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Tudors, Me, and an Elusive Ghost

To begin with, a piece of news: I am the first person to feature on the Blog Spot this Thursday on Richard Fair’s programme on BBC Radio Manchester. You can read more about the feature, about Richard (who is also a blogger), and, of course, about our beloved BBC Radio Manchester that has recently won the Station of the Year award. As Richard says in his post, you can listen to the programme online at 2pm, with a chance to listen again after the programme.

Not content apparently with making me his first game, Richard is talking to me at Ordsall Hall – Manchester’s very own haunted Tudor mansion. Strictly speaking, when I say ‘Tudor’ I rather mean its exterior. The Hall itself dates back to as early as the 12th c., and its first long-term owners, the Radclyffe family, had occupied the building and the land approx. between 1335 and 1662. The best-known owners of the Hall of that time include Sir John Radclyffe, the hero of the Hundred Years’ War, whose motto – ‘Caen, Crecy, Calais’ – denoted his taking part in several pivotal battles at the beginning of war, which the English had won. Sir Alexander Radclyffe was the High Sheriff of Lancashire on four occasions. Margaret Radclyffe (d. 1599) was Queen Elizabeth’s favourite Maid of Honour.

The Hall, however, is better known for two other things. In 1861 it was commemorated by the novelist William Harrison Ainsworth. The novel called Guy Fawkes, or The Gunpowder Treason used Ordsall Hall as the set, where political intrigue and romance entwined. In particular, it introduced the character of Viviana Radclyffe, daughter of Sir William Radclyffe. According to the plot, John Catesby and Guy Fawkes came to Ordsall Hall to hide from King James’s pursuivants. There, while Fawkes was detailing out his plot to blow up the Houses of Parliament, John Catesby was wooing Viviana. To perfect the novel and to complete the legend, Ainsworth conjured the love triangle. He made the renowned Protestant scholar Humphrey Cheetham (whose statue you can see in the Manchester Cathedral) Viviana’s secret admirer. However, she was a Catholic, thus they could not marry. When the Hall was raided by the pursuivants, Cheetham had rescued Viviana, Catesby and Fawkes via an underpassage. He spent the rest of his life in solitude, ‘tinged by the blighting of his early affection’.

Secondly, the Hall is haunted. It is not exactly clear whose ghosts meet you at Ordsall, and what time these ghosts used to live when they were connected to their bodies. But the ghostcam has been working at the Hall for years, and, reportedly, the best time to try and see a ghost was on Saturday night. I must admit, I never tried to *catch* one. However, the photo below shows quite clearly that the Great Hall is indeed being well looked after (see a blueish shadow between the fireplace and a little table?)


[Courtesy of Ordsall Hall).

I shall try and take some pictures on Thursday when I go to Ordsall Hall. This will not be my first ever visit there. The first time I’ve been to the Hall was in July 2002, and, believe it or not, Ordsall Hall was my first ever Tudor mansion. Prior to that, I’ve only seen Tudor buildings in the books and on the photos on the web. My impression is that I was somewhat disturbed to go from a huge spacious Great Hall into a dim claustrophobic bedroom, whose ceiling was painted in dark-blue colour and decorated with gilded stars. The feeling of the sky coming down on you was almost palpable. As if that was not enough, the room was called ‘the Star Chamber’, because of the ceiling. Every Tudor historian would instantly remember that this was also the name of the Royal court that had existed between 1487 and 1641. Its meetings were held in secret, with no indictments, no right of appeal, no juries, and no witnesses.

I chose to specialise in Tudor history because I loved England, the English language and culture, and because I adored Medieval and Early Modern History, but wanted to be closer to the modern times, thus I opted to research into the 16th c. It was an absolutely amazing period of time, as far as I’m concerned. The geographical and scientific discoveries, Renaissance and Baroque, the beginnings of cartography and research into the Solar system, on the one hand, – and Reformation, the Wars of Religion, the Inquisition, and slavery, on the other. The co-existence of the opposites has made the 16th c. irresistibly attractive. I don’t think I would want to study any other time, had I been given the choice once again.

And now to something spooky

As I wrote before, I initially wanted to upload two photographs of the ghost. But when I was uploading the photo below, it only opened halfway, so the blueish figure in the dress with the train wasn’t seen. Now you can see it well, which either means that the ghost decided to show herself to my readers, or that some forces from the bigger world have intervened.

