Natural Order: John Bercow revisited

John Bercow has gone from thorn in the side to darling of the backbencher, meme and national treasure. With the news that the Speaker of the House of Commons is stepping down from the role he’s held for a decade, I thought it was time to repost an interview (I’m shocked to find) I did nine years ago. Looking at the accompanying images I see that we’ve all aged a bit. But some of the Speaker’s pronouncements back then have proved prescient.

As an ice-breaker, it takes some beating – after asking about my journey to his office John Bercow reveals he briefly lodged in the house I live in when he first moved to his Buckingham constituency.
“It was freezing,” he remembers.
“It still is,” I reply.

John has been returned with a large majority ever since that first rung on the political ladder, but during last year’s election canvassing he found a frosty response on the doorstep. Possibly stirred up by mischievous independent candidates and the UK Independence Party’s leader Nigel Farage, who stood against him, the notion that the Speaker’s electorate is disenfranchised hit the local and national headlines. Why no fuss from the two previous Speakers’ – Betty Boothroyd’s and Michael Martin’s – constituents?

Known for his verboseness, John tells me in great detail why he thinks the age-old tradition for the major parties to withdraw their opposition from the Speaker’s ballot sheet caused such a furore in 2010. In a nutshell, Buckingham has a savvy and vociferous electorate not afraid to express their educated opinions – and they’d had to wait the full five-year term to exercise their right to vote only to find a disparate group of independents standing alongside the Speaker of the House of Commons. John insists he takes nothing for granted even though he’s certain his new role as Speaker gives him more clout to represent his constituency than any backbench politician or minister would enjoy.

On HS2

That explanation given, I tackle the prospective devastation the High Speed 2 rail link will wreak on the Chilterns, Aylesbury Vale, Buckingham and beyond and what he can do about it.

I’m profoundly opposed to this ill-conceived, unnecessary, wasteful and damaging project.

“First of all, there’s the economic point that when we’re bust it’s extraordinary to contemplate such a project; secondly, there will be an enormous cost but no obvious benefit to the constituency,” says John, leaning forward in his chair.

An £8bn investment for the railways was announced in November but that sum seems small change compared to the £15.8 – £17.4bn estimated budget for the HS2 link. During the last Parliament John quizzed Labour’s then Transport Secretary Lord Andrew Adonis on the scheme’s “all pain, no gain” approach to Buckinghamshire (no stops are planned in the county) and was told slowing up the journey would damage HS2’s business case.

John checklists the villages and suburbs set to suffer from noise pollution, property blight and a too-complicated compensation scheme and reveals he’s also aired his views in private meetings with the current Transport Secretary Philip Hammond and Minister Theresa Villiers. His talks haven’t changed anything – yet. Is this an already done deal or perhaps a vanity project? I ask him.

Modest gain

“The Government thinks it will facilitate commerce. The reduction in journey time from London to Birmingham will be about 21 minutes, which I think is a very modest gain… I have seen the outline business case and I myself don’t find it at all persuasive, I think it’s very optimistic and pie-in-the-sky,” he says.

When I point out the Marylebone to Birmingham line is already being upgraded and journey times due to be slashed, John nods and says: “It’s possible to do this incrementally, without a massive great new line. You could, for example, extend the West Coast main line… The Government seems to think it’s got to go for this super-duper massive new project based on what I consider to be a highly speculative and unconvincing business case. More disturbingly still, Ministers and Secretaries of State have started to say recently, it’s not just about the business case it’s about making a judgement in the national interest.”

There’s a light-hearted moment when we consider what would happen if great crested newts were found along the route, but it’s clear John takes his constituency problems very seriously despite the new calls on his time.
“I still get here a lot,” says John. “I’m not here every single Friday but I am here pretty much every weekend.”

