Emma Cons Gardens – derrickjknight

The Barbecue

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The human memory can be a notorious trickster. Recently, an excellent story from Bruce, himself a master of trickery, featured custard. This brought to mind the typically insightful and amusing Dennis Potter television drama ‘Blade on The Feather’, which had tickled me and Michael almost forty years ago. This contained five characters, three male, and two female. Having forgotten about the excellent Kika Markham and Phoebe Nicholls, and even the plot centring on revenge and the aftermath of a life of espionage during the Cold War era, I remembered only the three superb male actors, Donald Pleasence, Denholm Elliott, and Tom Conti. Only one scene, I thought, was burned into my brain.

This is the film I searched for on You Tube. We watched it last night. My one scene featured Elliott, Pleasence’s factotum, in the posh family dining room, serving lumpy, yet runny, custard from a pyrex jug, and Pleasance, for this insult, in the most progressively, calmly, abusive manner, calling Elliott a dollop of poodle diarrhoea. In fact this was two scenes I had fused together. You must admit, it made sense. My telling and retelling this story over the years produced a few exaggerations. I would act out the butler extracting a far more coagulated concoction from a saucepan, requiring several jerky shakes to slop it onto the baked jam roll awaiting its coating. I also added a few interpolations between the term ‘shit’ and ‘poodle diarrhoea’ during the early morning brandy deprivation scene. If you have witnessed my performance of this, please regard it as poetic licence, rather than a flawed recollection.

Today, Jackie drove me to New Milton and later collected me from Brockenhurst as I travelled to and from Waterloo to meet Norman for lunch at Tas in The Cut.

Looking over the wall on the taxi approach road far over on the other side of Waterloo Station, I was surprised to see an unusual angle on Emma Cons Gardens, and even more surprised that my little Canon SX700 HS was able to record it. The woman in the distance on the corner of Cornwall Road was walking down The Cut, which I was soon to do.

At first, however, I was drawn by the charcoal smoke and enticing aromas emanating from the barbecue stall, with its usual queue of hungry workers.

Naturally, I had to approach the scene and soak up the busy, friendly, atmosphere.

Others had brought their own refreshments.

It was, however, the usual Turkish meal that Norman I and enjoyed at Tas. My selection was the best moussaka I have ever tasted, followed by a delicious dessert the name of which I cannot remember, that included in its ingredients shredded wheat and honey. We shared a bottle of the smooth house red wine.

Geetha is another excellent blogger whom I follow. She was in my mind during my reading of ‘The Cream Of The Jest’ by James Branch Cabell which I finished today. This is because Geetha weaves her dreams into fascinating, powerful, poetry. Felix Kennaston, Cabell’s protagonist, goes further as he becomes so immersed in his dream world that ‘the jest’ is that the distinction between his own real life and the fictional world of his characters is considerably blurred. The sub-title of ‘A Comedy of Evasions’ suggests a secondary theme of Kennaston’s being so fixated on his dream woman that he is unable to sustain love for one of flesh and blood. Or is he suffering from a delusional mental illness?

This 1927 publication is illustrated by Frank C. Papé, a favourite of The Bodley Head at that time. The artist is very skilled at line drawing, and although these appear throughout the book, I have chosen to reproduce here just the endpapers.

This is because they demonstrate the contrast between Felix’s dream life and his reality.

Note the bookplate on the bottom right hand corner of the first of these two illustrations.

The website oxfordhistory.org.uk tells us that “No. 11 Broad Street, Oxford, was occupied by Thornton’s bookshop from 1870 to 2002. The building dates from about 1800, and is Grade II listed (ref. 1485/170).

The 1881 census shows Joseph Thornton, who was born in Billericay, as the employer of one man and three boys. Aged 72, he was living over this shop with his wife Clara and daughter Lydia (a governess), and one general servant. His son James was managing a bookshop of his own at 33 High Street at this time.

The business remained in the family until 1983, when it was about to go bankrupt. Wim & Scharlie Meeuws of Holdan Books bought it from John (known as “Young Jack”) Thornton, and altered the shop between 1983 and 1985 to meet fire regulations. The Thornton’s name survived on the shop until the business finally moved out on 1 January 2003.

Thornton’s Bookshop was based at Boars Hill until 2007 and is now at Faringdon, about twenty miles from Oxford.”

On The Move

Jackie drove me to New Milton For me to catch the train to Waterloo for a lunch date with Norman. The train was 16 minutes late, and the station toilet out of order. The reason for the delay was ‘a line-side fire’. Such was my discomfort that I felt inclined to offer to help extinguish it.

The arrival into Waterloo added five more minutes to the delay, which meant that decanted passengers fairly sped along the platform.

These barriers must be negotiated by passengers wishing to enter or leave the Underground. This is effected by inserting a ticket which may or may not be returned to you. Sometimes they don’t work. This tends to leave customers rather less than gruntled.

Outside, in Waterloo Road, buses tried their luck with other road users.

Underneath the station a gentleman found enough seclusion to employ his mobile phone.

The woman in the centre of this shot was in such a hurry that she had trouble keeping her feet on the ground. (You may wish to enlarge this one).

