Patience Strong

Speaker 10:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For rights reasons we've had to shorten the music.

Speaker 10:24

Unfortunately, this programme, recorded in 1966, is missing Roy Plumney's original introduction.

Speaker 10:31

Roy's Castaway in this edition is the poet Patience Strong.

Presenter0:36

Remind you of the past, cheer you up, what?

Patience Strong0:41

To remind me of England, and to evoke memories of home.

Presenter0:45

What's the first one?

Patience Strong0:47

For the first one.

Patience Strong0:48

would be The Creed, sung by the Russian Metropolitan Church Choir of Paris.

Presenter0:53

Why do you choose this?

Patience Strong0:55

Well, because I think it would be such a good thing to start the day with a great affirmation of faith.

Presenter1:40

Yeah, nobody's just

Presenter2:05

The Grechaninov setting of the Creed, sung by the Russian Metropolitan Church Choir in Paris.

Presenter2:11

What's your second choice?

Patience Strong2:13

Well, I think it will be necessary to establish some sort of routine on the island.

Patience Strong2:18

And I should like to have my grammophone sessions to hourly. Mm-hmm.

Presenter2:22

Uh

Patience Strong2:22

So by this time it would be eight o'clock.

Presenter2:25

You got up a

Patience Strong2:26

Oh yes, at s at six. I had the Creed at six, you see. So the next one would be at eight o'clock.

Patience Strong2:31

And uh I think I should like to

Patience Strong2:36

sort of confirm my identity.

Patience Strong2:40

My nationality.

Patience Strong2:42

And remember that although I was on this desert island, I was still a subject of Queen Elizabeth.

Patience Strong2:49

Which brings me, of course, to the coronation.

Patience Strong2:52

I should like to relive the wonderful memories of the Coronation Day.

Patience Strong2:57

So I've chosen the record.

Patience Strong3:00

the uh procession with the regalia.

Patience Strong3:02

at the entrance into the church.

Speaker 33:26

Her Majesty the Queen has made her humble adoration before the altar.

Speaker 33:31

She has knelt in prayer at the fall stool set before the chair of his state.

Speaker 33:36

On the south side of the altar.

Speaker 33:38

and is now seated in her chair.

Speaker 33:41

The communion vessels have been placed upon the altar.

Speaker 33:45

the pattern carried by the Bishop of London, and the chalice borne by the Bishop of Wichester.

Speaker 33:51

and, too, the Bible borne by the Bishop of Nottage.

Speaker 33:55

The Archbishop who stands by the altar receives from the lords who have carried them in procession.

Speaker 34:00

The regalia.

Presenter4:01

Uh

Presenter4:01

An excerpt from the Coronation Service and the Voice of John Snagg.

Presenter4:06

Miss Strong, where were you born?

Presenter4:07

Uh

Patience Strong4:07

In love

Presenter4:08

Do you come from a literary family?

Patience Strong4:10

No.

Patience Strong4:12

No, my.

Patience Strong4:13

Sister used to write verses, she used to publish them in magazines. My brother wrote

Patience Strong4:18

Stories, but um

Patience Strong4:20

I think that sort of thing is catching and finally really.

Presenter4:23

At school, what was it your first ambition to be?

Patience Strong4:26

Well, when I was very young I wanted to be a dancer, but later I was determined to become a novelist.

Presenter4:32

Mm-hmm. When did you start writing verse?

Patience Strong4:35

Oh, always. I can't remember a time when I didn't write verse.

Presenter4:39

When was your first poem published?

Patience Strong4:41

I just couldn't remember, but um

Presenter4:43

As a young girl at school,

Patience Strong4:45

Oh yes oh yes early teens. I was publishing verses in magazines and

Presenter4:56

Def.

Presenter4:57

When you left school, did you do a regular job? Did you start a career?

Patience Strong5:00

Well, you see, I wanted to get experience uh for this novel that I hoped I was going to write.

Patience Strong5:06

So I went to a commercial school and I learnt typing.

Patience Strong5:10

And um I typed out a novel for Paul Trent.

