Stinging yellow

Even after weeks of rain in Kent, when the clouds clear the colours of an English May are eye-catching distractions everywhere you look. It will soon be as hard to write here as it is in Provence.

“I think England is the very place for a fluent and fiery writer. The highest hymns of the sun are written in the dark. I like the grey country. A bucket of Greek sun would drown in one colour the crowds of colours I like trying to mix for myself out a grey flat insular mud. If I went to the sun I’d just sit in the sun; that would be very pleasant but I’m not doing it, and the only necessary things I do are the things I am doing. Unless by accidents, and my life is planned by them, I shall be nearer Bournemouth than Corfu this summer.”

So wrote Dylan Thomas to his literary acquaintance Lawrence Durrell in December 1938. I’m a great admirer of both men’s work but have to confess that I take heart from the Welshman on this: I much prefer to write in the dark drear of British grey than the vibrant light of the south.

Thomas on his Carmarthenshire waterfront; Durrell in the searing blues and golds of the Greek island of Corfu: both connected through a mutual admiration of what the other achieved, one in the dark, one in sunlight. It’s fascinating to see, as the letter goes on, how well Thomas understands the effort and the personal turmoil of Durrell as he hammers out his words, striving so hard to be taken seriously, and how generous his encouragement:

"I liked your Stygian prose very very much, it’s the best I’ve read for years. Don’t let the Greek sun blur your pages as you said it did. You use words like stones, throwing, rockerying, mossing, churning, sharpening, bloodsucking, melting, and a hard firewater flows and rolls through them all the time…"

Sunlight on Lavender



Some scents sparkle and then quickly disappear, like the effervescence of citrus zest or a bright note of mint. Some are strange siren songs of rarer origin that call from violets hidden in woodland, or irises after spring rain. Some scents release a rush of half-forgotten memories.  And then there are the scents that seem to express truths about people and places that you have never forgotten: the scents that make time stand still.

                                                                                             From The Lantern

A real taste of Provence to wish you Happy New Year, as there’s nothing like the promise of southern light and warmth to raise the spirits when January days can be dank and dreary.

Actually, bad weather, on a working day at least, can be a positive for writers of a certain disposition. Dark clouds and rain stimulate the imagination. The colours seem brighter in the mind, somehow. I’m content sitting at my desk knowing I’m not missing out on much outside, as I try to paint pictures in words.

A few years ago when I was reading everything I could about Lawrence Durrell for my novel Songs of Blue and Gold, I came across a telling exchange between him and the poet Dylan Thomas. However did Thomas manage to write in the grey gloom of winter in Wales, Durrell wanted to know. Surely he needed vivid colours and vibrant life around him for inspiration? Thomas replied that if he lived on Greek island, like Durrell, he would never get any work done; the grey helped him to see brightness better. I’m definitely with Dylan Thomas on that one.

Researching a book is something different, though. That’s the time to get out and about in the sun with a notebook; the time when life can seem pretty much ideal. Then, in my case, it’s back to England in winter to form the fragments, the odd details and observations, into some kind of whole. I’m just at that stage now with a new novel. New Year’s Resolution Number One: start writing!