Adam Thorpe - Ulverton

Sometimes I feel like having a good weep

Sun. April 26th 1953

Cold. Soup.

H. Communion. Walk to White Horse. Mr Stephen Bunce found me. Brought horse & cart, took me down. Gave me brandy in his council house in Vanners Crescent. Smelt of dogs. Kind folk. Never been in one before. You looks very creamy, Miss Nightingale. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Oh Violet

Mon. April 27th to Fri. May 1st 1953: incapacitated. Panic overhead. Furniture moved about like thunder. Mrs Dart said saw robin tap my window which means a death. Sorry to disappoint, I said.

Sat. May 2nd 1953

Warm, sunny. Dumplings.

Contributions weekend. Certainly ‘quotidian’. H. kept out of way. No more HP Sauce bottles tomorrow, and that’s flat. Headache from smiling. Some of the clothes smell. Well

Sun. Apr

Tues. May

Mon. May 18th 1953

Warm, overcast. Yorkshire pudding.

‘The Life As Lived’ finished. Nothing. Last paragraph. Spring 1953. ‘Enid and I walked up that day to the ruined mansion, her eyes flashing hope, mine only adoration. “April is the cruellest month”, she whispered, as we climbed to the terrace hand in hand. Within, where England’s old order had crumbled to dripping ceilings and scrawled walls, where perhaps you, the reader, are now cropping your sheep, or landing your space rockets, we found a bed. Here the seed was planted anew, as I had planted those ancient seeds. Just as I now plant this great steel seed filled with the dross of our so-called “civilisation”, and the struggle of one to free himself, as an angel must from the material shards of a lesser world, through the agency of the female essence, from that trivial and clogging stuff we call “daily life”, that you see before you in all its reality. And even there, the world invaded, poked us, did not let us be (see illustration). Only in death may that joy be everlasting, may that seed flower, just as this seed before you now has flowered in your eyes, like the golden flower of Homer. Pick it, and rejoice! May it give you hope! May it give you life! May it give you, too, O posterity, that vital fire of love!’

Handed it all over. Apple-pie order. Illustrations coming on, Mr B.? All done, Violet. Goodness gracious, you are a marvel, my dear. Look at this! So neat and tidy! Well I was thoroughly trained, Mr B. May I have a glance at the illustrations? Oh no my dear. There are some things that even you cannot view. Only posterity has that privilege, my dear!

Seems to have forgotten about my written contribution. Just as well. No stomach for it.

Tues. May

Wed. May 20th 1953

Mild. Coronation Committee Meeting: no more bunting needed, Miss N. You shd have brought it earlier! Ill, I know. But thank you anyway on behalf of the etc. Maybe the cottage hospital wd be interested? You’re looking better, I’ll say that. Have you checked yr garden for bonfire stuff? It’s rather wild at back, Miss N. Found two waggons already & a threshing machine in old barn on Barr’s Farm — hid under collapsed roof for 25 years, can you imagine? Gardened. Herbert distant. Biggest bonfire ever. Red Admiral. Chiff-chaff behind shed. No waggons.

Thu

Sun. May 24th 1953

Missed church. Hiked (that’s the word) up to Kisser Cross. Blowy. Wind right through me. Buffeting. So open up there, that’s the trouble. Let it push me off, almost. Like flying. Or as if nothing in way of it (i.e. the wind). Skylark on fence-post. Prefer it up high, funny scruffy brown thing down here. THINK I SAW STONE CURLEW!! Need stronger binoculars.

Elgar blasting away again. Her present to him, I believe.

Mon. May 25th 1953

Repository arrived on back of lorry. Only a week late. Like big bomb. Shiny steel. Makes me look wide. Mr Webb put cherrywood compartments inside. Fit to a T, look, Mr Bradman. Packing the Material. I don’t say much.

Tue.