There’s something about Sally

John’s role as Speaker and the stately apartments that come with it keep him in Westminster more these days, he says. And with a politically active wife – Sally’s a vociferous, some might say strident, Labour supporter – and three small children, the eldest of whom is in a London school, home life is also more city-centric. I ask how he and Sally manage to juggle it all. The answer is teamwork and mutual respect.

“She’s more London-based and though the schools here [in Buckinghamshire] are excellent Oliver is pretty settled where he is. I don’t feel her political aspirations [she hopes to become a Labour MP] are going to be a great problem,” says John, citing Sir Nicholas Winterton and his wife Ann as an example of a two-MP family [though I might add they both represented the same party]. John has to be apolitical as Speaker but admits he gets letters from Tory supporters suggesting he should keep Sally’s outspoken views in check.
“My answer is unequivocal.

We’re living in 2010 – Sally is my wife, but she’s not my chattel, she’s not owned by me and not obliged to do as I say.

“She’s definitely not told what to do. There’s no job called ‘The Speaker’s Wife’, she doesn’t have a Parliamentary office. Yes she lives in the Speaker’s House with me – but we are not one person. She’s entitled to her own views – but I do believe that we face the world together.”

Off the record John reveals some of the more extreme and personal content of the letters and seems more disappointed than shocked at the vitriol.
What’s happened to the notion of a meritocracy?
“There’s a certain body of people who are determined to be as critical as possible,” says John, adding that he’s put up with comments about his background ever since he entered Parliament in 1997. He is happy to receive constructive criticism and advice, but not opposition to him for its own sake.

I’m not so arrogant as to believe I know everything. You can always benefit from sensible suggestions.

“I’m very happy, I enjoy life, I think it’s a huge privilege to do what I’m doing. I have a lovely wife and lovely children. I’d like to do this for as long as I reasonably can.”
He particularly likes reading biography and political memoirs, and found some passages from Tony Blair’s book, A Journey, resonant. Sally has introduced him to the award-winning novels of Sarah Waters and he’s a fan of Sebastian Faulks’s writing.

A lifelong interest

John’s other love is tennis – he was England’s number one ranked junior while his sister, Alison, was an accomplished synchronised swimmer – their sporting prowess gained because their mother wanted them to have a lifelong interest.
“I was never good enough to be a professional,” he says, modestly, admitting his job and family life leave him with little time to play tennis nowadays. Doubles, he says, gives you a good insight into people’s characters.

“I played with David Cameron for a while,” he says. “He’s an extremely good player – he’s a left-hander and while he’s very hard on himself, he’s very supportive of his partner.”
He still squeezes out time to watch coverage of Grand Slam tournaments, particularly matches involving Roger Federer, whom he considers the sport’s best player and ambassador.

Our interview over, I leave Buckingham’s darkening streets. Fair play learnt on the tennis court makes John Bercow an ideal Speaker – it’s not unlike the role of a umpire. But if he chose to descend from his elevated seat to return to the play, who I wonder, would relish being on the wrong side of the net?

Facts and stats about the Speaker

• John Bercow was born in 1963 and went to Finchley Manorhill School.
• He graduated with a First Class Honours Degree in Government from the University of Essex.
• He married Sally in December 2002 and they have three children, Oliver, Freddie and Jemima.
• Besides playing tennis John is also a qualified coach.
• John was elected MP for Buckingham in May 1997 and has served as Front Bench Spokesman for Education & Employment and Home Affairs. He has also held the posts of Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury, Shadow Minister for Work & Pensions and Shadow Secretary of State for International Development.
• He serves or has served on a number of cross party Parliamentary groups, review committees and select committees.
• John Bercow was elected as the 157th Speaker of the House of Commons on June 22, 2009.

John Bercow without his golden robes at the House of Commons

This article first appeared in the March 2011 edition of Berkshire & Buckinghamshire Life.

#JohnBercow #HoC #UKPolitics #HS2 #HouseofCommonsSpeaker #TheSpeakeroftheHouse #MPforBuckingham #Brexit

Celebrated and celebrity

“Have you ever interviewed anyone famous?”

