A Reading Life, A Writing Life, with Sally Bayley

‘Enter Lillian…’ This week, we join Sally once again in conversation with the producer, James Bowen, on the subject of Sally’s latest work, Worm in the Bud: A Fable. Listen for a conversation on interpretation, ambiguity, and the instructive value of narrative. Worm in the Bud is published by the New Menard Press, and is available from all good booksellers. The wonderful piano accompanying Sally's reading of 'The Forest' is ‘Monday’, by Paul Seba. More on Paul and his work can be found here. This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. More information on James and his work can be found here. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.

‘A paragraph made up of waiting…’ We join Sally this week in the process of editing her forthcoming work, Mrs Parnell, focusing in particular on a single paragraph. Listen for a meditation on the creation of space and time in writing, and how a text can carve out a space to pause. The wonderful piano music in the opening section is ‘Doubt’, by Paul Seba. More on Paul and his work can be found here. This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.

For “Husband Ron” and Christopher Robin — may he come by again soon. This week, we join Sally at home, seeing in the New Year in the company of the residents of A.A. Milne’s Hundred Acre Wood. Listen for a reflection on domesticity, hospitality, and the physics of intimacy. This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.

‘Writing for me is always an embodied experience of flow…’ This week we join Sally at home, as she prepares to start her day, thinking in particular about her morning swim. Listen for a meditation on writing and reflecting on one’s environment, embodiment, and the interaction between thought and space, featuring James Joyce’s Ulysses (1922). The wonderful piano music in the opening section is ‘Tuesday’, by Paul Seba. More information on Paul and his work can be found here. This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.  

‘A kind of choreography of intimacy, which I return to again and again…’ This week, we join Sally on a cold winter’s morning, as she tries to settle into the rhythm of the day and develop an image from her forthcoming work, Mrs Parnell. Listen for reflections on the writing life, and the development of character from everyday scenes, via the life and work of Katherine Mansfield and Arundhati Roy. This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.

‘She brought so little personality with her that she seemed scarcely to disturb the air…’ This week, marking the arrival of Autumn, Sally has been thinking about literary arrivals, in particular those in L.P. Hartley’s 1957 novel, The Hireling. Listen for a meditation on the choreography of writing and the arrangement of characters, including those featured in Sally’s forthcoming work, Mrs Parnell. This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.

‘From Waterloo Station to the small country town of Ramsgard in Dorset is a journey of not more than three or four hours, but having by good luck found a compartment to himself, Wolf Solent was able to indulge in such an orgy of concentrated thought, that these three or four hours lengthened themselves out into something beyond all human measurement.’ We rejoin Sally this week in conversation with the producer, James Bowen, discussing how to navigate, and ultimately teach, ‘difficult’ literature, drawing on John Cooper Powys’ Wolf Solent (1929) and James Joyce’s Ulysses (1922). Listen for a discussion of ambiguity, pedagogy, and the role of the author in narrative resolution. More information on Powys can be found here. Sally’s fable, Worm in the Bud, will be published in November of this year by The New Menard Press. It will be available from all good booksellers. You can also find out more about James and his work here. This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.

‘The fate of the writer is to dwell in that realm of shadows and apparitions and half-seen thoughts…’ This week, we join Sally sketching a scene for her new novel, Mrs Parnell, in which the stern housekeeper Mrs Parsons encounters a figure on the stairs. But who is this figure? An intruder? A suitor? Or even, perhaps, a reimagining of Gabriel Conroy, from Joyce’s short story ‘The Dead’ (1914)? Listen for an immersion in Sally’s creative process, developing an image and its home in a narrative. Gabriel was previously the topic of Sally’s conversation with the producer in the last episode. Listen here. This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.

‘He stood still in the gloom of the hall, trying to catch the air that the voice was singing and gazing up at his wife. There was grace and mystery in her attitude as if she were a symbol of something.’ A special episode this week, as we join Sally in conversation with James Bowen, the podcast’s producer and a fellow teacher of literature. Listen for a conversation on the role of objects in narratives, and the way in which characters reduce one another to symbols in modernist literature, ranging across Joyce’s short story ‘The Dead’ (1904) to Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway (1925) and To the Lighthouse (1927). You can find out more about James and his work here. Alice Jolly’s novel, The Matchbox Girl, discussed near the end of the episode is forthcoming with Bloomsbury, and is available to pre-order from all good booksellers. The wonderful piano music in the closing section is ‘Monday’, by Paul Seba. You can listen to more of his work here. This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus. A note on the sound: We are still experimenting with this format, and apologise that the sound levels are a touch more uneven than normal. As such, you may need to set the volume at a slightly higher level than you normally might when playing this episode!

