Kristallnacht – Part Two

Continuing our interview with Renate Benedict about her family’s experiences in Nazi Germany at the start of the Holocaust.

Yesterday, when we left the story the Brownshirts had come in the early morning, destroyed the contents of the family home and taken Renate’s father – Walter – away.  Her Mother was in Berlin at the time, arranging exit visas, but arrived home to take control …

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VL:  So, your Mother came back from Berlin, found the house and its contents in ruins, and your father missing …

RB:  That’s right.  The very next day she called every person she could think of who would have the courage to step in and help us   She contacted my father’s colleagues in Gotttingen and local  carpenters and all  the old servants who dared to come back – and for the next few weeks set about repairing as much of the damage as possible.  What couldn’t be repaired was thrown away.  There were huge oil paintings of her grandparents which ended up in the rubbish because they were hacked to pieces and were beyond hope – as was most of their Meissen collection.  The furniture that could be mended was mended and then she set about arranging for two big containers to be delivered, so that it could all be shipped to the United States.

That, apparently, was where we were going.

VL: And what about your father? What had happened to him?

RB:  We found out that my Father was in a prison in Gottingen.  At the same time as repairing all the damage and arranging for us to leave, my Mother was also working at getting him out.  This meant filling in endless forms for the Nazis, and every time she got her foot in the door of some official, she was handed another form to fill out and told to come back.  Patiently, she went through all their hoops – doing everything they said.  Everytime, she had to hand over more money to them and she paid whatever was asked of her.  But time was fast running out.  We were meant to leave the US in the middle of December and here it was already nearing the end of November …

While all this was going on, and my Mother was doing all the important things,  my sister and I were staying with my friend Rutchen Seebohm, as we no longer had a bedroom, and every afternoon Annette would go to help my Mother.  Later, the Seebohms had to have a sign on their door saying “Here live friends of Jews” – which was meant to be a great insult – and every day Fraü Seebohm had to go and be interrogated.

My sister and I did actually go back to school – but it was very shaming and embarrassing because no-one knew how to react to us – whether they should even speak to us.  Most of my friends – quite understandably – were too afraid to show too much sympathy.  They were protecting their own necks – and who can blame them?

Finally, the time came when my Mother had apparently managed to do everything that was required of her by the Nazis.  She had the Visas, and had booked passage on a ship to take us all the United States – but still my father was in prison.  All along,  she had  acted as if he were certain to be released – and then unexpectedly,  she received an urgent message that she was to wait outside the Townhouse of Gottingen at exactly 5.30am, at the tiny side entrance.

She went, and stationed herself across from the entrance,  at the edge of the forest, so that she would have a good view of the door – and waited.  Half an hour went by, and still no husband, and then suddenly, the little door opened and my Father stepped out.  He had a beard, and his clothes were crumpled and he looked like a bum – but when he saw my Mother, he practically skipped across the grass to her and graciously addressed her as “Leonore”.  Her name was actually Annie, but she knew what he meant – it was a reference to Beethoven’s only opera - Fidelio – where Leonore rescues her lover from prison.

“We don’t have  TIME  for that, Walter” she said, “We have urgent appointments and you have to go to our friend Barsdorf and get cleaned up.”

VL:  Ever the pragmatic one?!  And shortly after that – you all left Germany?

RB:  It was around about the 14th of December, I think.  We had done everything, and the time had come to say our  goodbyes. I had given my rabbit to Rutchen and our lamb to the milkman.  We boarded the morning train for Bremerhaven.  As the train pulled out, we looked out of the window – and there stood my WHOLE class, waving a final goodbye.  Rutchen had told everyone and got them to come.  And it was at that point that I went to pieces …  But the really awful thing was that no-one came to say goodbye to my sister Annette – although we did spot our wonderful Nanny and a few others who had been brave enough to show up to see us off.  It was moving.  And so was the train …

VL:  You escaped from Germany just in time, because your parents had seen the writing on the wall and – to be brutally honest – because, unlike millions of others, they had the money to buy their way out.  But other members of your family weren’t so lucky, were they?

RB:  No.  I’m afraid not.  Uncle Oscar – my Father’s brother – and his wife  were put on a train for a concentration camp, but they never got there, because they were gassed on the train.  Their son, who had been left in their Berlin apartment -  put his head in the gas  oven. Their daughter,  Giselle,  was in London at the time and she survived.  Another brother – Maximilian – was sent to a concentration camp, but somehow my Father managed to get him out, too, and bring him to California – but not before he’d virtually lost  both his thumbs to frostbite because of the conditions in the camp.

A third brother, Albert, was a doctor of medicine and worked in Nice, but we never knew what happened to him.  He just vanished.  We assume he was handed over to the Nazis by the Vichy government.

A fourth brother – George – he did better.  He was a hero of the Great War and had lost his arm in it.  He was allowed to live in our house in Hann Munden – probably he paid the Nazis off.  We were, at that time, a very wealthy family …

VL: And once you got to California, your Father put what money he had left to good use, didn’t he?

RB:  Yes he did. As well as his brother Maximilian, he also brought Giselle (the daughter of  Oscar and his wife – who had been gassed on the train) to California.  Then he rescued his sister Catherine and her husband and child and brought them over too. It all cost of course and in the end we had absolutely nothing left – the Nazis had it all.

We lived in a rented house in Glendale and my Father – speaking no English – made a living by selling silk stockings door to door while my Mother worked as a housekeeper – cleaning, cooking, that sort of thing.  My sister and I were at school, which was hard because we had no English either.  After a year my Mother’s health broke down completely and I had to do everything around the house for six months until she recovered.  After that, we turned our home into a boarding house and took in three or four boys who worked in the aircraft factories … while my Father had started to help out in a local attorney’s office.  In the evenings, after work, he went to night school and eventually, at the age of 54, he qualified as a Notary.  He had his own office with the attorney,  furnished with some of the beautiful furniture from our house in Hann Munden, that my Mother had had repaired. And he and the attorney became very successful …

VL:  Your parents were quite extraordinary people – not unlike their daughter, in fact.  Thank you for sharing you memories with us …

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The striking paintings used to illustrate Renate’s memories are the work of artist Aaron Morgan –  whose website can be found HERE. Aaron says that in his ‘Holocaust Series’ he tried to portray the impact the Holocaust had on the Jewish people without graphically showing the ‘blood and guts’.  The two images on this page are ‘Deportation’ (above) and ‘Remember me’ (right), based on what is probably the single most famous image of the Holocaust.  Aaron very kindly gave us his permission to reproduce his work for Armistice Week.

Kristallnacht – Part One

To mark Armistice Day, Vulpes Libris asked Renate Benedict – mother of regular reviewer Jay and a popular guest in her own right – if she would consider sharing a little more of her amazing life history.

