About writing, the London connection.... 

 

I don't come from a literary background, or at least up until I left Toronto, I had no knowledge of having any specific literary ties. In fact part of my decision to write was because of ineptitude in all other fields, including expressing myself verbally, at times. I always saw myself as a regular guy and still do – not as part of the literary clique. However when I came to London and got to meet a lot of writers, I came upon some writing stuff which astonished me. My great great uncle Leslie was a writer of popular musicals in the London West End and wrote and perfomed a play called Lumber Love (about a Canadian Logging Camp) which was staged in front of The Duke and Duchess of York at the Lyceum Theatre in 1928. This was vaguely known in my family, but was largely lost in the telling as he was rumoured to have set his house on fire in the twenties and lost his fortune in the stock market crash of 1928. A shadowy figure who was a celebrated author in the roaring twenties he wrote a song called: Why do they call me a Gibson Girl? So what does it have to do with Taking the Stairs? Well sometimes you wonder where this stuff comes from and why you are motivated to write what you write. This is the strange psychic power of writing and this leads me to my own interest in writing and music which I have followed from an early age in a small town in rural Nova Scotia. The third Section of the Taking the Stairs is about a former celebrated writer, Richard Caple, who has dropped out of the scene because he cannot take the pressure or match up to his own expectations. Since this has not been touched upon in reviews of the work I thought I would add my views here, cheeky huh? 

 

Comparing Richard Caple (in Taking the Stairs) to Leslie Stiles in (1920's London). 

 

In the third and final section of Taking The Stairs, Richard Caple is a former celebrated poet (lyricist?) who has dropped out of the New York (London?) poetry (writing?) scene because of a failed romance (death in the family?) and has got a job in a dance hall as a janitor (Leslie Stiles worked as a theatre doorman in the West End till his death after the crash of 1928). I really don't know where this character came from as I only knew about a shadowy figure of a 'famous' great, great uncle in the family growing up Canada but the third section of Taking the Stairs is a strange diversion from the intense love triangle or relationship between Jarod, Elliot and Aidrieneese which has taken over the second part of book at this point. Is this the ghost of Leslie Stiles coming back to haunt me and the reader after all these years? I dunno exactly, but as you get older you start to see patterns emerging. That is all I'm going to say on this theme but if you do make it that far in the book, you might see more on the subject of the old poet who has made a name for himself and then seen his dreams go up in flames, literally. 

 

Lastly, there is more on Leslie Stiles on various internet sites and a portrait in the National Portrait Gallery of him in a top hat standing with quite wide hips, like me, about six foot four. It is weird to be in London and writing about Canada and the Annapolis Valley following almost exactly one hundred years to the day after my infamous great great uncle - who wrote and promoted a lavishly staged three hour London musical about a Canadian Logging camp.