The Best Thing 2012

Trying to decide what's The Best Thing I've seen this year.  It's very tempting to say Leonard Cohen.  After all, I'd waited nearly 36 and a half years for the miracle to come.  But I feel there has to be an element of serendipity to what ever occupies the Number 1 slot which is erased by the purchase of a ticket.  Plus, I'm seeing Him again in 2013. (Have I mentioned that at all?)

Last year's Best Thing was encountering two badgers in the middle of Parry's Lane.  I'd only ever seen dead ones before.  It was the sort of moment that imprints itself on the inside of your eyelids. And so was this - the swathing of the Vale of Avalon in mist with Glastonbury Tor poking out of the top as I came down off the Mendips, headed for this year's Wells Festival of Literature. 

Remembering Dennis O'Driscoll

So sad to hear yesterday of the death of Dennis O'Driscoll.  I was fortunate to hear him read some of his intelligent, witty and humane poems on a couple of occasions, as well as give a talk about Stepping Stones, his book of interviews with Seamus Heaney, and I hate the thought that he'll never come to Bristol, a city he professed to love, again.

But what I'll remember most is his generosity.  The way he would write a personal message in large letters alongside his signature in the book you'd just bought. How, in that moment, it was you who was the person of interest, not him.  How, upon encountering him at the door of the Arnolfini bookshop last September, he was more anxious to stay and chat to me and my companion, Pameli Benham, than go back to his hotel room to rest in preparation for the evening's reading.  How, when we each gave him a copy of our poetry collections, he said he would go back and read them - and did.  And sought us out later to comment on them.  

We didn't have him long enough. 

TED HAS HIS OWN CHRISTMAS CARD!

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone, prevent the dog from sulking with his very own  ...

CHRISTMAS CARD!!!  

Yes, a sneak preview of this year's card starring an unusually still and attentive Ted. (How on earth he held that pose long enough for Dru to paint him, I shall never know!)

On the back of the card, one of my favourite Christmas poems by Thomas Hardy:

THE OXEN

Christmas Eve, and twelve of the clock.

   'Now they are all on their knees,'

An elder said as we sat in a flock

   By the embers in hearthside ease.

We pictured the meek mild creatures where

   They dwelt in their strawy pen,

Nor did it occur to one of us there

  To doubt they were kneeling then.

So fair a fancy few would weave

   In these years! Yet, I feel,

If someone said on Christmas Eve,

   'Come; see the oxen kneel,

'In the lonely barton by yonder coomb

   Our childhood used to know,'

I should go with him in the gloom,

   Hoping it might be so.

Available from Dru's Etsy page.

The Look of Innocence

Ted, caught red-pawed having eaten my dinner, 17th May 2012 ...

'What foot? Oh, that one over there? ... nothing to do with me, Guv!'


Ted caught using my bed as a nice clean towel, 22nd December 2012 ...

'It was the cats what dunnit ... I'll get them for you if you like ... '


I think he's getting better at it.

Hallelujah II

Photo from September's gig at Wembley Arena.

Et in Arcadia Ego

I am in receipt of the final final final set of proofs for my novel, Dart.  Which is scary because I used to proofread professionally back in the days of galley proofs and Tippex and learnt then that the only thing more certain than the small error that escaped your red Bic is the fact that some bastard will gleefully point it out to you.  

Although that hasn't been the case with my poetry collection, Communion.  It was a while before I could even open it after it was published.  When I did manage it, I saw one very minor thing I wished I'd noticed and changed at proofing stage, but no one else has ever said anything and now I can't remember what it was.

That said, I'm really not keen on the idea of living down a novel with a hideous error half way down page 73 (or anywhere else) so I'll be proofing carefully between now and the New Year.  Never mind Christmas, it's publication day that's looming.

In the meantime, here are some pictures of the Valley of the West Dart, where my story is set.

The West Dart at Huccaby

Glittering innocence

Over the stone stile

Longaford Tor, Higher White Tor and Bellever Tor from Hexworthy

Stepping Stones at Sherberton Firs













My novel, Dart, will be published by Tamar Books (an imprint of Indigo Dreams) on 4th February 2012.  More details here, and here.

You might be avoiding Amazon on account of their (tax) avoidance, but fret not, my poetry collection, Communion, is also available from Indigo Dreams for £6.99.

Make Good Art

You can tell I'm confined to base, apart from going to funerals and petrol stations ...

You can listen to the entire speech here.

How To Speak Poetry with Leonard Cohen

I've been to quite a few poetry readings lately, as well as participating in several. I don't consider myself a performance poet - I have a horrible feeling that as soon as I stood in front of a mic without a piece of paper or a book in my hand, my brain would head for the exit - but I'm not averse to a bit of arm waving and breast beating from those who are.  

But the one thing I really can't stand is when people read intensely and v-e-r-y  v-e-r-y  s-l-o-w-l-y, pausing after every three words to let their significance sink in, even if they are only by way of or he took a, or - if you are reading Billy Collin's 'Paradelle for Susan' was my into ... it was with ... to to.

