Posts with the Hamlet tag

Barris Beat

A stage without Kenneth…

Written by Ted Barris on . 1 Comment
The look Ken Welsh often brought to his December readings of A Child’s Christmas in Wales. Photo  – Charlotte Hale.

I can think of all kinds of memorable spoken quotations. Winston Churchill’s wartime proclamation, “We will fight them on the beaches…” Oprah Winfrey’s motto, “Think like a queen.” Danny Gallivan’s “Savardian Spin-o-rama” on Hockey Night in Canada. Not only are the words etched in my memory, so are their voices. But there’s another memorable voice I’ve always heard around Christmastime offering these memorable words:

“I can never remember whether it snowed for six days and six nights when I was 12, or whether it snowed for 12 days and 12 nights when I was six.” Of course, those are words of Dylan Thomas, from the opening of A Child’s Christmas in Wales.

But I have only ever heard one voice associated with those lines, that of Kenneth Welsh. (more…)

Barris Beat

Precarious or preferred?

Written by Ted Barris on . Leave a comment
1930 Lewis Hine photograph depicting "skywalkers," steelworkers atop Empire State Building, is often used to symbolize "precarious work."
1930 Lewis Hine photograph – depicting “skywalkers,” steelworkers atop Empire State Building – is often used to symbolize “precarious work.”

We hadn’t seen each other in awhile. We stopped to catch up. My friend told me it had been a tough summer. His father had passed. He’d had to put a favourite pet down. So, his work as an artist had suffered. We’re about the same age and we talked about whether the idea of stopping work or even retirement had entered his thinking. He pointed out, while it might be appropriate and healthy to slow down or even retire, that it wasn’t feasible.

“I can’t just decide to stop working,” he said. “Working artists can’t afford to do that.”

We talked a while about what retirement might look like for him. He sensed that he might do more work of his own choosing, as opposed to the work that customers needed or wanted done. But ultimately we came back to the kind of work life he experiences.

“Freelance work never stops,” he said. (more…)