Sam's first Secret Santa weekend

December treats

It's tradition we go to Badby for a Secret Santa weekend every year and 2023 saw the Allard-Baker-Grimley-Johnson-Thompson numbers swelled by one.... not a very big or old one but a significant one in our lives at the moment.

2022 Advent

Spot the Differences

It's been a goodly strange few years and there are many differences between now and any point in the past: one week, one month, one year, or two or three or four weeks, months and years ago. And in some ways it seems like the world in going to hell in a hand cart. And in other ways it seems that life is a bowl of cherries. Whatever that means. But December comes round again and, although there have certainly been some profound things happening on a personal level over the last year, the leaves have just about fallen, the frost's beginning to pinch, the winter fog is creeping through the country and the Advent stockings are in place. Hello December.

 

Vaccinated Diamond Birthday

Six Months Later

So, six months after I was born in Wakefield, Sally Anne Allard was born on St Patrick’s Day in Bradford. March 2021 marked Sally’s Diamond Birthday. It wasn’t “normal” in that there was no meal out and no trip to the cinema or theatre…. But it was normal in keeping up the tradition of getting together with our daughters (even if we were walking two by two) and eating and drinking (a picnic in the open air, socially distanced.) Last March we began locking down before the government asked us to and this year we look forward to restrictions being lifted. So in the weeks and months to come I hope we’ll have a series of further birthday-style events….

St Patrick’s Day over the previous five years

• 2016 – Anomaleesa at The Everyman Cinema in Leeds
• 2017 – Gardening course and the live action Beauty and the Beast at The Everyman
• 2018 – Icy walk, wintry views and meal at home with (Sally’s choice of) Minority Report on the TV
• 2019 – The RSC touring production of Matilda at Bradford Alhambra and Green Book at Showcase
• 2020 – Almost UK-wide Lockdown, hikes (on different days) to the Druid’s Altar and Top Withins

No cinema, no theatre, but plenty still to enjoy

In the bullet-points above, I’ve mentioned cultural events that made 2016-19 distinctive, but all years have still included cards, a cake and presents revolving around themes of gardening, glamour, reading, flowers, food and drink. This year a parade of visitors passed by the garden gate to wish Many Happy Returns and delivery folk turned up at a steady pace…. Unusual gifts this year included a phone call from Australia, a home-knitted cardigan and a kit from Dishoom to make Naan-Bacon-Rolls. (After nearly 35 years of marriage we are learning to be cooperative in the kitchen!)

Birthday Talents

It’s easy to celebrate birthdays with Sally (or spend Christmas, or go on holiday, or do Bonfire Night, or do anything really….) All that’s needed are messages of love from family and friends and some time together making human connections. All the Lockdowns in the world can’t squash Sally’s talents for being generous and open-hearted to whatever can be achieved with whatever resources are at hand….

Spring in the air

The birds are nest-building, the daffodils are out, the buds are budding, the daylight hours are longer – these are all signifiers of Sally’s birthday every year – the Spring of the year. And in 2021, the Covid vaccine rollout continues apace…. A Spring-like birthday present from the scientific and medical community. What will St Patrick’s Day in March 2022 bring? We’ll be a year older. Will we still be socially distancing? Wearing masks? Time will tell.

A Birthday

by Christina Rossetti

My heart is like a singing bird

Whose nest is in a water’d shoot;

My heart is like an apple-tree

Whose boughs are bent with thickset fruit;

My heart is like a rainbow shell

That paddles in a halcyon sea;

My heart is gladder than all these

Because my love is come to me. 

Raise me a dais of silk and down;

Hang it with vair and purple dyes;

Carve it in doves and pomegranates,

And peacocks with a hundred eyes;

Work it in gold and silver grapes,

In leaves and silver fleurs-de-lys;

Because the birthday of my life

Is come, my love is come to me.

