A FEW OF MY FAVOURITE THINGS

Julie Andrews warbled famously in The Sound of Music about her favourite things. She was immaculately wholesome – she was after all a novice nun called Maria v Trapp – and I cannot stay even imperfectly wholesome for more than about 2 minutes. But I am an inveterate compiler of lists and rather than let Julie have all the fun, I share with you 10 things I particularly enjoy.

   Popular songs (1)

 Noel Coward observed that you should never underestimate the potency of cheap music. A visitor to the Cambridge spy Guy Burgess in Moscow in the 1950s found him incessantly playing an ancient 78 of 1930s charmer Jack Buchanan on a wind-up gramophone, with tears rolling down his cheeks. The Buchanan number was called Who? (not one of his better ones I understand) but it clearly triggered off a torrent of nostalgia – and why not? I suppose as a child of the 1960s I should plump for John Lennon’s iconic Imagine but actually I will be patriotic and blub over heart-string pulling My Ain Folk:

And it's oh! but I'm longing for my ain folk,
Tho' they be but lowly, puir and plain folk:
I am far beyond the sea, but my heart will ever be
At home in dear auld Scotland, wi' my ain folk.

Ironically this corny if evocative song was written by a South London employee of a piano making firm, called Wilfred Mills, who never set foot in Scotland!

   Hymns.(2)

Although I am a card-carrying atheist, I will lustily sing hymns in my bath. First choice for many would be dismal Abide with Me only fit for the blackest of funerals. Bizarrely, because it was George V’s favourite, the first and last verses have been solemnly sung at every FA Cup Final since 1927, the least appropriate venue imaginable.

The first hymn I had to learn by heart was Who would true Valour see adapted from John Bunyan. A bright tune from Vaughan Williams enhances matters considerably – sadly the C of E’s latest hymnal has suppressed the best line “Hobgoblin nor Foul Fiend shall daunt his spirit” in the name of modernity. The hymn was sung at Mrs Thatcher’s funeral and if it was good enough for the Lady, it is good enough for me.

   Cakes (3)

Maria v Trapp twitters on about crisp Apple Strudel and, if I know my Austrians, it would be secretly supplemented by generous portions of Black Forest Gateau and Sachertorte (mit Schlag). My own favourite must include lots of marzipan for which I have a passion.

I recall a Christmas in the late 1940s when our live-in cook made some error baking the iced cake and there was a splendid surplus of marzipan and less current cake than usual. Cook’s sister, our live-in parlour maid, (yes, those were the days!) shamefully confessed this error, but the end result was delightful to my juvenile taste-buds. The German Stollen is estimable but for a real marzipan treat I choose Battenberg Cake, a British confection, despite its German name, gloriously quartered in soft coloured sponge.

Battenberg Cake

   Sunday Lunch (4)

Again Maria v Trapp sings along about Schnitzel with Noodles – probably to create a rhyme with crisp Apple Strudel (see above) but while Schnitzel is fine (when not chewy) it is rather workaday covered with noodles. This favourite is a no-brainer. I select of course Roast Beef and Yorkshire Pudding, slightly underdone, accompanied by floury boiled potatoes, plenty peas and Brussels sprouts with oodles of gravy, horseradish sauce or English mustard. A meal for a King, and just to prove I am no chauvinist, it will be washed down by generous glasses of Burgundy (Pommard will do nicely, thank you).

   Books (5)

I know this is my chance to show off my high culture and rhapsodise about Stendhal, Balzac, Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky. Frankly, solemnity and high culture are not my strong suits – I am a disciple of frivolity and fun. I like my authors to make me laugh out loud and the above four are woefully short on jokes. Dickens can be very droll but there are sadly too many longueurs and much maudlin sentimentality in between.

For a concentration of side-splitting chuckles, the choice lies between incomparable P G Wodehouse and my cherished Arthur Marshall. I will hand Arthur the palm by choosing a volume I am presently re-reading for about the 10^th time, I’ll Let You know: Musings from Myrtlebank. The book is an anthology of magazine columns romping through prep-school instruction on the facts of life, Dame Edith Evans, wartime fund-raisers for Russia, loyalty to friends, the merits of Terence Rattigan, debutantes, dead pigeons, Jubilee gifts to the Queen, shooting at Huns or pheasants, odd surnames, economical Victorian recipes, Prince Albert at Balmoral, the fantasies of elderly nuns, Dame Edna Everage – all this and more and I have only got to page 50! Arthur writes with such sunny good humour and literary skill; he was a supreme life-enhancer.

