Narrow Dog to Wigan Pier Read online

  20 Electro-convulsive therapy – still widely used.

  21 Co-op dividend – traditional source of funds as last resort. Our fund held twelve pounds.

  22 Wide World – adventure magazine, published from 1898 to 1965.

  Chapter Four – The Ribble and the Lancaster Canal

  1 A-wop-bop-a-loo-bop – ‘Tutti Frutti’, song by Little Richard.

  2 Patrick Garland – actor, writer, director.

  3 Anthony Page – stage and film director.

  4 I could not get the ring/I coupled with your mate – The Changeling, play by Thomas Middleton and William Rowley, III. iv and V. iii.

  5 Isis – the university magazine.

  6 Newdigate Prize, Hawthornden Prize – winners Stuart Evans and Dom Moraes.

  7 Professor Tolkien – J. R. R. Tolkien, author of The Lord of the Rings.

  8 Allen Ginsberg – poet, leader of the beat movement.

  9 W. H. Auden – leading poet of the thirties.

  10 Henry Hall – famous mid-century UK bandleader. His introductory catchphrase was ‘This is Henry Hall speaking.’

  11 Anne Rogers – actress, singer. Original lead in The Boy Friend.

  12 Mike Hall – actor, sometime MC at the Players Theatre, Charing Cross.

  13 Clemence Dane – Winifred Ashton, playwright and novelist. A Bill of Divorcement, screenplay for Anna Karenina.

  14 Let me count the ways? – poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Sonnets from the Portuguese, No. 43.

  15 Through a glass, darkly – 1 Corinthians XIII.

  16 Battalions – Hamlet, IV. v. ‘When sorrows come, they come not single spies,/ But in battalions’.

  17 Smokehouse – Port of Lancaster Smokehouse, Glasson Dock.

  18 If I could snare – poem by Terry Darlington, after Edmund Waller’s ‘Go, Lovely Rose’.

  19 Allen key or hex key – one of those thin L-shaped things that you stick into the end of a special screw and turn.

  20 In a nook – poem by J. M. Synge, ‘In May’.

  21 Charles Baudelaire – I attracted Monica’s attention the night I met her by talking about the nineteenth-century poet – she was about to take her finals.

  Chapter Five – The Lancaster Canal

  1 The smylere with the knyf – Chaucer, ‘The Knight’s Tale’.

  2 While meeting in the sales office – poem by Terry Darlington.

  3 The Dam Busters – 1954 film with Michael Redgrave as Barnes Wallis, the inventor of the bouncing bomb.

  4 Gentlemen, the Board is most concerned – poem by Terry Darlington.

  5 Miss Joan Hunter Dunn – poem by John Betjeman, ‘A Subaltern’s Love Song’.

  6 Surly bonds of earth – poem by John Gillespie Magee, ‘High Flight’.

  7 Pamela Tiffin – film star – Harper, Viva Max!

  8 Robin Douglas-Home – socialite.

  9 Petula Clark – pop singer – ‘Downtown’, ‘Don’t Sleep in the Subway’.

  10 Kathy Kirby – pop singer – ‘Secret Love’, ‘Let Me Go, Lover’.

  11 Janette Scott – film star – School for Scoundrels, The Day of the Triffids.

  12 Claudia Cardinale – film star – The Pink Panther, Fitzcar-raldo.

  13 Ghosts on the sand – Nick Broomfield’s TV film Ghosts tells the story of the death of twenty-three Chinese picking cockles in Morecambe Bay. Abuse of workers from overseas was evident for years, and government regulatory agencies failed to act.

  14 Eric Gill – sculptor, typeface designer.

  Chapter Six – The Leeds and Liverpool

  1 Little Dutch liner – 15,000 tons. The modern Holland America Ryndam is 55,000 tons.

  2 Mad July gale – poem by John Masefield, ‘Cargoes’.

  3 Off-peak Off-beat – article in Punch by Terry Darlington under the name Ian George, 1965.

  4 It is a truth – opening of Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen.

  5 Moon River – song by Henry Mancini.

  6 When the Good Lord made the Canadian woods – poem by Terry Darlington.

  7 CFRB – Toronto’s oldest broadcaster.

  8 It was a face which darkness could kill – poem by Lawrence Ferlinghetti from Pictures of the Gone World, in the collection A Coney Island of the Mind. The latter has a million copies in print.

