A Big Order in a Crowded Bar: Creative Thinking in the Twilight Zone

Busy Bar by Norman Cornish

I had a big order: six pints of two bitters, a pint of lager, a Lucozade and a selection of different flavoured crisps. It was really crowded at the bar. People were elbowing their way past each other, waving and shouting for the publican’s attention. 

I made my way up some rickety backstairs to a smaller, more secluded bar that I imagined few people would know about. Sadly, when I arrived, it too was rammed. 

I was going to take ages to get served. My friends would be wondering where I’d got to. And it wouldn’t be too easy carrying that large order down those rickety stairs on a tray. 

I was in a real quandary. What on earth was I to do?

And then I woke up.

'Yes: I am a dreamer. For a dreamer is one who can only find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world.’
Oscar Wilde

I often forget my dreams, but this one stayed with me. I began pondering what it could mean. 

It’s true. Bar presence is a critical life skill, and one in which I’m sorely lacking. Perhaps I have been wrestling with this shortcoming in my subconscious. 

I’ve also read that dreams could be placeholders for other, deeper anxieties. Could my nightmare of the big order in a crowded bar indicate a more profound concern about my competitive competence, the struggle to achieve, the yearning to make a mark?

Then again, dreams are not just expressions of one’s inner cogitations. They can also be creative catalysts, sparks to original thought.

I read recently in The Times (December 14, 2021, 'Wake up your hidden creative powers’) about a study conducted at the Paris Brain Institute into hypnagogia, the transitional state of consciousness between waking and sleeping.

A team of neuroscientists and sleep doctors was keen to investigate a creative thinking technique used by inventors and artists. Practitioners would take a nap holding an object. (Thomas Edison used a metal ball. Salvador Dali clutched a key above a plate.) As they drifted off to sleep, they would drop the object and so wake themselves up at precisely the point before deep sleep. They believed this exercise, by accessing the ‘twilight zone’ between waking and sleeping, would inspire greater leaps of the imagination and more lateral problem solving.

Salvador Dalí demonstrates his creativity technique
Patrice Habans Getty Images

'Hold fast to dreams,
For if dreams die
Life is a broken-winged bird,
That cannot fly.'
Langston Hughes

The research recorded the brainwaves of more than a hundred people tackling a difficult maths puzzle over a long period of time. In the middle of the study participants were given a 20-minute break in which they relaxed with their eyes closed while holding a bottle. If they drifted off and dropped the bottle, they would be woken up. 

The puzzle had embedded within it a 'hidden rule’ that would enable participants to get to the solution much more quickly. Of those who managed to stay awake the whole time 31 per cent found the shortcut, compared with only 14 per cent of those who fell into a deep sleep during the break. 

However, there was another group - those who drifted into the non-rapid eye movement sleep stage 1, or N1. 83 per cent of this sample found the shortcut. 

The scientists concluded that the N1 respondents performed so well in the test because this semi-lucid, liminal state enabled them to 'freely watch their minds wander, while maintaining their ability to identify creative sparks.'

'Our findings suggest that there is a creative sweet spot within the sleep onset period… We know that the twilight period is a moment in which memories are replayed and new associations are made. This could in turn explain why some people report having explicit breakthroughs during these short sleep episodes.'

I have tried the ‘twilight zone’ creative thinking technique at home. Sadly, each time I’ve woken up in a grumpy mood, with no dream recollection and a concern that I may have smashed a bottle on the living room carpet.

Nonetheless, I’m sure we should regard dream states as useful provocations to the more linear processes and patterns of everyday thought, as rich seams of ideas and insight.

'Those who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night.'
Edgar Allan Poe

And so I’m prompted to reflect back on my nightmare of the big order in a crowded bar. Could I perhaps derive some creative inspiration from six pints of two bitters, a pint of lager, a Lucozade and a selection of different flavoured crisps?

Erm, I’m not sure. But at least it suggested this article.

'It was a cold day outside today,
I had nothing to do,
So I thought about you.
And then my friend said, "Lets go for a walk,"
Just to clear the air,
Well I thought about you.

The clock keeps ticking,
Cars keeps passing,
And the day goes by, slowly by.
I've nothing to do, but to think about you,
Think about you.’

The Scars, ‘All About You’ (D Child / P Stanley / A Carlsson / A Carlsson)

No. 355

Durer’s Travels: The Advantage of a Curious Mind

Albrecht Dürer, Head of a Woman, a drawing 1520/1520

‘Human curiosity can be so sated by an excess of all worldly things that it becomes weary of them, with the sole exception of knowing a great deal, of which no one tires.’
Albrecht Durer

I recently attended an exhibition of the work of the German artist Albrecht Durer. (‘Durer’s Journeys’ is at the National Gallery, London until 27 February.)

At the end of the fifteenth and the beginning of the sixteenth centuries Durer painted deeply felt religious paintings and stunning portraits and self-portraits. He also created a vast number of drawings, engravings and woodcuts - most famously his exploration of mythical subjects set in precisely observed depictions of the natural world.

The winged angel Melencolia sits with her head in one hand awaiting inspiration. Saint Jerome works away in his study, a dog and lion slumbering side-by-side on the floor in front of him. The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse trample all before them. A Knight rides alongside Death and the Devil, resigned to his fate. 

'An artist of understanding and experience can show more of his great power and art in small things roughly and rudely done, than many another in a great work.’

One can’t help but be struck by Durer’s acute eye for detail: the bark of a tree, the foliage on a branch and the rocks in a ravine; the tension in a muscle, the curls in long hair and the folds in a fabric are all rendered with meticulous care and attention.

'Sight is the noblest sense of man.'

Clearly Durer’s prodigious natural talent was fuelled by a curious mind, a passion for understanding, an appetite for travel. 

'Art is embedded in nature and they who can extract it, have it.’

