0:00:08 > 0:00:12There was sun enough for lazing upon beaches
0:00:12 > 0:00:16There was fun enough for far into the night
0:00:16 > 0:00:19But I'm dying now and done for
0:00:19 > 0:00:22What on earth was all the fun for?
0:00:22 > 0:00:26For I'm old and ill and terrified and tight.
0:00:30 > 0:00:3530 years ago on May 22nd, a hero of mine
0:00:35 > 0:00:39was buried here at St Enodoc's churchyard
0:00:39 > 0:00:42on a very wet and windy Cornish day.
0:00:42 > 0:00:46He was John Betjeman, the poet and broadcaster.
0:00:51 > 0:00:55During his lifetime, Betjeman had come to speak to,
0:00:55 > 0:00:58and for, the nation in a unique and remarkable way.
0:01:01 > 0:01:04There was Betjeman the poet, writing verse for the many
0:01:04 > 0:01:05and not just the few.
0:01:05 > 0:01:12One after one rise these empty consecutives
0:01:12 > 0:01:14Now we have come to the uppermost floor
0:01:14 > 0:01:18Where in the car park are Jags of executives?
0:01:18 > 0:01:22Where, far behind them, the bikes of the poor.
0:01:24 > 0:01:29There was Betjeman the broadcaster, explaining his passions and bugbears,
0:01:29 > 0:01:31and doing so with infectious enthusiasm.
0:01:33 > 0:01:36And there was Betjeman the campaigner, fighting to
0:01:36 > 0:01:40preserve the national heritage from developers, planners and
0:01:40 > 0:01:44politicians, and railing against their abuse of power and money.
0:01:45 > 0:01:50For here, once were pleasant fields and no-one in a hurry
0:01:50 > 0:01:57Behold the harvest Mammon yields of speed and greed and worry.
0:01:59 > 0:02:02With all of this he created both a real
0:02:02 > 0:02:08and an imagined place that, as his biographer, I call Betjemanland.
0:02:12 > 0:02:16I'm going to travel back to Betjemanland to understand
0:02:16 > 0:02:19the complexity and contradictions of the man.
0:02:19 > 0:02:24Where Betjeman, the snobbish lover of beautiful country houses, is just
0:02:24 > 0:02:29the same person who gains pleasure from the Great British seaside.
0:02:29 > 0:02:35Where he is haunted by memory, faith and doubt, love and infatuation.
0:02:35 > 0:02:39And where Betjeman has real enjoyment of life,
0:02:39 > 0:02:43but also suffers great melancholy and guilt.
0:02:43 > 0:02:47Please join me as I revisit Betjemanland
0:02:47 > 0:02:52to ask, 30 years on, whether it is a far away and forgotten country,
0:02:52 > 0:02:54or whether, as I would argue, it is still a place
0:02:54 > 0:02:57that can sustain us today.
0:03:16 > 0:03:20I am going to begin my exploration of Betjemanland
0:03:20 > 0:03:24high above London, where Betjeman was born in 1906,
0:03:24 > 0:03:28and spent a childhood of bittersweet experience.
0:03:29 > 0:03:33Betjeman's was an Edwardian upbringing in Highgate,
0:03:33 > 0:03:34close to Hampstead Heath.
0:03:36 > 0:03:41Betjeman was, in his own words, an only child deliciously apart.
0:03:41 > 0:03:44His best friend was Archibald the teddy bear,
0:03:44 > 0:03:46his surrogate brother until old age.
0:03:46 > 0:03:49And Archie's best friend was Jumbo the elephant.
0:03:49 > 0:03:52Betjeman the boy would come out of his back garden over
0:03:52 > 0:03:55there on Highgate West Hill onto Hampstead Heath, climb up
0:03:55 > 0:03:59Parliament Hill, clutching his pencil and his pad, as he said,
0:03:59 > 0:04:01awaiting inspiration from the sky.
0:04:01 > 0:04:03And he had a vision of the future.
0:04:03 > 0:04:06A little neighbour of his on West Hill once asked him
0:04:06 > 0:04:09what he wanted to be when he grew up and he replied,
0:04:09 > 0:04:14"I want when I grow up to grow long hair and to be a poet."
0:04:20 > 0:04:24The young boy lived with his bickering parents
0:04:24 > 0:04:27first at 52 Parliament Hill Mansions, before they went
0:04:27 > 0:04:31up in the world, to this house at 31 West Hill.
