Three Lives A Long Holiday and A Steel Elephant

<p>This is my memoir. It is also my personal history of Emergency Exit Arts from 1980 to 2007 where I was Co-Artistic Director from 1991 to 2007. It was the largest theatre and arts company in the UK committed to outdoor and spectacular shows.</p><p>This book is my first. It describes my experiences and adventures from a poor working-class childhood school further education dead end jobs and the meanderings in the underbellies of Soho in London and Amsterdam.</p><p>It then charts my second life with Emergency Exit Arts. I have kept this section discursive and I hope entertaining for both the general reader and professional theatre workers. I can only talk with veracity about the work I was responsible for. The history is unauthorised and at times contentious.</p><p>It concludes in my current hometown a small fishing and agricultural town in The Dominican Republic named Rio San Juan.</p><p></p><p>It's a remarkable achievement. Shocking funny brilliantly remembered with immense detail.... especially dealing with the traumas of your early years has been fulfilling and maybe even cathartic for you. It can be a huge and difficult task to unearth and objectify hidden stuff and your work here seems to be very thorough intense exceptionally honest and tightly (and brightly!) written.</em></p><p>As an outsider your personal revelations are enthralling to read and may well grab a wide audience. The story of your father's suicide with your reflections on it is a compelling example. It is very particular and unusual but paradoxically it might strike a universal chord.</em></p><p>From my point of view thank you very much for letting me into your special world. It has been a privilege to read of experiences where our paths have crossed and crossed creatively and great to learn of so much other joy and chaos you have engineered. As I have said your insights into your early years are revelatory and awful. I am glad you appear to have transcended them to fly off with multi-coloured wings.</em></p><p></p><p>John Fox</p><p>Co-director with Sue Gill of DEAD GOOD GUIDES Ex Founder and Artistic Director of Welfare State International. Published poet image maker author lecturer grandfather and cultural provocateur. </p>