New listings and the slave trade

[Moo]

Exactly.

 

[Nemesis]

No, he's just becomimg repetitive now, and predictable.

 

[Matt Green]

Nemesis[/b], of all people"]No, he's just becomimg repetitive now, and predictable.

I'm with Penners and Moo.

However, onward! Keeping with things Clarksonian and Period Properties, it reminds me of an annecdote.

I surveyed Repton School Library a year or so ago and they have a picture of him on the wall there. It's a fantastic building and I still use the slide of the chemical DPC injected into an external stone cloister pillar in lectures.

Whilst we were there we found two books by another famous alumnus in an eaves void, James and the Giant Peach and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (1st ed's, signed)....and we returned them to the school office.

They were overjoyed at their return, naturally:
Office staff member: "Oh...right...OK then, I'll give them to someone"

Morals. They just don't get the bills paid.


Matt

 

[Penners]

Morals. They just don't get the bills paid.

Moral: carry an innocent-looking briefcase with you wherever you go.

 

[Nemesis]

Well, he's s bit like a stuck record, and I don't care for cliched journalism. Time too that Top Gear was wrested from his hands so some fresh ideas can be injected in it.



Were Mr Dahl's little volumes not stamped with school stamps and /or with library plates in them? That reduces the worth a touch. So maybe you haven't missed out too badly on riches beyond the dreams of avarice.

 

[Matt Green]

Were Mr Dahl's little volumes not stamped with school stamps and /or with library plates in them? That reduces the worth a touch. So maybe you haven't missed out too badly on riches beyond the dreams of avarice.

They were afflicted with both, and indeed a written dedication to the school. Ah well. My dreams of riches didn't extend far beyond a new kitchen anyway.

 

[Nemesis]

Probably additionally had bumped corners, torn jacket, not the right sort of first edition, and most likely grubby schoolboys, whose fingers had been heaven knows where, had flicked the pages over carelessly too whilst reading. Careful inspection may have revealed sordid stains on the pages. With the school dedication, if put onto the market you may even have had a visit from PC Plod demanding the provenance and method of acquiring.

A lucky escape I feel in fact. And you have the warm glow of knowing you may be poor but honest. In extremis, it could warm a pan of beans?

 

[Matt Green]

Careful inspection may have revealed sordid stains on the pages.

Now hang on. I didn't have a private education, but even so- Roald Dahl...!?...I mean...Giant Peaches, is that what....would it...?


Penners?

 

[Penners]

Don't look at me, mate. I was more of a Tit Bits man myself.

 

[Nemesis]

I have, for my sins, in the past, as I recall, even written long academic study type stuff on Dahl and his problems with his portrayal of wimmin as displayed as an underlying theme in so many of his books.

Oh dearie me no, not the innocent tales of childish delight doting grannies think they are purchasing for Lucinda and Josh. Not at all.

 

[Moo]

Lady academics, most probably.

But schoolboys, of an age to read Roald Dahl? Surely not.

 

[Penners]

I have, for my sins, in the past, as I recall, even written long academic study type stuff on Dahl and his problems with his portrayal of wimmin as displayed as an underlying theme in so many of his books.

I'll bet that's a well-thumbed volume.

 

[Moo]

With sordid stains?

 

[Nemesis]

Lady academics? Not me guv. But his books are an interesting study.

What age do you have to be to read Dahl then? Repton boys? 13+?

And blimey - what sort of stains were you thinking of?

Sordid - a wealth of ideas in that word. Clearly.

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/sordid

James and the Giant Peach. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I know several former public school types who could make all manner of suggestions regarding the contents.

(I'm still curious as to why the books were in a roof void.)

Some pics here - maybe one of these shows the part Matt mentions as having lovely injection holes.

http://www.derbyphotos.co.uk/areas_p_z/repton.htm


Dahl and Repton:

ROALD DAHL - PRIORY 1930 – 1934


Best-selling author of 25 books for children and adults Roald Dahl came to Repton as a boarder in January 1930 and was to remain here until July 1934.

He lived at The Priory on High Street, which still serves as a boys’ house today. Evidence of the great writer’s time can still be found here, including a number of pictures of Dahl, often in successful Fives teams but also at his desk and as part of House teams.

