The Rubaiyat is an allegory.’
‘Oh, poet, is he?’ Munnings was pleased. ‘Landlord, fill the young gentlemen’s pots, there’s a good chap, thank you, and do
draw yourself another, and then the young gentlemen can recite for us some of Omar by Edward Whoever and I must say I’m looking
forward to hearing a bit of great poetry by a great poet, even if he is a Persian.’
Munnings settled himself down as an overattentive audience would, and his overattentive pause and the panic it created all
around him was quite delightful.
‘I’m … we’ve …’ began the pale one. ‘I’m afraid we haven’t brought a copy of his work.’
A.J. forgivingly spread his hands, as if he would be the very last person in the world to criticise anyone for that.
‘Doesn’t matter, does it, just recite me some, give me what you might call a taster of old Omar. In English. Or Persian, if
you prefer.’
At this, they looked cornered and went into a whispering huddle. For his part, A.J. patiently waited a while and then said:
‘But if it’s great stuff you can, surely? No? You can’t? Ah well. Does it rhyme? Can’t stand stuff that doesn’t!’
The remark about rhyme somewhat released the pressureon them and they reverted to their lighter tones; they may well have been unable to remember a line of poetry in English or
Persian but at the very least they could all be critics.
‘Well, that’s rather bad luck on
Paradise Lost
,’ said the ginger-haired one.
‘And a bit of a pity about Shakespeare’s plays,’ said the pale one.
And these supposed put-downs led to some Oxford chortling.
‘Good stuff, rhyme,’ A.J. reasserted, ‘rhyme is the thing.’
While the landlord placed out another round of drinks there was something of a lull in which A.J. wiped off their ironic smiles
by reciting the first fifty-two lines of Gray’s
Elegy
, and before the pale one could say Gosh that is actually quite something of a feat I must say, A.J. followed it up by giving
them his favourite passages of prose, verbatim, from Surtees, and standing (ale in hand) with his back to the fire and with
the landlord’s mouth agape, he finished ‘By way of a finale’ with a handsome swathe of
Hiawatha
,
‘By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow,’ he added, with a patronising smile, ‘and he’s a fucking good poet too. From Portland, Maine,
not Persia.’
They all ended the evening in tremendous fettle, all singing together, arms around each other’s shoulders, before A.J. (by
way of payment) covered the black blinds in the bar with some chalk drawings of horses and young people drinking and the three
young people in the drawings all had muzzy faces very like their own and were depicted toppling backwards in their chairs
towards the floor, laughing as they fell, and they all loved that, and they all thought him one helluva fellow.
A.J. saluted them at the door before taking his big-stepping horse home very slowly to Lamorna.
‘Call me a sentimental sod, but all in all,’ he said to Grey Tick, stroking his horse’s powerful neck, ‘not too bad a day,
Tick. All in all, eh?’
Botticelli’s Venus
Before she left her London home for Lamorna, Florence Carter-Wood went into her father’s library, stretched right up on tiptoe
and took down their large, leather-bound Atlas of Great Britain. She opened it out on her knees and sat very upright – it
was a habit of hers to sit very still and very upright, a habit which immediately attracted Gilbert Evans, was noted by Harold
Knight and copied, as the days went by, by Dolly – with the landscape of England beneath her hands. She turned and stroked
each page, sliding her fingers over the western counties.
The West. The western counties felt so far away they might as well have been the Bahamas. Florence had, it is true, already
travelled a good deal, but as far back as she could remember it had always been the same journey: from London to Carlisle
and from
‘Oh, poet, is he?’ Munnings was pleased. ‘Landlord, fill the young gentlemen’s pots, there’s a good chap, thank you, and do
draw yourself another, and then the young gentlemen can recite for us some of Omar by Edward Whoever and I must say I’m looking
forward to hearing a bit of great poetry by a great poet, even if he is a Persian.’
Munnings settled himself down as an overattentive audience would, and his overattentive pause and the panic it created all
around him was quite delightful.
‘I’m … we’ve …’ began the pale one. ‘I’m afraid we haven’t brought a copy of his work.’
A.J. forgivingly spread his hands, as if he would be the very last person in the world to criticise anyone for that.
‘Doesn’t matter, does it, just recite me some, give me what you might call a taster of old Omar. In English. Or Persian, if
you prefer.’
At this, they looked cornered and went into a whispering huddle. For his part, A.J. patiently waited a while and then said:
‘But if it’s great stuff you can, surely? No? You can’t? Ah well. Does it rhyme? Can’t stand stuff that doesn’t!’
The remark about rhyme somewhat released the pressureon them and they reverted to their lighter tones; they may well have been unable to remember a line of poetry in English or
Persian but at the very least they could all be critics.
‘Well, that’s rather bad luck on
Paradise Lost
,’ said the ginger-haired one.
‘And a bit of a pity about Shakespeare’s plays,’ said the pale one.
And these supposed put-downs led to some Oxford chortling.
‘Good stuff, rhyme,’ A.J. reasserted, ‘rhyme is the thing.’
While the landlord placed out another round of drinks there was something of a lull in which A.J. wiped off their ironic smiles
by reciting the first fifty-two lines of Gray’s
Elegy
, and before the pale one could say Gosh that is actually quite something of a feat I must say, A.J. followed it up by giving
them his favourite passages of prose, verbatim, from Surtees, and standing (ale in hand) with his back to the fire and with
the landlord’s mouth agape, he finished ‘By way of a finale’ with a handsome swathe of
Hiawatha
,
‘By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow,’ he added, with a patronising smile, ‘and he’s a fucking good poet too. From Portland, Maine,
not Persia.’
They all ended the evening in tremendous fettle, all singing together, arms around each other’s shoulders, before A.J. (by
way of payment) covered the black blinds in the bar with some chalk drawings of horses and young people drinking and the three
young people in the drawings all had muzzy faces very like their own and were depicted toppling backwards in their chairs
towards the floor, laughing as they fell, and they all loved that, and they all thought him one helluva fellow.
A.J. saluted them at the door before taking his big-stepping horse home very slowly to Lamorna.
‘Call me a sentimental sod, but all in all,’ he said to Grey Tick, stroking his horse’s powerful neck, ‘not too bad a day,
Tick. All in all, eh?’
Botticelli’s Venus
Before she left her London home for Lamorna, Florence Carter-Wood went into her father’s library, stretched right up on tiptoe
and took down their large, leather-bound Atlas of Great Britain. She opened it out on her knees and sat very upright – it
was a habit of hers to sit very still and very upright, a habit which immediately attracted Gilbert Evans, was noted by Harold
Knight and copied, as the days went by, by Dolly – with the landscape of England beneath her hands. She turned and stroked
each page, sliding her fingers over the western counties.
The West. The western counties felt so far away they might as well have been the Bahamas. Florence had, it is true, already
travelled a good deal, but as far back as she could remember it had always been the same journey: from London to Carlisle
and from
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