AN AMIABLE NOVEL ABOUT YESTERYEAR: Pigs Might Fly

On Amazon Kindle now

 

A Writer’s Notebook

No. 41, May 2013

Watsonworksblog.blogspot.com

James Watson

Friends and contributors

 

Contents

1. Pigs Might Fly: Author’s Introduction &

    sample chapter
2. Poems of Place (18)
3. Quote of the Month: It’s that man again
4. Review: Tony Williams on Barbara Kingsolver
5. Ned Baslow to Agamemon etc.
Editor’s note

 

PIGS MIGHT FLY

A new novel for teens of all ages

 Save the Ritz? Dad’s in hospital and 16-year old film buff and general layabout Clark Gable Stevens (Curlew to his friends) is faced with the biggest challenge in his life, rescuing his Dad’s cinema from the clutches of the developers. The obstacles are gigantic; the chances of success for Curlew’s Save the Ritz Campaign as likely as seeing a flight of pigs crossing the skies of Fetterton. Does destiny deter Curlew? Read on Kindle.

Author’s introduction

This story is set at a time when the only computers were as big as a house. Young people could not e-mail each other because there was no such thing as e-mail and the mobile phone was light years away; and as for television – well, just a few of the better-off were installing their black-and-white sets. In rural areas, milk floats were pulled by horses; and plenty of folks had to go down the backyard to the lavatory. It was even possible to play football and cricket in the street without being mown down by motorists speeding to work.

 Cold walks home
Going to the pictures was still the entertainment which got people out of their homes; unless they were in to dancing, in which case they'd gather to do the quickstep or the modern waltz in the church hall, or in the cities, the Palais de Dance. Girls got pregnant, but not quite as often as they do today and the best a boy could expect after a night out was a hug and a kiss – and a cold walk home.
Life was often hard, but the pictures opened up the world to adventure, fantasy and romance. The local cinema held a very special place in the hearts of communities, far more than do the multiplex entertainment centres of today.

However, in the minds of developers and businessmen out to garner profits after years of war and peacetime hardship, the future belonged to the shopping basket. Cinemas were prime sites for demolition and replacement by supermarkets, shopping malls and car parks.

Progress or preservation?

This was also the time when trams ceased to ply the streets of Britain, when thousands of miles of rail were closed in order to give free rein to the motorcar and the motorway. It was a time when old buildings came down and concrete skyscrapers began to take their place. Neighbourhoods vanished: was anybody consulted?
It is always a problem to know what, in the name of progress, should be held on to; what should be cherished and preserved in face of change. Each individual, each group of individuals, each community must decide for themselves. Sometimes there was conflict, though most often, resignation; only a few, like Curlew Stevens on behalf of his hospital-bound father, stood up to be counted.

Sample chapter

 

