hockney...

Our family has had something of a passion for Hockney’s art for several years now (eg. #hoctober: Hannah has been posting Hockney-inspired images each October on her social media pages).
So, you won’t be surprised that Moira and I spent Monday evening watching the David Hockney documentary on Sky Arts. It proved to be a rather lovely 90 minutes of television. It was the first in a four-part series - conversations between Hockney and Bragg, filmed over 12 months in both London and at the artist’s Normandy studio, plus archival footage and commentary from distinguished ‘Hockney fans’ allowing a chance to review his work over the past SEVEN decades (he’s now 86 and I think he sold his first painting – of his father – for £10 in 1955)(I wonder where it is now?)*.
Remarkably, he’s had more than 400 exhibitions over the course his lifetime (including 3 solo shows in 2023!) and, of course, he hasn’t finished yet because he shows no sign of slowing down. It was a reminder of the incredibly range of his work – which includes designing stage sets for opera, photography, stained glass, drawings and paintings… using a whole range of different technologies and traditional techniques.
Leaves me a little fazed by just how boring predictable I’ve become in MY old age!
Well worth watching if you can.

* a subsequent documentary revealed that Hockney bought the painting back several years later.

the great mountain sheep gather…

This programme was first shown on BBC4 in April 2020. I missed it the first time, but just watched it on iPlayer.

It’s a 100minute documentary about sheep farming on Scafell Pike, England’s tallest mountain, and so you’re probably not interested in watching it… BUT I really think you should.
Every summer, half a dozen shepherds and perhaps 20 sheepdogs gather a flock of 500 native Hardwick sheep from some 1,200 acres(?) and bring them down the mountain to the farm for shearing. It’s an event that has taken place in the Lake District for over a thousand years.
The Great Mountain Sheep Gather charts this journey across the fells with epic bird’s-eye view photography descending into the valley below. The gathering commences at dawn (in thick mist) and takes some 7 hours to complete – over foggy peaks, crags and incredibly rough terrain (no electric quad bikes here!).
As the fog lifts to expose the breathtaking landscape, and the small pockets of sheep merge into one big group, the voice of Lakeland shepherd Andrew Harrison allows us to see this unique world through his eyes – the knowledge of the dogs, farmers and sheep passed down from generation to generation for centuries, the challenges of life in the fells, and the conflict posed by visitors and the 21st century. Harrison explains that some of the smaller farms have been sold and the farmhouses converted to holiday homes. There are less and less experienced farmers and shepherds remaining to pass on knowledge acquired over generations. Harrison talks movingly of the pride and respect he holds for the land and the privilege of doing what he does
The documentary is beautifully put together – with the shepherd’s insights, poetry (written by Mark Pajak), bleats, barks and birdsong echoing down the valley creating an evocative natural soundtrack (no background is required!).
And, of course, once the flock has assembled at the farm, five hundred sheep now have to be sheared! It’s a shepherd’s life…
It’s a quite, quite wonderful and a hugely humbling account of the challenges, skill, knowledge and bravery needed to care for a flock in this rugged land.
PS: I’ve previously read the wonderful James Rebanks’ books ‘English Pastoral’ and ‘The Shepherd’s Life’ - about the Rebanks’ family having been sheep farmers in the fells of the Lake District for several generations and, like Harrison, about his love and pride for the land he farms; for his family; for the knowledge that has been passed down to him (and that he, in turn, will pass on to others); for the way of life (and duty, obligation, continuity, respect…).
PPS: I read an excellent interview with Rebanks’ wife Helen in last Sunday’s ‘Observer Review’… she’s written a book of her own – shining a light on small-scale farming and the pressures of Brexit and the women who frequently hold things together. It’s on my booklist!
PPPS: Will environment minister Thérèse Coffey have a clue about the lives of sheep farmers like Andrew Harrison and James+Helen Rebanks? I suspect not (she’s SO keen on sorting out the state of our rivers, obviously!).