Although she hopes, one day, to write the story herself, she agreed to tell us a little of it, and today we are honoured to carry the first part of an extraordinary and very personal two-part interview …

The beautiful and powerful images which accompany Renate’s memories are the work of artist Aaron Morgan and reproduced with his kind permission.  His website can visited HERE.   The painting on the left is entitled “Kristallnacht” and  I can do no better than to allow Aaron himself to explain the significance of the night of the 9th/10th of November 1938 …

“Kristallnacht – the “Night of Broken Glass”  took place throughout Germany and Austria on the night of November 9-10, 1938. Prior to Kristallnacht, Nazi police took precautions to ensure that Jews could not fight back effectively. On November 8th, police entered Jewish households, removing anything that Jews could use to defend themselves. In the course of just a few hours on November 9th, hundreds of synagogues were burned, thousands of Jewish owned places of business were destroyed, almost one hundred Jews were killed, and thirty thousand Jews were arrested and sent to concentration camps. The Kristallnacht prisoners who were released were forced to emigrate immediately, to have their properties “Aryanized,” or both. The shards of broken window glass seen in front of Jewish owned stores all over Germany the next morning gave this event its name.”

Renate is, of course, the copyright owner of everything that follows.  No part or parts of the interview may be reproduced anywhere without her express permission.

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VL:  Before you arrived in California at the end of 1938, you and your Mother and Father, and sister Annette, lived a very comfortable life in Germany, didn’t you?

RB:  Yes.  My father Walter was a well-respected and very influential attorney in our wonderful little town of Hann Munden, Lower Saxony.  He’d been awarded the Iron Cross by the Kaiser.  And my mother – for her part – had for many years been helping the poor of the town with food and clothing – and encouraging other well-off people to do the same.  But my Father was Jewish, and although his social position gave him – and us – a certain amount of protection, by 1937 things were changing.  My sister and I were not allowed to join any of the new clubs for the ‘perfect’ German girls and we started to feel undesirable.  Sometimes boys threw stones at us, and called us ‘dirty Jews’.  It became obvious that the time had come for us to go.

And so it was that my Mother went to Berlin to arrange exit visas for us all – to join her her sister in California.

VL:  And that was in early November, 1938?

RB:  It was.  On the afternoon of the 9th of November, my sister and I had gone to Kassel for our piano lesson, and coming back on the train I noticed that the young men travelling with us were behaving – how should I put it?  In a very undesirable way.  They were very ‘loud’ … and I felt that they knew something – some terrible secret -  that I didn’t.  It was very scary – but I didn’t mention it to my sister, or anyone else.

That evening, we had no servants in the house, but our supper had been laid out for us.  As we sat at the table – my Father, my sister, and I – I looked up at one of my Mother’s precious Ming vases, perched on a small shelf – and I suddenly had a mental image of it shattered into a thousand pieces.  I thought,  “We really should  protect some of these things” – but where that thought came from, I have no idea.  My sister didn’t seem to share my unease – so again, I said nothing.

That night, just before we went upstairs to bed, my Father said:

“By the way, if you hear the doorbell ringing during the night, don’t get up to answer it.”

VL: He knew …

RB: It gave me a terrible, ominous feeling, and I so wished that my cheerful Mother was with us. I was just twelve at the time (my sister was two years older) and wanted to share my thoughts and fears with her.

I woke at 5am the next morning, with a huge sigh of relief, and I thought “Oh good, they didn’t come” – without even knowing who ‘they’ were.  But hardly had I had this thought than the doorbell rang – sounding all through the house.  It’s  a sound I shall never forget.  It was the sound of the end of all good things – and for so many years …

The next sound was of our front door being hacked to pieces – and then we heard men entering the house – storming in with their axes, destroying the furniture, smashing the glass and china and porcelain…  It was absolutely terrifying, and my sister and I jumped out of bed.  She immediately said that we should hide in our big stand-up wardrobe, but for some reason I pulled her out of it and we went instead  to our Father’s rooms.  He was just standing there, with no idea of what to do either …

I announced that I was going up to our old hiding place under the eaves, where we used to play – so I took Annette up to the little guest bedroom on the 3rd floor – where she ran to the window and just started to scream at the top of her lungs .  I dragged her back and under the roof, where we crawled on our bellies under the eaves.

From there, we could hear them looking for us.  We could hear slamming doors and voices saying, “Here!  I think they’re up here!”

But they didn’t come, and they didn’t come, and we sat there praying to God as we had never prayed before: “Please, dear God …”

Then, quiet descended – and we heard them singing rude songs about dirty Jews as they went down the hill.  We waited until silence had completely returned and then, slowly and carefully, we crept downstairs, picking our way through broken jampots in our bare feet.  When we finally got to our Father’s room, he was standing there in his white underclothes.  He said to us that he had already telegraphed our Mother in Berlin and that she would be coming back on the 8.30 train that evening.  He said that we must go around to our neighbour, Fraü Nolte – because a car was coming to pick him up in 20 minutes.  I can’t remember where they said he was being taken, but I think they said “For safety”.

He dressed, put on his hat and coat and they came and took him away.

My sister and I tried to dress – but it was hard because our bedroom had been destroyed and our stand-up wardrobe -

VL:  The one Annette wanted to hide in?

RB:  Yes.  It was lying across our beds, with axe marks in the back.  I wondered, briefly, what would have happened if we’d been inside it . . . Anyway, we went around to the Noltes’ as my Father had told us and around 11.00 in the mornng – my sister and I shivering from fear and shock – we heard a truck pull up outside and some people going into our property – to the stable where our pet lamb, Lammy, was.  We heard him bleating and ran around to our home as fast as our legs would take us, to rescue our precious sweetheart.  When we got there, they’d tied a rope around his neck and some men were dragging him into the back of the waiting truck.  We threw our arms around his little neck and screamed and pleaded, but it was no use – Lammy was dragged into the truck, and they drove off.    We were absolutely  inconsolable as we went back to the Noltes’.  We couldn’t go back to our own home because of all the broken glass and furniture, so we just had to wait it out.  I was desperate for my mother to arrive and it was a very long day for us;  the conversation was strained because we didn’t know whose side our nice neighbours were on, or whether they dared even say they were on our side – and perhaps they didn’t know themselves.

Four hours later, the same truck pulled up in front of our house and our Lammy was paraded out and back into the stable …

VL:  What?!

RB:  Yes.  And I spent most of the rest of that day lying in the sweet-smelling straw, with him, waiting for my mother to come home.  It was much later that we found out WHY they brought him back.  Apparently, we were crying so loudly that the wife of someone high up in the Nazi party heard us, found out what had happened, felt sorry for us  and told her husband that if the lamb wasn’t returned to us, there’d be hell to pay.