1. A slight accident
                                              
Curlew Stevens opens the swing door of the Ritz cinema, Fetterton, and hears a terrible groan. 'Son,' comes the voice of his father, Leonard Lamont Stevens, proprietor, projectionist and movie maniac. 'I've had a bit of a tumble.' Curlew glances up at the trap door leading into the projection room, fondly known as the Cockpit. No ladder – so that means Dad forgot to descend the safe way.
   'I tripped over Mrs. Mead's confounded mop and bucket.'
    Curlew has now been waiting in Hospital reception for a couple of hours. A doctor arrives with a clipboard under his arm. 'You are Mr. Stevens' next of kin?'
   'I'm his son, if that's what you mean.' For a horrible moment he thinks Dad's passed on and joined the angels. 'My Dad's not –'
   'Kicked the bucket? – not quite.' Curlew wonders whether the doctor always speaks to people like this. 'Do you have any older, mature relatives?'
   'My Aunt Annie's mature.'
   'Then we'll need to speak to her.'
   Curlew doesn't think this is a good idea. 'She's an archeologist, you see.'
   'What's that got to do with anything?' queries the doctor.
   'She lives in the past – with the Picts from over the border, and the Roman Ninth Legion. It's no good talking to her about the present. Can I see my Dad now, please?'
   'You'll find him somewhat confused, having suffered concussion. He keeps claiming that saboteurs are trying to close down his cinema.'
   Curlew shakes his head sadly. 'Not saboteurs, just the Town Council. They want to shut the Ritz, flatten it and build a superstore.'
   'Well your father will be out of action for almost as long as it takes to build a superstore.' He is joking a little, of course. 'Okay, let's say a month at least. And I have to warn you, he's going to be a bad patient. His right arm, right shin, left wrist and collarbone are broken. You'd better go and inspect the damage.'
   As Curlew enters Ward 3 a nurse approaches and hands him a bunch of dahlias. He recognises them instantly – they are from Mrs. Mead's husband's pride and joy, his greenhouse. So she really had left her mop where Dad would trip over it.
   'Dahlias, Dad, they're good enough to win a prize.' The doctor had forgotten to mention Dad's bandaged head. 'Painful, is it, Dad?'
   'Agony, son – all over.'
   Curlew asks, 'Are we insured, Dad, against accident?'
   'Hadn't the ready cash to renew. But that's on one of my lists.'
   'You've got to rest, Dad. Doctor's orders.'
   'I'll rest in my grave, not before. Stuff the dahlias, or better still give them to the Sister with dark curly hair, with my compliments. Now are you listening?'
   'I am, Dad. All ears.'
   ‘Right, now while I'm cooped up in here for a day or two –’
   'Longer than that, Dad.'
   Dad is hearing only himself. 'Pay attention, Clark – I've got a thousand and one things demanding urgent attention. I've made three Lists of Things to Do.'
   Curlew sighs. 'Give me the lists, Dad, but don't call me Clark.'
   'Curlew was okay for when you were a child, Clark. That's over. From this day on, you're to be a man, ready to take on responsibilities. The Ritz cries out for rescue. It'll be touch and go, but I have every faith in you. Proud of you, indeed.'
   'Thanks, Dad. But why don't we just face facts?'
   'Facts? That's just what my three lists are designed to do. The first concerns matters of life and death. The second is very urgent and the third can be done at your leisure so long as it's completed by Wednesday at the latest. Are you listening?'
   'Every word, Dad, honest.' All at once, the lifestyle of Curlew Stevens, happy-go-lucky wanderer of the highways and byways, is to alter drastically, probably for ever.
   As if to stress the point, Dad repeats himself. 'You're going to have to do some growing up, my lad...No more fantasies. These broken bones are for real. My life's work has just shot right over the precipice – only you can save it.'
   Curlew thinks, if there's a kid around these parts who needs to grow up, it's Dad. 'According to the Doc, Dad, you're going to be out of action for at least a month. The Ritz can't run without you. She's finished.'
   'Finished? – my Ritz, my darling? How dare you say such things in front of a sick man?'
   'She's falling down, Dad. A lump of ceiling nearly hit me on Friday night. We're in debt up to your neck. The bank won't stump up. TV's finished us off.'
   'Never. One day people'll see the light. They'll flock back to the cinemas. I've seen a vision.'
   'It's okay for you, Dad. They feed you in this place.'
   'Get some chips. Mrs. Bulmer'll give you credit.'
   'She's been giving us credit since Christmas.'
   'Then throw yourself on the mercy of The Other Stevens.'
   Dad always refers to his brother Alfred and his family as The Others; and sometimes as The White Sheep of the family. 'He's pots of money.'
   'Uncle Alf doesn't even speak to you, Dad. Not since the language you used when he told you to sell the Ritz and get a real job.'
   'Then get Sue to plead with him. She's a soft spot for you, always has had.'
    'No she hasn't Dad,' replies Curlew, flattered and willing to be convinced; for Susan, the adopted daughter of Uncle Alf and Aunt Pheobe, is the golden girl of his dreams (unfortunately she is also the golden girl of a lot of other boys' dreams in Fetterton and beyond). 'And she's under orders not to mix with the likes of me.'
   'So what is it makes her turn up regular as clockwork at the Ritz every Friday night?'
   'A coincidence, Dad. Anyway, she likes films.'
   'A coincidence that Fridays is your turn to do the projecting? Eh, and have that cosy little Cockpit all to yourselves?'
   'She's been banned, Dad.'
   'Talk to Sue. Five hundred quid will see us through. In the meantime, I shall not be idle, believe me. I have ideas. We'll hold an international film festival.'
   Curlew cannot choke back a groan. 'Oh no, Dad! Not foreign films with subtitles.'
   'Whyever not?'
   Curlew does not want to upset his Dad: let him dream. He grabs the Lists. 'Got to fly. Long live the Ritz, eh?'
   Dad is already far away. 'I think I'll start with films from Korea. Or maybe Hungary...'

