The Blue Room

Anthology of poems and short stories - information to follow

 

Orbit 4 by Chris Elliott

Since the early 80's Chris has experimented with electronic music, combining the best of analogue synthesis with modern digital synth technology. The track Sunraze is part of a 45 minute piece. It is the most formulaic and repetitive track on the album, as the rest is uncompromising to say the least. However, this shows Chris at his best - morphing rythmic textures, precision audio engineering and thought provoking atmospheres.

Chris also writes music for computer games, creates soundtrack for his short film projects and creates off-world 3-D environments with the latest graphics software. Sunraze

Margaret Swindell, one of twins, was born in Huddersfield, a Yorkshire woollen town. At the twins’ birth, their mother had a mental breakdown and the six months old babies were farmed out to a foster mother. At two, they were brought home to a house full of strangers. These were the grandmother, the mother and father and three siblings. After time at a girls’ high school, where they gained National Diplomas in Printed Textiles. They started work in design studios in Manchester. After some years, Margaret left to marry a Huddersfield man. The marriage ended in divorce, and Margaret spent the next ten years working as a tracer in a large engineering company. She met her second husband at a trade union weekend school. They had two children. Margaret’s twin sister Cora died of emphysema at only thirty four. At fifty Margaret spent two years at art school in Newcastle, when the family lived in Hexham. With a diploma in graphics, she took a job doing printing at a party plan company. She also spent time at the Charlotte Press and began a series of autobiographical prints. After a partial vision loss, Margaret couldn’t continue with the prints. She then began her novel “Parallel Paths”, written on tapes and later on computer with a voice system.

The Parallel Paths are the lives of twins in childhood and of one twin in later life.

Part One explores the childhood of the twins Cath and Cora in a Yorkshire woollen town. They are placed in a foster home at six months, as their mother has a mental breakdown. Later they return to a house full of strangers. Growing up close to each other, they view with detachment the exciting lives of their older siblings.

Part Two covers the twins’ years at art school in wartime. Gauche and innocent, they envy the goings on of their friends. The twins’ father’s death and mother’s second breakdown affect them differently.

Part Three, the twins work in a Manchester design studio, but Cora is made redundant. From now on the life of Cath, the healthier twin, forms the main story line. Marriage, divorce and redundancies erode her self worth. A relationship draws her into a new sensual world.

Part Four deals with Cath’s second marriage, much of it set in Newcastle upon Tyne and Hexham. Exciting at first, a lack of harmony develops over time. Cora dies. The final chapter shows Cath, now partially sighted, trying to shore up her collapsing world. She begins to recreate the lives of the twins.