Herefordshire - On The Black Hill by Bruce Chatwin

[chesilbeach]

HEREFORDSHIRE
 
On The Black Hill by Bruce Chatwin
 
Synopsis:
On the Black Hill is an elegantly written tale of identical twin brothers who grow up on a farm in rural Wales and never leave home. They till the rough soil and sleep in the same bed, touched only occasionally by the advances of the 20th century. In depicting the lives of Benjamin and Lewis and their interactions with their small local community Chatwin comments movingly on the larger questions of human experience.
 
Other Herefordshire books:

[Janet]

Brief toast mention within the first few chapters, Kay! 

[poppyshake]

Brief toast mention within the first few chapters, Kay! 

Yay!! I love it already

[Janet]

ON THE BLACK HILL by BRUCE CHATWIN

 

On the Black Hill by Bruce Chatwin

The ‘blurb’
Bruce Chatwin's fascination with nomads and wanderlust represents itself in reverse in On the Black Hill, a tale of two brothers (identical twins) who never go anywhere. They stay in the farmhouse on the English-Welsh border where they were born, tilling the rough soil and sleeping in the same bed, touched only occasionally by the advance of the 20th century. Smacking of a Welsh Ethan Frome, Chatwin evokes the lonely tragedies of farm life, and above all the vibrant land of Wales.

I can’t say that Bruce Chatwin is an author with whom I’m very familiar. I picked this up on a recent trip to Swansea and very much liked the sound of it but I put it back on the shelf – so I was pleased to have an excuse to buy it when it was chosen to represent Herefordshire in the Counties Challenge!

It tells the story of twins Lewis and Benjamin who live on a farm, overlooked by The Black Hill, on the Wales/Herefordshire border. The story is sequential, telling of the twins lives from their birth around the turn of the 20th century until just after their 80th birthdays. The ups and downs of rural life are beautifully written and this story is definitely more character and location driven than it is plot driven. I really enjoyed it and the characters in it are so well-drawn. Despite the hardships suffered by many of the people in the pages of the book it did not feel depressing and really gave a sense of community.

I have to say that for me, this evoked a much stronger feeling of Wales than of England, so although this was the counties challenge choice for Herefordshire I’m not sure that it really gives a feel for that county. I think this feeling is reinforced by the fact that so many characters are defined by their occupations or character (Watkins the Coffin, Theo the Tent…) in the Welsh style, but nonetheless it was a really good, well-written enjoyable tale and I feel sure I will try some more of Chatwin’s works.

 

Oh, and Kay, toast gets two mentions!   
 

[Kidsmum]

Great review Janet   I'm not really familiar with Bruce Chatwin's books either but i do love books with good characters in so i shall look forward to reading this 

[Janet]

Thanks.    I hope you enjoy it. 

[Athena]

Great review, the book sounds interesting!

[poppyshake]

Review: This story has such a ring of authenticity to it that it's difficult to believe it's a work of fiction, I had to check to make sure, it reads very much like a true account. I hadn't actually heard of it before it was nominated for the county challenge (Herefordshire) but it's the perfect story to illustrate that area of the country - where England meets Wales - as the landscape is gloriously described. It is a pretty serious story with very few, if any, light moments. That's probably why I couldn't quite give it a top rating as I felt a little bowed down by all the hardships .. it is fairly relentlessly grim. The story spans eighty years and follows the twins throughout their lives. They are born on the farm and there they pretty much stay .. any enforced separations (as in the second world war) are felt as keenly as amputations. Though different in appearance and nature they are are also remarkably and telepathically the same. I felt a great likeness and empathy for their mother Mary.. always trying to do her best in an increasingly impossible situation (plus she was a reader which obviously was greatly in her favour ) Their father was dour and pretty joyless .. I never forgave him for poking Mary in the eye with a copy of Wuthering Heights He distrusted book reading and learning and as such .. I distrusted him. The community is peppered with exactly the right amount of eccentric and intriguing characters (characters to rival Laurie Lee's but, to me, not told with quite as much warmth.) Neighbourhood resentments and rivalries simmer in the background and occasionally blow up to catastrophic effect .. there are also scandals and intrigues .. but mainly life on the farm ticks over and the seasons come and go.

This is a snapshot in time really. For the inhabitants of this particular community nothing much changes and new innovations are slow in coming. It's quite claustrophobic in a way but I quite like it when a story stays in one place .. I can get as rooted in the landscape as the characters then.
As for the writing, there's not a false note in it, everything feels remarkably honest and true. Having been put through the mill a bit in regards to all the hardships, I felt the closing chapters were absolutely sublime and I actually had a grin on my face for the first time. Not for long though as the story closes in sadness but in a way that feels absolutely right for the story.

Despite the grimness there was toast .. plenty of it .. hurrah! 4/5

[willoyd]

On the Black Hill by Bruce Chatwin *****

(Copied from my blog thread)

 

Chatwin's only purely fictional book, this is the story of twin brothers, born and brought up on a farm on the Herefordshire/Welsh border, a farm they never really leave (one brother moves briefly about ten miles away for a brief period). The novel is essentially an evocation of rural life in the first half of the twentieth century, particularly the period before and after the First World War, with the local countryside playing as important a part in the story as any of the characters, and the interaction between characters and country paramount.

 

I loved the imagery created by Chatwin's simple but elegant prose, very much bringing to life a part of the world I am reasonably familiar with and for which I developed a definite fondness, my parents having retired to the English side of the border some years ago (my father is now buried in a local churchyard, whilst my mother has now moved to Pembrokeshire). The lives of pretty much all the characters are not exactly a picnic, but this never feels like a piece of mis-lit, far from it; life is tough and at times squalid, but there is definitely a streak of optimism spread through the plot.

 

There isn't much else to say really, other than, whilst it's probably more Welsh in nature than Herefordian, it's an excellent book to represent a county, being so setting orientated. One word of warning though: whilst Chatwin uses real place names, the geography doesn't really add up, with deliberate distortions and mixing up of names. I think Rhulen in the book is, in fact, Hay-on-Wye, whilst there is a Cefn Hill with a nearby Black Hill to the SE of the town - but other names are further north. No matter, just don't spend too long (as I did!) tracking the place names! More important: just read and enjoy!