This is a very short piece. In tribute to SH who died yesterday. I wrote it a few weeks ago when it was very hot – the video is Highgate Wood in the snow a couple of years ago.
Richard
I haven’t posted anything for ages so I thought I would post this
Yorkfleet is a little creek on the River Roach. I wrote this piece a while ago, but I couldn’t quite finish it. It is the first part/movement of a larger piece called Estuary. The words come from T.S Elitot’s The Wasteland and the video is shot on a recent trip sailing with my friend Dom.
Finishing things is hard!
I am nothing if not a child of the twentieth century and despite being born 20 years after VE day my generation grew up in the shadow of the second world war. The war was a formative influence on me, not just because my Father fought in it or that my Mothers relations in Poland were all but wiped out in one day, but because it formed such a backbone of narrative in so many stories, films and TV series as I grew up.
The Second World War for the British was, and still is widely seen as the triumph of good over evil. The stories of the second world war often seem to me, to be a way for us to forget our demotion from imperial super power and to recast ourselves as virtuous defenders of freedom rather than the supercilious carpetbaggers we once were.
Savage Continent seeks to explain the context surrounding the end of the second world war, In fact it goes further in showing how the forces that brought Europe to its knees still simmered on after 8th of May 1945. The cold war, the war after the break up of Yugoslavia and the geo political struggle in the middle east are all part for a continuing story that is so well told in this book.
Savage Continent will surely be seen as a seminal book on the Second World War. Ketih Lowe has managed to weave large events, small details, bewildering statistics and heartbreaking narrative seamlessly into this wonderful and disturbing book. No doubt the inter-nicene conflicts that formed the subplot of the Second World War will continue to resonate and disturb the twenty first century as they have in previous centuries but the book ends in expressing real hopes that at least some of the demons may have been tamed.
All books are a discovery. For me the story of how I came to read the book in the first place makes me savour this discovery all the more. Some friends from our road were sitting in our local pub. One of them – Keith handed out an invite for a book launch at our local book store. I had no idea up to this point what Keith did. Of course I went to the book launch and bought my copy which Keith signed with the words ‘see Richard I do write books:)’. At the end of the evening Keith made a short speech thanking us for coming and in a particularly sweet way, warning us that the book was perhaps ‘a little dark’. It must be a strange feeling to see something that has been a major part of your life being handed around your neighbourhood. I can only say that, Keith if you ever read this – you can indeed write books and you have written something profoundly good.
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Long shore drift
Orfordness is about as east as you can go in the UK its a product of long shore drift surely the most poetic of geographic phrases – The music is the kernel of an idea that might find its way into a new project or not…
Among the Christmas presents I got this year was the Charles Dickens biography by Clare Tomlin. I’ve read the excellent biography by Peter Ackroyd as well as many of his books of course. It is his 200th birthday in February and the BBC have been having a bit of a Dickens feast over christmas. For me as a fan of his writing this Dickensian orgy is wonderful. But reading about him as a man is more than a little bit problematic. His genius lies, not just in his fantastic characterisations or wonderful turns of phrase but in his superhuman work ethic. Reading about his work life leaves me uncomfortably breathless at times. Occasionally I get asked by friends if I am still writing music. “Well” I say, “You know how it is, you get home after a day in the office and by the time you have cooked and eaten your dinner it is 10pm – too late to really start something”. And then in bed as I read how Dickens came home at 1:3o am from reporting on a debate in the House of Commons to start work on Sketches by Boz and work through the night, I feel like a lazy indolent slob for staying in my warm bed!
This internal pressure, or lack of it is what prompts us to make resolutions in the last dying moments of the year. It is hard to imagine Charles Dickens ever coming home and saying “you know what, I am just going to have a nice night in and read the paper”. Of all his gifts it is that energy that I most covert.
I have to accept that I, along with almost everyone else don’t have and will never have that sort of energy. And If Charles (We must be on first name terms by now after all the time we have spent together) looks out of Clare Tomlin’s book reproachfully, I can only thank him for the reproach.
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Arsenal – recherche du temps perdu
I write this knowing that some who read it will think me mad. Some will see me on the road to recovery others to a sort of bleak meaningless existence. For those of you who are ambivalent about football this little missive might give you a little insight into the mentality of a football fan – well this football fan at least.
I first went to Highbury the spiritual and erstwhile temporal home of Arsenal football club 41 years ago. It was so long ago that I remember it as being in black and white. It was a cold foggy day in 1970 and I have to admit that aged 5 it didn’t grip me. Throughout my school days I was a very infrequent visitor to ‘The home of football’ I was always a Gooner but the mania really struck me in my twenties. I found myself living on Highbury Hill slap bang opposite the away entrance.
