Tues at the Oxford Lit Fest. Amateur Dramatics and Why We Love them

Didn't expect to love this one as much as I did, but for pure entertainment Michael Dobson was terrific.  It was also a joy to just sit back and laugh, and not feel that I must learn something! - even though I did, anyhow.  I may be getting a bit obsessed with improving the old brain, as the small reminders of time running out get larger!

Anyhow Michael Dobson is a director of the Stratford Theatre and a world expert on Shakespeare.  Among others, his latest book is "Shakespeare and Amateur Dramatics, a Cultural History".  It might sound heavy but in his telling us of it, he was hilarious.

Seemingly, we are all very keen to dress up and playact - or at least the British are.  There are more amateur dramatic societies in Britain now than ever.  People are willing to give up their time to rehearse, and get up on a stage and act, purely for the love of it.  And, going right back, it was ever so.

He started with the first recorded amateur dramatic performance which was on an English galleon called "The Red Dragon" which anchored off Sierra Leone in 1607.  The local chief came on board to visit and before his plan to take his visitors elephant shooting, the crew put on a performance of "Hamlet" for him!

"Am.dram." as Dobson calls it, was very popular on board ship as the captains saw it as a way of keeping the crew happy and busy and so avoide them planning a mutiny.  Female parts were alway willingly taken on as, in early days, women didn't go on stage in any event, their parts being played by men in costume.   Later, when we moved on to prisoner of war camp performances in Germany, Denholm Elliot (the well known British actor) who was in Lansdorf Silesia camp (not sure if that right?) was such a hit in his female parts, that lots of prisoners were in love with him and he was almost mobbed after performances!

Dobson showed us photos of the war-time prisoners, on make-shift stages, in hilarious costumes, provided for them by their German captors.  The group Denholm played with were so loved by the Germans, that they were taken 'on tour' to other camps around the Polish border.  They did everything from Shakespeare to the Mikado.  And lots of prisoners were so involved with their am.dram. group that they had absolutely no interest in planning escapes.

In Kilkenny in 1802 we had our  first private theatre for amateur dramatics.  It was run by Richard Power a rich estate owner, and this theatre was only for himself and his wealthy friends.  They did allow a small audience but the tickets were very expensive and any proceeds went to 'charity'  A motto over the stage read "While  We Smile We Sooth Affliction".  There's a whole story there in itself and of course I was doubly interested, it being Ireland.

Dobson talked for an hour, bringing us up to date on Britain today, through how amateur dramatic groups expanded from village halls to big companies like Shredded Wheat where stars like Flora Robinson cut their teeth.

The blurb said that this talk would "enrich our understanding of why Shakespeare matters, to 'rude mechanicals and aristocratic dilettantes alike' (sic!) and though I'm not sure which category I fit into, it certainly did for me.

"Irel - the only thing for a Coffee Cake"

Sounds like a jingle for an Irel commercial but is in fact my mother's voice still audible long years after her passing.  Yes she was a good cook, as all our mothers were then I suppose, never having any alternative but to cook everything themselves.  Talk-aways and frozen meals being way in the future, my mother was mainly self-taught and relied, like the bible, on All In The Cooking, a cook book I still have, and which, for most of my childhood I thought, like your prayer-book or your cathecism, was the only cook book any home would have.

From the image of the Irel bottle, I'm remembering a tea-party she organised for us children, somewhere in the '50's.  For some reason, she felt obliged to invite  two of our cousins, Anne - 10 , and Raymond, 12, for tea one Sunday.  We two sisters ( of round the same ages)  didn't really like them, as Anne sniggered after everything she said and talked with her mouth full, and Paddy had a dreadful stammer.  We, little stuck-up madams, had heard our mother say that these children has 'no manners' and were  quite in agreement.

Our neighbours were a family of boys and I was secretly in love with the youngest one  Robert (again around 12).  Mother invited him too and so, that afternoon, we five children sitting round our dining-room table were a stiff little party, with none of us knowing what to say.

