintain that any company offering unpaid internships should not then take their interns for granted. We are useful for something other than making coffee and stapling – we have degrees and, in my case, Masters degrees for goodness sake! Thankfully however, the staff at Broad Street are offering me the opportunity to work on some fantastic projects, are genuinely interested in my progress and are willing to listen to ideas and opinions from everyone.
If this has been the first week, I can only imagine that the next eleven will be increasingly more weird and wonderful – and I shall keep you lucky lucky people informed of how I get on… In the meantime, why not visit our events page to see just how exciting my work is going to be this summer?
Filed under: The Bookshop, Blackwell's Intern, Norrington Room
June 20, 2012 • 12:18 pm 0
The Bookshop Band in the ‘Grandad Eyebrows Room’
The tour of independent booksellers by The Bookshop Band is well under way now. On July 3rd they will play the Norrington Room. Yesterday they popped into the shop to say hi and to pick up the book that we are asking them to turn into a song to be premiered on the night.
They will turn Alice and NFG into songs!
Us being us we couldn’t choose just one book so we happily handed over a copy of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and - surpise, surprise - New Finnish Grammar. Our breath is truly baited to see and hear what they turn these two books into.
We are always proud to show off the Norrington Room to visitors but on this occasion I was well and truly trumped – it turns out that Ben, the founder of the band, is the grandson of Arthur Norrington – or Grandad Eyebrows as he was known in the family.
The Bookshop Band turn each ‘season’ of songs into a CD and their collection from their first year will be available in the shop soon. Each ‘season’ has a theme and a reading list:
Tickets (£5 only) are still available for what promises to be one of the most exciting events of our Summer season through our Customer Service desk or by calling 01865 333623. You wouldn’t want to miss a song inspired by New Finnish Grammar now, would you?
Filed under: Bookshop news and events, The Bookshop, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Arthur Norrington, New Finnish Grammar, Norrington Room, The Bookshop Band
March 20, 2012 • 12:04 pm 1
Ben Thompson, an actor with The Factory, provides his thoughts about performing in the current production of Hamlet at Blackwell’s Bookshop . . .
‘I first saw Hamlet at Wilton’s Music Hall about 4 years ago and I was struck by how vibrant it was and how a play I thought I knew quite well could sound so fresh to my ears. Little did I think when I watched that performance that I’d find myself in the midst of all the madness, the nerves, the excitement, the immense amount of line learning and verse grappling several years later. It’s great to be a part of this ongoing project as it comes up against a new set of challenges. In the past each performance has been in a different venue and quite often a space in which the relationship between the audience and the actors is a fluid one. Here at Blackwell’s the seating is fixed and so is pretty much all of the performance space. However this only serves to give us something else to play against.
Part of The Factory’s work on Hamlet in performance is to set ourselves certain ‘obstacles’ which stop the actor getting stuck in habits and rhythms as well as hopefully showing parts of the text and story in a new light. Examples of these might be something as simple as not being allowed to touch the ground or perhaps having two actors play the same role at the same time; one speaks the lines from without the performance space while the other physically responds to what happens within it. The use of the audience’s objects as essential props within the play is yet another way of keeping it fresh for us.
Added to the mix here in Oxford is the fact that we are running Hamlet for three weeks; the longest stretch we’ve done to date so the task will be to keep the freshness and playfulness that The Factory’s work is synonymous with. In the end though all we have is the audience and the text which, at times, in itself can be a huge mountain to climb; but when (or perhaps if!) you reach the top the view’s amazing.’
Ben will be performing with The Factory in ‘Hamlet’ and ‘The Odyssey’.
‘Hamlet’ runs until Saturday 24th March.
‘The Odyssey’ runs from Thursday 29th March to Saturday 28th April.
Box Office: 01865 766266
Filed under: Bookshop news and events, Creation Theatre, Factory, Hamlet, Norrington Room
February 9, 2012 • 3:49 pm 0
We’ve known for months now that Creation Theatre were bringing The Factory to Blackwell’s in March and April with two productions: Hamlet (much acclaimed already and seen by around 15,000 people so far, in venues ranging from The Globe to a London street corner) and The Odyssey (a World Premiere).
It’s about now, however, that the excitement really mounts . . . It’s only weeks away, tickets are selling, anticipation is rising, preparations are more than underway.
Hamlet comes first and without doubt, one of the most intriguing aspects of the production is that the actors put their names in a hat at the beginning of the evening to decide who is playing which part. How versatile is that?! In addition to this, audience members are encouraged to bring their own props, which the actors will work into the play. And of course, all this means that every evening will be a unique experience – the production that you go and see on Monday won’t be the same as the one your friend goes and sees on Tuesday.
The Odyssey will demonstrate the same innovative and dynamic spirit. The Factory won’t necessarily attempt to tell the entire story of The Odyssey every night, (the epic poem is over 12,000 lines long), so instead, audiences will get a different book or books each night – one night it could be the Cyclops, the next night The Lotus Eaters, the night after that the Slaying of the Suitors . . .
Excited? We are and we hope you’ll be able to join us for one (or both) of these productions which will be staged – just as Doctor Faustus was last year – in our world-famous Norrington Room.
Hamlet runs from 5th-24th March. The Odyssey runs from 29th March-28th April. The Creation Box Office number: 01865 766266
Filed under: Bookshop news and events, Creation Theatre, Factory, Hamlet, Norrington Room
