Harold Abrahams (1899-1978)

I guess that most people know of Harold Abrahams through Chariots of Fire, Hugh Hudson's 1981 film of two contrasting athletes part in the 1924 Olympics. I think that Chariots of Fire was maybe the first video along with Kagemusha that I rented, we were staying with the O'Learys in Kettleborough and as a special treat had a visit to Woodbridge and a video rental shop.
One exchange from the film sttays with me. Its between Harold and his wife to be, Sybil.

Harold: I'm what I call semi-deprived.
Sybil: That sounds clever what does it mean?
Harold:It means they lead me to water but they won't let me drink.

Harold was Jewish and his sense of frustration and the need to fight against the restrictions that bound him runbs through the film. His plaque is in Hodford Road in Golders Green still a very Jewish area, cosy and middle class. He went up to Cambridge and read law at Gonville and Caius (again battling the status quo) and there his athletic potential came to the fore and was part of the British Team for the 1924 Paris Olympics. He ran the 100 metres which he won in a time of 10.6 seconds, the 200 metres where he placed 6th and the 4x100 metre relay where the British came 2nd. He broke his leg in 1925 competing in the long jump and his career came to a close. He was a sports journalist for 40 years and commentated on Athletics for the BBC, including the Berlin Olympics and was chairman of the Amateur Athletics Association and the Jewish Athletic Association.

Its these little plots of surburbia throwing up extraordinary people that I love and I genuinely think that I got an insight into what inspired Harold Abrahams to "run them off their feet"

Harvey Pekar 1939-2010

To some the word comicbook will always be a perjurative term. A synonym for near illiteracy, juvenile, immature trash. And theres a reason for that - many comic books are juvenile, many are immature. There are however, books out there, books that just happen to be written in the graphic medium. Books that make you think, books that make you feel. And those are the books that I tend to go for. I'm Spandex intolerant and thanks to Harvey Pekar there are plenty of books out there that don't feature Men of Iron or Dark Knights but rather books that deal with everyday lives. Harvey's work features his trials and tribulations told in an utterly honest way, exposing his curmudgeonly take on life , his tales of the means streets of Cleveland and his frustrations at his wife, his fans, the system that we all have to endure - books written by authors like - Adrian Tomine, Daniel Clowes, Andi Watson, Art Spiegalman, Joe Sacco and The Hernandez Brothers. He came to wider attention with the release of the movie American Splendor (2003) based on his book which garnered awards at Cannes and the Sundance Festival and also an Oscar nomination.

Thanks Harve.

The mystery of the disappearing blue plaques

OK so its not exactly Sherlock Holmes but.... I noticed a while back that the facade of the Arts Theatre was being done. The Arts Theatre is on Peas Hill and normally bears a blue plaque to John Maynard Keynes which had been prised of, I thought as part of the redecoration. But then I noticed that one of the blue plaques near work, that to Hobsons Conduit had also gone missing and then I checked on the plaque to Jack Hobbs on Parkers Piece and that too was gone. I thought that maybe all the plaques had been withdrawn as part of Council costcutting with the economy as it is and with local councils having to institute swingeing cuts across the board, but then how much is an already extant plaque scheme going to cost? Not a whole lot I would think. And then on the way back from Queens' were we'd gone on a sweltering Saturday evening to see the lovely 'Na and the Fairhaven singers go through their paces we walked down Silver Street and saw the blue plaques all ship shape and Bristol fashion. There are a couple on the Street one to Gwen Raverat who was Charles Darwins great grandaughter and an accomplished artist, she maily worked in woodcut and was part of the grand alliance of the Keynes/Darwin/Vaughan Williams family. Her second cousin was Ralph Vaughan-Williams whose work we listened to on Saturday. She married Jacques Raveret, a french painter. The second plaque of Silver Street was a little more prosaic dedicated to New Hall which was a womans only college in Cambridge founded to address the shameful fact that Cambridge had one of the lowest proportion of female students of British universities - it started with a whopping 16 students. Its now out on Huntingdon Road on land donated by the Darwins...