0:04:34 > 0:04:37Although they were well off and coming up in world,
0:04:37 > 0:04:39in the snobbish distinctions of the time,
0:04:39 > 0:04:41the family were "in trade".
0:04:43 > 0:04:47His forbidding father, Ernest, ran a business on the Pentonville Road
0:04:47 > 0:04:51that made luxury products, sold in the West End
0:04:51 > 0:04:56to the upper classes, and young John was expected to inherit the family firm.
0:04:59 > 0:05:03His mother, Bess, was all smothering and alarm.
0:05:03 > 0:05:06But in this tense and nervous household
0:05:06 > 0:05:09the truly terrifying figure was his nanny.
0:05:09 > 0:05:13She is chillingly evoked in Betjeman's autobiographical poem,
0:05:13 > 0:05:16Summoned By Bells, in unflinching detail.
0:05:17 > 0:05:20Maud was my hateful nurse
0:05:20 > 0:05:24Who smelt of soap and forced me to eat chewy bits of fish
0:05:24 > 0:05:26Thrusting me back to babyhood
0:05:26 > 0:05:29With threats of nappies, dummies and the feeding bottle
0:05:29 > 0:05:32She rubbed my face in messes I had made
0:05:32 > 0:05:34And was the first to tell me about hell
0:05:34 > 0:05:36Admitting she was going there herself.
0:05:38 > 0:05:41And there were other painful memories from his childhood.
0:05:41 > 0:05:43At school, Betjeman was bullied
0:05:43 > 0:05:47because of his German sounding name, that led him to later drop
0:05:47 > 0:05:52the second N in Betjemann so as to appear more reassuringly English.
0:05:52 > 0:05:56# Betjeman's a German spy Shoot him down and let him die
0:05:56 > 0:05:59# Betjeman's a German spy A German spy, a German spy... #
0:05:59 > 0:06:00They danced around me
0:06:00 > 0:06:05And their merry shouts brought other merry newcomers to see.
0:06:08 > 0:06:11The cruelty of children, the cruelty of adults,
0:06:11 > 0:06:13summoned up in verse that speaks to all
0:06:13 > 0:06:16who have suffered similar wounds.
0:06:26 > 0:06:28There was escape from all this misery
0:06:28 > 0:06:30during family holidays in Cornwall.
0:06:34 > 0:06:37Betjeman once said that his sense of beauty was
0:06:37 > 0:06:39quickened for the very first time
0:06:39 > 0:06:43when he came here to Daymer Bay and the village of Trebetherick.
0:06:43 > 0:06:47And this is our first sight of a Betjemanland that can be
0:06:47 > 0:06:49beautiful and pleasurable.
0:06:55 > 0:06:59Long, hot Cornish days of childhood rapture were later
0:06:59 > 0:07:03evoked in his television series Remembering Summer.
0:07:05 > 0:07:07And I remember that garden...
0:07:09 > 0:07:14..which we used to have for treasure hunts, had a haunted cottage.
0:07:16 > 0:07:19At least we thought it was haunted. It was an old Cornish cottage,
0:07:19 > 0:07:22a bit of old Cornwall, and seemed to us full of ghosts.
0:07:30 > 0:07:33Of course, what we really came here for was the sea.
0:07:35 > 0:07:38I so enjoy watching the sea like this that I wouldn't mind if all
0:07:38 > 0:07:44television programmes were just of breaking waves and sea noises.
0:07:44 > 0:07:47And living inland makes me so long for the sea,
0:07:47 > 0:07:52sometimes, that I find the longing becomes unendurable.
0:07:57 > 0:08:00Enchanted from this early age, Betjeman would come back to
0:08:00 > 0:08:04Cornwall every summer for the rest of his life.
0:08:07 > 0:08:10In the excellent phrase of his daughter, Candida, Cornwall was
0:08:10 > 0:08:13"the healer of all wounds" for Betjeman.
0:08:13 > 0:08:18The sight and sound of the sea in Daymer Bay always brought him
0:08:18 > 0:08:19peace of mind.
0:08:19 > 0:08:22His Shell Guide To Cornwall is a hymn to the
0:08:22 > 0:08:25beauties of Cornish landscape and architecture.
0:08:26 > 0:08:29And in the poem he wrote about this place, Trebetherick.