 

A review of Pigs Might Fly posted on Amazon Kindle, signed PH, 2 May 2013:

***** A caper laden gem

Pigs Might Fly is a wonderful evocation of life in the recent past, however the passion shown by the main protagonist to preserve the local cinema remains as relevant today. This is a fast moving, caper laden story of complex relationships, commercial greed and love of our cultural heritage. James Watson is clearly passionate about film and the education of his readers and this book will have you scampering to hire or buy some of the many films referenced in the course of the narrative as well as looking more closely at the architectural gems that are our old cinema buildings. This is a truly enjoyable book and it is to be hoped that a television producer chances upon it as Watson's expressive writing would translate very easily into a wonderful film. Buy this book, you will love it.

 

Other stories for Young Adults by James Watson:

 Sign of the Swallow

The Bull Leapers
Legion of the White Tiger
The Freedom Tree *
Talking in Whispers *
Where Nobody Sees
No Surrender
Make Your Move (and Other Stories)
Ticket to Prague *
Justice of the Dagger *
Fair Game: The Steps of Odessa *

      * Now on Kindle

For further information please go to the author’s combined website and blog: Watsonworksblog.blogspot.com

 

POEMS OF PLACE (18) 

KNOWLTON: ENDING AND BEGINNING

In memory of Muriel Barker (1905-97), the author’s best aunt

 You always said you would have liked

To be Dorset-born, and it was sad
That it was in Christchurch, Hampshire
You breathed your last. So I hope
You will forgive another commutation,
Of cowslips (my favourite) against primrose (yours):
For the thought was there and the word.

 At Knowlton where a ruined church

Nestles within the enigma of a pagan henge
I scattered your ashes on grassbanks
Which in the spring we saw palely-washed
With more cowslips than I’ve ever seen.

The wind-driven rain was a blessing

For the place was ours alone
And there was ample time for the telltale traces
Of your farewell to vanish into earth.

 It will be there in the spring

Succouring the roots of tomorrow,
Matching the green-fingered energy
Which was always yours in life;
Perpetual evidence that in the end
You were truly Dorset-born.

 

REVIEW

Tony Williams likes Barbara Kingsolver’s Flight Behaviour (Faber & Faber, 2012).

In Barbara Kingsolver’s latest novel, flight has taken on various meanings, principally the aberrant flight of billions of monarch butterflies from their logged-out home in Mexico to a new unaccustomed winter roost in the Southern Appallachians of North America. Flight also takes in the intention of the human narrator to flee her dead-end farm home and her TV surfing husband and take up with a new lover.

 Prize-winner?

But the first flight upends the second. Up in the mountain forest she is dazzled by her first sight of the vast blazing orange of the newly arrived monarchs. This forest is owned by her father-in-law who is about to sell up to a logging company. She has to prevent this.

Flight Behaviour, the eighth novel by Barbara Kingsolver, born 1955, has been shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction 2013. It tells of the interplay between the narrator’s personal needs, the story of her family – all in poverty – the scientists who arrive to count the butterflies, global warming, the local community, media interest and the loggers.

More biologist than feminist

So much so worthy. Barbara Kingsolver is nothing if not stern and passionate in fighting for her many causes. What makes this novel eminently readable is the unexpected humour, and even hilarity.

Her eyes and ears are ever keen to take in the idiom of modern American women. Kingsolver is more biologist than feminist, and the eye she turns on the curiously alien physical doings of males is largely benevolent. In an earlier novel she describes how one 61-year-old is about to leave her husband of two years because he entered matrimony for family silence, whereas what she wants is the conversation she has missed all her previous life.

 Sparkles with life

The author also muses over how men manage to support their pants under an enormous apple-shaped belly, and indeed how they can boastfully thrust such a mountain out into the world whereas a woman will devote her entire life to containing or at least concealing hers.

