Mustn't Grumble [Paperback]

 

 

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This is a cracking read. Bennett, with the advantage of returning to England after years of absence, is able to view the Country, and more importantly it's people with wisdom, honesty and, most importantly a great deal of humour.

Thankfully, he does not come to mock nor reinforce the "bettter in my day" attitude so prevelant in the poular press. He finds many things which will make you laugh out loud but there are also touching moments where some of the good people he meets shine through.

This is more than a travel book. In tracing the footsteps of Morton, Bennett has produced a brilliantly written, enthralling picture of England as she really is. Buy it, you will not be disappointed.

"Slough seems to have no definable edge ... Slough just sort of happens." - from MUSTN'T GRUMBLE

In 2005, expatriate author Joe Bennet returned to England, his birthplace, from his residence in New Zealand to literally and figuratively follow in the footsteps of H.V. Morton (In Search of England, 1926) and endeavor to discover the essence of contemporary England.

As a disclaimer here, I must tell you that England (and the rest of Great Britain) is my pet country of those that I've visited in my lifetime, and London is my favorite city in the world. Indeed, I read most of this book on my recent vacation there, and finished it on the plane home. So, I'm biased.

One who's read Morton's travel essay (as I have) and feels as affectionate about England (as I do) will soon realize Bennet's book won't be quite so warm and fuzzy when the author states early on that while Morton was a child of the Empire with a veneration for it, he himself, of a later generation born when the Empire had mostly crumbled away, has no such reverence. Despite his book's title, then, the author does grumble. For example, in describing the cluster of historically-themed, tacky tourist entrapments that Land's End has become, he grouses:

"None of these things pretend to be anything but froth. But this stuff purports to have some bearing on reality. It is a travesty of the past and of the present. It represents the divorce of language from meaning and the divorce of cosseted urban contemporary man from any sense of the actual world he lives in ... The place deserves bombing."

Then, there are his comments regarding a Boy Scout parade in Tavistock, less acerbic but no less perceptive:

"There was something brave about the parade, but also something half-hearted. It felt like the tail-end of a long tradition, born of the deeply strange Baden-Powell, and the relief of Mafeking, and stout Victoria, and an unswerving belief in Empire. Morton was part of all that. It's what gives him his buoyancy. But it has dwindled now to almost nothing, the moral mainstream reduced to a quiet backwater."

I'll jump ahead to admit now that I'm awarding MUSTN'T GRUMBLE five stars. Why? Because, for all his disenchantment, Bennet is right on - and with engaging wit. Indeed, what is perhaps the author's finest moment is given account on page 157 (of the paperback), whereon is described his encounter, or, more accurately, non-encounter, with a woman walking her dog across the meadows near Bradford-on-Avon. It's one of the finest pieces of self-deprecatory humor I've ever read.

England has changed noticeably even in the last thirty-five years since I first visited. Whereas in 1975 the souvenir display at Salisbury Cathedral was nothing more than a rickety table of postcards set-up in the shadowy north aisle manned by a volunteer, now it's a huge emporium tacked-on to the side of the church that sells religious and cathedral-themed junk of all sorts. As the author observes:

"Cathedrals strive so hard to deny that they've become theme parks. Salisbury Cathedral is typical, in refusing to charge an entry fee. Instead you pay a four-quid 'donation'. The dean and chapter appease their God and assuage their guilt by waiving the donation on Sundays. But it isn't a donation, of course. If it were, I wouldn't have paid it."

I can personally attest that as of October 11, 2010 the "donation" had reached five pounds ten. I paid it.

However, amidst all that Bennet finds discouraging in present-day England, his spirits were sporadically restored, and therefore mine also:

"I sometimes wonder whether I am alone in liking the English climate. It provides the occasional exciting extreme, the phew-what-a-scorcher heat wave, the nation-stopping dump of snow, but generally it provides a temperature you can do things in, a soft light and the ceaseless swing of the seasons. Put me in the endless sun of California or Brisbane and I'd soon be screaming for drizzle." (From here in Southern California, I hear ya!)

