Divided Loyalties

I spent the whole of today looking forward to England versus Poland in the last of the World Cup Group qualifying matches. Then, fifteen minutes into the match, I realised that the last instalment of Rick Stein’s French Odyssey was starting on BBC2 – an hour long finale to the wonderful ten-part TV series in which the celebrated Padstow chef has traversed France from Bordeaux (Atlantic) to Marseille (Mediterranean) in a rather fine canal barge.

I managed to reach a compromise, with the wife and daughter posted in the living room to watch out for goals on one TV, whilst I stayed in the kitchen learning how to prepare bouillabaisse on another set in the kitchen. At times we changed around (even meeting up for some supper at around half time). I ended up seeing both the England goals and almost the entire Rick Stein programme. What a great goal from Frank Lampard, and how fascinating also to see cucumber being served as a hot vegetable with John Dory and a sauce made with crème fraiche , fish stock and Noilly Prat.

Maybe we should spend next summer watching World Cup TV from a canal barge somewhere in South West France. Dream on!

The Misunderstood Thomas Hardy

Sunday, and the wife and I are being diverted around South Dorset as roadworks close the A31. From Wimborne to Blandford through avenues of autumnal beech trees, it is a pleasant outing on a sunny and crystal clear day, and soon we pass historic Dorchester and motor on in search of lunch at a seafood pub in Burton Bradstock.

We stop at the Hardy Monument, one of the highest points in the county and reflect on the popular misconception that this strange chimney stack (or is it an empty plinth) was put there to commemorate the life of Thomas Hardy the greatest writer to come out of those parts. The spectacular views soar for sixty miles or so and encompass everything from the Isle of Wight and Portland, Dorchester, Chesil Beach, Bridport, Paris probably (on a very clear day).

The monument of course was erected in 1844 to honour the other Thomas Hardy - Vice Admiral Sir Thomas Masterman Hardy (formerly Flag Captain of HMS Victory) who was born in nearby Portisham.

Readers of my recent blog about First Lieutenant George Joliffe, the nineteen-year-old killed on board HMS Bellerophon at the Battle of the Nile may be interested to know that Hardy was also at the Battle of the Nile (as well as Midshipman Aubrey, Admiral Nelson et al).

Poor Hardy. After the triumph of battle specially struck gold medals were awarded by the Admiralty to all the Captains who had commanded ships in the Bay of Aboukir, with the sad exception of Thomas Masterson Hardy, as he had only captained a brig.

Hardy is, of course best known for the death of Nelson and the famous dying words “Kiss me, Hardy”. History records that Hardy did plant a rather respectable kiss on the dying Nelson’s forehead and, a few minutes later, a second kiss on his cheek. But I am rather taken by the alternative version – that Nelson actually said “Kismet, Hardy” (using the popular Arabic word meaning “That’s Life” or “It’s the Will of Allah!”). How surprised the Admiral might have been in his dying moments to receive such a fond response. Modern historians assure me that the “kismet” theory is ludicrous, but I still like it.

Crying “Fowl”

It is Saturday and I’m looking forward to the England – Austria World Cup qualifier. But first, there is the small matter of lunch. Now the wife and the daughter are on diets and have promised themselves (and their menfolk) a lunch of Roast Chicken, but a small Roast Chicken enlivened (for their menfolk) by lashings of bread sauce, stuffing, Yorkshire pudding, assorted vegetables, etc., etc. It’s the perfect warm-up for an afternoon with David Beckham and the Big Match.

The Aga is fired up, goose fat is bubbling around the roast potatoes, a couple of bottles of Fleurie have been uncorked, and we are nearly ready to eat, when unexpected visitors arrive. From over the neighbour’s wall they have come and thence through the churchyard; they are animated, noisy and rather indignant.

It is a posse of bantams come to check out whether or not that strange smell means that we are about to eat “Mother”. After that, and Beckham’s sending off, and the awfulness of the Big Match, I think I’m about to turn vegetarian.

Another Ghost Ship – The 'Billy Ruffian'

What do Cheryl Ladd and Josiah Wedgwood, Oscar Hammerstein II and Bill Cosby, Gareth Edwards and Gareth Gates, Gaby Roslin and Anna Friel, Pablo Neruda and Lionel Jospin, R. Buckminster Fuller and The Ranting Nappa all have in common? Well we were all born on “Orangemen’s Day”, that doubtful and rather nasty commemoration of the Battle of the Boyne in 1690.

