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(Background noise might make this episode a challenging listen.)
Episode image is a detail from the cover of A Time Of Gifts by Patrick Leigh Furmor, published in 2004 by John Murray.
Noise warning: There is more background noise than usual in this recording and listeners may find it too difficult to follow the conversation. Many apologies for this.
For the second ever Page One On The Run, Miriam Ross, campaigner, media maven and massage therapist, invites Charles Adrian to her stomping ground, which she calls Hampstead even if the buses call it South End Green. Sitting with some of the rowdier locals in The White Horse on the corner of Constantine Road and Fleet Road, Miriam and Charles Adrian talk about easing into books, Miss Jean Brodie and journeying to Constantinople. Incidentally, isn’t “snob” a wonderful word!
The Memory Of Love by Aminatta Forna is also discussed in Page One 164. Another book by Aminatta Forna, Ancestor Stones, is discussed in Page One 138.
Another book by Muriel Spark, The Abbess Of Crewe, is discussed in Page One 25.
A Time Of Gifts by Patrick Leigh Furmor is also discussed in Page One 164.
This episode was recorded at The White Horse in Hampstead for London Fields Radio.
This episode has been edited to remove music that is no longer covered by licence for this podcast.
A transcript of this episode is below.
Episode released: 23rd April, 2013.
Book list:
Memory of Love by Aminatta Forna
The Snobs by Muriel Spark
A Time Of Gifts by Patrick Leigh Furmor
Links:
Episode transcript:
Jingle
You're listening... you're listening... to London Fields Radio.
Charles Adrian
Hello and welcome to Page One On The Run. This is the 32nd Page One. This is the 22nd Second Hand Book Factory. I'm on location today in Hampstead for London Fields Radio. I'm Charles Adrian. My guest today is Miriam Ross and we are in the White Horse, just... I... it's not really Hampstead, is it. What do they call this?
Miriam Ross
Oh, I guess it's Hampstead Heath, Belsize Park. Yeah.
Charles Adrian
[speaking over] It's... Yeah, it's one of those vague areas, isn't it.
Miriam Ross
[laughs]
Charles Adrian
It's somewhere the 24 bus stops. This... This programme will go up on about the 23rd of April, which is just after the Queen's birthday. I know that because it's also my older sister's birthday.
Miriam Ross
And my mum's.
Charles Adrian
No! Is that right?
Miriam Ross
Yeah.
Charles Adrian
The 23rd?
Miriam Ross
Yeah.
Charles Adrian
Oh, okay. The 21st is the Queen's birthday.
Miriam Ross
Okay.
Charles Adrian
Good. So this will go up on your mum's birthday.
Miriam Ross
Aww.
Charles Adrian
That's very good to know.
Miriam Ross
[laughs]
Charles Adrian
So this... this track that I've chosen has nothing to do with any of that. Unfortunately, just thinking of the Queen made me think of this track. This is not for any of those people. This is Queen Bitch by David Bowie.
Music
[Queen Bitch by David Bowie]
Charles Adrian
So that was... that was Queen Bitch by David Bowie. And that was.... that was only in there because it's on the soundtrack to The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou, which happens to be one of my favourite films. So I'm here... As I say, I'm here in Hampstead with Miriam Ross. Hello Miriam.
Miriam Ross
Hello.
Charles Adrian
Now I should ask you first of all - because it's the... it's the question that I ask everybody - how you would describe yourself, either professionally or personally.
Miriam Ross
Okay. [laughs] This is the bit I don't really want to do from having listened to one...
Charles Adrian
[laughs]
Miriam Ross
... of your episodes before. And I was telling a friend the other day that you were going to ask me that...
Charles Adrian
Yes.
Miriam Ross
... and he was coming up with all sorts of silly responses that I could give you.
Charles Adrian
[laughs]
Miriam Ross
But my favourite one was: “Oh, I'm a work in progress. It's too early to tell.” [laughs]
Charles Adrian
Oh that's lovely.
Miriam Ross
But you probably want more information than that, don't you.
