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Jennifer Jones comes to Wenlock

It’s hard to imagine, but in 1949 Hollywood descended on my little home town of Much Wenlock. Both its locations and inhabitants featured in David O. Selznick’s screen version of Mary Webb’s 1917 novel, Gone to Earth. The film’s star, Oscar-winner Jennifer Jones, certainly looks the part, and in this respect she well conjures the book’s central character, the untamed but doomed spirit that is Shropshire lass, Hazel Woodus.

As an American, Jones of course had to receive specialist drilling in the Shropshire dialect, a form of speech which these days is scarcely heard, but would have been the norm during Webb’s childhood. She writes it very clearly in the book’s dialogue, and Jones makes a good stab at it, but it perhaps sounds overdone to modern ears. People in England do not speak like this any more.

Mary Webb herself spent her adolescence in Much Wenlock, and for the rest of her too-short life lived in various parts of rural Shropshire. She knew country ways intimately. Her writing is rooted always in the landscapes of her own growing up – the upland wilds and rugged long-gone lead-mining and peasant farming communities, the small market towns. But although she observes the hardship and poverty with a keen eye, she has tended to be dismissed as a writer of the romantic and rustic, her work parodied in Stella Gibbons’ Cold Comfort Farm.

In her day, though, she had some very well known literary admirers including Rebecca West and John Buchan (Thirty-Nine Steps). I think her novels deserve a rediscovery. Her themes are still relevant today: male attitudes to women being one of them; human cruelty and wilful destructiveness for another.

In Gone to Earth, the central character, Hazel Woodus, is eighteen, motherless, and living in an isolated cottage with her coffin-making, bee-keeping father, Abel. Her only companion is a tame fox, Foxy, and her only guidance in life is dubiously received from her dead mother’s book of gypsy spells.

Two men want her: the Baptist Minister who marries her and tries to protect what he sees as her innocent spirit, and the fox-hunting landowner who wants only bodily possession. Hazel herself is torn between respectable conformity and her growing sexual awareness. And if I tell you that the term ‘gone to earth’ is the huntsman’s cry when a fox goes underground to escape the hounds, you will know that the story does not end well.

In other senses the book’s plot may be purely allegorical. Above all, it is about the pointless destruction of natural beauty and freedom. Webb was writing it at a time when three of her younger brothers were fighting in the World War 1 trenches.

Much Wenlock 1949 in outside and inside the medieval Guildhall: scenes from Gone to Earth, director Michael Powell

The making of the film did not run altogether smoothly, and there are perhaps some parallels between Hazel as an object of male possession and control , and the position of the film’s star, Jennifer Jones. She had had an affair with the executive producer, David O. Selznik, and by 1949 they were married. He wanted Gone to Earth to be solely a showcase for her, and he did not think the film’s makers, the fabulous storytelling team of director Michael Powell, and screenwriter, Emeric Pressburger, (The Red Shoes, The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp) had done her justice. He even took them to court for not producing what was in the script. He lost the case, but he still had the right to make an alternative version.

The upshot was that for the 1952 American release, renamed The Wild Heart , he chopped all the scenes that did not make the most of Jones, had new scenes shot, and to make sense of the makeover added a commentary by Joseph Cotton. The film was not well received, and so did not serve his purpose. Only recently has the original Powell and Pressburger version been fully restored.

In the film clip below you will see, not Much Wenlock, but a location some miles across Wenlock Edge. Here are the beautiful hills of South Shropshire, in particular the Stiperstones with its bleak outcrop known as the Devil’s Chair. This is where Hazel goes at night in expectation of guidance from one of her mother’s superstitious rites. This silly, girlish act, and mistaken reading of events will have tragic consequences.

Hazel goes to the Devil’s Chair

For more on Mary Webb:

“This year’s discovery has been Mary Webb, author of Gone to Earth. She is a genius, and I shouldn’t mind wagering that she is going to be the most distinguished writer of our generation.”

— Rebecca West, review of Gone to Earth in the Times Literary Supplement, August 30, 1917

Mary Webb: neglected genius for the synopsis of Gone to Earth and also for details of her other works.

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ILLUMINATING INGENUITY AFRICA-STYLE

“production from local resources for local needs is the most rational way of economic life.” E F Schumacher

You could call this the mother of all light bulb moments: a piece of African technology transfer that would have been right up E.F. Schumacher’s street (Small is beautiful: a study of economics as if people mattered). Of course light bulbs aren’t much use to people whose politicians have failed to connect their villages to the national grid. One might also assume that a blown light bulb isn’t of use to anyone anywhere. But well, think again. Here we have the proof of it: some very natty Tanzanian recycling. And in case it is not entirely obvious from this photo, here we have a used light bulb, and a remodelled tin can made into a very handy carrying lamp. The cap that holds the wick in place, can be removed to refill the bulb with oil as needed.