That’s a question I’m frequently asked when I say that I’m a journalist and editor, and when I reply yes, the follow-up is invariably, “Who?”

Olympians, actors, MPs

At that point I usually list a handful of personalities who make regular headlines – MPs, Olympians, actors… then I blank. You’ll find a few of them listed in my character interview pages on this blogsite.

The truth is, I’ve interviewed so many people in the course of 30 years in the business that I’ve forgotten more of my interviewees than I can remember.

That’s not what my offspring would call a humble-brag. Genuinely, I can’t name names when put on the spot and in the early days of my career (when I interviewed the likes of composer Sir Malcolm Arnold, Monkees lead singer Davy Jones and Dr Who actor Jon Pertwee) it never occurred to me to keep a record. I can’t for the life of me remember the author I interviewed when I was in my first few weeks as a professional journalist. I do recall that it was at a barn conversion near Diss and I was especially impressed by his floor-to-rafters bookshelves.

On Saturday then, flipping through the Register section of my paper copy of The Times, it wasn’t the name that caught my eye, but an image. Sandwiched between the obituaries of The Earl of Plymouth and actor Bill Maynard was a third, that of a man standing on the deck of a ship wearing naval uniform and looking both proud and pleased – and I knew I’d seen the photograph before.

He went on to receive not one, but two knighthoods

Vice-Admiral Sir James Weatherall considered his time as Captain of HMS Ark Royal as a boyhood dream come true, he told me. But despite the fact he went on to receive not one, but two knighthoods, the first after a distinguished 37-year-long career in the Royal Navy, the second after serving in the Diplomatic Corps, our interview didn’t even make the front page of the magazine that had commissioned me for members of the Marine Society & Sea Cadets (MSSC).

Not even the Sir James Weatherall’s status as a former chairman of the Sea Cadets and a series of interests and distinguished appointments that made me wonder when he had time to sleep gave him the cover slot of Seafarer.

The Winter 2009 issue that featured him also carried an interview I’d done with poster-boy television broadcaster and now much-respected historian Dan Snow. So perhaps understandably, it was Dan who made the cover, his steadfast gaze and crumpled shirt a contrast to the super-smart uniform of a Naval officer standing on the deck of one of the most famous ships of the modern age.

Celebrated, not famous

Of course I also remember the interview I conducted with Dan. It was done over the phone as he shuttled between terminals at Heathrow, competing with so much background noise from baggage trolleys and tannoy announcements that I was fearful that I would not have enough material to create the feature I’d been commissioned to write.

On Saturday, I couldn’t help reflecting on a life well-served but not in the spotlight. To the wider public, Sir James Weatherall wasn’t a celebrity, and if I told anyone I’d interviewed him, I’m not sure they would have a clue who he was or be impressed.

You can read the obituary in The Times, March 31, 2018 (paywall) and a pdf of my original article in Seafarer is available to view here.

My career in journalism has led to brief connections with the hugely respected and celebrated, as well as the feted and famous, and for that privilege I’m grateful.

But it’s a funny old concept, celebrity – isn’t it?

Off to uni? Here’s what to buy, according to last year’s freshers

It’s that time of year when stores send out marketing emails full of smart ‘back to uni’ merchandise, and parents splash out to get their teens set up for life away from home. But before you fill your trolley with things that may never be used, check out these do’s and don’ts from students themselves.

Clever marketers know how to pull parental heart- and purse-strings as A-level, BTEC and other results come to fruition. But before mums and dads give free rein to thoughts of tidier bedrooms and a fully stocked fridge, and students relish the release from the ‘what time will you be back?’ question, there’s a big hurdle to jump first – the transition from home to halls. And with university freshers’ week looming large, it’s easy, in the excitement and apprehension of this next phase of life, to be sucked into buying ‘stuff’.