Then welcome, Winter

Hunkering down with Call My Agent and It's A Sin

Winter's costs and benefits

Although this year’s Winter has not included usual highlights like sitting by roaring fires in stately homes, getting a beer at a Christmas market, singing carols in the cloisters at Fountains Abbey or solving Murder Mysteries on New Year’s Eve, snow has still fallen appropriately, woolly clothes have been wrapped around, mulled wine has been glugged and boots have crunched on icy meadows. And I thank the Winter stars for the universe’s permission to savour stodgy pudding and custard at this time of year. I manage to stem the flow of inner tears when our weekly posh takeaway from La Rue restaurant in Saltaire doesn’t include a sponge pud as a dessert choice on their menu. But then I’m only human. Winter has costs but benefits too – hunkering down with movies and box sets, curtains shut, anticipating that Spring will come. Carpe diem.

Winter's Beauty
by W H Davies

Is it not fine to walk in Spring,
When leaves are born, and hear birds sing?
And when they lose their singing powers,
In Summer, watch the bees at flowers?
Is it not fine, when Summer's past,
To have the leaves, no longer fast,
Biting my heel where'er I go,
Or dancing lightly on my toe?
Now Winter's here and rivers freeze;
As I walk out I see the trees,
Wherein the pretty squirrels sleep,
All standing in the snow so deep:
And every twig, however small,
Is blossomed white and beautiful.
Then welcome, Winter, with thy power
To make this tree a big white flower;
To make this tree a lovely sight,
With fifty brown arms draped in white,
While thousands of small fingers show
In soft white gloves of purest snow.

One tree, Four Seasons.... (plus the real Frankie Valli and the movie-acting Four Seasons from Jersey Boys)

Three Households One Day

Three households….

…. All alike in dignity

In fair Saltaire where we lay our scene

In troubled times break to new jollity

Neath patio heaters, waiting for a vaccine….

Advent gives way to Christmas Eve.... Stocking One to Stocking TwentyFour…. Christmas is Go!

Tier Three Walks

Thankfully, walking in the open air is not yet prohibited so it is still a joy to tramp around the woods and dales and moors and fields of West Yorkshire on the days leading up to Christmas.

A mince pie in the forest, anyone?

I think, on average, I must have walked more miles in 2020 than in any previous year of my life. If I decide on any Resolutions in the New Year, I think it will be to Keep Walking amongst the local trees and alongside the canals and rivers and up and down the hills, mountains and dales of Yorkshire.

White Christmas Eve

A crisp and frosty (and at times blizzardy) walk on Christmas Eve above the town of Oxenhope brought Yorkshire horizons of every type: black pendulous clouds, misty snowscapes, bright blue expanses and boiling pink sunsets – the sky was as mad and varied as 2020 has been.

Al fresco

Although the latest rules allowed us to be inside on Christmas Day, bearing in mind Emily’s work in the NHS, we summoned our inner Carry On Campers with patio heaters and fairy lights to feast outside.

Penultimate post of 2020

My 50th post of the year will be on New Year’s Eve so between now and then I’ll scour my memory banks to see if there’s such a thing as a clear summary of the last year. I know we won’t be doing what we usually do on New Year’s Eve.…

Clear and simple

What’s true now – and it always has been and always will be – is that Connecting with loved ones is the most important human impulse of all…. whether that’s by card, letter, phone, text, a friendly wave, a doorstep chat, friendly small talk in the woods, WhatsApp, Email, Zoom, Skype, Teams – or, if you’re lucky, sitting down with others to share festive food and drink…. only connect.

Talking Shakespeare Kaksi (Two)

Like a potter’s wheel (Coasters, Stockings and Nativities)

My thoughts are whirled like a potter’s wheel:

I know not where I am, nor what I do.

The valiant Talbot’s words in Henry VI Part One are a potent reflection of what my mind has felt like during 2020. At times, the effects of the pandemic (on me) have produced clarity, joy and hope but more often confusion, frustration and despair (the negative emotions mostly caused by the UK government, I have to say.) Time has seemed elastic so pre-Covid times feels like two months ago and also two years ago. 

