Surely everyone is glad to be home, wherever you’ve been, after a long absence. Home is knowing where the tea bags are. I had a purpose again, organising the whole place and picking up where we left off. But I was easily overwhelmed at such times. My mother used to say she usually felt I had the water right up to my neck. I am afraid she was right.
Eric and the children nestled back into their familiar routines easily while I was dealing with new situations. Our overgrown garden sparked an interest in horticulture for the first time, although I was ignorant of plant names in English or Latin. So I began my own little agrarian reform, making the usual mistakes of planting big things in front of little ones. But I developed a complete new passion for growing old roses, especially French ones like ‘Zephirine Drouin’, ‘Albéric Barbier’ and, after my mother died, I planted a ‘Louise Odier’ near the house. The colours, names and smells intoxicated me. I automatically acquired a new subject of conversation, as it turned out that loads of people loved French roses too.
We also found ourselves with an adorable distraction, having somehow acquired a cat who insisted on belonging to us. She just waltzed into our lives one day and none of us wanted to part with her. We put a notice on a lamp post outside, but nobody claimed her. We decided on the name of Ticlio, after that highest pass in Peru, though when I had taken her to the vet it turned out she was a female and her permanent name became Ticlia. She was a most handsome tabby cat with four snow-white patches on her nose, chin, neck and paws. She had a good character and was not difficult – although she hated laughter, which was a hoot, and was easily annoyed by recorder playing. She knew Eric was the important one because he made the least fuss over her. Ticlia was loved by us all – she never got lost and was with us for fifteen years.
My life seemed to be at a watershed. My family continued their normal lives while I began to do things I’d never done before. I enrolled in an ILEA (Inner London Education Authority) recorder evening class where I met a set of completely new people. Our first teacher, Peter Wadland, was a delight, and extremely talented. His day job was running the Early Music repertoire for Decca Records. It was his ultra enthusiasm that got us going. He would actually jump up a little, saying, ‘Yes, that’s good. Please let me hear it again. One more time.’ It was a long evening for me. Early shepherd’s pie for the family, then a dash down to Marylebone Grammar School for the recorder class, over two hours of playing, and then off to the local pub. I did not want to miss out on the instalments of everyone’s weekly updates. We made a very satisfactory group.
*
It was wonderful to see our dear friends again after half a year away. Several have already cropped up in previous chapters. As always, many stemmed from Cambridge. They were all sophisticated and could get along well with anyone. In our core circle were Gabriele and Noel Annan, Neal and Isabel Ascherson, Paul and Sally Barker, Leslie Bethell, Nick and Rosaleen Butler, Linda Colley and David Cannadine, Cynthia and Roderick Floud, Roy and Aisling Foster, Michael Frayn, Catherine and Erich Fried, Jack Goody, Richard and Vivien Gott, Felicity Guinness, John and Sheila Hale, Francis and Larissa Haskell, Bruce Hunter and Belinda Hollyer, Ian Hutchinson, Nicholas Jacobs, Martin Jacques, Helena Kennedy, Marina Lewycka, Brenda and John Maddox, Karl and Jane Miller, Juliet Mitchell, Gaia and Hugh Myddleton, Kathy Panama, Ruth Padel, Stuart and Anya Proffitt, Emma Rothschild, Garry and Ruth Runciman, Joseph and Anne Rykwert, Donald Sassoon, Graeme Segal, Stephen and Tia Sedley, Amartya Sen, Leina and André Schiffrin (when in London), Jean Seaton, Yolanda Sonnabend, Vanessa and Hugh Thomas, Claire Tomalin, Marina Warner, Dorothy Wedderburn and John Williams, Lindy and Robert Erskine.
Just looking at this list makes me smile. This is the core group we drew from, but it was interspersed with others all the time, often depending on who was in London.
In the seventies, dinner parties were the norm, usually with eight to ten at the table. Cookery books, especially Elizabeth David, were all the rage. I spent a lot of the time on the telephone, organising who would fit well together. I would think nothing of phoning Jack Goody in India, where he could easily be, if not answering his phone in Cambridge. Eric would have liked the dinners to take place once a month, but then he only saw to the wine. Gradually, towards the naughty nineties, it became more popular to throw larger parties for more people, which were sometimes catered for professionally. I suppose as we grew older, we all made more and more friends.
At our dinner table, we wanted to talk without noise or muzak: conversation is all. If the ambience is right – informal, casual – then people are relaxed enough for freer talk and might come out with things they’ve never said before or thoughts they are still formulating. In any case, there was much chatter among the chattering classes on whatever was current – I liked it best when one conversation was happening around the table. The food was as casalingo as possible. No posh things en gelée or shaped food en cocotte, just simple, familiar and plentiful dishes, mainly dependent on the weather. Three courses was the usual custom. In the seventies guests still expected cheese or savoury after puddings, but was eventually phased out.
Sometimes I made food that could be laid out for a buffet and people helped themselves. It’s nice for guests to get up, and in England everyone feels comfortable queuing. I remember a dinner party when, completely out of character, I said, ‘Oh, now we’re older we seem to talk more about food; we used to talk about sex.’ Gaby’s response was: ‘Well, Marlene, think of the varieties. Take spaghetti alone … alle vongole, al pomodoro, all’amatriciana, al’arrabiata, bolognese …’
I am no longer sure when the children stopped wanting to play host, mingle and hand out olives to the guests; I suspect Julia (who was more gregarious) enjoyed it for longer than Andy. As they entered their teenage years, their interests were beginning to shift. Julia was spending her time with friends but still singing in the school choir. Andy began learning the guitar and often had an expression on his face that seemed to say, ‘Hey, why am I not skateboarding in California?’ No longer little children and not yet adults, they were coming into their own.