Lots of what’s needed may already be available from within family – ask grandparents who have downsized, or just accumulated a lifetime of crockery and cookware, what they can spare, for instance. And bear in mind that items parents feel are essential, or just want to buy as a treat and reward for getting to uni, may never be used. So what did students make the most of once they’d settled in? Ahead of a pre-university shopping spree, I asked a few of last year’s freshers and freshly graduated adults what every parent preparing to buy up the store should know.

Don’t get too much crockery and cutlery

Within weeks of purchase that 24-piece set of blue-handled cutlery you thought was a distinctive (and identifiable) must-have could well have been absorbed into a mass of shared kitchenalia. Worse, its destination could be under another student’s bed, festering with unwashed plates and other ‘borrowings’. There always seems to be one housemate whose room is a black hole pulling other people’s belongings into its orbit. And mounting a retrieval raid can be difficult. It’s easier, in the first few days and weeks, to keep track of a set of one or two knives, forks, dessertspoons and teaspoons, and bowls, tea-plates and dinner-plates. Your teen could keep a spare of each in their room to cover losses and breakages until they’re sure they won’t go missing. That said, less crockery may not be altogether better.

“I wish I’d had more plates, bowls and cutlery so I didn’t have to wash up ALL the time,” says Victoria, adding that these would have been ideal when new friends came around.

Other kitchen essentials mentioned by more than one student include a lidded pan for pasta and a cheap frying pan.

“A frying pan and fairy lights were the best things I was bought for uni,” says Lydia, who graduated last year. She also made use of a far-from-essential food mixer and baking equipment simply because she loves cooking, but she turned down a fellow fresher’s offer of cash in exchange for a share of her regular meals on the grounds it was too much responsibility (and he was lazy and should try harder). Meanwhile Amy found a toastie maker an invaluable addition to her kitchen. “We used that loads!” she says.

A frying pan and fairy lights were the best things

A multi-purpose oven- and microwave-proof dish with lid may prove an important addition as it can be used for baking, roasting, reheating and serving. One small and sharp knife, an easy peeler, plus a chopping knife and board are enough for all preparation. No student really needs an array of Sabatier or sushi standard blades. Besides, if anything does go astray or your teen discovers their culinary genius ahead of impressing a new partner, most big supermarkets sell cheap and cheerful ranges and the charity shops close to halls will have items donated by last year’s graduates who couldn’t find room for them in the car they left in.

Tone down the bed linen

Your fresher may not be ready to relinquish their Harry Potter bedset, while you want to upgrade them to matching bedding complete with toning cushions, to show you care and ensure they’re not teased. There’s nothing wrong with buying new for uni and ditching the young teen look, but check whether your ‘baby’ will be sleeping in a single or double bed (many student rooms cater for cuddling up at night) so you buy the right sizes. Unless your teen can style out a loud pattern, opt for plain-dyed bedlinen (at least two sets of everything) and don’t forget to add in a couple of mattress covers. The chances are, student bedsheets won’t see a washing machine above once a term and will come back at Christmas, or even at the end of the academic year, looking like a shroud (especially if fake tan has been involved).

Printers and stationery

Your student son or daughter probably owns a laptop, but may have been using the family printer. If you buy new, make sure the ink refills are cheap as some cost more than the printer to replace. Getting wifi access set up (the uni welcome pack issued when they collect their keys covers this) and creating a study scene on their desk area will encourage a continued work ethic and cut procrastination time once the hard work starts.

Few students will turn down a supply of paper, a couple of notebooks and pens, so put these in the trolley along with a small pot of coloured drawing pins to make it easy to decorate. Many student rooms have a ban on sticky tape and tack for posters, favouring corkboards instead.

“It’s a small thing, but I didn’t bring any pins and I wished I had,” says Polly. “I wanted to put up timetables and photos but didn’t want to go searching for them in Aberystwyth in my first week or so!”