Albrecht Dürer, 'The Knight, Death and the Devil', © The Syndics of the Fitzwilliam Museum, University of Cambridge

Durer was born in 1471, the son of a Hungarian goldsmith who had settled in Nuremberg. He learned his father’s trade and was apprenticed to one of the town’s leading painters. From 1490 to 1494, as was the custom at that time, he embarked on a Wanderjahre - in effect, gap years – in order to acquire skills from artists in other regions. His trip took him along the Rhine to Strasbourg, Colmar and Basel.  

'Love and delight are better teachers than compulsion.’

On his return to Nuremberg, aged 23, Durer got married. But he must have been bitten by the travel bug. That same year he set off on the first of two major trips over the Alps to Italy (1494-5, 1505-7). In Venice he met the elderly Giovanni Bellini and learned to be more confident in his use of colour. From Jacopo de' Barbari he discovered the new developments in perspective, anatomy and proportion. 

In 1520-1 the intrepid Durer journeyed to the Low Countries, visiting Antwerp and Aachen, Mechelen and Bruges. In Ghent he admired van Eyck's altarpiece. In Brussels he marvelled at Aztec gold and the animals in the zoo. He met up with royalty, artists and intellectuals. He collected prints and Lutheran pamphlets. He sailed for six days to see a beached whale in Zeeland and was almost killed in a storm.

A 1521 drawing by Dürer of Livonian women in winter dress

‘I was amazed at the subtle ingeniousness of people in foreign lands.’

In the course of his travels Durer kept journals containing numerous drawings in silverpoint, chalk and charcoal. He sketched nobles and nuns, soldiers and servants, dogs and wildlife. He made a note of local landscapes, contemporary fashions and architectural details.

There is a lesson for us all here. At whatever stage we are in life or career, we must find food for thought, catalysts for ideas. We need to look, discover, observe and understand in order to stay fresh. We must continue to learn.

'As I grew older, I realized that it was much better to insist on the genuine forms of nature, for simplicity is the greatest adornment of art.’

Durer died back home in Nuremberg in 1528. He was just 56 years old, but he had led a full and active life. Perhaps he appreciated that the better he understood the world around him, the better he understood himself.

'Some think that they know everybody, but they really don't know themselves.'

'Travel round,
I travel round.
Decadence and pleasure towns,
Tragedies, luxuries, statues, parks and galleries.
Travel round,
I travel round.
Decadence and pleasure towns.’

Simple Minds, ‘I Travel’ (D Forbes / C Burchill / M Macneil / B Mcgee / J Kerr)

No. 354

‘That’s Why I Had That Pen’: The Trials and Triumphs of Mary J Blige

‘I didn’t think that stuff like that could happen to somebody like me – you know what I’m saying? - like us.’
Mary J Blige

I recently watched a moving documentary about Mary J Blige. The film, ‘Mary J Blige’s My Life’ (2021), directed by Vanessa Roth, marked the 25th anniversary of the singer’s second album.

‘The whole ‘My Life’ album was: ‘Please. Love me. Don’t go. I need you.’ It was a cry for help.’

In the mid ‘90s Blige redefined contemporary R&B by integrating her raw soulful vocals with hard-edged hip-hop beats. She sang with deep emotional power, but her voice also had an element of grit that suggested a life fully lived. Her message was honest and urgent, heartfelt and true. She was, and still is, the Queen of Hip-Hop Soul. And 1994’s ‘My Life’ represented a pivotal career moment.

‘I was writing to get free, so I can move around and I wasn’t in so much bondage and I won’t be stuck.’

Blige teaches us to break through the limits that environment sets on our ambition, and to find consolation and healing in creative expression.

1. ‘You Can’t Love Anybody If You Don’t Love Yourself’

'How can I love somebody else
If I can't love myself enough to know
When it's time,
Time to let go?’
‘Be Happy’ (M J Blige/ A DelValle/ S Combs/ J-C Olivier/ C Mayfield)

Blige was born in the Bronx, New York in 1971. Her mother, a nurse, separated from her jazz musician father, and settled the family in the Schlobohm Housing Projects in Yonkers. Money was tight and this was a tough environment for a girl to grow up in.

‘In that neighbourhood someone would get jealous or mad at you for having something – for having a smile, for having a dream…It’s like a prison inside a prison inside a prison. It’s like hurting people hurting each other.’

Bullied at high school, Blige dropped out and turned to alcohol and drugs to numb the pain.

‘Most of the times I was just depressed and didn’t want to live because I didn’t love myself.’

2. Find an Escape

From an early age Blige had found solace in music. She would watch her mother dance round the apartment to the Staple Singers, Gladys Knight and Aretha Franklin. And she developed a particular affinity for Roy Ayers’ ‘Everybody Loves the Sunshine.’

‘That record made me feel like I could have something. I couldn’t get my hands on it, but I could have something. ‘My life in the sunshine’ was something I wanted.’

Blige discovered she had a strong voice and musical talent. She sang in private and public, outside and in.

‘Singing was the escape for me. Singing made me forget that we were struggling so much. Singing made me feel free.’

But Blige was consistently held back by her environment. She was living in a world of levelled aspirations.

‘When I was growing up, in the neighbourhood we lived in, it was like: ‘You better not dream it. You better not hope it.’’

3. Take a Chance

In 1988, while visiting the Galleria Mall in White Plains, Blige stopped off at a studio booth and recorded a cover of Anita Baker's ‘Caught Up in the Rapture.’ Through a friend of her mother, the cassette was played to Jeff Redd, a recording artist at Uptown Records.

‘When I heard the demo at the time, I heard the pain of a generation.’
Jeff Redd

The following year Andre Harrell, CEO at Uptown, signed Blige to his label and she set to work with producer Puff Daddy on her first album, ‘What's the 411?’ The record introduced a new chapter in R&B.

