Dave Hughes, In Memoriam

In Praise of English Teachers

At the end of last year my old English teacher, Dave Hughes, died. I saw him last in the summer, when he came to my book signing in York, and admonished me for repeating words in the opening scenes of Shieldwall.

'It's meant to be poetic repetition,' I told him, but he wasn't convinced, and I think he was still marking me down.

We were supposed to go for a coffee, but he seemed distracted, and hurried off. I only found out later that he was suffering from bowel cancer, and that in five months he would be dead.

I meant to write personally to him, but in the end, his death came quicker than my letter, and all that arrived in time was a Facebook message. Less than I had intended, but then so much in life is so. But fitting perhaps, that it was on Facebook that he chronicled his decline.

His Facebook page is still there. I wonder how long it'll be before Facebook decide his account has been inactive for too long, and they clear away his account.

I was 13, in grade 3 at St Peter's School, York, when Dave became my English teacher, and he remained it, and I kept the same seat in the same class until I left school at 18. We went through 'O' levels and 'A' levels together: namely, the Miller's Tale, Auden's poetry, Macbeth, Hamlet, Douglas Dunn, and Rosencrantz and Guildernstern and Dead.



Dave was the kind of teacher who had something of the Dead Poet's Society about him, before the film or the concept came out. We called him Dave, rather than Sir. He had a curriculum in mini lessons that he gave to you at the beginning of term, and included his and other student's writings. He liked to recite chunks of the Canterbury Tales in middle English, and invited us to write modern versions: the Tax Collector's Tale; the Hairdresser's Tale; the Policeman's Tale. Before we were old enough to pass as 18, he used to invite me and a few friends over to his house on a Saturday night, and we sat in his living room, like juvenile Inklings, with our cans of John Smiths by our feet, and he talked to us as if we had something interesting worth saying.

That first lesson he taught us about speed reading, and let us ask him any questions we liked: and he answered them all. Though letting a class of 13 year old boys come up with questions was always inviting a degree of silliness.

There was a lot of distinctive things about Dave. He handed back your work with a sheet of footnotes on your work. These could run into 30s little numbered stars, with comments on a separate sheet. I remember the day he gave a short story I wrote, 36/40. Anything about 34 was great, 35 fabulous, and that 36 earned me a distinction in English, and a little early confirmation that I might have a gift.

I told him, or perhaps my parents did at parents night, that I both loved Tolkien and wanted to be an author. Both seemed embarrassing details at the time. But Dave was kind and considerate, and I think he shared my love of Northern literature. He was of course, drawn to mountains, and tragically to Norway, where his friend, and my chemistry teacher, died in a climbing accident on the Svartisen Icecap, in Arctic Norway in 1986. And he had poems published in a journal called Giant Steps, alongside names now well known, like Simon Armitage and Helen Dunmore. My first signed book: and knowing an author seemed such an important step towards becoming one myself.


Even though I now have many other signed copies - from more renowned authors - Dave's collection of poems keeps it's prized place.

And this morning as I brought it down, I found tucked inside a bundle of his curriculum, with the distinctive typeface he used.



It was odd reading his Facebook posts. He had a gift for language of course, but the most poignant thing Dave wrote on his Facebook account, was 26th October.

NOT a good week so far... Felt terribly weak - and had to abandon a stay with Mum and Dad when reflections of each other other simply made us aware of what each side was losing. I rode the stair-lift and Dad could only say, this was meant for me, not for you.
But feeling better: if I can have another transfusion, it could make all the difference. Do call soon if you plan to call at all....

And when a friend promised to visit after Christmas, he wrote:

David Hughes: won't be here till then, Sorry

But rather than these as his last words, perhaps better would be his poem Valediction, for his friend Barry Daniels, who died attempting to save a student who had fallen into a crevasse. I think much of this would apply equally well to Dave:

You'd much prefer a place where gods might hike
on sponsored walks that you could organise -
to build a climbing wall, or something like.

Your sort of heaven should have lowering skies
that always look like rain, but never quite
make up their minds - then soak you by surprise

and leave you squelching in your tent all night
with sodden sleeping bag and wrinkled feet,
damp boots, wet breeches, shrinking till they're tight.

When morning hammers in with wind and sleet,
disgusting though it seems, your flapping tent
must feel a bit like heaven: twelve square feet

comparatively dry, where you're content
to fester till they call you. Then in haste
you'll shudder into clothes: it's time you went.

I hope your lunch is always Lion Bar waste
or greenfruit pastilles - nowhere near a stream
to swill away their sickly after-taste

It don't take much of those to make it seem
that reindeer pate, marmalade and bread
are things you've never eaten, just a dream.

