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Life as we know it

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Following curiosity

November 29, 2019 in Life as we know it | Permalink

“Doing a documentary is about discovering, being open, learning, and following curiosity.”

Spike Jonze

In the UK there is currently a general election taking place. This is not – of course – news to those who reside there. Canada has just been through a very pale shadow of what the UK is experiencing with its own federal election, following which those who are of a mind with me (and those like me) breathed a sigh of relief at the outcome. It could have been much, much worse.

I am not going to say anything at all about the UK’s election (for now at least) except that I fear that the old country is not going to be as lucky as much of Canada feels itself to be at the moment.

Elections do bring out the very worst in people though – and I am not just referring to the politicians and their lackeys (and masters!). One area in which this manifests itself in the UK is in regard to the BBC, against which even more bile is directed than usual.

Now – I have become slightly dismayed at the loss of nerve suffered by this august institution over the last few years, though I fully understand the reasons that this has happened. However, I do feel that those in charge simply have to stand up for themselves a little more and dig in against the constant wail of criticism from those who abhor public services of any kind; more specifically those who bitterly resent paying for something that they absolutely do not (and should not) control.

It is no secret that I am a huge fan of the corporation and have over the years admired significant swathes of its output. In particular this year I have been most impressed by the breadth and depth of its documentary offerings, particularly at a juncture at which knowledge – and thus truth – are at an all time premium.

I have – for example – in the recent past praised within these musings the BBC’s strands on the anniversary of the Troubles in Northern Ireland; important and invaluable contributions that are most timely. Here I want to mention two more offerings with which I was much impressed of late:

The first concerns one of my heroes – the author Bruce Chatwin – and is entitled ‘Nomad: In the Footsteps of Bruce Chatwin’. When Chatwin was dying of AIDS, his friend Werner Herzog made a final visit. As a parting gift, Chatwin gave him his rucksack. Thirty years later, Herzog set out to make this film of his own journey, inspired by Chatwin’s passion for the nomadic life. The 100% positive critics’ reviews on Rotten Tomatoes should tell you all you need to know about the film.

Chatwin’s ’The Songlines’ was an enormous influence on me. I have purchased the book a number of times and each time lent it – terminally as it turns out – to others to read. I guess it is time to buy another copy!

The other inspirational program was the taping of this year’s ‘Dimbleby Lecture’ from the Design Museum in London. Sir Tim Berners-Lee gave a stark warning on the direction that his gift to human-kind – the  World Wide Web – has taken of late and a call to arms to put in place a remedy that might hopefully restore its original promise. I could write much more on this topic and at some point might just do so.

In the meantime I urge all of like mind to support the BBC – whilst it is yet possible so to do.

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Synchronicity?

November 27, 2019 in Life as we know it | Permalink

Wednesday mornings (for another week at least) find me up at crack of dawn (literally!) getting ready to wend my way in to the College for an early lecture.

Even at the height of summer my thought processes do not run very rapidly such an antisocial time of day. In the winter – when it is still dark as I stumble into the shower and fumble with the controls to turn the hot water on full – I barely register as a life form.

It follows – ergo – that nothing much of any import passes through my mind at this point. Thus is was this morning that my usual befuddled musings on the state of the world were unexpectedly leavened somewhat by the sudden thought that – unlike other recent years – at least in this one we have not suffered a relentless tide of deaths amongst the great and the good (or celebrities at the very least).

On arrival at the college and having a few minutes before my lecture I checked the BBC news headlines. Amongst the top stories were announcements of the following deaths:

  • Gary Rhodes – one of the first of the TV celebrity chefs, who influenced many that followed. Gary was the cousin (I think) of a friend of a friend and I met him once at a party. He seemed pleasant enough and he was very tall…
  • Clive James – Australian who made the UK his home – writer, program maker and TV critic for The Observer newspaper in the UK. We loved Clive’s dry wit and brilliant way with words and he was a fixture in our younger days.
  • Jonathan Miller – satirist, writer, opera director, medical consultant and polymath. He was one of the four great names that came out of the Footlights review – ‘Beyond the Fringe’ – back in the 60s, along with Peter Cook, Dudley Moore and Alan Bennett (who is now the only survivor). Jonathan was alumnus of the final school at which I worked and the new theatre there is named for him. Back in the 80s at some point he came to the college of the University of London at which I then worked to give a talk on a book that he had recently published on re-interpreting Shakespeare. It was called ‘Subsequent Performances’ and I still have my copy. He spoke brilliantly without notes for forty five minutes and then did as long again answering questions – also without notes and also quite brilliantly!