At some point, Clough Williams-Ellis had decided to restore and refurbish the 16th c farmhouse of Parc Farm. It was part of a larger farm complex consisting of a grand manor house, two big barns and a beautiful small pond beside the farmhouse. It was just about a mile down the Croesor Valley from our cottage Bryn Hyfryd. Waiting for the restoration to finish, it would be two years before we could move into this larger and more romantic house called Parc. Clough had left a tree growing out of an attic room. By now it was so tall, Eric had an extra clause inserted into our lease in case it toppled over in a storm (all of this to the dismay of our lawyer). It was not a cosy home, but we fought the damp and slowly adapted. It had so much character and style. We were still in Snowdonia National Park, and as before, still going on our usual, wonderful walks as well as discovering new ones.
After the commotion of moving house on a fine sunny day, I caught a glimpse of Andy and Samantha Campbell-Jones going for a walk hand in hand. This was a big surprise for me, but their innocence was so sweet. When the children were younger, Eric and I agreed that he would deal with religion and I would deal with sex – but when the time came with Andy, I felt it was Eric’s territory and I wanted him to have a hand-on-shoulder chat (even though on this occasion it wasn’t necessary). Samantha was one of two lovely daughters of a charming family who were great friends of Dorothy and Walter and often spent their holidays in the Croesor Valley.
We were now a few metres away from Dorothy and Walter, who had moved in to the gatehouse of Parc Farm. Their youngest child, Zac, used to sit outside, where Eric was kept busy chopping much-needed wood for our damp indoors. Many conversations would take place between Eric and the toddler. Once, when Zac repeated something to his dad, Walter asked, ‘Who told you that?’ to which Zac replied, ‘The woodcutter!’ pointing towards Eric.
The farmer, Dai Williams, looked after vast numbers of sheep, but no longer any other animals. Whenever coming into conversation with him, Eric would end up unconsciously speaking in a Welsh accent for a while. He had a habit of doing this; the same would happen speaking to the local garage owner, or asking ‘Where ya from?’ of a New York taxi driver. I didn’t mind, but it was entertaining to see how embarrassed the children were. Quite often we three had a good laugh at Eric’s droll and eccentric character.
I remember a fine summer weekend when our friends Amartya Sen, the economist, and his wife Eva Colorni came to stay. Eva was for many years my closest friend. She was an Italian economist and teacher, as well as a very domestic and intimate person. She was totally involved with her family and children, Indrani and Kabir. Her death from cancer, when the children were young, was the most shocking thing in my life. Even though Eva was my best friend, I did give Cupid a very small hand in helping Amartya get together with his new wife, Emma Rothschild. I felt Emma was the best thing for him, and the children. In the end, their happiness is what Eva would have wanted most. And so it proved to be.
Before we knew it, both our children were desperate to start life and the ‘awkward teenage’ years were now upon us. Andy was ambiguous about staying on at school, and continuing with more exams. We were not tiger parents and we never wanted to push them; as Andy recalled, ‘I remember that Dad was so keen for us not to feel pressure of following in his footsteps,’ but for fear of doing this ‘he put no pressure on us at all to go to university’. Clearly, we had taken our eyes off the ball. Eric and I felt higher education could be delayed until later in life if necessary, but we insisted they must at all costs get their A levels.
Eric took the initiative and decided to send a lost and muddled Andy to a sixth-form college called Bransons, split between a first year in Canada near Montreal and a second year back in the UK in Ipswich, which did wonders. He really wanted to go to Canada and their outdoors programme seemed very enticing for him. He came home a confident young man with three A levels under his belt and with many friends of both genders. I remember my mother being very impressed that Eric had put all his principles against private education aside and did what he felt was right for his son. Upon reflection, it could have been in part his original school, William Ellis, who overdid their disappointment that the ‘son of Eric Hobsbawm’ was falling short of their academic expectations. Andy recently admitted that ‘if someone had said to me that university is a unique opportunity for learning and forming memorable life experiences and making lifelong friends, I might have considered it differently’ Julia was different: she did want to go to university, but somehow did very badly in her A levels and did not get anything like the required grades to read English literature at Sussex University. This was an enormous shock to her. She was very disappointed indeed, but on reflection she felt that during school she had been intellectually underrated by her teachers, who deterred her from applying to prestigious institutions. Julia admitted this dented her confidence and caused her to ‘stop trying a bit’ with her A levels.
Instead she attended the Polytechnic of Central London to read Italian and French, but never enjoyed it. Among other reasons, she found herself surrounded by mature students while she herself was only seventeen. She decided not to continue and began working at the student union, where she fell in love with the union president, Alaric Bamping. Andy remembers feeling both concerned and impressed at receiving letters from Julia while he was travelling. She wrote about student protests organised by Alaric (was there perhaps a resemblance to her daddy?), where everyone barricaded themselves into the student union building for days on end. So, the older brother was looking out for his little sister, just like my brother Victor did for me.