A strange Spring

I've been using my one permitted outing of the day for early morning walks with the dog in our local (deserted) woods.  This morning, with all the primroses, wood anemones and violets out, the birds in good voice and the sun coming up on the other side of the valley, it was as if the natural world was at odds with the social. Everything was so peaceful, so as it should be, yet only a short distance away health care staff are fighting for the lives of so many patients in this our worst-hit part of Wales.

But now it's back to the desk with an article to finish by the end of the day. There should be few distractions to keep us from our writing for the time being, of course, but the temptation to go for frequent news updates is difficult to resist - though it probably doesn't much help our mental health.  Better to immerse ourselves for a while in worlds of fiction, poetry or less depressing fact!

The written word

I was thinking this morning about the contribution of writers and the value of the written word in these increasingly stressful times - certainly to communicate accurate information but also to provide diversions from the seemingly relentless march of problems thrown up by the corona virus. Books, magazines and on-line reading materials will hopefully be good companions for many of us in our enforced isolation. The book I'm reading at the moment, "All Among The Barley"  by Melissa Harrison, is transporting me to the very different world of 1933. It was a world that had big problems of its own of course, but the book is beautifully written and the story of farmer's daughter Edie Mather's coming of age is captivating.

How important our own writing about the present situation could be too - our "unprecedented" situation, as we're continually reminded by the politicians. As a small child my father lost his eldest sister in the 1918 'flu pandemic and my father-in-law was only a year old when his young mother succumbed. There was hardly a family in the land, indeed in the world, that wasn't touched by the outbreak. There's plenty written in the medical and history textbooks about it but I've found comparatively little, other than brief mentions, in personal, family history accounts.  "This too shall pass" and, when it's all over, no doubt there will be endless dissection of the details in the press and the textbooks. But something so major, with such far reaching implications for our individual lives, surely deserves chronicling on a more personal level for our future family readers too.

International Women's Day

A great afternoon yesterday, celebrating International Women's Day at the Raised Voices event at St. Mary de Crypt in Gloucester - female poets from all over Gloucestershire coming together to delight in and honour the contribution of women across time and place. The strength of women (like a "hornbeam leaning into the wind"), the struggles of women (miscarriage -"the reality no-one wants to acknowledge", "the full body armour" when fighting eating disorders), the endless caring for the young, the old and the sick; the day to day existence and the moments of transcendence  - all were expressed by established names and new-comers who had never before read in public. Moving testimony about undertaking the Hajj after a year in which the poet had lost her husband, a child and both parents; reminders of all the women who paved the way for the freedoms and rights we now enjoy; recognition of how much further we have to go to achieve the parity we seek - there was so much emotion and so much energy in the participants, it was incredibly inspiring. 

Another positive has been the improvement in the weather over the last few days - Spring does seem to be hovering in the wings now and putting a tentative foot forward from time to time. On Friday we did a few miles of the Wye Valley Walk we've been doing on and off for a while now; the sun shone and the countryside just north of Hereford, though still showing signs of the recent flooding, certainly seemed to be moving forward into better days. I have to disagree with Robert Browning though - perhaps you remember his poem "O to be in England"? He spoke of the buttercup as being "the little children's flower"; for me that will always be the celandine, which I loved as a child and which was growing in abundance on Friday with primroses and early violets in the hedgerows. Apparently the name celandine shares its root with swallow, and both are said to arrive in the countryside at about the same time. No signs of swallows around here yet though!

"There's a flower that shall be mine,
'tis the little celandine"
William Wordsworth

World Book Day

As a child I just took it for granted, the fact that my parents read to me, that our house was full of books, that birthdays and Christmases invariably brought more to go on my bedroom shelves and later to be squirreled away under the bedclothes, read by torchlight way after bedtime. I had no idea then how fortunate I was. But how I loved the books I had - witness the fact that several of the favourites are still on my bookcase now!

Recent research into the impact of World Book Day (which this year takes place on Thursday) shows that for almost a quarter of the children given their free £1 book token this marks their first opportunity to have a book of their own; amongst children having free school meals that's the case for a third of them. I think that there can be little doubt as to the real value of this charitable enterprise.

But I'm saddened to think of some of the activities that have grown up around World Book Day and the pressures that these too often exert on families. Going to school dressed as a favourite character from a book can be great fun - and I'm sure some parents and carers probably enjoy the challenge of putting together a costume for their child or children. But for those with little time or little inclination to design and make their own, the pressure to buy outfits so that a child or children fit in with their peers can be an unwelcome and expensive imposition. You only have to look at some of the costumes offered on line and advertised specifically with World Book Day in mind - a couple of the cheapest I've seen have been Alice in Wonderland ones at £19.99, Gruffalo ones at £24.99. For families in straightened circumstances, how on earth can that be justified?  How much better if activities can be planned that demand less and offer more.

