It happens every year. The circus leaves town. Autumn hits Edinburgh overnight. The leaves are brown and red and gold, and the streets are empty once more.
The festival began for me with a meeting. I found Hermann Nitsch unexpectedly sitting in a corner of the room for the opening of his exhibition at Summerhall. We spoke a while – both of us through a fog of wine – and he gave me a gift of his recording – Sinfonie für Mexico City. He was an unexpectedly warm fellow, sitting grinning in a pool of blood and meat and gore, as it were. I promised I would write to him, and further that I would buy him lunch when I was next in Vienna.
At the other end of the festival I rounded off my series of Total Theatre reviews with a reverie more than a review of Robert Lepage’s 887. I actually saw the show in the first half of the festival, but I sat on the piece for a while, because it contained a decision. If I published the piece, I woudl be forced to go through with the decision. Which I did. And so I have. The air up here, or out here, is really very thin. But I feel light, and sure, and resolved.
You can read here what the decision was:
http://totaltheatre.org.uk/making-better-memories-robert-lepage/
So now I return to nothing more than my sound making, my mark making, my word forming. I return with perfect faith. I have at least thirty letters to write. I must begin.