  9 Beat poets and novelists – Jack Kerouac, On the Road; William Burroughs, The Naked Lunch; Ken Kesey, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest; Allen Ginsberg, ‘Howl’.

  Super Region Four, Fall 1965 – editor David Morton.

  10 OZ – psychedelic hippy magazine, London, 1967–73. Subject of obscenity trial.

  11 Scott McKenzie – song ‘San Francisco (Be Sure To Wear Some Flowers In Your Hair)’ by John Phillips.

  12 Broken Arrow – fifties western with James Stewart.

  13 Esther Williams autobiography – Million Dollar Mermaid.

  14 Many mansions – ‘in my Father’s house are many mansions’, John 24.

  15 It Happened In Monterey – song by Mabel Wayne and Billy Rose.

  16 Howard Marks – ‘Mr Nice’. Seven years in American prison for smuggling cannabis. Rector of Glasgow Caledonian University.

  17 Simon Rodia/Funny little guy – poem by Terry Darlington.

  18 The Watts Towers – built over thirty years by Simon Rodia (d. 1965). Local authorities and neighbours tried to destroy them. Now a National Historic Monument.

  Chapter Seven – Aston

  1 Why, this is hell – Christopher Marlowe, Doctor Faustus, I. iii.

  2 Old Joe Guyer – a harmless old man. Children would sing this song.

  3 A seed floats through – verse by Terry Darlington.

  4 Flights of angels – Hamlet, V. ii.

  5 Book about cocktails – Classic 1000 Cocktail Recipes by Robert Cross.

  6 Brought forth a mouse – Horace, parturient montes, nascetur ridiculus mus.

  7 Beaker full of the warm south – poem by John Keats, ‘Ode to a Nightingale’.

  8 But I was desolate – poem by Ernest Dowson, ‘Cynara’.

  9 I am a fish/I am a rook – poems by Terry Darlington.

  10 How I surfed the fields lady – poem by Terry Darlington.

  11 Remember with advantages – Henry V, IV iii.

  Chapter Eight – Willington

  1 A little academe – Love’s Labour’s Lost, I. i.

  2 These two emparadised – Milton, Paradise Lost, IV.

  3 Vanity of vanities – Ecclesiastes 1.

  4 Stafford Hospital – ‘a gross and terrible breach of trust’ – Sir Bruce Keogh, medical director of the NHS, 17 March 2009.

  5 Dans le vieux parc – poem by Paul Verlaine, ‘Colloque Sentimentale’. ‘In the old park lonely and frozen, two shapes have just passed’. I changed park to station.

  6 Plan B arts society organized monthly readings 1972–6. Poets included Patricia Beer, Martin Booth, Edwin Brock, Pete Brown, David Calcutt, David Chaloner, Jeni Couzyn, Carol Ann Duffy, Paul Gater, Lee Harwood, Philip Higson, John Hind, Libby Houston, Enos Lovatt, Norman MacCaig, Barry MacSweeney, Edwin Morgan, Peter Philpott, Tom Pickard, Peter Porter, Omar Pound, Bill Symondson, Charles Tomlinson, W. Price Turner, Nigel Walker, and others mentioned in text.