It was a time when you could decide to go to a game on the Saturday (in my case at 2:55pm) and for £8 which wasn’t that much even twenty years ago; money on the turnstile and in you go to another world. Like all all obsessions it doesn’t take you all at once it is insidious. My then girlfriend (and now wife) came to a match and fell totally in love with it. And from then on Saturdays (for it was only on a Saturday then) became a special day; a day of rituals, of triumphs and disappointments.
In 1993 we both became season ticket holders I seem to remember them costing about £200. Post Taylor Report all Football league grounds were all seater and the days of paying on the gate were gone. Having a season ticket isn’t just about the football. You end up sitting with and eventually becoming friends with the people who sit around you. You go to away grounds with them, sometimes you find yourself meeting them in another countries. They are people who I hardly ever see other than in the context of football but whom I have known for nearly twenty years. It is a strange and lovely thing – close but disconnected.
On the 7th of May 2006 I left the seat (which I only ever sat in at half time) for the last time and went with my neighbours to the gleaming Emirates stadium. Looking back it was a watershed – a point where things took on a different, more corporate hue. Around me were still some of the familiar faces I had known over the previous 13 years but they were somehow diluted in a vast sterile commercial space. At this point a season ticket cost just under £1000 pounds. Arsenal had made a point of holding down the price of season tickets – a somewhat hollow boast given how much they had gone up in previous years. Still you can’t really blame them – football was booming. Sky and European competition had raised its profile. Everyone wanted a piece of football. In 1991 after England got knocked out by Germany in the semi finals of the World Cup playing some really decent football the collective disappointment garnished with a healthy dose of Puccini and Des Lynam made football main stream. Nick Hornby’s book fever pitch and the first major International football tournament hosted on English soil since 1966 (euro ’98) further cemented football at the centre of English life. football was now seen as a wholesome family, inclusive activity, a world away form the troubled days of the Heysel and Hillsborough disasters. Politicians and Commercial concerns jumped on this seemingly unassailable band wagon attracting even more money into the game and with the Bosman ruling that money found it’s way into the pockets of the players and their agents. All this time we who went to the matches week in and week out were slowly being squeezed. A season ticket was the only way to see Arsenal play at Highbury demand so outstripped supply that there was a reported 10 year waiting list. People around me now found themselves having to dig deeper and deeper into their pockets every May in order to stump up the ever increasing ticket prices and inevitably some didn’t.
Whereas in the past one could boast that ‘I hadn’t missed a home game all season’ as a sign of unwavering support. These days it is as much (perhaps more) a statement about your disposable income. We sat in our seats at the last home game of the season and looked around us. If it was two thirds full I would be surprised. As the game went on, the disappointment of a season where both on and off the pitch the good guys had not won; Arsene Wenger’s faith in talented youth playing total football had proved fruitless yet again and the club, the last of the top flight clubs independently owned was now a playing thing of an american businessman, took it’s toll. For the first time I could ever remember the chant went up specifically about ticket prices: 6 per-cent you’re ‘avin a laugh… By the time the announcer ‘Thanked us for our loyal support’ and flashed the total attendance for the season (a figure much derided) on the jumbo screen the chants were deafening.
We left the stadium knowing that we would not renew our season tickets. We toyed with the idea of selling them on, but that would have perpetuated a merry go round that ends with players earning more in a week than most of us earn in two or three years.
Perhaps I am wrong and it will be difficult to get tickets to games but I doubt it – we are now red members (red – a colour I am more comfortable with than gold) We can’t go to all the games anyway – we have another life. It has been a long process to get to this point. Its not one thing that has pre-empted it: The change of the club crest to garner intellectual property rights over it or more recently the change of club motto from Victoria Concordia Crescit (Union enhances victory) to the rather more bland and prosaic ‘forward’. Its not the fact that we are paying very large sums of money up front for matches that we can’t both go to. Its not the vulgar thoughtless show of wealth or a rich American owner. It is none of these things in isolation. Football is no longer the darling of the media industry and politicians. Perhaps the bubble, if not burst has at least been pricked and ticket prices will become affordable again. One things for sure they wont be getting our £2.5k this year at least and although I am sure that they will find someone prepared to take our place this time I am also sure we are not alone.