Whatever is the reason for such metamorphosis, it still proves, in the words of Krzysztof Kieslowski, the Polish cinema genius, that ‘something exists beyond this saucer’. Indeed, it does.

A Psychic Moment

‘Voxpops are not representative – it’s just a few people who stopped to talk to you on a rainy Friday afternoon‘ (an old journalistic adage).

It’s Thursday, but it’s been raining nonetheless (we’re in Manchester, after all). I sorted my headache out by interviewing my own GP about migraine management, and the last thing I needed to do was to collect some voxpops from those Mancunians who’d wish to chat to me about their migraine and headache experience.
Some people didn’t want to talk. Most of those who did never experienced either migraine or a severe headache (is that ever possible?) One young man who kindly decided to asnwer my question told me he didn’t suffer from any sort of migraine, but that he suffered from asthma instead. Unfortunately, we already covered asthma before.

Finally I saw this lady in a black-and-white stripy jumper walking towards me.

– How do you feel when you have a headache? – I asked.

She stopped and looked at me in amazement. She asked what it was for, then said that she’s currently suffering from a severe headache, which feels like a knife is being stuck in her head.

At the end of all this, when we still stood together in the street with me saving the file, my anonymous interviewee said:

– You know I’ve actually got this terrible migraine right now, and when you came up and asked me, I thought: how does she know? is she a psychic?

Morale: voxpops may not be representative, but they’re invaluable for getting an odd story or comment.

Ups and Downs (Researching For Academia And Media)

I love research. I adore it. There is nothing better than to look for something and to find it in the most unexpected place. For example, I’ve been following the fate of the late Sergei Bondarchuk‘s last film, Quiet Flows the Don, for years. I’ve read a lot about it, I’ve seen the trailer, and today I’ve found an absolutely wonderful interview with a famous Russian actor who’d worked on that film. And I’ve never found that interview before, and I never even knew it existed.

Being a media researcher made me realise that I’ve got incredible perseverance. Not that I didn’t know this before. Simply there is a difference between an academic research and a media research. When you’re visiting an archive, it obviously helps if your archivist is a nice accommodating chap (or an equally accommodating lady). But even when the archivist clearly treats you as an intruder or better else, as a hopeless uncultivated individual who’s got no right or chance to lay their eyes on a precious illuminated manuscript, your knowledge and confidence will make them surrender. In addition, there are printed and online catalogues of books and manuscripts, hence you can always catch your Dark Angel off guard by showing them that you know exactly what the library holds.

In media research, it’s a bit different. Being knowledgeable and reliable yourself is not enough if other people are not, especially those who are supposedly assisting you in your task at finding a contact. I’m deeply thankful to all reliable PRs and members of the public who’ve helped me in the past. I’ve managed to secure some wonderful interviewees for the programmes, but it’s only now that I’m exploring the dark side of the job. For the third week running I’ve been trying to find a medical professional to speak about migraine, and, to my huge amazement, still haven’t got anyone, except for a couple of doctors, whose secretaries are difficult to track down. Two organisations that I tried didn’t have a contact, and the third one is showing great deal of relaxation in not getting back with any kind of response. Thankfully, this is not urgent, and I have vowed to get this sorted by Thursday – it’s truly annoying otherwise.

My current mood – perplexed.
Music in my head – Elton John, I’m Still Standing

…Acclimatised!..

When I first came to England four years ago in mid-July, it’s been raining cats and dogs for two long weeks. It was very cold, plus I didn’t take any sweater with me and, being an incorrigible aesthet, I was frantically knitting myself a sweater instead of buying a cardigan.

This Friday I looked out of the window in the morning, and I saw beautiful blue sky. The day was promising to be nice and warm, so I put on a light summer denim dress. Even when by the evening it started raining, I didn’t feel cold.

When at one of the pedestrian crossings I saw a girl wearing a long puff jacket, with its hood on, I realised that I acclimatised.

I read the news today, oh boy…

Perhaps unwittingly, today’s Metro (www.metro.co.uk) was full of offbeat stories. This is just a short sample of what was intended to attract today’s readers’ attention (among other stories, of course).