‘There wasn’t a lot of R&B singers singing over hip-hop tracks. So that alone right there was: ’OK. We can groove to this. We can do our dances off of this. This doesn’t sound like Mama’s music. But she’s singing, so Mama might like it too.’’
Method Man

Kevin Westenberg - Mary J Blige (2004)

4. ‘Only Connect’

Blige cut a dash in big earrings, boots, baseball shirt and reversed cap. People could relate to her authentic look, but also to her authentic feelings. She developed a remarkable intimacy with her listeners - with people that recognised real emotion. In the documentary a fan articulates the bond between them.

‘I feel like I know her personally. I connect with her through her music. And I just want to hug her.’

Sadly, despite her accomplishments and growing popularity, Blige still didn’t believe in herself.

‘Success comes when you are successful inside. For a long time I didn’t know I was successful outside, because I was a wreck inside.’

Blige was dating Jodeci singer Cedric ‘K-Ci’ Hailey, but their relationship was marked by alcohol and abuse. During a 1995 interview on ‘The Word’, Hailey denied that the couple were planning to get married. When subsequently shown the clip in a TV interview, Blige was visibly upset.

‘Whatever. Let’s move on please. I’m disgusted.’

Blige tumbled into an abyss of depression.

‘I was falling completely off the planet… You’re screaming and there’s nothing coming out.’

5. Channel Your Emotions into Your Work

It was at this point that Blige channelled her indignation and sorrow into her music.

‘That’s why I had that pen. And that’s why I had it all inside and I was able to sing it and write it. It was the only way to survive. It was the only way to get through what I was getting through.’

Built on a foundation of robust beats and sophisticated samples, ‘My Life’ was deeply soulful and gloriously tuneful. Introspective and personal, it spoke of yearning and anger; frailty and strength; joy and pain. Released in 1994, it topped the R&B/Hip-Hop chart for eight weeks and subsequently went triple platinum.

'Sleep don't come easy,
Boy please believe me.
Since you’ve been gone
Everything's going wrong.
Why'd you have to say goodbye?
Look what you've done to me.
I can't stop these tears from falling from my eyes.
Ooh baby,
I'm going down.'
‘I’m Going Down’ (N Whitfield)

What can we in the creative professions learn from the trials and triumphs of Mary J Blige?

‘I wrote it because I needed to write it.’

First we need to be alert to the levelled aspirations that can be found in deprived communities and disadvantaged environments. If people don’t even hope to realise their ambitions, their potential will go unrealised.

Secondly, whilst we endeavour to direct our talents to commercial ends, we should never forget that creativity can provide emotional release and psychological relief. Creativity soothes the soul.

‘No matter how bad it hurts dealing with the truth, whatever the truth is, that’s how you get to the core. You’ve got to feel it to heal.’

Blige went on to create many more fine albums. Her path through life has not been smooth. But she has been sustained by her ability to translate her pain and vulnerability into words and music; to articulate her suffering in song.

‘Being human is hard. But I think I’ve evolved in a major way. What’s consistent is my heart. And my heart is that little girl in Yonkers. My heart is that teenager trying to get through and making it through. My heart is never forgetting the environment I grew up in and going back and helping others. So the evolution is not being afraid to expose my truth and myself, to touch someone else’s life.’

'Ooh baby, not tonight
I don't want to fuss and fight.
I just want to make it right.’
'Mary Jane (All Night Long)' (M J Blige/ S Combs/ C Thompson/ R James)

[If you’d like to read about the issue of levelled aspirations, I’d recommend the 1987 social science classic ‘Ain’t No Making It’ by my friend Jay MacLeod.]

No. 353

A Brief for Planners: Outsiders Who Want to Belong

Richard Hamilton, 'Swingeing London 67 (f)’. 1968–9

‘Oi, Boris!

I kept my head down and quickened the pace.

‘Oi, Boris!’ the stranger shouted after me again. It was a young lad with a group of his mates, all laughing heartily.

‘Boris, get back to work!’

I pretended not to hear and hurried down the street. I crossed the road and blended in with the commuter crowds, losing myself in a fog of self-doubt.

I get this once a week.

‘Alright, Boris?’

‘Hey Boris, are you off to a party?’

Why Boris? I ask myself. Why not Clooney or Beckham or Pitt?

I’ve looked in the mirror many times, assessing my resemblance to the UK Prime Minister. Yes, I have messy hair - but it’s grey, not blond. Yes, I have a heavy frame - but surely not that robust. And there the likeness ends. I have stubble and big ears and wear artisanal jackets… 

I have concluded that it’s more a reflection of Boris’ celebrity than of our similarity. A few years ago I spotted Jeremy Corbyn on every street corner. He was often hanging around in shopping centres or waiting at the bus stop, carrying a plastic bag and looking a bit bored and angry. Now I don’t notice him at all.

'Why fit in when you were born to stand out?’
Dr Seuss

When I was at school I always wanted to belong. I tried to engage and participate - to be in with in-crowd. I aspired to be every Tom, Dick or Harry, every average Joe. Anyone in fact but Jim. I imagined that if one were anonymous, unremarkable, invisible, it would be incredibly liberating.

And yet at the same time I consistently felt a little different – just slightly adjacent, eccentric and offbeat. I laughed at the wrong time, wore the wrong clothes, said the wrong thing. I was one step removed.

'Conformity is the jailer of freedom and the enemy of growth.'
John F Kennedy

This I suspect is the curse of all Planners. They tend to be outsiders: people who regard the world from a distance, with a critical eye and a sense of objectivity. And yet at the same time they yearn to fit in. They strive to understand and imagine what others might be thinking or feeling. They want to be normal.

I have come to believe that it is this combination of empathy and objectivity that qualifies Planners to do their job. At their best they feel what others feel and see what others fail to see. They are outsiders who want to belong.

'Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter, and those who matter don't mind.'
Bernard M Baruch

When I was a kid my mother gave me a crew cut - like a US Marine. And when I was a student I had my hair slicked back with coconut oil - like a Kray twin. Neither of these looks was particularly mainstream, but I’ve considered reverting to them in an effort to break the association with the Prime Minister. Indeed my barber Simon has recently offered to ‘de-Boris’ me.