0:08:29 > 0:08:33What I find so moving about it and so typical of Betjeman - it's
0:08:33 > 0:08:37not just an evocation of the place but of the people he's known here,
0:08:37 > 0:08:40the friendships he's enjoyed since childhood.
0:08:42 > 0:08:44Blessed be St Enedoc
0:08:44 > 0:08:45Blessed be the wave
0:08:45 > 0:08:47Blessed be the springy turf
0:08:47 > 0:08:49We pray, pray to thee
0:08:49 > 0:08:51Ask for our children
0:08:51 > 0:08:53All the happy days you gave
0:08:53 > 0:08:56To Ralf, Vasey, Alastair, Biddy, John and me.
0:09:00 > 0:09:04The Natural beauty of the Cornish landscape always captivated Betjeman.
0:09:04 > 0:09:08But so did the buildings he discovered there.
0:09:08 > 0:09:11Cycling off on his own, the young Betjeman began to visit
0:09:11 > 0:09:14churches and found what would be a lifelong
0:09:14 > 0:09:17favourite in the village of Blisland.
0:09:17 > 0:09:20An older Betjeman conveyed the delight
0:09:20 > 0:09:22he experienced here to television viewers.
0:09:24 > 0:09:26Now get ready for a surprise.
0:09:26 > 0:09:29See the outside, all rough,
0:09:29 > 0:09:31huge stone blocks of granite from the moor.
0:09:33 > 0:09:35Now wait.
0:09:35 > 0:09:37There's going to be a contrast.
0:09:46 > 0:09:49Betjeman would also write about what he saw and felt
0:09:49 > 0:09:56here at Blisland in his 1958 Guide To English Parish Churches.
0:09:56 > 0:10:00"This screen..." He's talking about this marvellous structure behind me.
0:10:00 > 0:10:03"..gives to this weather-beaten village building,
0:10:03 > 0:10:06"with its 15th century southern arcade of granite,
0:10:06 > 0:10:12"sloping this way and that, an unforgettable sense of joy and mystery."
0:10:18 > 0:10:20ORGAN MUSIC
0:10:46 > 0:10:48Of course, that was a trick of television.
0:10:48 > 0:10:52I can't play a note, organ or piano.
0:11:01 > 0:11:04At the age of 11, Betjeman was sent away to board,
0:11:04 > 0:11:07at the Dragon School in North Oxford.
0:11:07 > 0:11:09# England today's in a terrible way
0:11:09 > 0:11:12# Well, so every artist declares
0:11:13 > 0:11:15# No-one enthuses or cares for the muses
0:11:15 > 0:11:18# And every poor actor despairs
0:11:18 > 0:11:20# Art hasn't any support
0:11:21 > 0:11:24# Everyone's crazy on sport
0:11:26 > 0:11:29# Sport, sport, sport... #
0:11:29 > 0:11:33Here amongst the hearty fun and compulsory games he both feared
0:11:33 > 0:11:38and loathed, the sensitive and solitary boy began to learn
0:11:38 > 0:11:40skills for survival.
0:11:40 > 0:11:43"Making myself popular, siding with
0:11:43 > 0:11:47"the majority, telling lies to get out of awkward situations."
0:11:56 > 0:11:59After the Dragon he went to Marlborough College where
0:11:59 > 0:12:03he further blossomed becoming the school character - charming and witty,
0:12:03 > 0:12:05keen on pranks and practical jokes.
0:12:16 > 0:12:21Betjeman also began to show a talent for quite extraordinary friendships,
0:12:21 > 0:12:23often oblivious to their consequences.
0:12:23 > 0:12:27One correspondence the teenager started was with the now
0:12:27 > 0:12:33middle-aged but still notorious Lord Alfred Douglas - Bosie, the lover of Oscar Wilde.
0:12:34 > 0:12:38But when his father Ernest found out about these letters,
0:12:38 > 0:12:41he proceeded to give the shocked young man a forthright
0:12:41 > 0:12:45and graphic lecture on the practice of buggery.
0:12:59 > 0:13:03It was when Betjeman went up to Oxford in 1925 that
0:13:03 > 0:13:07the budding aesthete found the most congenial place to
0:13:07 > 0:13:12nurture his ambition to live a life of beauty and pleasure.
0:13:20 > 0:13:25Naturally, he came to the college of Oscar Wilde and Bosie,
0:13:25 > 0:13:28during what he called the Silver Age of the Aesthetes,
0:13:28 > 0:13:33when clever, camp undergraduates were in thrall to the 1890s.
