At a later point, House Mother Normal walks in on the polar bear FEEDING, the reeboks in a FRENZY. Who fed them? House Mother Normal works herself up over the polar bears and the reeboks freeloading. She is exploring the possibility of them fixing the boiler in exchange for their squid-. No! I say. The polar bears are novelists, the reeboks are poets, it is not within their remit nor skill set to fix and English boiler!” Discussion of several aspects of life on the Isle of Wight. Secret military projects (the Rainbow Codes such as Violet Club and Purple Possum can become characters in Waidner’s world), Sandown zoo and life in a guest house all play a part. Isabel Waidner (Creative Writing) shortlisted for Goldsmiths Prize 2021". All Things SED. 2021-10-07 . Retrieved 2021-11-24. I think part of that may be due to my familiarity with Waidner’s very distinctive techniques and style.

If I were to take a giant sieve and sift through the main themes, I would definitely say that this is a political novel, which criticises current day Britain. We’re realistic in Britain. The project to somehow, we don’t know how exactly, write credible modes of resistance while running out of options is probably at the heart of interdisciplinary queer writing atm, don’t quote me on it. In DIAMOND STUFF, even the Upside Down ends up turning bitter – the fantasy can’t be sustained, not under the circumstances. Not in Tory Britain, no way. But the Tonya Harding story doesn’t possess a single, defeatist meaning. She may have been ostracised and undervalued by the skating community. She may have turned to violence in retaliation or revenge. She also kept going. Class trappings operated as a brake on respectability but not self-realisation. And so it goes for the narrator of this resourceful, fist-raising novel – trapped in Brexit Britain, perennially precarious, but finding a way through, as reflected in their statement of defiance, the lovely, comma’d motto, “I have talents, I’ll use them.”

The judges on the shortlist

A key element of their writing I believe (again in my words) is the rejection of the traditional novelistic structure featuring a main character, other key characters, minor characters and then passive objects with which they interact. It might be because I’ve had some practice with Gaudy Bauble, but this new book is actually more accessible. That said, There is not a single ordinary sentence in Isabel Waidner’s We Are Made of Diamond Stuff. A novel that reads like an act of sabotage, of resistance, written as a song-scream against our nullifying need to belong. It is charged with undeniable life, like some explosive projectile aimed at all our insidious narratives (nationalism, exclusionary culture, corporatism, conservatism and so much more). You hope it goes off, that it blows open everything in its sights—just so that you may ride out on its wake. It leaves you laughing, breathless but also heartbroken and hopeful, like the spirited survivors in the book itself. Like lightning, this novel. It is a furious work, stuffed with necessary power, purpose and also affection. And to borrow one of its lines to re-articulate it—Like the lypard, it navigates dimensions.

There is not a single ordinary sentence in Isabel Waidner’s We Are Made of Diamond Stuff. A novel that reads like an act of sabotage, of resistance, written as a song-scream against our nullifying need to belong. It is charged with undeniable life, like some explosive projectile aimed at all our insidious narratives (nationalism, exclusionary culture, corporatism, conservatism and so much more). You hope it goes off, that it blows open everything in its sights – just so that you may ride out on its wake. It leaves you laughing, breathless but also heartbroken and hopeful, like the spirited survivors in the book itself. Like lightning, this novel. It is a furious work, stuffed with necessary power, purpose and also affection. And to borrow one of its lines to re-articulate it – like the lypard, it navigates dimensions.’However, unfortunately, I did not enjoy th

We Are Made Of Diamond Stuff is an innovative and critically British novel, taking issue with the dream of national belonging. Set on the Isle of Wight, a small island off the south coast of England, it collides literary aesthetics with contemporary working-class cultures and attitudes (B.S. Johnson and Reebok classics), works with themes of empire, embodiment and resistance, and interrogates autobiographical material including the queer migrant experience. What even is this? It’s a daring, uncompromising, bonkers serious-scape of the kind that rarely gets the limelight in the UK’s contemporary literary field. Why? Because it’s subversive, off the wall and, frankly, challenging to the status quo of what literature is and does. For all these reasons, I’m glad of it. queer identities, especially in the case of their overlap with the two factors above (working class and immigrant identities). Also the issues arising between the queer and gay people in the modern day Britain due to their politics. To my interest, both of these elements (which I initially may have regarded as criticisms) are dwelt on and examined and explained in the thesis as intrinsic to their situation and to their new literary concept.Expat identities: a queer migrant's reinvention abroad". propertylistings.ft.com . Retrieved 2021-11-24. This book published by Dostoyevsky Wannabe has been shortlisted for the 2019 Goldsmith Prize – which I think could not be more appropriate, and in fact is overdue recognition of Isabel Waidner’s concept of a form of fiction which in line with the prize’s aims “breaks the mould … extends the possibility of the novel form …. embodies the spirit of invention that characterises the genre at its best”. America has longer traditions of innovative queer/trans writing and a new press called Cipher Press is publishing interesting stuff, like Large Animals by Jess Arndt. This is the kind of writing I’m excited about and it’s coming through in the UK now – Shola von Reinhold [author of L ote, winner of this year’s Republic of Consciousness prize] is obviously part of that. When Sterling is unjustly put on trial after being assaulted, the judge offers to drop the case if he can appear on Sterling’s show…

This leads to reflection on the work of Tommy Pico and his Nature Poem (which includes the line I can’t write a nature poem bc that conversation happens in the Hall of South American Peoples in the American Museum of Natural History.) This is no surprise given that Waidner uses every interview as an opportunity to decry posh, elitist “Oxbridge”. They Are Made of Diamond Stuff (2019) is a formally innovative novel set in a queer working-class milieu in post-EU-referendum Britain. It is designed as an intervention against the normativity of experimental publishing contexts in the UK, and, more widely, against the rise of conservativism and nationalism globally. In a 'post-truth' sociopolitical context where powerful narratives and imaginaries shape public opinion and influence electoral results, They Are Made of Diamond Stuff explores the potential of innovative fictions to help advance a progressive politics within marginalised (migrant, LGBTQ, BAME) communities and beyond, and to act as a mode of cultural resistance. Overall it is an experimental brave novel. The author is definitely taking risks which should be applauded for. But aesthetically i was not very pleased which is rather subjective of course and reflects my taste rather than the book quality. I will try their another novel to know them better. What else can you expect to come across in We Are Made of Diamond Stuff. Well, as just a few examples, considerIsabel Waidner is a writer and critical theorist. Their books include We Are Made Of Diamond Stuff (2019), Gaudy Bauble (2017) and Liberating the Canon: An Anthology of Innovative Literature (ed., 2018), published by Dostoyevsky Wannabe. Waidner’s critical and creative texts have appeared in journals including AQNB, Cambridge Literary Review, The Happy Hypocrite, Tank Magazine and Tripwire. They are the co-founder of the event series Queers Read This at the Institute of Contemporary Art (with Richard Porter), and an academic at University of Roehampton, London. The judges on the shortlist The best way to consider this latest thesis extract(Diamond) is as a response to this “Oxbridge” vitriol: Waidner, Isabel, ed. (2018), Liberating the Canon: an Anthology of Innovative Literature, Dostoyevsky Wannabe Experimental, ISBN 9781999924508 N2 - We Are Made Of Diamond Stuff is an innovative and critically British novel, taking issue with the dream of national belonging. Set on the Isle of Wight, a small island off the south coast of England, it collides literary aesthetics with contemporary working class cultures and attitudes (B.S. Johnson and Reebok classics), works with themes of empire, embodiment and resistance, and interrogates autobiographical material including the queer migrant experience.