Skip to main content

Here are many voices

  






Here are many voices. Each one silent

though full of words, waiting to be woken.

I recognise these names and titles.

Many are friends from long ago, beside

the newly arrived and unacquainted –

quite a few I’ll never know.

 

Nothing so patient as the unread book

ready to unlock its store of story –

eager description, gentle reflection,

anger, sadness, earnest instruction.

Some urging laughter. Others just trying

to make you cry – sealed up and silent

 

as I draw near I hear in my head

this voice of mine talking in various accents.

My index finger touching the bindings

can open up, unlock, unmute – set free

stories and thoughts packed tidy and tight

waiting like goods in a hold.

 

There they remain, heavily freighted

with authorial intention, their burdens

of words bound up and silent, unless another

with finger and voice releases those words

giving them sound. Until then, inside their covers

they wait, weighted with so much to say.

 

 

 

Isn’t it hard to get rid of books – old friends, reminding you of where you were, what you enjoyed, who you were with and, well, who you were – perhaps even are now?

Text books are a bit easier, containing stuff that’s no longer useful – probably out of date now, but they too represent part of one’s past, one’s old identity – each being companions in their own way, with whom you sweated and teared, if not bled. So, several of mine have survived – no longer read or even opened, but still there on the shelves, destined to share my own oblivion when it arrives.

So eloquent are books, we think, that a visit – or a zoom, when perhaps the stage has been set quite self-consciously – to someone’s work area has us craning to read the titles…

(sometimes you don’t even need to read the words on the spine – the books are instantly recognisable by their colourway and font, like the paperback Fabers of the Alexandria Quartet. But of course that tells you as much about me, as them)

 … so that we can draw conclusions/confirm opinions/ write off the observed, through their books.

But there’s more to this story than all this, since many books have come down to us – inherited, like genes. And we for our part will pass them on to our children.

Just look at these Beatrix Potters for example.

 


 

Some were given to me when I was little, some are even older; I read them to our children, and grandchildren.  They will go on.  And probably, on and on.

 

And my Observer books, which I collected, or was given, or (I confess) pinched from brothers. Several are duplicated, as you can see; it’s not a proper collection at all, but I can’t help feeling warmly towards those little 5/- books.

 


As for my father’s Encyclopedia…

 


How well my brothers and I recall the titles of the ten volumes, starting with A – Banjo and ending with Tanks – Zymotic Diseases, via Freebench – Hythe (nor am I too sure of the significance of either of those).

 


Passed to me, never used to find information but occasionally dipped into like a family photo album, to react sometimes with amusement, other times with a shudder at the imperial militarism – can I, should I, discard them?  And how, as for certain my friend the bookdealer won’t give me anything but a wry smile?

 


So there they all are, and remain for the time being – that run of Dorothy Dunnetts which came from my wife’s mother, my grandfather’s Modern Pig-Sticking by Major Wardrop, my own Hilary Mantels, perhaps destined themselves eventually to become Dunnetts – enough for now, all those books, all those voices…

 

 

 


Comments

  1. Thank you Richard. So much to agree with there and so beautifully said. I love the photos. And please may I borrow Modern Pig-Sticking?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Beautiful, I truly enjoyed this one. I too can't make myself get rid of my father's old books, although some are in Hungarian which I don't quite understand. They feel far too precious because of who owned them before me!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

We were all together there in a foretime

    I find myself attracted to certain words, and here’s one.  Not a word often heard in modern speech, but perfectly proper and well-used since at least the sixteenth century. I came across it in Seamus Heaney’s Section 3 of Keeping Going in his phrase – We were all together there in a foretime. I imagined hearing in my mind’s ear his attractive rich voice rolling it out.   Foretime. Not just, or simply, the past, but a   foretime . (Interesting, that 'a'.  Not 'the', but 'a'). Fore , from before, so it is of course the past, but with a slightly different twist – an added dimension arising from the other words which use fore, as in forecast, foretell or even forehead, when it somehow also looks ahead, to the future… what lies before us? Foretime, Aftertime… be all that as it may, we’ve been here before, it affected us all then, it’s doing the same now and it’s threatening to overwhelm us in the future.   We were all together there in a for

The Signpost

Here’s a signpost – originally distinctive, being unique and handmade, and now even more so, with the evidence of ageing.   … numbers, distances, which way? While all signposts are interesting in their duty to inform, their presentation of choices and their simple declarative presence, I find this one special. It’s not just that it has much to say in terms of where you actually are, in which direction you might choose to go, how far your destination is (down to quarter mile accuracy) and even if your chosen method of transport is suitable. It’s also special in the simple elegance of its design, with the arms’ supports and the bevelled edges of the main post rising to that unexpected point. But the specialness goes further.  My friend James Ravilious took me there just at this time of year, over twenty years ago.  It was then upright and brilliant white, with crisp black letters. He certainly thought it was special, photographing it lovingly, in May 1988 ( Chawleigh Week Cross –

The Three Hares

  The Three Hares We continue on our way running, running, running around held together tip to tip so I can hear what she can hear as well as her. And the other follows me in front of her – we are joined up by our ears so we follow, lead and follow running, running, running around we continue on our way. Running, running, running around – no cause for worry – what's to come has already been. The future's past – watch us here – we're going nowhere – the last is first and first is last. Our present moment sees us still although we seem to race – running, running, running around we continue. On our way running, running, running around hearing your persistent questions – why do you keep on asking? We cannot tell you any more. May you share your senses and find soft silence at your centre which is so close, while you go on running, running, running around. The turning of the year, with the various thoughts about the past and the future that c