Of course, I’ll probably still end up looking a bit weird. But where’s the shame in that?

'It's weird not to be weird.'
John Lennon

'Strange, I've seen that face before,
Seen him hanging 'round my door.
Like a hawk stealing for the prey,
Like the night waiting for the day.
Strange, he shadows me back home,
Footsteps echo on the stones.
Rainy nights, on Haussmann Boulevard,
Parisian music drifting from the bars.’

Grace Jones, ‘I’ve Seen That Face Before (Libertango)’(B Reynolds / A Piazzolla / D Wilkey / N Delon)

Wishing everyone a Happy New Year and a thoughtful 2022.
Look after yourselves. 

No. 352

Chaplin’s City Lights: You Only Know Me When You’re Drunk

‘City Lights’ is a 1931 romantic comedy written, produced, directed by, and starring Charlie Chaplin. 

Chaplin had created his character the Little Tramp in 1914, and by the end of the 1920s he was famous the world over. With his neat toothbrush moustache, curly black hair, bushy eyebrows and awkward waddle, the Tramp was instantly recognisable. His bowler hat and cane, wing collar and waistcoat suggested that he had once been a man of distinction. But now his clothes were tatty, he was homeless and friendless, and all he had to sustain him were his resilience, sharp wits and good humour.

As the opening title card of Chaplin’s 1921 film ‘The Kid’ announced, audiences could expect:

'A picture with a smile - and perhaps, a tear.'

Chaplin started developing the script for ‘City Lights’ in 1928. Since the success of 1927’s ‘The Jazz Singer,’ Hollywood had been investing in ‘talkies,’ and he came under some pressure to make the Tramp speak for the first time. But Chaplin felt that the character’s charm resided in his silence. And so he determined to use just occasional sound effects and also, for the first time, he composed the score. 

Filming started in December 1928, but was not completed until September 1930. The unusually lengthy production was in part down to Chaplin’s fastidiousness. He constructed elaborate sets. He experimented with casting. He re-shot a critical opening scene 342 times. But he also suspended the shoot for substantial periods while he worried about the sound issue. 

'In the past my work had usually stimulated interest among producers. But now they were too preoccupied with the success of the talkies, and as time went on I began to feel outside of things; I guess I had been spoiled.'

‘City Lights’ is full of elegantly choreographed comic set-pieces. The Tramp narrowly escapes falling down a sidewalk elevator. He mistakes a party streamer for spaghetti. He replaces his foreman’s cheese with soap. And when he swallows a whistle, he inadvertently hails a taxi and attracts a pack of stray dogs. 

The movie is also graced with a compelling plot.

As he wanders the busy streets of downtown Los Angeles, the Tramp meets a beautiful blind Flower Seller (Virginia Cherrill – cast because she had very poor eyesight). He is beguiled by her sweet nature and walks away a man in love.

That evening the Tramp saves a drunken Millionaire (Harry Myers) who was intent on committing suicide since his wife has left him. The new friends go back to his mansion for drinks and then hit the town to celebrate. As dawn breaks, the Millionaire takes the Tramp home in his Rolls Royce.

The Tramp: Be careful how you're driving.
Millionaire: Am I driving?

From this point on the Tramp oscillates between pursuing his romance with the Flower Seller and enjoying adventures with the Millionaire. The two plot strands interact with each other, but the Flower Seller and Millionaire never meet.

When, later that same morning, the Tramp chances upon the Flower Seller on the street, he buys her whole basket of blooms with money borrowed from the Millionaire, and he drives her home in his friend’s Rolls. Naturally she assumes the Tramp is wealthy, but she is also quite taken with his charm and gallantry.

Sadly the girl is soon confined to her bed with a fever. She falls behind in the rent and is threatened with eviction. To help her out the Tramp takes a job as a street sweeper and gets himself a slot on a boxing bout for a $50 purse. 

In a classic scene the Tramp prepares for the contest with smelling salts, rabbits’ feet and horseshoes. He endeavours to persuade his opponent to fix the fight - to no avail - and takes to the ring in his bowler hat. Once the bout begins, he hides behind the referee and dances around the Prizefighter. He hugs his opponent, hugs the referee and hugs the corner post. He takes a running jump at the Prizefighter, rings the bell to end the round early and gets himself tied up in the bell rope. Eventually our hero is left sprawled on the canvas and counted out.

The Tramp is incredibly unfortunate and accident-prone. He can be both cowardly and foolhardy. But he is also resourceful, generous and good-natured. And, above all, he has a heart.

A running gag through ‘City Lights,’ and indeed one of the primary plot mechanics, is that the Millionaire only recognises the Tramp when he is drunk. When he wakes up each morning with a hangover, he swears he’s never seen his new friend before and has him ejected.

This resonated with me. I suspect we all have friends and colleagues who seek us out when they need something, or when they’re just looking for company. But the test of true friendship, and indeed fellowship at work, is whether you stick around through the tough times, when there’s nothing you can gain, no purpose to be served, no larks to be had.

At length the drunken Millionaire is persuaded to pay for an operation to cure the Flower Seller’s blindness. But the Tramp is mistakenly thought to have stolen the money and is put in prison.

When, months later, the Tramp is released, he can’t find the Flower Seller at her usual spot and so roams the streets, dishevelled and disconsolate.

In fact the Flower Seller, her sight restored, now runs her own successful shop and has been waiting in hope of one day meeting her benefactor again.

Then, by chance, the Tramp stoops to pick up a flower discarded in the gutter outside the Flower Seller’s shop. He turns and sees her, and breaks into a grin. Not knowing who he is, she is nonetheless amused.

‘I've made a conquest!’

In pity, she offers the Tramp a fresh flower and a coin. He makes to leave, but she insists. And then, when she presses the coin into his hand, she suddenly recognizes his touch. 

‘You?’

 The Tramp nods.

‘You can see now?’
‘Yes, I can see now.’

She continues to hold his hand. The Tramp smiles back. The End.