In the barriers around the building works opposite these people waiting for the traffic lights to allow them to cross, can be seen viewing windows.

Peering through one revealed this scene, complete with statutory fag sticking to lips.

Across the road, on the paving alongside Emma Cons Gardens, this photographer’s subject was not what it would seem. She was examining the picture she hd just taken of The Old Vic opposite.

On the corner behind the young lady, a gentleman later gave a literal meaning to the expression ‘nose in the trough’.

This mirror-writing version of the Young Vic posters in The Cut was the result of focussing on a window opposite.

A little further along this thoroughfare a cyclist was attending to his steed outside Evans, which is a long-standing supplier of various types.

I normally spend some time over my street shots, but today, because of the transport delays, I was very much on the move, as were most of my subjects.

Norman and I enjoyed a tasty meal at Tas, the Anatolian restaurant in The Cut. My choice was mixed seafood casserole followed by baklava. We shared a bottle of the house red wine.

Jackie collected me at Brockenhurst on my return journey, and drove me home.

I received a text from O2 telling me that my direct debit could not be implemented and asking me to ring my bank who would explain what the problem was. I did so. The bank staff informed me that with a new direct debit the reference number would be changed and that only O2 could implement the debit. The O2 text gave me a number to ring once I had learned the problem. That number was, of course, a machine, giving me only two options, one of which was irrelevant, and the other requiring me to type in my bank details. Just that ‘your bank details’. This message was repeated. I couldn’t get off it, so I politely stated, into the void, ‘I AM NOT PREPARED TO DO THAT’. I then tried the chat line and got referred back to the text. I said I’d visit an O2 outlet at my own convenience, which might take a while.

The usual survey form ensued.

After my splendid lunch I had no need for further sustenance this evening.

Robin Hood Theatre

Jackie drove me to and from New Milton station today, in order for me to travel to Waterloo to lunch with Carol.

The Hampshire station itself is impeccably kept, but the garden attached to the railway buildings has seen better days. It now boasts a collection of discarded supermarket trolleys, burst wooden planters, and the ubiquitous buddleia plants.

On the journey up, I enjoyed a brief spell as an interfering old git. I walked through two of the five carriages before I found a seat. I had to claim it. I came to a halt between two four seat sections. Only four of the eight held passengers. On one side a young couple sat opposite their wheeled case laid across the other two. Alongside them one seat was occupied by a walking stick; another by a backpack. I announced: ‘Well, I need one of these’. A young man politely settled his bag on his knees.

Throughout the journey people stopped, looked at the large case, and silently walked on. Soon, an announcement informed us that more customers were expected, and asked that luggage be removed from seats. The couple did not move. After a minute or two, ‘excuse me’ said I, and asked the man if he had heard the announcement. ‘I did’, he replied. ‘And you have seen people looking at your case and moving on?’, I continued. There was no reply. In mitigation I said that I knew this was a difficult train for luggage. ‘I’ll find somewhere to put it’, he said, and carried it back down the carriage. After he had done so, another man, who had twice walked on past the case, and must have been standing in the aisle further along, collapsed into one of the now vacant seats and thanked the young man. A woman sat in the other, and also expressed gratitude.

From Waterloo I walked along The Cut to Tas restaurant.

In Cornwall Road, SE1, a young woman sat on a low wall, speaking into her mobile phone, in This plot is very small, and contains no benches, but at least they have made an effort.

‘High Society’ is still being performed at The Old Vic, and further along The Cut, Rory Kinnear looks down on us from The Young Vic where he is receiving acclaim for his performance in ‘The Trial’.

Smoking is not, of course, permitted in our theatres, or in any other workplace or public building. Perhaps that is why the sunken gravel-coated paving around a nearby young plane tree has been converted into an ashtray.

Even before I passed these famous theatres, I was thinking of the Robin Hood Theatre at Averham, just outside Newark in Nottinghamshire. It was the setting of Rumer Godden’s novel ‘A Candle for St Jude’, that brought it to mind. This book was my train reading. Except to say that the action takes place in a private theatre, I will write more about it when I have finished it.

Robin Hood Theatre’s website describes it as ‘a timber-built private theatre of 1913 set in the grounds of the former Rectory; outbuildings which were once stables are now used for storing scenery, properties and costumes. One such outhouse contains two small dormitories which can accommodate drama students on their occasional visits to the theatre. The auditorium is on one level, the rear half raked, seated in 15 straight rows each containing ten seats. This is a most interesting and much-loved little playhouse. The backstage arrangements are quaint, compact and different.’

It is unconfirmed that Actor Manager Sir Donald Wolfit who was born and raised in Balderton, on the other side of Newark, acted there as a schoolboy.

During our Newark years Jessica and I enjoyed several performances in this historic venue.

Lunch with Carol at Tas was a delightful occasion. We enjoyed our usual entertaining conversation, and the food and service was as good as my last visit. We had different meze starters, mine being calamari, and garlic sausages; and both chose an excellent chicken casserole to follow. My choice of wine was the house red. Baklava was our chosen dessert, followed by excellent coffee.