But dreams aren't thinks confined to food or bed:
your waking, walking dreams inspired us all
to want to follow paths you chose and led -

and led us safely till your own one fall,
your fatal stumble where our paths all fork.
I mostly hope your heaven holds lands that call

where all their better bits are three months walk
through glaciated valleys, peak on peak,
that shadow, loom, and avalanche; and talk

must always plan in detail, week by week,
the many first ascents that wait for you:
those marvellous, untrod summits you still seek.


NB
After posting this I went in search of some of Dave's poems, but came across this instead, which says a lot about what a distinctive man Dave was.

Sunday Times Picks the Best Historical Novels of 2011

‘Much the best was Justin Hill’s Shieldwall, which superbly evoked the wordplay of the period’s poetry as it unfolds a compelling story of Earl Godwin’s battles against the Norse.’

Singapore Day 2: Man Asian Shortlist Announced

What to do at a literary festival?

Well - I always imagine them something like my backpacking trips when I was a younger me: early nights, lots of reading, up early, and hours and hours walking and seeing places.

Then you throw in a bunch of writers, and the balance shifts more to long dinners, late night's drinking and then late mornings, just up in time for breakfast, where we sit and wipe bleary eyes and set out for our days.

I was delighted to be included in the Chinese writer's lunch: and as soon as Paul Tan of the festival told me this, I struggled to bring all my mandarin back to mind. Was with Bi Feiyun and Taiwanese writer, Hao Hsiang-yu.

Then an interesting event on settings, with Meira Chand, Kunal Basu, and Dawn Farnham. A really interesting session, followed by dinner with the Man Asian Prize team who were buzzing from their simultanous launch of the 2011 longlist.

Bi Feiyun spent the night trying to finish off the last of last year's prize money on some fine wines: and I thought that was a good lesson in life, to share the bounty we get with others. A great guy, who's had a great year, also winning the Mao Dun Prize. Well done him!

Great that the prize is attracting big names, and that the prize is so well run: slick, professional, and focussed on the job of promoting Asian writing.

Razia Iqbal below:

Singapore Writers Festival

There's something special about festivals that call themselves writers festivals, rather than literary festivals, and spotted Bi Feiyun sitting in the lobby as I went for lunch.

Bet he's not written a think since I last saw him at the prize event last year: there's something highly disruptive about winning prizes like the Booker/Man Booker. And then who else should I run into here, than a bunch of Hong Kongers standing in the hotel lobby.

Thanks to Jean who was the best of volunteers, taking me out to find a very delicious beef randang. And then a few hours wandering the streets with a taste of pork knuckle in vinegar; and cracked pepper pig stomach and chicken soup with a spicy sweet soy sauce.

Everyone very friendly. First event tomorrow, after a rather long lunch.

Tonight we're off on a boat trip. Ten writers sent up the river: will we survive? Will I be sea sick..?

Unknown Soldiers of 1066

History – like memory – tends to fixate on the principal players, victors and casualties, and glosses over circumstantial details and many events of interest to us remain hidden and mysterious. 

Arthur’s twelve battles are just names without locations, as is Brunanburg; while even the locations of later battles like Bosworth are often sketchy. But the Battle of Hastings is unique in that we have an astonishing amount of detail of this battle, fought 945 years ago. 

We can trace, for example, Harold’s movements from September 8th when his army supplies ran out; almost to the day through to his famous march north to the Battle of Stamford Bridge on 25th September; and then south again, ending up at Hastings, on 14th October. Of the important men who died at the battle there is Harold, of course; his two brothers Leofwine and Gyrth and their friends and cousins and retainers, but we also know the spot – the precise spot - where Harold’s banner flew and where he was killed. 

We know this because William insisted that the high altar of his abbey mark the exact spot, and when the Norman monks started work on a site they thought much more appropriate, William furiously chastised them and ordered them to do his royal will. 

Uniquely we also know some of the common folk who died at Hastings. We know, for example, Abbot Leofric of Peterborough died on campaign but before the battle. (Campaigns in Saxon times were no doubt as unsanitary as they were in Florence Nightingale’s times. ‘Summer sickness’ doubtless thinned both armies). 

Another Abbot, Aelfwig of Winchester’s New Minster died in the battle with twelve of his monks: and the lack of information provokes us to wonder who these monks were. Were they the moustached and warlike monks, like Bishop Leofgar of Hereford, Harold Godwinson’s chaplain, who died in battle with the Welsh? Can we picture these Winchester monks in the heriot – here-geat – wargear of mail, helm and spear, wielding beaded axes and chanting their prayers? Or were they performing a more supporting role – tending, ministering, and caught up in the massacre after the battle? 