Despite being released well into the sound era, ‘City Lights’ was the highest-grossing film of 1931. Chaplin invited Albert Einstein to join him at the premier in LA. When the house lights came up, the scientist was in tears. 

Time for a festive break.
Have a restful Christmas. 
Next post will be on Thursday 6 January 2022.
See you on the other side, I hope.

'Maybe I'll sleep real late.
Maybe I'll lose some weight.
Maybe I'll clear my junk.
Maybe I'll just get drunk on apple wine.
Me, I'll be just fine and dandy.
Lord, it's like a hard candy Christmas.
I'm barely getting through tomorrow,
But still I won't let
Sorrow bring me way down.’

Dolly Parton, ‘Hard Candy Christmas’ (C Hall)

No. 351

Frans Hals and the 27 Shades of Black: Learning to Change Your Mind

Portrait of a Man. Frans Hals , early 1650s: Photograph: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

'If you do not change direction, you may end up where you are heading.'
Laozi, ancient Chinese philosopher

I recently attended an exhibition of portraits by 17th century Dutch painter Frans Hals. (‘Frans Hals: The Male Portrait’ is at the Wallace Collection, London until 30 January 2022.)

I confess I have had only a moderate opinion of Hals. My impressions were formed many years ago from seeing cheap reproductions of his most celebrated work, The Laughing Cavalier. I didn’t take to this fellow’s arrogant sideways stare, his absurd upturned moustache, his supercilious grin. And over the years, in various galleries across Europe, I’ve occasionally bumped into other smirking Hals portraits. They’ve served to confirm my reservations about the artist. 

As we enter the exhibition The Laughing Cavalier regards us from the end of a long purple-walled room. The accompanying commentary points out that he is neither laughing, nor a cavalier. Rather he sports a knowing smile. And though we don’t know the sitter’s identity, his carefully groomed hair and fashionable attire suggest a wealthy young man, possibly a cloth merchant.

On closer inspection I found myself admiring the Cavalier’s dashing wide-brimmed hat and richly embroidered doublet - bees, arrows, flames and flowers painted in gold, red and yellow - slashed to reveal an immaculate white linen shirt. I liked the elegance of his soft, lace-trimmed ruff, tied with a black ribbon to match his substantial sash. I was even charmed by that glint in his eyes.

The Laughing Cavalier. Frans Hals (c.1581–1585–1666). The Wallace Collection

The gallery commentary tells us that such flamboyant outfits were de rigueur amongst the young bachelors of Haarlem, the town where Hals was based nearly his whole life. And there are a few other similarly confident, carefree, clean-shaven young men in the exhibition. But once married, the gentlemen of Haarlem would don more sombre apparel, in line with their Calvinist faith, and many of Hals’ sitters were Men in Black.

Such conformity may have represented a challenge for an ordinary portrait painter. But Hals managed to render this single colour in an infinite variety of tones, tints and textures. As Van Gogh later observed:

‘Frans Hals must have had twenty-seven shades of black.’

As we wander round the room we encounter a procession of Haarlem’s military men, councillors, drapers and brewers. The sitters look self-assured, poised, relaxed. Often they place an arm on one hip. Sometimes they regard us over the top of a chair. And despite their formal attire, their individuality shines through.

Tieleman Rossterman has flushed cheeks, a pointed beard and an upturned moustache. With his extravagant lace collar, cambric cuff and gold-trimmed leather glove, he exudes an aura of hard-earned status and authority. Pieter van den Broecke, a Dutch admiral with tousled hair and a weathered visage, sports a long gold chain over his shoulder and rests his gnarled hand on a baton of office. Further along there’s a dignified middle-aged man, whose tightly buttoned black jacket implies restraint. But coloured silks peer out from below and, together with his elegant white cuffs, suggest swagger beneath the surface.

As Hals aged, his brushwork became looser and more fluid, his colour palette more restrained. Critics at the time complained that his paintings looked unfinished. And some subsequently inferred that he had led a dissolute life. These same qualities later appealed to the Impressionists, and he was much admired by Manet and Van Gogh.

Pieter van den Broecke (1585–1640). Frans Hals (c.1581–1585–1666).Photo Credit: English Heritage, Kenwood

I walked away from the exhibition full of respect for Hals. He had ushered in a more natural style of portraiture. He had distilled real characters in oils, conveyed true personalities with vigour and vitality. His work was animated and immediate.

I reflected with some sadness that it’s not often that I change my mind. And rarer still that I admit it. As we age, our views calcify. We repeat the same familiar lines, recite the same righteous wisdoms - with tedious regularity and without giving them fresh thought. We become prisoners of our own opinions.

And yet when we change our minds we demonstrate that we are alert to new information and different circumstances; that we are learning and progressing; that we are alive. Perhaps I should do it more often.

'Progress is impossible without change; and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.'
George Bernard Shaw

'Sure I understand.
Of course, I'll be fine.
You had to change your plans.
Oh well, I'll just change mine.
But if it turns out bad,
And if your nights get long,
And if she makes you sad,
No need to be strong.
And if you ever change your mind,
And find you miss those feelings that you left behind,
We can give it one more try,
Some magic place in time,
If you ever change your mind.’

Crystal Gayle, ‘If You Ever Change Your Mind’ (P McGee, B Gundry)

No. 350

Excellent Experiments: What I Learned from Galloping Round the Coffee Table

Joseph Wright of Derby, ‘An Experiment on a Bird in the Air-Pump’

'Negative results are just what I want. They’re just as valuable to me as positive results. I can never find the thing that does the job best until I find the ones that don’t.'
Thomas Edison

My father’s idea of a great Saturday afternoon was watching seamless sport on TV. With an Embassy on the go and a mug of black Nescafe at his side, he’d transition from athletics to speedway to rugby league with equal attentiveness. 

Though not a betting man, Dad spent a good deal of time watching horse racing. This made quite an impression on me as a young child. I developed a solitary game that involved running endless rings round the living room coffee table. I’d gallop in circles at great speed, with an occasional sharp slap to one hip, commentating as I went in an approximation of the patrician tones of Peter O’Sullevan. 

