A Common Spring
Radiophrenia, November 2020
Original painting by Isabella Shields
A Common Spring is the radio adaptation of Isabella Shields’ work-in-progress horror novel of the same name, accompanied by a sonic response from the artist Adam Benmakhlouf.
Taking its name from Edgar Allan Poe’s ‘Alone’, A Common Spring follows five content creators for ‘Interim’ magazine who have been sent to cover the village of Hareton Gowt’s annual fete. The existing romantic and resentful tensions in the group complicate their difficult engagement with the villagers, and realities and relationships become increasingly destabilised as their coverage of the fete takes increasingly horrifying turns. In its mood, the story itself is designed to create a pervasive sense of disturbance and dissonance. As it develops thematically, it becomes a consideration of personal authenticity, the erosion of individualism, and the mutability of selfhood.
In turn, Benmakhlouf’s soundscape combines original composition and bootlegged mixtape in a theme of suspense that emphasises the multiplicity and re-figurations of the story through an anxious interaction of a diversity of audio materials. For A Common Spring, Adam treats the sonic and textural audio elements as a further means of creating a surprising and out of the ordinary encounter in order to facilitate a sense of leaving the rigid patterns of daily avoidance or emotional disengagement.
A Common Spring is based on an original concept by and has been developed with Harlan McGlinchey, whose vocal performance features in this broadcast.