These souls will all be sadly missed and yet more figures from our younger and formative days are now no more.

So – that thought of mine in the shower… Synchronicity or what? – (probably ‘or what’!).

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Lest we forget

November 11, 2019 in Life as we know it | Permalink

Remembrance day is with us again.

I have written on the subject of Remembrance Day itself more than once before in these musings and feel no need to add to those thoughts here.

I have been aware this year, however… or maybe actually for the past few years… of a seemingly increasing number of anniversaries that demand reflection and which give us pause for thought.

Now – to my way of thinking these febrile times mean that  ‘pause for thought’ is no bad thing and I have indeed myself been taking the opportunity to reflect on a variety of past events and occurrences which – for many reasons – merit our attention.

Last year brought to an end the four year cycle of commemorations of the centenaries of the many momentous events from the Great War on which we rightly reflect. 2018 also marked the fiftieth anniversary of the happenings of that most startling of post-war years – 1968.

2019 – however – boasts its own share of dramatic commemorations. It is fifty years since the moon landings – and who of my generation can forget that extraordinary accomplishment. It is the fiftieth anniversary of Woodstock and – yet to come – of Altamont, as well as of the start of the troubles in Northern Ireland. It is also the fortieth anniversary of the assassination of Lord Louis Mountbatten. I have written in these pages several times of the urgency of remembering these latter events and of how they came about… in the urgent interests of preventing them from so doing again.

The development at this juncture in the calendar that we perhaps remember as having the greatest emotional impact on those of my generation occurred thirty years ago. I still find it difficult to ruminate upon that extraordinary period in which the Berlin Wall came down and the communist empire that was the USSR dissolved before our disbelieving eyes without finding myself once again moved to tears and I know from the testimony of others that I am far from alone in this reaction.

When I was growing up – turning slowly and belatedly from a callow teenage youth to a young man – there were a number of situations around the world for which we just could not see any hope of resolution. There was the cold war – apartheid – the Arab/Israeli imbroglio – Northern Ireland. These situations we had grown up with and we were resigned to their perpetual continuation.

The fall of the wall thus came as an unexpected and joyful shock that moved grown and hard-bitten men to tears. That it should be followed in the subsequent decades by the ending of apartheid and the (hopefully) permanent resolution of the Troubles in Ireland were more than we could rightly hope for. The middle east? Some things are sadly just too intractable for such hope of success.

One of the many reasons that I could never agree with the frankly ignorant critics who would carelessly destroy the beleaguered BBC is the continuing and excellent quality and relevance of their many documentary strands, the which have enabled me and many others like me to come to understand more fully the essence of these events, as well as to remember and to commemorate them in our own ways in the light of that greatly needed and massively appreciated knowledge.

In memoriam…

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Nor shall my sword sleep

September 12, 2019 in Life as we know it | Permalink

I watched a fascinating program the other night on the ever reliable BBC on the subject of Hubert Parry’s setting of some of the lines from William Blake’s poem – ‘Milton‘ – the which in this form is considerably better known as ‘Jerusalem‘. This great ‘hymn’ – particularly in the stirring arrangement by Edward Elgar – has the power to reach parts that other anthems cannot, to the extent that some demand that it should be adopted as the English national anthem in place of ‘God Save the Queen‘.

Sadly it takes but a few moments of searching on the pernicious InterWebNet to discover that the very rousing qualities with which the piece is imbued can have unfortunate side-effects. It is one thing being moved to feelings of patriotic enthusiasm, but the border between this sort of positive resonance and a considerably less acceptable jingoism is porous in the extreme. It is but a short step to the sort of exceptionalist national ‘pride’ that is indistinguishable from xenophobia – particularly in the light of the ongoing and deadly saga of Br**it!

Those who feel moved to leap to their feet upon hearing the familiar introduction and the opening gambit – “And did those feet…” – chests jutting and bursting with nationalistic fervour regarding the unconquerable nature of the British spirit might care to take a slightly closer look at the mast to which they have chosen to nail their colours.