I bring this up because this morning I was stranded for a while in Petersfield while the wife’s car underwent a “While-u-Wait” service. My waiting had taken me to the main square where after filling myself with Café Latte and Danish pastry at the (heaving) Café Nero, I pondered on the statue of William III (William of Orange and perpetrator of the Battle of the Boyne) commissioned by a local landowner, William Joliffe, which stands at the centre of the square. Orangemen still come to Petersfield occasionally to lay wreaths at the statue and to sing hymns and taunt any Catholics who might be out shopping. But about Mr Joliffe I knew next to nothing.

Back at the office I did a little “Googling” and got completely sidetracked by mention of a plaque in St Peter’s Church, Petersfield, honouring 1^st Lieutenant George Joliffe who was killed in action aged 19 at the Battle of the Nile on board HMS Bellerophon.

Now the Bellerophon features in the Aubrey/Maturin novels of Patrick O’Brien (much favoured by the Ranting Nappa). Known to the lower decks as ‘The Billy Ruffian’, she was a 2-decker, 74-gun, 3^rd rate ship of the line. At the Battle of the Nile in July 1798 she went on station against the French flagship, L’Orient a 3-decker, 120-gun ship of the line. She suffered appalling damage, was dismasted and lost a total of 193 men (including Lt. Joliffe), but she had also inflicted enormous damage to L’Orient and it was relatively easy for the following English ships to finish her off.

At Trafalgar the Bellerophon formed part of the lee division, and following the Battle of Waterloo in 1815, Napoleon was compelled to surrender to Bellerophon's Captain Frederick Lewis Maitland at Rochefort, and she carried the defeated Emperor to England prior to his exile in St. Helena.

Readers of my previous blog will be aware that yesterday I spent some time looking at J M W Turner’s Fighting Temeraire in the National Gallery – recently voted Greatest Painting in Britain. The painting was completed in 1838 and shows the great veteran of the Battle of Trafalgar being “tugged to her Last Berth to be broken up”. The ship is painted in a haunting, silvery grey offset by the magnificent colours of the sunset. Co-incidentally the poor old Bellerophon was broken up at around the same time, and the two ships had both served as prison hulks for many years after the Napoleonic War. The same sad ending for two extraordinary ships that played such important roles in English history.

Ghost Ships, Ladies on Plinths, and Bookshops

To London today, to attend Linux World at Olympia for a useful hour spent as a visitor rather than as an exhibitor, and then, to my surprise, I had a free afternoon – no appointments, no ties, no responsibilities – the chance to reacquaint myself with our capital city and to see how it had changed in the eighteen-odd months that I had been away.

And, probably to the disappointment of my readers who sense a good rant a-coming, I didn’t mind the lady on the plinth at all. In fact I was curiously unaffected by her having spent a dizzy forty-five minutes reminding myself just what a great place The National Gallery is for Londoners and tourists alike. That ghostly Fighting Temeraire, the Monets and Van Goghs, the Constables and those Swimmers at Asnières; these and so many more world class paintings that I staggered out of the Sainsbury Wing exit in a bit of a daze.

I checked out the rest of Trafalgar Square and was slightly disappointed that, after so many years as a building site while the big pedestrian piazza project took shape, the Square is still a building site with large areas cordoned off. Leicester Square by contrast seemed, by day, a really pleasant, traffic-free place to stroll around. Tourist buses (the ones with open tops) have become much more modern; and there seem to be more pigeons than ever before.

And then to the bookshops. I did the mystery shopper thing in Waterstone’s, Piccadilly (which still seems more museum than bookshop, and which has lost the variety of little nookie snack areas which were a feature when it opened), to Hatchards (same, great shop for posh people and still not much good for computer books or graphic novels), and to the Charing Cross Road. Blackwell’s and Borders were pretty much unchanged, although the latter had a posse of managers arguing loudly about sight-lines. Foyles seems to improve all the time although the 20% off student promotion jarred slightly with this non-student. None of shops I visited, however, had copies on display of my test computer book (a current bestseller in a small way).

I found time to wander down Sicilian Avenue and to peer, nostalgically, through the bare windows of my still-unoccupied old store. I also had time to sit for a while on a bench on the South Bank near Waterloo Bridge. This is the place I have always gone to at moments of change in my working life. I’ll stare at the river and contemplate my most recent decision and hope I’ve chosen right. I didn’t stare at the river this time. I just reckoned that I need to find a new place to do my contemplation-thing now, as that stretch of river has never brought me much luck.