• Local walks continue on most days,
• jigsaws keep the left brain/right brain synapses twanging,
• freshly-baked mulled wine and mince pies have now been sampled and
• posh takeaways from La Rue restaurant provide a once-a-week luxury oasis, providing a time to scrub down, dress up and light candles.

Whatever it takes to cope in this strangest of times…. In the collage below there is evidence that our Advent Stockings (from Sue) have continued to yield treasures at morning coffee time. You can also see the creative endeavours of our Badby friend, Alex Thompson, honorary daughter and sister to the Allard-Johnsons, who has used some of her time at least to design beautiful coasters. These are all evidence of “clarity, joy and hope” – as is the glimpse of an ambitious Nativity scene (see collage above) constructed in a neighbour’s garden, along with child-friendly story sheets telling of those days in May or September (likely) between 4 and 6 BC (probably) when a stable in Bethlehem became the centre of the universe. The centre of my imaginative universe at the moment is re-reading, re-listening to and re-watching Shakespeare plays – it stops my thoughts whirling and helps me avoid becoming frustrated by the news bulletins. I introduced the RSC Talking Shakespeare series in an earlier post (here). PS Kaksi is Finnish for Two so the information below is my record of the second “batch” I enjoyed.

Paterson Joseph and Sir Simon Russell Beale

• Paterson Joseph almost became a chef before turning to acting. All of the interviewees were asked about their earliest introductions to the national poet and Paterson Joseph delivered a classic line that chimed with my own experience: “I didn’t come to Shakespeare – Shakespeare came to me.” I first “noticed” Joseph in 1990 as Oswald in King Lear, and suddenly realised – because of his performance – what a brilliant and significant role Oswald is. I was also lucky to see his shattering Othello (with the evillest Iago I’ve seen in Andy Serkis) at the Royal Exchange in Manchester. I loved Joseph’s Patroclus in Troilus and Cressida and, most jaw-droppingly, his tormented Brutus (pitted against Ray Fearon’s Mark Antony) in Julius Caesar. He didn’t talk about his many non-Shakespearean roles (including the recent Kamal Hadley in the BBC’s Noughts and Crosses and one of my favourites, his role in Survivors; plus on stage his compelling Atahualpa in Shaffer’s Royal Hunt of the Sun at the National Theatre) but then the point of the series is to talk about Shakespeare and I’ll never forget the Channel 4 documentary in which he directed a group of disaffected teenagers in London in a moving production of Romeo and Juliet.
• Simon Russell Beale first exploded into my theatrical knowledge in a series of Restoration plays at the Royal Shakespeare Company playing gut-wrenching comic grotesques with painful vulnerabilities. He has spoken to the RSC Summer School a couple of times and it became obvious that comedy was not his only skill. Seeing him in Ghosts and The Seagull made it clear that he was “one of the greats.” He extracted every moment of impact from his appearances as Edgar in King Lear and his Thersites in Troilus and Cressida was truly disgusting. Then as a toad-like Richard III, an extremely strange Ariel in The Tempest and (at the Donmar) a heart-breakingly buttoned-up, pinched and pained Malvolio from Twelfth Night it became clear he could tackle anything Shakespeare wrote with clarity, intelligence and heart. He triumphed at the National with Benedick in Much Ado About Nothing and Hamlet and surprised (inevitably) with his Cassius in Julius Caesar and Macbeth at the Almeida. I thought he was tremendous as Leontes in The Winter’s Tale at the Old Vic but it was his Timon in Timon of Athens at the National (and broadcast to cinemas) that blew me away, reinventing the play anew as a Play for Today in these no-such-thing-as-society Thatcherite times. Of course he’s done Falstaff on TV (a more vicious one than usual) and (brilliantly) King Lear himself at the National. But his Prospero, on his return to the RSC, in a multimedia Tempest was a revelation – here was a guilty Prospero, as tormented as Ariel and Caliban, struggling to forgive himself never mind anyone else and finally breaking the audience’s hearts as he parted from the island.

