Tuesday, 6 July 2010
Saturday, 3 July 2010
Prick Up Your Ears
'Mr Cock' by Roger Hardon
The spirit of Joe Orton lives on! Joe Orton was a very talented playwright but for librarians he might be better remembered for his guerilla artwork. In 1962 Joe was jailed for 6 months for stealing and defacing books from Islington Library.
‘Libraries might as well not exist; they’ve got endless shelves for rubbish and hardly any space for good books.’
Joe Orton, 1967.
48 years later (without knowing about Joe Orton) this artwork was created. Not only was the cover impressively altered but the whole book has been subverted turning a children's book into something quite different.
‘I used to stand in the corners after I’d smuggled the doctored books back into the library and then watch people read them.
It was very fun, very interesting.’ Joe Orton
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