Relocation, relocation

So this blog is moving - to WordPress and to a proper domain - http://www.notarobot.co.uk

I'm going to leave this up for a while, but there won't be anything new here.

See you over there,

David

Four Stories about my Grandfather

He travelled to the city where I live by train, arriving at noon. My mother had orchestrated the meeting, she persuaded me that my Dad could help me strip the paper from the walls in the sitting room of my new house. I had agreed. He would come down, work, then we would go out and have dinner somewhere. I told my mother that I didn't want to drink a lot, hoping the message would get through.

We worked for a few hours in the afternoon, but didn't really get much done. The wall under the paper was patched and fractured, but better than I had hoped. After we had tided the room I made coffee, decaffeinated because his blood pressure has been high since he retired. We drank the coffee in silence, and read our respective papers.

Around seven we went out for a meal. The restaurant was busy enough to be distracting. We discussed people I had known when I was younger and what had happened to them, and Dad told me about their fathers. He talked for a while about his business colleagues and his trips to Italy with work. He loved the food, and the people. I listened.

After an hour we had finished eating. Dad wanted to go to the pub over the road. It was quiet when we entered. At the bar he ordered a pint for himself, and a bottle of beer for me. We sat, and to break the silence I asked about Granddad.

His name was Tommy. I had only distant memories of him, he had died when I was seven or eight, and we had visited only rarely. He used to sit on a huge pile of cushions, and I wouldn't get too close or he would grab me and tickle me half to death with his hugely strong hands. I knew he had been a miner and a boxer too, for a while. That was all I knew.

Dad told me four stories, though I had to press him for details. I wrote them all down the next day, as far as I could remember.

-

Nobby Clark

When my Dad was about twelve years old he beat up Nobby Clarks' son. I couldn't really find out why, though Dad suggested that the son had been calling him names. While Dad was talking about it I remembered him pointing out his school in the colliery village, a huge high walled building that looked like a prison. I could imagine my Dad and Nobby's son outside the high wrought-iron gates pushing and hitting each other until one ran away with a bloody nose. My Dad headed home for his tea.

Nobby Clark and his son lived on the same street as Dad. He was the 'street bully'. A huge red-faced man, much taken to drink, who could often be heard bellowing and shouting, known for beating his wife when he got home from the pub. As Dad walked up the road past Nobby's house, Nobby burst out the front door in a fury. He must have been looking out the window, waiting. Before Dad could run Nobby caught him a blow across the head that sent him spinning. As he fell he found his feet and ran as fast as he could towards home. Nobby lumbered after him, cursing and swearing as he went.

When Dad got home Tommy was just sitting down for his tea. Dad burst into the front room out of breath. Tommy just looked at him and told him to sit down. You could hear Nobby shouting on his way up the street, but Tommy didn't let Dad say anything. He just told him to sit down. Dad sat down.

A few seconds later there was a huge banging on the front door. Nobby was shouting and hitting the door with his fists. He was shouting 'get out here you little bastard, get out here'. Dad looked across at Tommy. He quietly put his knife and fork down, stood up and walked to the door. He opened it and kept walking. As he walked he jabbed Nobby Clark sharply in the chest with his left fist, pushing him back each time. Although Nobby was over six feet tall, and Tommy only five foot eight or so, Tommy was a powerful man, fresh out of the army after the war. He stopped as Nobby backed off from the pavement onto the road. He said, 'Nobby Clark, I've heard you shouting in your house, and I've seen you strutting about the place. I'll tell you this - you touch my lad or my house again and you'll have me to answer to'.

Dad stopped the story at this point, told me to go to the bar while he went to the toilet. When he got back I asked if Nobby had bothered him again. He said he hadn't, 'everybody knew Tommy, everyone knew who he was. He kept himself to himself your Granddad but everybody knew who he was.'

-

Two Sten Guns & a Mattress

On the 2nd of June 1940 Tommy was among the last of over three hundred and thirty thousand soldiers belonging to the British Expeditionary Force to be evacuated from the beaches of Dunkirk.

He was a member of the 37th Royal Artillery (known as 'The Broken Wheel' Regiment). They had been posted to mainland Europe following the German invasion of Poland. My Dad didn't know how long Tommy had been over there, though he knew he was a veteran by the time the war started. Tommy had been out in India for years.