august 2023 books…

Books And Island In Ojibwe Country (Louise Erdrich): This is our next Storysmith Bookgroup selection. I’d never previously read any of Erdrich’s books (American author of novels, poetry, and children's books featuring Native American characters and settings). Our bookgroup theme was ‘Travel-related’ and this book describes her travels (with her 18-month-old daughter in tow) to the terrain of her ancestors: the lakes and islands of southern Ontario… and yet, it’s rather more than just a journal of her travels. It takes in history, language, songs, spirits, mythology and memoir of her native homeland… and also links ancient stone paintings with a magical island where a bookish recluse built an extraordinary library (note: this recluse, Ernest Oberholtzer, born in 1894, suffered with a heart condition and was told by his doctor that he had just one year to live… so he decided to paddle a canoe through the wilderness of Ojibwe Country… and kept on paddling. He lived to be 93!). As a lover of books and the owner of her own bookshop, Erdrich was clearly in her element. I enjoyed it too.
The Provincial Lady In America (EM Delafield): First published in 1934 (the third volume of Delafield’s “The Diary Of A Provincial Lady”). I loved the first two ‘Provincial Lady’ books and just knew that the third would provide similar amusement and light relief (which it did!). The publishers decide to send the author on tour to America and the book starts by how she imparts this news to her family and neighbours. Her circumstances have somewhat changed - by now, she is ‘somewhat famous’, travels First Class (except that travels back to the UK ‘tourist class’ as the publishers are no longer trying to impress Americans!), and is photographed as she disembarks the ship at New York. The trip is a series of whirlwind tours - being whisked from mansion to mansion, combined with endless cocktails and pompous speaking engagements - and all surrounded, it seems, by a host of millionaires (which, given that the diary was written in the throes of the Depression and never mentioned, seems somewhat puzzling). Her observations of the characters she met and the circumstances in which she found herself are rather wonderful and very amusing. I enjoyed the book enormously (just one more book left in the series!).
The Satsuma Complex (Bob Mortimer): This is Mortimer’s first novel (I very much enjoyed his autobiography ‘And Away’). It’s a crime novel, set in south London, involving police corruption, domestic violence, murder… and LOTS of absurd, surreal humour. The main character, Gary, is a shy, legal assistant at a firm of solicitors - who lives something of hum-drum life and conducts conversations with a passing squirrel (you perhaps wouldn’t have expected anything less from the author!). In truth, it‘s quite page-turner… although there’s a large part of me that somewhat resents how readily ‘celebrities’ are able to write work that achieves the ‘Sunday Times’ bestsellers list when far more gifted authors fail to get recognised (or even published). Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the book and liked the main characters… but Bob Mortimer is no Richard Osman!
Stories We Tell Ourselves (Richard Holloway): The book’s sub-title is: ‘Making Meaning in a Meaningless Universe’. I’ve long been an admirer of Holloway’s writings and thinking and I’ve read several of his books. This book (published in 2020) explores the stories we’ve been told about where we come from and about getting through “this muddling experience of life”. It’s thought-provoking, challenging, compassionate and wise. I continue to find myself agreeing with Holloway’s views on a lot of things in his own personal spiritual journey. In 2000, he’d basically given up on the church (you might recall that he’d previously been Bishop of Edinburgh) but, over subsequent years, he’s found himself slowly “slipping back” into the place where his prayers had once “been valid”. He’s an advocate of Jesus, but definitely NOT of the Church (or, some respects, even of God)… and, clearly from reviews of the book, such views attract strong support and opposition from both sides of the argument (I’m tending to go along with Holloway!). “The resistance goes on, though the Church that calls itself after Christ has rarely ever tried to join it, or never for long. Often it has done the opposite. It has followed the world’s style in its own institutional life. It has been one of the cruellest and least forgiving institutions in history… No, the Church never really tried to live the Jesus-life. What it did was to keep his story alive. Even as they shifted uncomfortably in their seats, Christians were compelled to listen to it. Week after week and day after day, the story was read to them”. I could go on… but I trust you get the general drift (and, again, I’m with him in large part). I think now might be a good time to re-read his book ‘The Heart of Things: Memory and Lament’.
Girl (Edna O’Brien): This is a novel (published in 2019) based on the horrific trauma of Nigeria’s abducted schoolgirls from the Government Girls Secondary School in the town of Chibok in 2014 by the Islamic terrorist group Boko Haram. One of the girls, Maryam, is the story’s narrator. Following her ‘capture’, she has given birth, and she and her daughter have somehow escaped from the compound, where she had been raped many times and then forced into marriage and motherhood… the trauma of her abduction wrecks her family (or what’s left of it). It’s all pretty devastatingly shocking (and feels amazing ‘real’). Politicians trying to take credit for other people’s actions and sacrifices… but also the kindness of some brave women who helped some of the other ‘Maryams’ survive. O’Brien spent several months in Africa researching for the book - meeting women who’d suffered at the hands of Boko Harum, together with a whole host of volunteers, doctors and trauma specialists… and such experiences obviously played a vital part in helping her convey the terror so palpably real. I’m a huge fan of O’Brien’s writing and I found this book incredibly powerful and impressive (no surprises there). Man’s inhumanity to man laid bare. 