Presenter5:14

Uh

Patience Strong5:14

the novelist. And of course that was very good experience. And at the same time I was under contract with a music publisher for songs.

Speaker 15:23

Yeah.

Patience Strong5:23

And I used to write scripts in uh verse.

Patience Strong5:27

for a firm of talkie publicity.

Presenter5:29

Mm-hmm.

Patience Strong5:30

Also, of course, magazines.

Presenter5:32

When did you start your famous Quiet Corner feature?

Patience Strong5:35

Ah, that was in nineteen thirty five.

Presenter5:37

How did it start?

Patience Strong5:40

Well I

Patience Strong5:41

Went along to Mr. Nicholson's office, he was the editor then, and the Daily Mirror, yes.

Speaker 15:44

Uh

Presenter5:44

Yeah.

Patience Strong5:46

And um

Patience Strong5:48

I said, Well, what about this for a daily feature? He liked the idea very much.

Patience Strong5:53

And he said, Well, can you do me another eighteen verses, so we've got a few in hand.

Patience Strong5:58

I said yes, so I

Patience Strong6:01

went home and I did the verses, and I took them the next day, and that launched it, you see, and it ran for ten years without a break.

Presenter6:06

You can

Presenter6:08

Yes, and after ten years with the Daily Mirror you move to the Sunday Mirror. Yes. And you also write verses for one of the weeklies.

Patience Strong6:15

Yes, for a woman's weekly.

Patience Strong6:17

and the Johannesburg Sunday Times.

Presenter6:21

Would I be right in guessing that Patient Strong is not your real name?

Patience Strong6:25

Note

Presenter6:26

Uh Uh

Patience Strong6:26

It's a pen.

Presenter6:27

Why did you choose this particular worm?

Patience Strong6:29

Well, I was wanting a suitable name for the quiet corner feature.

Patience Strong6:35

And a friend gave me a book called Patience Strong.

Patience Strong6:39

It was an old American book.

Patience Strong6:41

By Mrs. Whitney. And of course it was the very.

Patience Strong6:44

Name that.

Patience Strong6:46

I was looking for it. It was just what I wanted.

Presenter6:49

Let's have your third record now. What next?

Patience Strong6:53

Ah, the third record would be at ten o'clock, wouldn't it, in the morning?

Patience Strong6:57

By ten o'clock it would be beginning to be very hot, I should imagine.

Patience Strong7:02

And I think I should start to think about an English winter.

Patience Strong7:06

and to try and visualize.

Patience Strong7:08

the snow and the frosted filigree of leaves and twigs.

Patience Strong7:14

And thinking of winter, of course, would remind me of Christmas.

Patience Strong7:18

And I should remember

Patience Strong7:21

The Christmas

Patience Strong7:23

Eve memories when my husband and I used to sit

Patience Strong7:26

By the log fire in our Sussex Cottage.

Patience Strong7:29

and we used to try and get all our jobs over by three o'clock in the afternoon.

Patience Strong7:33

so that we could sit quiet.

Patience Strong7:36

and listen to the broadcast from King's College Chapel at Cambridge.

Patience Strong7:41

That would be my

Patience Strong7:43

Uh record the nine lessons and uh carols. Mm-hmm.

Presenter7:47

Which carol would you like to hear?

Patience Strong7:48

Well, I think

Patience Strong7:50

The Processional, once in Royal David City.

Presenter8:49

The choir of King's College Chapel, Cambridge, once in Royal David City.

Presenter8:54

Miss Strong, you've been writing your quiet corner feature, sometimes daily and sometimes weekly, for over thirty years. How many poems does that mean? Have you any idea?

Patience Strong9:03

Oh no, I'm not very good at arithmetic.

Presenter9:05

Thousand

Patience Strong9:05

Thousands. Yes.

Presenter9:07

Now how do you write them? You tell us you wrote eighteen overnight when you started for the mirror.

Presenter9:12

Do you write them in batches or is it a a daily?

Presenter9:15

Stint.

Patience Strong9:16

Well, I do them daily. I try to keep office hours, and I usually send them.

Patience Strong9:20

Weekly using as well.