My game was pretty rudimentary. But there was not a lot going on in the 1970s. 

Sadly my child jockey phase came to a disastrous end. On one particular race day I determined to gallop at an even greater than usual tempo. Round and round the coffee table I went, hollering encouragement and instruction to myself at the top of my voice. All of a sudden I became so dizzy that I saw stars, fell over and incurred a gruesome gash on my forehead. 

When later that day I returned from Oldchurch Hospital in bandages, my father called me to one side. Having ruined his afternoon of TV sport, I thought I was in trouble. But I did not receive the expected rebuke. Instead he just asked:

‘What did you learn from all this, Jim?’

In our youth we are instinctively experimental. We engage in all manner of diverse activities - the random and inappropriate, the silly and superficial, the ill-conceived and misguided. But if we manage to emerge from our trials in one piece, they can contribute to our understanding of life.

When I played rugby at school, I learned how to overcome physical fear. When I took mad dog Dillon for a walk, I learned about social anxiety. When I attended heavy metal gigs at the Hammersmith Odeon, I learned that double denim is not a good look. And when I drank whisky with Caz and Thommo, I learned to avoid dark spirits.

Experimentation is similarly valuable in the world of work.

When I had a job cold calling, I learned that polite prevarication doesn’t sell. When I was hired to do filing, I learned that someone needed to invent cloud computing. When I was a focus group moderator, I learned how to direct conversation. And when I was employed on a building site, I learned that The Guardian isn’t welcome in every setting.

'Observation is a passive science, experimentation an active science.'
Claude Bernard

I read in The Guardian recently (I wasn’t on a building site at the time) about a study carried out by Professor Dashun Wang, with colleagues at Northwestern University, into the ‘hot streaks’ experienced by artists and scientists at the peaks of their careers: periods when they found themselves ‘on a roll’ in terms of innovation and output. (12 September, 2021, ‘Scientists identify key conditions to set up a creative ‘hot streak’’) 

First the researchers identified the purple patches experienced by thousands of leading painters, film directors and scientists by reviewing auction prices, IMDb ratings and research citations.

Then they used Artificial Intelligence to assess the diversity of the individuals’ work at different points in their careers. Their algorithms reviewed the variety of the artists’ brush strokes and subject matter; of the directors’ plots and casts; and of the scientists’ research topics.

The team found that all three career types engaged in more diverse output immediately before they hit a 'hot streak.' And then the ‘hot streak’ itself was characterised by a narrower, more focused working style.

‘There’s experimentation, and then there’s implementation based on what you have learned through experimentation.’ 
Prof Dashun Wang (writing in the journal Nature Communications)

The Guardian article cited the example of the film director Peter Jackson:

‘His hugely successful Lord of the Rings trilogy came after an eclectic range of movies such as the sci-fi comedy horror Bad Taste, the puppet film Meet the Feebles and the drama Heavenly Creatures.'

There’s a lesson here for us all in the business world. Of course, we should recognise and reward ‘hot streaks’: those magnificent spells when an individual or team is creating output of consistent quality at high velocity. But we should also understand that these fertile and productive periods can only occur if we allow preceding time and space for experimentation. Incomparable implementation proceeds from excellent experimentation.

'No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong.'
Albert Einstein

I can’t quite remember how I replied to my father’s question. What had I learned from my bloody tumble? I guess, reflecting on it now, I discovered that if you spend too much time running round in circles, you end up falling over.

'I fall to pieces
Each time I see you again.
I fall to pieces.
How can I be just your friend?
You want me to act like we've never kissed.
You want me to forget,
Pretend we've never met. 
And I've tried and I've tried
But I haven't yet.
You walk by and I fall to pieces.’
Patsy Cline,'I Fall To Pieces' (H Cochran / H Howard)

No. 349

‘Sweet Smell of Success’: Are We In a Prison of Our Own Making?

'Don't do anything I wouldn't do! That gives you a lot of leeway…'
Sidney Falco, ‘Sweet Smell of Success.’

I recently re-watched one of my favourite films: Alexander Mackendrick’s 1957 reflection on the New York gossip industry, ‘Sweet Smell of Success.’ Based on a short story by Ernest Lehman, caustically scripted by playwright Clifford Odets, shot in moody black and white by James Wong Howe, and set to a swooning jazz score by Elmer Bernstein, it’s a noir classic. 

'Harvey, I often wish I were deaf and wore a hearing aid. With a simple flick of a switch, I could shut out the greedy murmur of little men.’

Burt Lancaster plays J J Hunsecker a tyrannical Broadway columnist for the New York Globe. Bespectacled and elegantly attired, he inhabits the late-night clubs of New York’s Mid-Town, dining with powerful Senators, aspirant stars and unctuous managers. He trades in hearsay and half-truths. He is at once charming and condescending, composed and yet with an air of menace.

'You're dead, son. Get yourself buried.’

Tony Curtis plays Sidney Falco, a Press Agent who earns his modest income by placing stories with columnists like Hunsecker. He is vigorous and smooth talking, with youthful good looks. He’s ‘the boy with the ice cream face.’ But he is also cynical, self-interested and completely lacking in scruples. He will stop at nothing to climb the career ladder. 

'J J Hunsecker is the golden ladder to the place I want to get.’

Falco fawns over Hunsecker, who in turn treats him with disdain. Theirs is a relationship of reluctant dependency. The columnist holds his unlit cigarette towards the agent.

'Match me, Sidney.’

The film focuses on Hunsecker’s endeavours to prevent his beloved sister from marrying a jazz musician. (It’s based on the real life columnist Walter Winchell who was similarly protective of his sister.) Hunsecker has commissioned Falco to put an end to the relationship, by any means necessary - so far without success. The columnist is frustrated.

'Sidney, conjugate me a verb. For instance, "to promise.”’