It’s a small thing, but I didn’t bring any pins and I wished I had…

A personal supply of sticky tape (now you’re no longer going to be on hand as official tape finder and dispenser) and a glue stick may also prove useful. Tuck a family and pre-prom photo among the ‘congratulations’ and ‘good luck’ cards they received from friends and family ready for them to put up or look through once you’ve left the building. These will also serve as a reminder that they’ve been working towards, and looking forward to, this day and that many of their schoolmates are also heading for pastures new.

Other essentials

Shower gel, shampoo, toothpaste, sanitary products and that all-important must-buy special antiperspirant can add significant expense to a grocery bill. Maybe you want your teen to realise the harsh realities of semi-independence and the cost of branded buys, but initially, it’s nice to stock them up with a small supply of their preferred toiletries to remind them of home and help keep their finances in order. If they don’t already know that supermarket own-label will do the job just as well when their little stash runs out, expect to be enlightened about this (and several other things they’ve ‘discovered’) when they come home at Christmas. A pot plant (succulents are the in-thing) can also add a home-from-home feeling to an otherwise impersonal room.

Another recent graduate, Clare, recommends buying a coin purse just big enough to cram in ID, campus card and £10 for a night out. But speaking of non-essentials though, Clare reveals one much-loved treasure that never left her room. “I had a really nice Emma Bridgewater teapot that I wouldn’t let near any of our kitchens over the three years.”

On the money front, encourage your student to download a budgeting app, or sign up for their bank account’s spending monitor to help them stay on track in this first term. That way they won’t be coming back for handouts before the Christmas holidays (fingers crossed), when the empty fridge and full washing basket for a month will be reinstated back home.

Best buys according to students

• Airing rack
• Fairylights
• Frying pan
• Mattress topper
• Mini fridge, if you can wangle one
• Pins for the pinboard
• Quadruple plug extension and power breaker
• Wok (for cooking large quantities in one go, then storing).

Less useful

• First aid kit
• Beanbag
• Fancy teapot.

Five stores selling back to uni items that won’t break the bank

Argos

Debenhams

Ikea

John Lewis

Next homewares

With thanks to Frank B, James C, Clare E, Hector F, Amy J, Lydia K, Polly K and Victoria P for their input.

© Copyright Sandra Kessell

This article is unsponsored. Contact me to work with me.

Character interview – Colin Dexter’s Guilty Secret

Colin Dexter’s guilty secret.

All is quiet…

Interior Photographer Bristol, Commercial Photographer Bristol

It’s not always easy to find a new angle for a feature on a best-loved Cotswold town. Burford’s beautiful buildings and picturesque streets feature in many magazines and on websites, but a quick look around gave me the inspiration for a nativity trail. It’s reproduced in the link below if you missed it. Happy Twelfth Night!

cots-life-dec-16-burford-nativity

©Cotswold Life December 2016

 

Sophie Grigson’s kitchen

Sophie Grigson portrait by Mark Fairhurst.

She’s a self-confessed cook rather than a chef and champions local food production.

Sophie Grigson explains what’s going on in her kitchen.

COOK Sophie Grigson has a personal sense of style more in keeping with an Eighties pop star than a chef. With her spiky haircut, dangly earrings and elfin features she could so easily have bagged a record deal or presented the cult programme The Tube during that era, you can’t help but feel as you talk to her.
Her lovely Oxfordshire farmhouse also has a slightly whacky feel. There’s the new dog, Ben, recently adopted, who currently has to be kept in one side of it while the cat, Spice, rather put out by the usurper, has taken refuge in the kitchen. The door between Ben’s and Spice’s territories remains firmly closed and it’s not clear, if it came to a bun fight, which pet would come off the victor.