VL:  So back he came?  How extraordinary.  You really wouldn’t have put any money on that happening, would you?

RB:  No.  None at all …

VL: So, eventually, your Mother arrived home?

RB:  Yes, at the appointed time.  She came home with somebody who had met her off the train – and I had never seen my Mother the way she was when she got back – nor did I ever witness anything like it again.  She was an absolute powerhouse – determined, controlled, unemotional – ready to tackle anything and everything.  She was NOT going to take it lying down and she just  inspired total confidence.  The very next morning, she sprung into action …

To be continued tomorrow …

‘Blackadder goes forth’ or ‘How I learned to enjoy ‘rat au van’

It is 7 November 2009, I’m enjoying a glass of Pedro Ximinez sherry after a delightful dinner while listening to the ticking of an early trench watch (dated from 1919). I am pondering Armistice Day and today’s subject, Blackadder Goes Forth. The First World War was ‘The Great War’ and ‘The War to End All Wars’. Sadly, it was not to be and the war ended 90 years ago in 1919 when the Armistice was signed. I have always had a deep interest in the First World War as a war, in the West, of stagnation, trenches, and endless attrition. The war at sea is more fluid but not always dramatic. In the East and in Africa or the Near East, the war is more mobile and cavalry even makes an appearance.

Blackadder, of course, is a series which needs very little introduction to a British audience and, to some degree, to an American audience. We follow the comic misadventures of these men who are at the mercy of General Melchett (Stephen Fry) at the back lines. A classic scene in the first episode sees our heroes ostensibly sent forward to attack German lines while Melchett and Captain Darling (Tim McInnerny) sit, enjoying their dinner (filet mignon with sauce bearnaise) and a fine wine. Unbeknownst to them, Captain Blackadder (Rowan Atkinson), Private Baldrick (Tony Robinson), and Lieutenant George (Hugh Laurie) were pretending to be chefs (a plan concocted by Blackadder in desperation). In the background of the chicanery and the antics, we understand that the war for the man in the trenches was deeply unpleasant and that many certainly felt as if they were being sent forward with no real purpose. Indeed, one gets the impression from our historical sources that many of the generals did not seem to understand that the war was now one of attrition and that tactics from the last war would not be of service now.

We watch other attempts to get out of the trenches, as Blackadder and his men take to the skies to become one of the ‘20 minuters’. Yet, the most powerful episode is the final episode and we watch our heroes contemplate what is likely to be the end of the war for them. In an attempt to reach Berlin, they have been ordered to make a big push. The humour of the series remains but there is an edge of melancholy to it and you feel the dread of the characters as they contemplate their mortality. This is a sharp change in direction as the earlier episodes were comedic (even as Blackadder faced a firing squad) and you knew that our chaps would muddle through. Blackadder attempts to feign madness to get out of the war (wearing underpants on his head, two pencils in his nose, and he answers ‘Wibble’ to every question posed to him). Baldrick composes a war poem which, as par for the course, is not very good. The most poignant thing he contributes is a question to Blackadder on why the war began and the answer describes the political situation between the Triple Alliance and the Triple Entente and the faulty premise that two militarily strong coalitions would prevent a war, which was ‘bollocks’. The casualties of the war are brought home when George, who is enthusiastic about this big push, is asked by Blackadder how many of his friends from 1914 survived the war to this date. George has a think (a difficult task for him) and realises he is the last one of his Cambridge group still alive. Speaking from my own experiences, this reminds me of many of the plaques I saw in train stations or at Oxbridge colleges, among many other locales, which were put up in remembrance of the war dead and the many promising officers and soldiers whose lives were cut short.

Joining them is Darling, who has been sent to the front as a gift by Melchett (who seems to think that all men must want to go over the top). When he arrives in the trenches, to the surprise of the others, Darling remarks that all he wrote in his diary, after being asked how he feels, was the word ‘Bugger’. As Blackadder climbs up the ladder he notes that no one ‘…would notice another mad man around here’ and he wishes everyone luck as they go over the top. It is a sad ending with that commentary by Blackadder on the war when his attempt to escape the push failed. There is almost a reprieve as the guns fall silent and Darling smiles and looks hopeful, ‘The Great War, 1914 to 1917′ he says, before he is informed that it is merely their own guns stopping to give the Germans a sporting chance with their own artillery. They go over the top and, well, you will have to find out for yourself if you do not already know. This is no ‘All Quiet on the Western Front’ but it captures the feel of the Great War and the humour can vary from grim to just outlandish parody: a fitting way to describe the First World War at times.

Charlotte Gray by Sebastian Faulks

Commemorating Armistice Week
Having seen the film based on this book last winter, I wanted to reread the novel to compare them. The film, directed by Gillian Armstrong and starring the luminous Cate Blanchett had a haunting atmosphere, emphasized by the landscape and colors. The movie focuses on the personal stories, skimming over the airplanes and spy school details, as well as compressing relationships. It also has a much less ambiguous ending than the book.

Like his masterpiece, Birdsong, Faulks concentrates on how war affects ordinary individuals, this time World War 2. The title character is a young Scotswoman who goes to London to find work in the early years of the war. There, she falls into a brief but passionate affair with an RAF pilot, Peter Gregory. Because of her fluency in French, she is recruited by a British government agency to be a courier to the French Resistance. When Gregory is shot down in a mission over France, she decides to stay on in that country after her assignment to look for him. Lodging in the small village of Lavaurette, Charlotte continues to help the Resistance, headed by Julian Levade and also becomes involved with the hiding of 2 little Jewish boys, whose parents have been rounded up. The boys, Andre and little brother Jacob, were endearing and what happens to them is heartwrenching. Faulks surpasses himself in describing their outcome poignantly without sentimentality, which makes it all the more powerful.

The main thing I took from this second reading, was that the person you love at one point in your life may not be suitable at another.  Experiences can change a person to such a degree that their outlook and requirements demand something else from a relationship that an existing one cannot provide. It doesn’t invalidate the relationship or mean the feelings were any less deep that they appeared, it just means it doesn’t fit the mindset anymore. This was an unsettling revelation. The first time around I was tense, worrying about the characters, but since I knew what happened to them now, I looked more at the layers of interactions and what they meant.

The novel’s main theme seemed to be change, not only in the sacrifices and betrayals of war, but how it suspends ‘real life’ and prevents it from being the same once real life resumes again. It’s not often that I have a completely different experience in reading a book a second time, but with Charlotte Gray, I did. Obviously, that says something about the book, or me, or both.

Random House 1998 399 pp. ISBN 0-375-50169-X

Armistice Week on Vulpes Libris

To mark Armistice Week Vulpes Libris is running a series of five features and reviews linked by the common theme of  ‘war’ – followed on Saturday by a little light relief from the final frontier  …

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Opening the week on Monday, Jackie contemplates love and loss in wartime France in Charlotte Gray by Sebastian Faulks.