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Venice in Vitro
At the risk of sounding like I am always on holiday or at least that I live from one to the next I find myself writing about yet another Holiday. The fact is we are currently now in Venice. A trip that we have been looking forward to for about a year. Visiting a new place can (perhaps should) be experienced in every tense: Future, planning and research the buying and of course reading of maps and books. The present; the experience, sensual, observational and in the moment. And lastly the past, reflective a compound of ones preconceptions, misconceptions and new experiences.
I had a great time finding out about Venice. Jan Morris’s book Venice is a great read if like me you needed a personal introduction to La Serenissima. I also read ‘Venetian Navigators: The Voyages of the Zen Brothers to the Far North‘ a lovely whimsical account of how Venice’s Nicolo and Antonio Zen might have discovered America 100 years before Columbus and lastly the wonderful Francesco da Mosto’s Venice DVD (BBC) – gripping and insightful. Of course that is a barely scratching the surface of a city that has enthralled Shakespeare, Byron Dickens, Goethe.. well let’s stop there shall we?
So in writing this I am painfully aware that there is not much that I can do add to their sum of knowledge and insight except to humbly insert my impression for what its worth. Now I am a city boy, yes I love the countryside, the peace and quiet of a rural idle but if you want to see the apogee of humanity you have to visit a city. Cities are where we test ourselves, where great art and industry is realised. Venice like my city (London) has been the centre of a trading empire. However Venice’s imperial power went into decline when Vasco da Gama reached India by sea in 1499 and was finally given the coup de grace by Napoleon 300 years later. Since then travellers and perhaps most particularly British travellers have been mesmerised by its decline.
There is no doubt that it is truly is one of the most beautiful cites in the world. The combination of extreme age, water and isolation make it visually irresistible. Even the internal combustion engine – the most destructive urban phenomenon has not blighted it (much). There are no cars on the island so people walk. This means that people talk to each other, they know about the places they travel though as much the places they travel to. In this respect Venetian life is lived as it has been for over a thousand years. What has changed is the volume of visitors. If ever there was a perfect realisation of a Faustian Pact it must be the tourism industry. The money that pours into the city disgorged by the multitude that arrive each day from cruise ships and two airports goes some way to keep alive some of the cultural highlights of the western world but at what a price. The look of frustration and sometimes bewilderment on the faces of Venetians as they try to move around their city during the summer months is very apparent. You can’t help wondering whether some of them would prefer to see the gold leaf of St Marks blowing away on the wind to the hoards of brightly coloured glassy eyed invaders clogging up its narrow streets.
Well we have ridden in a Gondola (and the Tragghetto – four times) Taken numerous Vaporetti. Visited the Doges Palace and St Marks. Shopped in the Rialto. Gone to the Beach. Watched glass blowing in Murano. Visited beautiful Burano and Torachelli. Visited a few churches (as Many as Joseph and Evie could stomach) and have eaten and drunk and made merry. Yes it was not for the feint of wallet. Venice is after all a city where you can see wealth in its extreme very close up. It is, and has always been, a city of Oligarchs. Our last day in Venice coincided with the opening of the Venice Bienalle – a sort of Olympics of the art world. All along the water front from St Marks to the Arsenale were moored the Yachts of the super rich and as we made our way back down the Grand Canal at night on our last Vaporetto ride home we looked up in awe at the illuminated Palazzos. On roof tops and in grand salons the great, the good and the not so good supped their Bellinis and prepared to party into the night. Who cares about the banking crisis or global warming or any other trivialities? This is, as it has always been Venice in Vitro!
Bootnote: There are a few things that really merit a mention. In no particular order first off: Osteria Ca’ D’Oro (La Vedova) Google it and ignore the luke warm comments the meat balls are indeed to die for. Around the corner is Grom – not a traditional Gellatia (ice cream parlor) but awsomely scrumptious.
If you are there for the Art and want to see a painting rather than a ‘concept’ . Go and see Günter Pusch at the Palazzo Albizzi Cannaregio 4118
Last year we went camping in Wales. It was lovely, Wales was beautiful and The Green Man Festival was fabulous (again) however there were dark clouds, alas not metaphorical clouds but real clouds with real rain. We had a good time but when we looked at this years camping trips in our van we decided that we needed to remember what camping is like when the sun shines. Cue the New Forrest. Now I am sure that it does rain sometimes in the New Forrest but we have never been there when it has, and when you are camping that is what counts.
