Hi Peter,
Sure, don't I know well that it's no more in your
nature than in my own, ever to complain about
anything.
In fact, I agree with much of what you say, as a
description of how things currently happen. But
not as prescriptive for how things should be. As
I said myself, only partly facetiously, I've paid
a lot of taxes over my years as a slave of
industry, and I have an interest in how that
money was spent, and in how current taxpayers'
money is spent.
It's true that filling out funding applications
seems to be something of a black art, but that's
not a reason, to my mind, for not trying to learn
it. Those forms appear to be written by arts
administrators, for arts administrators, and
those of that tribe who aren't employed by the
funding agencies tend, in my experience, to be
linked to large festivals, production companies,
and the like. I'm guessing that's a major reason
(certainly not the only one), why poets backed by
the few large publishing houses can often be
glimpsed as they pass through, from one junket to
another. Their backers know how to tap public
monies in order to push their own 'product'.
You were wrong in ever thinking that the Cork
Festival got substantial funding. Only in the
last couple of years have we broken above 1500
euro (£1000) for the entire festival, and that
has mainly come from individual supporters, a
hundred here, a hundred there, or even out of the
pockets of the organizers. (Which is why I tend
to get a little tetchy when some drunken academic
wannabe puts my windows in.)
This year, due to the freak of culture called the
EU, we may get lucky, but we've not seen a red
cent so far.
But my basic point is simply that 'we' shouldn't
simply abandon all hope of tapping those public
funds. Dammit, we're (ostensibly) who they're
intended for: poets, publishers, organizers of
events who will genuinely produce the goods in
return for some of that funding.
It's an odd thought, maybe - and one to which I
was introduced by cris cheek - but I reckon it's
worth the candle to go after some of that moolah
you mention.
Anyone?
T
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