11 schools shut on the eve of Robbie Williams’s concert, to avoid problems. One parent, however, was not amused: ‘Everybody is back at school,… and they have closed already’.

A student, who was secretly filming his fellow female students taking a bath, initially tried to hide a digital camera in a shower gel bottle but didn’t manage to record clear footage. I wonder, why…

A new drug that was developed to treat premature ejaculation comes with side-effects: nausea, diarrhoea, headache and dizziness.

In the States, three men, aged 20, drove 50 miles to dig out a corpse of a girl, to have an intercourse with it. They’ve never known the young woman, but saw her photo on the obituaries page in a newspaper. All three face more than 5 years in prison.

You thought that Mona Lisa could only be used in one way – as an object of inspiration that hangs under the glass in the Louvre? Pas du tout. It can also be used as a Hallowe’en mask, and this newly discovered facet has just been presented at the Tokyo International Gift Show. If you’re tired of goth damsels and Freedy Krugers swarming at your Hallowe’en’s party, spice it up with a bit of true Beauty. Worry not: you’ll look as fearful, as the occasion demands. This latex Gioconda’s beauty is indeed a dreaful force.

In Paris, Societe Generale [apologies, I cannot insert accents] celebrated the opening of the Rugby World Cup by having the acrobats stage a vertical rugby match on the Societe’s facade. I wish I could see it.

A bull attempted to cross the river to reach a herd of cows on the opposite bank. Unfortunately, he got stuck in the mud and had to be rescued by the fire brigade and a tractor.

Finally, the paper contained a plenty of advice to the couple who suffer from their over-amorous and loud neighbours. Someone suggested to play Handel’s Hallelujah Chorus at the peak of the neighbours’ passion (and claimed it had worked).

I tried to do a similar thing several years ago, in Moscow. My neighbour upstairs was a convinced DIY-er. He DIYed everything in his flat, from furniture to cars and motorbikes. Some outcomes were freakish. His passion for fish-breeding, for instance, culminated in dropping of a 20-litre fish tank, filled with water (without fish, thankfully). I was told there had been torrential rain in my parents’ corridor.

Naturally, my parents tried to influence him in one way or another, but nothing would stop this Jack-of-all-trades. As I grew older and began to listen to a lot of music, this man’s domestic pursuits started ennerving me. His drilling and hammering was way too loud, and I literally couldn’t hear my music. I decided I’d use shock therapy. I had a record of Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture, which score, as you know, contains the sounds of cannon fire. One day, when my neighbour had once again passionately embraced his electric drill, I forwarded the record to the exact point of cannon fire, and played it on full volume.

This was the only time I played any record on full volume. Believe it or not, the drilling became less loud. Or maybe I just deafened myself shortly. At any rate, this did not avert my neighbour from DIYing, and he continues to drill and hammer until this day.

This is one of the few occasions when I can (otherwise being an apartment partisan) wholeheartedly agree that having your own house has its benefits. On the other hand, having neighbours is very beneficial for one’s life experience.

Churchill, The Little Chef and Freemasons

Visiting a local Cheshire Masonic lodge for a charity event witnessed a Little Chef as the symbol of the Freemasons

I’ve been recently to a provincial Masonic Lodge in Cheshire, on behalf of a non-Masonic charity. Among the stands in the room there was one that listed ‘Famous Masons’. Quite a few biographies have been taken from an American database, including the one of Winston Churchill. At a certain point, when reading his profile, I thought my research into Tudor history began to bring the most unexpected fruit. I was reading on the sheet that Churchill had been initiated in ‘1591’. Fortunately for me, ‘1591’ was, of course, a typo.

That typo came as quite a surprise, since I never scan these kinds of profiles for the purpose of finding errors in them. So, I carefully let one of the members know, and he promised to try and do something about it. However, the story he told next confirmed to me that most people (including me, perhaps) would never notice that ‘1591’ thing.

The map of Cheshire on the Lodge’s stand was an extremely zoomed version of a nice colourful table mat from the Little Chef, the classic chain of road cafes. It was chosen simply because of its colour and slightly moderated, just to distinguish the names of the places where provincial masonic halls were located. What could not be moderated, were the black signs designating the locations of Little Chefs on the Cheshire roadways. The signs were, predictably, in the form of a chef.