Sophie is all smiles, welcome and hand waves, excusing the chaos and ushering me into the most obvious room for this interview the kitchen – or rather, Spice’s space.
It’s just the kind of kitchen you would expect Sophie to have. Not for her the pristine pans gleaming on a rack beside polished granite work surfaces. Instead, it’s a used, lived in, experimented in, sat in, chatted in creative kitchen. It was hand built by a local joiner and has a range down one end, while jars, bottles and packets line shelves all over the walls. The windows frame views over the valley beyond and the sills are packed with kitchen paraphernalia, including a stylish hand-juicer, which, I note, has dust all over it.
“I take it that’s not used much,” I venture.
Sophie, busy creating coffee for us, is unabashed as she replies that it looks good, which is why it won its place in her kitchen.
Sophie herself has lived an interesting life. Her late mother Jane Grigson was a highly acclaimed author, translator and one of the pioneers of the Sixties culinary revolution and her father Geoffrey Grigson was a poet and critic. Hardly surprisingly, Sophie has a string of books to her name and is a regular contributor to Waitrose Magazine. Easy to talk to and passionate about food, she regularly pops up on hit TV cookery shows and spent the run-up to Christmas cooking in Sri Lanka. She was one of the judges of the BBC Radio 4 Food Programme Food and Farming awards and uses her not inconsiderable influence and profile to champion local food producers, farmers’ markets and small food-related businesses. Indeed, it was at a local food producers’ festival that I first met her.

Such a good cooking pedigree

With so many strings to her bow, so many demands on her time, so many accomplishments and such a good cooking pedigree, it’s refreshing, if a little surprising, to her that she was slightly daunted on her Sri Lankan trip to discover she was cooking for around 50 guests.
“I’m a cook, not a chef,” she says, adding in the same breath that she really enjoyed the experience. “It made me realise how hard chefs work every day, especially in that heat. In the course of preparation we had several power cuts, the fuse box went up in flames and not all the staff spoke English – but we got it done on time and it was a really good evening,” she says.
I ask her if her children can cook and she assures me that they can, a bit, though se reveals that they think what Mum does is a bit boring.
“They can both cook their favourite dishes,” she says. Favourite means a Thai coconut vegetable and fish noodle soup and pasta with tomato sauce. They’ve also been known to supply peanut butter brownies to local fundraising markets.
“They get the idea and that’s good,” says Sophie.

“It’s important, as a food writer, to give my backing to people who are producing the kind of food I want to use.”

Living with one foot in Oxford and the other in the countryside, it’s perhaps not surprising that Sophie is so passionate about supporting local food producers and retailers.
“I think there are issues that we do need to address… I think it’s important, as a food writer, to give my backing to people who are producing the kind of food I want to use,” she says.
“We are seeing a lot of changes in attitudes to food production. You can have a green hotel, for example, without compromising on quality; in fact by raising your quality. Hotels and restaurants tapping into local food producers get lots of things, not just fresh produce. They can have more say and ask local people to make things for them” she says. And there are so many human interest stories behind the food we eat.”

Community and rapport

Sophie is keen that we should be aware of what is available at farmers’ markets and in farm shops. She also points out that shopping regularly that way establishes a sense of community and rapport between buyer and seller or producer.
Other cooks are also lending their weight and voices to highlighting the way we produce food – recent programmes with Jamie Oliver and Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall about the lives of British-reared chickens have had an impact on supermarkets and customers.
“The demand for free range chickens has gone up, which is also good for British producers – it’s very exciting,” says Sophie, pointing out that the ultimate aim was to improve the way that chickens were raised.
“Good for Channel 4 for being brave enough to do that. When I first started appearing on television programmes 15 or 16 years ago I wouldn’t have been able to do that sort of thing,” she says.
Sophie would like to do a series on meat and follow the progress and lives of beef cattle, because she feels that if we are going to eat meat we should know the process of getting it on to our plates.
“I love meat, as long as I know it has had a good life,” she says.
So, food apart, how does Sophie spend her time?
“I do a lot with the children. I like reading novels. I’ve been reading a Barbara Trapido book – I really enjoy her novels. I had this strange experience of sitting in bed one night, reading one of her books and there was my name. It was a conversation someone was having – it felt lovely!” says Sophie, adding that she has been a volunteer at Oxford Literary Festival. She enjoys amateur dramatics, recently playing the fairy godmother in her local village panto and taking part in the The Vagina Monologues in Abingdon.
Sophie makes regular visits to France and loves the way the French have remained so connected to their food production. She would like to travel more, especially if she could combine her journeys with discovering food. She was enchanted by Sri Lanka and would like to travel through South America.

