Monday, 8 August 2011
Barkstorm
This lunchtime, while sitting in a Kensington public garden with my book and sandwich, I was hit on the back of the head by flying bark. In a lifetime replete with more-or-less comical minor indignities (I like to think of myself as a kind of English Monsieur Hulot), this was a first. The bark, I should explain, was plane-tree bark, and great chunks of it were being stripped from the trees by the fierce northwest wind, every gust bringing more bark gliding through the air and clattering to the ground around me. It's beautiful stuff, plane-tree bark, with its curved, cedar-brown underside like the lining of a cigar tube, and, happily, it's light enough to be the bark of choice if you have to be hit by a chunk of the stuff. Indeed it was a pleasure to be struck - a rather wonderful experience - and I don't think I've ever before seen such a dramatic barkstorm.
Weather Lore Updated
'Short summers lightly have a forward spring,' remarks Shakespeare's Richard III, murderously eying the young Prince Edward...
Last Friday evening, the swifts treated me to one more flypast over the trackside hotspot - I counted a round dozen - and one lone straggler overflew the garden later, in the dusk. That, almost certainly, was it, so my swift summer (the essential summer) was short indeed, running from the 7th of May to the 5th of August. And today there's a chilly Northwest wind blowing in London, the first leaves are falling from sycamores, planes and the poor, blighted horsechestnuts, some of the urban rowans and cherries are putting on their fall colours, and it's feeling like autumn already. But it wasn't a forward spring; as last year, it was rather late - and, again as last year, it was glorious when it came. In fact, it was even more glorious - and certainly more long-lasting - than last year. And, as last year, it was followed by a lot of really pretty dreadful weather in June and July, the months when it matters most (I'm thinking, of course, of the needs of my butterfly friends). Perhaps a new rule is emerging in English weather lore: 'Bad summers lightly have a glorious spring.'
Last Friday evening, the swifts treated me to one more flypast over the trackside hotspot - I counted a round dozen - and one lone straggler overflew the garden later, in the dusk. That, almost certainly, was it, so my swift summer (the essential summer) was short indeed, running from the 7th of May to the 5th of August. And today there's a chilly Northwest wind blowing in London, the first leaves are falling from sycamores, planes and the poor, blighted horsechestnuts, some of the urban rowans and cherries are putting on their fall colours, and it's feeling like autumn already. But it wasn't a forward spring; as last year, it was rather late - and, again as last year, it was glorious when it came. In fact, it was even more glorious - and certainly more long-lasting - than last year. And, as last year, it was followed by a lot of really pretty dreadful weather in June and July, the months when it matters most (I'm thinking, of course, of the needs of my butterfly friends). Perhaps a new rule is emerging in English weather lore: 'Bad summers lightly have a glorious spring.'
Thursday, 4 August 2011
The Swifts
Any day now, the swifts will be gone. The skies are already quiet, with only one or two silent stragglers passing overhead. My best local site, where 50, 60 or more swifts could be seen hurtling acrobatically through the air at the height of the season, was down to a dozen or so birds earlier in the week, and to just one last night. I see this swift-rich site from the train window on my way home, and I know that very soon, perhaps this evening, I'll look out and there will be no swifts at all. And summer - the real summer - will be over. Their stay is so short - just three months in which to arrive, nest, mate and rear the next generation (I saw my first swift on the morning after my daughter's wedding, which was on May 6th - a week later than last year). No wonder Gilbert White was so convinced that his beloved swifts (and swallows and martins) spend the winter in hibernation rather than migrating - how could a bird be raised from a helpless nestling to a creature capable of flying thousands of miles south in such a short period of time? What White didn't know, and what makes the fact still more extraordinary, is that our swifts take epic flights of anything up to 800 miles to evade oncoming storms, leaving their young untended. The fledglings survive by sinking into a semi-comatose state - closely resembling hibernation - which enables them to last for up to ten days with no food. And even after losing half their body weight, the young swifts can recover and grow to full strength, ready for that epic flight south. Wonderful, mysterious birds - how we'll miss them...