So with a scorching bank Holiday beckoning we loaded up the Van and headed south. We had stayed at Denny Wood five years ago and loved the way you can camp under the trees. This is a site where you don’t have to book months ahead and even if it is full. There are other sites all run by Forrest Holidays. We have our own loo so we have a greater choice of sites including Denny’s. We arrived on Thursday evening, set up and had supper. By the time we had washed up it was almost dark and wonderfully peaceful. Because the site has no loo; the site is populated almost exclusively by Motor homes and caravans, the owners of which tend to retreat inside them when it gets dark leaving the forest to us. I don’t think we have stayed on a quieter site anywhere!
The next day we woke up and had breakfast watching the dear and listening to a cuckoo. Went a couple miles into Lyndhurst, hired a couple of bikes and came back and read and lazed around in the sunshine. The kids found other kids to play with and I looked blissfully out into the forest. Looking up through the iridescent green oak canopy to the powder blue sky above I remembered why I love camping.
I am not sure how many times I have been to the Natural History Museum. it must be quite a few but this time it was going to be different. For a start we arrived over an hour after it closed to the public with sleeping bags, a picnic and 5 very excited children. Dinosnores as the Natural History museum sleep over is called is run once a month and requires pre booking, quite a lot of pre booking as it turns out. There are the various forms that need to be signed by the parents of the children you are taking and a fair bit of planning about what you will take.
Although we ate just before we arrived we packed a snack (as requested) for the evening, sleeping bags, wash bag and a change of clothes for everyone. We arrived at the Darwin Centre Entrance at 7pm and began to get a sense of the scale of the evening. We were met by museum staff who organised our group into a larger group of about 40, distributed pre printed name badges and led us into a briefing of the nights activities. From there we were led into the main hall where we made camp along with the 500 other campers. It was at this point you got a feel for the scale of the evening – I had up to this point, imagined it as a few kids and grown ups, camped around the large Dinosaur in the main hall. The reality was altogether much more impressive.
The hall was filled with sleeping mats not just in the main area of the hall but up the stairs and into the gallery. Even Darwin had company as he look down on the multitude. The first activity of the evening was to use Lyme Regis clay to paint a gigantic fossil montage with fingers – a cleverly thought out activity as it calmed everyone down including over excited adults like me. After that it was time for a snack followed by a torch lit ‘Guess the Dinosaur trail’ All the while we were shepherded by museum staff who struck exactly the right balance between keeping us all nicely in line without at any time being overbearing. The result was that we were all really relaxed and receptive for a lecture on poisonous and venomous bugs from 10:30 – 11pm. Yes that’s right 250 8 – 14 year olds switched on to a lecture on invertebrates and when I say switched on I mean it. One kid in front of us described how honey bees Kill invading Hornets ( they cook then to death), all way past bedtime.
If you have never been to the Natural History Museum then you won’t know that the original building is a cross between a cathedral and a railway station. if you have been there you might remember the statue of Charles Darwin. It was moved a few years ago and now looks down on the main hall from the staircase. So after 500 people brush their teeth we all lie down and look up at the vaulted ceiling embellished with monkeys, to our right is a Diplodocus to our left Darwin looks down in thought… and then the lights go out. within a minute there is quiet – quiet enough to hear the last tube rumbling way below the museum. I can’t say that I had the best night sleep ever but it was not nearly as bad as I feared it might be.
By Five people were surfacing albeit quietly and by six we were all awake and ready for breakfast (free for the Kids) they managed to tuck in two more events, the first given by a very funny entomologist and the second by a guy who had a nice collection of animals and a good line in banter. We were then free to go off and explore the museum before the ordinary punters traipsed in at 10 in the morning.
This was a great experience for grown-ups and Kids alike and well worth the lost sleep!
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Up on the Hill…
I have a slightly jaundiced attitude when it comes to a view outside my window. I grew up in a flat that had the most amazing view across Hampstead Ponds so amazing in fact that it killed my father. He was so in love with the view that he forgot that he could go out into it and as a consequence died of atrophy ( and Vodka and fags). Now we find ourselves in a Flat in Muswell Hill that at the back at least over looks huge Horse Chestnut trees with not another house in sight. At the front the Plane trees that line the road have been pollarded to within an inch of their life. They look in the twilight like giant alien beasts that have fallen head long into the pavement, their limbs frozen in shock.
Its been ten years since we last moved home and it was the first time for our kids. They are treating the experience as sort of holiday, albeit one where they still have to go to school. For us it has been an exercise in logistics and adjustment – mainly due to the loss of two rooms. Amazingly we seem to have fitted all our stuff in remarkably well, sure we left practically all out books and quite a few boxes of other stuff, languishing in out loft, but the vast majority of what we own is now in our two bed flat. I am quite proud of that.