Trashing the Heritage Museum Trashing the Heritage Museum Andrew Hedgecock examines the work of John Evans, cultural cartographer of the postindustrial Valleys.
‘I felt there was an audience for writing which was relevant to people’s experiences in the 1990s - writing which challenged traditional perceptions of poetry through experimentation with language and style. And I wanted to explore themes not traditionally considered suitable for poetry - particularly in Wales.’ John Evans
Fictional portraits of damaged communities tend to shy way from the worst excesses of social alienation: think of ‘The Full Monty’, ‘Brassed Off’ and even Alan Bleasedale’s ‘The Boys from the Blackstuff’. But Pontypridd-based writer, editor and publisher John Evans takes his audience to the kind of place where other artists fear to tread - a desolate topography of rotting estates, derelict tenements, grim malls and abandoned collieries. His books explore the postindustrial badlands of the South Wales Valleys - a domain of glue sniffers, speed freaks, jack-up merchants, menacing gangs of aimless kids and spraycan declarations of desperation.
And he’s equally relentless in his examination of the cultural froth that conceals this nightmare - people seeking oblivion through the anodyne pap of MTV, under-the-counter porno videos, karaoke bars, slot machines, bingo and the romanticised historical simulations of heritage theme parks.
In his books ‘How Real Is My Valley?’, ‘Industria’ and ‘GBH’, Evans exposes the malaise at the heart of the postindustrial era. He cuts away the layers of fantasy in which we’ve cocooned ourselves: the ‘memories’ of an industrial golden age that never was; the fallen idols of Marxism, religion and free-market capitalism; the escapism of drugs and trash entertainment; and the big lie of the 1990s - the classless society.
Firmly rooted in his South Wales background, Evans’s writing evokes a powerful sense of place. But his observations, jeremiads and prescriptions are just as relevant to Merseyside, the north-east, Devon, Cornwall - every place where the demise of key industries has resulted in a loss of confidence in the value of local culture.
The key to his work is ‘How Real Is My Valley?’ (1994), a rigorous but entertaining essay on postmodern culture (originally delivered as an audio-visual lecture to the Welsh Union of Writers) which sets out his major themes.
If you’ve often wondered what postmodernism is all about - but never managed to get your head around Jean Baudrillard’s stuff on simulations, the retreat of reality and the collapse of meaning - this is an excellent place to start. But Evans offers much more than an accessible introduction to some difficult ideas: he carries out a detailed analysis of the impact of postmodern culture and the postindustrial order on a specific place - the South Wales Valleys.
The book gives a brief economic history of the Valleys, from the era when coal was king, through the boom of the 1960s, to the miners’ strike of 1984-85, the collapse of the coal industry, the increase of poorly paid service sector employment and the advent of the heritage industry. These socio-economic upheavals are linked to fictional representations of the area: the naturalistic novels of authors such as Jack Jones in the 1930s, an era when coal was still king; the development of a richer stylistic approach to reflect times of diversity and change by authors such as Gwyn Thomas (in the 1940s) and Ron Berry (in the 1960s); and the self-conscious irony of Christopher Meredith’s ‘Shifts’, published in the postindustial 1980s.
Evans highlights the link between the poor quality of life in the Valleys - particularly the lack of social cohesion - to the loss of its cultural identity. The main culprits are identified as the arts festivals showcasing imported culture, spurious community development programmes, commercial simulations of the region’s industrial history (such as the Rhondda Heritage Park), the popularity of escapist art and the creation of a ‘techno-dreamscape’ through the commodification of information by global TV networks.
Evans is an optimist. For him the Valleys are in danger of becoming a museum culture whose most popular fictional representation is the ‘wildly distorted and overly sentimental’ novel by Richard Llewellyn, ‘How Green Was My Valley’ (1939). But he believes the area can regain dignity and self-confidence through genuine community-based activities and the development of art that has integrity, is relevant to the local experience and embraces postmodern culture:
‘We also need to generate new community initiatives and social movements, and we must have creative responses to the precise circumstances of our present moment - an art that is able to confront the depthlessness and fragmented nature of contemporary culture.’ From ‘How Real Is My Valley?’
Evans’s own contributions to the development of a new, confrontational art are ‘Industria’ (1995) and ‘GBH’ (1996). These maps of postindustrial hell recapitulate the themes of ‘How Real Is My Valley?’ through dense and fragmented narratives, whose form shifts between lyrical free verse, gritty reportage, complex rhythmic rap, dirty-realist short story, violent thriller, visionary allegory and pornographic tale. At times he tries, like James Kelman, to develop an approach to fiction which captures the experience of powerless people in their own language: an unconfident - but not uncommunicative - voice, free from the cultural assumptions of official forms of expression:
‘Junk-sick, kick-start, kick
that girl; devil doll. Cut the
sleep tight, to hold on
tight, to night flights. In
the shutout. In the fallout.
In the fade. Dug up by
dogs. Kick that habit; eye;
one more time. Kick that
one. Down here for days.
Can’t fix it. In the shut-
tight. Kick that eye; Hit
it. Hit it. Hit it again,
and again. Hard the
pain. No resistance to
pain. Keep-on, keep-on.
Kick it. Get it over, Snap
the skin tight...’
From ‘GBH’.
The cinematic sweep of the books, their mixture of narrative styles and sharp focus on drug use has been likened to the work of Irvine Welsh. But Evans is tackling a much wider range of themes - people getting off their faces on heroin is just one symptom of the societal affliction his books describe - and his angle of attack is utterly different.