Charles Adrian
Well, I want as much or as little as you want to give. I like the idea of you being a work in progress....
Miriam Ross
[affirmative] Mmm.
Charles Adrian
... and that gives me... I like the idea that, in fifty years time, if I asked you the same thing you'd give me the same answer.
Miriam Ross
[laughs] Yes.
Charles Adrian
What's... like, what would be your professional description? What do they call it? It's not a description, is it. What would you call that.
Miriam Ross
[speaking over] Yeah, well I guess. Yeah, job title or something.
Charles Adrian
Your job title.
Miriam Ross
My job title is Media Officer at the World Development Movement...
Charles Adrian
[speaking over] Wow!
Miriam Ross
... but I guess...
Charles Adrian
Great.
Miriam Ross
... I just see myself as a campaigner because I've been working in campaigning organisations all my life.
Charles Adrian
Okay.
Miriam Ross
Yeah. And Massage Therapist sometimes on the side.
Charles Adrian
[speaking over] Aha. Yeah.
Miriam Ross
Yeah. So professionally that's what I am, I guess.
Charles Adrian
Great. I think that's a... that's a really interesting combination of things.
Miriam and Charles Adrian
[laughter]
Charles Adrian
Campaigning to stir things up and then... and then...
Miriam Ross
Massaging! [laughs]
Charles Adrian
... soothing it all down again afterwards. [laughs]
Miriam Ross
No, I don't really combine the two.
Miriam and Charles Adrian
[laughter]
Charles Adrian
Now what have you... what have you brought? What's the book that you've brought that you like?
Miriam Ross
[musing] Mmm. Well, I love this book. This is The Memory Of Love by Aminatta Forna.
Charles Adrian
Aha!
Miriam Ross
And she is a writer who lives in London but I think grew up at least partly and is... maybe her father... one of her parents is from Sierra Leone.
Charles Adrian
Okay.
Miriam Ross
And this book is set in Sierra Leone, kind of, just after the civil war there. And it's... it's... Despite being set in a, kind of, quite politically interesting time, it's very much a, sort of, internal book so...
Charles Adrian
Aha. Okay.
Miriam Ross
... it's very much about the character's internal lives and about memories of love - as in the title - but memories of other things as well and how those, kind of, play out. And you, kind of, just gradually, very, very slowly get to know these people.
Charles Adrian
Right.
Miriam Ross
So it's a real slow burner - like, I wasn't really into it much at first. It took a while to get there. But then when I got hooked, I was really, really hooked.
Charles Adrian
Cool.
Miriam Ross
Yeah, really great. Really great characters.
Charles Adrian
Is this... Is this a book that you've read more than once. Or do you plan to read it more than once, do you think?
Miriam Ross
[speaking over] No. I've read it once.
Charles Adrian
[affirmative] Mmm hmm.
Miriam Ross
And just over the last few days I've been looking at it again...
Charles Adrian
Right.
Miriam Ross
... because it's a couple of years since I did read it and... Yeah, it's a bit painful. Some painful things happen in it and... I don't know, maybe a bit frustrating as well to dip in and dip out. So...
Charles Adrian
Right. Uh huh.
Miriam Ross
Yeah. Maybe.
Charles Adrian
Read... Read me the first page.
Miriam Ross
Okay.
On the iron-framed bed a single, scant sheet has moulded itself into the form of the human beneath. On top of the bedside cabinet, a small pile of spiral-bound notebooks sits alongside a vase of flowers, bright-coloured and plastic. The notebooks are worn from handling, the leaves rippled with damp. In the atmosphere of the room the memories of the old [sic] man float and form. The man in the bed is telling a story. His name is Elias Cole.
Adrian turns away from the photograph. He listens. He is new here. Elias Cole says:
*
I heard a song, a morning as I walked to college. It came to me across the radio playing on a stall I passed. A song from far away, about a lost love. At least so I imagined, I didn't understand the words, only the melody. But in the low notes I could hear the loss this man had suffered. And in the high notes I understood too that it was a song about something that could never be. I had not wept in years. But I did, there and then, on the side of the [sic] dusty street, surrounded by strangers. The melody stayed with me for years.