Back in 2014 I posted two missives to these pages on the subject of that other great national favourite – Sir Cecil Spring Rice and Gustav Holst’s “I Vow to Thee my Country” (with the second part here). Those posts sounded a note of caution regarding the unthinking adoption of the piece as an anthem to patriotism. The hymn is certainly a lament for the fallen but can also be read as a warning of the perils of misguided idealism.

In a similar fashion ‘Jerusalem‘ demands closer study to if we are truly to understand both the work itself and the intentions and motivations of those who created it.

William Blake was a complex character but he was very clearly not a nationalist. He was in fact a revolutionary and – along with other radicals of his age – eagerly endorsed the French revolution. Living through both that other insurgency – the Industrial Revolution – and the Napoleonic wars, Blake was horrified that his ideal of a society of universal peace and love was being corrupted by the ‘dark Satanic mills’ of an industry churning out the weapons of war and that the poor and downtrodden were being used as fodder both for the military and economic machines. ‘Jerusalem‘ is thus clearly actually a revolutionary call to build a better society, rather than a peon of praise for the nation as it was/is.

Hubert Parry was himself a man of liberal views and a moderate outlook. Having set Blake’s words to the now famous theme in 1916 for ‘Fight for Right‘ (a movement that had been formed to reinforce the idea of British cultural values during the Great War) Parry rapidly became disillusioned by the jingoistic tone that that body adopted and withdrew the tune from them. He agreed instead that the rights should be given to the suffragette movement, who held them until women eventually won the right to the vote in 1928, upon which they were passed to the Womens’ Institute. The song was also regularly sung at labour movement rallies. It is only in more recent times that it has taken on its current chauvinistic overtones.

Now – there is no denying the power of the piece to move the soul. In the Elgar arrangement in particular the second verse is so very stirring that for many it is impossible not to be moved to tears and for the hairs to stand upon the back of one’s neck.

That one be moved in body and spirit, however, is no excuse for disengaging the mind! If we be stirred then let us indeed be moved – as Blake intended –  to try to make the world a better place.

 

 

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Something important

September 4, 2019 in Life as we know it | Permalink

“Come back!” the Caterpillar called after her. “I’ve something important to say.”
This sounded promising, certainly. Alice turned and came back again.
“Keep your temper,” said the Caterpillar.”

Lewis Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking-Glass

Well – this little corner of the year always takes me by surprise – comprising as it does an unexpected overload of events/things to do/world-wide happenings etc…

Sometimes it all feels as though it is just a little bit too much, but – hey! – it’s not as though I am supposed to be retired and taking it easy or anything, is it?

Oh – wait…

So – what has been/still is going on:

  • the end of August is Fringe time – and this year was no exception. I will report back further on how that went in a future post.
  • the academic year has just restarted. This morning at 8:30am (brutal!) I was facing a new class of 32 keen-eyed students. My timetable is somewhat unkind. More on that later also.
  • the Kickass Canada Girl (who grows more kickass by the day) is about to spend four days on another course. For logistical reasons the instructors – who hail from Vancouver – are staying with us for the duration of the course. This has meant that we must…
  • …finish off the redecoration of our big ‘family’ room downstairs (more on that too) and put our guest suite back into service.
  • the garden – as ever – demands constant attention.
  • I have been working hard to prepare a whole bunch of tracks for mastering, so that we can finally get some music up on the web. More on that… you get the idea!
  • Brexit rumbles on in ever more convoluted contortions and the Canadian election campaign is about to kick off. I will do my best not to comment on either, but you know how it goes…

 

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Mountbatten

August 28, 2019 in Life as we know it | Permalink

As an addendum to my post on the documentary concerning The Troubles in Northern Ireland that was shown recently on the BBC I thought I should make mention of a second BBC programme that was broadcast but a short while later.

This excellent and most moving film – by director Sam Collyns – concerned the assassination of Lord Louis Mountbatten (second cousin once removed to the Queen) at Mullaghmore in County Sligo, in the Republic of Ireland. The programme also detailed the bomb attack that was carried out on the same day at Warrenpoint on the Irish border, the which resulted in the single greatest loss of life suffered by the UK armed forces during the conflict. I was particularly moved by the testimony of those who lost loved ones on that dark day – not least one of Mountbatten’s granddaughters who was able most eloquently to put into words the terrible and lasting void left by that senseless act.