Flight Behaviour sparkles to life with the interchanges between the narrator, the 29-year-old unwittingly named Dellarobia and her friend Dovey, who is given to texting loony messages spotted on church slogan boards including ‘Moses was a basket case’. 

 Lost battle?

The ‘What the...’ factor present in The Lacuna (the reminder of the 1932 brutal suppression of the Bonus Marchers in Washington) may be absent here but replaced by the laugh-out-loud factor.  Hilarity, ‘you’ve got to laugh’, makes the dour message readable, but no more palatable. We readers may do what we can to minimise our own impact on the world’s diminishing resources but it is a lost battle. Our physical world will collapse and a lot sooner than we think. Pensioners may fret for the future of their grandchildren, but that is too optimistic: we should fret for the next few years the ravished world allows us.

 

QUOTE  OF THE MONTH: it’s that man again

Fifty-four historians wrote a joint letter to The Times (Tuesday 14 May, 2013) protesting about remarks made by Education Minister Michael Gove

in a recent speech on the teaching of history. Evidence for the case he was making proved to be unreliable, leaving him basing his arguments less on facts than personal prejudice.

‘The key skill that the study of history teaches us is the ability to evaluate evidence. Gove has demonstrated in his speech a remarkable capacity for manipulating and distorting it’.

Mr. Gove was deemed ‘Mr. Sloppy’.

 NED BASLOW TO AGAMEMNON  etc.

Note from the editor

Ned Baslow’s letter to Agamenon, Menelaus and Odysseus has been regrettably held over till the next issue, but readers can sample his correspondence with Harold Godwinson, Giorgione, John Milton, Homer the Greek, William (Billy) Blake, King Nebuchadnezzar, Wolfy Mozart, Inspector Morse and Capability Brown in previous editions.

 To avoid disappointment readers are urged to book tickets for the various events that will take place at the Wickerstaff-cum-Fernhaven International Festival of the Arts (2014).  We hear that not a ticket is to be had for the Tableau of Beauty Through the Ages, featuring guest appearances by Helen of Troy and Bo Derek.

 

THANKS FOR READING THIS.

CONTRIBUTIONS ALWAYS WELCOME.

Watsonworks@hotmail.co.uk

 The Writer’s Notebook is taking a summer break: back in September!

'THAT' FUNERAL: MEDIA REVERTING TO TYPE

THAT FUNERAL: MEDIA REVERTING TO TYPE

 

PIGS MIGHT FLY: A TALL TALE ABOUT TEENS OF YESTERYEAR

 A Writer’s Notebook

  No. 40, April 2013
Watsonworksblog.blogspot.com

 

James Watson
Friends and contributors

 

Contents

1. That funeral: media reverting to type
2 Whatever happened to Glenda?
3. Pigs Might Fly: author’s preface
 No wizards, no smartphones, just the flicks and 
Saturday night dances in the village hall -a new novel now available on Amazon Kindle.
4. Poems of Place (17) Butterflies
5. Quotes of the month
6. Correspondence 1: Freedom of speech: the limits of expression. From Mark Turner
7. Correspondence 2: Ned Baslow to King Harold (not Hardrada)

 

That funeral: media reverting to type

Predictably with the run-up to the Thatcher funeral and the event itself, the media by automatic default reverted to type as stenographers of power. Whatever pale rider of radicalism is permitted to gallop across the pages of the nation’s press or through the airwaves of radio or TV, the ruling model of society as upheld by the power elite soon reasserts itself according to dominant ideology; that is, the socio-economic and political requirements of the establishment as contrasted with those of ‘people’.

It’s all in the Mail

They are not separate entries, simply defined in hierarchical order. The elite’s advantage, however, is that it has the power of definition, not the least the definition of the people, or as they are referred to when approval is called for, the ‘silent majority’.
      The argument is put that Margaret Thatcher did not believe there is such a thing as society; this because she is reported to have said it. What she was probably thinking is if people followed her lead, voted for her, read the Mail or Telegraph and kept their traps shut, society does exist indeed – to be conveniently shaped and guided, or as some calumnists might say ‘ exploited’.
The state funeral of Maggie – make no mistake, it was ‘state’ in every meaningful sense of the word – was the media’s opportunity to remind us of the values we are all supposed to share: adulation of greatness whatever its socially divisive effects, affirmation of nation, identification of the enemies within.

