{"id":2169,"date":"2012-04-10T16:22:19","date_gmt":"2012-04-10T16:22:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ink.verticalplus.co.uk\/archive\/?p=2169"},"modified":"2023-06-28T10:01:27","modified_gmt":"2023-06-28T10:01:27","slug":"ken-head-reviews-asterisk-by-paul-munden-poems-marion-frith-photographs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/ken-head-reviews-asterisk-by-paul-munden-poems-marion-frith-photographs\/","title":{"rendered":"Ken Head reviews ‘Asterisk*’ by Paul Munden (Poems) & Marion Frith (Photographs)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Smith \/ Doorstop Books<\/a>\u00a0<\/span> ISBN:\u00a0 978-1-906613-47-1 (hbk)\u00a0 \u00a312.95\u00a0 69pp<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

<\/strong>This delightful and beautifully produced book has been a pleasure to read and has persuaded me to arrange a trip later this year to the place which is its immediate subject and somewhere I should long since have visited.\u00a0 Immaculately printed on high quality paper, it does equal justice\u00a0 both to the text, the twenty-four excellent photographs, one alongside each poem, and the four additional photo collages contained in the Notes.\u00a0 Poems and photographs together take us on a journey through Shandy Hall now a literary museum situated in the North Yorkshire village of Coxwold and headquarters of the Laurence Sterne Trust<\/a>, but between 1760 \u2013 1768, the home of Laurence Sterne himself, novelist, local clergyman and, most famously, author of The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Although Sterne suffered from consumption<\/em> (tuberculosis) during this time, there were, as a photographed fragment of one of his letters dated 7th<\/sup> June, 1760 makes clear, some considerable compensations:\u00a0 I am as happy as a prince at Coxwould<\/em> (sic), and I wish you could see in how princely a manner I live \u2013 \u2019tis a land of plenty.\u00a0 I sit down alone to venison, fish and wild-fowl, or a couple of fowls or ducks, with curds, and strawberries, and cream, and all the simple plenty which a rich valley under the Hambleton Hills can produce<\/em>.\u00a0 The pleasure which he describes here with such lip-smacking relish seems to me also to reflect the authors\u2019 clear intention that their poems and images together should be enjoyed not only for themselves, but also as an introductory glimpse into a place that has been home to many people since the original village parsonage was built in 1430.\u00a0 The point is well made both in the poem DIY<\/em>:\u00a0 Even today there\u2019s not much evidence \/ of the worst excess \u2013 artex, woodchip, warping \/ MDF, those classic errors of taste – \/ or crack-brained solutions \/ to a crooked chimney, leaking roof, sloping floor, \/ wet-rot, dry-rot, death-watch beetle …<\/em> the photograph of a commemorative plaque above the front door:<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

SHANDY HALL.<\/p>\n

HERE DWELT LAURENCE STERNE,<\/p>\n

MANY YEARS INCUMBENT<\/p>\n

OF COXWOLD.<\/p>\n

HERE HE WROTE TRISTRAM SHANDY<\/p>\n

AND THE SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY.<\/p>\n

DIED IN LONDON IN 1769<\/p>\n

AGED 55 YEARS.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

and the brief quotation from Sterne\u2019s novel which accompanies it:\u00a0 -\u2019tis all one to me \u2013 please but your own fancy in it<\/em>.\u00a0 Anyone who has ever moved house will recognize the truth in his wickedly off-hand comment.<\/p>\n

Reading the book, it\u2019s impossible, as the above examples show, not to notice that each photograph is accompanied by a brief quotation, no more than a line or two, from somewhere within Sterne\u2019s nine original volumes.\u00a0 What is being pointed out is self-evidently true, a knowledge of the novel would be helpful to a reader\u2019s understanding of the relationship between it, the poems and the photographs.\u00a0 Whether or not this is asking a lot depends on the reader\u2019s interest and curiosity, of course, although, that said, in many cases the links are so universal as to be crystal clear.\u00a0 The poem Graves<\/em>, for example, reminds us that funerals \/ recall more personal memorials<\/em> and speaks of the inevitability of erasure and forgetting, of how quickly stone \/ becomes its own blank page \/ in the obliterating rain<\/em>.\u00a0 On the facing page, a photograph of Coxwold churchyard, with its many gravestones disappearing into deep shadow, works powerfully with the poem, as does the blackly humorous quotation from Sterne\u2019s novel with its nod towards the graveyard scene in Shakespeare\u2019s Hamlet<\/em>:\u00a0 – not a passenger goes by without stopping to cast a look upon it, – and sighing as he walks on, Alas, poor YORICK! <\/em><\/p>\n

Whilst it would be inaccurate to describe Asterisk* <\/em>as a guide book, it does, as the Introduction points out, fulfil some of those functions, in that it comes complete with helpful notes, provides an informative photographic record of its initial subject, Shandy Hall, and sets out to approach the place in the spirit of Sterne himself, that is playfully<\/strong> and with a mind to explore the unexpected<\/em>.\u00a0 It is, though, also a good deal more than this.\u00a0 The photographs, for example, are finely observed and executed, they support and frame the poems very effectively and so go well beyond their obvious documentary function.\u00a0 The same is true of the quotations from the novel.\u00a0 Selected to shed light, often ironic and witty, sometimes more darkly philosophical, they do exactly that, not only upon the poems, the photographs, the house and grounds of Shandy Hall, but upon the author himself and the working of his mind.\u00a0 The photograph entitled Sterne\u2019s Study <\/em>\u00a0is a good final instance of this.\u00a0 Cropped to suggest a small room, it has as its background threequarters of an open fireplace in front of which are shown the corner of a desk, neatly arranged manuscript and a small black pot containing three quill pens.\u00a0 The accompanying quotation is brief and pithy:\u00a0 Writing, when properly managed, (as you may be sure I think mine is) is but a different name for conversation, <\/em>whilst <\/em>the poem, Study<\/em>, ends as follows:\u00a0 But here, feel yourself grow as you step inside \/ the tiny cockpit;\u00a0 the tooled leather console \/ and its hidden circuitry all at your fingertips; \/ a reassuring co-pilot appearing at your side.<\/em>\u00a0 I wouldn\u2019t want to exchange my laptop for Sterne\u2019s parchment and quill, but sitting in front of it now and typing these words, I recognize that feeling.\u00a0 I think Sterne would have, too.\u00a0 As writers, I\u2019m sure we all do.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Ken Head<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Asterisk*<\/a> can be ordered from Amazon.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Smith \/ Doorstop Books\u00a0 ISBN:\u00a0 978-1-906613-47-1 (hbk)\u00a0 \u00a312.95\u00a0 69pp   This delightful and beautifully produced book has been a pleasure to read and has persuaded me to arrange a trip later this year to the place which is its immediate subject and somewhere I should long since have visited.\u00a0 Immaculately printed on high quality paper, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2169","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2169","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2169"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2169\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23752,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2169\/revisions\/23752"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2169"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2169"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2169"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}