This is how it is when you glimpse a woman for the first time, a woman you know you could love. People are wrong when they talk about [sic] love at first sight. It is neither love nor lust. No. As she walks away from you, what you feel is loss. A premonition of loss.
I never thought I would hear that tune again. Then a month, or perhaps it was two months ago, as I sat alone in the room in my house that serves as a study, the window was open, and through it faintly, I heard somebody whistling the tune and singing pieces from the refrain. A woman's voice. The very same tune from those years ago. I shouted for Babagaleh, who for once came on the first call. I sent him down into the street to find whoever was whistling. He seemed to be gone for ever. And all the time as I waited what could I do but sit and listen to my heart keeping time with my impatience.
Charles Adrian
I think that's beautiful. I love the idea of love at first sight being really a presentment of loss.
Miriam Ross
Yeah, it's a funny one.
Charles Adrian
[affirmative] Mmm.
Miriam Ross
Yeah. I'd never thought of that before.
Charles Adrian
[speaking over] But there's something quite... there's something very melancholy about that, isn't there.
Miriam Ross
[laughing] Yeah. Yeah.
Charles Adrian
It's very... very, kind of, glass-half-empty-ish. But I...
Miriam Ross
[laughing] Yes.
Charles Adrian
... associate... I identify with that, actually.
Miriam Ross
[musing] Mmm.
Charles Adrian
Well, thank you very much. Yeah, that's intriguing. Now, I'm going to play the first track that you... or the first of the tracks that you suggested that I picked. This I couldn't really not choose. This is... This is The Proclaimer's track The Joyful Kilmarnock Blues.
Miriam Ross
[laughing] Haha! Yes.
Charles Adrian
This is so great.
Miriam Ross
No, I thought I'd... I'd try and correct the impression that people seem to have south of the border that The Proclaimers are some kind of joke band...
Charles Adrian
Right!
Miriam Ross
... which they're not. [laughs]
Charles Adrian
[speaking over] [indistinct] No. [laughs]
Miriam Ross
This is from is one of the first albums I bought, which was...
Charles Adrian
Really.
Miriam Ross
It's the same one that has the famous Letter From America, which was their number three hit...
Charles Adrian
[laughing] Okay.
Miriam Ross
... in '86 or '87 or whatever.
Charles Adrian
Okay.
Miriam Ross
But it's got some really good stuff on it.
Charles Adrian
Great.
Miriam Ross
So yeah. I love it.
Charles Adrian
This is wonderful. This is The Joyful Kilmarnock Blues.
Music
[The Joyful Kilmarnock Blues by The Proclaimers]
Charles Adrian
Cool. So that was the... that was The Joyful Kilmarnock Blues by... by The Proclaimers. A little...
Miriam Ross
Excellent. [laughs]
Charles Adrian
... memory of Miriam's [laughing] childhood.
Miriam Ross
Yes.
Charles Adrian
Wonderful. Now, my book for you is... is... is quite different from the one that you just read. It's a little collection of short stories by Muriel Spark.
Miriam Ross
Oh! [laughs]
Charles Adrian
Have you ever read anything by Muriel Spark?
Miriam Ross
No but I've seen... Well, maybe I have. Maybe I've read... what's it called? The famous one.
Charles Adrian
The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie.
Miriam Ross
Yes. Or I've certainly seeing a play of it.
Charles Adrian
Right. Did you see... You didn't see the production with Patricia Hodge, did you, in the nineties?
Miriam Ross
No, I saw one with Fiona Shaw. She was excellent.
Charles Adrian
She must have been [indistinct].
Miriam Ross
Yes, she was.
Charles Adrian
Oh, wonderful. Oh, I... No, I... Yeah. I saw Patricia Hodge. She was very, very good. But Fiona Shaw happens to be one of my favourite actors...
Miriam Ross
[affirmative] Mmm.
Charles Adrian
... so I'm now feeling quite envious.