And talking of E F Schumacher, his book Small is beautiful has been rated one of the 100 most influential books written since World War 2. It has inspired highly inventive Intermediate Technology Development projects around the world, low tech solutions that use the kinds of materials and spare parts that can be maintained, replaced and replicated locally. Adeyemi’s floating school in Lagos (see earlier post Floating not flooding) is a good example of such principles in action.

This particular light bulb lamp was bought in the market in Tabora in central Tanzania. Graham lived there two years in a house beside the old Arab slave route, while working as an agricultural extension officer for V.S.O (Voluntary Service Overseas). These were in the days TBT – Time Before Tish.

But then much later there was another light bulb moment. When we were in Kenya doing fieldwork on the Central Province farms ( Looking for smut: work on Kenya’s highland farms ) I came across quite another use for a cast off bulbs. We had been invited into a Kikuyu farmer’s home for tea and cake, and there it was hanging on the sitting room wall. Our hosts had already told us the sad tale of how they and their neighbours had made financial contributions to a political candidate who promised to bring electricity to their community, but then conveniently ‘forgot’ once he had been elected. I wrote a poem about it.

Power-play

Joe Maina, small-time farmer, says

before the polls he paid

some local boss three thousand bob

to bring the power lines down the Rift.

The big man won the vote,

but now, as ever,

Faith Waithera Maina cooks githeri,

bending at her hearth,

three rocks to hold the pot,

sleek skin cured hide in smoke-house fug.

Next, slogs like an ox on cow-track paths

to fetch more wood to feed the fire.

“Our days’ career,” she shrugs.

Till dusk she lights her

sofa room with fumy lamps,

where, hanging on the wall with

keep-safe snaps and family memorabilia,

a cast-off city sixty-watt has second lease;

recharged of course,

a perfect vase

for garden sprays of purple

Tradescantia.

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A Word A Week: technology

Hyena Heist in the Mara

First light on the Mara plains, and the Marsh Pride lionesses have eaten well. In the night they have killed a giraffe and are resting up near the remains of the carcase. The peace doesn’t last though. And it isn’t us who are bothering them.

Other predators are moving in on the leftovers. First a black-backed jackal comes trotting by, watches hopefully from the side-lines. Her chances are looking slim…

…already the heavy mob are moving in – a pack of spotted hyenas.

As I said in an earlier post, hyenas do not only scavenge, they are powerful hunters with jaws like demolition-crushers. And despite their lop-sided gait, their feet with blunt, non-retractable claws, are well adapted for the long-distance chase. They can take down a wildebeest and eat and digest the lot (apart from horns and rumen) within 24 hours. They will also eat anything, including the faces of sleeping humans caught out without sufficient night-time protection. This was a commonly reported horror while we lived in Kenya. In consequence they are East Africa’s most successful large predator, apart from politicians, that is.

Here, one of the pack has made a rush on the kill and escaped with some leg bones, but it doesn’t look as if sharing is on the hyenas’ menu.

The lionesses go on watching, alert in that laid-back kind of way that cats do so well. The remnants are not worth fighting over. When the time comes, and bellies are empty, they will make another kill.

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giant gwendol makes the wrekin

As hills go, The Wrekin (pronounced REE-kin) in my home county of Shropshire is not very high – just over 400 metres (1300 feet) . But then, as estate agents say, location is all, and this is the only big hill for miles around. It rises over a county of farm fields and the flatness of the Shropshire Plain beyond, and thus is a useful landmark when navigating the county’s ancient network of sunken rural roads. It has also long loomed large in local imagination. As with significant natural features the world over, it gives people something to think by, prompting many a tale and joke.

For instance, we have a saying whose usage extends into neighbouring counties. To go all round The Wrekin means to ramble on for hours before arriving at the point. Hopefully not exemplified in this post. Because yes, I will get around to Giant Gwendol before too much longer. But first some geology. Please don’t groan. I’ll make it snappy.

Looking at the photograph above, the first thing that strikes you is that the hill looks like an old volcano, and I seem to remember being told that it was in year 3 geography at secondary school. This apparently is not the case, although it is composed of volcanic rock. The vent that spewed it out is no longer around or visible. This is perhaps worrying. One has to put faith in notions of volcanic dormancy and, since the spewing forth of rhyolites, tuffs and agglomerates took place in the Precambrian some 680 million years ago, we can perhaps rest easy in our beds: Shropshire has had long enough to get over its hot phase.

This is also good because as you can see from the second photo, the place where I live, Much Wenlock, is rather close to The Wrekin. The yellow wheat field in the middle ground is behind my house.

But now for the Gwendol story.

There once was a Welsh giant called Gwendol. For reasons unknown he had conceived a grudge against the mayor and townsfolk of Shrewsbury, in the neighbouring county of Shropshire. Since the town lay within a nearly closed loop of the River Severn, Gwendol came up with a dastardly plan. He would dam the river and so drown the town and all who lived there.