The regiment had received the order to evacuate, and had to make their own way, on foot, across the fields and towns of France to Dunkirk, where the British fleet was waiting. They were instructed to leave whatever equipment they could not easily carry. Soldiers were worth more than weapons.

The young officer in charge was panicked. He came to the corner of a field, and he began to march diagonally across it. Tommy had to reach quickly forward to restrain him. You never walked across the fields, you walked around them, for fear of mines. He angrily shrugged off Tommy's hand, but walked around the field.

As they got to the main road they could see the German soldiers approaching in the distance. The officer quickly sent a young Welsh soldier into an abandoned farmhouse with instructions to find a mattress. When the lad returned the officer handed Tommy two Sten guns. He told Tommy and young lad to use the mattress as cover and hold off the Germans as long as they could, then follow on when they had a chance.

Tommy had been fighting long enough to know this was a suicide mission. They propped the mattress up at the corner of the house, and watched as the rest of the regiment disappeared around the corner. Even before the last soldier had gone Tommy was already on his feet.

Tommy told the Welsh lad to come with him. They jogged after their regiment and quickly caught up with the soldiers at the back of the line. Nods and winks were exchanged as Tommy and the Welsh lad silently rejoined the evacuation. The other soldiers grouped together around them so the officer wouldn't see if he chanced to turn around.

After another couple of hours they came in sight of the harbour. It must have been terrible. Luftwaffe planes were strafing lines of troops and vehicles, dogfighting with British planes and attacking the small ships engaged in taking waiting troops out to the deep water where the destroyers waited.

Behind the German's grew closer, the distant rumble of trucks and gunfire coming closer with every second. Around them there were very few remaining British or French soldiers. Gradually the regiment broke into a run, desperate not to miss their last chance of escape.

Tommy must have seen men shot by the German fighters. He choose to run, bent almost double along the line of a wall going down towards the sea. After covering nearly a mile he arrived at the shore. There were no small boats left. The destroyer was out of the bay, in the deep water. Tommy threw away the gun and most of his gear, waded in and began to swim out to the huge battleship. Dad told me it was around half a mile, and that by the time Tommy swam out to the boat he couldn't climb the rope lowered for him. A man climbed down and dragged him aboard. As soon as he recovered his breath he asked for a turn on the ship's guns, to try and shoot down the fighters.

That's the version Dad told me. When I was writing it it led me to recollect talking to my Granddad about the war when I was very young. I have a clear memory of him telling me about Dunkirk, about running through the machine gun fire to the beach, and then telling me that he climbed onto a small boat. He told me when he sat on the boat he kept feeling down for his legs, since he had heard that when they were blown off, you didn't feel it.

-

Sergeant For a Day

There were only a couple of stories left to tell, and Dad struggled to remember the details. He went quiet for a while, and then asked if he had already told me about when Tommy was Sergeant for a day.

It was when he was posted over in India. A Welsh officer, a giant of a man, had made it his business to bully and intimidate the soldiers under him. There was little you could do as a private. The best course of action was to keep your head down, and not make yourself conspicuous. This Welsh officer had singled out Tommy, perhaps because of his boxing successes, and often 'took the mick'.

During some battle or other Tommy had distinguished himself. His reward was to be promoted to Sergeant, which amongst other things gave him access to the officer's mess. He received his promotion in the morning, took part in training, and then was expected in the mess for his first lunch as an officer. He walked into the mess, passing the Welshman standing by the door, who made the same kind of derogatory remark he had been coming out with since Tommy had started.

Tommy didn't reply. He just turned around put his fists up, and knocked him out cold with one punch.

The same day Tommy was demoted back to Private, but the Welshman never bothered him again, and he got himself a bit of a reputation about the place.

-

The American

Dad and I sat and finished our drinks. He went to buy another round and when he came back sat down slowly.

There was another story, he said, about some black American soldier in the war. Not much to tell.

Tommy went into the bar in the army camp one night for a drink. At the time he had just won some boxing trophy and was known about the camp for the fight, which had been a hard battle.

He asked the barman for a beer, and stood and waited as it was poured out. While he was leaning on the bar, an American soldier came in and also asked the barman for a beer when he was ready. The barman glanced up and then looked back down at the drink he was pouring for Tommy.

"We don't serve your kind in here", the barman said, "black lads".