Miriam Ross
[laughs]
Charles Adrian
This... Yeah, I've never read anything else by her. I've seen that and... and I've read this little collection. And I really like it. It's just... They're... They're, sort of... They're fun. They're little... They're little snippets, they...
Miriam Ross
[speaking over] Mmm. Okay.
Charles Adrian
I think it's... it's a collection that has been put together. So it's just one of these little Penguin books that they bring out sometimes...
Miriam Ross
[affirmative] Mmm.
Charles Adrian
... to say, you know, these are... these are a few things written by this person.
Miriam Ross
Right.
Charles Adrian
It's called The Snobs because the first... the first story is called The Snobs. And I'm going to read you the first page of...
Miriam Ross
Great.
Charles Adrian
... The Snobs by Muriel Spark.
“Snob: A person who sets too much value on social standing, wishing to be associated with the upper class and their mores, and treating those viewed as inferior with condescension and contempt.” Chambers Dictionary.
I feel bound to quote the above definition, it so well fits the Ringer-Smith couple whom I knew in the nineteen-fifties and of whom I have since met variations and versions enough to fill me with wonder. Snobs are really amazing. They mainly err in failing to fool the very set of people they are hoping to be accepted by and, above all, to seem to belong to, to be taken for. They may live in a democratic society, it does nothing to help. Nothing.
Of the Ringer-Smith couple, he - Jake - was the more snobbish. She at least had a certain natural serenity of behaviour which she herself never questioned. She was in fact rather smug. Her background was of small land-owning farmers and minor civil servants. She - Marion - was stingy, stingy as hell. Jake also had a civil service background and, on the mother's side, a family of fruit export-import affairs, which had not left her very well off, the inheritance having been absorbed by the male members of the family.
Jake and Marion were a fairly suitable match. He was slightly the shorter of the two. Both were skinny. They had no children. Skeletons in the family cupboard do nothing to haunt the true snob.
Miriam Ross
[laughing] Excellent.
Charles Adrian
That's the first page. I like... And I think I like that because you start to get a sense that when the narrator is a snob herself...
Miriam Ross
[laughing] Yeah.
Charles Adrian
... as she's [laughing] describing their... their family background.
Miriam Ross
I like the “fairly suitable couple”.
Miriam and Charles Adrian
[laughter] Yes.
Charles Adrian
It's really nice. I think that's... I mean, of the... of the collection, that's my favourite story. But yes, so I...
Miriam Ross
Thank you very much.
Charles Adrian
... hand that to you and you can read that...
Miriam Ross
Great.
Charles Adrian
... in snatches whenever you are not...
Miriam Ross
Yeah...
Charles Adrian
... dealing with the media or campaigning...
Miriam Ross
[laughing]
Charles Adrian
... or massaging.
Miriam Ross
Yes, well, there are plenty of those times.
Miriam and Charles Adrian
[laughter]
Charles Adrian
So I'm going to... I'm going to play your second track now. And this is by Bob Dylan - who, again, I... total... has totally passed me by.
Miriam Ross
[gasps]
Charles Adrian
You know, I'm thirty-three years old and I've heard so many people...
Miriam Ross
[speaking over] Travesty! [laughs]
Charles Adrian
... talk about [laughing] Bob Dylan and all the different Bob Dylans that there are.
Miriam Ross
[affirmative] Mmm.
Charles Adrian
But this is... this... I do like it and I think...
Miriam Ross
[speaking over] Good.
Charles Adrian
... I should... It's made me think I should listen to more Bob Dylan.
Miriam Ross
It's from Blood On The Tracks, which is...
Charles Adrian
Blood On The Tracks.
Miriam Ross
... an album from about '70 or '72, which is just beautiful.
Charles Adrian
[speaking over] Okay. Okay. Okay.
Miriam Ross
So give that one a go.
Charles Adrian
I will bare that in mind. Blood On The Tracks. And from... so from Blood On The Tracks this Bob Dylan singing Shelter From The Storm.
Music
[Shelter From The Storm by Bob Dylan]
Jingle
London Fields Radio... it's London Fields Radio.