Paterson Joseph in Julius Caesar, Othello, Noughts and Crosses, Royal Hunt of the Sun, Simon Russell Beale in The Tempest (as both Ariel and Prospero), The Winter's Tale, Twelfth Night, Hamlet, Troilus and Cressida (with Paterson Joseph), Juliet Stevenson in Measure for Measure, As You Like It, Truly Madly Deeply, Troilus and Cressida, Antony Sher in King Lear (as both The Fool and King Lear), Falstaff and Richard III

Juliet Stevenson and Sir Antony Sher

• Juliet Stevenson confided that she peed on stage during a spear-carrier scene (alongside Ruby Wax) in her first appearance at the RSC in a production of The Tempest. She paid tribute to early mentors in her acting career (well known like Peter Brook and less well known like David Perry) – sometimes by saying or doing things that she reacted against. Her insights into language and space were marvellous to hear as she discussed in detail her approach to Isabella in Measure for Measure, Cressida in Troilus and Cressida and Rosalind in As You Like It. The season in which she played the latter two roles was a significant one for me as I was living in Stratford-upon-Avon during that year teaching English as a Foreign Language to groups of adults who I would accompany to the theatre so I saw those two productions a great number of times, each time spotting more and more depth and detail, especially in Stevenson’s performances. Of course in later years I got to know her screen work such as Truly, Madly, Deeply and Life Story in which she played Rosalind Franklin, the scientist who contributed to the discovery of the structure of DNA.
• (Sir) Antony Sher, one of the most powerful presences I’ve seen on stage in plays like Tartuffe and Tamburlaine the Great, had a plethora of breakthrough roles to discuss, not to mention aspects of his own biography (growing up a Lithuanian-Jew in South Africa, being gay and working at the Liverpool Playhouse.) His famous Richard III (on crutches with a prosthetic back), Shylock (in Merchant of Venice), Titus Andronicus (in a production which started in South Africa where audiences were unsurprised by the anarchic violence in the play which was given a contemporary political context), Leontes in The Winter’s Tale (where he researched and brilliantly portrayed the psychological condition of morbid jealousy), and the warrior-like Macbeth, in a Swan production that he and Harriet Walter infused with a palpable and terrifying sense of panic - all these performances were memorable and mesmerising. In recent years he famously portrayed Falstaff with equal doses of bonhomie and arrogant cruelty in the History sequence of Henry IV and a monumental King Lear arriving on an elevated wheely-throne.

Greg Doran Talking Shakespeare with Paterson Joseph, Simon Russell Beale, Antony Sher and Juliet Stevenson

Advent 2020

Countdown to Christmas

So muddy walks with family, jigsaw puzzles and posh takeaways continue to distract from Tier Three Restrictions. As do creative ways to meet up with longtime friends to catch up and Only Connect. It was easier this year to follow my instinct that Christmas fol-de-rol can only manifest on December 1st because lockdown meant that most shops were out of bounds and I’ve fine-tuned my ability to block out Christmas music in October and November…. Over the years, certain “traditions” mean that the Christmas countdown can begin: the Blue Peter Advent Crown (tinsel and wire coat hangers, anyone?), the decision about what day to choose (and who will decorate) a Christmas tree, the flutter of (fewer and fewer) Christmas cards through the letterbox (who will be first off the mark?), the slowing down of Autumn as Winter approaches and the military-style lists of “Things To Do” get gradually crossed off and, naturally, some form of Advent Calendar. Last Christmas Sue (in collage above) gifted us Advent Stockings and this year Sally secretly filled the Evens and I’m (naturally) Odd.

Out with the Old, In with the New

As Advent began, global miracles were occurring – yes, there’s the familiar….

• the rising Star of Bethlehem/Comet
• the approaching of the Three Wise Men/Kings/Astronomers
• the glimpse of Shepherds counting their socks and heralding Angels
• the longed-for arrival of a beloved baby in a Manger

But in the present-day, Advent 2020 heralds the start of a new world order with a few concrete miracles, in ascending order of importance….