He set off from Wales with a great spadeful of earth to do the deed, and headed for Shrewsbury. He tramped for mile after mile, but somehow lost his way, ending up instead near the town of Wellington. Weary with the search, and from carrying a heavy load, he sat down to rest.

After a time, an itinerant cobbler came walking by. He had walked from Shrewsbury and was heading for Wellington. Over his shoulder he carried a big sack of used shoes for mending.

Gwendol stopped the man and asked for directions. He even told the cobbler his plan to fill in the River Severn and so drown Shrewsbury and all who lived there.

The cobbler was horrified, and especially appalled at the prospect of losing so much trade.

He thought fast.

“Oh dear me,” he told the giant, “that town is so far away. Many days’ walk.” Then he opened his sack of old shoes. “See,” he said. “I have worn out all these shoes and boots walking from Shrewsbury.”

At this, the giant groaned. “I am too tired,” he said, “to carry my load of dirt that far. I had better leave it here.” And so he emptied it out there and then and, as a parting shot, before setting off back to Wales, he cleaned the mud from his own boots, and so left behind little Ercall, the small hill that stands nearby.

And so now you have the true story of how The Wrekin was born. In fact, for a not very bright giant, I think Gwendol did a pretty good job, landscaping-wise. Also the damming plan would never have worked. Old Shrewsbury town may sit inside the loop of the River Severn, but it is also on a very steep hill. Just as well, though, that Giant Gwendol trudged back into Wales and was never heard of more in Shropshire.

SOURCE: This tale appears in Charlotte Burne’s Shropshire Folklore 1883. In other versions the Devil is the hill-builder.

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Floating not flooding: Adeyemi’s ‘Ark-ademy’

And what is this extraordinary structure?

Why, a floating school of course. It is also a prototype building created by Nigerian-born architect, Kunle Adeyemi and his Amsterdam-based company NLÉ. Adeyemi has more plans too, ones that will relieve the dire conditions for the 100,000 people who currently live in this, Nigeria’s Makoko slum. The fishing settlement in Lagos Lagoon has been there since the 18th century. To cope with changing tidal levels, the shanties are built on stilts, rising from the lagoon mud; the main way to get around is by boat. There is zero sanitation, and consequently much disease. Life expectancy is reckoned to be less than 40 years.

For the past two centuries Makoko slum dwellers have adapted to tidal changes, but now climate change, with rising sea levels and increasingly extreme weather events, is putting them at grave risk.

Recently the Nigerian authorities have addressed their plight by demolishing many of the stilt-built dwellings, making the inhabitants homeless. There will be re-development naturally – not for the poor who have long lived there, but to replace their community with flashy lagoon-view high rises. Makoko as it stands is deemed a blot that must be erased. It is an interesting approach to social deprivation: to make it worse.

See instead Adeyemi’s vision:

Now doesn’t this make your heart sing? Homes to live for.

And here is where it begins:

Diagram courtesy of NLÉ.

Makoko floating school, then, is literally the flagship of NLÉ’s proposed waterborne city. The structure was designed and built in collaboration with the Makoko Waterfront Community and with input from Dutch naval architect, Erik Wassen. It is movable, and capable of dealing with storm surges and flooding. The triangular frame which is mounted on 256 floating plastic barrels makes it very stable and with a capacity to keep 100 people safe in storm conditions. PV cells on the apex generate solar power, and there are facilities to recycle organic waste and harvest rainwater. Most importantly of all, it was built using the techniques and skills of local craftspeople. It is a building that fits with people’s view of themselves. And it is beautiful.

The school has three levels with a capacity for 60 -100 pupils. The 1st level is an open play area for breaks and assembly. Out of school hours this space may be used by the community. Level 2 is an enclosed space for 2-4 classrooms, and Level 3 has a partially enclosed workshop space.

The only fly in the ointment of NLÉ’s scheme for Makoko’s regeneration is the fact that Nigerian authorities say the floating school is an illegal structure, and should not be there. NLÉ are currently in negotiation with Lagos state government and are said to be optimistic that no immediate action will be taken.

I for one hope that this African solution to an African problem will be seen for what it is – an amazingly wonderful, life-giving, life-enhancing scheme of which Nigeria should be heartily proud. The floating school addresses both present need and future uncertainty, and in ways that its community can reproduce and embrace. It has inherent sustainability. It is a pattern to build on, adapt, develop, replicate, but on an individual human scale that everyone can understand. And as time goes on, we may all have need to tap into some of NLÉ’s ingenuity if we wish to continue living well and safely on our home planet. Town Planning that gladdens my heart and gives me hope, and believe me, that does not often happen.

