She stood on the bridge at midnight
She stood on the bridge at midnight is, of course, the opening line of that liberal anthem of which the first verse runs:
She stood on the bridge at midnight
Throwing snowballs at the moon
She said, “Jack, I’ve never ‘ad it”
But she spoke too bloomin’ soon.
The chorus that follows sets the tone:
It’s the same the ‘ole world over
It’s the poor wot gets the blame
It’s the rich wot gets the pleasure
Ain’t it all a bloomin’ shame?
Common politeness prevents me singing other verses outside a rugby club (which is where I learned many of my choicer ditties; it’s only now that I wonder whether other people know a more wholesome version of this song), although there’s no harm in telling you that the last two lines before the final chorus are:
She is now completely ruined
And it’s all because of ‘im.
I found these lines running through my head after receiving an email telling me why A Just and Upright Man was such rubbish and how pleased my correspondent was that she’d bought it for her Kindle and read it quickly because she’d been able to get her money back from Amazon, the miserable skinflint, and so my trash hadn’t cost her anything other than the few hours of her time I’d stolen.
My offence was to write an historical romance/crime novel from the point of view of the people at the bottom of the social heap—the poor. Lizzie Greener and her family, as well as Tom Laws and his, should be beneath notice. Literature, whatever that is, should concern itself only with the upper classes. If some people of the past are invisible there is, it seems, a reason for that. They are not worthy of notice.
Well, I can’t agree. I suppose I’m influenced by the fact that, if Lizzie Greener and Tom Laws had not lived in the northeast two hundred and fifty years ago then I wouldn’t be here now, but it’s more than self-interest. Those peasants and paupers whose every day was a struggle to survive make for better fiction than some spoilt princess.
In any case, they’re not invisible. You have to look a bit harder—I’ve spent hours in archives around the country, going through original documents, and I’ll spend hours more and after doing that for a while these “invisible” people start to look out at you from the pages. Look at this from a 1765 parish account book:
Three Fox and two Foulmartens heads four and twopence
Who trapped and killed those foxes and martens so that they could claim the bounty? And what did they do with the money? Four shillings and twopence was a fortune at a time when they could also write:
To Hauxley Todd for 2 carts of coals & loading three shillings and eightpence
and when it cost the parish a guinea—one pound and one shilling—to keep Edward Scott in the Poor House for 14 weeks.
In 1745 there were sixteen paupers in Ryton Constablery (sic) and we know their names and how much they were given to get them through the year (it wasn’t much). Turn to the parish registers and there they are lined up for us: the year of their birth; the year they were baptised (not always the same as the birth year and there’s a story there, too, for anyone who cares to look); the names of their parents; who they married (and when); what children they had; and when they died.
What about Richard Evans, imprisoned and sentenced to hard labour for being “a loose disorderly fellow of ill fame”. Evans was convicted on no more than the oath of a churchwarden. Who is going to tell his story if not me? And what would that churchwarden have made of the man I saw sixty years ago trying to get the key into the door of his miserable cottage while concealing from this small boy the fact (actually quite unconcealable) that he was as drunk as a Lord? Why does this woman who abuses me by email and steals the fruits of my labours by reading and then not paying believe that the Lord’s story would be more worth telling than the labourer’s? Those shabby cottages were knocked down years ago—is every trace of the people who lived there to vanish?
Not if I have anything to do with it.
A Just and Upright Man is available for Kindle, and you can order the paperback from Amazon–or order it from your local bookshop using the ISBN 978-1-910194-04-1.
Bravo!!!!
There is a missing element of honesty in your reader’s whining, complaining, and “skinflinting”.
First, it MUST have been a good story, or at least good writing, or she wouldn’t have finished it. It is evidenced by her rapid reading that she was captured, which leads me to my second point.
Second, many, many, people lack FUNDAMENTAL honesty with their self. A. I think your writing may have struck a nerve and THAT is why she didn’t “like” it. B. This nerve, this guilt, whatever it may be, kept her intrigued as these type of people are VERY interested in themselves, but only feign at self-improvement. She was intrigued, no doubt, by a reflection of herself in your novel. Self-Improvement is a topic of great import with them, but one they rarely pursue very far beyond a new addition to their wardrobe! They vast majority of the “upper crust” who have built their fortunes on the broken back of the lower masses are always plagued by both guilt and a fear of the poor and their lives, complete with struggles and triumphs. That beings said, many a wealthy person who has, by honest gain, reached that status STILL understands the plight of the common man and hasn’t lost their sensibilities to humanity.
Keep after it! Don’t give up! Your recitation of records has me absolutely intrigued. Remember Charles Dickens was a poor, poor boy. Everybody needs constructive criticism from time to time, but like I tell my wife… “People who are bitter; their opinion doesn’t count…”
Thank you–I appreciate your comment. And I suspect you are right in your analysis of that unpleasant behaviour.
A most deferred response to your request, I assume it’s based on old HW –
http://www.bartleby.com/42/782.html
and a Navy view is here
http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/navysong/Data%20Song/S0028.htm
(And pay no mind to the carping harpy, it’s just jealousy…)
🙂