Fighting the elements

Well, the waters may be receding but, in the Biblical phrase, there is no sign yet of "a rainbow standing across the land". For the residents of Monmouthshire, and those in Herefordshire, Worcestershire and Shropshire, the effects of the floods will be felt for a long time to come.  Living on a hill, we are very fortunate, having nothing more than a shortage of drinking water to worry about (the water treatment plant in Monmouth was inundated and is without power). But for those living closer to river level the last few days have been catastrophic.

I've written before about how the weather and people's fight against the elements feature large in so much literature. I was looking back last night over some of my writing. When I was researching the background to my own family history in Monmouthshire in the nineteenth century for my book "Digging Up The Family - A Lesson In Social History" I came across frequent references to the great flood of October 17th 1883. That evening a fierce storm was blowing up the Severn Estuary and it corresponded with the highest tide of the century; at 7pm. a tidal wave of water six feet high suddenly engulfed the land all along the Caldicot Levels. Miraculously, all eighty three men trapped in the shaft of the Severn Tunnel, then under construction, were saved by the heroic measures taken by their comrades above ground (a story well worth reading). My grandfather, aged five at the time, and his family were in a cottage in the direct path of the wave, which swept up from the wharf, through their garden and into the house. My great grandparents and the older boys grabbed the smallest children (it was a big family) and fled with them to the comparative safety of the upstairs rooms whilst the storm battered at the windows. The devastation awaiting them downstairs and outside next morning was unprecedented.

Perhaps we now have more sophisticated approaches to planning for and dealing with "natural disasters" but it's becoming glaringly obvious how much we have ourselves to blame for the frequency and the extent of many of them. Our tardiness at getting to grips with climate change, policies that sacrifice safety for profit (inappropriate house building on flood plains etc.) - I could go on.  The politicians' knee jerk reactions to the present crisis and their fervent promises of assistance in the media sadly give little hope for any meaningful, long term strategies. 

"Whatever the weather ..."

I'm sitting here in my study looking out on the very wild morning delivered to us by Storm Ciara. I took the dog out for a two hour walk early on, before the rain set in, as she certainly won't be getting much of a one later. We had the wind behind us to start with but coming back into a head wind was definitely a challenge - hardly the 86 mph gusts they've had at Capel Curig, but enough to take me off my feet at one point. Carys, of course, was fine - this is when having four legs and a low centre of gravity is really advantageous!

No wonder the weather becomes such a major feature - indeed a character in its own right - in so much literature. The effect it has upon individuals, decisions they make, their environments, on history itself  (the decision when to launch the D Day invasion for example) - it has tremendous significance. At the moment I'm reading "Twenty Thousand Saints" by Fflur Daffydd, a novel set on Bardsey Island; the elements rule the lives of those living on Bardsey and those coming, as do Daffydd's characters, for recreation, religion or less reputable reasons. The narrow straight of water between the island and the mainland and the winds and tides that govern it subtly dominate the narrative. It's an intriguing story on many levels - well worth a read.

 

Love and St. Dwynwen

In Wales we don't wait for Valentine's Day - we have our own patron saint of lovers, St. Dwynwen, whose festival we celebrated yesterday. History tells us that she was the daughter of a medieval king,  legend (probably originating in the eighteenth century) that she was spurned in love because of her chastity, but granted by God three wishes because if it. One of her wishes was that all lovers "might either attain the objects of their affection or be cured of their passion"; another was that she should never marry. She is reputed to have died a nun in the church named after her at Llanddwyn just off the coast of Anglesey.

I've been rereading some of my favourite love poems in Dwynwen's honour. A great favourite has to be the clear-eyed, down-to-earth "There's a kind of love called maintenance" by U. A. Fanthorpe (do read it if you're not familiar with it - this is about the love that lasts). And I'm very fond too of the poems in Carol Ann Duffy's collection "Rapture" - so many that most of us can identify with. Her anthology of love poems, "Hand in Hand", contributed by a variety of poets who chose one of their own and a favourite by another writer, also makes good reading. But there's one poem I always carry in my handbag, one that's really special - W. B Yeates' "When You Are Old"; to me that's the greatest love poem ever.

An Absent Love

In threadbare hours

my mind weaves stories -

stories to tell you on the shores of morning,

when the tattered curtains of night draw back,

when grey mists thin,

when a rising sun glints

on the straining canvas of full sails

carrying you back into the compass

of these dreamcatcher tales.

(copyright Gill Garrett 2015)