After another hectic year, staff of the Cyprus Mail look back on the year in terms of the books, films, music and TV they enjoyed
GINA AGAPIOU, Journalist
BOOKS: Woman on the Edge of Time, Marge Piercy
I could never choose a favourite book until I read Woman on the Edge of Time by Marge Piercy. Even if you’re not into science fiction, you should give this book a chance; it describes an alternative future where people are in touch with Nature and live respecting the Other – perhaps because they’re not divided into frivolous categories of class, sex, race or sexuality.
A beautiful utopia and my ideal way of living. I believe this book is holy, and should be read by all political leaders.
Nicosia Beyond Barriers: Voices from a Divided City
My suspicions have been confirmed: Cyprus has so many great writers! An impressive collection of short stories and verses dedicated to the last divided capital. As a Nicosian, you live always and never in-between, you are forced to choose sides and say goodbye to friends at the barrier. At the same time, those emotions are universal, and the book can be appreciated even by non-locals.
MUSIC: ‘I’m With You’, Vance Joy
“If you need a light, I’ll be the match to your candle / My darling, I’m ready to burst into flames for you…” I love music but mainly I love poetry. A singer’s voice is another instrument, with a meaning I can often understand better than the music itself.
Interpretation gets a little more complicated when a song has an official video clip. Sometimes, of course, the clip is unrelated to the song, however this is not the case with I’m With You. The video actually tells us much more than the song, and encapsulates a detailed timeline of human erotic relationships from beginning to end (?).
Film/TV: Vita & Virginia
The movie we all (just me?) have been waiting for. A movie revolving around the erotic affair of writer Virginia Wolff and Vita Sackville-West. The choice of the model-like lead actresses was clearly made in an attempt to target a larger audience as they do not resemble the real characters at all. Despite this quibble, the movie remained faithful to Wolff’s diaries, and portrayed the relationship of the two women beyond judgement, as a love affair of two great minds.
Adapting the 1992 play by Eileen Atkins, the young director Chanya Button puts her own twist but gives the audience exactly what they were asking for: a lesbian film not staged for the male gaze.
ALEXANDER McCOWAN, Herbalist/Restaurant reviewer
An interesting year – though, as one ages, it becomes increasingly difficult to discover anything of interest that doesn’t increase or justify the prejudice that slides inexorably into the frontal lobes. I could ruminate at length on the BBC – how ill the championing of pseudo-populist political and social causes slips from the tongues of public servants earning six-figure salaries! – but probably best to stick to the arts, for the moment.
FILMS/TV: Gentleman Jack is based on the secret diaries of Anne Lister – a real-life 19th-century landowner and (inevitably) closeted lesbian – played by the superb Surranne Jones. A fine series, the sensitive pen of Sally Wainwright creating a sympathetic character who would’ve been difficult to portray in another era. I also flirted with the enormously popular Peaky Blinders, but found it so lacking in any credibility and historical validity it warranted no more than two episodes.
Chernobyl should be compulsory viewing for all of Lenin’s useful idiots and those deluded cretins who promote Marxist theories that still abound in the groves of academe and some unions and political parties. The exposure of the level of incompetence, mendacity, corruption and inhumanity was so revolting it was, according to Gorbachev, a major contribution to the collapse of the Soviet Union.
In more pleasant news, Chris Kikkas of Diachroniki Gallery – a stalwart promoter of local artists – provides a regular film and lecture on a major artist each week, usually Wednesday, at his premises just off Ledra Street. I attended an illuminating programme on the perils of the decadent German artists, which had special resonance for us because we once housed the sculptures of Ernst Blensdorf at our house in Somerset.
BOOKS: On the literary front my reading was dominated by women authors, all from this century and professional, compelling writers.
In The Kindness of Strangers, Kate Adie – the former BBC chief news correspondent and presenter of Radio Four’s From Our Own Correspondent – reveals the life behind the camera in a crisp, funny way. A damn good read, and such a contrast to the poor solipsistic self-promoting posturers we tolerate today.
The next two reads can only be read safely if you are not hampered by surgical stitches. I was given The Best of Dorothy Parker, Parker (who died in 1967) being probably the most quoted of all female humourists; a wit, and mistress of the back-handed compliment. The book has a selection of her articles, short stories and poems; every woman should have a copy in her bag. Next up Tina Fey, a natural successor to the great Parker; although lacking her sophistication, she is completely barmy! She is the writer of the television series 30 Rock, a triumph of absurdity, and in her book Bossypants she manages to reduce every situation to a distillation of the ridiculous.
MUSIC: Alas, nothing really stood out in 2019, musically speaking…
PETER MICHAEL, Journalist
When I think back on 2019 in books, television or cinema, and music, I always find myself coming to some interesting finds, and some old favourites (especially regarding music).
BOOKS: First off for me this year was my book find, which is an older book, but still a book that has stunning imagery interwoven with a unique and modern tale: The Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie. At first the tales seemed chaotic, and you find yourself wondering how everything will blend together, but then the stories start to mix and you find yourself taken away by his words, the truth of the lives lived, and the blending of old and new, and you are captivated. Specifically for me the scene where Mahound communicates with the angel, I feel like I’m actually attached to the string that Mahound is connected to, and I can understand the narrator.
