JIM HAYNES

Introducing Jim Haynes:

"Begin life in Louisiana, pass early teens in Venezuela, three years in a boarding school in Atlanta, attend university in Louisiana (L.S.U. and Tulane), do military obligation and in 1956 settle in Scotland.
Attend the University of Edinburgh, start The Paperback Bookshop & Gallery (1959), The Howff (1961), a folk-song club, the Traverse Theatre (1963), co-organize The Writers' Conference (1962) with John Calder and Sonia Orwell, the Drama Conference (1963) with John Calder and Ken Tynan and participate in the creation of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.
Move to 'swinging London' in 1966 and there co-create the London Traverse Theatre Company with Charles Marowitz, Michael Geliot, and Ralph Koltai. Co-launch the newspaper "I.T." (with Barry Miles, John Hopkins, Jack Moore, and Michael Henshaw), the Arts Lab mixed-media space (with Jack Moore, David Curtis, Biddy Peppin, Pamela Zoline and others). Producer by now of over 250 theatre shows I am awarded The Whitbread Prize in 1966.
In 1969 in Amsterdam co-launch Suck, the sexual freedom newspaper (with William Levy, Heathcote Williams, Germaine Greer, Willem de Ridder, Susan Jensen, Lynne Tillman and others), and direct the Wet Dream Film Festival also in Amsterdam. That same year the newly created University of Paris 8 invites me to be a professor. I taught Media Studies and Sexual Politics with them for thirty years." >>

Activities

Our kitchen-table publishing house, Handshake Editions, continues. Founded in 1980, we publish small print-runs. >>

I also write and publish newsletters, pamphlets and books. >>

The A2 Gallery hosts small exhibitions of paintings and photographs. >>
From time to time, the atelier is transformed into a performance space for theatrical and other events.

Jim's life in the Theatre

My first theatrical experience was a T.S. Eliot play (I think The Cocktail Party) in Shreveport, Louisiana way back in the 40s. I was knocked out.

In the 1950s, I managed to see South Pacific, Porgy and Bess and other Broadway shows.

In 1956, when I moved to Edinburgh, my theatre-going activities increased. Thanks to Edinburgh's Gateway Theatre, the Lyceum Theatre, touring productions at the King's Theatre (another production of South Pacific and John Osborne's Look Back in Anger) and every August the Edinburgh Festival. Glasgow, an hour away, had the Citizens Theatre. Plus many trips to London's West End. On a brief trip to New York City in 1959, thanks to Fifi Sigg, managed to catch the off-Broadway production of The Three Penny Opera with Lotte Lenya.
In the 1957 Edinburgh Festival, after attending Ugo Betti's Corruption in the House of Justice, I stopped my Volkswagen in the Royal Mile and asked three people, who I had noticed earlier sitting near me in the theatre, if they would like a ride... >>

Plans

How to make the gods laugh: tell them your plans. Nevertheless I hope the future includes my continuing to live here in my Paris atelier, travelling to see friends, writing newsletters and books, hosting friends, organizing the Sunday dinners, and enjoying every minute of life. For me, happiness is an intellectual concept, and I decided years ago to be happy. In spite of (and because of) everything, I love life. It has been good to me, and I hope that I have been good to it.

young Jimmy Haynes

The Sunday Dinners

In the early 70s launch with Cathy Sroufe (now Monnet), a Sunday salon chez moi. It is still a major event in my life and takes place, rain or shine, every Sunday evening from 20h00 to 23h00 - except for the two or three weeks in August when I attend the Edinburgh International Festival. People, over the past twenty-five years, come from all corners of the world. To attend, please write, email or call to have your name added to that week's list. >>

Throw a Great Party, the cook book inspired by Jim's Sunday dinners, has just been published.
Get your copy here!
Read about the Cook Book on the Handshake editions' page!

Travels

One of my favorite activities is to travel to visit friends and lovers. I also travel to further projects and to meet new friends and lovers. Favorite destinations are festivals. Over the years I have attended dozens of festivals and conferences. And I like going back to the same festival year after year. I have attended The Edinburgh International Festival every year... >>