On Tuesday, we have Blackadder Goes Forth: Michael survives the Great War, 1914-1917. Wait … bugger!

On Wednesday and Thursday we are running a two-part interview with popular Vulpes guest Renate Benedict, who tells us about her remarkable parents and what happened to her and her family in Nazi Germany before, during and after Kristallnacht, November 1938.

Then, on Friday, in the last of our Armistice-themed pieces, Lisa loses herself in Libby Cone’s haunting War on the Margins.

Kirsty changes the mood completely on Saturday when she boldly goes ahead and tells us why she loves the original cast Star Trek films – and why Spock is one of the great fictional creations.

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(The striking image of Canada Bereft, from the Canadian National Vimy Memorial is courtesy of itmpa on Flickr, and reproduced under a Creative Commons licence.)

Hidden Conflict: the highs and lows of historical GLBT war fiction

I must say straight up that Bristlecone Pine Press who kindly sent me the eBook version of Hidden Conflict for review also publish two of my own books in e-format so you must judge my prejudices as best you may. I shall endeavour to be impartial. I’m also pleased to report that I read this book on my wonderful brand new Sony eReader, which I love to bits and (unlike my previous eReader from another company which shall remain nameless) is so far working like a dream, hurrah. The book is also available from Cheyenne Publishing as a paperback, however, so those of us of a more delicate persuasion do not need to panic.

Anyway, Hidden Conflict consists of four GLBT (Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual & Transgender) historical fiction novellas, where all four of the main characters are homosexual men. I’m not a huge fan of historical GLBT fiction, though I do acknowledge that there are one or two writers who do it extremely well; on the whole I prefer my heroes to be a little more contemporary. But I am a big fan of GLBT writing, so I was delighted to be asked to review this collection.

The first story, “Blessed Isle”, is by Alex Beecroft, a fact that gave me great pleasure when I saw her name as, frankly, I think that these days Beecroft can do no wrong. She’s in the top grade of those one or two good historical GLBT writers I mentioned above. Indeed I’ve already reviewed her latest novel, False Colors, on this site. Very favourably too.

“Blessed Isle” is set in the 1790s and purports to be the long-lost diary of Captain Harry Thompson who wrote his diary entries at night whilst, in the morning, his lover and former lieutenant, Garnet Littleton, would add his thoughts and commentary. Through this dialogue, we hear the story of the ill-fated voyage of the HMS Banshee, its mutiny, the escape of the two men, and ultimately, how they overcame all odds to build a life together in Rio de Janeiro. It’s an interesting premise that we already know the ending before we begin but, hey who cares, as what a fabulous beginning it is:

I look on the man sprawled face down among tangled bedclothes. The night air is sticky, almost as hot as the day. I’m sat here at the desk, sleepless from the heat, as I will be until dawn brings a breeze from the sea, the scent of tar and ships, and a faint cool. I’ll sleep then. For now, I’ll light a candle, take out this journal and write. And look at him.

It’s a typical Beecroft beginning as we’re right there, placed well and truly in the setting, with the two main characters strongly introduced, and we know exactly what’s going on. There’s something about the way Beecroft writes that draws you instantly into the centre of the frame and is at the same time very seductive. Neither does it let you go. Naturally, Beecroft’s descriptions of life at sea, the battles and the mutiny are all magnificent; with her, that really goes without saying. But I was equally impressed with the way she takes the traditional diary format and makes it into something lively and strangely interactive; the two men use it as a way of reassessing their past and how they came to be where they are now. It’s also a sharp method of contrasting their very distinctive voices – Harry being the conservative and cautious figure; and Garnet being more impulsive and recklessly courageous. After all, who else but Garnet would confront the sea-captain, Edwards, who discovers the two men in a compromising position (sodomy being a hanging offence at the time, of course) in this way (told from Harry’s viewpoint):

“We thought you might like to watch, sir,” he said.
Edwards’ disapproval flickered for a moment. Something intense went through it, fast as lightning. It looked to me a lot like panic.

Fabulous – Garnet assumes he’s going to die now anyway, so what the hell, and just cocks (as it were) that wonderful snook to it all. Great stuff. The diary format is even used as a way of revealing facts to each other that they hadn’t, for a variety of good reasons, been able to talk about directly. Clever indeed. Even their names are appropriate, with Harry being the lower class man made good, and Garnet being the more sophisticated and socially acceptable of the two.

There are however two sections where Beecroft, like the good Homer, nods. I didn’t like the overemphasis on the journal being read in the future by a society more liberal-minded about homosexual relationships. It was unnecessary and, to be honest, I don’t believe it’s the way people actually think. Or perhaps I’m just a narrow-minded, self-absorbed, sociopathic Essex Girl who doesn’t really care two hoots about what the generations to come might be like? It has been mentioned before … And I also believe that the first meeting between Harry and Garnet is ridiculously overwritten and would never, in a thousand voyages, be the way Harry would see it, let alone write it. Thankfully, Beecroft makes a magnificent recovery after that mistake, and the rest of the story is top class. I can thoroughly recommend it.

The next offering, “Not To Reason Why” by Mark R Probst, is set in 1876 and tells the story of Corporal Brett Price, who together with his married fellow soldier, Sergeant Dermot Kerrigan, is part of the 7th Cavalry following Custer into his final battle with the Sioux. The trouble with it is that I don’t think either of the characters ever comes fully alive, and their relationship, or lack of it, certainly doesn’t. What’s more, the journey towards the terrible massacre (or great rout, depending on your point of view) was really rather dull in parts. I just wanted them to get there and get on with it. Once they did, I do have to say that the battle parts were exciting and well described. However, I don’t think that the end, which introduces a whole new character, works at all in the context of what has gone before. In fact, I would have preferred to start with the actual battle, and then bring that new character in sooner, which would give Probst a chance to work up the relationship between this new man and Brett much much more. That in essence felt like the story that needed to be told, rather than the one that actually was. If you see what I mean. Still, I was impressed with the fact that quality time is given to the welfare of the horses – this strikes me as very realistic for a cavalry man, and is something that doesn’t often appear within, for instance, the gay cowboy genre of GLBT literature. The horses, after all, are hugely important to such people. I did also wonder if part of the reason for my lack of positive interest in the majority of this story was to do with the fact that, to my knowledge, Probst writes mainly in the Young Adult GLBT field, and I’m not a fan at all of children’s or YA literature (Harry Potter? Who? Never heard of him, and I’ve certainly never read him …). It may be that younger readers than I would get more out of this tale therefore.