Presenter9:21

Do you write in long hand or straight onto what I'm saying?

Patience Strong9:23

Go straight on to the typewriter.

Presenter9:25

Looking back through your scrapbook over thirty years, has your style changed very much?

Patience Strong9:29

Yes, it has.

Presenter9:30

In what way do you think?

Patience Strong9:32

Well, I think really they were.

Patience Strong9:36

simpler in the old days, because

Patience Strong9:40

Public taste has changed. I mean, people are different. It's a different world really, isn't it?

Presenter9:43

Isn't it?

Presenter9:45

Now you publish many books of poems. Are these mainly collections or are they fresh material?

Patience Strong9:50

Oh, yeah, they're they are reprints of things that have already appeared, you see, in periodicals.

Presenter9:54

And they come out twice a year.

Patience Strong9:56

Yes.

Presenter9:56

You have written prayers books as well.

Patience Strong9:58

Yes. Well, The Kingdom Within, devotional books, you know, and I did once write a book on gardening.

Presenter10:05

You also write verses for greeting cards.

Patience Strong10:07

Yes, and calendars.

Presenter10:09

There's a constant note of optimism through all your poems. You're not really in step with other contemporary versifiers who take a gloomier view.

Presenter10:18

Whom do you like among modern poets?

Patience Strong10:20

Well, I don't read very much modern poetry. I like the old poets.

Presenter10:24

School in particular.

Patience Strong10:25

Well, Browning

Patience Strong10:27

The Brontees.

Patience Strong10:29

Pete Shelley Wordsworth.

Patience Strong10:31

particularly the Nietzsche poets.

Presenter10:33

Yes.

Presenter10:34

Let's have your fourth record now. What time of day is it?

Patience Strong10:37

Well, it's twelve o'clock, probably the very hottest time of the day.

Patience Strong10:44

and I should be just longing for a cool shower to descend on that hot sand.

Patience Strong10:49

That would remind me of an English garden and I should

Patience Strong10:53

try to close my eyes and imagine myself to be seated

Patience Strong10:57

at an open window looking out on to a rain washed garden.

Patience Strong11:02

And um I think

Patience Strong11:05

The uh record I would choose for this particular session would be Gardens Under the Rain by Debussy.

Patience Strong11:12

Because I feel

Patience Strong11:13

that every note is a raindrop.

Patience Strong11:16

You know, you can feel the ecstasy of the flowers lifting up their faces to the rain, and the earth just drinking it up.

Presenter11:23

And who's to play it?

Patience Strong11:24

Walter Giesky.

Presenter12:30

Walter Giesekin playing Debussy's Gardens in the Rain.

Presenter12:34

Now, as you listen to that, you visualise this rainwashed garden. Where is your own garden, in Sussexstone?

Patience Strong12:40

No inkhead.

Presenter12:42

What are your hobbies, mister Rum, apart from gardening?

Patience Strong12:45

I haven't really many hobbies except, you know, reading and walking.

Presenter12:48

Yes. You travel a lot? Uh

Patience Strong12:50

No, no, I don't like travelling.

Patience Strong12:52

Uh

Presenter12:52

I am sure that many people take comfort from your writings. Do you get a lot of letters from your readers?

Patience Strong12:56

Yes, I do. In fact, I spend more time in answering letters than I do in writing verse.

Presenter13:01

If just one poem of yours was to survive,

Presenter13:04

Which one would you like it to be?

Patience Strong13:07

Well, I suppose it's really the verse that's really the most popular.

Patience Strong13:13

There's a little story attaching to that.

Patience Strong13:15

There were some people who built a little chapel in the Redwoods in California.

Patience Strong13:19

and they were wanting to find a verse they could have recorded.

Patience Strong13:26

and that it would be possible for anyone going into this little chapel of meditation to press a button and

Patience Strong13:32

Here, a record you see, and my verse came to them on a on a Christmas card, and it was just what they were wanting. So they had the record made and they sent it to me, but of course this was many years ago, before the war.

Presenter13:44

Can you recall the poem would you recite it for us?

Patience Strong13:46

Yes.