  7 Roger McGough – member of pop group The Scaffold as well as a poet.

  8 Three great twentieth-century poets – he was referring to William Butler Yeats, Dylan Thomas and himself.

  9 His little son dying – poem by Jon Silkin, ‘Death of a Son’.

  10 Carol Ann Duffy – Poet Laureate, 2009.

  11 The Bells Of Rhymney – poem by Idris Davies, music by Pete Seeger.

  12 Plaisir d’Amour – song by Jean Paul Égide Martini, 1780.

  Chapter Nine – Shardlow to the Tidal Trent

  1 Vegemite – Australian Marmite.

  2 Shangri-La – lost city of the Himalayas. I thought I was going to Tibet.

  3 John of Gaunt – Richard II, II. i.

  4 Stewed in corruption – Hamlet, III. iv.


  5 I fled Him, down the nights – poem by Francis Thompson, ‘The Hound of Heaven’.

  6 Leslie Watson – Now a physiotherapist. Ran 206 marathons and won 68.

  7 Ninja – Japanese spies and assassins.

  8 Two hours and fifty-eight minutes – in 1896 I would have won the Olympic Marathon, but this was 1978.

  Chapter Ten – North to York

  1 No Name restaurant – I have seen mixed reviews now.

  2 Bill Rodgers – 58 marathons at the highest international level, won 22, many long-distance records.

  3 Stone Master Marathoners – founded 1978 by Terry Darlington, Bill Couldrey and Tom Chitty: www.stonemm.co.uk.

  4 Weave a circle – poem by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, ‘Kubla Khan’.

  5 Chris Brasher – Olympic Gold Medal steeplechaser, later director of the London Marathon.

  6 Rosetta Stone – ancient Egyptian stone carved in three languages allowing deciphering of hieroglyphics.

  7 A book about it all – Run for Your Life, Columbus Books, 1985.

  8 Music dwells lingering – poem by William Wordsworth, ‘Inside of King’s College Chapel, Cambridge’.

  9 Mama Cass, Michelle Phillips – the US vocal quartet The Mamas and the Papas.

  10 Calder and Hebble handspike – shaped wooden stake to open locks on the Calder and Hebble Canal.

  Chapter Eleven – Dewsbury

  1 Oil and Gas in the Soviet Union – Dr J. Daniel Park, Research Associates, 1978.

  2 Lord King – chairman, British Airways, 1981–93.

  3 Colin – Colin Marshall, managing director, British Airways, 1983–2004.

  4 Highlife – fusion of African and American sounds.

  5 Nigerian snail – delicacy, widely farmed.

  6 Arturo’s – Houston Street, New York. The restaurant lives on.

  7 Galleria, Duomo – the great arcades and the cathedral.

  8 Men have died from time to time – As You Like It, IV. i.

  9 Scottish Development Agency – 1975–91. Aimed to encourage Scottish industry.

  10 A worldwide study – Opportunities for the Scottish Wool Textiles and Knitwear Industries – published by Scottish Development Agency, 1980.

  11 Willie Nelson – country singer and songwriter – ‘Crazy’, ‘Funny How Time Slips Away’.

  12 James Dean – film star – East of Eden, Rebel Without a Cause.

  13 Borobudur – demonstrates in stone the route to perfection.

  14 The Guinness Scandal – chief executive Ernest Saunders was sentenced to five years in 1990 for false accounting, conspiracy and theft, for inflating the Guinness share price to allow the takeover of Distillers. Sentence reduced on appeal.

  15 Charles Dunstone – founder and chief executive of Carphone Warehouse.

  16 Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again – first sentence of Rebecca, novel by Daphne du Maurier.

  17 Flower park – Stonefield Park – two acres very near our home, maintained by Stafford Council.

  18 Andrew Davies – prolific adapter of classics for TV. Best known for Pride and Prejudice, 1995.

  19 Books on how to write – My favourites are The First Five Pages, by Noah Lukeman, and How to Tell a Story, by Peter Rubie and Gary Provost.

  20 The Literary Consultancy – editorial advice, particularly for new writers.

  21 Annette Green Authors’ Agency – my agents, recommended by the Literary Consultancy. David Smith suggested this book, combining travel with memoirs.

  Chapter Twelve – The Pennines

  1 ITV Waterworld – a half-hour weekly prime-time programme in the Midlands in the noughties, reaching audiences of over a million.

  2 Carcassonne was featured in 9 episodes in 2004–5. There was later a seven-minute feature on Indian River.

  3 He won a prize – best feature programme of the year in ITV annual awards.

  4 Thunderbirds – mid-sixties marionette series by Gerry and Sylvia Anderson.

  5 Kate Silverton and Dermot Murnaghan – broadcasters, presenters of BBC show Breakfast.

  6 Libby Purves – broadcaster, presenter of Radio 4’s Midweek, author of One Summer’s Grace, the story of sailing round the UK with her family.

  7 Sandi Toksvig – broadcaster, presenter of Radio 4’s travel programme Excess Baggage.

  8 Joanna Lumley – actress, comedienne, beauty, campaigner.

  9 Website – www.narrowdog.com.

  10 Bill Bryson – travel writer published by Transworld.

  11 Andy McNab – military writer published by Transworld.

  12 Standedge Tunnel – opened 1811. Reopened 2001. Longest (5000 metres) canal tunnel in UK, and deepest underground (200 metres) and highest above sea level (600 metres).

