An excruciating kind of nudity

Since the release of Dolores and Other Sorrows, I have been to several open mic nights around Brussels. The book is a collection of short stories, so it lends itself to this format: I sign up to read, I enjoy some authors of poems, short stories or songs and then my name gets called. The venue goes quiet as I approach the microphone. This isn’t one of those dreams where you’re naked giving a presentation at university on a subject you know nothing about. This is real. I have clothes on, but even so I’m feeling worse than naked. The stage is too big when I have it to myself. These readings weren’t the first time I’ve ever been on stage because I used to be a drummer in a mediocre band. However, sitting behind my drumkit and three other musicians gave me a safe cocoon that a microphone can’t. I played pretty much naked once (the real naked, the one without clothes on) and it wasn’t as hard. The thing is, reading stories that are close to your heart is difficult. Some of them are nothing but imagination going wild, but with others you’re saying ‘hey, I’ve got these broken bits and I’ve ripped open my skin. It hurts, but do you want to check it out?’ In my case, most images are often suitably smothered in metaphors, but that just adds another problem. What if people don’t get the meaning? You’re exposing yourself out there, maybe reading about something that’s painful, and certainly reading something that you’ve spent months working on. You want people to like it. They don’t need to come up to you to tell you ‘hey, you’re awesome!’ but, rather, simply to say ‘what you said moved me’ or, in the best-case scenario, ‘what you read was meaningful to me’. The sense of communion with the audience is what is critical. Polite applause is painful. Getting ignored is agony. Someone coming up to you to shake your hand and say ‘hey, I liked your story’ gives you the energy to carry on.

I’m sure there are people who enjoy these performances, or who even relish them. Others will just live with it, consider it part of the job of presenting a book, like waking up early in the morning or putting up with bad coffee and the smelly colleagues who cycle in to work. I’m neither of these. I have a really bad time. On most occasions, I manage to hide my hysteria beneath giggling and speaking fast. I have to make a conscious effort not to rattle off a 2000‑word story in under two minutes. People can get used to all sorts of excruciating ordeals, so I’m sure I’ll grow numb enough to it, if I have to. Probably. For the time being, though, it’s still a work in progress.

Despite all this, I don’t want this entry to come through as gloomy or a sob story. While what I’ve written above is true, there’s also an exhilaration that comes with performing. Is it because you feel most alive when you’re close to death? Now now, let’s not get too melodramatic. The first thirty seconds are hard, but then it gets progressively easier, and in the end there’s certainly some sort of rush. It also helps if there are lights in your face and you can’t see the audience!