“One of the good things about having an interest in food is it’s a common language.”

“I’d love to take six months out and go from top to bottom, or the other way round,” says Sophie. “One of the good things about having an interest in food is it’s a common language.”
It’s a language that Sophie has proved fluent in and our local food producers are lucky to have such an eloquent and dedicated champion for their cause. She’s not just another personality dreaming up recipes in the kitchen. Sophie’s choice to be hands-on in the food world is Oxfordshire’s – and the nation’s – gain.

This interview first appeared in Oxfordshire Life magazine on June 2008 under my former name, Sandra Fraser. ©SandraKessell
Image ©Mark Fairhurst

The monuments men (and the people who made them)

Dynastic Egypt & Nubia © Richard Bryant & arcaid.co.uk

Summer has drawn to an end and I’m reminded of a trip H & I took to the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, followed by lunch in the splendid Dining Room restaurant and a wander around the neighbouring Museum of the History of Science. Having been a troublesome child, H has turned into an interesting and interested teenager. We haven’t seen the film The Monuments Men, but getting a 16-y-o’s take on the collection of relics makes me realise how differently this generation sees the world (again). Surprisingly, H is not of the ‘We should return them to their original owners’ school (George Clooney on the Elgin Marbles) or in the ‘We should destroy them, they’re not PC’ camp (Prince William on ivory) but ‘I can’t really see the point of viewing such things out of context.’

Imagine, he says, taking a brick from a modern London landmark building and carefully placing it in a case in a city in X number of years, whereupon an endless number of people file past it in wonder evermore.

Is it because in times past that we understood there could be no hope of going to see Egyptian treasures in situ that my generation considered museums an interesting place to visit? Back in 1972 schoolchildren had the Pharaohs drummed into them for what seemed like endless lessons, when the British Museum hosted a Treasures of (I can still spell it) Tutankhamun exhibition. London was as remote to me, as a small child in Norfolk, as Egypt would have been to all the flapper girls excited into Tut fever by Howard Carter and the discovery of the tomb in the Twenties. The proximity to a real archaeological site was the reason that 35,000 people queued around the block on the first day to see the ruins of the Temple of Mithras unearthed in London 50 years ago. Unless you were privileged, driven and determined and could overcome the cost, dangers and health hazards associated with pursuing your passion, (let alone had the time to spend on such journeys) a bit of earth and a few low walls in a giant hole in the ground around the corner from your workplace were the best you could hope for back then.

But H’s dismissive comments about why you’d bring a bit of what you’d seen back to your homeland got me thinking. Was that so your fellow countrymen could see something of the fascinating artefacts they would never otherwise see – a bit of education for the masses –or was it a case of showing off? A spot of I’ve got something you’ll never have or was it genuinely to educate the poor and worthy? Or else was it a compulsive acquisitional gene indulging in a spot of one-upmanship?

The collectors, Pitt Rivers and Ashmole, the Rothschilds, The Ephrussis, the Sainsburys and many more – were they thinking how future generations would come, ooh and aah and gaze in awe that anyone could have made so much effort over a tiny statuette? Or would they have looked at the cynical 16-year-old and pitied the poor people?

