Oh man, I've been meaning to post this for a week now but haven't really had a minute to sit down and do it. Did you know that grad school is time-consuming?!
Anyway. Most interesting thing that has happened to me recently: I met a Baron!
How this happened was through my PhD program, of course. My PhD, in "Texts, Contexts & Cultures," is part of an inter-collegiate endeavor, between NUI Galway, Trinity College Dublin, and University College Cork. Last year, we had two classes that were teleconferenced-- we had cameras linking all three groups together, with one professor, and we all interacted that way. Since we've all mostly gone off to do our own research, we haven't had as much to do with each other, but last week we had a big group meet-up down in Cork.
Originally the Galway group lobbied to spend the night, but that didn't end up happening, so we made the 3-hour trip there and back on the day. We left at 9:30 am and got to Cork for lunch, meeting up with our UCC and TCD comrades. After lunch, we had a couple lectures, then a couple workshops, which were lively and interesting. The point of these things is not really to teach us anything specific, because there is no way to have a lecture that pertains specifically to everyone's research, but rather to get us thinking in different ways about our own material-- always a useful enterprise. After the workshops were over, we made our way over to UCC's art gallery, where one of the Cork professors was interviewing Melvyn Bragg.
Melvyn Bragg is, as Wikipedia puts it, "an English author, broadcaster and media personality." He worked for years with the BBC, involved in projects that attempted to bring mass media to the working classes-- basically, to make it "popular." Since popular theatre is what I study, I was really interested in hearing him talk about his works. Eventually his involvement with the Labour party got him appointed to the House of Lords! (The House of Lords is kind of the U.K. equivalent to the U.S. Senate. Both governments have bicameral representation, but while in the U.S. it's the House of Representatives and the Senate, in the U.K. it's the House of Commons and the House of Lords.) In order to sit in the House of Lords, of course, you have to be a Lord... so Melvyn was granted the title of "Baron Bragg"!
Before the interview, there was a wine reception that the TCC group was invited to. We were all standing rather respectfully and quietly talking amongst ourselves, when one of the professors hustled myself and a couple other researchers over to meet Melvyn Bragg. He came up, introduced himself, shook all our hands, and asked us all about our research! He was especially interested in mine, and we chatted about it for a few minutes. He's a very genuine, friendly, down-to-earth type of guy. But after he left, one of my British colleagues, Laura, turned to us and exclaimed "We just met a Baron!" Which suddenly made the whole thing feel rather surreal.
Showing posts with label meeting famous people. Show all posts
Showing posts with label meeting famous people. Show all posts
Friday, April 2, 2010
Sunday, February 22, 2009
In which our heroine is a total squealing fangirl
I have internet at home again! Huzzah. Anyway, the most notable thing that happened this week was that, on Tuesday, I met Amanda Palmer and Neil Gaiman!
Amanda Palmer is half of the band The Dresden Dolls, and recently released a solo album. I saw her back in September, and she is fabulous. Neil Gaiman is one of my favorite writers of all time, and if you knew just how much I read you'd realize how big a statement that is. His book American Gods is one that I can read and re-read over and over again-- I probably read it at least twice, maybe three times, a year. (Meaning that I've read it at least ten times.) He is something of a celebrity for me, and when I found out that he and Amanda Palmer were doing a reading together in Dublin, I figured I had to be there. Amanda's solo album is called "Who Killed Amanda Palmer," and features liner notes written by Neil. Also, they are releasing a book to tie in with the album-- it has artistic dead photos of Amanda, accompanied by Neil's short stories.
The show was absolutely fantastic. First of all, the venue, Chapters, is an awesome bookstore. It's the largest independent bookstore in Ireland, and has a huge used collection. As well as a really impressive graphic novel section. The staff were all really nice and helpful... which is important, as what they had thought would be a "small, intimate bookshop reading" had five hundred people turn up. Yeah, the place was packed. I got there at about 4:30-- it was supposed to start at 5-- and managed to get a decent seat on the floor. I wasn't too close, but I had a great view of Neil and Amanda.
(Sorry it's so blurry, I was zooming over a lot of heads.)
Since there were so many people, there were some technical difficulties in getting the reading going. For one thing, they decided to limit the signing to one item per person. ("So if you've brought your entire Sandman collection, you're shit out of luck," said Neil.) The book still isn't out, won't be out for a couple weeks, but they did material from it. They took turns, with Neil reading stories from the book while Amanda displayed the accompanying photos, and Amanda singing and playing the ukulele. Yes, the ukulele.
And. Neil and Amanda. Oh man. What can I say? Seeing Neil Gaiman read was almost surreal. I have seen so many pictures of the man, watched lots of videos of him speaking, and I read his 'blog, so when he walked up to the mic it was hard to grasp that this was the real man standing in front of me. I was definitely star-struck at first, just sitting there grinning excitedly. Neil Gaiman is, absolutely, a bard. His reading was pretty much magical. And he has a beautiful voice, and can somehow make the words "shit out of luck" sound genteel.
