Cornflower

Ladybird, ladybird

     The rest of the world may know this, but I discovered only yesterday that a lot of the artwork of Ladybird Books, so familiar from my childhood, is available to buy in print form or just to browse for nostalgia's sake (website here).

 

    As you see, I still have some of my old Ladybirds and what struck me on looking through them just now was the strong, serious emphasis on imparting knowledge, explaining something of the wider subject, and all without talking down - the books assume that children want to know these facts and they deliver them in a clear and straightforward fashion.

    But back to the pictures; here are the ones from my Trees book, a few from The Seashore, a range of Things to Make (remember potato printing?), and for a certain 'period cuteness', how about these? Go on, have a browse!

Postcards from Penguin

     Postcards from Penguin: 100 Book Jackets in One Box is a small treasure store of images, some familiar, some nostalgic, some strikingly modern for their age. I've chosen a few of the most attractive non-fiction covers here (you can see a sample of the poetry and fiction ones here), 

 

for instance, this 1957 knitting book (design by Heather Standring) - sixty patterns for 5/-!
 

This is A Book of Scripts from 1960, cover by Jan Tschichold.

 
I like this fresh and jolly 1946 cover.

 

The privations of the war years must have seen a run on practical manuals such as these!

Now, which to send to friends and which to keep?

Monroe or Bardot

      In an entry in The Ivington Diaries from mid-September, Monty Don writes "...I love dahlias. They are undiluted fun. The deep, dark ones are velvety and voluptuous like the inside of a bordello, and the bright, garish pinks, yellows and oranges have the 1950s sumptuous joyfulness of Monroe or Bardot.

 

They come as tight, minimal pompons of flower or clumsy starbursts of petal.

 

They can be childishly simple or mathematically complex.

 

They are busy plants, giving out more energy than almost any other."

I caught some of the Botanics' dahlias yesterday in what must be their last gasp of the season. They seem to illustrate Monty's words pretty well.

Persephone books and cakes - 2

    "I had a bit of a bake this morning," explained Mrs. Briggs. "... I was determined to give you a proper tea, because I don't suppose you get overmuch to eat where you are. Mrs. Chadwick looks as if she'd skimp you a bit."

In entertaining Jane Carter, the heroine of Dorothy Whipple's High Wages, Mrs. Briggs certainly has had a bit of a bake - as part of a huge spread she's made rock buns, jumbles, parkin and "oven-bottom cake".

     Fans of Mrs. Whipple will rejoice that Persephone Books have reprinted her 1930 novel about "a shop-girl-made-good", and for more on the book pop over to Dovegreyreader Scribbles and see what Lynne has to say. But don't go without having one of these rock buns first, because Jane Brocket has written the book's preface and it is Jane's recipe I've used here, and they are without doubt the best rock buns I've ever tasted!

     In her preface Jane points out that when Jane Carter goes to work in Chadwick's draper's shop as a junior assistant in haberdashery she is "living-in" staff, given bed and board but quite inadequate amounts of food, so she is permanently hungry. That accounts for the book's very frequent references to meals, from kippers (I hope they were Manx!) to Bury Simnel cake.

    But with Mrs. Briggs settled comfortably behind the teapot and Jane C. tucking in, all that remains is for me to say that if you have not yet read any Dorothy Whipple please remedy that without delay because she's far too good to overlook, and do try Jane B.'s rock buns at the first opportunity!

Don't let it get away!

    Back to pantries for a moment and do read Catherine's comment here, then if you want the book grab it while you can. You can get it directly from Catherine, or through Amazon or The Book Depository.

    Any secret 'pantry scoffers' out there? I have one here - Mr. C. is notorious for depleting the stash of chocolate in our pantry so that when I fancy a modest square or two I find there is none, and my grandfather was of similar stripe, disappearing into the pantry to polish off any cake which happened to be on the shelf leaving only a plate of crumbs.

I'm in the pantry

    Yes, I  bought the book! It's quite beautiful and just the spur I needed to make me re-organise my own pantry. It hadn't occurred to me that there is a whole 'pantry culture' out there, but there is and more power to it, and 'pantry aficionados' all have their own memories or references to share. I remember my grandmother's pantry, its flagstone floor, its shelving - some slate, some wood - the things she stored there from china and pans to the butter, cakes and so on. It faced north so it was always cool, and from its small window you could see the garden and beyond it, a glimpse of this place.

    The book's author, Catherine Seiberling Pond, has a blog appropriately titled ...in the pantry.

Cornflower Book Group 2009: Volumes 11 & 12

     "Floating upward through a confusion of dreams and memory, curving like a trout through the rings of previous risings, I surface. My eyes open. I am awake."