Patience Strong13:48

If you stand very still.

Patience Strong13:50

In the heart of a wood

Patience Strong13:52

You will hear many wonderful things.

Patience Strong13:56

The snap of a twig

Patience Strong13:58

and the wind in the trees.

Patience Strong14:00

and the whir of invisible wings.

Patience Strong14:04

If you stand very still,

Patience Strong14:06

in the turmoil of life,

Patience Strong14:08

And you wait.

Patience Strong14:10

For the voice from within you'll be led down the quiet ways of wisdom and peace.

Patience Strong14:16

In a mad world of sorrow and sin

Patience Strong14:20

If you stand very still.

Patience Strong14:23

and you hold to your faith.

Patience Strong14:26

You will get all the help that you ask.

Patience Strong14:29

You will draw from the silence the things that you need.

Patience Strong14:33

Hope.

Patience Strong14:35

and courage.

Patience Strong14:36

and strength for your task.

Presenter14:40

Thank you, Ms. Drone.

Presenter14:42

Well, back to music now.

Presenter14:44

Number five.

Patience Strong14:45

Now let me see. It's two o'clock, isn't it?

Patience Strong14:49

I probably had my lunch.

Patience Strong14:51

and feeling perhaps a little drowsy.

Patience Strong14:54

and perhaps this would be the moment to allow myself to indulge a few personal memories.

Patience Strong15:02

Now I believe in miracles.

Patience Strong15:04

And I think that one of the greatest miracles in life

Patience Strong15:08

Is love at first sight

Patience Strong15:10

I think it's something far more wonderful than a sputnik.

Patience Strong15:14

You can explain launching a rocket to the moon.

Patience Strong15:18

Bay, sales, technology.

Patience Strong15:21

But

Patience Strong15:22

You can't explain the miracle of affinity.

Patience Strong15:26

It doesn't happen to everyone, but it happened to me.

Patience Strong15:32

I was leaning one day on the wall of a jetty.

Patience Strong15:35

looking down into the water.

Patience Strong15:38

On the island of Anglesey.

Patience Strong15:41

by the many straits, with the lovely Snowdon Range, you know, across the water.

Presenter15:45

What are you doing?

Patience Strong15:47

and I saw a little boat approaching.

Patience Strong15:51

And uh

Patience Strong15:52

That little boat was sailing right into my life.

Patience Strong15:56

and I knew it was for ever.

Presenter15:59

This was your husband who was to be in their bed.

Patience Strong16:01

Yeah.

Presenter16:03

So what is the record that

Presenter16:05

reminds you of that very eventful day in your life.

Patience Strong16:09

Well, you see, that night there was a dance up at the hotel.

Patience Strong16:12

And um Wonderful One was a very popular song in those days, and we bribed the um pianist to play it over and over again for us.

Patience Strong16:24

That would be my record.

Presenter16:25

My wonderful one, whatever I'm dreaming.

Presenter16:33

Is love white gleaming I see

Presenter16:41

My wonderful one, to my heart I would mull you.

Presenter16:50

Forever to the holy

Presenter16:56

David Whitfield singing Wonderful One.

Presenter16:59

And what's your next record?

Patience Strong17:01

Well, as I would be the only human being on the island, I should have to people it with creatures of my imagination.

Patience Strong17:08

Angels and Fairies.

Patience Strong17:09

Well, we've had the angels, and now it's time for the fairies.

Patience Strong17:13

And that brings me to the incidental music to Midsummer Night's Dream.

Patience Strong17:17

'Cause that would evoke such lovely memories for me of Stratford on Eve and the old Vic.

Patience Strong17:22

and the open air theatre at Regents Park.

Patience Strong17:26

I think it's the most enchanting music because you can almost hear the wings of the fairies fluttering in and out of the notes of the violins.

Presenter18:38

The schizo from Mendelsohn's Midsummer Night's Dream Incidental Music.

Presenter18:43

The Concert Gebar Orchestra of Amsterdam.

Presenter18:47

The strong, how practical a person are you?

Presenter18:49

How would you manage on this desert island?

