David Gullen

Sometimes I’m reminded that I don’t always see things the way other people do. It’s human, we’re all different, and in many ways it is a good thing, almost an ideal.  What a terrible fate it would be if we were all the same.

Lockdown has made me very productive in the house, the garden, my leathercrafts, but I’ve also become disconnected from my writing. The wider world is desperately distracting and it seems the part of me that writes is the part that gets most distracted. Meanwhile, the part of me that weeds and plants and grows food is positively encouraged.

I’ve started reading Jeff VanderMeer’s Wonderbook, a book I’ve owned for several years and failed to engage with. This time however I’ve fallen into it[i]. Obviously the book hasn’t changed, it’s me. I’m intrigued, fascinated, and illuminated by VanderMeer’s  wise words, his open-minded approach to creativity and the internal and external worlds it needs. Wonderbook is very energising and it’s helping me regain focus and motivation.

It’s easy to look back at a day and think ‘I’ve achieved nothing worthwhile, I’ve wasted all that time,’ but most things worth doing take longer than a few hours, and down-time is needed. Those ten and twelve hour days are hugely satisfying but I also know I need to plan in those rest days so I can sit and relax, potter about, and let my mind wander. I need to make the time to simply be.

Over the past few days the black garden ants have been swarming. You can see them getting ready a week before they do – the workers enlarge the entrances to the nests (and, presumably the tunnels behind them) so the big flying queens can leave the nest. And they become more alert – a foot-stamp on the ground sends scores of workers flooding defensively from those wider openings.

A few days later you can see a few queens tentatively emerging and then retreating back into the safety of the nest, surrounded and escorted by attentive workers.  It turns out that swarming day is fairly unpredictable here in the UK, but is usually a humid day following rain sometime in July. Whatever the specific triggers, they help colonies coordinate swarming to maximise the chances of the queens meeting drones from other nests.

One reason to write (as if you need a reason) is to try and give shape to what it is you are thinking, and how those things you are experiencing make you feel – even if it’s just for yourself. Even if it’s an apparently little thing like watching ants swarm. Yesterday I sat on a step in the garden path near a nest and watched them. There were far more drones than queens, the queens seemed clumsy and indecisive at first, wandering back and forth then floundering through the air in short, low flights of just a few inches. I wondered if they were warming up their flight muscles.

I noticed other queens climbing up plants to take flight. I let one climb on my finger and held up my arm. The queen ran to the tip of my finger, checked it was as high as it could be, and took off. (Ladybirds do this too.)

Meanwhile our nice neighbour was having a minor panic about the swarms. Coming from another part of the world she’d not seen them before and was worried for her young children.  My partner, Gaie, explained there was nothing to worry about. I said it was one of the grand sights of English nature and she looked at me a little strangely.

Down in the garden dozens then hundreds of queens and drones took flight. It was the only time in their lives they would fly.  Each queen could found a new nest, a new underground city of ants. They would never see the sky again.

The air filled with flying ants climbing into the sky, each seeking a mate from some foreign nest. I watched them rise and wondered if those queens had hopes and fears, if their small minds held dreams for the future. Perhaps they did; the more we find out about insects the more we discover their version of intelligence.  In one shape or form ants have swarmed every year for over 100 million years. I felt very fortunate to be able to see this happen once again. An odd wave of optimism filled me.

[i] I’ve found myself reading a lot of graphic novels recently, I’m clearly being drawn towards visual as much as written narratives, and Wonderbook is very much that, filled with clever, imaginative and colourful illustration.

Back in another era, another age[i] I bought a book in one of the charity shops along the local high street. This is something I’ve been known to do from time to time.  Sometimes I find a book by an author I like, or someone I’ve been meaning to read, or some interesting piece of non-fiction.

This one was a bit different,. It was old, it was a little scruffy, the pages were yellowed, and it was horror. I don’t read a lot of horror, but this one somehow, called to me.  Maybe I remembered the glorious description from the second-hand trade for books a little (but not too much) the worse for wear ­– slightly foxed but still desirable.  Some days I aspire to that description.

It also included a couple of stories by Arthur Machen, and that persuaded me. I bought it, took it home, and read it like horror should be read – in bed, late at night by the light of the table lamp.

Published by Hutchinson, New Tales of Horror by Eminent Authors had no publication date, and no editor credited. Maybe that information was on the long-gone dust jacket, maybe they didn’t do things like that in those days. Some simple Google-fu reveals it was published eighty six years ago, in 1934. With 17 of the thirty stories previously unpublished, I’m guessing this would have been a desirable book for horror fans between the world wars.

In the main I was a little disappointed, even by the Machen and the Hugh MacDiarmid. These are stories of their era, written in that era’s style. Some are more vignettes than tales, and too many relied in the shocking twist, the ghastly revelation on the last page. Except…

Except there was one story, by one of the many writers in the anthology  that I’d never heard of.  Love at First Sight, by Richard Middleton, was short, strange, shocking, and very clever. A story that brought me to a dead stop after reading it. I read it again. Clever, strange, and a little mad. That last line.

Middleton had a short and unhappy life. Suffering from depression he took his own life aged 29. By then he had real reputation. Machen and others rated him, and Raymond Chandler seemed a little in awe.[ii]  His  short novel, The Ghost Ship, is a book I would like to track down.

It’s hard not to wonder what unwritten stories Middleton had, and to regret their non-existence.  I also wonder at the names of the other Eminent Authors such E.H. Visiak, Sir Ronald Ross, Nugent Barker,and  R.L Mégroz and realise that almost inevitably given another eighty four years, someone finding one of my stories in an anthology will  think, ‘David Gullen? Never heard of him.’