Charles Adrian
It is. This is London Fields Radio. I'm Charles Adrian and I'm in Hampstead on location for Page One On The Run, the 32nd Page One, the 22nd Second Hand Book Factory. We've already... We've already manufactured one second hand book so far today. And I, with my guest - this week's guest - Miriam Ross, I'm about to be the... what would you call it... the client for the second...
Miriam Ross
Recipient.
Charles Adrian
The recipient!
Miriam Ross
[laughs]
Charles Adrian
I, like... I was trying to pursue a manufacturing metaphor.
Miriam Ross
Oh, okay. [laughing] Yeah.
Charles Adrian
It doesn't matter. I'm going to get a book now, is the point.
Miriam Ross
[laughs] Yes. So this is one you might know already because it's a classic: A Time Of Gifts. And it's...
Charles Adrian
[speaking over] No. I've never heard of it.
Miriam Ross
Oh. Okay. Well, it's a... it's a travel book and it's by this guy, Patrick Leigh Fermor, who only died a few years ago but he lived a long time and, in 1933, at the age of eighteen, he set off on this huge journey across Europe. He walked from... Well, he started off at Shepherds [sic] Market, as you'll hear, and he got a boat over to Holland and walked to what was then Constantinople.
Charles Adrian
Oh, wow.
Miriam Ross
Yeah. And, well, there are lots of things I love about it. His language is fantastic, beautiful. And he's... he's quite a character, I think, and he's so young. And so...
Charles Adrian
[affirmative] Mmm hmm.
Miriam Ross
... everybody he meets just seems to like him or so... you know, that's the impression he gives anyway so...
Charles Adrian
[laughing] Oh right.
Miriam Ross
And he just seems to be able to get on with everyone. He's really, really learned so he... he's very interested in culture. And he, you know, ends up staying in castles with counts or earls or whatever...
Charles Adrian
[speaking over] Wow!
Miriam Ross
... in Eastern Europe but he's also quite happy, you know, drinking in a beer hall with a load of German workers and sleeping in a barn or something like that.
Charles Adrian
It sounds amazing. I love the idea of that.
Miriam Ross
[speaking over] Yeah. It's lovely and it's also...
Charles Adrian
[speaking over] It's beautiful.
Miriam Ross
... it's such an interesting time because, you know, it's Europe as it was before the Second World War so...
Charles Adrian
[speaking over] Right. Yes.
Miriam Ross
... everything's about to change massively.
Charles Adrian
Yes. Yes. Quite.
Miriam Ross
[speaking over] So, you know, he's got this fantastic description of Vienna in here in the thirties as it was before things changed so much.
Charles Adrian
[speaking over] [indistinct]. Yeah.
Miriam Ross
So yeah. It's lovely.
Charles Adrian
[speaking over] Oh, amazing. Oh, I'll really look forward to reading that. Read... Yes, read the first page [indistinct].
Miriam Ross
Yes. So this is the first page:
‘A SPLENDID AFTERNOON to set out!’ said one of the friends who was seeing me off, peering at the rain and rolling up the window.
The other two agreed. Sheltering under the Curzon Street arch of Shepard's [sic] Market, we had found a taxi at last. In Half Moon Street, all collars were up. A thousand glistening umbrellas were tilted over a thousand bowler hats in Piccadilly; the Jermyn Street shops, distorted by streaming water, had become a submarine arcade; and the clubmen of Pall Mall, with china tea and anchovy toast in mind, were scuttling for sanctuary up the steps of their clubs. Blown askew, the Trafalgar Square fountains twirled like mops, and our taxi, delayed by a horde of Charing Cross commuter [sic]... commuters reeling and stampeding under a cloudburst, crept into The Strand. The vehicle threaded its way through a flux of traffic. We splashed up Ludgate Hill and the dome St Paul's sank deeper in its pillared shoulders. The tyres slewed away from the drowning cathedral and a minute later the silhouette of The Monument, descried through the [sic] veils of rain, seemed so convincingly liquified out of the perpendicular that the tilting thoroughfare might have been forty fathoms down. The driver, as he swerved wetly into Upper Thames Street, leaned back and said: ‘Nice weather for young ducks.’