    Sport (6)

Maria’s favourite sport seems to have been skipping over green alpine meadows, singing loudly and followed by a group of saccharine children – pleasant but hardly competitive. Not for her the joys of Football, and not for me either, as the sport is drowned in money and hype and its protagonists behave like the more moronic specimens in the zoo. Cricket, where Neville Cardus could once write of the sound of Tom Graveney’s off drive “like a glass of old port”, has declined too into gamesmanship and “sledging”. Rugby Union retains agreeable middle-class aspects but, alas, the demands of the modern game turn too many of the leading players into chunky Neanderthals, uneasy on the eye.

My choice inevitably falls upon the great Scottish invention of Golf. Never much of a player myself, I did get better in my late 50s. It is a great psychological rather than a physical test and can equally well be played in unbuttoned solitude or in chummy company, preferably as a 2-ball foursome. How engrossing it is to see Tiger Woods and now Rory McIlroy battle with their demons or await Luke Donald (no relation) or Lee Westwood to achieve their first Major – with the 2014 Ryder Cup in Gleneagles to anticipate!

   Clothing material (7)

The von Trapp wardrobe gloried in Dirndl, so apposite for Alpine festivities, but not really the thing for Mayfair or the Rue du Faubourg St-Honoré. We Scots sport Harris Tweed, Lisle sweaters and lurid Tartan Tammies but for a more sophisticated garment nothing beats the finest Cashmere, woven in a Scottish Border woollen mill. Soft, deliciously warm and luxurious to the touch, it is a splendid product of the humble goat, source of delicious Chèvre cheese and here in Greece much eaten roasted, if rather an acquired taste.

 Classical Aria (8)

In a very strong field, I imagine the most popular aria is Nessun Dorma from Puccini’s Turandot hitting many of the highest notes in the tenor register and famously sung by Luciano Pavarotti at the opening of the football World Cup in Italy in 1990. Pavarotti was an impressive sight, carrying the bulk of a small mountain with his tonsils determinedly and tunefully aquiver.

Yet I will play a wild card and nominate patriotically Henry Purcell’s lovely song Britain, thou now art great from the 1685 Welcome Song for King James Why, why art all the Muses Mute? When sung by a virtuoso counter-tenor like James Bowman, nothing gives me more quiet pleasure.

Walks (9)

Maria v Trapp tended to hop, skip and jump rather than walk as she was a somewhat hyper-active soul. At my advanced age I enjoy a modest walk, but have had such all my life. In Aberdeen I loved a post-prandial stroll around Rubislaw Den, a private wood bisected by the charming Denburn. In Golders Green, sylvan Princes Park was a joy and in the Cotswolds a circuit of the old RAF officers’ houses was agreeable. In Athens I go for a Ravine Walk in a shaded wood with a normally dry stream, the haunt of chattering birds and occasionally enlivened by a group of tortoises.

But I nominate as favourite my Samos Walk from my house to the Archangels’ Chapel, through smallholdings of vines and olives: yesterday a harmless iguana crossed my path – the delightful Orthodox Chapel itself is seldom used but casual visitors like me habitually light a candle there particularly in honour of the Archangel Michael whose icon dominates, though Gabriel and Raphael are also quaintly venerated.

 Pet dogs (10)

My final favourite thing is not a “thing” at all but a vibrant personality and a cherished member of the family. I presently have no pet dog and I rue this deficiency daily; a family is incomplete without a dog and happily a neighbour has a crossbreed Peke and Pomeranian .called Toufa (Tufty) whose antics give us endless pleasure. When we lead a less peripatetic existence we will make this addition to the family.

I have in my time had a West Highland White Terrier, a Yorkie, an Elkhound and a Peke, all splendid companions. An old friend of mine recommends Flat-coated Retrievers but really I prefer a lap-dog whose exercise requirements are modest.

I therefore choose a Yorkshire Terrier. Our old Yorkie was grandly called Wellington (Welly to his friends) and he often occupied a ledge on an upstairs oriel window from which he observed the London street scene with a baleful eye like a Leeds businessman. When I hove into view, returning from my labours in the City, he was transformed, rushing to the door like a bullet, doing handsprings and wagging his tail frantically. What a welcome and what generous affection – he drove away all the cares of the world!  

A Yorkshire Terrier

                          

SMD

25.08.13

Text Copyright ©Sidney Donald 2013