In five years nobody has asked what that black symbol meant‘, the Mason told me.

They probably think it is a Freemason‘, I replied.

I never knew a man could laugh so loudly…

little-chef-freemasons
This is not just Little Chef; this is a Freemason (Image courtesy: minfin.com.ua)

Family Friendly Film Festival – 2006

The first ever Family Friendly Film Festival in Manchester brought children and adults together to celebrate the lure of the Big Screen

Another family event that took place across Greater Manchester during the Late Summer Bank Holiday Weekend was the first ever Family Friendly Film Festival. In the words of its co-ordinator, Leah Byrne, the idea has been in the air for some time, and was finally brought to life – and to children and their parents – between 25th and 28th August, 2006. The event was taking place at such venues, as the Chinese Arts Centre, the Cornerhouse, the Green Room, the Manchester Museum, the Zion Arts Centre, and even Princes Park in Irlam in Salford. The festival was supported by Manchester City Council, Salford Council, Manchester Kids, the Workers’ Film Association, Robert Hamilton and Cosgrove Hall, Arts About Manchester, and Arts Council England.
family-friendly-film-festival-spirited-away
Spirited Away (dir. Hayao Miyazaki, 2001) is one of the FFFF’s headliners. (image courtesy of danbooru.donmai.us)

Acknowledging the Children

The tagline for the festival was

“life is just as complex for kids as adults, so why should children’s films be superficial and formulaic?”

Instead of the Disney films there was an amazing selection of cartoons, shorts and features from all over the world. The festival premiered Eve & the Fire Horse (dir. Julia Kwan, Canada, 2005, 92 mins), which scooped quite a few awards, including the Special Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival this year.

Other films at the Festival included the Oscar-winning Spirited Away, the Oscar-nominated Belleville Rendezvous, as well as some undying British classics, like The Wind in the Willows after the novel by Kenneth Graham. Three films by Eva Saks were also screened, Colorforms, Getting My Goat, and Confection. Confection, in particular, tells the story of a girl who learns empathy from a pastry – definitely a film to watch with a family!

Some other distinguished films were The Fan and the Flower, Chika’s Bird, Lucia, La Grande Migration, to name but a few. Open A Door series (2003) were also shown, an award-winning international exchange of 5-mins silent films. The series is aimed at the young viewers, illustrating the differences and similarities between the world’s cultures. Episodes come from Cuba, USA, Great Britain, Taiwan, Iran, Mexico, and South Africa. Whose Children Are These? (2004) looks at how the 9/11 has affected the lives of three Muslim teenagers. In Leah’s words, the aim of the Festival organisers was to bring such films to Manchester’s youngest viewers that would tell them about the bigger world and children that live in other countries.

Family Friendly Film Making

But children and their parents were not just watching films together – they could also dabble into filmmaking, providing they booked a place in a workshop. Several kinds of workshops were going during this year’s Festival, supported by the Workers’ Film Association. A workshop at the Greenroom was for teenagers between 10 and 15 yrs old, who were invited to create their own short films, using professional digital video camcorders and I-Mac work stations. Two workshops were held at the Zion Arts Centre in Hulme, a session of puppet animation for 5-10 year olds, and a Manga-themed animation workshop for 10-15 year olds. And a workshop at Princes Park in Irlam, Salford, was dedicated to wildlife animation and invited family members of all ages.

I went to the puppet animation workshop on Saturday, 26 August, at the Zion Arts Centre. In a large well-lit room children and their parents were sitting at the tables, absorbed in the task of making figurines of plasticine. The multi-aged and multicultural groups showed formidable team-working skills, especially when it finally came to shooting. The room periodically filled with bursts of laughter, especially when things were not going smoothly. At one point all props (plasticine pines) collapsed at the set of one of the features. At another set two plasticine “actresses” fell face down from their carton board bench. In spite of this, the filmings progressed well, the credits appeared, the “actors” bowed, and then the groups went on to edit their films.

The scripts, composed by children themselves, were anything but simple. One group’s film was about a squirrel visiting another squirrel and bringing a bag of hazelnuts. When opened, the bag contained a mouse, who was eating away the nuts! Another group made a film about two female friends who had to handle an uneasy task of sharing money between themselves. Yet another group’s film (by The Quincy Blake Production) was about two aliens fighting and then befriending on the Sun. In the words of Quincy Blake (a boy of about 7), he enjoyed making his movie. And in the words of one of the mothers, attending such workshop was not just enlightening, but also made her feel like going back to her childhood.