“No Darkness” by Jordan Taylor brings us into twentieth century history and is the story of Lieutenant Darnell and Private Fisher who are trapped in a root cellar after being shelled behind the First World War trenches on the Western Front. While their lives hang in the balance, and in their increasingly desperate bids for escape, they begin to form a bond that neither expected. I very much liked the start of this one, as we’re straight into the action with Darnell being given a fool’s mission to search a house that’s already been searched countless times before:

Now most of the soldiers were standing around the barn and house, smoking and waiting for someone to tell them what to do next. They had pulled off their haversacks and unslung the rifles from their shoulders. Darnell resisted reprimanding them for this since he had left his own rifle and pack leaning against a kitchen wall of the small house. He slogged through the mud to the cellar door, standing open from a previous search. The wood of the door was warped and beginning to rot; just like everything about this abandoned farm site; just like everything about this war.

I also thought the scenes of Darnell and Fisher being trapped in the cellar, facing a long slow death and in considerable physical pain, were bleakly and powerfully described. I could feel the cold, the sense of being abandoned and the increasing desperation of both men very well:

As time passed, Darnell found the work of clearing away rubble more and more difficult, not only because of his throbbing, burning hands, but because it had now been over thirty hours since he’d eaten anything. His brain seemed frozen, as dead as his mangled hands were becoming. His head throbbed almost as hard as his hands did. His back, legs and shoulders were on fire. The muscles seemed to have reached some sort of maximum capacity he had not known they could.

In fact, I do think that the descriptions and the driving force of the escape and survival plotline are so very strong that the fairly minor scenes of the attraction between the two men are not in fact necessary. The novella would have been far stronger if just Fisher was gay, and Darnell remained distinctly straight throughout. That would have been a better story, to my mind, and more realistic. Then the emotional journey of Darnell as a straight man of his era coming to terms with the fact that Fisher is a man still worth saving in spite of his sexuality would have been interesting to explore. That said (SPOILER ALERT …), I was impressed with the fact that we do lose one of the two main characters at the end in spite of all they’ve been through by then. That was a brave decision. Still, I didn’t like the final scene that took us out of the war zone and back into civilian life – it spoilt the power of the narrative and that loss. The story should have ended earlier.

For the final novella in the collection, we have “Our One and Only” by E N Holland. Here, the focus is on the life of Philip Cormier in the aftermath of the death of his closest friend and lover, Eddie Fiske, who is killed in France during D-Day in September 1944. What’s fascinating here is how the story covers a forty year arc, told in decade-long intervals, that chronicles Philip’s slow resolution of his grief.

And I must say it started off in rather a clunky fashion with a minor character being given a viewpoint on the day Eddie is killed – a character whose viewpoint we never get again. It would have been much stronger simply to have started with Philip. He is where the story lies. Neither was I very impressed with the glimpse we get at an early stage of how things were between Philip and Eddie before Eddie went to war – the love scenes here are somehow rather bland and strangely distancing.

So far so disappointing. But, my goodness, Holland then takes my assumptions by the scruff of their neck and shakes them up in ways I’d never expected at all. It’s a gripping and unusual choice to tell the story of a love affair after one of the participants is dead and, as I mention above, over a period of forty years in the life of Philip. I actually found myself slowly falling in love with Philip and looking forward to seeing what he was up to every ten years or so, almost as if he was a personal friend who lived abroad. Which was a very strange feeling indeed. His interactions with Eddie’s mother and family are both moving and realistically described, and I did enjoy watching the shifting relationships as time went by.

I also appreciated the way significant moments of remembrance are not sugar-coated. Here’s Philip at the end of a conversation with a high-ranking army officer who asks who he is at a memorial service in 1954:

“I’m Philip Cormier,” Philip said simply.
“PFC Fiske’s brother…relative…?”
“Friend,” Philip said shortly. “Close family friend.”
“Ah,” he said, nodding. “Well, thank you for coming. I hope to see you at the Mayflower. Of course, Mr. Cormier, you are invited too.”
He turned and left, Philip watching his broad shoulders as he walked away from them. He realized he had never felt so invisible in his life.

The terrible issue of the official lack of acknowledgement of an unacceptable partner to a dead war hero is subtly put here, I think. In addition, when Philip finally gets to see Eddie’s grave in the 1980s, I thought the first visit to the war cemetery was very powerful, as it is not seen in soft-focus in any way. Not only does Philip and the woman friend he is with, Phyllis, have to put up with some hugely irritating official interference, but his reactions when he’s finally able to get to Eddie’s grave are not what he expected at all:

“Why did you leave me?” he asked softly. “Why did you go and get yourself killed?” Another deep breath. His throat felt tight. “You could’ve let that officer get shot instead, you know. Why did you have to be a hero? I never wanted a hero …”
He felt a rush of hot anger in his chest and his hand tightened into a fist, as if to hit some invisible opponent.

In fact Philip is so angry with Eddie, after forty years of not being so, that he has to leave and it’s only on his second visit on the following day that some kind of closure begins to be reached. I have to admit that I did find these scenes very moving, and realistic – especially in terms of the emotions of graveside visits never being those one imagined one would have.

The tracking of the love affair between Eddie and Philip was also cleverly brought into full clarity in these final sections, with Phyllis acting as a listening ear for how the two men really began and experienced their relationship. It was interesting that Eddie suddenly came into much clearer view at this point, in a way that he never had earlier in the story. Which supports my opinion that we don’t need the scenes between Eddie and Philip that didn’t work at the start. Sometimes less is more, and it’s worthwhile making the reader wait.

I also thought that the brief sex scene between Philip and the male hooker in the hotel is particularly worthy of mention. Powerful and ultimately bleak indeed. Finally I must also say that there’s a very good twist at the end of this story, which in this case, unlike in the previous two novellas, worked beautifully and had me punching my fist in the air and shouting Yes! Which certainly startled my husband, for one. Good for Philip is what I say.

So, in conclusion, Hidden Conflict is perhaps something of a mixed bag offering in the historical GLBT genre, but nonetheless the jewel of Beecroft’s story and the surprising slow-burn power of Holland’s are both well worth the price of battle.

Hidden Conflict, by Various (Cheyenne Publishing (paperback) & Bristlecone Pine Press (eBook), 2009), ISBN: 978-1-60722-009-1

[Anne writes and reads in the GLBT fiction genre with enthusiasm, but thinks the present is difficult enough without worrying about the past too. To catch up with some rather more contemporary angst-ridden gay men, please click here.]

Medina Hill by Trilby Kent

In the interests of a totally transparent review, I’m stating up-front that Trilby is a fellow Bookfox.  I’m also going to admit that I read a very early draft of Medina Hill a long while ago, although as in all early drafts the book is much changed now.

Whew… now that’s done, I can get on with sharing my love of Medina Hill.