After our plate of cold ham, hard boiled egg and tomatoes, mother arrived back from the kitchen triumphantly bearing her coffee cake.  Butter icing she flavoured with Irel, stood in peaks on the top, more of the same bulged out from between the perfectly rounded sponge disks.  It has three layers and she'd finished off the top with glace cherries.

We sisters were full of pride watching her place it in the middle of the table.  She asked Paddy (he being the biggest of us) if he liked cherries.  He tried to reply, but - poor child - his stammer took over.  This started Anne's famous snigger,  which in turn started the divine Robert giggling too.  In a few minutes, we were all at it, even our mother, though none of us knew what we were laughing at.

And then Robert, his glasses sliding down his face, suddenly jumped up and ran out.  We heard the front door bang. Everyone sobered up.  The fun was over and  I was heartbroken he was gone, but mother just said "Ah don't mind him, he probably forgot something."

It was only days later she gave way to her own horror and let us in on the secret of Robert's disappearance.  Her prized, green leather covered dining chairs, and more especially, the one on which poor Robert had been seated, now bore a large circular stain with the imprint of the lad's nether regions.

After she'd told us, my secret passion for Robert faded quickly.  The imprint he left on our chair however, remained. 

Even Silence has an End - Ingrid Betancourt on her years in Captivity in the Columbian Jungle.

This is Ingrid Betancourt who I went to hear speak on Monday on my day 3 of the OxLit. Festival.  She was terrific.  She gave her talk in the big white marquee

Ingrid Betancourt

in the grounds of Christ Church, were everything happens.  She looks a lot younger than her 49 years and is a very beautiful woman.

She was running in her country's presidential campaign  on an anti-corruption ticket when she was abducted and she spoke for over an hour about her six and a half year ordeal as prisoner in the jungles of Columbia.  She was spellbinding.  How she survived is all in her book but is mainly due, I felt to her fighting spirit and strong mind.

She was born in Columbia but has dual nationality with France.  She arrived wearing a dark jacket and skirt with no colour or relief except for a bit of red lipstick.  Yet she looked fantastic, elegant and so french.  She has a beautiful smile and a sort of beatific calm that she seemed to be saying she learned in captivity.  She explained this by saying that after many years she discovered that no matter what the terrorists did to her, they could not take away her spirit or her mind and that gave her a peace that she could not describe.  She tried to escape on many occasions - risking being shot - but was recaptured.  In the end, the Columbian army freed her, along with several other captives held with her.

One anecdote I loved was that in Columbia, so many people are abducted that one radio station has a slot every day to broadcast messages from family and friends of those disappeared, in hopes that they might hear their words of love and support.  Every day of Ingrid's captivity, her mother broadcast a message to her, and sometimes, when the guards allowed her their battery radio, she heard these messages!   She smiled her beautiful smile when she told us this, and said "I have a fantastic mother".

Another book I'll be buying.

Fay Weldon and Paul Bailey = writers (Older ones) at the Ox lit festival

Sunday afternoon I had tickets for an all encompassing talk on India from someone called Patrick French.  He was coming to give us India from every point of view, social revolution, today's 'high tech' on to Sonia Gandhi - one of the most powerful women in the world.  My daughter made a dash by bike to join me - sweet child, as it was Mother's Day.  She arrived red faced (the bike broke down) and panting but in time, but only for us to hear that poor Mr French had a foot infection - that he'd contacted in India - and so couldn't make it.

Would we like tickets for another speaker then?  of our money back?  Devastation etc and then we plumped for Fay Weldon and Paul Bailey instead.  There are so many venues and talks going on here at once, Christ Church is so huge but when we looked through the list for 2 p.m., really Fay and Paul were the best on offer.

So all that to explain what we were doing there.  I'm not a big fan of Fay Weldon, though lots adore her (Confessions of a She Devil etc )  and she is interesting in that she is 79 and writes every day!!!  Described as a feminist wit she has countless novels to her credit and currently teaches creative writing in Brunel University.  Bailey is 74 and has just published "Chapman's Odyssey" - has awards for several novels - At the Jerusalem and Gabriel's Lament among them and also teaches creative writing at Kingston London uni.  Both great raconteurs,  talked a lot about hospitals and their experiences of but were very funny in the telling.

