Years ago, my wife stumbled across the longest, and most unusual, name she’d ever come across. It was that of an English leather merchant and Puritan preacher, Unless-Jesus-Christ-Had-Died-For-Thee-Thou-Hadst-Been-Damned Praise-God Barebone.
At the time, I was producing a film for BBC Arena about the role of artists in war. My new production company needed a name and Barebone Films was born. When setting up this press, I decided to resurrect the name, christened after the man who gave his surname to the Barebone’s Parliament of the English Commonwealth of 1653.
Welcome to BBB. And don’t worry. We’re a lot friendlier than our brimstone-eyed namesake!
Anne Aylor has had short stories published by the Arts Council of Great Britain, The Literary Review, London Magazine and Stand Magazine. She was twice an award winner in the Dixon-Ward Short Story Competition and an excerpt from her first novel, No Angel Hotel, was a winner in the BBC Radio 3 Short Story Competition. No Angel Hotel was published in the UK by HarperCollins and in the US by St Martin’s Press (title: Angel Hotel). The BBC have broadcast a number of Anne’s short stories, including one which became a chapter in The Double Happiness Company. In 2008 she was shortlisted for the Bridport Prize with her story, ‘The Speed of Dark’.
Her stage play, Children of the Dust, won a playwrighting award and was staged by the Soho Theatre and the Theatre Warehouse, Croydon (director: Terry Johnson). Her recent play, The Trainer, had a rehearsed reading in May 2009 at the Hackney Empire with Corin Redgrave, Tim Pigott-Smith, Roger Lloyd Pack and Janie Dee (director: Tom Platten).
She is the founder of Anne Aylor Creative Writing Courses which offers workshops in the UK and abroad. Anne has danced with the Oakland Ballet, worked in the Big Apple at the Salvation Army Trade Department, sold brass and wind music of the 17th and 18th centuries and practiced as an acupuncturist. Several years ago she gave up needles to concentrate on writing. She loves to teach because it doesn’t involve high maths or high heels.
Elizabeth Gilbert wrote Eat Pray Love which became a worldwide publishing phenomenon. In this TED talk she riffs about many things: the fear of success, about genius (what it meant in ancient Rome and how its meaning has changed), how Tom Waits reacted when the words to a new song came to him when he was driving. And most importantly, why the Spanish say Olé. Well worth 19 minutes of your time.
Years ago, my wife stumbled across the longest, and most unusual, name she’d ever come across. It was that of an English leather merchant and Puritan preacher, Unless-Jesus-Christ-Had-Died-For-Thee-Thou-Hadst-Been-Damned Praise-God Barebone.