One aspect of his life at Repton that everyone is sure played a significant role was the blind tastings for confectionery giant Cadbury’s. Each term the Priory boys were given a box full of new types of chocolate together with a checklist on which they had to give marks for the products. Roald developed a lifelong love of chocolate and Reptonians like to think this experience was the inspiration for Willy Wonka’s marvellous chocolate factory.

His autobiographical Boy is worth reading.

http://www.roalddahlmuseum.org/archives/default.aspx

has the Dahl archive.

Boy is only a short, slim little book, over before you know it, leaving you hungry for more (don't worry, there are two further volumes) and so I'd better not tell you much else. Soon enough, Dahl makes the step from prep to boarding school, and here things aren't so blissful. The rigid, incomprehensible discipline, the endless push for pigeon-holing and conformity and the cruel, institutionalised ways this was enforced often left Dahl lonely, homesick and afraid. He wrote home to his mother every week and even after countless readings of the book I still get a tight, sad, terrible feeling inside when I see some of the copied letters, signed "love, Boy" and when I read of the horrors of ritualised corporal punishment. Still, these times weren't without their amusements, and anyway, I've given away too much already. You should read them for yourself. Boy is written with every bit of the skill Dahl has brought to children's fiction - it is amusing, honest, rhythmic, wry. And it provides also a fascinating insight into the inspiration for all that wonderful fiction.

http://www.thebookbag.co.uk/dahlboy.htm

 

[Nigel Watts]

This is also of great interest to me as a direct descendant of Thomas Molyneux, slave trader, and mayor of Liverpool in 1807 who lost his campaign to stop the Bill but sucessfully lobbied the goverment for compensation. His house, Newsham, still exists in the suburbs of Liverpool. A brother of another direct ancestor was Lt Col of the Cheshire militia and led a cavalry charge at Peterloo. A nice lot, my relations.

 

[Nemesis]

Ah - Peterloo!

I gather there is a new and better memorial erected in Manchester.

http://www.manchester.gov.uk/site/scripts/news_article.php?newsID=3246

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/PRpeterloo.htm


[Open Image] [Hosted by PhotoGalaxy.com]



Pity about the Free Trade Hall, which is now only a facade with a ghastly 'gut and stuff' modern hotel building rising out of the roof line. The interior had been reconstucted after wartime bombing, but it was rather more in sympathy with the building than the present mess, and had its own history (it's where Bob Dylan was booed...)

I suspect if we delve we will find all manner of skeletons in ancestral cupboards, much money was made from exploitation of an underclass - if not slavery then coal mine ownership or factories.

Even if you look at places like New Lanark or Saltaire (both now World Heritage Sites) although the conditions provided by benevolent owners were much better than most, they were hedged around with all manner of restrictions to keep workers on the straight and narrow path of virtue.

http://www.saltaire-village.co.uk/saltaire-info.html

http://www.saltairevillage.info/

http://www.newlanark.org/

Saltaire is a purpose-built "model" Victorian industrial village, next to Shipley and just to the north of the centre of Bradford in West Yorkshire's Bronte Country.
The village itself was built in the nineteenth century by the Victorian philanthropist Sir Titus Salt, to provide self-contained living space for the workers at his woollen mills, a welcome alternative to the then "dark satanic mills" of Bradford and Leeds.

More recently Salt's Mill has been converted by the late Jonathan Silver into the "1853 Gallery" which houses a collection of the works of the famous artist, David Hockney (who was of course born in Bradford ).

Other buildings in the village have now been similarly transformed into shops, licensed restaurants and pubs (just a little touch of irony here - as Sir Titus was a staunch advocate of abstinence from alcohol !)

Also of interest is the United Reformed Church - one of the nation's most precious Victorian buildings and a unique example of Italianite religious architecture.

I presume Newsham is connected with Newsham Park, the subject of a strong campaign to save it:

http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/regions/liverpool/2004/07/294845.html

And a link to Nigel's own site:

http://www.fitzwalter.com/afh/Molyneux/molyp1.htm

 

[Nigel Watts]

Newsham House still stands on the edge of Newsham Park. It used to be used as a residence for circuit judges but I dont know if it still is.

Thomas Molyneux's grandson, a cotton broker, inherited Newsham but subsequently went bankrupt and the estate had to be sold. I believe it was bought by the Corporation, which is probably why it survived until now. Most other large villas on the edge of Liverpool were knocked down and their grounds developed as the city expanded.