Thurs. May 28th 1953

Packing the Material. Location Stone delivered. ‘Posterity’ spelt with an ‘e’ on the end. At least he got the 4953 date right, and Percy Bysshe Shelley. ‘Of bitter prophecy’ a bit too crowded, I thought, but then I’m always a stickler. H. displeased, but I didn’t tell him about the wrong celandine on Wordsworth’s. Why should I? Don’t have

Fri. May 29th 1953

Packing. Herbert like little boy. Bisto in with the Oxo cubes now, Violet!

Don’t have the stomach, but I do it.

Sat. May 30th

Mummy sweet pea’s first flower. Rather small, but bright yellow. Picked it before a soul was up, just like that. In jam-jar on my window-sill. Waited 3,000 years and only felt early morning sun & a bit of a breeze on its petals. Better than nothing. Like a bird’s-foot trefoil, that golden

Sun. May 31st ’53

Walked up to scarp at dawn. Back along river. Whinchat. Bit of white campion by stile. Viper’s bugloss in usual place (early). Ragged robin out at last in Quabb B. Heron by ruined mill? Repository all ready for Burial (Planting, he calls it now. Well, it’s a bit late for me to change.) Tripped over bunting on way to church. Bunting everywhere. Miss W. got children at school to make them, needless to say. All colours of rainbow. Gold and silver even, like wings. Rather windy. Bit of sun. Bonfire or whatever by Saddle Bridge half-built already. Big. Waggons & carts one on top of another like they’ve dropped from sky. Thump thump. Loads of axes swinging away at lots of things. Big sweaty men grinning, tossing on wooden bits, swinging their axes. Nice old hay-wain straight out of Constable went in two minutes. Splinters flying they’d better watch their eyes. Two men holding either end of plough, looked just like Mr Dimmick’s. One two three & on it goes. Little boy rolling barrel up. Waggons looked bigger all piled up. Like a pile of elephants out of that book on Africa. Gone without a struggle, as Joan Lowe said of her Eric. Little by Little, as Kenneth said, rather cruelly. Scribbled down the names on Gordon’s envelope. Habit. Have to have a name, don’t we? They’ve all got a bit of flaky paint & a name. Like on war memorial. Poppy day. Blast on the trumpet. JOHN STIFF, MAPLEASH FARM ULVERTON 1833. LORD CHARLES H. CHALMERS ULVERTON HOUSE FARM, ULVERTON. ERNEST M.BARR ULVERTON 1887. JACOB SWIF … (rest indecipherable — greasy patch on Gordon’s envelope). Funny poem on wireless full of names. Like lullaby spinning round and round. Gordon’s good on names. Missed ‘What’s My Line’. Thought it best all round. Hardly seen him. It sounds a bit religious, this. Will send me to sleep I hope. Nice voices

Mon. June 1st 1953

Big hole in garden. Instructions deposited in the bank vault. Officially. Repository to be opened 4953 (June 2nd I suppose). Don’t have faith that bank vaults will survive but still. Big mechanical digger thing snorting away. Tore up lawn in two minutes, azaleas with it of course. Small crane coming tomorrow to lift it in. Six years’ work. More, really. Meat-paste repeating. Nerves. Everything packed. He’s going about waving his hands like little boy. Another mummy sweet pea out. Just in time for his speech. Whole village gone a bit mad, really. With Coronation, not our do, of course. Scouts came & put canvas wrap over it cos it’s set to pour. Our Sovereign will get soaked says Mrs Whiteacre. Took the roll of bandage up to bonfire or whatever. Taller than the trees now, just waiting. Like the back of Ray Leatherbarrow when Shirley was late to the altar. She and her pink roses. River gurgling past. Hooked bandage on waggon shaft & walked round and round, only circled twice before it (bandage) gave out. Tucked end into cart-wheel. Little boy watching with nose problem. What’s your name? Give Walters Miss, what you up to, Miss? I’m wrapping it all up, Master Walters. You’re bonkers, Miss. Bonkers! Runs off. Bonkers!