0:13:33 > 0:13:37"Oh, I do like a bit of decadence," he once said wistfully.
0:13:44 > 0:13:46Betjeman was now 18.
0:13:46 > 0:13:50Already he had the infectious toothy grin, the slightly seedy air
0:13:50 > 0:13:54of a defrocked clergyman, the sharp knowledge and the ready wit.
0:14:04 > 0:14:12Here at Magdalen College, gilded youth fed deer with sugar lumps soaked in port.
0:14:12 > 0:14:17And the boy from London Trade eagerly joined the smart set
0:14:17 > 0:14:21of clever but fey young men that populated the salons of Oxford.
0:14:25 > 0:14:31Betjeman had much sought after and expensively panelled rooms
0:14:31 > 0:14:34on the second floor of New Building, overlooking the college.
0:14:39 > 0:14:43Here they are, a little more Spartan than before it seems,
0:14:43 > 0:14:46but we do live in more prosaic times, do we not?
0:14:48 > 0:14:52Privacy, after years of public school
0:14:52 > 0:14:56Dignity, after years of none at all
0:14:56 > 0:15:00First college rooms, a kingdom of my own
0:15:00 > 0:15:02What words of mine can tell my gratitude?
0:15:06 > 0:15:11But at Oxford he was idle, mannered and precious and extremely tiresome
0:15:11 > 0:15:16to his tutor, the austere Ulsterman CS Lewis, later of Narnia fame,
0:15:16 > 0:15:19who had no patience with Betjeman, failing a simple
0:15:19 > 0:15:24Divinity exam, and had him sent down at the end of his first year.
0:15:24 > 0:15:27The sense of rejection was awful.
0:15:27 > 0:15:31But here he had learnt the aesthete's credo which shaped
0:15:31 > 0:15:37Betjemanland, the everlasting pursuit of beauty in people and in places.
0:15:55 > 0:15:59It was Betjeman's eager pursuit of beauty that prompted him
0:15:59 > 0:16:02to seize on an invitation from an Oxford chum to
0:16:02 > 0:16:06stay at the country house of his family at Sezincote.
0:16:06 > 0:16:12Grand, imposing and exotic in its imitation of an Indian Palace,
0:16:12 > 0:16:15this was a kind of heaven on earth.
0:16:17 > 0:16:21Down the drive, under the early yellow leaves evokes
0:16:21 > 0:16:25One largest Tudor, one in Indian style
0:16:25 > 0:16:31The bridge, the waterfall, the temple pool, there they burst on us
0:16:31 > 0:16:36The onion domes, chudgers and chutries made of amber stone
0:16:36 > 0:16:38Home of the oaks, exotic Sezincote
0:16:38 > 0:16:43Stately and strange it looked, the Maybob's house,
0:16:43 > 0:16:46Indian without and coolest Greek within
0:16:46 > 0:16:48Looking from Gloucestershire to Oxfordshire
0:16:53 > 0:16:55Crackle of gravel.
0:17:01 > 0:17:04Throughout his life, Betjeman loved great houses.
0:17:04 > 0:17:07But this place isn't your average stately home of England.
0:17:07 > 0:17:11It's fantastic. It's as if somebody has taken the Brighton Pavilion
0:17:11 > 0:17:13and set it down in the middle of the Cotswolds.
0:17:13 > 0:17:18It's so Betjemanic. The owner was Colonel Dugdale.
0:17:18 > 0:17:22He was married to Ethel, a keen socialist.
0:17:22 > 0:17:26Betjeman wrote that Mrs Dugdale was "mother to us all".
0:17:26 > 0:17:29But he must have found in this place, with its large rooms
0:17:29 > 0:17:34and its civilised atmosphere, such a contrast to the pinched,
0:17:34 > 0:17:37quarrelsome suburban world from which he came.
0:17:38 > 0:17:43And in his first book, Mount Zion, or In Touch With The Infinite,
0:17:43 > 0:17:48he wrote a dedication which is in effect a kind a love letter to Sezincote.
0:17:48 > 0:17:53"Constantly under those minarets I have been raised from the deepest depression
0:17:53 > 0:17:56"and spent the happiest days of my life."