In his defence, my son doesn’t have many foreign holidays, but a few summers ago he visited Pompeii with his father and stepmother, and last year came to Venice with his stepfather and me. What surprised us was the honest pleasure he took from seeing the churches, palazzos and piazzas and even the art in situ. I’ve recommended that his next trip is to Turkey for sheer mind-blowing quantity and quality of treasures. My first visit to the Topkapi Palace 30 or more years ago was like stepping into a fairytale world. Not only could you see the caskets and collections of the Ottoman sultans, you could stand alongside them, since so few were behind glass and so many were packed into the displays. My aunt said the vaults were packed to the gunnels, and for that reason the less famous of the exhibits were rotated. During that holiday I watched horrified in the Blue Mosque as visitors made souvenirs of the miniature mosaic tiles that formed the Christ and Mary images on the walls. One week later, by contrast, at the Jorvik Museum in York, I sedately and reverently shuffled past the Coppergate Helmet, hermetically sealed in a glass case complete with a hygrometer. My Turkish uncle laughed when I complained about the Turks’ casual approach to their treasures and said that Turkish civilisation was so old, people could dig up antiquities in their gardens while trying to plant their vegetables. Which went some way to explaining their casual approach to anything less than the Spoonmaker’s Diamond. Times had changed when I took a return visit to the Topkapi more recently. Far from being ignored as we reached out to touch ancient clocks, let alone picked tiles off the walls, we were corralled and shuffled along past display cabinets in a manner befitting of treasures of such rarity and worth. Part of my thought it was a shame that the Western approach had crossed the Golden Horn.

Which brings me back how worthwhile H’s generation will consider the behind-glass viewing encounter. Virtual experience in glorious colour is nearly as good as being able to dig it up for oneself. It’s just unfortunate the technology wasn’t available when the treasure seekers were despoiling other people’s countries in their quests to bring home a bit of loot or rescue a nation’s unique heritage from ruin (their thoughts, not mine). But then again, so many poor people have despoiled – and sold on – their own country’s artefacts and heritage to the collectors, it does make you wonder who is in the wrong. Or maybe the lack of reverence for such items had more to do with the fact that they considered old pots and cracked helmets a bit of a hindrance when they had mouths to feed and veggies to grow.

Why should e-readers be treated as second class?

I’m rarely moved to write reviews these days but having loved Notes from an Exhibition by Patrick Gale for its setting, characters and evocative writing, the experience was marred by the poorly proofread copy. It jars when you have to stop midflow to check whether you should be reading ‘filing’ or ‘filling’ or when wordsareruntogether so you have to do a double take. It takes you out of the world you and the author have created together, that intimate setting or quiet haven. It’s even more annoying when you’re reading, not a cheap imprint or self published novel, (when typos and literals are understandable and more forgivable, if no less noticeable) but one promoted through a large publishing house, written by a well-respected author, that was downloaded at the cost of £4.99. I buy e-books because I just don’t have any more shelf space but that doesn’t mean I’m prepared to sacrifice quality for slapdash. Come on HarperCollins, honour your readers, honour your authors, honour your good name and fine publishing traditions – proofread your e-imprints to the same standards as your hard copy prints.

Seafarer summer 2011

Great to see Ben Ainslie inspiring his team mates to achieve another of his ambitions – to win the America’s Cup. If you want to know what inspired him to sail, read on.
Ben Ainslie – gentleman assassin.

An afternoon at Windmill Hill

James finally found a free Friday afternoon this month to visit the artworks and architecture at Windmill Hill, so I’ve retrieved this blogpost from the archive, written on a windswept and wet opening day.

Sandra Kessell

A couple of weeks ago I was lucky enough to be invited to a sneaky preview of the latest attraction at Waddesdon Manor. Not, as you might think, a new piece of art bought by the renowned collector Jacob Rothschild, whose family built the manor – but instead a glorious new building. Designed by Stephen Marshall Architects, the cynical might suggest that such a breathtaking location and, presumably, budget, ought to bring out the best in any architect worth his salt, but whatever your viewpoint – inside, outside, aesthetic, architectural, structural – it is a triumph of the kind only a love of the English landscape, combined with skill and vision, can create.

Add to its already charmed pedigree items from Lord Rothschild’s modern art collection and the fact it will be open to the public and available for hire and you can see why the art world, architectural…

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