• a new Christmas special episode of Call The Midwife
• the departure of some toxic staff from 10 Downing Street
• the very-nearly-complete dismissal of the TanToxic TwitterChundering US President
• the beginning of humanity’s vaccination FightBack against the Coronavirus – a triumph of international scientific collaboration 

– a sign of what the world can do with Wit, Wisdom, Will and Wherewithall....

Talking Shakespeare Yksi (One)

Outer images from last Christmas, inner images from 2020 prep

Member Benefits

Christmas is a-coming – a few purchases have now been made (mincemeat mixed, Christmas cake being “fed” monthly, a few gifts have been wrapped….) I’m allowing Christmas to infiltrate my life in November having, in the sixty previous years, banned all thoughts until December 1st but in this Covidacious year I take pleasure however and whenever I can. (Full disclosure: Sally still wears The Christmas Crown and is entirely responsible for the spicy aromas of fruity baking.) One advantage of having a Royal Shakespeare Company membership is being granted access to resources giving insights into the ongoing bottomless chasm of Shakespeare exploration. During both lockdowns a number of actors are giving interviews under the title Talking Shakespeare and that is just what they did. I’ll post about them all in due course, a few at a time….

Greg Doran intervewing Adjoa Andoh, Ray Fearon, Judi Dench and Alex Gilbreath

Adjoa Andoh and Ray Fearon

• Adjoa Andoh, known for Doctor Who and Casualty, is known to me especially for two stunning performances: as Ulysees in Troilus and Cressida and as an astonishing Richard II in an all-black, all-female production of Richard II at The Globe. Her interview ranged widely over all her Shakespearean roles but, most powerfully, about her personal life and commitment to community work.
• Ray Fearon revealed how he fell into acting by accident and started performing in amateur community projects. He was inspired when working as an extra in Caryl Churchill’s Serious Money to (successfully) apply for Rose Bruford drama school. He worked at Liverpool Everyman and Manchester’s Royal Exchange before rising through the ranks at both the RSC and the National Theatre. His big breaks at the RSC came in a touring production of Romeo and Juliet and then (his third) Othello with the frisson of his Desdemona being played by his Juliet, Zoe Waites. He gave a moving account of his experience playing Pericles, a magnificent performance that stuck in my own mind when I saw it, and then talked about the sensational all-black Julius Caesar when he played a scarily dangerous Mark Antony.

Adjoa Andoh in Richard II and Troilus and Cressida, Ray Fearon in Antony and Cleopatra, Romeo and Juliet and Othello

Judi Dench and Alexandra Gilbreath

• Judi Dench revealed herself to be the trooper she is and went the furthest back in time to her childhood in York and her early appearances at the Old Vic before marking off virtually all of Shakespeare’s heroines in her 70-year career. She talked about some of her legendary performances with typical humility – and plenty of funny anecdotes – but came up to date with her recent stage work that I’ve been lucky enough to witness live, in Macbeth, The Comedy of Errors, Antony and Cleopatra, Hamlet, All’s Well That Ends Well, The Merry Wives (musical) of Windsor, A Midsummer Night’s Dream and The Winter’s Tale.
• Alexandra Gilbreath’s throaty tones have always drawn me in to her performances and she was enthusiastic and insightful about her major roles, all of which I saw in Stratford: Hermione (The Winter’s Tale), Juliet, Rosalind (As You Like It) Kate (The Taming of the Shrew), Olivia (Twelfth Night) and, alongside Judi Dench, in the musical version of Merry Wives.