Hunsecker and Falco emerge from the Twenty One Club into the Manhattan night. It’s a bustling world of crowded sidewalks, teeming traffic, crooked cops and gaudy neon. A drunk is thrown brusquely from a nearby nightspot, crashing into a garbage can.

'I love this dirty town.’

Falco pleads for one last chance. He plans to place a smear of the boyfriend in a rival’s gossip column – that way the young couple won’t trace it back to Hunsecker. The piece will suggest that the jazz musician is a communist and a marijuana user.

'The cat's in the bag and the bag's in the river.’

As the plot thickens and the tension ratchets up, Hunsecker offers Falco a candid character assessment.

‘You’re in jail, Sidney. You’re a prisoner of your own fears, your own greed and ambition.’

‘Sweet Smell of Success’ is indeed a tale of ambition, and the damaging effect it has on people. Occasionally we see suggestions that Falco has the residues of a conscience, that he might once have been a decent human being. But his blinkered drive for personal gain, his unquenchable appetite for advancement, has eradicated any qualms and misgivings, any consideration of others.

'I'd hate to take a bite out of you. You're a cookie full of arsenic.’

Now I’m sure none of us could be accused of being quite so amoral as Sidney Falco. But we are all, to varying degrees, driven by ambition. Today ambition is broadly celebrated and encouraged. It’s the urge to get on, to realise our potential, ‘to be the best that we can be.’ It’s a measure of commitment.

But perhaps it’s worth regarding our ambition with a certain amount of circumspection. In historic times this same quality was considered a sin. Ambition is compulsive, corrosive, all consuming. It can eat away at trust and relationships. While driving us upwards and onwards, it can also isolate us. 

In time, compromised by excuses, half-truths and neglect, our friends fall away and our colleagues keep their distance. We become our own gaolers, constrained by walls and fetters we have created ourselves. We are in a prison of our own making.

'The best way to keep a prisoner from escaping is to make sure he never knows he's in prison.'
Fyodor Dostoevsky

For a brief moment it seems that Falco’s plans will come to fruition. He withdraws to a bar to celebrate.

'I am tasting my favorite new perfume - success!’

But ultimately his plot is defeated by the integrity of others. As dawn breaks we find him out on Times Square being beaten up by the cops. The lieutenant wipes his hands clean, pigeons flock to the scene and the sound of the brass section swells to a climax.

'Here I am, after so many years,
Hounded by hatred and trapped by fear.
I'm in a box. I've got no place to go.
If I follow my mind, I know I'll slaughter my own.
Help me, I'm the prisoner.
Won't you hear my plea?
I need somebody to listen to me
I beg you, brothers and sisters
I'm counting on you.’
Gil Scott-Heron, ’The Prisoner'

No. 348

Laura Knight: Before the Curtain Rises

The Ballet Girl and the Dressmaker

‘I am just a hard-working woman who longs to pierce the mystery of form and colour.’
Laura Knight

I recently attended an excellent exhibition of the work of English artist Laura Knight. (‘Laura Knight: A Panoramic View’ is at the MK Gallery, Milton Keynes until 20 February 2022.)

'As in the fourteen lines of a sonnet, a few strokes of the pencil can hold immensity.’

Having grown up in modest circumstances, Knight became a much admired and much loved figure in the art establishment. She painted women at work and play; performers on stage and off; troops on duty, machinists on the job and Gypsies on the racecourse. Eschewing modernism, she employed a realistic style of simple lines and vivid colours, revelling in the effects of sunlight; the glow of the footlights; the shimmer of silk and satin.

'One of the greatest moments of Mother's life came when she found that I, a mere baby, was never so content as with pencil and paper; even before I could speak or walk, I drew. There was no question of my purpose in life.'

Laura Johnson was born in Long Eaton, Derbyshire in 1877. Her mother, a single parent of limited means, raised three children and taught part-time at the Nottingham School of Art. She enrolled her youngest daughter to study there when she was just 13.

‘I became aware of my latent power. Daring grew, I would work only in my own way.’

At art school Laura had to deal with rules that restricted her access to life models, and tutors who thought she should develop her ‘feminine side.’ But she also met fellow student Harold Knight. They became friends and married in 1903. 

A Dark Pool

The couple stayed for a time in Staithes, a village on the Yorkshire coast. Knight painted fishing and farming folk going about their working day; women plucking, polishing, peeling and waiting. 

‘Each day she will bid her husband goodbye, not knowing whether she will ever see him again.’

Next Laura and Harold moved to Cornwall, joining the Newlyn artists’ colony. Here Laura painted families enjoying a day on the beach; young women in fashionable bobs walking along the cliff edge, staring out to sea; nude bathers revelling in the summer sun. 

‘How holy is the human body when bare of other than the sun.’

Knight seemed to enjoy capturing women at ease, in reflection, away from the constraints and drudge of daily life.

‘An ebullient vitality made me want to paint the whole world and say how glorious it was to be young and strong.’

The Three Clowns

Knight became intrigued by the tension between outward appearance and inner self. She befriended groups of Gypsies at Epsom and Ascot racecourses, creating portraits from her makeshift studio in the back of an antique Rolls-Royce. Though their clothes were brightly coloured and exotic, their expressions were serious and knowing. 

‘The beauty and remoteness from the world outside gripped me.’

Knight took a particular interest in performers: ballet dancers, circus acts and thespians. She liked to catch them in rehearsal and backstage; before the show and behind the scenes; in stolen moments of rest and recuperation. 

‘Who among the audience could imagine their matchless ballerina hanging on to a curtain in the wings, panting, almost too tired to stand, with a stream of sweat pouring down her neck?’

A ballerina ties her shoes, adjusts her hair and inspects herself in the mirror. A dancer applies her lipstick while her colleague regards us with weary disinterest. A red-costumed acrobat chats with a yellow-hatted bareback rider, as they await the signal for the show to begin. Three clowns in comical outfits are immersed in serious conversation, one cradling his cigar under a ‘No Smoking’ sign. An actor runs a tap in a crowded dressing room, lost in thought. 