This is a very different book to the ones I’ve been reviewing recently.  It’s been all werewolves and vampires and teen angsty stuff and I’m not really sure how that’s happened.  It certainly hasn’t been deliberate.  At the moment the marketplace is flooded with all these black and red covered teen romance novels, some of which I love, some I… well… don’t! So,when the opportunity arose to read something completely different, I jumped at the chance and was enchanted.

Medina Hill is set in 1935. Eleven year-old Dominic Walker has lost the power of speech, his mother is ill and his father has no job. Lively, oddball Uncle Roo arrives in the midst of this downtrodden family and whisks Dominic and his young sister, Marlo to Cornwall. There, Uncle Roo and his wife run a boarding house full of lovable, eccentric residents. Dominic, discovers a book called Incredible Adventures for Boys: Colonel Lawrence and the Revolt in the Desert, and his sister, Marlo, discovers a love of cooking. During the summer months the pair find a way of life completely removed from the hardships and stresses they faced in London. Dominic becomes obsessed with Lawrence of Arabia and he gets caught up in a village war against a band of travellers after silently befriending Sancha, a one legged gypsy girl.  When Dominic eventually finds his voice he discovers that it not only sets him free but it has far reaching repercussions.

Medina Hill is a superbly written historical novel for middle grade readers.  It’s marketed for teens, however I think it would appeal to readers 10 years and older. Think Michael Morpurgo or Enid Blyton-esque adventures. It’s an old fashioned tale but the concepts and ideas resonate well with children of today.  It’s about friendship, loyalty and sticking up for what you believe in.  All relevant lessons for our youngsters.  The characters in Medina Hill are absolutely wonderful, they leap off the page and I was just slightly disappointed the book wasn’t longer so we could get to know them all a bit better.  But then, I am a nosy grown-up and I do think the length was probably perfect for children.  One of the things that especially stood out for me reading Medina Hill was that it’s a book that involves every sense.  I could smell the Cornish countryside, hear the wildlife and when Marlo is on a cooking frenzy and bakes every single recipe in her book, I could taste her delicious creations…

Everything was coated with flour – even my sister. Pots, pans, and mixing bowls were piled up in the sink; breadboards, whisks, rolling pins, and labels were strewn across the counters: and on the refectory table, dozens of plates displayed a multitude of treats the likes of which I had never seen before.

“Those are blackberry tarts, next to the fairy cakes… and those are coffee biscuits, with rosebud madelines. Those are just boring old blueberry muffins,” explained Marlo, with surprising authority.

“And that?”

“What, the apricot flan? Or the butterscotch cake?”

“That one,” I pointed.

“Chestnut galette.  And chocolate loaf, lemon gateau, rubarb crumble, spice cakes… treacle duff, tipsy cake… plum pudding, cinnamon buns…” Marlo raised a finger thoughtfully to her lips, frowning. “The gooseberry clafoutis doesn’t quite look like the picture.  Or the Maderia cake.”

“Is that a Victoria sponge?”

“Mm.”

“What about that one with the cream?”

“Peach cream pie. Or these? They’re called profiteroles. That’s rosemary shortbread.”

“And trifle?”

“Raspberry,” nodded Marlo.

It was truly a majestic medley, each and every item turned out in its Sunday best.

… okay, who’s hungry now??

Medina Hill is a glorious read, full of warmth and extraordinary, vibrant characters. After picking it up, I didn’t put it down until it was finished.  If you’re looking for a book with a compelling story to give your children or grandchildren this Christmas, then look no further.  It’s all here… and it makes a refreshing change from books with black covers.

Medina Hill by Trilby Kent. Published by Tundra Books.  ISBN: 9780887768880.

The Firemaster’s Mistress by Christie Dickason

Celebrating Guy Fawkes Night
In America, Nov. 5th is just another day. That’s why I was partway through this book before realizing it was about the events leading up to what the British celebrate with bonfires. To be fair, though, Guy Fawkes is a secondary character who rarely appears.
Set in the London of  1605, at the beginning of James I’s reign, the story centers on Francis Quoynt, his father “Boomer” and Kate Peach, his former lover. Quoynt, a fifth generation ‘firemaster’ (or explosive expert) has returned from soldiering on the Continent. After a mysterious warehouse explosion, Quoynt is hired by Robert Cecil, the Secretary of State, to look into it and other suspicious activities. In doing so, he infiltrates a group that includes Fawkes and reluctantly agrees to make 40 barrels of gun powder for them.
In an atmosphere of religious persecution, where simply wearing a crucifix can get a person arrested, there’s a lot of suspense in this novel, especially since all is not as it seems. The story shifts from Kate to Quoynt and back again as the lovers reconnect and drift apart. Instead of ending the book with Fawkes plot thwarted and arrests made, Quoynt wanders aimlessly around London trying to hear news of the culprits, before returning home to a surprising conclusion.
It was a satisfying mystery and I found the historical aspects realistic. Though there was some famous characters such as Sir Francis Bacon, it concentrated on the ordinary people. The details of gun powder making and a fireworks display was fascinating, the book is well worth reading for those descriptions alone. So if you appreciate a good suspense novel or intriguing historical fiction, pull this one off the shelf.

Harper 2008    544 pp.   ISBN 970-0-06-156826

Red Dust by Ma Jian

Review by Sam Ruddock

The essence of good travel writing lies in duality: in the balance between the external journey through a physical landscape and the personal journey which takes place alongside it. It is not enough simply to travel through a country meeting people and visiting places, then recounting anecdotes so as to shed light on the nature and culture of that society. To do so is to forever remain an outsider looking in. Rather the best travel writing interrelates the landscapes, cultures and people to the parallel emotional journey of the writer so that the terrain of one moulds, shifts, and reacts with that of the other.

So it is with Red Dust, a book subtitled ‘A Path Through China’ but as much a tale of Ma Jian’s quest to find himself as an artist and a man as anything else. Because of this, his panoramic, three year tour of China provides a wonderful insight into the nature of that vast country and the people who live there. Through it all, from the emotional highs and moments of tranquillity surrounded by outstanding natural beauty to the lonely lows, near death experiences and horrendous acts of barbarism, he retains a clear perspective and reports what he sees and feels in a remarkably impartial manner. He is honest about his faults and those of his country, unapologetic about their successes. His is a search for answers to three specific questions: who is Ma Jian? what is China? And how do they relate to each other.

It all begins in 1983 as Ma turns thirty. Recently divorced, his ex-wife is now seeking custody of their daughter; his current girlfriend is sleeping with another man. By day he works in the Foreign Propaganda Department in Beijing, photographing the country in order to create books of images which will be presented to foreign diplomats. At night he moves in an artistic milieu of painters and poets whose gatherings have to take place quietly under cover of darkness to avoid detection by the police. These gatherings consist of lots of impotent jokes – a kid asks his dad, “Dad, why do we have a picture of Chairman Mao but no picture of the Communist Party?” And his dad says, “Because the Communist Party isn’t human” –poetry recitals, camaraderie, and life drawing exercises. All of which means that despite his best efforts Ma is very much on the state radar. With his long hair, gregarious lifestyle and denim jeans he does not fit the standards expected of a healthy young socialist. Economic development may be beginning to open up the country but with the newly launched Campaign Against Spiritual Pollution he can feel the authorities breathing down his neck.