We don’t know. It is as the historian Richard Fletcher wrote, that facts seldom speak for themselves and ‘have to be coaxed and entreated into utterance’. The gaps between these facts are fertile ground for the historical novelist, who brings the facts and characters to speak. 

Other names include Godfric, Sheriff of Berkshire, who was no doubt leading the worthies of Berkshire. Imagine those waiting at home, hearing rumours of slaughter. The terrible absence of men who did not return. Their experience must have been like the hometowns of the pals regiments when they began to hear rumours of the Somme. You wonder if any of them really knew what happened to their sons, fathers and husbands. 

Most of these names are gleaned from the Domesday Book: men who were still remembered 20 years after the battle, when the book was composed, and English scribes began to count every ox and cow and pig and hide and yard of land. These missing men were the GPs, vicars, local businessmen, and MPs of their time. They were the local lord of the manor; the self-made farmers and freeman; the lynch pin of their communities; the good and the respected and the resented; that familiar face that rode off to answer King Harold’s fourth summons, and did not return. 

There was Eadric the Deacon. 

Breme, a freemen from Suffolk, who had been one of King Edward’s men. And then there are unnamed men: men from the abbeys of Abingdon, St Benet of Holme, Bury St Edmunds, St Augustine’s, Canterbury were all said to have fought in the battle. Individual men listed in the Domesday Book: one from Cavendish in Suffolk, and two freemen from Tytherley who rode off in September 1066, and did not return: the unknown soldiers of 1066. 

 

Tytherley is now split into two villages, with both with churches dedicated to St Peter. Google the place and you get images of churchyard tombs, bungalows, houses for sale, a black and white picture of a Victorian gentleman fishing in the village pond. It looks much like any other village, really. Green, hedgerows, a church wall war memorial, someone’s photograph of a full English breakfast: rashers, sausages, tomato, both scrambled and one fried egg. 

Both East and West Tytherley are listed on Wikipedia, and neither entry remembers the men of 1066. The earliest mention is for 1335, when the manor, no doubt still part of the royal estate inherited by William from Harold, and so to Edward III, who then gave it to his wife, Queen Philippa. The next entry records that William Fothergill Cooke invented the first commercial electric telegraph whilst living there. 

It’s a fairly typical village. And so it was in 1066. Then three men held it from King Edward, and then King Harold after him. It had land for 6 ploughs, 2 villans, 22 bordars, 7 ½ acres of meadow, and woodland for fencing. The Domesday Book says ‘two of those who held [in 1066] were killed in the Battle of Hastings’. 

Were they brothers? Neighbours? Friends? Begrudging neighbours? We do not know. But there are stories in these scant facts. Ways of coaxing those facts to speak. Their names are like the faces of people standing in the fire lit shadows of a Vermeer painting: just brief and tantalising glimpses of people usually lost to the long dark night of history. 

As with so many of our glimpses into Anglo-Saxon England, the detail about these men is brought to us because of a land dispute. The scribe records that ‘The men of the hundred say that they have never seen the king’s seal, nor his officer who had given seisin of this manor to Alwine Ret…and unless the king were to bear testimony, he [Alwine] has nothing there.’ 

This comment hints at the chaos after Hastings, and no doubt refers to a disputed inheritance; resentment of how the dead men’s families fortunes changed. We are lucky for these flashes of faces from the long dark winter’s night of the past. How the grievances of the men of Tytherley were resolved we cannot tell. Away from the spot lit leads of Harold and William, the light of history only falls so far.  But Hastings still stirs up strong feelings, and we the inheritors of these Tytherley men are still arguing over that battle's inheritance.  

Look what's just landed in my inbox

Always great to see the 'face' of a book you've written, and here's Shieldwall, in its mass market form.

The Long Road to Hastings....

It took Harold Godwinson 17 days from hearing of William's landing to march south and face a battle. Embarrassingly, it's taken me a week or so longer to get a synopsis put together. I blame Real LIfe TM - but finally done and sent off and can't wait to get stuck in. There's some really fabulous material here: great choices for the characters, complex and interesting situations - and unlike Shieldwall - there's a lot of not battle action, which I know will please a lot of people. (Heh - I didn't get to write history...!) And I'm sitting at my desk, and I find myself in early Autumn, which is the best time to start a novel. Can't wait to get stuck in. Am going to spend a couple of days letting a head of steam build, go through index cards and pick out good bits, and then set off with a Harold Godwinson as he sets out in life. He's only a young lad in a cloak and kirtle, sitting whittling a stick and dreaming big dreams: and I bet if you told him he'd end up being Earl of Wessex and King of England, and die in the most famous battle in Christendom, when I bet he'd be pretty happy with that. And if anyone is curious about the appeal of Shieldwall to an Asian audience, then here's Peter Gordon in the Asian Review of Books...