Wednesday, 3 August 2011
Holiday Reading?
What a dismal business British political life is. I can only hope that Ed Milliband has no intention of reading any of this lot
and has a couple of real books stashed away, or even a poolside page-turner... How very different is the approach of Iron Man Putin - no sissy reading lists for him. He will no doubt be spending his hols wrestling bears into submission, swimming in raging torrents and tearing small animals apart with his bare hands. Come on, Ed - throw those books away! Find your inner Putin... And while you're about it, stop trying to dress down as badly as Cameron.
and has a couple of real books stashed away, or even a poolside page-turner... How very different is the approach of Iron Man Putin - no sissy reading lists for him. He will no doubt be spending his hols wrestling bears into submission, swimming in raging torrents and tearing small animals apart with his bare hands. Come on, Ed - throw those books away! Find your inner Putin... And while you're about it, stop trying to dress down as badly as Cameron.
Tuesday, 2 August 2011
Dowson Day
'They are not long, the days of wine and roses:
Out of a misty dream
Our path emerges for a while, then closes
Within a dream...'
'I have forgot much, Cynara! Gone with the wind...
I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! after my fashion.'
The poems of Ernest Dowson, who was born on this day in 1867, are rich in sonorous phrases which live in the memory and, in the case of those quoted above, survive in the titles of a film (Days of Wine and Roses), a novel and film (Gone with the Wind) and a song (Cole Porter's Always True to You in My Fashion). Dowson also, if the OED is to be believed, made the first written use of the word 'soccer' for football (though he spelt it 'socca' - it's unlikely he ever played a game). He was a hard-working writer, a member of the Rhymers' Club and a prolific contributor to magazines such as The Yellow Book and The Savoy, but his personal life was a chapter of tragedies. There was his doomed love for a Polish girl whom he first met when she was 11 years old and whom he finally lost, after years of dogged pursuit, to a tailor who lodged above her father's restaurant. Then Dowson's consumptive father died of an overdose of chloral, after which his mother, also consumptive, hanged herself. This succession of events was too much for Dowson, who went into a steep, alcohol-fuelled decline, dying derelict at the age of 32. His poems, full of lovesickness, languor, world-weariness and (understandable) longing for oblivion and release, are prime specimens of English 'Decadent' verse, overripe for modern tastes. But, in small doses, Dowson is still worth reading - and he certainly had an ear for the music of words. His lines might tend to hollowness, but they sing.
Out of a misty dream
Our path emerges for a while, then closes
Within a dream...'
'I have forgot much, Cynara! Gone with the wind...
I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! after my fashion.'
The poems of Ernest Dowson, who was born on this day in 1867, are rich in sonorous phrases which live in the memory and, in the case of those quoted above, survive in the titles of a film (Days of Wine and Roses), a novel and film (Gone with the Wind) and a song (Cole Porter's Always True to You in My Fashion). Dowson also, if the OED is to be believed, made the first written use of the word 'soccer' for football (though he spelt it 'socca' - it's unlikely he ever played a game). He was a hard-working writer, a member of the Rhymers' Club and a prolific contributor to magazines such as The Yellow Book and The Savoy, but his personal life was a chapter of tragedies. There was his doomed love for a Polish girl whom he first met when she was 11 years old and whom he finally lost, after years of dogged pursuit, to a tailor who lodged above her father's restaurant. Then Dowson's consumptive father died of an overdose of chloral, after which his mother, also consumptive, hanged herself. This succession of events was too much for Dowson, who went into a steep, alcohol-fuelled decline, dying derelict at the age of 32. His poems, full of lovesickness, languor, world-weariness and (understandable) longing for oblivion and release, are prime specimens of English 'Decadent' verse, overripe for modern tastes. But, in small doses, Dowson is still worth reading - and he certainly had an ear for the music of words. His lines might tend to hollowness, but they sing.
Mad As Hell?