‘Tension was tremendous during those last moments before the curtain rose. Then all was private behind; in a second, that thin wall of protection of cloth has disappeared, disclosing a cavern containing what seemed the whole of the rest of the human race.’

Knight was clearly fascinated with the transformation that takes place when a performer steps into the spotlight; when she or he changes from quiet and withdrawn to outgoing and expressive. Here – away from view, before the curtain rises - we see the real person, the true self.

Corporal Elspeth Henderson and Sergeant Helen Turner

Perhaps we are all performers - on occasion and in our own way. We all dial up the energy, turn on the charm, smile and project. Even more so in the social media age. But it would be wrong to think of life and work as a performance. Knight reminds us that genuine reflection, true experiences and real relationships are formed off stage and out of view. We need to protect and preserve the quiet times, the private moments.

Knight was hugely popular in her day. In 1929 she was made a Dame, and in 1936 she became the first woman since 1769 elected to full membership of the Royal Academy. Her work as an official artist during the Second World War sealed her place in the hearts of the nation. 

‘No praise be too high for their staunchness, be they in crowded districts, or in lonely places miles from home.'

Although figurative art fell out of fashion, Knight carried on working into her eighties. She died in 1970, aged 92. 

‘There was beauty in very simple things if one had eyes to see it.’

Knight’s painting was not radical or revolutionary. But it consistently communicated a quiet dignity and understanding. She celebrated hard work and true talent, individuality and difference. She presented us with our better selves.

'Don't you know the skin that you're given was made to be lived in?
You've got a life,
You've got a life worth living.’
Joy Crookes, ‘Skin'

No. 347

My Infectious Ideas: Rosé Wine, Stubble, Neil Young, Mini Cheddars and the Top Button

Jan Vermeer van Delft - Het glas wijn (1658-60)

'Tranquillity is contagious, peace is contagious. One only thinks of the contagiousness of illness, but there is the contagion of serenity and joy.'
Anais Nin

In 2003 I introduced rosé wine to the UK. 

I had attended a work conference in Provence and the light fruity taste of rosé seemed ideal for warm weather and mellow conversation. I liked its informality and optimism, its breezy style and sunny disposition. On my return I began ordering it in pub gardens and at pavement cafes. I took it to summer parties and evening barbecues. I may have attracted some curious glances at first. But soon everyone was drinking it.

A few years later I decided to cultivate an unshaven look. It suggested an appropriately rugged, romantic, Bohemian personality. I spent a night out in the bars and clubs of Hoxton and before too long the local hipsters had adopted my stubble.

What was going on? Why were people copying me?

On reflection I realised this was not a new phenomenon. I was the first person in the UK to listen to Neil Young. Now everyone likes him. I was the one who first selected Mini Cheddars (‘Baked not fried!’) as a pint accompaniment. And periodically I precipitate a fashion amongst young men for wearing their top buttons done up. 

Sometimes it feels like we’re at the vanguard of change; that we’re leading the charge, setting the pace; pioneering new behaviours and attitudes. We feel we’re being original, inventive, individual. When really we’re just another link in the chain of transmission.

'I have often noticed how primate groups in their entirety enter a similar mood. All of a sudden, all of them are playful, hopping around. Or all of them are grumpy. Or all of them are sleepy and settle down. In such cases, the mood contagion serves the function of synchronizing activities.'
Frans de Waal, Primatologist

I read recently (The Guardian, 22 September, 'Mathematicans Discover Music Really Can Be Infectious') about a study carried out by a team from McMaster University in Ontario into the popularity of music downloads.  

The researchers considered the thousand most downloaded songs in Britain between 2007 and 2014, analysing the speed with which they spread and the length of time that they remained popular. They discovered that the pattern of music downloads after their release closely resembled the epidemic curves for infectious disease.

Lead author Dora Rosati explained:

‘With a disease, if you come into contact with someone who is ill, then you have a certain chance of catching that disease. With songs, it looks very similar. The big difference is that for songs, it doesn’t necessarily have to be physical contact – it could be that my friend used this cool new song in their Instagram story, so now I’m going to go and find it.’

The research also established that the rate of reproduction (R number) varied significantly by musical genre. Songs classified as electronica were more than ten times more contagious than rap or hip-hop for example; and heavy metal was not very infectious at all. Which makes complete sense.

We may recognise the phenomenon of contagion in the world of commercial communication where for some years now we have talked about ‘viral marketing.’ Brand ideas are transmitted by personal contact and virtual interaction. At their best they multiply rapidly and exponentially; spread with accelerating speed and thrilling intensity. 

And yet often we judge communication concepts as if they are fixed and stable; statically encountered and passively consumed. Surely the best ideas are kinetic and shifting. They earn attention rather than buying it. 

It is helpful therefore to assess ideas in terms of their capacity for contagion.

What are we doing to make our idea more infectious than those of our competitors?

What is it about our idea that will make consumers copy and mimic it; participate and play with it; adopt and advocate it; adapt and distribute it?

What is our idea’s transmissive power? What is its R number?

'Pure truth cannot be assimilated by the crowd; it must be communicated by contagion.’
Henri-Frederic Amiel

I have in recent years developed a new sartorial variant in the form of a fisherman’s smock. I like its rugged cotton drill, roomy collars, functional pockets and the subtle suggestion of artisanal excellence. And I now have smocks in royal and navy blue and cadmium green. I was expecting my smock to be highly contagious. But curiously this has not so far proved to be the case.

'I'm always a flop at a top-notch affair,
But I've still got my health, so what do I care?
My best ring, alas, is a glass solitaire,
But I still got my health, so what do I care?
By fashion and foppery, I'm never discussed.
Attending the opry, my box would be a bust.
I never shall have that Park Avenue air,
But I'm in such health, why should I care?’
Ethel Merman, 'I've Still Got My Health’ (C Porter)

No. 346