Where Adults Get to Be Kids

I must admit I felt I went back in time, too, despite the fact that I didn’t participate in preparing the sets or props, or in the actual filming and subsequent editing. Simply the glee and the spirit of team-working have filled the ground, so it was almost impossible not to immerse oneself in this wonderful atmosphere.

The first Family Friendly Film Festival will definitely not be the last, although it did take a lot of time, pain and money to obtain clearances for screenings, especially of such films as the multi-winning Spirited AwayBelleville Rendezvous, and Eve and the Fire Horse. However, with the obvious success of this year’s Festival the plans will be growing bigger for the next year, and Leah Byrne has told The LOOK that the BBC is already looking into taking part with a workshop on score-writing. So, watch out for the Family Friendly Film Festival next year (www.familyfriendly.org.uk), and in the meantime check out this year’s list, and try and catch the films you haven’t yet seen!

The List of the Family Friendly Film Festival

Holes (dir. Andrew Davis, USA, 2003, 117 mins)
Raju & I (dir. Gayatri Rao, India, 2003, 30 mins)
Whose Children Are These? (dir. Theresa Thanjann, USA, 2004, 27 mins)
Getting My Goat (dir. Eva Saks, USA, 2005, 2 mins)
Colorforms (dir. Eva Saks, USA, 2003, 8 mins)
Maya – the Indian Princess (dir. Kavita Ramchandran, USA, 2005, 3 mins)
Happy Holy Maya (dir. Kavita Ramchandran, USA, 2005, 2 mins)
Dial ‘M’ for Monster (dir. Kevin Nikkel, Canada, 2003, 1 min.)
Open a Door (Cuba, USA, Great Britain, Taiwain, Iran, Mexico, South Africa, 2003, 7×5 mins)
Welcome to My Life (dir. Elizabeth Ito, USA, 2004, 5 mins)
Circuit Marine (dir. Favez Isabelle, France, Canada, 2003, 7 mins 50)
The Wind in the Willows (dirs. Mark Hall and Chris Taylor, UK, 1983, 79 mins)
Eve & the Fire Horse (dir. Julia Kwan, Canada, 2005, 92 mins)
La Grande Migration (dir. Youri Tcherenkov, France, 1995, 7 mins 54)
Let’s Play (dirs. Francois Lecauchois, Cassandre Hornez, France, 2003, 26 mins)
Confection (dir. Eva Saks, USA, 2003, 5 mins)
Lucia (dir. Felix Goennert, Germany, 2004, 8 mins 30)
Chika’s Bird (dir. Adam Mars, Canada, 2003, 15 mins)
The Fan and the Flower (dir. Bill Plympton, USA, 2005, 7 mins 10)
Spirited Away (dir. Hayao Miyazaki, Japan, 2001, 125 mins)
Yoko! Jakamoko! Toto! (dir. Tony Collingwood, UK, 2005, 2×4 mins 30)
Bark, George! (dir. Gene Deitch, USA, 2003, 6 mins)
Eddy and the Bear (dir. Tony Collingwood, UK, 2003, 9 mins 30)
The Pipsqueak Prince (dir. Zoia Trofimova, France, 2002, 7 mins)
Animal Stories (dir. Tony Collingwood, UK, 2001, 2x 5 mins)
Gorden the Garden Gnome – The Veggie Pet (dir. Tony Collingwood, UK, 2005, 11 mins)
A Fortune in Frozen Dim Sum (dir. Ling Chiu, 2004, Canada, 13 mins)
Belleville Rendezvous (dir. Sylvain Chomet, France/Canada/Belgium, 2003, 80 mins).

(The list has been compiled after the Festival’s brochure).

The previous event: Bomber Command Exhibition at the Imperial War Museum North.

Bomber Command at the Imperial War Museum North

The Bomber Command exhibition at the Imperial War Museum North details the complex history of the celebrated British military forces.

Before the programme covering the activities in Greater Manchester during the Bank Holiday weekend goes out on September 1 (the back-to-school day in Russia, incidentally), this is a report of some impressions, starting with the Bomber Command exhibition at the Imperial War Museum North.