Adolescent objectors

The Souvenir edition of the Daily Mail was an exemplar of practically everything the student of media has been taught to expect. First, those who are in our camp, then those in their camp. Robert Hardman (Inside St. Paul’s, ‘As the coffin emerged in the sunlight, the crowd erupted in cheers…’, page 2) offered an adulation but did not shrink from dishing those not on wavelength: ‘no one was unduly worried if a few “look at me” adolescents thought it appropriate to heckle a coffin en route’.
That a good third or more of the nation may have fallen into the classification of look-at-me adolescents was a reminder that division remains as it has always been a weapon in the maintenance of power.

Accessories to death

An event such as the funeral provides an opportunity not only for the media to mark who deserves favour and who doesn’t, it reminds us of those who broke the rules. Yes, a few of the upper crust who ended up in jail (‘Jailbirds’ but still welcome) received a disapproving welcome, but the Mail’s stick was out for that ‘surprise addition to the guestlist’, the Duchess of Kent, the ‘gurning exhibitionist’ who was suspected of using her mobile at the end of the service.

     Of course there were no comments, complimentary or otherwise, on the way Fergie was dressed. The fashion observations were reserved for the celebrity wives of the great and the good. Bearing in mind the estimated £10 million cost of the funeral to the British taxpayer, one can only guess at how much our top designers (we are a nation of shopkeepers) made out of the ‘ladies in black’.
    Not that the Mail’s Nicole Mowbray suspended her critical faculties for this occasion, Cherie Blair missing ‘the mark with a large hat reminiscent of a cake tin covered in satin’: fair do’s, for when you strut the stage, you court the applause (or not). It was all a case of good, healthy capitalist/personality projection opportunism.
    The opera star Katherine Jenkins (from the Welsh valleys?) earned a PS: Did Katherine go far too low? by seeming ‘determined to show-off her curves in a plunging cocktail-style dress and flared overcoat’.
Somehow this whole fashion charade summed up the sheer hypocrisy that accompanies the national penchant for languishing sentimentality. For a moment (and for one moment only) George Osborne’s tears seemed the only genuine expression on display. As for the clergy, they too affirmed that when it comes to taking sides…

EDITORIAL: Whatever happened to Glenda?

Well that is what some of us, unfamiliar with the deeper depths of parliamentary life, have probably been asking over the years. Not any longer: Glenda Jackson rose in parliament and delivered a speech about the Thatcher era that was passionate, eloquent and inspiring. If she were not a 76 year former actress (of considerable stature), if she were a recently elected MP, in her late thirties or early forties, those on the left would have thought the extremely unlikely was happening: a Labour leader in the making, and a woman to boot.
 That professionalism brought with her from stage and film ensured that throughout the manic responses baying from the Right, the shouts, the calls to sit down, she continued without hesitation, repetition or divergence. She was spot on, revealing herself a force that should have been reckoned with.

 Introducing Curlew Stevens, one-time bird-watching layabout, now entrepreneur

Save the Ritz? Dad’s in hospital and 16-year old film buff and general also-ran Clark Gable Stevens (Curlew to his friends) is faced with the biggest challenge in his life, rescuing his Dad’s cinema from the clutches of the developers. The obstacles are gigantic; the chances of success for Curlew’s Save the Ritz Campaign as likely as seeing a flight of pigs crossing the skies of Fetterton. Does destiny deter Curlew? Read on.

Author’s preface to Pigs Might Fly

This story is set at a time when the only computers were as big as a house. Young people could not e-mail each other because there was no such thing as e-mail and the mobile phone was light years away; and as for television – well, just a few of the better-off were installing their black-and-white sets.
    In rural areas, milk floats were pulled by horses; and plenty of folks had to go down the backyard to the lavatory. It was even possible to play football and cricket in the street without being mown down by the cars of commuters late for work.
    Going to the pictures was still the entertainment that got people out of their homes; unless they were in to dancing, in which case they'd gather to do the quickstep or the modern waltz in the church hall, or in the cities, the Palais de Dance. Girls got pregnant, but not quite as often as they do today and the best a boy could expect after a night out was a hug and a kiss – and a cold walk home.