So what did I learn from them?  That age is of absolutely no interest to a writer, only that it has added value in that your are wiser and have less to worry about, and - more time to write the ideas that you now are more sure of! ( Mind you, Bailey said that on reflection, he wasn't sure if he was wiser, but that he 'knew more" - which i certainly agreed with.

More soon.  Humanism, Ethics, Shakespere and Ingrid Betancourt to come. .. Hope you've not dozed off....  

Day 2 Ox Lit Fest. A.C Grayling + +

So far, Sunday has been the best day - for me.  I was looking forward to hearing the philosophy professor, A.C. Grayling speak.  He was timetabled for the Sheldonian Theatre - which in itself is an experience.  Another stunning building, built in circular form, yellow sandstone - its everywhere here, and all those huge carved heads along the railings.  (Round to the tourist office later for some data on it..? after the coffee of course..)

Anyhow, bang on twelve A.C. came striding in, long silver hair, dark suit, spectacles, every inch the modern philosopher.  He spoke, without a pause, for over an hour and he was riviting.  He was there to tell us about his latest book "The Good Book" which he has written as a 'secular bible'. Its a 'thoughtful non-religious alternative to the Bible.

There is hardly a section of world history, from pre Christian to ancient civilizations of east and west, through Greeks, ancient Rome, right up to discoveries of 20th century thinking, that he hasn't covered.  It would be a book to have forever, and if you got through it, and retained even half of it, well you can just imagine.

The atmosphere was hushed, the audience spellbound as he talked and explained his thinking in writing it.  I loved every minute and felt privileged to be there.

Then it was on in the afternoon, to Fay Weldon and Patrick Bailey, who were fun and interesting too.  But more of them later.

Today it's Shakespere  A Cultural History at 4.30, followed by Peter Atkins "On Being. A Scientists Exploration of the Great Questions of Existence"  Will I be able for all this?  Well it looks good written down, and then I can run to the tent for the free gin after!  Ah me..

Day 1 At the Oxford Literary Festival

Christ Church Meadow is the setting.  Its Oxford's Literary Festival week and I’m in the middle of it!  I love it.  Christ Church College – if you want to hear about it, is just spectacular.  Built in ??? but many hundreds ago, its yellow stone just glows in the sunshine.  There are quadrangles and turrets, narrow passageways that lead into squares with ancient trees, all surrounded by the Meadow, which is acres and acres of fields – cricket pitches and meadows. And, oh yes, people are punting by on the river that seems to flow out of that manicured garden.  Oh wow. 

I forget how many British Prime Ministers studied here, but at least a couple of dozen, and the list of other luminaries, in every academic field you might come up with, were here at some stage.  So as I wander round with the well-heeled English booklovers who are now thronging the place, I am filled with a mixture of envy and awe.

Blackwells book shop ( trading in town since year dot) have put up a huge marquee on one of the lawns.  It’s doing a roaring trade with dozens and dozens of stalls of books.  You name it, they have it – its Amazon under canvas! 

Floating about through the book buyers are beautiful girls in ‘40’s style (shirtwasters, red lipstick high blocky heels) bearing trays of (tiny glasses, free) gin and lime.  (I suppose they’re students of philosophy or something, on their day off?).  Im resisting, as I’m clutching my ticket to hear two biographers give their talk on Life Writing and the gin mightn’t mix…

And who else is here besides me?  Well the list is so long I’ll just give you a few: They have Kazuo Ishiguro, Philip Pullman, Madhur Jaffrey, Bed Okri, P.D.Hames Melvyn Bragg – not to mention King Abdullah of Jordan (though I wondered if he might just be house-hunting?) and HRH Princess Anne (she’s cutting the tape I think).

Every now and then I hear polite clapping coming from a window where a lecture is taking place but I’m hurrying off to my class room which is billed as the ‘Junior Common Room’!  Well folks, University life…. It’s all go you know....  

Sadly, Last Class in DCU for me- for this term

Thanks Cathy and Marion.  So enjoyed Saturday - especially Cathy's talk on Life Writing.  Lots to think about.  Will be thinking of y'all next Saturday round 10.  Cheers  Nuala Smith