Everything is starting to change. China feels like an old tin of beans that having lain in the dark for forty years, is beginning to burst at the seems…Six years have passed since the death of Mao Zedong and the end of the cultural revolution. Deng Xiaoping is back in power, calling for ‘Four Modernisations’, private enterprise and foreign investment. He has liberated the economy, but continues to clamp down on all forms of dissent. When the activist Wei Jingsheng said the Four Modernisations were meaningless without the Fifth – democracy – he was arrested, put on trial and sentenced to fifteen years in jail.

Despite artistic promise he does not have the political astuteness that is required of someone in his line of work. He causes a furore when failing to notice a patch of flaking paint in the foreground of a photo of Yangzi Bridge in Nanjing. He receives a heated ticking off when he chooses a yellow font on the front cover of a magazine. “You are trying to suggest that we are a federation of pornographic trade unions!” exclaims the irate section head of his work unit. It is all told with straight faced satire, an absurd situation which would be hilarious if it wasn’t so terrible.

Creatively stagnant, restless, and fearing arrest any day, he resigns his job and spends most of his money on a train ticket to the westernmost border of China. It is a journey which requires some forgery but which would have been near impossible only a few years earlier. And so begins his three year shoestring budget, 13,000mile plus tour of China. He survives thanks to the kindness of those he meets, and by making a bit of money by selling short stories and poems, or doing odd jobs in cities he passes through. Much of the time he walks vast distances alone. Sometimes he goes days without eating, or months without washing. He is absurdly ill-prepared for the journeys he takes, and seems unwilling to learn that it is not wise to set off across a desert at night with only a compass, small back pack and a couple of bottles of water. He treats his escapades with almost flippant disregard, yet his survival instinct and slippery loner tendencies demonstrate a man of rare tenacity. He is a man existing for existences sake, travelling for the sake of travelling, searching for himself everywhere he goes without a plan of where to go next. He is an engaging, amazing, enthralling character.

Most travelogues are written by foreigners travelling the country with a purpose in mind, usually to uncover the hidden heart of a place so as to advance understanding of it. It is so refreshing to view China from the inside, from a native who has spent their whole life there and yet still finds shocks and surprises on an almost daily basis. Ma Jian has the cultural understanding of a native but the wide eyed amazement of an outsider: he is both. He gives us an insight into how an educated Han is perceived in different areas of the country, from indigenous tribes of the Burmese border to the intellectuals he meets along the way. And because he is travelling in a country where people do not travel, he remains perpetually on the outside of life, viewed with amazement, welcome and distrust wherever he goes.

It is not a criticism per se, but it is his footloose approach to his travels which I found most difficult about Red Dust. It is not the most purposeful of books to read, there is no narrative arc or sense of where it is going at all. While it is subtitled ‘A Path Through China’ Red Dust would perhaps be better conceived as ‘Paths around and around China.’ It sat by my bedside for almost a month as I read five or ten pages per night before bed without ever becoming fully engaged. It reads as an endless series of encounters set within a greater spiritual journey but which has no discernable sense of progress. He is in search of Buddhist enlightenment and dreams of travelling to Tibet but never seems to make much effort to get there. His wanderings are captured in an anecdote he recounts when visiting a village in remote South Western China. There they tell him about an American pilot who landed there in the 1940s and was kept as a slave by the local tribe for 9 years before finally escaping and going home.

The American pilot was able to stay here all those years because he had a goal in life: he wanted to go home. I have no such goal, so I must keep walking.

So it is. The lack of purpose is the greatest strength and most awkward weakness of this fascinating, though not always easy to read, book. There is an occasional tension between past and present tenses which irritated me and provided another barrier to a smooth reading experience. But in the end, he does learn something of himself. At last, after nearly three years of travelling and an enthrallingly terrifying journey through the borderlands of Burma he reaches Tibet. There he seeks Buddhist enlightenment only to find disappointment. Buddhism, he concludes, cannot solve the problems of man. “From now on I will hold to no faith. I can only strive to save myself. Man is beyond salvation.” The answers he has sought throughout his travels do not exist. It is the most enthralling, poignant and rewarding part of the book. It rectifies any flaws in the structure and leaves you with a cathartic sense of culmination, or the start of a new passage in his life. His journey has come full circle. The answer to the great myth of life has taken the form of another question. And all he can do is hope.

In the middle of the night I lie awake on the metal bed under two thin quilts, shivering with cold. A wind howls through the rain and snow outside. This stinking body no longer belongs to me, my mind is as empty as a plastic bag caught in the high wind. Suddenly, I think of Beijing, and realise that although it is crammed with police, at least there is a bed and pillow waiting for me there. I came to Tibet hoping to find answers to all my unasked questions, but I have discovered that even when the questions are clear, there are no clear answers. I am sick of travelling. I need to hold onto something familiar, even if it is just a tea cup. I cannot survive in the wilds – nature is infinite but my life has bounds. I need to live in big cities that have hospitals, bookshops and women. I left Beijing because I wanted to be alone and to forge my own path, but I know now that no path is solitary, we all tread across other people’s beginnings and ends. I have stopped here, not because the Himalayas stand in the way, but because my inward journey has reached its end. In fact, we all tread a path – the gold-digger, the coil-remover, Myima who left her turquoise behind and rose to the sky. We are just travelling in different directions, that’s all.

Vintage.  2002.  ISBN-13: 978-0099283294.  336pp.

Sam is a former bookseller who now works for Writers’ Centre Norwich where he helps promote, develop, and explore the artistic and social power of creative writing.  As well as writing a popular monthly review for Vulpes Libris, he also has his own blog,  Books, Time and Silence.

The Glorious Day: In Conversation with Stephen Greif

Comrades!  Today Bookfox Kirsty is joined by an honoured guest indeed:  actor Stephen Greif.

Stephen is a familiar face (and voice) to generations of TV viewers, cinema fans, theatre goers and audio book listeners.  His screen credits range from Citizen Smith and Blake’s 7 through Eastenders and Holby City to Casanova and Boogie Woogie.  On stage, he has most recently appeared in Epitaph for George Dillon and Fallen Angels.  No prizes for guessing what Kirsty wants to talk about first…

KM:  Maybe I could start by asking: did you enjoy working on Citizen Smith?

SG:  The short response is that I wanted to enjoy myself; and to qualify that fast food answer let me relate the circumstances that led me to do it on and off for three seasons and nearly a fourth.