july-august 2023 books…

Drawn From Life (Steve Hurst): An account of the author’s experiences and reflections on his life as a student at Oxford’s Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art (1949-1953). Set against the background of an austerity Britain in the immediate aftermath of WW2 (and leaning heavily on Hurst’s contemporary diaries), it explores his journey as he tries to assess if the world of art has a place for him. The book is both a personal and a social history of that time. Moira came across this book while we were staying in Oxford for a few days and so, given that Hurst was describing places that we knew well (from Sandford village on the edge of Oxford to numerous city locations) and that resonated with our own student days – albeit that they were some 20 years after Hurst’s own time… the ‘growing up’ challenges; relationships; class differences; self-confidence (and the lack of it!); self-questioning etc. Things had changed quite considerably by the time we began our studies in Oxford (eg. available grants, no national service etc) but, nevertheless, Hurst’s account makes fascinating reading.
The Solace Of Fierce Landscapes (Belden C Lane): This is a rather special book… exploring desert and mountain spirituality. I love reading about mountains and deserts (over the years, I’ve read several books about them) – despite having never really experienced any of them first hand (and I have a fear of heights!). In some ways, I suppose I’d hoped that the book would help point the way out of my own spiritual wilderness, but it didn’t. But I did find it incredibly helpful in a variety of ways. I found his references to the lives of the desert fathers and mothers fascinating and also how these challenging locations and experiences haven’t just been limited to the Christian faith… the book contains numerous references to Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists as well as Tibetan mythology and Chinese traditions. I was relieved that the book wasn’t full of biblical references (these days, I find I’m struggling with a lot of biblical stuff!), but it did include words which resonated for me, such as: “If you cannot go into the desert, you must nonetheless ‘make some desert’ in your life”. It was good that Lane didn’t over-romanticise the desert and mountain experiences/references… and that he was able to point to some of the terrors and tussles of the wilderness/mountainous terrains as well as providing glimpses of their majesty. Throughout the book, the author interweaves his mother’s long struggle with Alzheimer’s and cancer with meditations of his own “wilderness experiences” – which I found both helpful and illuminating. I could write so much more on Lane’s book, but I think I’ll leave it at that. Beautifully written and something of an oasis, perhaps, for me.
More Work For The Undertaker (Margery Allingham): First published in 1949. The book focuses on Apron Street, an isolated neighbourhood in London… going ‘up Apron street’ has become a byword for a criminal vanishing. Undertakers are kept busy accordingly and bankers become involved with the eccentric Palinode family, which has inherited shares of stock once thought worthless. I’d read a number of Allingham novels, but had never really ‘warmed’ to her Campion character – unlike a number of my good friends who very much rate him. So, this was another attempt to become a fan… Yes, it’s an impressive, clever, complex storyline and, yes, I was rather more impressed by Campion, BUT I also found the novel rather annoying at times. There were far too many characters for my liking and it took me ages to get them clear(ish) in my head (on the other hand, it might just be my lack of intellect of course!). In addition, I frequently found Allingham’s written dialogues very confusing… and kept having to re-read them to discover who was actually speaking (again, it might just be me – but I did find this happening time after time). It took me about a third of the book to properly ‘get into the story’ and, once I did, found it intriguing. I’m a great lover of crime novels but, frankly, have yet to become a huge fan of Allingham’s writing (sorry!).