And -

"My dear wife Carrie and I have just been a week in our new house ... a nice six-roomed residence, not counting basement, with a front breakfast-parlour."

These are the opening lines of the book group's November and December titles respectively. To find out more click here.

Ripping yarns

     "There's more to knitting than getting it right first time, and not everyone can learn quickly. But adventures with yarn can be rewarding, soothing, creative and pleasing, and knitting is a skill most definitely worth acquiring."

So writes Jane Brocket in the 'Learn to Knit' section of her magical book Ripping Things to Do, and she cites My Naughty Little Sister Does Knitting by Dorothy Edwards as an example as the little girl knits a scarf for Mr. Cocoa Jones "who is the perfect recipient of her coaly, floury, multicoloured knitting and isn't in the slightest bit worried about the holes."

    I don't think Bernie the St. Bernard pictured here was bothered about any irregularities in the tiny scarf Harriet knitted for him a few years ago. Seeing me knit for the first time in ages, both my daughters wanted to have a go, so I took them to a yarn shop to choose their materials (and that was an experience in itself as they were bowled over by all the colours and textures), I showed them the basics and they got going. Harriet made the dog's scarf and has picked up the needles a few times since, but if she's anything like me when I was young, she'll have phases of enthusiasm for the craft, and that's fine - who knows what she'll do with it in the future.

   In her book, Jane goes on to give some practical advice for the beginning (or resuming) knitter, whether adult or child, most importantly that it's better to be taught by "patient demonstration" (my granny taught me when I was small), which failing, look at the how-to videos on the internet. Seeing someone else fashioning even the simplest thing from yarn and needles provides a strong creative impulse; in my experience, that's not be underestimated!

The Cornflower Book Group

     Anyone wanting to find out a bit about the CBG might care to read this short post.

Wisdom sits in places

    As I walked through the Botanical Gardens the other day I took pictures of colour: vivid blue salvia and ceratostigma, brilliant red dahlias, a border so full of rudbeckia that to the screwed up eye it resembled a field of sunflowers.

 

But looking at them now I find it is not the bold and bright and showy that I want to see because they were mere accessories: most of the garden was wearing autumn colours, and they were right for suit and fit.

 

So it is the subtle and subdued hues that the site dictates should represent it.

"Wisdom sits in places" is  - so I learn - a saying of the Western Apache, and Madeleine Bunting has used it as an epigraph in her book The Plot: A Biography of an English Acre. Her scope in the book is broad, though her canvas is narrow, but those words could apply equally well in the most general sense to looking and seeing and interpreting and understanding, no matter where we are.

The full Monty

  

     For all you Monty Don fans, here he is from the back of the book!

     But this is just an excuse to quote a passage from his diaries - which I am so enjoying. Not of the season, I grant you, but I loved this piece from May 1998 on 'Umbellifers', so here is an extract:

     "Sometimes England strikes you round the head like a cheap religious experience or a jolt of lust. Just now the cow parsley spins and spills along these border lanes under the shade of the May blossom like a good dream and I am riding it with the careless rapture of the dreamer. These greedy eyes that cannot look enough are me as a child wading chest high in cow parsley and calling out in joy, the feathery leaves delicately brushing my lips and eyelids and white coronets of tiny flowers smelling mustily familiar of something much older than me. Colour is reduced to just white clouds held by the hawthorn branches and a million white flowers gathered in one glance along a line of cow parsley with everything else in this piece of world a hundred tones of damp, glowing green. I do not believe there is a more beautiful sight on the planet. But only a ghost of this can be stored, which is why every spring these moments expand so astonishingly, catch our knowing weariness so completely by surprise."

He's back!

   

     Freddie has returned! Read all about it here.

Just acquired - 1

   I've had my eye on this for ages and now it's here - the serendipitous result of a quick stop at a bookshop while waiting for a dawdling daughter.

The Garden Book: 500 gardens in one very compact book. I'll give you a glimpse when I've had a chance to take it all in (if that's possible!).

Just acquired - 2 is here.

Today's (first) post ...

  

    .... would be equally at home here or on Cornflower Books, but I have chosen to put it there. I hope you'll take a look, even if you don't usually venture over to 'the other side'!

By the book(s)

    I was writing about Alexander McCall Smith's Corduroy Mansions the other day, and I mentioned the scene in which James and Caroline decide to bake Nigella's Lemon Gems. Despite the fact that our copy of How to be a Domestic Goddess has been very well used, that's one recipe from the book that we'd never tried, but as James describes the biscuits as "Heaven", I thought we'd better see if he is right.
Being otherwise engaged, I set my trusty assistant baker Harriet to work and she produced two batches - deliciously short, melting, sharply lemony, and utterly heavenly!