~

[i] In other words, last year.

[ii] “Middleton struck me as having far more talent than I was ever likely to possess; and if he couldn’t make a go of it, it wasn’t very likely that I could.” (Raymond Chandler Speaking, Dorothy Gardiner, Kathrine Sorley Walker (ed.), Houghton Mifflin)

Once a quarter I log my Solar PV reading with my electricity supplier. I have a 3.8 KWh installation on a near-enough south-facing roof in the UK. Along with a Tesla Power2 it generates about 75% of our electricity in any year.

I’ve been doing this for 8 years, and logging the detailed info for the past six. It’s been interesting in that my perception of what makes a sunny quarter often isn’t reflected in the readings. They’ve been reasonably consistent.

1. March-May 2014-19

March-May totals 2014-2019 have been, on average, 1,178 KWh, varying from as low as 90% (1,064 KWh) of that average in 2018 to 106% (1,218 KWh) in 2015. (Graph 1.)

2. Cumulative Total

To show personal perceptions of how much sunshine there is can be wrong, the annual total generation for the past few years is pretty much a straight line. (Graph 2.)

But wow, that’s over 30MWh generated!

I’ve just logged this year’s Mar-May reading. Graph 3 shows what that first graph looks like with that reading added in. The new reading that is an extraordinary 129% above the previous six year’s average, at 1,515 KWh.

3. March-May 2014-20

One rule with SolarPV is the longer the days and the sunnier the days, the more electricity is generated. While a clear winter’s day can hit peak generation it will only do it for a short period because the days are short.

It’s been a very sunny quarter. Based on my generation records, there’s been more sunshine in this March-May than in any June-August quarter since 2014 (The highest was 1,490 KWh in 2018). In every other year June-August has always been the highest generating quarter of the year.

Great for us, in the last three months we used an insignificant 28KW from the mains grid, but I’m really wondering why there’s such a big jump. Was it the Covid19 lockdown giving clear skies, or climate change, or a bit of both? I’m wondering what next quarter will be like, and next year too.

Wet winters, dry clear springs and summers seems to be the new normal here. The weather’s beautiful but I can’t help but worry this is bad news.

That wonderful organisation the ALCS (Author’s Licencing and Collecting Society) have been running a campaign called Axe The Reading Tax to have VAT removed from digital publications in the UK. They are now asking all UK writers to write to their MPs before the coming budget.

Not only is this an illogical tax, it also penalises the disadvantaged. Rather than repeat myself, please read the draft letter below. Even better, use it as a template to write to your own MP.

I based my letter on the one the ALCS have on their campaign page. Feel free to use and edit it as you wish.

Please spread the word if you are able. Thank you.

-~-

Dear xxxx,

I am writing to you as a local constituent to ask that you write to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rishi Sunak, to ask on him to remove the tax on digital publications in the coming Budget.

Printed books, magazines and newspapers have always had a zero-rate of VAT applied to them, and rightly so. But their digital equivalents are subject to 20% VAT. This is illogical and unfair, and is in effect a tax on reading, education, and learning.

Ever since the UK’s VAT regime was established in the 1970s, it was recognised that books and knowledge are essential to people’s lives and applying tax to them is wrong. This long-standing belief has helped ensure that reading and learning remains affordable and accessible to people of all ages, incomes and abilities.

According to research from the National Literacy Trust, over 45% of children prefer to read on a digital device and young people on free school meals are more likely to read digitally than their more advantaged peers. Furthermore, this tax disproportionately impacts vulnerable groups such as the elderly and people with disabilities, who may need audiobooks or e-readers that can be used to alter print size. In this light the tax on digital publication appears arbitrary and unkind.

Please support the campaign to end this tax.I enclose a pre-paid envelope and look forwards to your reply.

Yours sincerely,

Note: This is essentially the same as a recent Twitter thread I’ve posted. I decided to blog about it too because not everyone uses Twitter and it’s easier to cross-post from here to places like FB. Also, because I am incensed.

Briefly, some background: I am the current Chair of the Milford SF Writers conference, an annual, week-long event for critique & discussion. We’ve run in the UK since 1972.

Since 2017, thanks to the generosity of individuals and two EasterCon committees, we have been able to offer bursaries to BAME writers around the world, and currently are funded for a few more. We’ve always been pleased to offer two bursaries a year.

To date, as well as UK writers, this has allowed SF&F writers from Nigeria, Netherlands, and USA to attend Milford. Not this year.

For 2019 we were again delighted to be able to fill both places. Except – annoyingly, frustratingly, infuriatingly, one must now fall vacant. Because UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI) have rejected their visa application on the grounds of ‘financial capacity’.

One committee member is highly experienced in the problems the Hostile Environment policy causes musicians seeking visas, and has seen the refusal letter. It says there is no room for appeal, and in their experience it means exactly that. The writer we had been hoping to welcome to the UK says it is too heartbreaking a task to try again.

We’ve lost them. This is enormously disappointing. We are proud to be able to play our own part in increasing inclusion and diversity in our field of literature and the arts, immensely grateful to our donors. It is obvious that everyone benefits.

But this is where we now are with the poisonous Hostile Environment policy that Theresa May, our outgoing Prime Minister, introduced in her time as Home Secretary. It tells us low-income writers from other countries are not welcome, & we cannot help them with grants & gifts.

In short, this government thinks they are not rich enough to be given a bursary.