John Keats 1795-1821

I had a very nice Sunday. It started early and yes I forgot my camera, I actually realized as I was crossing Elizabeth Way but decided not to turn back. It was gorgeous and sunny and though I had to endure a bit of a breeze, a breeze that was astonishingly in my teeth all day but that kept my cool as I peddled, well mostly peddled southwards through Shelford and Whittlesford, Elmdon and Duddenhoe End. Langley is remembered for the fact that the village green is bisected by the road, the fact that the cricket pitch is sited on that village green means that the boundary provides some rather idiosyncratic road markings. Then its down through the Pelhams being overtaken by the vintage Triumph bike club and then the Hadhams including a brief respite for water and a Mint Feast - and its a while since Ive seen a Mint Feast and then Widford and Hunsford. It was then that deterred by a veritable mountain on the road to Royden meant a left turn through Stansted Abbotts at which point I hit Hoddesdon. I have nothing against Hoddesdon but I was hoping for a bit more bucolic beauty so cut back through Nazeing and Waltham Cross. Not the nicest area and next time I think Ill try and find an alternative route but so far so good. This takes you to the very northernmost point of Enfield, the outermost outer London again though more traffic, more noise, more people and running out of time as Marie had texted to say that she was wandering around Camden Market and we were going to meet at the top of Primrose Hill at 2.30.
Id mapped out my route on the A-Z hoping to swing by Hodford Road but also stopping by a few more points of interest so it was that I neared Edmonton Green and Church Road where I was going to swing West through Edmonton and Tottenham and had just found it when I punctured. As I'd spent Saturday afternoon sitting in the pub with Wayne watching the Germany-Argentina game when I could have been buying a new inner tube. Hindsight i guess.
It could have been a lot worse as I found myself at the doors of Edmonton Green rail station. Just round the corner from the station is Keats Parade which marks the place where Keats underwent his apprenticeship to a surgeon/apothecary - God knows what the lad saw but with a traumatic childhood it was reckoned by by Charles Cowden Clarke a friend of Keats to be "the most placid time in [Keats'] life".
Next up why Cambridges Blue Plques are disappearing...

Home again, home again jiggedy jig

Well I'm back home after a two week break. Ywo weeks with ups and downs as I guess is the way travelling as a couple. We both survived the trip but I guess that it exposed my doubts about moving in with Marie. She doesn't deal well with conflict and neither do I. There was a moment in front of the Dolmabahce Palace where I would quite happily have given her the guidebook and the card for the hotel and just gone off on my own for the rest of the day. Im also enjoying the rest of the weekend as we got back at a rather respectable 2 p.m. yesterday. Its funny to think that yesterday morning we were travelling through the mist shrouded streets of Istanbul and now Im back to the chaos of the flat.
I guess that compromise is the key to a relationship - and I guess that we had a compromised trip. We both indulged in pursuits that we wouldn't maybe have do - Marie - walking and me shopping. My frustrations are I think in that Im supposed to be the one who organises, Im the one that does the reading, Im the one who does the prep. and Marie simply comes along for the ride. The truth of course is that the joy is in the reading, its in the preparation and finding the places of interest.
Still we both enjoyed the trip. Different aspects of the trip but we DID both enjoy it. I was a think a little disappointed with Istanbul - I think that The first trip in October suited me more - with fewer tourists and a bit less heat it gives you more time and makes you more inclined to stretch yourself. Not that we did stretch ourself - OK well I didnt I think that the spectacle of Marie struggling up the hill to Arbanasi will stay with me for a while. Its a worry because iy wasnt really that much of a climb - Marie whined that I shouldnt always measure things in my terms but the truth is that unless shes ready to offer alternatives And Im being harsh, after her dissertation she was after a holiday while I as usual wanted a bit of an explore. And as I say we managed a bit of both, in fact I think that I probably got the best of the compromise. We did get around, we did see stuff and the holiday was confined to the occaasional sit and read in the shade. We did Ok there as well - a couple of cloudbursts but all in all good weather throughout - lovely while walking in the old town of Plvdiv or Veliko Turnovo not so more in the crowded metropolis of Istanbul!!
Marie has promised to arrange the next trip. Hopefully were looking at Berlin at the end of the summer...

