Paul Edwards' room
The Room
The room is painted a dull green almost to the ceiling, to picture rail height, though there is no picture rail. Above and onto the ceiling is painted an off-white. There is an Edwardian panel door opposite a small upvc window that overlooks the street and beyond that, the river. It’s a crisp, bright, weakly warm February day.
The room measures little more than two metres square, barely enough space to contain the large dark wood desk under the window, the velveteen easy chair next to the desk, the printer sitting on the low metal table against the wall to the right of the window, and the ‘Billy bookcase’ next to the door. This room – designated a bedroom, but always too small – is an office/studio, a collision between day job and vocation. It is organized and it is chaos. All surfaces are covered. Pages from a ‘New Yorker’ calendar, A4 typed pages, notebooks, a dictionary, laptop, keyboard and a coffee cup. Under the desk more papers in boxes and covering a footstool.
On the back of the easy chair there is a woven blanket – tassels and stripes – and on the chair three notebooks, two files, a shoulder bag and yet more papers - no place to sit.
Across the honey-coloured sanded floor to the bookcase - no room for more books. On shelves vertically and horizontally are books about writers and writing, about photography and the heart – there is a medical students plastic model of the heart on one of the shelves. There are photographs too – a framed photograph of three sisters in America and another photo of one of the sisters in Paris, with a new French haircut. On top of the bookcase there are two box brownies and a pinhole camera, two shelves down an SLR and a plastic ‘Diana’ next to two cartoon tourist American telephoto lenses. More papers, more files.
Hanging hidden, from a hook on the door there is a bag from an American writers conference in Chicago, and a small hand made shoulder bag from Cameroon.
The desk chair is a 1950’s Kitchen chair, cute but bad for posture and there is a small chrome pedal-bin – empty and never used.
On the wall to the right of the desk there is a small radiator and close to the desk, four post it notes. There is an illustration on the wall close to the left side of the window, of the pyg and miners tracks to the summit of Snowdon – 3559’.
Above 5’, the top half of the room to the ceiling is almost entirely devoid of clutter, making the occupied lower half resemble sediment or a tide-line. On the ceiling there is a hatch into the roof space – too small to be of much use – and a central light with a neat, tubular, translucent lampshade.
The sound is the click of fingers on a keyboard, forty words a minute.
The room is painted a dull green almost to the ceiling, to picture rail height, though there is no picture rail. Above and onto the ceiling is painted an off-white. There is an Edwardian panel door opposite a small upvc window that overlooks the street and beyond that, the river. It’s a crisp, bright, weakly warm February day.
The room measures little more than two metres square, barely enough space to contain the large dark wood desk under the window, the velveteen easy chair next to the desk, the printer sitting on the low metal table against the wall to the right of the window, and the ‘Billy bookcase’ next to the door. This room – designated a bedroom, but always too small – is an office/studio, a collision between day job and vocation. It is organized and it is chaos. All surfaces are covered. Pages from a ‘New Yorker’ calendar, A4 typed pages, notebooks, a dictionary, laptop, keyboard and a coffee cup. Under the desk more papers in boxes and covering a footstool.
On the back of the easy chair there is a woven blanket – tassels and stripes – and on the chair three notebooks, two files, a shoulder bag and yet more papers - no place to sit.
Across the honey-coloured sanded floor to the bookcase - no room for more books. On shelves vertically and horizontally are books about writers and writing, about photography and the heart – there is a medical students plastic model of the heart on one of the shelves. There are photographs too – a framed photograph of three sisters in America and another photo of one of the sisters in Paris, with a new French haircut. On top of the bookcase there are two box brownies and a pinhole camera, two shelves down an SLR and a plastic ‘Diana’ next to two cartoon tourist American telephoto lenses. More papers, more files.
Hanging hidden, from a hook on the door there is a bag from an American writers conference in Chicago, and a small hand made shoulder bag from Cameroon.
The desk chair is a 1950’s Kitchen chair, cute but bad for posture and there is a small chrome pedal-bin – empty and never used.
On the wall to the right of the desk there is a small radiator and close to the desk, four post it notes. There is an illustration on the wall close to the left side of the window, of the pyg and miners tracks to the summit of Snowdon – 3559’.
Above 5’, the top half of the room to the ceiling is almost entirely devoid of clutter, making the occupied lower half resemble sediment or a tide-line. On the ceiling there is a hatch into the roof space – too small to be of much use – and a central light with a neat, tubular, translucent lampshade.
The sound is the click of fingers on a keyboard, forty words a minute.
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