For Gabriella Kelly Davies. ‘On the last day of summer Mrs Bohannon fell in love. The poplars, fallaciously pathetic, looked horrified, their branches rising on the wind like startled hair, and a pilgrim cloud wept a few chill tears.’ This week, Sally is once again in the world of Alice Thomas Ellis. Listen for a close reading of the opening of Ellis’ fourth novel, The Other Side of the Fire (1983), focusing on the construction of space, character, and intimacy between writer, narrator, and reader. The wonderful piano music in the opening section is ‘Thursday’, by Paul Seba. More on Paul and his work can be found here.  This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.

‘Mrs Mason looked now through Aunt Irene’s rich windows, sparking like spring water and framing fat pink shrubs that grew with child-like health in the tiny London garden.’ This week, we join Sally navigating the world of Alice Thomas Ellis’ absurdist novel, The 27th Kingdom (1982), exploring the parallel lives of its two central women. Listen for a meditation on building character, society, and our means of placing ourselves in the world around us. More information on Ellis and her work can be found here.  This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.

For Miss Braithwaite, who gave me eloquence. ‘I need to summon the spirits of place…’ This week, we join Sally in rehearsal for a performance, given last week at Somerville College as part of Oxfordshire Mind’s evening of ‘Connections.’ Listen for an invocation of character, both in fiction and of those figures in our own lives that become part of our stories. Both Gladys and J.M.W. Turner feature in Sally’s recent novel, The Green Lady (William Collins, 2023). This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.

‘Enid’s hands are always kept busy caring for other people…’ This week, Sally continues her theme of developing characters from objects by presenting a portrait of Enid Bagot, a young woman used to working with her hands, who will feature in Sally’s forthcoming imagined biography, provisionally titled Mrs Parnell. Listen for a reflection on the routines and rhythms of life and work, interspersed with the moments from Sally’s own life that provide her inspiration. The image of the cat by Edward Lear that Sally refers to can be viewed here. The wonderful piano music in the opening section is ‘Tuesday’, by Paul Seba. More on Paul and his work can be found here. This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.

‘His straw hat hurt him, it pinched his forehead and started a dull ache in the two bones just over the temples…’ This week, Sally has been reading and teaching Katherine Mansfield, focusing on characters in her short fiction. Listen for a masterclass on openings, writing characters through objects, and making connections between and through them. The full text of the stories Sally reads can be found here. The passage read in the final section comes from Sally’s forthcoming fictional biography, provisionally titled Mrs Parnell. This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.

For Emilie: may you always sing. We return this week, for a special micro-episode, to Mrs Dalloway’s London. Listen for a brief meditation on the fragmentation of life, interruption, and finding meaning in art. This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.

‘Now it was time to move, and, as a woman gathers her things together, her cloak, her gloves, her opera-glasses, and gets up to out of the theatre into the street, she rose from the sofa and went to Peter…’ This week, we join Sally reflecting on the arrangement of character. Listen for a journey, via Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway (1925) through perspectives, cityscapes, and the means by which we navigate everyday life. The music accompanying the initial discussion of Mrs Dalloway is ‘Friday’, by Paul Seba. More about Paul and his work can be found here. This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.

‘Sightlines produce a story, an avenue, a walkway, a space to move through…’ This week, we join Sally reflecting on the idea of the sightline, and the stories they structure. Listen for a meditation on narrative, childhood, and a unique perspective of and from The Dreaming Spires… The text of the Sylvia Plath poem Sally references can be found here.  This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.

‘I try to live my life as though I were stitching together a book of songs.’ This week, Sally offers us a tour through the stitched-together songs of her life, reflecting on the form of rhapsody. Join her for a series of vignettes on art, education, memory, and connection. This text of this episode is based on an address Sally gave at Wadham College Chapel, part of an evening of ‘Taking Heart in Poetry & Song’ for St David's Day. More information can be found here.  The full text of Dylan Thomas’ poem, ‘The force that through the green fuse drives the flower’, quoted early in the episode can be found here.  The wonderful piano music in the opening and closing sections is, respectively, ‘Tuesday’ and ‘Saturday’ by Paul Sebastian. This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.

‘I see that she is thinking most of her canvas, and how she will get there…’ This week, we join Sally after visiting her friend, the artist Emma Neuberg. Listen for a reflection of friendship, travel, and the connections art offers us. More information on Emma and her work can be found here. She can also be found on Instagram @emmaneuberg. The beautiful piano music in the closing section is ‘Tuesday’, by Paul Sebastian. This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.

‘Blithe came to me, not in flashing red or pink neon, but in pastels… in soft, painterly tones…’ This week, Sally has been inspired by a dream of the word ‘blithe.’ Listen for a meditation on the relationship between words, language, and the memories they ignite. The Muir poem Sally reads can be found here. The music used in the opening and closing section is, respectively, ‘Sunday’ and ‘Thursday’, by Paul Sebastian. This episode was edited and produced by James Bowen. Special thanks to Andrew Smith, Violet Henderson, Kris Dyer, and Maeve Magnus.