During the spring and summer of 1977 I’d spent two gruelling months in Corsica and London filming five episodes of Treasure Island for the BBC, immediately followed by two more weeks in Elstree Studios and on location on an episode of Return of the Saint and then straight into four episodes of the first of the Armchair Thriller series for Thames playing the leading role in  Rachel in Danger. A schedule that required me almost every day for about six weeks on location and in the studio.   I was punch drunk by the end of it all, and when I was offered a friend’s mother’s house in Cornwall for a week’s rest I jumped straight into my car and  drove off down to Flushing.    Driving through St. Just in Roseland, where I had often stayed, I saw the familiar red telephone box ahead of me that seemed to pulsate a signal to my shredded brain to step inside it and phone my agent.  That  inexplicable but compelling summons had to be surrendered to, so I swiftly pulled over and made the call.   Before I had any chance to fob off a feeble excuse for ringing them (just wanted you to know I’ve nearly arrived safely, as if they cared, or some such infantilism) Barry, my agent, said excitedly: “Stephen, thank god you’ve called. The BBC want to see you tomorrow at noon for a regular part in a new sitcom directed and produced by the legendary Denis Main Wilson  (he  discovered Tony Hancock).  It’s four episodes plus a possible Christmas Special.”   “Christmas Special”:  those words  sparkled like the tinsel that I imagined would adorn the opening credits. “ Oh bollocks… I mean,   tell ‘em I’ll be there. By the way, when does it start ?”  “In four days, and it’s location filming first on Barnes Common. They’ll give us a Yes or No after the meet.”

On the stroke of noon the following day I walked into Denis’s office on the fourth floor of White City Centre.   He was famous for having his office appointed opposite the BBC  Club, most likely due to his urgent passion for regularly checking the quality of alcohol was of a high enough  standard.  I was knocked out by his energetic and old English almost military style of welcome and warmth, and together with knowing that he’d discovered  one of my heroes, Tony Hancock, I was already pretty well disposed to a project I knew nothing about.  I was introduced to the shy, rather plump young scriptwriter, called John Sullivan, and my part was outlined as a shady but expansive pub owner called Harry Fenning,  who had two permanent body guards and who delighted in terrorising the Tooting Popular front leader Wolfie Smith and his cohorts in any way he could.   A pilot had previously been made and,as a result, a series of 7 or 8 episodes greenlit by Billy Cotton Jr. and Head of Comedy John Howard Davies.    Robert Lindsay , Mike Grady, Tony Millan and Cheryl Hall (Robert’s real life wife) were signed, as were Peter Vaughan and Hilda Braid as Cheryl’s parents.  I was a huge admirer of Peter’s and also had worked with Cheryl years earlier on the movie of No Sex please , we’re British.   In fact I later heard that it was Cheryl who had suggested me for Harry by waving my Spotlight picture in front of Denis and John saying “Him ! Its him you want ! Him !”  God bless her.  I love her.  It sounded fun, and I  felt that the abandonment of my holiday for the chance of doing this was worth the risk.   I didn’t have to wait too long.  – a glance from Denis to John and back again was Denis’s cue to offer me the part if I liked the scripts, which they gave me there and then to read in an outer office. I laughed a lot at this odd medley of characters in bizarre situations, and a few days later pitched up on Barnes Common to do the first filming day, which consisted of yelling at Wolfie and co out of a van window where they, it is revealed by way of a slow camera pullback,  are towing my van by hand along a main road.  Madness.

A memory I have of that day’s filming was of the manic singlemindedness of Robert, Michael and Tony to try and extract as much out of these short moments as possible. There were no laughs that day…  comedy being a serious business don’t you know!   I wasn’t comfortable with it . I had had no time to nail the character of Fenning and his interaction with the other characters, who had at least had some period to get to know each other.  I yelled over and over again as Denis asked,  but it was acting by rote and  in at the deep end with concrete shoes and blinkers. Now… I  do realise that  I’m  looking at this a little too “seriously”,  but what kind of man harnesses three kids to a van and terrorises them into hauling it along a  main road ?  I was put in mind of “Mad” Frankie Fraser and Ronnie Kray, whom I’d met, but these guys were far too gritty and real for a sitcom;  also I came to see that there was something about Harry that careered between villainous charm and light hearted silliness … even naivety .  I recalled a large actor in a comedy thriller that I saw when I was a kid whose voice and manner suggested these characteristics.  Deep toned and sinister looking, but at the same time childlike at times, and that seemed to me, rightly or wrongly, to be a base to work from…

KM:  Your description of Harry makes perfect sense to me, because that is very much how I perceive him and it is undoubtedly what makes him such a fascinating character in my eyes.  Did you feel that this dichotomy between villain and comic relief was a problematic aspect in the writing, something you had to overcome in your performance?  In other words, to what extent do you feel Harry Fenning was a creation of Stephen Greif, the actor, as opposed to John Sullivan, the writer?

SG:  Yes… The Villain /Comic relief aspect was hard to balance . I hadn’t done much sitcom, and certainly not a recurring character, so my focus, as always, was on making the part believable.  The absurd situations that John Sullivan had contrived for the Harry/ Wolfie relationship were challenging .

Harry was not written with any actor in mind, so inevitably whoever played him would bring their own personality to the mix. I guess I was cast because of my vocal and physical difference to the Tooting popular front.  My way of dealing with the situations John put Harry in was to have Harry “toy” with Wolfie as a kind of amusing avuncular distraction to his other more alleged serious activities, and as a consequence Wolfie,  through guile, would befuddle the big bad bear by slipping alcohol in his honey.    BTW… I loved calling Wolfie “What a wally!” and so incidentally did Robert.  It always made us chuckle. Even on the take.

When Denis stopped  directing and Ray Butt took over, he wanted Harry played  more realistically.. Less flashy clothes and more down to earth. Ray later produced sterling work on Only Fools and Horses, but I was fiercely loyal to Denis’ approval of the way Harry was played and disinclined, perhaps even unable, to make the switch.  The BBC were very upset with me for not doing the fourth series after having sent me, I blush to say, eulogistic letters from John Howard Davies and Denis to try and get me to change my mind .  I was adamant.  I’d had enough and I didn’t work for them again for two years.

KM:  Of course, by the time you were cast as Harry Fenning you already had quite a pedigree in TV and film.  Dixon of Dock Green, Treasure Island, Play for Today, the first of the Armchair Thriller and Killers series; and of course the famous Blake’s 7 was filmed in the same period as Citizen Smith…  I have to admit to being a Blake’s 7 newbie as I only recently saw any of it, in preparation for this interview, but I am hooked!  To steal a line from my fellow Fox, Moira, do you feel that Blake’s 7 helped your career or hindered it?  And do you ever get sick of people talking about it?