FILMS/TV: Secondly, there is television for me. I have watched possibly too many series on Netflix, but then I found Carnival Row, which is on Amazon Prime to be fair. I really enjoyed the series; despite some Game of Thrones-isms, you can see a show trying to draw parallels between modern British history and the story of the empire. It tries to blend them in a fantasy series and it does it quite well, and the actors were very good; notwithstanding the power of makeup, they portray their roles well.
MUSIC: Lastly there was music – a fraught subject since I’m very picky about what I listen to, and the feelings I choose to delve into! Music always transports me to another world and this year’s pick is an old favourite, only with a new album and different sound: I listened to Fever Dream, the new album by Icelandic band Of Monsters and Men, and I was swept away, with the songs ‘Wild Roses’ and ‘Soothsayer’ being particular favourites. I really connected with this album, which (I admit) I only managed to do with a couple of songs on their first album. The songs are more mature, funky, and at the same time deeper and more meaningful. I highly recommend it and I’d like you all to travel on the same journey.
JONATHAN SHKURKO, Journalist
BOOKS: My Brilliant Friend – Elena Ferrante. This is the story of the friendship between two female protagonists, Elena (a.k.a. Lenù) and Raffaella (Lila), in a rundown neighbourhood of Naples. The women are both very intelligent and allergic to the strict rules of their complex environment, their bond being tested by a multitude of factors ranging from economic difficulties to the social differences between their families. I was gripped by the subtle tension that pervades the book. Will they remain friends? Will the intricacies of life eventually destroy their bond and make them fall apart? Alas, the author did not exactly give me a straight answer – but maybe that’s why I loved it.
FILMS/TV: German TV series Dogs of Berlin, produced by Netflix in 2018, tells the story of the mysterious and unexpected murder of the fictional Turkish-German player Orkan Erdem, on the eve of an important football match between Germany and Turkey. The case is assigned to two investigators: Kurt Grimmer, a former Neo-Nazi, and Erol Birkan, a gay police officer of Turkish origin.
This is a masterful urban crime story, with the German capital as the perfect setting to explore the infinite and intricate facets of a modern metropolis. Rather than finding out who is responsible for the murder, Grimmer and Birkan’s biggest challenge is to distinguish good from evil, as both aspects are constantly changing, evolving and surprising. Dogs of Berlin gripped me from beginning to end.
MUSIC: Although it was released back in 2017, I only got around to listening to gypsy-punk band Gogol Bordello’s Seekers and Finders in October 2019. This protean band’s most recent chapter is a powerful collection of songs that masterfully combine punk, gypsy and rock with a more mellow and reflective mood that rarely appeared in Gogol Bordello’s past works. Leaving aside the song ‘Did It All’ – a fierce slap in the face right at the beginning of the album – the overall feeling of Seekers And Finders is slightly less amphetaminic than expected. All in all, and maybe for the first time ever, Gogol Bordello’s main goal in this album is not to shake and shock the listener, but rather to lull them into a gentle, dark and slightly disheartening dream. The melancholy and intimacy of the title track managed to overwhelm me in the same way the band is also able to make me jump around the room.
PRESTON WILDER, Film reviewer
BOOKS: “There is no more thrilling sensation I know of than sailing. It comes as near to flying as man has got to yet – except in dreams.” I read that line at 36,000 feet (occasional plane trips being where I do most of my reading these days) and realised, with a start, that the book I was reading – Three Men in a Boat, by Jerome K. Jerome – was written in 1889. Take that, currency! On the other hand, I also finished Yuval Noah Harari’s book about the future (Homo Deus) this year – having started it in 2018 – and have this advice for my fellow humans: Starve the algorithms, and they will die. You’re welcome.
MUSIC: “I want shit to feel like it used to,” sang Lana Del Rey in ‘The Greatest’ – and, in 2019, I felt her pain. “The most popular song of 2019, spending a record-breaking 19 consecutive weeks at No. 1 in the US,” wrote The Guardian, topping its end-of-year list with a track (‘Old Town Road’ by Lil Nas X) I’d never heard of – then, on checking it out, I realised I had heard the first few seconds on the radio a couple of times, and quickly turned the dial. When did such old rubbish become so popular? (That said, Billie Eilish – another husky throaty voice, like Ms Del Rey – is pretty good.)
As for me, I spent the year waking up to NJOY (99.5 FM) – too many ‘quirky’ covers, but otherwise pleasing – and using my friend Haris’ monthly Spotify playlists (his nick is ‘manumad999’) to try and keep up. Rock chicks will appreciate Sleater-Kinney’s ‘The Future is Here’, 80s refugees try ‘Violins’ by 80s legend Lloyd Cole; everyone should check out a fabulous bluesy wail called ‘Lucifer’ by the late Charles Bradley. End-of-year lists also introduced me to Thom Yorke’s ‘Dawn Chorus’, a song he wrote about the death of his partner – and, if you consider that most Thom Yorke songs already sound like they’re about the death of a partner, you can imagine how desolate this one is. (It’s great.) But I prefer to dwell on a happier musical memory: a day at the beach in mid July, and stumbling on that sleepy ‘Heard Somebody Whistle’ thing in the car on the way back. Ah, summer…
FILMS/TV: Films are (literally) work, and who has time to watch TV shows? But I still recall the nice-warm-bath feeling of putting on The List of Adrian Messenger – a jaunty, not-very-good comedy mystery from 1963, starring the magisterial George C Scott – while vegging on the sofa after a 60-hour working week. Sometimes, the perfect movie isn’t necessarily the best.
