[Victoria]

Originally Posted by issybird

Victoria, our fathers shared a birthday! Mine would have been 91 on Sunday. But he grew up in New York City; no farmer boy he........

(Although did anyone else cringe early on when he took a swig from the milk carton? That had to be deliberate in establishing his character.) .........

Ultimately this was polemic, the sense that he was harranguing us.

Issybird, how neat that they shared a birthday! Coincidentally, my father’s family was from New York as well, albeit 4 generations back. However, they were from Staten Island, so perhaps still the country?

Yes - I cringed when he swigged from the carton, and I frequently felt lectured.

Originally Posted by gmw

....For example I've been sitting on the what I post below, not really sure whether I should air this. issybird you speak of instincts at war with each other, and for me the idea of offering what seems such personal criticism feels wrong to me, a literary critique should not be personal, but how can we possibly discuss reactions to a memoir like this without getting personal?

What follows relates to what you were saying about a lack of self-awareness, and I think that is probably at the core of what irks me about this book; the constant stream of contradictions that he doesn't seem to recognise.


Quote from the book:

And while in Oxford, did he ask himself who raised those walls or laid that pavement, or built that desk he was sitting at? As a man steeped in tradition, didn't he sit in awe of the history that surrounded him? (I get that feeling just by watching an episode of Lewis.)

My guess is that it was more likely the Lake District tourist had asked the question, than he had; he seemed to show no interest at all in Oxford or its inhabitants. I get the impression the author has never been a tourist anywhere; to be somewhere (other than home) simply to watch and wonder. Do this and he might better understand those that are invade his home lands.

And this surprised me:
Why not? As I grew up we had multiple places on the farm worth holding picnics on: family time, and the farm was part of the family. Or I could lose whole afternoons wandering our property alone, watching for finches, hoping to see robins and so on (okay, and I admit it, sometimes with the destructive intention of shooting rabbits). As I read this book I imagined having the fells to explore and simply could not understand his lack of interest.

It seemed yet another self-contradiction in the book. He professes a love of the landscape, supposedly inherited from his grandfather and father, and yet never explored the fells for their own sake? No wonder they cannot understand the intruders (tourists).

I had expected to be told about the joys of his life, not listen to him dismiss mine as unworthy. It quite disrupted my enjoyment of the parts of the book that spoke of things I did want to know about.

Gmw

So well said! I had many of the same perspectives and feelings reading the book. A lightbulb went on for me in your earlier post, when you described the dynamic of the three generations of men as extreme isolationism.

One of the many times it struck me was when he talked about outsiders not traveling to their area until 1750, with the advent of roads and railways.

“I’d be annoyed to discover that no one from the outside seems to have thought it beautiful or a place to visit until then....”

It surprised me that anyone could feel personally slighted by a major transformation in cultural and industrial history 250 years earlier, which had altered the live and fortune of almost every person alive in the country.

I know it’s not fair for me to give too much weight to any one passage. But the impression I got from reading the full book was a world view characterized by “us against the world”.

I didn’t strike me as just a reflection of a general Northern attitude towards outsiders, or even the smaller enclave of shepherds. It seemed personal and familial. Like the rest of us, Rebanks is a work in progress.

My guess is that he was a very bright boy who, sadly, felt that an interest in school, books, and the outside world was a personal betrayal of his grandfather and father. Maybe, as you point out, joy, leisure, exploration and beauty were also verboten. He’s still squirming on that hook, and projects it outward, probably unintentionally.

Though I didn’t appreciate the lecturing tone, I do admire how he’s harnessed his life energy for good.

Originally Posted by astrangerhere

I think I saw this less as a glorification of ignorance and more a glorification of "other." I think this speaks to me more uniquely as I am from the American South. Many folks hear my accent and assume many, many things about me, very few of which are true. But I will own that there are people who have base-level literacy that are better craftsmen, farmers and artists than me and my doctorate will ever be.

I think that is the point he might have been trying to make - that these people are living on land that has been sustained for hundreds of years by people who have very little education beyond the dirt on their hands.

I don't truck with praising ignorance, but I also don't truck with the notion that intelligence means the same thing for everyone. I am sure that this underpinned his writing, whether he meant it or not.

Either way, I am really glad to see such thoughtful discussion of the book

Astrangerhere. You're so right - the world is very quick to dismiss the intelligence and resourcefulness of others based on superficial criteria, like formal education. Rebanks does speak with pride and passion about the people of his community and the their heritage. And the same values must underpin his work with UNESCO.

It is a thoughtful discussion, and I really appreciate being introduced to the book, and learning about James Rebanks and the the world he’s writing about and fighting to save. Thank you!