0:17:59 > 0:18:04Great country houses like this captivated Betjeman, not only
0:18:04 > 0:18:07because they were lovely to look at but because here
0:18:07 > 0:18:12he gravitated to people who shared with him a tendency to eccentricity.
0:18:13 > 0:18:19"Oh, Ethel!" Loudly Colonel Dugdale's voice boomed sudden down the table,
0:18:19 > 0:18:23"That manure, I've had it shifted to the strawberry beds."
0:18:23 > 0:18:25"Yes, Arthur, Major Atley, as you said.
0:18:25 > 0:18:30"70 million of the poor Chinese eat less than half a calorie a week."
0:18:33 > 0:18:36Of course the country house set was made up of the titled,
0:18:36 > 0:18:39the well-connected and the rich.
0:18:39 > 0:18:41And how Betjeman craved their acceptance!
0:18:43 > 0:18:45He had heard, and been deeply wounded,
0:18:45 > 0:18:48by snide remarks directed his way,
0:18:48 > 0:18:52that really he just a little, middle class upstart with bad teeth
0:18:52 > 0:18:54and a foreign sounding name.
0:18:54 > 0:18:57So, to protect himself, humour became his shield.
0:19:00 > 0:19:02His contemporary, the novelist Anthony Powell
0:19:02 > 0:19:06made two brilliant observations about Betjeman.
0:19:06 > 0:19:10One was that Betjeman has a whim of iron.
0:19:10 > 0:19:16The other was that the key to Betjeman's success as a social climber was buffoonery.
0:19:16 > 0:19:19He became a kind of court jester to the upper classes.
0:19:19 > 0:19:20He loved to be loved
0:19:20 > 0:19:25and clowning about was his making himself feel that he fitted in.
0:19:25 > 0:19:28But I feel that behind all the clowning there was
0:19:28 > 0:19:30a sense of insecurity.
0:19:39 > 0:19:42Country houses like Sezincote would always bring out
0:19:42 > 0:19:45the snob in Betjeman.
0:19:45 > 0:19:48But there another important part of him
0:19:48 > 0:19:50that was far from being snobbish.
0:19:51 > 0:19:55Betjeman believed that what was beautiful should not be
0:19:55 > 0:19:58narrowly defined, and the preserve of elites.
0:20:00 > 0:20:04He was quite able to see beauty and gain pleasure
0:20:04 > 0:20:08and share that in very different kinds of places.
0:20:14 > 0:20:17And here I am at Clevedon built by the Victorians for a spot
0:20:17 > 0:20:20of gentle and genteel holiday-making.
0:20:20 > 0:20:22A quiet respectable place,
0:20:22 > 0:20:25Betjeman described it, unspoilt.
0:20:25 > 0:20:27In a radio broadcast he said that if would appeal to the
0:20:27 > 0:20:32sort of people who liked peace and mistrusted progress.
0:20:32 > 0:20:36One of his favourite songs was Tea For Two - a very Clevedon
0:20:36 > 0:20:39sort of song, don't you think?
0:20:39 > 0:20:43Betjeman once remarked, "Isn't abroad awful?" Which is
0:20:43 > 0:20:46why he could celebrate with genuine feeling
0:20:46 > 0:20:49the pleasures of the Great British seaside that he found
0:20:49 > 0:20:51at the more raucous Weston-Super Mare,
0:20:51 > 0:20:53just along the Somerset coast.
0:20:56 > 0:20:58Let's see what the guidebook has to say about it.
0:21:00 > 0:21:04"Here, the grown-ups can relax happily in deck chairs
0:21:04 > 0:21:07"while the kiddies build sand castles."
0:21:09 > 0:21:13That's a guidebook sentence well worth reading twice.
0:21:13 > 0:21:18"Here the grown-ups can relax happily in deck chairs
0:21:18 > 0:21:20"while the kiddies build sand castles."
0:21:31 > 0:21:35Betjeman especially loved a good seaside pier,
0:21:35 > 0:21:39and none comes better than this finely proportioned and elegant
0:21:39 > 0:21:44structure opened to the Victorian public in 1869 here at Clevedon.
0:21:45 > 0:21:49He called it "charming, the finest of its kind in the country".
0:21:49 > 0:21:51And who could argue with that?
0:21:54 > 0:21:57But more than anything else he liked this place was
0:21:57 > 0:22:00because it gave pleasure and delight to the many not just to the few.
