Treacle Walker

Alan Garner
4th Estate

Treacle Walker is a stunning fusion of myth and folklore and an exploration of the fluidity of time, vivid storytelling that brilliantly illuminates an introspective young mind trying to make sense of everything around him.
'Ragbone! Ragbone! Any rags! Pots for rags! Donkey stone!'
Joe looked up from his comic and lifted his eye patch. There was a white pony in the yard. It was harnessed to a cart, a flat cart, with a wooden chest on it. A man was sitting at a front corner of the cart, holding the reins. His face was creased. He wore a long coat and a floppy high-crowned hat, with hair straggling beneath, and a leather bag was slung from his shoulder across his hip.
Joe Coppock squints at the world with his lazy eye. He reads his comics, collects birds' eggs and treasures his marbles, particularly his prized dobbers. When Treacle Walker appears off the Cheshire moor one day - a wanderer, a healer - an unlikely friendship is forged and the young boy is introduced to a world he could never have imagined.

I must admit, and I've no idea why I thought this, but I had kind of assumed that Garner had retired from writing but this little 152 page novella shows him to be a writer still right at the top of his idiosyncratic game.

Treacle Walker tells the story of Joseph (Joe) Coppock and the incidents that coincide with the arrival of the rag 'n' bone man of the title.  Told in a delightful, poetic lilt we find Joe trapped in a fairy tale adventure as a folkloric cavalcade of fantastic phenomena both vex and aid him as he tries to quietly reads his comic.

I've never been the biggest of Garner fans having missed the opportunity to read him as a kid I found his books a tad frustrating as an adult but here we have what must surely go down as one of his definitive works.  Despite Garner's predominant reputation as a writer of intelligent fantasies for younger readers this is very much aimed at a mature reader and is in many ways a love letter to Garners own youth of marbles and comics, steam trains, rag 'n' bone men and playing amongst the ghosts and legends of a perpetually haunted country.  It's a darkly funny tale of another world, a mythic world filled with old lore, a world of deep, dark woods and the mischievous creatures that live within them, a world of magic and imagination leaking through into our own that draws from all the tales that transported and terrified us as kids and it's utterly wonderful.

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The Keeper (1983)

'The Keeper', written by Alan Garner, was the final episode of the original 'Spooky' series of the long running Dramarama series, an anthology show for children.

Garner's story concerns 'Beacon Lodge' a dilapidated and long abandoned gamekeeper's lodge where two paranormal researchers - Peter (Tim Woodward) and Sally (Janet Maw) -  settle themselves in for the night.  We know right from the off that there is something already resident, and comfortably at home, in the house and it's not best pleased at the arrival of the interlopers. A game of scrabble and a poem set the scene for the conclusion as the secret of the house is revealed.

At the heart of the story is a typically Garner tale of the power that resides in the land, an animistic presence that holds sway over the patch of earth.  It's a short little tale that uses many well worn tricks to build suspense - eerie acoustic instruments, predominantly a dulcimer, and a restless camera that's constantly circling and hovering just behind Peter and, particularly, Janet - but it must be remembered this is a show made for kids for whom many of these tricks of the trade would be new and also they are well worn because they work.

A genuinely scary story from that golden age of kids television when film-makers had literally no qualms about utterly terrifying their young audience.



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To Kill A King

Alan Garner's 'To Kill A King' was the final episode of the supernatural anthology series 'Leap In The Dark' that ran for 4 series on BBC2 between 1973 and 1980.  Whilst the early series were documentaries the latter two consisted of various dramas written by the likes of Garner, Fay Weldon (author of 'The Life and Loves of a She-Devil') and (the writer of 'Penda's Fen') David Rudkin.

In 'To Kill A King' Garner tells an autobiographically tinged story of an author, Harry (Anthony Bate, Oliver Lacon in 'Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy'), haunted by a disconnect with his restless muse as he battles against writer's block or of man rapidly descending into depression and madness as he rages against the turmoil of his mind.

Garner has spoken in the past of his struggles with depression and in many ways this seem like an exploration of its causes as Harry is pressured from all sides - by colleagues, family, fans but most of all by himself - and as a result 'his head' is submerged in muddy water unable to see the light, a terrifying prospect that throws him into even deeper water. 

As you may have inferred the play is heavy on symbolism with Harry reaching a decision as he emerges from a dark tunnel and the idea of inspiration as a transmission from elsewhere embodied by the presence of Jodrell Bank Observatory at the end of his garden and the plethora of communications technology - typewriter, telephone, television - that haunts him and it's not until he uses 'his head' to break their hold that his muse settles and his block lifts.

The finished piece is an oddly compelling collision of supernatural tale with psychodrama that offers an interestingly ambiguous take on both.



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The Owl Service

Scripted by Alan Garner from his own novel of two years previous, The Owl Service is an 8 part television series originally screened in the UK in late 1969 and early 1970.  It's the story of an eternal love triangle replayed throughout history with it's roots in the Welsh myth of Blodeuwedd, a magical woman made of flowers who is turned into an owl for her role in the deaths of two men.

Alison (Gillian Hills), Gwyn (Michael Holden) and Roger (Francis Wallis) are three teenagers thrown together in an isolated Welsh farmhouse when Roger's father Clive (Edwin Richfield) and Alison's mother Margaret (who we never see) go there for their honeymoon.  The house, formerly owned by Alison's Uncle Bertram, is home to Gwyn and his housekeeper, Mother Nancy (Dorothy Edwards), and the eccentric gardener Huw (Raymond Llewellyn).