A smell of fish was there for the moment, then gone. Enjoining haste, the bells of St Magnus the Martyr and St Dunstan's-in-the-East were tolling the hour; then sheets of water were rising from our front wheels as the taxi floundered on between The Mint and the Tower of London. Dark complexes of battlements and treetops and turrets dimly assembled on one side; then, straight ahead, the pinnacles and the metal parabolas of Tower Bridge were looming. We halted on...
Charles Adrian
Great. Thank you. [laughs] [indistinct] bowler hats. I think it's just amazing.
Miriam Ross
[speaking over] Yeah. Yeah.
Charles Adrian
[indistinct] Piccadilly Circus.
Miriam Ross
It just takes you so vividly back to that different time. [laughs]
Charles Adrian
Absolutely. Oh, wonderful. I would like to say that the... I think the cover is beautiful.
Miriam Ross
Isn't it.
Charles Adrian
It's this, kind of... I mean, I wouldn't know what even... how to describe the style of it. But I love...
Miriam Ross
[affirmative] Mmm.
Charles Adrian
It's very naive.
Miriam Ross
It's like a children's book...
Charles Adrian
Yeah.
Miriam Ross
... illustration, isn't it?
Charles Adrian
It is. With these, kind of, vivid orange... orange [indistinct].
Miriam Ross
[affirmative] Mmm. In the east, I guess, where he's walking to.
Charles Adrian
[affirmative] Mmm. Yes, I suppose that's right.
Miriam Ross
Sunrises.
Charles Adrian
Oh, it's gorgeous.
Miriam Ross
[laughs]
Charles Adrian
And there's something of a, sort of, Teutonic forest, I think. [laughs]
Miriam Ross
[affirmative] Mmm.
Charles Adrian
Or maybe some, I don't know, Bohemian turrets.
Miriam Ross
Yeah.
Charles Adrian
I'm not sure. Wonderful. Thank you so much, Miriam. That's lovely.
Miriam Ross
[speaking over] I think you'll like it.
Charles Adrian
So I'm going to finish with a track that I was reminded of recently. This is by Gruff Rhys - who, again, I was never really aware of when I was a teenager. He was in the Super Furry Animals. But I've come across him recently because I've been involved in something called the Brautigan Book Club and he is a big Brautigan fan. And he...
Miriam Ross
[affirmative] Mmm hmm.
Charles Adrian
... with a couple of other people, played some wonderful music at the opening event of [indistinct]. And this is a track by him called Xenodo... Xenodocheionology.
Miriam Ross
Right. [laughs]
Charles Adrian
It's a great track. And I looked up... So xenodocheio means ‘friendly to strangers’ and xenodocheionology is...
Miriam Ross
In what language? [laughs]
Charles Adrian
In Greek.
Miriam Ross
[laughs] Okay.
Charles Adrian
‘Xeno’ is ‘stranger’ and ‘docheio’ must be... [laughs] I don't know. Anyway.
Miriam Ross
[speaking over] Ah. It's the science of being friendly to strangers.
Charles Adrian
I don't know if it's a science. I think it's just the state of...
Miriam Ross
[speaking over] The study of or...
Charles Adrian
The state of being...
Miriam Ross
[speaking over] Okay.
Charles Adrian
… friendly to strangers. So ‘xenodocheionology’ is, apparently, a love of hotels and inns.
Miriam and Charles Adrian
[laughter]
Charles Adrian
Isn't that wonderful? But anyway I think this is an absolutely lovely track and... so I'm going to play us out with Xenodocheionology by Gruff Rhys - I've been practising saying that for, obviously, hours.
Miriam Ross
[laughs]
Charles Adrian
Thank you very much, Miriam. This has been lovely.
Miriam Ross
[speaking over] It's been a pleasure. Thank you.
Charles Adrian
Thank you.
Music
[Xenodocheionology by Gruff Rhys]
[Initial transcription by https://otter.ai]