The story of Bomber Command at the IWM North

Some of the activities at the Imperial War Museum North were linked to a new exhibition, called Against The Odds: The Story of Bomber Command in the Second World War (27 May 2006 – 7 January 2007). It traces the history of the mentioned part of the British Army in the Second World War, its Lancaster bombers, pilots and operations. The curators did not turn a blind eye to some difficult questions, e.g. whether or not some of the well-known operations were justified. The organisers have spent about a year working on this exhibition, which uses mostly the Imperial War Museum North archives.
bomber-command-iwm-north
The assembly of a Wellington Bomber (Image courtesy: https://www.culture24.org.uk/)

The proverbial ‘against the odds’ can be applied to almost everything in the story of 1939-45 War, so of course it was interesting to know, exactly how it refers to the story of Bomber Command. In the words of David Hopkins, Special Exhibition Manager, Bomber Command as a military force had “against the odds” risen from a poorly equipped group at the outbreak of war to a vast and respected organisation by 1945. From the start it was a pivotal agent in the British and the Allies’ war effort, but its story was not always smooth or glorious, as the exhibition well illustrates.

Glory and Gore

Several displays are dedicated to personal experiences of soldiers, some of whom had never returned from the duty. One of the stands exhibits the log book, goggles, papers and medals of Leonard Cheshire, including the Victoria Cross that Cheshire, as the Master Bomber, had received for his outstanding gallantry. Other displays cover technical issues, such as the construction and operation of the Lancaster bombers. The very last sections cover major operations, presenting their outcome through the archival photos and films. The general sense, though, is that however important was an operation, one can’t help looking at it through the prism of the number of casualties and the images of the ruins of historic cities. The well-known Dams Raid in 1943 resulted not only in the destruction of the water dams on the rivers Eder, Mohne and Sorpe, but also in the death or captivity of many soldiers. And the infamous raid of Dresden, which still stands out as a senseless operation with devastating effect, has somewhat overshadowed the glory of both Bomber Command and the Allied Forces in general.

Identifying with the Past

During the Bank Holiday weekend, on Sunday 27 August, the visitors to the IWM North were given identity cards, which ‘ascribed’ to them the story of one of the pilots of the Bomber Command. I was identified as Geoffrey Pell Dawson, who was born in Manchester in 1923. An architecture student, he was in the forces between May 1942 and September 1946, serving as a Bomb Aimer and achieving the rank of Flight Lieutenant.

The last page of identity card contains some questions for reflections on the experience of the pilots, asking, in particular, how the exhibition had changed the way visitors feel about the events of the Second World War. The comments left in Reflections area give much hope to pacifists, as the majority of them are written (or even scribbled) by children as young as 7, expressing their resentment to war.

Plane Building for All Ages

And on Monday, 28 August, the activities were celebrating cultural diversity presented in the Museum’s collections. Children of all ages and their parents were invited to build a wooden (!) plane, to hear about the animals who took part in the war, and even to play on the computer. I listened to a couple of really nice stories about animals, including the one about two cows who were the mascots of a Scottish division. I also know that children enjoyed assembling the aircraft (with the help of a volunteer Sean, who admitted that the parts of the plane were quite heavy). But then I looked into a Learning Studio East, where computer-based activities were taking place. And there I saw someone’s father being totally immersed in a computer game of some kind. So, family activities at the IWM North were quite literally attracting all generations.

Britannia Rumba and the Caribbean Music

Still in Salford Quays, a short distance from the IWM North, another one Monday’s hot events was the performance of African and Caribbean music, in the same vein of celebrating the cultural diversity. The band in question turned out to be Britannia Rumba, a Manchester-based musical collective, performing what is usually called here ‘world music’, accompanied by a dance group of four girls in lovely green sarongs, tops and visors. The band was playing on the stage outdoors, it was a bit cold, and the wind was quite strong. Nevertheless, the Afro-Caribbean sounds have filled the surroundings completely, and children, parents and even some of the IWM workers were jiving gleefully. Soon after I packed my equipment and went to catch the bus home. I could long hear the drums and guitars, as I was walking away from Salford Quays.

More on Late Summer Bank Holiday 2006: Family Friendly Film Festival.

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