  13 Harecastle Tunnel – opened 1777. 2700 metres long.

  14 And what shoulder and what art – poem by William Blake, ‘The Tyger’.

  15 Jive Bunny – an estate agent in Rotherham who added drum and bass to well-known music in the eighties and sold it to people whose understanding was impaired.

  16 John Prescott – British Deputy Prime Minister, 1997–2007.

  17 If you seek a monument – si monumentum requiris, circumspice – inscription on the tomb of Christopher Wren in St Paul’s.

  18 Kennet and Avon Canal – 87 miles, 100 locks, reopened 1990.

  Chapter Thirteen – Stone

  1 In a somer seson – poem by William Langland, ‘Piers Plowman’.

  2 The land of lost content – poem by A. E. Housman, ‘Into My Heart an Air That Kills’.

  3 (Write it!) – poem by Elizabeth Bishop, ‘One Art’.

  4 The lone and level sands – poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley, ‘Ozymandias’.

  5 Australia – film by Baz Luhrmann.

  6 The castle of Mordor – The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien.

  7 You work your side of the street – Steve McQueen to Robert Vaughn in the film Bullitt.

  8 She breaks my heart – Jess lost her leg two months later. She is happy and active and Monica and I are expected to recover over time.

  9 Death closes all – poem by Tennyson, ‘Ulysses’.

  Extract from ‘Ulysses’ by Alfred Lord Tennyson

  Tennyson was out of fashion for a long time because of his soft rhythms and literary content. But there was no greater master of rhythm – so often in creative writing the sense is in the words, while the meaning is in the rhythm. ‘Ulysses’ is of course about Homer’s hero, now grown old, deciding to set off one final time on the bounding main. It is a grand poem, and this, the final section, is the best bit. Tennyson used to stride around the shrubbery shouting It may be we shall touch the happy isles,/ and see the great Achilles, whom we knew. If I had written that couplet I would have done the same.

  There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail:

  There gloom the dark broad seas. My mariners,

  Souls that have toiled, and wrought, and thought with me–

  That ever with a frolic welcome took

  The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed

  Free hearts, free foreheads–you and I are old;

  Old age hath yet his honour and his toil;

  Death closes all: but something ere the end,

  Some work of noble note, may yet be done,

  Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.

  The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks:

  The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep

  Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,

  ’Tis not too late to seek a newer world.

  Push off, and sitting well in order smite

  The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds

  To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths

  Of all the western stars, until I die.

  It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:

  It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,

  And see the great Achilles, whom we knew

  Though much is taken, m
uch abides; and though

  We are not now that strength which in old days

  Moved earth and heaven; that which we are, we are;

  One equal temper of heroic hearts,

  Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will

  To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

  About the Author

  Terry Darlington was an athlete and a businessman before becoming a writer. Like many Welshmen, he is ill at ease with practical matters and known to linger in public houses. He likes boating, but is not very good at it.

  Monica Darlington was beauty queen of Brecon and Radnor, has a first-class degree, has run thirty marathons, and leaps tall buildings with a single bound. She quite likes boating.

  Jim is sprung from a long line of whippets with ridiculous names. He is cowardly, thieving and disrespectful, and hates boating.

  Jess is a rescue whippet. She is affectionate but three parts wild. She really really hates boating.

  Also by Terry Darlington

  Narrow Dog to Carcassonne

  Narrow Dog to Indian River

  For more information on Terry Darlington and his books, see his website at www.narrowdog.com

  TRANSWORLD PUBLISHERS

  61–63 Uxbridge Road, London W5 5SA

  A Random House Group Company

  www.transworldbooks.co.uk

  First published in Great Britain

  in 2012 by Bantam Press

  an imprint of Transworld Publishers

  Copyright © Terry Darlington 2012

  Many thanks to the editor of the Western Telegraph for permission to quote from Vernon Scott’s book Inferno 1940.

  Many thanks to City Lights Books for permission to include the poem ‘It was a face which darkness could kill’ by Lawrence Ferlinghetti, from the collection Pictures of the Gone World, included in A Coney Island of the Mind in 1958.

  Terry Darlington has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  Version 1.0 Epub ISBN 9781446465752