Confined to her bed, Alison hears scratching in the attic where she and Gwyn find a set of plates with an unusual pattern that Alison realises can be traced and combined to create an owl.  This is the trigger for a series of events that finds the trio of teens becoming increasingly embroiled in the myth as class and sexual tensions are brought to the surface.

Since it's original screening, and with minimal repeat showings, The Owl Service has deservedly come to be considered as being amongst the finest pieces of supernatural television. Beautifully filmed on location in the Welsh countryside around Dinas Mawddwy in North Wales which makes it a visual feast whilst the themes it plays with make it an unlikely children's programme and to this day feels more suited to a more mature - even if only YA - audience.

The cast are mixed with both Holden (angry working class Welsh boy) and Wallis (smug middle class English) seemingly out of their depth on several occasions. More successful is Richfield's creepily overattentive Clive, Llewellyn's portrayal of the broken Huw and Hills who at 25 and with a career as a French pop singer (Zou Bisou Bisou) and a memorable role in the previous years 'Blow-Up' behind her was perhaps too old for the part but whose personality dominates the screen.

The pace is glacially slow which allows for the relentless building of tension but, at eight episodes, it occasionally feels like it has been stretched to breaking point and I can't help but think that it's originally intended seven episode run (or possibly even six) would have made for a leaner and more dynamic show.  It is however a unique television experiment that pushed all manner of boundaries for a children's programme in ways that had never been done before and have rarely been done since and which combined the supernatural with the mundane in a subtle and pervasive manner that has very much stood the test of time.

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Ghostly Experiences

Susan Dickinson (editor)
Armada Lion

Apart from having just about the most glorious cover art - by Antony Maitland - of any book I've ever bought this collection of supernatural tales turned out to be great fun. There are some fabulous authors behind that cover, a few of whom I know well and a couple I'd been looking forward to checking out.

This collection was originally published as half of  much longer anthology called both 'The Restless Ghost' and 'The Usurping Ghost' which was subsequently split into this and a second anthology called 'Ghostly Encounters' - which I've just noticed I have on my shelf waiting it's turn.  It's  lovely discovery because if it's half as good as this one then it'll be a good ride.

Opening proceedings is 'Feel Free' by Alan Garner wherein a young artist finds himself physically in harmony with the creator of an ancient Greek dish.  It's beautifully executed and straight off the bat a very unusual, sympathetic and human take on the idea of a haunting.

Quatermass creator Nigel Kneale is up next with a haunted house tale, 'Minuke', which felt like a home counties version of 'Poltergeist' and is very much in the modern day rural horror vein that he explored in shows such as 'The Stone Tape' and 'The Murrain'.

'Witches Bone' by the one author in the book I'd not heard of, W. C. Dickinson, followed on with a slightly silly tale about a wishing bone and the mayhem it leaves in it's wake.  It was entertaining enough in a 'Tales of the Unexpected' sort of way.

H. R. Wakefield's 'Lucky's Grove' is a dark and bloodthirsty little tale about a Christmas tree inadvisably transplanted from a grove of trees with a dark reputation.

Continuing the rural horror is H. P. Lovecraft's, 'The Moon Bog', as two Americans attempts to clear an Irish marsh lets loose entities who are otherwise inclined.#

Sheridan Le Fanu (here billed as J. S. Lefanu) is represented by what is by far the weakest story in the collection, 'The White Cat of Drumgunniol', with it's story of a cat that foreshadows death for a particular family.  It's not bad, it's just a bit of cliche.

I'd never read any Robert Louis Stevenson before so his 'The Bottle Imp' came as a very nice surprise as a couple desperately try to rid themselves of a malign magical bottle.  It's wonderfully constructed and I was almost cheering for them by the end.

Closing the book was a real treat, Joan Aiken's, 'The Apple of Trouble'.  It's light, funny, inventive and fully silly as two resourceful children attempt to rid themselves of the apple from the Garden of Eden, a cantankerous uncle and the three Furies (or Erinyes) who follow the apple around and exact vengeance on whoever is unfortunate to own it.  It's a joyous read and by the time I was halfway through I'd already made the decision to track down more in the series.

In all it's a great little collection filled with variety and invention featuring some great writers and stories written over at least a century that feel entirely at home in each other's company. 

The Owl Service

Alan Garner
(Armada Lion)

Something is scratching around in the attic above Alison's room. Yet the only thing up there is a stack of grimy old plates. Alison and her stepbrother, Roger, discover that the flowery patterns on the plates, when traced onto paper, can be fitted together to create owls-owls that disappear when no one is watching. With each vanished owl, strange events begin to happen around Alison, Roger, and the caretaker's son, Gwyn. As the kids uncover the mystery of the owl service, they become trapped within a local legend, playing out roles in a tragic love story that has repeated itself for generations... a love story that has always ended in disaster.

I've been wanting to give this one a read for a long time now but was waiting to find a nice old copy. I was finally able to track one down the other day (same edition as the one pictured) and jumped right in.

The story tells of a trio of teens and assorted adults in a house in a valley somewhere in mid Wales. The discovery of some old plates with drawings of owls on them links the three kids into an ancient story from the Mabinogion that has returned again and again to plague those of the valley.

It was an odd sort of read that left much unanswered - Why was Huw so respected in the village if he was simply one of the previous participants? Why had no one else spotted the fairly obvious solution to the problem?

There was little in the way of redemption at the end for the central characters and it made a nice change for it to be the more unpleasant of them to emerge as the hero.

An odd and intriguing book with a dark and uncompromising personality that leaves you feeling more than a little drained at the end.

Buy it here - UK / US

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