Dadbhai Naoroji 1825-1917

Spotted on my last foray into London on the outside of the Art Nouveau Finsbury Town Hall. I guess it's rather aposite given the events of the last few days.

He was elected as a Liberal MP in 1892 and was the first Indian to sit in the House of Commons. He was a founding memeber of the Indian National Congress and a mentor to Gandhi. He was also paternal uncle of the rather un-Gandhiish J.R.D.Tata.

I wonder what he would amke of the mess that the Mother of Democracies is in at the moment?

I guess that I should come clean and say that I voted Lib Dem in Thursday's election. Yes there are issues that I differ from the manifesto on - I'm less than convinced of the need for big government from Brussels and I'm less than sure that an amnesty for illegal immigrants is the way to go (though I acknowledgement that that is at least an attempt to deal with the continued problems that we have with immigration). I believe that renewing Trident at the very least needs to be at the very least looked at - because it aint an independent deterrant and its not too effective against the enemies that we face. I believe in fairer taxes where those who can afford to pay more to the sociry off've which they make their money should do, I believe that education will shape the future of this country and that that is where we need to invest, I believe in maintaining public services as much as possbible in a harsh economic environment, I beleive in a low carbon economy. But most of all I beleieve in electoral reform. Because this simply isn't working. A party that has 10% of the popular vote should have 10% of the seats in the house. I'm sorry but it IS that simple. We need concensus politics not the monkey house at the zoo that we see week in and week out at PMQs. Yes that will mean seats for UKIP and the BNP but thats democarcy and UKIP and the BNP do reflect some peoples fears. And you cant defeat these dickheads unless you confront them and take them on face to face on open debate. We should be able to votefor what we want rather than a least worst option. We need a UNITED kingdom not a divided one. Back to the matter at hand - we had a hustings at work which I attended which I really enjoyed. The Tory candidate came across as supercilious and the Labour guy as defending the indefensible who the hell can a union guy be a Labour MP when Gordo is every bit as anti-union as the Tories? Tony Juniper, the Green Candidate couldnt make it which was a shame because I would have liked to have heard his ideas. Simon Sedgewick_jell turned up as a bit of a comedy turn but didnt impress...so Lib Lem it was. I had Friday off so that I could stay up to watch and made it til 6.30 when there were less than 100 seats left to declare and by which time it was pretty much decided that it was going to be a hung parliament.... Stick it out Nick a commitment to a commission dont mean dick...

Blitz Street

On my wanderings last week I spotted (well was looking out for thanks to plaquesoflondon.com )n inconspicuous plaque on a pub wall in Nevill Road. An ordinary, terraced street in an unremarkable suburb of London with an unfortunate claim to fame, that being that the first zeppelin bomb to fall on London dropped into the back garden of the Nevill Arms pub on 30th May 1915. The attack killed 7 and injured 35 and with it came a new era in warfare. An era thats certainly left its mark on London, in most cases the marks are all but disappeared, signalled by a gleaming glass and not so gleaming concrete plonked down in the middle of victorian brick. The blitz is being recreated at the moment by Channel 4 subjecting a specially made terrace to ever larger explosions which kind of misses the point of the true horror of the blitz. Not the effect on brick and mortar but on flesh and bone.
Maybe these periodic conflagrations are the equivalent of a bush fire that some trees require to activate these seeds. From Boudicca through Saxon and Viking raids, Peasants Revolts, plague and fire, The Gordon Riots right up to 7/7. Its part of a dynamic city I guess, one that constantly reinvents itself. And thats not even counting on the rather less dramatic predations of the property developers who ensure that history doesn't get in the way of profit.
Theres a quote from Babylon 5 that seems rather apt - "The universe is driven by the complex interweaving of three elements: energy, matter and enlightened self-interest"
Election Day tomorrow. Woo-hoo!!