This evening I finished reading "No Way But Gentlenesse" by Richard Hines.
Raised in Hoyland, South Yorkshire, Richard was born into a coal mining family. He had an older brother called Barry who became famous for writing "Kes" in the late nineteen sixties. That novel was later made into an iconic film.
It was all about a boy called Billy Casper who had little going for him but he managed to capture a young kestrel and train it. He called the bird Kes.
As an English teacher, I taught "Kes" to several classes over the years and it became a standard GCSE English Literature text. One of the things that I always loved about that novel is that it portrayed a coal mining community with understanding and compassion. Barry Hines's lived experience was his principal source.
"No Way But Gentlenesse" is a personal memoir in which Richard Hines recalls his early encounters with kestrels and how later he was employed as the falconer during the filming of "Kes". The book also maps Richard's personal development from being an educational failure to becoming a university lecturer here in Sheffield where he lived with his childhood sweetheart Jackie and their two children - John and Kate.
I believe that Richard and Jackie have now moved down to Sussex to be close to their daughter and her family but until fairly recently they lived just fifty yards from us near the junction at the bottom of our stretch of road.
West & South Yorkshire and the Black Country got into my soul long ago.
ReplyDeleteSo the Barry Hines novel and the Ken Loach film spoke to me as well.
Hines wrote about rural life in his novel The Gamekeeper (reissued 2022).
By the 1968 Hines and Barstow were the only novelists of substance still
living in the North, though there were good poets (Bloodaxe & Carcanet).
Sid Chaplin had worked as a miner but was in London writing for The Guardian.
Alan Plater stuck to his native Hull but made frequent visits south for TV work.
Stanley Middleton lived all his life in Nottingham, a grammar school teacher.
Catherine Cookson, Sillitoe, Shelagh Delaney, Braine, David Storey had all left.
To live in post-industrial Britain is to be haunted by dear happy ghosts,
but ghosts nevertheless. So I was touched to read about Richard Hines.
Today the last industrial novelist is James Kelman, who lives here in
Glasgow. A writer of genius like Beckett. Best short story writer in English.
Anglo-Welsh novelists looked unsentimentally on the industrial scene.
DeleteMenna Gallie's *The Small Mine* is a little classic, reprinted by
Honno (Welsh Women's Classics).
Her 1959 novel *Strike for a Kingdom* is about the 1926 General Strike,
and the murder of a hated pit manager.
Lewis Jones's novel *Cwmardy* looks at the hardships of the mining
communities in South Wales in the year of the General Strike.
Gwyn Thomas was a huge character in Welsh letters, appearing on
Michael Parkinson (YouTube) and his Welsh documentaries are online.
Rhys Davies, Richard Llewellyn, Glyn Jones, Gwyn Jones, Kate Roberts,
Emyr Humphreys, Brenda Squires were all popular novelists in their day.
... and there are all the Welsh poets who looked on the scarred landscape.
That's one of those I wish I had moments.
ReplyDeleteI'd be very interested to read both books.
ReplyDeleteWhat a pity you never knew who it was that lived just down the road. I imagine you might have had quite a bit to talk about.
You still have time to train a dog
Also, how are you since your tumble on the ice?
ReplyDeleteHines has a look of importance about him. I know about the kestrel training. Was there a film? Or did I just read quite a bit about the kestrel training. I've read about the rich in the UK, and the poor. The rich became boring to read about but the poor, never.
ReplyDeleteWhile not life changing, the Glasgow novel? No Mean City was certainly very educational. I assume you have read the book.
Many years since I saw that film, but it stands out as one of the best ever.
ReplyDeleteI still haven't read "Kes" or watched the film, fearing it might make me cry buckets.
ReplyDeleteMaybe I should start with Richard Hines' book.
Thanks for the recommendation; loved Kes, whenever I read it, way back in the mists of time.
ReplyDeleteLike Meike I never watch films that will make me cry. But it reminded me that it was probably a gritty 'Northern' film made in the genre of 'Kitchen sink' films, it was made in 1969 rather later. Rita Tushingham came to mind with her "Taste of Honey"
ReplyDeleteSocial drama became film worthy and an exploration of poverty and sexual barriers thrown open for discussion.
I often find have a connection to the place, makes reading even more meaningful. I am reading "Pappyland" a book about the bourbon industry and legends in that field. Having lived in Lexington and gone to school in Louisville, I know what it is like to drive the winding roads through the hills between the two.
ReplyDeleteSo odd you never knew you had them for neighbors. Just goes to show that even the quietest among us can affect so many with their stories.
ReplyDeleteThat seems an enjoyable and entertaining book, with much to be learned from it.
ReplyDelete