0:22:00 > 0:22:04It was part of that popular culture which he cherished
0:22:04 > 0:22:07just as deeply as he loved country houses.
0:22:07 > 0:22:11He once quipped, "I like all piers whether they are seaside piers,
0:22:11 > 0:22:13"or peers of the realm."
0:22:13 > 0:22:18So Betjemanland contained the seaside and all its fun.
0:22:18 > 0:22:23It contained cinemas which he once said were the churches of our day.
0:22:23 > 0:22:27And it contained the music hall, who's blue humour
0:22:27 > 0:22:31and songs he so much loved, and whose stars,
0:22:31 > 0:22:35like George Robey, Max Miller, the Crazy Gang, were his heroes.
0:22:37 > 0:22:41# The undenied and loving couple courting close to me
0:22:41 > 0:22:45# She was just turned 21 He was 83
0:22:45 > 0:22:47# The rain came down they'd got not gamp
0:22:47 > 0:22:49# They both sat down The grass was damp
0:22:49 > 0:22:52# He couldn't get up He'd got the cramp
0:22:52 > 0:22:53# Passing the time away. #
0:22:58 > 0:23:01I know exactly what you're saying to yourself.
0:23:01 > 0:23:04You're wrong. I know what you're saying.
0:23:08 > 0:23:10You wicked lot!
0:23:12 > 0:23:14You're the kind of people who get me a bad name!
0:23:18 > 0:23:20Now this is a funny thing.
0:23:38 > 0:23:41There were other cherished places that Betjeman revered.
0:23:42 > 0:23:46There was Berkshire, The Ridgeway, Upper Lambourne,
0:23:46 > 0:23:50and the White Horse of Uffington, with the village of the same name
0:23:50 > 0:23:52nestling in the valley below.
0:23:54 > 0:23:58This is where we can understand that Betjemanland is more than
0:23:58 > 0:24:04just a physical place, it is also an emotional landscape, where the
0:24:04 > 0:24:08loves and infatuations of Betjeman's adult life were played out.
0:24:11 > 0:24:16Garrards Farm in Uffington, the first real home that Betjeman
0:24:16 > 0:24:21lived after his marriage to Penelope, daughter of Field Marshal Chetwode,
0:24:21 > 0:24:24former Commander in Chief of the British Army in India.
0:24:26 > 0:24:29Here are the stables where Penelope kept her favourite horse,
0:24:29 > 0:24:33Moti, which she took absolutely everywhere.
0:24:36 > 0:24:41But the man his friends called Betj never liked equine pursuits.
0:24:41 > 0:24:43He and horses never really got on.
0:24:47 > 0:24:50Because Betj wasn't really the horsey type, because his father
0:24:50 > 0:24:54was in trade, don't you know, the Chetwodes looked down on him.
0:24:54 > 0:24:58Betj's way of coping with the snubs and snobbery of his parents-in-law
0:24:58 > 0:25:01was to exaggerate them make them into jokes and anecdotes.
0:25:01 > 0:25:05Then there arose the terrifying question - how was
0:25:05 > 0:25:07the father-in-law to be addressed?
0:25:07 > 0:25:09"Well, I'm not having you calling me Philip.
0:25:09 > 0:25:12"And you can't call me father. I'm not your father.
0:25:12 > 0:25:15"I know - you can call me Field Marshal."
0:25:15 > 0:25:18In the village museum, there are copies of the many letters
0:25:18 > 0:25:22that he and Penelope exchanged during their long marriage.
0:25:22 > 0:25:25And my, what a fiery one it was!
0:25:25 > 0:25:26Look at this one.
0:25:28 > 0:25:33"Darling Plymmie." That's Penelope. He had nicknames for everybody, and
0:25:33 > 0:25:39for her he had lots of nicknames - Plymmie, Ugly, Beastly, Filthiness.
0:25:42 > 0:25:45And there's the children, Paul, Candida,
0:25:45 > 0:25:49and flanking them on either side the two most important
0:25:49 > 0:25:52members of the family, perhaps, Archie and Jumbo.
0:25:52 > 0:25:55Gosh, Penelope looks cross in this drawing.
0:25:55 > 0:25:59It was a very stormy marriage, like his parents' marriage.
0:25:59 > 0:26:03People often witnessed the most furious rows between the Betjemans.
0:26:03 > 0:26:07Cyril Connolly, the critic, was once staying at a country house party.