The flicks: heart of the community
Life was often hard, but the pictures opened up the world – to adventure, fantasy and romance. The local cinema held a very special place in the hearts of communities, far more than do the multiplex entertainment centres of today.
    However, in the minds of developers and businessmen out to garner profits after years of war and peacetime hardship, the future belonged to the shopping basket. Cinemas were prime sites for demolition and replacement by supermarkets, shopping malls and car parks.
    This was also the time when trams ceased to ply the streets of Britain, when thousands of miles of rail were closed in order to give free rein to the motorcar and the motorway. It was a time when old buildings came down and concrete skyscrapers began to take their place. Neighbourhoods vanished: was anybody consulted?

Save the Ritz

 

It is always a problem to know what, in the name of progress, should be held on to; what should be cherished and preserved in face of change. Each individual, each group of individuals, each community must decide for themselves. Sometimes there was conflict, though most often, resignation; only a few, like Curlew Stevens on behalf of his hospital-bound father, stood up to be counted.
    True, Curlew would much prefer to continue to idle away his days in a hay meadow staring at the clouds, but the Ritz is more than just a building: it is a cause. So what if his plan to mastermind a Save the Ritz Campaign is as likely to succeed as, in the words of his friend Chippy Bulmer’s dad, pigs might fly?
The tower, featured on the cover of Pigs Might Fly plays an important part in Curlew's story. A tiny caption gives the game away - a real tower that played a part in the author's life.

Issue 41 (May): opening extract of PIGS MIGHT FLY.

For further information, please go to  http://tinyurl.com/cz315rp

Poems of Place (17) Butterflies

     In Kelsey church, a red admiral fluttered in panic

As if mauled by ants; or was this because

On the day the world mourned the Roman pontiff

The creature was trapped in Anglican communion?

To rescue its conscience as well as its humming wings

 I engulfed it in the dark perpendicular of my hat,

 Raced with it through the ancient door, putting out of mind

Questions of Should I or Shouldn’t I?

Or What if there’s a hawk on the prowl; rewarding it

With a suddenly dubious freedom – of drenching rain,

Enough for this premature child of spring to catch its death of cold.

In another church – majestic Stoke by Nayland –

I  read in marble the life-flights of the Rowleys, frail of wing.

Children of one Sir Charles and his wife Maria Louise,

They'd They’d had less strength to survive than my butterfly.

Aged one – that was Frances Charlotte.

Aged two and a half – that was Elinor Caroline.

Aged thirteen (oops, an unlucky number) – that was Haland.

Aged seventeen – that was William Arcedechne.

On January 20th 1857, all of twenty-two, Lucy Mary

Breathed her last. And then there was spring for the Rowleys

Until in April of the same year Harriet Georgina

Flew the empty nest, aged seventeen.

At this point I brought to an end the pilgrimage of an unbeliever

To the stately churches of Suffolk, except to linger

Before the great east window of Boxford

Marvelling at the inanities of faith, yet equally moved

By flights of hope and love this side of death.

 QUOTES OF THE MONTH

Young people remain particularly stricken by the [unemployment] crisis. Currently, some 73.8 million young people are unemployed globally and the slowdown in economic activity is likely to push another half-million into unemployment by 2014. The youth unemployment rate – which had already increased to 12.6 percent in 2012 – is expected to increase to 12.9 percent by 2017. . . Currently, some 35 percent of all young unemployed have been out of a job for six month or longer in advanced economies, up from 28.5 percent in 2007.” ILO Global Employment Trends 2013 Report.

 

Robert Fisk in the I newspaper (15 April 2013) reflecting on a story posted on line of a Syrian youth holding the decapitated head of an air force officer whose helicopter had been shot down by a ground-to-air missile.

Propaganda? Most certainly. Truth? Perhaps. But the internet has so skewed the Syrian war that propaganda has become truth and truth propaganda – even myth. Everyone believes what they want to believe. And this awful image is not just a challenge to humanity. It is also a challenge to journalism…Alas, in war, photoshop technology and the internet have made villains of us all.