(Boring) Truths on Bookselling

So what would happen if we abolished speed limits in the UK? Would we all be scared off the fast lane of Britain’s motorways by Ferraris traveling at over 200mph? Would the M25 become a giant motor racing circuit with lap times taken at the Clacketts Lane Service Area? You really cannot tell until you’ve gone and done it.

From 1900 to 1997 the UK book trade conformed to a curious entity called the “Net Book Agreement”. As a result of this legislation books, like newspapers, were regarded as exceptional items and merited price protection. Thus a £1.95 paperback was always a £1.95 paperback whether you purchased it in a supermarket or in Harrods. This protectionism was loved and hated in equal measure, but it did have a calming effect on the industry allowing independent retail booksellers to develop their businesses, publishers to expand and flourish, and (most importantly) authors to get their books into print.

When the Net Book Agreement was abandoned the effects were partly as foreseen by the 1962 enquiry by the Restrictive Practices Court - that the number of stockholding bookshops would be reduced, and that the stocks held by bookshops would be less extensive and varied. The imminent takeover of Ottakar’s by Waterstone’s basically means that regional bookselling (outside major city centres) is now be in the hands of one company. What about W H Smith and British Bookshops/Sussex Stationers, you might ask? Well they are not stockholding booksellers – concentrating as they do on promoting 100 or so titles at special prices.

But it is the degree of “price-busting” which has most taken me by surprise. The experts thought that price-cutting would be limited to bestsellers and special promotions. They were wrong. There is scarcely a book in print that cannot be obtained (by members of the public) at a price below that at which a bookseller can acquire it from a wholesaler or publisher.

Last week the Harper Collins Award for Expanding the Market was awarded to Ted Smart, Chairman of The Book People. Ted is king of the “price-busters”, and in my measured opinion has done more to damage the High Street retail book business than any Amazon or Tesco. His skill is to suggest that his operation is that of a book club and to buy run-ons of current bestsellers direct from the publishers at cut-down prices. These are then peddled in factory canteens and through catalogues at “half bookshop price or less”. Add to Mr Smart the supermarket factor (I bought two current paperbacks at half price from Tesco last week, and Sainsbury have just appointed their first dedicated book buyer) and there is just no sense in trying to compete in any way.

But then, if the book trade has changed a lot in the last ten years, it is probably fair to predict that it will keep on changing. Spare a thought for the publishing houses and literary agents who will surely lose out to organizations like www.lulu.com and www.iuniverse.com as authors find that they can keep more control through self-publishing. Spare a thought for branches of Wottakar’s as a new generation of independent booksellers who are not governed by a central head office start to sell books properly rather than concentrating their efforts on three-for-two offers. Spare a thought for the Ranting Nappa – industriously making plans for Britain’s first Drive-Through bookshop.

Eating in France

Last night we found a decent restaurant in Le Touquet! It’s a town that has fifty or so eating places – some expensive (and mediocre), some medium price (and mediocre), and some relatively cheap (and mediocre). Small wonder that the Michelin Guide scarcely mentions any of them.

Now a decent restaurant in France should be one of two things – expensive and worth it, or cheap and worth it. The wife and I had reached the doorway and were on the point of entering the celebrated (but mediocre) fish soup restaurant Chez Perard in the rue de Metz, ready for a “Friday night is Fish Night” sort of meal which would probably have set us back 100 euros. Blocking the doorway was the inevitable singer (complete with silly hat and inevitable rendition of “Yesterday”). At that moment we both recalled the rather poor bag of prawns for which I had paid 17 euros on a recent visit to the adjoining poissonnerie, and we backed off.

Further down the street we found a more humble establishment called A Table: Brasserie Traditionelle which appeared to major on Moules Frites but with some other stuff on a blackboard. We went in and managed to manouevre ourselves into a four-seater table by the window. We both ordered exactly the same meal – a starter of Poélée d’Ecrevisses et Moules, Beurre et Ail as scrumptious as it sounds; main course of Medaillons de Lotte in a delicious sauce of tarragon and (surprisingly) red wine, served with lentils, roast tomato and a yummy mash incorporating slices of black olive; desserts of Poire Pochée, Caramel d’Endive á la Fleur de Bière et son Glace, coffee and a bottle of house Vin Rosé between us. The bill was half of what we would have paid at Chez Perard, the service was attentive and prompt, and we left with the glow of having enjoyed a really nice meal at a sensible price.

Probably next time we go there they’ll have changed hands, doubled the prices, and fired the chef (as is the French way). I hope not.