Judi Dench in Macbeth, Merry Wives, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Alex Gilbreath in As You Like It, Romeo and Juliet, Taming of the Shrew, The Winter's Tale

Pumpkin Trail to Bolsover

The Pumpkin Trail
It’s Autumn:

That time of year thou mayst in me behold
When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang
Upon those boughs which shake against the cold,
Bare ruined choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.…

(sonnet 73)
People who know me, know I love Autumn: a fresh start for the new academic term (still feel it even after retiring from teaching); birthday month; ravishing colours in the world outside; wearing jumpers; lighting fires; wandering along the atmospheric Pumpkin Trail at Bolton Abbey estate (pictures above and below)

Metaphor of Autumn
The traditional poetic view of Autumn is that it represents the dying of the year, the Autumn of life, the descent into decay and transition towards Death…. Winter is coming.  I agree there’s something in the metaphor, though my Libran Pollyanna rose-tinted specs also sees and feels the following:

• Autumn leads to Advent to Winter to Christmas to New Year and it finally leads to Spring = good;
• the Autumn colours red, burgundy, purple, gold, orange, yellow, green, brown and beige scattered across a landscape = good;
• falling leaves like nature’s confetti = good;
• warmth of a real (controlled) fire = good;
• Bonfire Night and fireworks = good;
• cosy knitwear = good;
• snuggled up indoors, hunkering down with food, drink and TV = good 

Golden Age of TV?
Everybody has an opinion about pinpointing the golden age of TV. In the 1960s I was breathless with excitement at the cliffhangers at the end of each Batman episode and had many a dream of Cathy Gale and Emma Peel in The Avengers. Was anybody as thrilled as me in the 1970s at being allowed to (once a week) stay up and watch Glenda Jackson in Elizabeth R or Derek Jacobi in I, Claudius? Or the camp excesses of Dynasty or the stately poignancy of Brideshead Revisited in the 1980s? Was the 1990s the Golden Age with the first run of (weekly) showings of Friends or the weird compulsive cult of (the first season of) Twin Peaks? I could keep going, but it’s clear to me that this Autumn, in Covid Full-Semi-or-Partial-Lockdown, I’m grateful that there is so much choice on TV that it is easy to find something to while away the hours, conversing with the flowers, consulting with the bees. No such thing as a Golden Age since creative talents have always produced good stuff, but today there is a (happy) glut of choice.

How can all these things happen to just one person? 
My “birthday season” viewing has included the glorious 1938 Bringing Up Baby (from which the sub-heading above is one of a hundred quotable lines) with the astonishing Katherine Hepburn at the top of her game, and Cary Grant in one of his finest unfettered performances. I also chose to watch Tom & Kelly & Val & Anthony & Tom taking breaths away in the retro jetplane-porn of 1986’s Top Gun. And for binge-watching I'm watching Goose from Top Gun (that’s Anthony Edwards aka Mark Greene) leading the ensemble cast of the early seasons of ahead-of-its-time ER; but as a bedtime digestif, to reassure myself that everyone can adapt to change, I like to visit Schitt’s Creek, where Moira is proving to be my touchstone of taste and dignity….

Jigsaws, Meals out, Walks
I continue to puzzle through Autumn. For me, jigsaws have been a lifelong activity, not just a lockdown one. And Katherine Hepburn appears on my current jigsaw with Peter O’Toole in The Lion in Winter along with my own face and snapshots of selected loved ones from “The Harry Potter Film Club” and beyond. Above also features snaps of The Terrace in Saltaire, another local venue for lovely grub. And below our socially distanced birthday walk with our adopted family from Badby, this time meeting at Bolsover Castle for a wet and misty meander through muddy Derbyshire.

Twilight Garden Tour at Harewood

Life starts all over again…. 

As Summer hovers, clinging on, and Autumn looms, about to spread, I think about Jordan Baker’s line in F Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby,

“Life starts all over again when it gets crisp in the fall.”

I wrote about that idea in the last post. A potent activity that reflected the idea was also our recent evening visit to Harewood House grounds. For many years, it was a place to take children to go wild on the adventure playground; and in recent times the Christmas decorations have been a highlight. Now, it’s all about the grounds….

