I'm Not Dreaming of a White Christmas and other stories

 I'm Not Dreaming of a White Christmas, or of any other sort very much. Today's announcement rules out any place I might have been going and rules is rules. Otherwise where would we be. We'd be the Prime Minister's Chief Advisor.

It'll be fine. If anybody's well set up to survive such hardships, it's me. Kempton and Chepstow, a house full of books and records and some words of introduction to Fulke Greville to write for a Portsmouth Poetry Society meeting next year which will almost certainly be virtual. And I'm not short of people to meet in the outdoor circumstances that by now have come to seem entirely normal.

We have seen the seasons come and go on our Tuesday walks and become experts in the tide times of Langstone Harbour. They are particularly fascinating round here due to something to do with the Isle of Wight causing two high tides a day in these parts.

But the weeks fly by. It's not as if I'm looking for anything else to fill the days. One does notice, though, that Autumn, by some way the finest of the seasons, is short changed and there's no way it gets its fair share of three months. September is gorgeously not summer but November isn't the same sort of Autumn. Wouldn't you just know that we get the least of the best bit.

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Having been lent Martin Stannard's biogrpahy of Muriel Spark I thought I'd better read it, not having read her novels. And one turns out to be grateful, has ordered three of the novels which are mercifully short having read a lot of long books this year.

But one is struck by Muriel's devotion to her art, never mind her refusal to be treated with anything less than the respect she deserves, and the time she spends on it and how much she produces. That must be what being a writer must be like and why, with my dilettante disposition, I could never have been one. It's not that the horse racing is an excuse, either, because Muriel was an owner. But the idea that even for a couple of days a week I could put in office hours at such 'work' was a non-starter from the beginning. 

Wide Realm, my workmanlike survey of Thom Gunn, progresses gradually two mornings a week until after a couple of hours it must be lunchtime and then maybe it's a better idea to read good books rather than write bad ones. Writing a poem doesn't take long if and when a suitable idea presents itself but they tend not to. I wouldn't mind if one did from time to time because it can provide some satisfaction but it doesn't matter. I very much did not become the defining poet of my generation.

 

But, much more crucially to a devout 70's pop fan. Who knew which teenage sensations turned up to back Gilbert on this not forgotten, most appropriate masterpiece. Not me.