The reason for these documentaries being shown in such quick succession is that their respective anniversaries – of the start of the troubles in 1969 and of the death of Lord Mountbatten ten years later in 1979 – both took place during the month of August, at a time when many peoples would have been thinking more of holidays, sunshine and relaxation. Mountbatten was himself, of course, on a family holiday at the time of the tragedy.

August 27th 1979 was a bank holiday Monday in the UK (in Canada this would be called a long weekend). The date sticks clearly in my mind because the band in which I then played (my first band) had driven from London to Edinburgh overnight that very day to commence a week of engagements playing at the Fringe Club (then as now this bank holiday fell during the Edinburgh festivals). The first that we knew of these atrocities was watching the news reports on the TV screens in a bar on the south side of the city. Two of our number hailed from Belfast and we were all too aware of the significance of what had happened, which led to a somewhat sombre evening.

It feels strange to be living in a time when the memories of those appalling events appear to have faded sufficiently into the historical past that the pale shadows of politicians that we now suffer can in such a cavalier fashion set a course of action that is quite likely to have all too foreseeable and catastrophic consequences.

That is – however – exactly what they appear to be intent on doing.

One of the most telling elements of the documentary was its confirmation that the IRA’s then Chief of Staff – Martin McGuinness – must have given approval for the assassination, regardless of the fact that it was known that the boat on which Mountbatten was murdered would also have been carrying children and other family members. McGuinness went on to become Northern Ireland’s First Minister once the Good Friday Agreement had brought a close to that sad period in Ireland’s history and the documentary featured again the momentous occasion on which the Queen visited Belfast and shook McGuinness’s hand – an act which must have been hideously difficult for all that it symbolically confirmed the peace accord.

The role that the Queen has been obliged to carry out today in acceding to PM Johnson’s mischievous prorogation of parliament is far, far less noble, but may yet have consequences that last as long.

Sad times indeed!

 

 

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Oh dear (sick)!

August 20, 2019 in Life as we know it | Permalink

Hmmm!

I received in my mailbox just the other day an email circular from the medical practice with which I am registered. The communication commenced thus:

“Andrew,

Need a pap? If you have a cervix and are over the age of 25, get it checked!”

Now – I think that it is safe to surmise that this message was generated automatically. At least – that is what I going to assume because the alternative is that those professionals who operate the practice actually produced that missive without spotting the obvious – which would be worrying on many levels…

But then – why should we expect artificial intelligence to be any smarter than that on which it is modelled!

 

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Thoroughly persuaded

May 27, 2019 in Life as we know it | Permalink

“No distance of place or lapse of time can lessen the friendship of those who are thoroughly persuaded of each other’s worth.”

Robert Southey

A little less than two weeks ago I wrote the following on the subject of how I felt about returning (for however brief a visit) to the land of my birth.

“A dear friend here in BC asked me the other day how I felt about going back to the country of my birth. I told him the truth: I am really not at all sure how I feel about it. I am certainly looking forward to seeing family, friends and acquaintances and it will be good to visit some of the old haunts again. Beyond that I currently feel somewhat ambivalent.”

Safe to say that I am now a whole bunch less ambivalent!

Since arriving in the UK just over a week ago I/we have been met with nothing but kindness, generosity, enthusiasm and love. It has been a real joy to revisit old friendships and acquaintances and to rekindle relationships that have been dormant for years or even decades. The whole trip has thus far been an incredibly positive experience.

That said it seems invidious to single out any particular one of these joyful (and I make no apology for the repeated use of that word) experiences – but I do have to make mention of the heart-warming gathering that took place on the first Sunday that I was back in the UK.

Shortly before leaving for Canada four years ago I passed a delightful afternoon in the company of some old musician friends of mine – none of whom I had seen for some considerable time – chewing the fat about the old days in which we had played in a band together and about the theatrical works with which we had been involved.

With this visit to the old country in the offing I once again contacted my guitarist friend and suggested that it would be good to repeat that experience. What he actually did – whilst keeping from me all but the broadest hints – was to arrange a full-scale re-union of all of the old band members and a good number of those who belonged to the youth theatre with which we then worked.

