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Product Description
Product Description
Tennis Whites and Teacakes brings together the best of Betjeman's poetry, private letters, journalism and musings to present a fully rounded picture of what he stood for. From his arguments for new steel buildings to his amusement about the etiquette of village teashops, it reveals Betjeman not just as a sentimentalist but as a passionate observer with a wonderful sense of humour and an acute eye.
From the Author
I am the editor of the work on this CD and my name should be added to the credits - thus: "by John Betjeman (Author), Stephen Games (Editor), Charles Collingwood (Reader)". Thank you.
--This text refers to the Audio CD edition.
--This text refers to the Audio CD edition.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
46 of 47 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
What a delicious book! "Tennis Whites and Teacakes" gathers Betjeman's thoughts on a range of subjects from childhood and school to girls and boys, friends and aristocrats, war and peace, holidays and travel, and church and belief. And you get much more than you were expecting: there's his trademark sentimentality - but Betjeman thought that sentimentality was good, and that forces you to reconsider your preconceptions. Then again, it's much sharper and more sceptical about Englishness than you might have guessed. Betjeman, for all his snobbery and fogeyness, had a keen eye, and he saw - and saw through - a lot that the heritage industry now expects us to lap up uncritically. One other thing that's surprising is his enthusiasm for aspects of the modern world - stuff that we've always understood he disapproved of. In short, this huge tome is a treasury of surprises - a real eye-opener. And there's masses inside it that's very relevant today too - articles about bullying, about Oxford's gay culture in the 1920s, about his refusal to fly the flag during the last war, and about the difficulty of belief in God, for example. If you thought Betjeman was just a poet, then read this and you'll find he's just as entertaining and thought-provoking as a journalist, a diarist and a correspondent. This book is a must-buy for anyone who wants to understand the patron saint of Englishness and England's national spirit in the 20th century.
2 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
A great little book for 'anytime' reading. Nostalgic and thoroughly enjoyable as all this gentleman's work is. Thoroughly recommended!
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
1 review
Hymnal to taste...
3 April 2012
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
A Miss Sparrow, of London, in her review of this book wrote 'If you thought Betjeman was just a poet, then read this and you'll find he's just as entertaining and thought-provoking as a journalist, a diarist and a correspondent. This book is a must-buy for anyone who wants to understand the patron saint of Englishness...' remarking that it was a "delicious" read.
So it is.
One of the sub-sections of this edited collection (yet another fine job by Stephen Games) is titled Englishness and the pieces written by our "Patron Saint" are appropriate - on Teas, High Teas and even Dainty Teas and why Betjeman wished he was a Station Master. Not of British rail of course, but a `branch-line' in the country with rambling roses climbing the station's wall, two Clydesdales thumping aboard a van, the rattle of milk churns and the `crunch of steps on the gravel'. All vaguely remembered even in my generation. Another included piece is almost a hymn, from our Saint, on the old country railroads "The Great Western" with descriptions of it's great Pullman's service to Cornwall, it's sleepy branch lines and cuts and Betjeman's feeling that it was a privilege for him to have been born so early in the century (1906) that he was to enjoy it all.
It is, of course, on churches, cottages and old building that the Poet laureate waxes most lyrical - if he was a Patron Saint of anything it was the education - by poetry, prose, radio and television - of the British to encourage and support the preservation and renovation of fine old buildings - and of taste.
So it is.
One of the sub-sections of this edited collection (yet another fine job by Stephen Games) is titled Englishness and the pieces written by our "Patron Saint" are appropriate - on Teas, High Teas and even Dainty Teas and why Betjeman wished he was a Station Master. Not of British rail of course, but a `branch-line' in the country with rambling roses climbing the station's wall, two Clydesdales thumping aboard a van, the rattle of milk churns and the `crunch of steps on the gravel'. All vaguely remembered even in my generation. Another included piece is almost a hymn, from our Saint, on the old country railroads "The Great Western" with descriptions of it's great Pullman's service to Cornwall, it's sleepy branch lines and cuts and Betjeman's feeling that it was a privilege for him to have been born so early in the century (1906) that he was to enjoy it all.
It is, of course, on churches, cottages and old building that the Poet laureate waxes most lyrical - if he was a Patron Saint of anything it was the education - by poetry, prose, radio and television - of the British to encourage and support the preservation and renovation of fine old buildings - and of taste.
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