Trevor and Sam

Head Gardener, Trevor Nicholson, led a small Covid-secure group on an exclusive tour of the site as the day visitors left and the sun went down. Accompanying Trevor was super-enthusiastic volunteer, Sam. We spent most of our time in the Himalayan garden and heard about the challenges of developing a great garden space and keeping it fresh each season. Many changes have happened over the centuries and in recent years, the mix of conservation, climate change, visitor experiences and the personal whims of gardeners and family alike have kept the team busy and scratching their heads and scrabbling in the soil to make the place spectacular for now but secure for the future. The Buddhist Stupa in the Himalayan Garden at Harewood is the only one of its kind in the UK and has been built and blessed by monks from Bhutan.

Walled Garden and Terrace View

The Walled Garden at Harewood currently has twelve large borders, all useful, many growing fruits and vegetables that are used on the estate or sold in local farm shops. It too has taken many forms over the decades and access to pictures of its development were fascinating, including a surreal period when it housed a maze. We ended our tour on the famous Charles Barry terrace with a glass of Prosecco and a meet-up with our “rival” twilight tour of people who had been round the Bird Garden.

Saltaire, England - Rydal, Sweden

2018 windows

Traditions New, Traditions Old
Saltaire Living Advent Calendar has been running since 2006. Villagers are invited to “release” their windows gradually between 1st and 24th December each year. I have posted pictures before of this experience and it has become a tradition to take friends and meander round the twilight streets, admiring the creativity and wit of the residents’ designs.

2018 windows

In another town far, far away
Other towns in the UK have developed their own tradition but in 2019, a direct link was made with another place in Europe. At Rydals Museum, on the banks of the river Viskan near the town of Kinna, in southern Sweden, museum staff met with the Saltaire Inspired Living Advent Calendar team to discuss expertise and arrangements for a window “swap.”

The Mark Council
Local dignitaries decided the local council (The Mark) wanted to include some decorative windows in their Town Hall and so some jolly competitiveness began!

2019 Swedish windows

Similarities
A theme of recent years is that we all have “More In Common” than we might think. Certainly the regeneration of Salt’s Mill from Titus Salt’s original vision into Jonathan Silver’s commercial and artistic community hub is also reflected in what has happened at Rydal Museum in Sweden. Originally Rydal’s was a spinning mill and now houses a museum, a meeting place, private businesses and craft boutiques.

Recovering from man flu
Much of December saw me laid low with a persistent cough, high temperature and feeble levels of energy so come the New Year it was a delight to take our customary stroll with the Thompsons round the 2019 Saltaire Advent Windows. Carrie Fisher and the Star Wars saga featured poignantly, as did the message “Keep Well” which I took to heart after my recent illness. Let’s hope 2020 proves to be less divisive year than 2019.

Did I have a 2019 favourite?
Of course the Swedish window (below top right) is a special favourite this year, as was the one quoting Shelley in the third picture from the top (If winter comes, can Spring be far behind?) (which, if I'm honest, was from 2018) but I am a sucker for dark silhouettes and I do like the one in the centre of the collage immediately above which shows a cat prowling across rooftops beneath a lurid moon. Flying off out of the top right of the design is one Father Christmas. No doubt he and the windows will be back next year.

Around the World at Christmas

Around the World

The world is a big place – and in some ways a small place – and a marvellously diverse place. As I’ve said before, home is where the heart is. By the end of 2020 the UK will have “Brexited” whatever that might mean, deal or no deal, with full sovereignty or, more likely, the illusion of sovereignty. The rich of England will continue to get rich, whoever pulls the invisible purse strings. In the meantime, one pair who I usually spend time with in the Festive season went off to Europe on a train (see central image above – Amy and Maggie on a sledge not a train at that point.)  This past Christmas season, home was Badby, home was Saltaire and home was Around the World in Christmas-themed displays at Chatsworth House….

“I think I might be different, I might not be the same.”

