Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Writer and traveller, best known for her writings on colonial East Africa.
On the island
Eight records
The first disc is quite a light hearted one. I think one will need a little um cheering up sometimes on this island. I was very devoted to Cole Porter when I first did come back to Europe and uh caught up with it a bit.
Symphony No. 9 in E Minor, Op. 95, "From the New World": II. Largo
Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Rafael Kubelík
The second record is rather in my mind connected with my going to America soon after I came back to England.
George Gershwin with Paul Whiteman and His Orchestra
At this time it it was a sort of jazz age and one was very hooked on that.
Piano Concerto in A Minor, Op. 16Favourite
By that time I think my husband was very much more interested and knowledgeable about music than I was, and so I really learnt from him. We were both very fond of Grieg at that time
This is after the war then, I think. We were very fond of a a song called La Mer
The Planets, Op. 32: IV. Jupiter, the Bringer of Jollity
London Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Sir Adrian Boult
I thought a little jollity might be needed on the island.
Theme from The Flame Trees of Thika
My seventh record is a bit to remind me of the remote things you've just been mentioning, the Flame Trees, and uh this series which have been on television and a very attractive, I think, theme song was been written for it.
Philharmonia Orchestra, conducted by Otto Klemperer
When we one is on one's island, one obviously. really wants some good music and some classic music and so on.
In conversation
Presenter asks
0:54How much does music mean in your life?
Well, not as much as I wish it did, because um I think music, probably like other arts, is something that you really need to be exposed to when you're young. And having been brought up in uh East Africa, which in those days was you might describe it as a cultural desert, I should think, uh I never really heard any music. I think we did have a cracked old gramophone which played rather popular records or something. I don't think I really ever heard any proper music until I was about eighteen. So that I've never really caught up from that.
Presenter asks
2:06How did it come about that you spent a lot of your early life in East Africa?
Well, my parents went out there as uh settlers in nineteen twelve, I think, nineteen thirteen to um start um well, they were hoping to grow coffee. They did, in fact, grow coffee. As a sort of pioneers, as you were, in those days before the First World War. So it was all quite an adventure.
Presenter asks
2:26Did your father know anything about growing coffee?
Nothing about growing coffee. He did know something about Africa. He'd been in South Africa in the Boer War and he'd been uh, I think, looking for gold mines and things of that nature in in places like Mozambique and Rhodesia. So he was used to Africa. Coffee uh he didn't, but I then I think nobody else did. It was a a new crop and very few people had grown it, so it uh there were plenty of little booklets and leaflets published by the experts that told you what to do, and otherwise you had to just find out by the hard way.
The keepsakes
The book
The Collected Works of P. G. Wodehouse
P. G. Wodehouse
Well, I thought after Art of the Bible and Shakespeare one would want a little something light to to read of an evening, and uh I should like to take I don't know if I could take the collected works of PG Woodhouse.
The luxury
Camera with films and developing equipment
I think one could make a very fascinating record of the island.
Presenter asks
5:03What about your education?
Well, it was rather non-existent. That was really the trouble, as I was saying, about the music. Um, because uh there were no I mean, there was a school in Nairobi, but I didn't go to it until the very end. I just went for a year. Well, my mother used to teach me when she had time, and my father came in with a little instruction when he had time, and one or two neighbours came in because um one young man I think came was supposed to teach me Latin, but the only thing he really knew about was rugby football, so I learnt a great deal about that, which I've forgotten, but very little of anything else.
Presenter asks
14:27How did it come about that you were taken on to write the biography of Lord Delamere?
I had no background. Well, I think his widow just took a chance, you know. I think she thought somebody who knew Kenya has a background and had some experience in writing, if not books. Maybe she couldn't get anybody else.
Presenter asks
17:59Were you happy with the television series [of The Flame Trees of Thika]?
Yes, I was, really. I think they made a marvellous job of it. I think w one can always uh find fault with with things, you know, in certain ways. But I think it on the whole it was marvellous, and the photography was superb, and I think the little girls were super. And of course the scenery gorgeous, and the animals splendid.
“I don't think I really ever heard any proper music until I was about eighteen. So that I've never really caught up from that.”
“I did get myself sacked and got back as I intended. It wasn't ev difficult to get sacked in those days. Mostly mostly gambling on horse races, I think.”
“I wouldn't call gardening a recreation. I should call it more a torment most of the time. ... battle against various insects and things, not recreation.”
“Would you try to escape? Certainly not, under no circumstances, because I can't bear the sea being on it. And it always makes me sick. And I couldn't possibly build a boat. So I should just stay where I was until somebody came along, if they did.”