Further info:

Kunlé Adeyemi Founder NLÉ

The Architectural Review Jan 2014

http://www.nleworks.com/case/makoko-floating-school/

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Desert Date ~ a real-life tree of life

Badda, Othoo, Olokwai, Eroronyit, Mjunju, Kiwowa – are just some of the names that Kenya’s peoples use for this super-tree. Here, in the Maasai Mara, its lone presence on the grasslands adds a sense of drama. Perhaps the spare silhouette springs some ancestral memory. For if we believe that humankind evolved in the Great Rift, then we must have an ages-old association with this tree, and not only as a source of food, but for firewood, the making of shelters and tools and, most especially, for medicine.

All the photos here were taken in the Mara, but the range of the Desert Date (Balanites aegyptiaca) extends across much of Africa, and into parts of the Middle East and India. But wherever it grows, its multiple uses have long been valued. Much like the baobab, it is a natural pharmacy. Every part of this unassuming tree has been scientifically shown to be packed with pharmacologically active substances.

Saponins are the key compounds. They protect the immune system, decrease blood lipids, lower cancer risk and cholesterol levels. They include diosgenin, from which hormones for the contraceptive pill may be produced. In short, the tree’s parts – roots, shoots, bark, fruits and seeds – have been shown in laboratory tests to have many healing and prophylactic properties: anti-fever, anti-diabetic, anti-inflammatory, antibacterial, antifungal, anti-parasitic, anti-cancer, antioxidant and liver-protecting. (For more scientific details see Bishnu P Chapagain 2006.)

And so it is that the practices of generations of traditional healers, from Africa to India, (and so often sneered at) may now be vindicated: all along they have been barking up precisely the right tree.

For example, the Pokot pastoralists of northwest Kenya make a decoction of the root to treat malaria. They also boil the root in soup to ease oedema and stomach pains. For heartburn, the Akamba of central Kenya make an infusion of bark. Throughout East Africa, the root is used to get rid of intestinal worms, and as a general purgative. The bark is used as a fish poison, and when mixed with fruit will kill freshwater snails and copepods that host the parasites that cause Bilharzia and Guinea Worm respectively, both scourges in many parts of Africa. In Sudan herbalists use Desert Date to treat jaundice, and in West Africa the fruit is mixed into porridge and eaten by nursing mothers. The seeds, when boiled, produce an excellent oil that is used in food preparation and to soothe headaches. Over 4,ooo years ago in Ancient Egypt this oil was a prized cosmetic. So much so, that the seeds were placed in tombs beside the dead as if to suggest that, in the afterlife, this was a tree that no one could be without.

In fact Balanites thus once grew in profusion along the Nile Valley, and were possibly cultivated. But they are also well adapted to arid and semi-arid conditions, tolerating both sand and heavy clay. Their vertical roots reach down 7 metres, while the horizontal roots may extend 20 metres from the trunk. It can also cope with stock and wildlife grazing (the characteristic canopy is shaped by browsing giraffes), flood, and grassfire. Their boughs and long, thin spines photosynthesize even when the leaves drop off. This makes them a valuable famine food. No matter how dry, each year they can produce up to 10,000 date-like fruits. The flesh is bitter-sweet, but eaten by humans, their stock and most wild game. In fact elephants are one of the main propagators of this species, at least in Africa. While most other creatures spit out the stones, elephants swallow them, depositing them in due course in dollops of ready-made compost.

In Kenya the Pokot and Turkana also eat the tree’s young leaves and shoots, boiled, pounded and fried with fat. The Maasai eat the gum, and the Marakwet boil the seeds and eat them like beans. In other parts of Africa the small flowers are stirred into porridge, and the fruit is fermented to make alcoholic drinks.

And then there is the wood. This is an excellent cooking fuel since it burns with little smoke. The wood is durable and used for house-building. It is also easily worked to make yokes, wooden spoons, pestles, mortars, handles, stools, combs. Resin from the tree stems is used to stick feathers on to arrow shafts and spear heads to shafts. The Turkana use it to repair cracks in tool handles. And the tree itself may be grown in farmsteads as a living fence that can be cropped for both human needs and livestock fodder. While it is protecting domestic animals and crops it is also fixing nitrogen in the soil.

And now you know why I called it a tree of life. It is ripe for development too, the kind of development that can only enhance existence on the planet. In fact one gasps at how much potential can subsist within a single tree species. AND THIS IS JUST ONE TREE. But doesn’t it show, and with glaring clarity, that instead of destroying the world’s wild places (and for mostly very pointless reasons), we need to protect and learn from them, and learn, too, from those indigenous peoples who still know them intimately and understand where the real treasure lies.

For my earlier post on the baobab:

Anthology Baobab: African Story Tree

Jungle2Jungle and Bishnu P Chapagain 2006 for more about the Desert Date

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Tish Farrell

Writer on the Edge