Let's hear it for Leonard Cohen who tells us exactly how we should speak poetry in this piece called ... erm ... 'How to Speak Poetry'. 

A Riot of Biblical Proportions

It was our annual family murmuration yesterday, a time to catch up on news from various far-flung outposts in a non-funereal context.  And there was some good gossip on offer, like my cousin Hayley delivering her own grandchild because the midwife insisted the baby (a little girl called Millie, 8lbs 6oz, since you ask) wouldn't be born till morning.  But there was something more unusual from my cousin Pam, who'd been helping her mother sort through papers following my Uncle Meric's death. 

My photos are rather hurried - my cousin was en route to Bristol's newest museum, the M Shed, where the pages will now be housed - but the pages (from 2 Kings Chapter 11, it would seem) are inscribed with the following in copperplate handwriting:

This was part of a bible which was plundered from the dwelling houses in Queen Square, Bristol, on the ever memorable Sunday the 30th day of October when the dreadful Riot and burning of that place was perpetrated by an infuriate and lawless mob.  

Which poses all sorts of questions.  How did my great-grandmother (for it was she who gave it to my uncle) come by such a thing?  What on earth was a rioter doing looting a bible?  Was the bible the then equivalent of a flat-screen TV as far as entertainment was concerned?   And perhaps most pressingly of all, where's the d from the end of infuriate?

Remembering: Gloucester Part II

Can't possibly leave Gloucester Cathedral without exploring a few more places and sighing over the artefacts therein, like the Lancaut Font in the Lady Chapel.  














I have a soft spot for the remote, ruined church at Lancaut on the banks of the Wye.  I first saw it from the Welsh side of the river years ago and longed to get a closer look.  Then, newly single and in possession of a car, I discovered a walk in a book, the route of which took me and Ted right past it.  Inside there was a grave slab with a heart etched on it.  

So it was especially lovely to see the font from the old church here. It is made of lead and dates from c1120-40.  Can't help wondering how many children have been baptised in it, and what were their lives like.

The soaring vistas of butter-coloured stone do much to lighten wintry spirits.

Some rather lovely turn-of-the-century Arts and Crafts stained glass by Christopher Whall.  

And, of course, the stupendous Great East Window which boasts the second largest expanse of mediaeval glass in the country. 

 Wooden parclose screen and Tower

Struts supporting the arches which support the Tower

The Romanesque nave built in the final years of the 11th century

Stained glass stone ... 

The 15th century Tower and South Transept

The South Porch built at the beginning of the 15th century.

As the Treasury is closed on Sundays and the Tower and Crypt were closed for winter, I reluctantly left, squeezing my way past men in khaki and women in black who were filing in for the next Remembrance Service.  The City Museum and Folk Museum were also closed, so I hobbled down to the docks on my poorly feet to make the most of the sun on water.

Taking a short cut back to the Leisure Centre to wait for Son the Elder, I found myself trundling down a road that looked disquietingly familiar, given that I barely know Gloucester at all.  Then the penny dropped: I was walking down Cromwell Street.  

Where so many women were murdered, there is now a tarmac walk way with a sign post pointing to the city centre. 




Of course it's impossible for anyone old enough to remember those terrible discoveries in 1994 to be at all objective, though I would defy anyone to wander down that street without feeling a sense of foreboding. 

The Box of Delights: Gloucester Part I

And so to Gloucester for the next round of Roamin' Robots, at the behest of Son the Elder.  I suppose I could have returned to Bristol after dropping him at the GL1 Leisure Centre, as it's only 30 miles away, but it was a beautifully clear and sunny day and anyway, why run the risk of having to do some housework when you can jaunt?

The last time I'd been to Gloucester, as opposed to through it, was as a small child on the bus with my mother and sister.  My mum told me off for reading a book on the way because I'd get sick but I didn't.  We went to the Cathedral - my father had explained to me what fan vaulting was in advance - and the livestock market where the pigs were bleeding from having holes punched in their ears.  I came back with a model animal for my farm, which was my favourite toy.

I decided, therefore, that a return visit to the Cathedral was almost certainly long overdue, but before I even got there, there was an amuse-bouche positively smothered in childhood and tied up with a big pink bow of literary interest.  Look, the Tailor of Gloucester's House!  

Through the arch was the Cathedral, and after the dark brick of Chester, how lovely it was to set eyes on buttery West Country stone.  The main morning service was still in progress when I arrived, so I took a wander around the Cloisters.  

Now, you might well recognise these and so you should because great tranches of the Harry Potter films were shot here.  I remembered how when I was teaching a class of German high school students during my year abroad, they had scoffed to see Gloucester Cathedral described in their textbook as world-famous.  Well, it is now.  

I was particularly pleased to spot this late Morris & Co window, c1920, and the watery-themed Victorian stained glass in the lavatorium.  

Oh, but the stone!  I wonder if the monks, copying scriptures with numb fingers, took solace in the staggering beauty of it, or did they become inured? 

