PerfectlyWritePoetry: Recalling Film’s Great Laureate

Tuesday 16 September 2014

Recalling Film’s Great Laureate

There was a distinctly old-fashioned English air to a charity film show in Karmiel on Sunday.

This was no surprise as the event, arranged by the Keren B’Yachad group, was a tribute to the late film actor-director, Richard Attenborough.

What’s more, the screening of Richard Attenborough – A Life In Film concluded just how I’m convinced our hero would have loved – with the presentation of 1,000 shekels – about £180.00 - to local people in need.

One of the documentary interviewees commented that Attenborough’s marriage to Sheila Sim was so long and comfortable that it was almost a reflection of a John Betjeman poem.

Sir John was British Poet Laureate from 1972 – 1984.

I’ve chosen the poem below as I think it’s a fetching description of an area I knew well when I lived in Sheffield during my teens.

“An Edwardian Sunday, Broomhill, Sheffield

“High dormers are rising
So sharp and surprising,
And ponticum edges
The driveways of gravel;
Stone houses from ledges
Look down on ravines.
The vision can travel
From gable to gable,
Italianate mansion
And turreted stable,
A sylvan expansion
So varied and jolly
Where laurel and holly
Commingle their greens.

Serene on a Sunday
The sun glitters hotly
O'er mills that on Monday
With engines will hum.
By tramway excursion
To Dore and to Totley
In search of diversion
The millworkers come;
But in our arboreta
The sounds are discreeter
Of shoes upon stone -
The worshippers wending
To welcoming chapel,
Companioned or lone;
And over a pew there
See loveliness lean,
As Eve shows her apple
Through rich bombazine;
What love is born new there
In blushing eighteen!

Your prospects will please her,
The iron-king's daughter,
Up here on Broomhill;
Strange Hallamshire, County
Of dearth and of bounty,
Of brown tumbling water
And furnace and mill.
Your own Ebenezer
Looks down from his height
On back street and alley
And chemical valley
Laid out in the light;
On ugly and pretty
Where industry thrives
In this hill-shadowed city
Of razors and knives.