His exuberant use of imagery has led to comparisons with William Burroughs, Kathy Acker, Hunter S Thompson, Henry Rollins and Cardiff-born Iain Sinclair, who has called him ‘a hot and necessary particle in an evidently grim landscape’. And there are significant similarities with Sinclair: a relish for exploring forgotten zones, high-energy prophetic prose and detailed observation of mass psychic breakdown.
‘Economy and climate; dead. This bleak industrial pyre; filthy wet and chill. Black tips, black geometry. Shafts collapsed. Discarded machinery. Swap Coal for Dole. Too many souls lost.’ From ‘GBH’.
‘I wander, shopping mall, skatetracks and concrete walkways, I glimpse apertures of remote lights, occulted details, slogan plastered walls, I watch swollen bodies, flesh dripping from bones, thin crazy faces, rusty punctures in their arms...’ From ‘Industria’.
There are influences from music as well as poetry and literary fiction. The earliest entries on Evans’s artistic CV are as a singer/songwriter. On leaving school in 1976 he went to London, formed and fronted Tax Exiles (a punk band which supported X-Ray Spex and Sham 69) and hung out with the likes of Siouxsie and the Banshees, The Clash and the Sex Pistols. He also performed as a solo artist under the name ‘John Marlon’ and was recorded on the Situation 2 arm of the Beggars Banquet label. Parallels have been drawn between his poetry and the stark, disturbing lyrics of Joy Division and the Manic Street Preachers. And at times his work exhibits the paradoxical mixture of cool observation and raw emotion of classic political songs such as Lou Reed’s ‘Dirty Boulevard’ and ‘Heartland’ by The The.
For Evans, the visual impact of the books is important: it works with language to build an emotional response and makes the work accessible to a wider readership. Each page has the look of a posterpoem - a blend of found images, photographs (by Evans’s regular collaborator Paul Nurse) and varied typography. Evans runs his own publishing house, Underground Press, and takes a rigorous approach to the design of his own books and those of the writers he works with:
‘I try to ensure that the book design reflects the content of the work as much as possible - we were the first in Wales to combine poetry with images and are always looking at ways to attract non-literary audiences to our writers.’
He has edited a series of books surveying the literary talent of the Valleys. ‘Out of the Coalhouse’ is a collection of uncompromising new writing; ‘Black Harvest’ is an anthology of contemporary poetry, including contributions from Peter Finch, Chris Torrance and the excellent Labi Siffre; and ‘Mogg Williams - Selected Works’ celebrates the life and work of Williams, a poet and disabled miner from Ogmore Vale.
‘I was very conscious of - and frustrated by - the poor perception of Welsh writing outside Wales. I wanted to demonstrate that not all Welsh poets and writers were self-absorbed and self-indulgent and that some of us were trying to break out of the stereotypical image which the arts establishment seems determined to maintain. I wanted to demonstrate that Welsh writers could be as exciting and stimulating as writers anywhere in the world.’
Evans constantly blurs the boundaries between his life and art, and his high profile in South Wales (he appears in the regional press with impressive regularity) goes beyond his activities as a writer, editor and publisher. He also works as an underground filmmaker, political campaigner, freelance community development worker and cultural mover and shaker.
Outspoken in his criticism of the official culture and arts establishment, he’s pragmatic enough to support initiatives of genuine benefit to the community. He takes every opportunity to attack the Arts Council of Wales for its neglect of talent, its support of literary cliques and its tendency to promote work that is elitist, insular and safe. There’s an impressive integrity to his artistic vision - but this sits alongside a deeply held commitment to the place he comes from, and there’s nothing precious about his approach to energising his community. He recently told Wales on Sunday: ‘Creating fresh opportunities for young people has got to be a top priority for the Welsh Assembly. I’d like to see an academy for the performing arts, like the one in Liverpool sponsored by Sir Paul McCartney.’
Evans believes grass-roots cultural initiatives can bring worthwhile and stable employment to the Valleys. Not content merely to bang the drum for community arts, he runs creative writing workshops with Valleys Artworks, and edits Kulture Vulture - a popular glossy magazine with a focus on Valleys culture, put together with young local people. Early issues covered topics as diverse as South Wales street fashion (Prêt-à-Ponty), 60ft Dolls, body modification, heroin abuse, the buy-out at Tower Colliery, eating disorders and Stereophonics. In spite of the magazine’s limited funding (a grant from Mid-Glamorgan TEC and a ‘derisory sum’ from the Arts Council) it managed to find its way on to the shelves of HMV and Virgin Megastore - in London.
John Evans deserves a wider audience for his anthologies, essays and prose poems. His first full-length novel will be published some time in 1999. At present he’s pretty tight-lipped about the project: all he’s willing to give away is that the plot centres on a young man who returns to the Valleys after an absence of several years.
There aren’t many overtly political writers in Britain at the moment - and fewer still get their ideas across with wit and originality. Let’s hope John Evans continues to produce his lively and committed books: he could turn out to be the most effective antidote we have to the myth of Cool Britannia and the growing culture of complacency. At the time of writing, publishing is becoming more market-driven and monolithic. An ‘official’ British culture, which ignores most British people, is gaining more and more influence - with the hideously over-hyped and over-funded Millennium Dome as its principal emblem. And, in spite of worthy government rhetoric about tackling social exclusion, the recently published Acheson report clearly demonstrates that disparities in health and lifespan are related to the increasing gap between Britain’s rich and poor. People like Evans are essential to the survival of communities like the South Wales Valleys. His energy is astonishing: he’s a community entrepreneur, a doughty opponent of the arts establishment and an unflinchingly honest observer of forgotten people, disregarded places and an undervalued culture. Just the kind of artist we need at a time when life is pretty grim for many, but few seem prepared to talk about it.
NOTES
Unsourced quotations are taken from an email correspondence between John Evans and the author.