 

After a coffee in the Cathedral café, the Remembrance Day service was over and the godless could roam.  There was more glorious glass for a start, these windows by Thomas Denny having been installed in the South Ambulatory Chapel in 1989 to mark the 900th anniversary celebrations of the current building on this site. 

And this lovely work of art was installed in the Lady Chapel in 1992 to commemorate the Gloucestershire composer of English Church Music, Herbert Howells.  


In fact, Gloucester Cathedral is as good at commemorating the dead as Chester is at wood carving.  Here's a few of my favourite tombs and memorials.  

The tomb of Thomas Machen and his wife, Christian, who died in 1614 and 1615 respectively and who both look pretty intimidating.  They had seven sons and six daughters, and their Latin inscription reads 'It comes down to this: we die.  Death is the final boundary of things'.  

Their near neighbours and contemporaries, John Bower (d 1615) and  Anne (d 1613) had nine sons and seven daughters, so there ...   

... whilst poor Elizabeth Williams died in childbirth in 1622 at the age of 17.  Her sister, Margery Clent, fared little better, dying the following year, also in childbirth, aged 21. Both women were daughters of Miles Smith, the then Bishop of Gloucester and one of the translators of the 1611 King James Bible. 

This is Abraham Blackleech lying next to his wife, Gertrude, who erected their monument in 1639.  We know that he was a gentleman and benefactor, and also that he had smelly feet.  How?  Look at the expression on the face of that bird of prey as it realises that it's stuck there propping them up for all eternity. 

Going back further in time, there are tombs of sundry Abbots, the Cathedral having been a Benedictine Monastery up until the Dissolution of the Monasteries, a 15th century effigy of Osric who founded the first religious house on that site in 679, and this rather dashing figure in painted bog oak of  Robert Shortstockings, the rebellious eldest son of William the Conqueror who seems to have been the butt of many practical jokes and who never did manage to claim the English throne. 

This is perhaps the most beautiful and famous of ancient tombs in the Cathedral, however - namely, that of King Edward II who was murdered at Berkeley Castle in 1327.  

The guide book cites suffocation as cause of death.  I hope it was rather than the more horrific method traditionally given. 

An interesting bit of graffiti with serifs carved onto the tomb makes mention of Pearce Gaviston and Spencer [sic]. 

Two more modern memorials I loved were those of Douglas Tinling and Ivor Gurney, both in the Arts and Crafts idiom, although the latter's is a good deal later than Tinling's, who was a Canon of the Cathedral and died in 1897.    Poor Ivor, composer and poet of the Severn and the Somme, who never recovered from his experiences during the Great War.  It's fitting to remember him today, a casualty of war as much as any soldier fallen at the Somme.  

More about my jaunt to Gloucester anon.  

A Poem for Remembrance Day 2012

Tobruk

for LRH

Silence,

not for two minutes

but sixty years.

Only then does he start to talk, 

not to his family but his brothers,

those soldiers in slippers,

with cemetery teeth,

their medals saucepan lids

pinned to punctured chests,

their stories shrapnel

lodged in matter

from a distant land called War.

Later, I gather rusted splinters,

their gist a desert expedition:

mirage of wire,

signs in barbed Gothic script,

hot metal surfacing

through oceanic sand, in front, behind. I panic,

turn to trace his steps,

a trail of breadcrumbs

swallowed up by circling dunes;

not knowing how this terror ends,

if my father will survive

to speak its name.

                       © Deborah Harvey 2011

My father was ground crew in the RAF during the second world war and saw service in Palestine, Egypt, Tripolitania and Italy.

This poem is from my collection, Communion, published by Indigo Dreams.  If you like, you can read some more here.

Like the Swiftest Arrow Whizzing from a Bow ...

Photograph: FogStock/Alamy

Good news from my publisher, Ronnie Goodyer of Indigo Dreams.  My novel, Dart, which is due out in January, is to be published under their imprint, Tamar Books, which publishes books the subject matter of which specifically concerns the South West. 

Plus, he and his partner, Dawn Bauling, have been in talks with the owner of Bossiney Books, who will pass on any contacts he receives that are not suitable for Bossiney, ie anything not specifically to do with walks.  

PLUS, Tamar Books are also going to be using Bossiney's distributor, which means that Dart will get much wider coverage in its home region than would otherwise have been the case.  Which in turn means I might well get to do more readings and therefore more jaunts with more nights in the biscuit tin by the sea!  Ted is going to have to learn how to sit still during readings and/or pass himself off as a guide dog. And Dart's lovely cover by Dru Marland will have the names of two magical rivers on it instead of just the one.  

On the Nature of Disappointment

I was supposed to be going to Devon tomorrow for a final blast of sun and salt sea air before the biscuit tin is shut up for the winter. Not to mention a blow across Dartmoor with Ted.  But I am too poorly to go and shall be spending at least the next two days in bed with a succession of mugs of hot milk and rum.  

Here's what I'm going to be missing.

rain, but not on me

murk

salt

peace

exertion

fog

treasure

wind

reflection

shelter

redwings

waters

stormlight

horizon

sheep

life

an exorcised dog