A Terrible Kindness (Jo Browning Wroe): It’s October 1966 and 19 year-old William Lavery has just qualified as an outstanding embalmer (I know!) and is about to celebrate at a posh black-tie dinner, but news comes through of a landslide at Aberfan… and there are lots of fatalities. Lavery feels the need to help as a volunteer. The story fluctuates from his time, nine years earlier, when he’s a chorister in Cambridge to perhaps 6 years beyond the Aberfan disaster. The novel’s about families, relationships, grieving and kindness (among other things). It’s very readable (I read the 380-page book in less than 3 days) and is full of quite moving passages… but I also found it somewhat annoying (and frequently predictable). I didn’t warm to the William character (or his mother) and frequently found the writing style and narrative (particularly in the first third of the book) somewhat clumsy and ungainly as far as character and dialogue were concerned. I became regularly irritated by what I felt was the author ‘showing off’ that she’d done her research about Aberfan, choristers, ‘pop music’ of the time, homophobia, embalmers and locations in the West Midlands (where she grew up) and Cambridge (where she now lives). The book-cover is full of glowing praise for the book – but I noticed that they ALL seemed from female writers/critics(?). To sum up: I enjoyed it and was exasperated by it in equal measure!
The High House (Jessie Greengrass): This incredibly moving novel describes the climate crisis as not just a possibility, but grounded in REALITY (as the book’s cover puts it: “You think you have time. And then, all at once, you don’t”). Perched on a hill above a village by the sea, the high house has a mill, a vegetable garden and a barn full of supplies. A girl and her younger half-brother arrive there one day and find it cared for by an elderly man and his granddaughter (I’ll the background details!). They learn to live together and care for one another… in a world that is fast disintegrating – islands are disappearing due to rising tides; weather extremes are becoming normal; the changing climate is even starting to have devastating effects on those privileged countries of the ‘western world’… in the UK, villages are being abandoned during the ‘winter’ months (and, even in the ‘summer’, are only occupied by those with second homes); flooding has become a dangerous reality for people who never imagined that their homes would be at risk etc etc. The novel doesn’t have a specific time-scale, but there are references to the grandfather listening to “Children’s Hour” on the radio as a youngster (so I suspect he was born around the same time as me – say 1949)… and, in the book, he’s reached a somewhat doddery ‘old age’ – so, I imagined the book being set perhaps ten or fifteen years hence(?). I’ve read a lot about the Climate Crisis (and all the frustrations that go with it – the lack of action by governments, including ours, throughout the world etc) and, yes, I appreciate that this is a novel and not an academic analysis but, for me, this book has provided the most effective and compelling description of the REALITY of the nature of the Climate Crisis we face and its imminent threat to our world. In the circumstances, it might seem rather frivolous to say that I REALLY enjoyed this book (but I did!). It’s beautifully written and, as the Sunday Times’ reviewer puts it: “full of elegant, resonant sentences about human fallibility, complacency, selfishness and our unquenchable capacity for love”. I think you definitely need to read this book.   
Footnote: I started reading ‘The High House’ on the same day that I’d finished ‘Terrible Kindness’ and was immediately struck by the huge difference in the quality of the writing. Wroe’s ‘Kindness’ showed her skills as a storyteller (despite her ‘clunky’ writing style), whereas Greengrass’s ‘High House’ was altogether more impressive and accomplished (like suddenly being to relax when a brilliant actor arrives on stage and spoke his/her first lines and you just KNEW everything was going to be ‘ok’).