Michael cooked up a feast or two in Badby (and Janet and Alex turned their hands to a gingerbread house.) This year’s Royal Shakespeare Company Christmas show was only tenuously Christmassy, but it had a very witty set, enthusiastic performers and very jolly songs, though one (If I don’t cry) made my eyes moist…. David Walliams’s The Boy in the Dress has been adapted by Mark Ravenhill with songs by Robbie Williams, Guy Chambers and Chris Heath. The main character, Dennis, sings of being Ordinary but by the end he is anything but – he’s extraordinary – and the message, I thought, was all about the intrinsic value of individual differences – an apt reminder in this most divided of eras. 

Sparkle round the globe

The differences between Morocco, China, Japan, India, Portugal, Italy and America were celebrated in exuberant style at Chatsworth House in Derbyshire this year. Some of the differences were artistic and involved traditional (stereotyped?) imagery but some of the displays were harder to spot: Venetian masks, the Russian dolls on the huge Christmas tree in the Painted Hall, and the Nativity scene in the baroque Portuguese-inspired chapel.

“It’s really useful to travel, if you want to see new things.” (Jules Verne in Around the World in Eighty Days)

Quirky nods to fictional traveller Phileas Fogg and historical aviator Amelia Earhart guided you through imaginatively lit rooms containing hidden and not-so-hidden delights, like the Chinese lanterns and paper dragons. Floating candles hovered around the Nativity in the Chapel, warding away Damien Hirst’s Exquisite Pain statue of Saint Bartholomew.

Cherry Blossom

Probably my favourite display was in the Japanese-themed room, partly because it was a potent reminder of Spring in the dark days of Winter.

Hokusai’s Great Wave off Kanagawa

A calligraphy desk, paper fans and more blossoms framed 3d art work reminiscent of Hokusai’s Nineteenth Century woodblock print Kanagawa-oki Nami Ura.

Effortless glory

Staff at Chatsworth apparently unite from the middle of Summer onwards to prepare for the Christmas displays and it certainly impresses with thousands of baubles, wreaths, swags and greenery. I particularly like the charming homemade smaller items that appear when you have time to stop and stare.

Decking the Hall

It’s impossible to walk around grand Christmas decorations without Christmas carols ear-worming into your subconscious and I was amused to read about the two variations of Deck the Halls 

Deck the hall with boughs of holly,

Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la!

'Tis the season to be jolly, (Fa….!)

Fill the meadcup, drain the barrel, (Fa….!)

Troll the ancient Christmas carol (Fa….!)

See the flowing bowl before us, (Fa….!)

Strike the harp and join the chorus. (Fa….!)

Follow me in merry measure, (Fa….!)

While I sing of beauty's treasure. (Fa….!)

Fast away the old year passes, (Fa….!)

Hail the new, ye lads and lasses! (Fa….!)

Laughing, quaffing all together, (Fa….!)

Heedless of the wind and weather. (Fa….!)

Censorship of meadcup, barrel, bowl and quaffing

The tune may well go back to medieval times and the original lyrics were in Welsh, with the variation above appearing in 1862, the lyrics being attributed to Scottish musician, Thomas Oliphant. In Chatsworth’s gift shop I learned that the Pennsylvania School Journal attempted to rewrite the lyrics changing all the references to getting drunk:

Deck the hall with boughs of holly,

'Tis the season to be jolly,

Don we now our gay apparel,

Troll the ancient Christmas carol,

See the blazing yule before us,

Strike the harp and join the chorus.

Follow me in merry measure,

While I tell of Christmas treasure.

Fast away the old year passes,

Hail the new, ye lads and lasses!

Sing we joyous all together,

Heedless of the wind and weather.

Soft bosoms

Even the quaffing version of Deck The Halls is a dilution of the Seventeenth Century version which celebrates bosoms and blisses and kisses – and why not? It’s Christmas, after all.

Oh! How soft my fair one’s bosom 

Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la!

Oh! How sweet the grove in blossom (Fa….!)

Oh! How blessed are the blisses (Fa….!)

Words of love, and mutual kisses

Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la!