And, near Trebetherick, he becomes almost poetic:

"I climb Bray Hill beside the golf course to find a view as sweet as strawberries. The sea comes in from the north between dark heads, and past an off-centre island. On the far shore, waves feather a sandy beach, and Cornwall stretches away behind in greenly gentle slopes before dissolving into greyish watercolor distance. A clump of indefinite buildings to the south must be Padstow. The sands of Trebetherick bay reflect a shimmering hazy sky. A skylark does its invisible tuneful stuff and beside me where I sit, a clump of cowslips droops, the flowers the color of cheap margarine, the leaves a grayish crinkled wad. And I feel strongly that this is good. Part nostalgia, part literature, part clean air and sky and sea and grass and solitude, entirely good."

I love the author for this paragraph. I've felt the same so many times at various locales around the island.

I don't know if I shall ever get back to England (and Wales and Scotland). I hope to; the desire is there. But, as I age, health and energy will wane. However, like Morton, I remain the incurable romantic when it comes to this green and pleasant land; I fancy it so. As Morton wrote within IN SEARCH OF ENGLAND:

"... there rose up in my mind the picture of a village street at dusk with a smell of wood smoke lying in the still air and, here and there, little red blinds shining in the dusk under the thatch. I remembered how the church bells ring at home, and how, at that time of year, the sun leaves a dull red bar low down in the west, and against it the elms grow blacker minute by minute. Then the bats start to flicker like little bits of burnt paper and you hear the slow jingle of a team coming home from the fields ... When you think like this, sitting alone in a foreign country, you know all there is to learn about heartache."

Comparisons with Bill Bryson are inevitable, but so what? There are many different ways to approach similar topics, as witness the vast number of travelogues written over the decades/centures by people wandering through Britain. This is the down-market, rather grubbier version of Bryson. I have lived outside the UK about as long as Bennett, and bought the book during a layover at Gatwick, looking for another Brit's view on England from afar, but from the moment I read about Bennett trying to hitchhike in England - come on, is he really that far out of touch? - I knew this was going to be uninspiring. And it is; in fact, it is downright depressing, and shows many of England's warts with few (other than wistful reflections about the scenery) of its pleasures. Bennett seems to talk to very few people outside pubs, those he does come across are mainly either rude or wishing they could leave England or commenting on how the place is going to the dogs, and he offers little insight into the way England thinks, or how he now sees things after 20 years away. It's funny in parts, but bleak in many more.

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1.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing read

Overall a very disappointing read. Having moved to NZ myself 3 years ago, but having visited much of the UK, I can't see the need to spend 3/4 of the time writing about the... Read more

Published 19 months ago by Lloyd Bower

1.0 out of 5 stars Morton
Even this author found Morton lacking in authenticity and did not complete his travels in the time allotted. Vide Michael Bartholomew.

Published 22 months ago by C. A. Snodgrass

2.0 out of 5 stars Why bother?
As evidenced by this book; Joe Bennett is no Bill Bryson and no Pete McCarthy, heck; he's not even a Tony Hawkes! Read more

Published on 19 Feb 2009 by Captain Pugwash

4.0 out of 5 stars Why compare?
Bennett does not set out to be another Bryson so why compare him to that author's works? Taken on his own merits, for me he creates a bittersweet tentative and occasionally very... Read more

Published on 11 Dec 2008 by Derek Massey

5.0 out of 5 stars Musn't Grumble 'bout Mustn't Grumble
Very enjoyable read. It just shows how we have changed into the paranoid nation that we are here in Britain allowing the politicians, the press and reality TV to dictate our... Read more

Published on 10 Mar 2008 by Dr. David G. Harries

1.0 out of 5 stars Ironic title
I had high hopes for this book. An Englishman who lived into adulthood in the UK then spent years overseas comes back to the UK. Read more

Published on 14 Sep 2007 by catsatcastle

1.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing
This book was a disappointment throughout. Bennett obviously wanted to follow Morton's trip but it's a shame this his journey had to have so many literary connections. Read more

Published on 7 Sep 2007 by Stevie G

4.0 out of 5 stars Not as good as his first, but good
This book is a follow up to his Land of two Halves, which is a fine, fine book. If you wish to read a travel book entirely about the place and its culture this may not be for you... Read more

Published on 7 Sep 2007 by M. Smith

1.0 out of 5 stars don't buy it
This book is not about England; it is about the author's grumpy dissatisfaction with almost everything. Read more

Published on 5 Aug 2007 by The Sword of Truth

2.0 out of 5 stars In search of HV Morton
Ever since Bill Bryson's great Notes from a Small Island different travel writers have tried to do the same thing, and this one's the latest. Read more

Published on 25 July 2007 by Archy

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