I heard on the radio that, in polls, some 70 per cent of Americans now assent to the proposition 'I'm as mad as Hell and I'm not going to take it any more'. Well, God bless America! In this country - where, God knows, we have every reason to feel mad as Hell about the political/cultural elite's apparent determination to send us off on the highway to Hell in a fleet of custom-built handcarts - you'd be lucky to get 70 per cent to assent to the proposition 'I'm really a bit cross, since you ask, but I know I'm going to have to carry on taking it for the foreseeable future'. Which, I wonder, is the healthier approach? Is being mad as Hell likely to make the slightest difference? Do we really have any other option but to carry on 'taking it'?
Monday, 1 August 2011
What I Did On My Holidays: Two Finds, A Belated Spot and an Exhibition
1. In The Bookshop in Wirksworth - where, as usual, half a dozen items seriously tempted me - I found a volume I didn't even know existed: a King Penguin edition of Cowper's Diverting History of John Gilpin, illustrated with typical dash and brio by Ronald Searle. You can see the pictures online here.
2. In Whitby, I not only ate the best fish and chips of my life - at a quayside restaurant misleadingly called The Magpie Cafe, where long queues outside signal the quality of the food within. But the big surprise was that the Magpie not only has a good wine list but also, by way of aperitif/digestif, that versatile nectar Pineau des Charentes, both white and red. Mind you, I say versatile, but last time I tried to get a Pineau as a digestif - in a somewhat swanky restaurant in La Rochelle - I was summarily refused and advised/ordered to drink something else. Clearly I had broken the laws of gastronomy - but a Pineau is actually very good after dinner.
3. In Derbyshire, belatedly, I saw my first Small Coppers of the year. Disappointingly, I hadn't seen a single one of these little beauties back in the sunny spring, and wondered if I was going to draw a blank with this far from uncommon butterfly, so it was a great delight to spot the first, basking prettily on a hedegrow leaf.
4. We made our way home by way of Castle Howard, which I had never visited before. For the most part, I found the interiors as oppressive as they are impressive (and was appalled by the repainted ceiling of the great dome, a terrible piece of work). The grounds, though, are full of wonders - and, in the house, there was a fascinating exhibition devoted to George Howard, the 9th Earl of Carlisle. A friend and patron of many of the great names of late Victorian art, he was also an accomplished, if patchy, painter. Some of his portraits, and the oils he painted on his travels in India and the Middle East, are very fine.
And now I am back from my northern jaunt, as ever feeling better for having escaped the Great Wen and discovered that there's another England out there, a rather friendlier and more relaxed one.
2. In Whitby, I not only ate the best fish and chips of my life - at a quayside restaurant misleadingly called The Magpie Cafe, where long queues outside signal the quality of the food within. But the big surprise was that the Magpie not only has a good wine list but also, by way of aperitif/digestif, that versatile nectar Pineau des Charentes, both white and red. Mind you, I say versatile, but last time I tried to get a Pineau as a digestif - in a somewhat swanky restaurant in La Rochelle - I was summarily refused and advised/ordered to drink something else. Clearly I had broken the laws of gastronomy - but a Pineau is actually very good after dinner.
3. In Derbyshire, belatedly, I saw my first Small Coppers of the year. Disappointingly, I hadn't seen a single one of these little beauties back in the sunny spring, and wondered if I was going to draw a blank with this far from uncommon butterfly, so it was a great delight to spot the first, basking prettily on a hedegrow leaf.
4. We made our way home by way of Castle Howard, which I had never visited before. For the most part, I found the interiors as oppressive as they are impressive (and was appalled by the repainted ceiling of the great dome, a terrible piece of work). The grounds, though, are full of wonders - and, in the house, there was a fascinating exhibition devoted to George Howard, the 9th Earl of Carlisle. A friend and patron of many of the great names of late Victorian art, he was also an accomplished, if patchy, painter. Some of his portraits, and the oils he painted on his travels in India and the Middle East, are very fine.
And now I am back from my northern jaunt, as ever feeling better for having escaped the Great Wen and discovered that there's another England out there, a rather friendlier and more relaxed one.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