 

Brenden O’Neill, Five things Liberals love that Thatcher invented’ Spiked, 17 April 2013. In essence, Thatcher naturalised unemployment, turning it from a social predicament brought about by the failure of modern society to provide all with gainful employment into an individual’s own problem, caused by his physical or mental ineptitude. You are unemployed because you are sick, not because society is sick.

 CORRESPONDENCE 1

Free press, free speech continued
From Mark Turner
Dear Ed.,
One of the real problems concerning censorship is how far it is legitimate to cause offence. Various advocates of free speech and a free press argue that there are currently enough laws to curtail free speech, in the UK the most pernicious are laws relating to defamation. These are not alone: hate speech, speech that offends religions, are subject to rigorous surveillance and redress.
   The number of people arrested for ‘offensive’ language on Twitter, for example, is multiplying. Currently it is politicians and celebrities who do the talking, and the police who do the acting: each has a vested interest in using the law either to protect their backs or, as in the case of the police, to patrol boundaries defined in the interests of law and order, not liberty of expression.
    Where do you draw the line; and equally important, who should do the line-drawing? In my own experience, every time you attempt a definition of a term, like ‘truth’, ‘objectivity’ or ‘impartiality’, things start to unravel. They become immensely more complicated in a multicultural society where different cultures and religions hold differing positions on what is true and what is permissible.
    Where opinions clash, the inevitable outcome in a reasonable society is compromise; but even this is problematical. Compromise ideally would represent a ‘giving way’ by both sides in a confrontation over communication and behaviour. ‘When in Rome do as the Romans do’ used to be a useful marker; it has less meaning today because ‘Rome’ is too complex to sustain normative values and conduct relating to communication.
    Perhaps free speech in an immensely complex society has reached a point of either surrendering its high ideals to pragmatism or substantially redefining itself, beginning with an examination of expectations. Unfortunately, compromise is not something certain (if not all) religions and many cultures are used to or prepared to accept.
Mark Turner.
Thanks, Mark: may the debate continue. A Times leader of 23 March 2013 stated that ‘It is precisely the ability to publish the most annoying, offensive and fringe opinion that should be protected…A liberal, free society ensures that agreement among the good and the great does not become a conspiracy of silence and respectability. The right to be an irritant is crucial.’

 The Ned Baslow Letters (continued)

   Dear King Harold,

I have to say that I was taken aback to receive your email, but delighted all the same to learn that you and your men have reached Knaresborough on your way south. What’s encouraging is that information about our Wickerstaff-cum-Fernhaven Summer Festival 2014 is getting to those places, to borrow a phrase, which only a well-known lager reaches.
    It is an excellent idea of yours to join our Battle of the Titans, once you have obtained victory over William the Norman. We have pencilled in a bunch of eager Greeks and some merry vagabonds from Sherwood Forest. You and your housecarls would certainly add to the excitement, especially as folks around here are always moaning about the loss of the good old days when the Edwins and the Edgars and the Edwards ruled the roost instead of a lot of Fitzes.
    At the moment, Sire, we cannot guarantee seats during the main show, as the last tickets for the front three rows have been taken up by our chairman, Lord Gilbert, and his family. When I broached to him your request for reservations, he was quite unequivocal, saying we’d have to put things on hold until after, well, you know what.
    But rest assured, there will standing room down the side aisles of the village hall theatre for all participants, apart from beside the stage where the St. John’s Ambulance people will be situated.
    Finally, good luck with your enterprise. I hesitate to remind you, but consider it important to repeat the advice I ventured in my earlier correspondence: there’s always a chance of disaster if you rush in to things. I think I can trust a good old Anglo-Saxon to let his head rule his heart on this occasion.
Yours etc.
Ned Baslow

PS: My boy Benjie has drawn your picture complete with helmet and beard; only he’s written Harold Hardrada on the bottom. When I pointed out that Hardrada was your enemy, he altered it to Harold Pinter. In my view and that of my wife Betty (who is still studying for an Open University degree) that’s a compliment and a half.

As ever, contributions – poems, comment, critiques (books, films etc.), short literary pieces – are very welcome. Please mail to Watsonworks@hotmail.co.uk, best by the tenth of the month.

THANKS FOR READING THIS.
Jim.