Coffee-Table Notes

Donald Campbell – Playwright, poet, theatre historian Born 1940; died March 8 2019 Donald Campbell, who has died aged 79, was a major poet and playwright, whose work tapped into some of Scotland’s hidden histories with a muscular relish for language, an immaculate sense of structure and a rough-hewn empathy for the common man on his own doorstep. While his profile may not be as high as some of his 1970s contemporaries in the new wave of Scots dramatic poets writing vigorously in their own tongue, Campbell was a key figure in Scottish play-writing and a huge influence on the generations that followed. Fellow playwright David Greig described Campbell as ‘a man of theatre’ and ‘one of the rocks on which the 1980s renaissance in Scottish playwriting was built.’ These are fitting words from the current artistic director of Edinburgh’s Royal Lyceum Theatre, where Campbell was resident Playwright from 1981-83 and about which he wrote a vivid history, A Brighter Sunshine, publish

Jo Clifford holds up a framed photograph of the little boy she used to be. The boy is dressed in a scratchy grey suit and tie, and, standing in the Worcestershire countryside, has a pet dog with him. On the face of it, the picture is an all too familiar if accidental depiction of a buttoned-up 1950s world in which little boys and girls became trapped by other people’s ideas of who or what they were.      Close by on Clifford’s desk sits a personalised gift to the playwright from actress Paula Wilcox, who played Miss Havisham in the west end production of Great Expectations, Clifford’s stage adaptation of Charles Dickens’ novel. In different ways, both artefacts are crucial to Clifford’s brand new reimagining of The Taming of the Shrew, which arrives at the Tron Theatre in Glasgow this week after opening at the Sherman Theatre, Cardiff. This goes back to Clifford’s first professional writing job, adapting another Shakespeare play, Romeo and Juliet, for young people. It was the

Disc 1 1. THE REZILLOS (My Baby Does) Good Sculptures (12/77)  2. THE EXILE Hooked On You (8/77) 3. DRIVE Jerkin’ (8/77) 4. VALVES Robot Love (9/77) 5. P.V.C. 2 Put You In The Picture (10/77) 6. JOHNNY & THE SELF ABUSERS Dead Vandals (11/77) 7. BEE BEE CEE You Gotta Know Girl (11/77) 8. SUBS Gimme Your Heart (2/78) 9. SKIDS Reasons (No Bad NB 1, 4/78) 10. FINGERPRINTZ Dancing With Myself (1/79)  11. THE ZIPS Take Me Down (4/79) 12. ANOTHER PRETTY FACE All The Boys Love Carrie (5/79)  13. VISITORS Electric Heat (5/79) 14. JOLT See Saw (6/79) 15. SIMPLE MINDS Chelsea Girl (6/79) 16. SHAKE Culture Shock (7/79) 17. HEADBOYS The Shape Of Things To Come (7/79) 18. FIRE EXIT Time Wall (8/79) 19. FREEZE Paranoia (9/79) 20. FAKES Sylvia Clarke (9/79) 21. TPI She’s Too Clever For Me (10/79) 22. FUN 4 Singing In The Showers (11/79) 23. FLOWERS Confessions (12/79) 24. TV21 Playing With Fire (4/80) 25. ALEX FERGUSSON Stay With Me Tonight (1980) 1. THE REZILL