Richard Bell's Wild West Yorkshire Nature Diary, Monday, 22nd March 2010
GERVASE
PHINN visited the Rickaro Bookshop in Horbury this afternoon
to sign copies of his autobiography, launched today, Road to the Dales
subtitled The Story of a Yorkshire Lad. Gervase doesn't sound like
a likely lad's name for someone born in Yorkshire in the 1950s; 'everyone around
me seemed to be called Terry or Tony or Trevor or Tom,' he recalls, 'As a child
you want to be one of the crowd, like everyone else, just ordinary. Being called
Gervase in post-war Rotherham certainly set me apart.'
'Isn't there a temptation,' I asked him, 'in writing an autobiography, to settle old scores?'
There is, he admitted, but in the book he's only done it once.
I won't spoil the story for you, but I can see why in that one case he should
still feel a sense of injustice about what happened, even after all these years.
I
photograph him in storytelling mode for the bookshop website, forgetting that
it's asking the anti-shake device in my new camera too much to cope with my
shaky hands. I soon revert to drawing. He's got quite a following locally -
not least amongst teachers and former teachers (he has written about his years
as a school inspector) - and the bookshop is packed, which is quite a feat on
a dull drizzly afternoon, especially as half the shops on the High Street are
closed on Mondays, taking a break after the weekend. He soon gets people laughing
and he takes quite a while to get through the queue of people waiting for books
signing as he talks to every one of them . . . and occasionally bursts into
song too.
When
the rush has died down I sketch him looking a little more serious (right)
as he signs some extra copies for the bookshop stock. And, afer all that,
he has to sign one last copy for Barbara and I.