Amanda Palmer, of course, is gorgeous. She has an amazing, beautiful voice, and the fact that she did an acoustic set on the ukulele just makes her the more awesome. She played a Cure song, a song of her own composing, and Radiohead's "Fake Plastic Trees," all of which were beautiful in a way you don't associate with the ukulele. Her show back in September was awesome, but that was a big concert; this was much more personal, much more like a conversation. She is also an absolutely cute, funny person, and the way she and Neil bantered was adorable.
After the reading was over, there came the signing, and a made chaotic rush to form a line ensued. I was nervous because I only had an hour to catch my bus, but luckily ended up at the front of the queue. (I guess the signing took over three hours to get everyone!) Since there were 500 people behind me, I wasn't exactly able to talk to them, but I did get to say hello while they were signing my things. (I brought my copy of Amanda's album, and bought a copy of The Graveyard Book at Chapters.) I would just like to say this: Neil Gaiman said my name. *swoon*
(From left to right: some other fan in line, Ayla about to explode in squealing, Amanda Palmer signing my CD, Neil Gaiman talking to me!)
And, my booty:
I love Amanda's handwriting, especially the swirly curly way she wrote my name!
That is EXACTLY what I want my headstone to look like. *swoons some more* You can't tell in my webcam photo, but Neil signed with a fountain pen in dark brown ink. Including an ink spatter by the moon. Gorgeous.
Hooray for meeting famous people! I took some videos, but I have to mess with them a little. I'll post 'em as soon as they're up on youtube. Also, Neil talked about the show on his 'blog. Wee!
Amanda Palmer is half of the band The Dresden Dolls, and recently released a solo album. I saw her back in September, and she is fabulous. Neil Gaiman is one of my favorite writers of all time, and if you knew just how much I read you'd realize how big a statement that is. His book American Gods is one that I can read and re-read over and over again-- I probably read it at least twice, maybe three times, a year. (Meaning that I've read it at least ten times.) He is something of a celebrity for me, and when I found out that he and Amanda Palmer were doing a reading together in Dublin, I figured I had to be there. Amanda's solo album is called "Who Killed Amanda Palmer," and features liner notes written by Neil. Also, they are releasing a book to tie in with the album-- it has artistic dead photos of Amanda, accompanied by Neil's short stories.
The show was absolutely fantastic. First of all, the venue, Chapters, is an awesome bookstore. It's the largest independent bookstore in Ireland, and has a huge used collection. As well as a really impressive graphic novel section. The staff were all really nice and helpful... which is important, as what they had thought would be a "small, intimate bookshop reading" had five hundred people turn up. Yeah, the place was packed. I got there at about 4:30-- it was supposed to start at 5-- and managed to get a decent seat on the floor. I wasn't too close, but I had a great view of Neil and Amanda.
(Sorry it's so blurry, I was zooming over a lot of heads.)
Since there were so many people, there were some technical difficulties in getting the reading going. For one thing, they decided to limit the signing to one item per person. ("So if you've brought your entire Sandman collection, you're shit out of luck," said Neil.) The book still isn't out, won't be out for a couple weeks, but they did material from it. They took turns, with Neil reading stories from the book while Amanda displayed the accompanying photos, and Amanda singing and playing the ukulele. Yes, the ukulele.
And. Neil and Amanda. Oh man. What can I say? Seeing Neil Gaiman read was almost surreal. I have seen so many pictures of the man, watched lots of videos of him speaking, and I read his 'blog, so when he walked up to the mic it was hard to grasp that this was the real man standing in front of me. I was definitely star-struck at first, just sitting there grinning excitedly. Neil Gaiman is, absolutely, a bard. His reading was pretty much magical. And he has a beautiful voice, and can somehow make the words "shit out of luck" sound genteel.
Amanda Palmer, of course, is gorgeous. She has an amazing, beautiful voice, and the fact that she did an acoustic set on the ukulele just makes her the more awesome. She played a Cure song, a song of her own composing, and Radiohead's "Fake Plastic Trees," all of which were beautiful in a way you don't associate with the ukulele. Her show back in September was awesome, but that was a big concert; this was much more personal, much more like a conversation. She is also an absolutely cute, funny person, and the way she and Neil bantered was adorable.
After the reading was over, there came the signing, and a made chaotic rush to form a line ensued. I was nervous because I only had an hour to catch my bus, but luckily ended up at the front of the queue. (I guess the signing took over three hours to get everyone!) Since there were 500 people behind me, I wasn't exactly able to talk to them, but I did get to say hello while they were signing my things. (I brought my copy of Amanda's album, and bought a copy of The Graveyard Book at Chapters.) I would just like to say this: Neil Gaiman said my name. *swoon*
(From left to right: some other fan in line, Ayla about to explode in squealing, Amanda Palmer signing my CD, Neil Gaiman talking to me!)
And, my booty:
I love Amanda's handwriting, especially the swirly curly way she wrote my name!
That is EXACTLY what I want my headstone to look like. *swoons some more* You can't tell in my webcam photo, but Neil signed with a fountain pen in dark brown ink. Including an ink spatter by the moon. Gorgeous.
Hooray for meeting famous people! I took some videos, but I have to mess with them a little. I'll post 'em as soon as they're up on youtube. Also, Neil talked about the show on his 'blog. Wee!
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