Tommy leaned over the bar and grabbed the man by his collar, lifting him up to his toes.

"He's had to deal with the same bullets we have. I'm buying him a bloody drink".

The barman muttered some apology and poured the drink.

-

Dad finished his last beer quickly, and half of mine was still in the glass. Time to get back, he said, and we picked up our jackets and left.

On the walk home we didn't say much. I asked Dad what I had got from his side of the family.

"You'll go grey early like me," he said," and your temper. That's the same as me and your Granddad. Your temper."

Unititled, Unfinished

These two lines have been rattling around my head for years.
I could never make line three, so I'm posting them here as a kind of exorcism.
Are they druids? I could never tell.

'A vision?', said I, in incredulous tones,
She watched as I picked through the animal bones.
...

Jack Kerouac on a TV near you

It always amazes me when I see people like Jack Kerouac on TV, getting interviewed. He seems a little uncomfortable here and the jazz is kind of weary sounding , but it is still great to hear him read.

12 Months in 41 Seconds

Autumn Book Review

Whilst you read you may hear the sound of distant laughter. Ignore it, it's God chortling away at the moving target that is the title of this series. 'Autumn Book Reviews' is the follow up to 'August Book Reviews' and will, I imagine, be followed in due course by 'Book Review 2011' after which we can put the whole sorry enterprise to rest.

I should warn you at this point I am a terrible critic. My approach is to think of witty things to say about a book and put them instantly to paper. The truth and accuracy of what I am saying is by the by. As an example, I am only writing this paragraph because I became paranoid I may meet an author and wanted a get out.

Anyway...

A tired jade I may be but 'Stone's Fall' by Iain Pears crossed a line that I had no idea existed in me. I grew tired of London, and by extension, tired of life. Another trawl around the St. James's Square in the company of the English Class System was too much for me.

The book is undoubtedly well written, but the characters seemed somehow lifeless. The 'grand reveal' nature of the plot may have been to blame. The novel invests a great deal of time and energy in keeping a secret, and when the truth finally appears you feel like Dorothy when the Wizard emerges from behind the curtain. In a word, disappointed. To prove the point I am now going to ruin the book for everybody so look away now.

"Man unknowingly marries own daughter. Kills self."

'Stone's Fall' put me off novels so much that I convinced myself it was time to tackle 'The Case For God' by Karen Armstrong. I could not be anything but in awe at the scholarship, reflection and thought displayed throughout. This had the unfortunate side effect of making me feel cripplingly stupid whenever I picked it up, but I soldiered on.

I think a better, though less sales-friendly title, would have been ' The Case For Religion'. There is no irrefutable proof of God's existence offered in these pages (of course!), rather an exposition of the history of religion that shows how our dialogue around faith has been twisted into something that would have astounded our ancestors. The conclusion of the book, in which Karen Armstrong writes eloquently of the foundations of the religious spirit is worth the price of the book alone. If you genuinely can't be arsed with this sort of thing I would suggest at least giving that a read next time you are in a bookshop with chairs.

As I closed 'The Case For God', thanking my lucky stars that the amount of notes gave me an early release from it's worryingly dense pages, my tired eyes scanned my bookshelves for something I could cope with.

That is how I found myself reading 'Murder On The Orient Express'. Every time I read an Agatha Christie I am always struck by two things: firstly by how bad her writing appears to be and then by what a total shit Poirot is. About a day later I finish the book, having barely looked up, and certainly without having a bloody idea whodunnit until the dénouement.

The rest of the season was taken up by housework, working like a dog and a proposal of marriage. Despite this troublesome intrusion of reality, I did find time to fit in 'Burning Bright' by Tracy Chevalier and 'The Lodger, Shakespeare on Silver Street' by Charles Nicholl.

The former was, you know, alright. The second was one of the most interesting books on Shakespeare I have read. The author takes as a starting point the only occasion when his actual spoken words have been recorded, a deposition in a lawsuit of 1612. The case in question is a trivial dispute over a dowry payment. However we learn enough to enable Nicholl to go on a thorough exploration of Shakespeare's surroundings and associates at that time. The book is naturally full of heavily disclaimed supposition, but it still grips.

Of course, if Shakespeare leaves you cold, and you think him overrated, you should not bother. Though I may think your soul is devoid of art, what do you care what I think?