Any fears that I might have had about being able to recognise those whom I had not seen for forty years – some of whom were then only in their late teens – vanished just as soon as I walked in. I was far from alone in showing my delight at seeing again those with whom we had enjoyed such formative experiences all those years ago. The afternoon was quite, quite magical and none of us really wanted to leave at the end of it. The subsequent outpouring of gratitude on email by all concerned clearly illustrated just how much the re-union – and the adventures some four decades back that we were celebrating – had meant to us.

A lovely, lovely occasion – and one which I will never forget.

A heartfelt thank you to all concerned.

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Two things…

May 18, 2019 in Life as we know it | Permalink

…surprised me on my arrival back in the UK for the first time since leaving the country for British Columbia nearly four years ago…

The first was that on landing, coming through customs and leaving the airport I had the strangest sensation that I was entering a foreign country. I can’t quite put my finger on what it was that made it feel that way, but it undoubtedly did so.

Now – a day and a half later – the feeling has diminished somewhat but I still find myself experiencing the sensation of being a little disconnected from everything I see about me.

The second oddity is quite the opposite. I had been rather concerned that, having driven only in Canada for the past four years, I would find it difficult to deal with a right hand drive car on the ‘wrong’ side of the road. This would have been made worse by the fact that I had hired a manual (stick) vehicle as opposed to the automatics that I have been driving for the past four years. That I had immediately to set out on that bear-pit of a road – the M25 ( the London orbital motorway) did not help at all.

In the event – and for reasons I need not go into here – the vehicle was upgraded to a better model, one with a hybrid transmission (to all intents and purposes an automatic).

Further – and to my surprise – it felt as though I had never been away and driving on the left felt entirely natural. In the last couple of days I have driven into London twice but not yet felt out of my depth once. Fingers crossed (and wood touched) that this state of affairs continues.

The visit is already massively busy – but at the same time really rather lovely (with the sorry exception of badly missing The Girl!) and everyone is being most kind and massively generous.

My heartfelt gratitude to all…

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Longer ways to go

May 13, 2019 in Life as we know it | Permalink

Photo by The Lazy Artist Gallery from Pexels“Our battered suitcases were piled on the sidewalk again; we had longer ways to go. But no matter, the road is life.”

Jack Kerouac

The Kickass Canada Girl and I have been most fortunate in that during our time together (not far short of a decade and a half now) we have been able to travel both widely and well. We might not have ventured to quite such far-off and exotic places as have other friends of ours, but we have derived nonetheless a great deal of pleasure – joy even – from our joint excursions.

It probably goes without saying that foremost amongst those trips were our Atlantic crossings to Canada. We visited in 2006 (my introduction to both the country and to British Columbia) and 2008. We were back in the summer of 2010 to get married (whoopee!) and again in the spring of 2011 for less happy reasons. Those who have followed this blog throughout will recall that The Girl came to Victoria early in 2012 for a job. In the ten months that she was here and I was still in England we both traversed the ocean several times to see each other before her return to the UK in the November of that year.

Finally we visited at Christmas time in 2013 with the additional pleasure of celebrating my sixtieth birthday at the Wickanninish Inn on Chesterman Beach outside Tofino.

I say ‘finally’, but of course our real final crossing – to date – was in July of 2015 when we moved with all of our goods and chattels from the UK to Vancouver Island.

In the nearly four years since that momentous event we have not ventured in the direction of the United Kingdom or Europe… until now! (For those who have not been following these scribblings – I leave for the UK in two days time).

A dear friend here in BC asked me the other day how I felt about going back to the country of my birth. I told him the truth: I am really not at all sure how I feel about it. I am certainly looking forward to seeing family, friends and acquaintances and it will be good to visit some of the old haunts again. Beyond that I currently feel somewhat ambivalent – a feeling most likely re-enforced by the current political chaos there. I will just have to be prepared for any eventuality and I will – of course – document the experience in full in this journal.

Even more pertinently, perhaps, the friend asked me how I thought I would feel when – after nearly a month away – I returned to Victoria in June. I told him what I expected to feel. We will just have to wait to see how accurate is that expectation.

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