Patience Strong18:53

Well, I suppose I should

Patience Strong18:56

Be able to just look after myself, but um I'm not very practical really. I'm not very good at

Presenter19:02

What is made of meat?

Patience Strong19:04

Well, I'm just hoping there'd be lots of fruit, you know, and

Patience Strong19:08

coconuts and dates and things like that, you know. I'm hoping that would be sufficient to maintain life.

Presenter19:13

If some kind of craft was washed up, if you found a raft

Presenter19:18

Would you try to escape?

Patience Strong19:19

No, I don't think I would, because I'd be rather afraid of shocks, you see. I think I'd rather wait for the ship.

Patience Strong19:25

that I would hope would come.

Presenter19:27

What do you mean to live in? Could you build a shelter?

Patience Strong19:32

Probably.

Patience Strong19:33

Yes, probably I'd get a few branches and

Patience Strong19:36

Make some sort of a

Patience Strong19:38

little tent for myself.

Presenter19:41

Right, record number seventies.

Patience Strong19:44

Well, seven. That brings us to six o'clock.

Patience Strong19:46

And it would remind me of six o'clock back home.

Patience Strong19:51

Going to the little village church for even song.

Patience Strong19:55

And that is why

Patience Strong19:57

My seventh record.

Patience Strong19:59

would be Evensong.

Patience Strong20:02

Sung by the choir of King's College, Cambridge.

Patience Strong20:06

I choose this because

Patience Strong20:08

I love Stanford's Magnificat in G.

Speaker 120:18

My sent affect me five or more And my stir is ever joyous encouraged my soul.

Speaker 120:50

I'll have to. Oh drink.

Speaker 320:53

I'm on my way.

Speaker 121:05

What is that?

Presenter21:13

Stanford's Magnificat in G.

Presenter21:16

Sung by the King's College Chapel Choir, Cambridge. Now we come to your last record. What's that going to be?

Patience Strong21:23

Well, I think this would have to be my bedtime record. It would be eight o'clock, you see.

Patience Strong21:27

I think I'd like to end the day on a note of hope.

Patience Strong21:30

and I'd like to think of a song that I wrote during the war.

Patience Strong21:35

I was in an airage shelter with my friend the pianist Hero Durance.

Patience Strong21:40

And I remember she said to me, I wonder what sort of a world it's going to be after all this is over.

Patience Strong21:46

And I said, Well, somewhere over the hill there's a new world waiting to be bought.

Patience Strong21:51

And she said, Ah, that's a good title for a song.

Patience Strong21:54

So we got out our paper and pencils and we wrote the song, and Richard Talba recorded it.

Presenter22:00

And that's what you like to hear.

Patience Strong22:01

Uh

Patience Strong22:02

Somewhere.

Speaker 322:14

Of the reach in the thin flamber of the Lord.

Presenter22:20

There are golden acres and silver streams. There are fields of plenty when the sunlight gleams. On the glorious

Presenter22:33

Richard Tarway.

Presenter22:34

There you are eight records. If you would choose only one of them, which would it be?

Patience Strong22:39

I think a midsummer night's dr

Presenter22:40

Green.

Presenter22:41

and one luxury to take to the island with you.

Patience Strong22:44

Well, I think I would take a picture with me.

Patience Strong22:46

It's a lovely picture I have painted by an Indian.

Patience Strong22:49

of John leading Mary away from the scene of the crucifixion.

Patience Strong22:53

John is heavy eyed with weeping, and Mary is very calm.

Patience Strong22:57

with her hand on her brow.

Patience Strong22:59

The figures are depicted as Indian.

Presenter23:01

Mhm. And one book putting aside the Bible and Shakespeare.

Patience Strong23:05

Uh a complete words of

Presenter23:07

Right. And thank you, Patient Strong, for letting us hear your choice of desert island discs.

Patience Strong23:12

Thank you. Goodbye, everybody.

Presenter23:15

Goodbye everyone.

Speaker 323:28

The guest in today's recorded program was Patience Strong. The interviewer was Roy Plumley, and the producer, Monica Chapman.

Speaker 123:43

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Islandists Archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk/radio4.