0:26:07 > 0:26:10He was having a bath. It was a bathroom with two doors.
0:26:10 > 0:26:12One of the doors flew open.
0:26:12 > 0:26:15The Betjemans came running through the room, one shouting hate
0:26:15 > 0:26:18and abuse at the other, and out through the other door,
0:26:18 > 0:26:21neither of them noticing that there was a naked man sitting in the bath.
0:26:23 > 0:26:29During the time they lived in Uffington, Betjeman and Penelope were not the least stand-offish.
0:26:30 > 0:26:35Betj did his bit for village life by becoming church warden at what
0:26:35 > 0:26:38he called the Cathedral of the Vale - St Mary.
0:26:44 > 0:26:49Here he learnt and loved the very English art of bell ringing.
0:27:04 > 0:27:08The peal of bells is the very soundtrack of Betjemanland.
0:27:08 > 0:27:12Indeed when he was on Desert Island Discs one of his choices was
0:27:12 > 0:27:14a record of English Change Ringing.
0:27:15 > 0:27:21It resonates and echoes throughout his work and indeed is
0:27:21 > 0:27:24the inspiration for the poem he wrote about this place, Uffington.
0:27:27 > 0:27:30Tonight we feel a muffled peel
0:27:30 > 0:27:32Hang on the village like a pall
0:27:32 > 0:27:35It overwhelms the towering elms
0:27:35 > 0:27:38That death reminding dying fall
0:27:38 > 0:27:41The very sky, no longer high
0:27:41 > 0:27:44Comes down within the reach of all
0:27:44 > 0:27:47Imprisoned in a cage of sound
0:27:47 > 0:27:49Even the trivial seems profound.
0:27:54 > 0:27:59What is poetry? I think it is recollected emotion.
0:27:59 > 0:28:05It's a sort of shorthand, and it's saying things simply and clearly.
0:28:08 > 0:28:11An admiring friend once remarked that
0:28:11 > 0:28:15the poems of Betjeman are simple but deceptively so.
0:28:15 > 0:28:19In form they are traditional and accessible in their language.
0:28:19 > 0:28:25But they deal with universal themes of love, loss and death
0:28:25 > 0:28:27and have great emotional depth.
0:28:27 > 0:28:31And it was these qualities that ensured an appreciative and
0:28:31 > 0:28:35growing readership for his poetry collections during his lifetime.
0:28:35 > 0:28:39So when the collected edition of his works came out it was
0:28:39 > 0:28:42a publishing phenomenon - a poetry best seller!
0:28:47 > 0:28:53On the surface, the much-loved writer appeared the picture of respectability -
0:28:53 > 0:28:59the family man, wife, two children, dog, the house in the country.
0:28:59 > 0:29:01But this was never enough for Betjeman. I think
0:29:01 > 0:29:04he also needed an element of fantasy in his life.
0:29:08 > 0:29:10He enjoyed the thrill of infatuation,
0:29:10 > 0:29:12the pleasure of the crush,
0:29:12 > 0:29:16craved impossible yearning and longing, admitting that,
0:29:16 > 0:29:20"It was insecurity that made me fall in and out of love so often.
0:29:20 > 0:29:23"I think by nature I am masochistic."
0:29:23 > 0:29:26And Betj made no secret of his liking for the girls.
0:29:28 > 0:29:31Everywhere you go in London in public transport,
0:29:31 > 0:29:34you can't get away from the beauty of the girls.
0:29:50 > 0:29:52The sort of girl I like to see
0:29:52 > 0:29:56Smiles down from her great height at me
0:29:56 > 0:29:59She stands in strong, athletic pose
0:29:59 > 0:30:01And wrinkles her retrousse nose
0:30:01 > 0:30:04Is it distaste that makes her frown
0:30:04 > 0:30:07So furious and freckled down
0:30:07 > 0:30:10On an unhealthy worm like me?
0:30:10 > 0:30:12Or am I what she likes to see?
0:30:15 > 0:30:18It was infatuation on the tennis court
0:30:18 > 0:30:20that created poetic perfection.
0:30:26 > 0:30:29Anyone who has heard the name Betjeman is likely to know
0:30:29 > 0:30:32A Subaltern's Love Song, inspired by his infatuation
0:30:32 > 0:30:36for a Surrey doctor's daughter - a tennis champ, of course.
0:30:36 > 0:30:40I think it's his most perfect lyric, where every word counts.
0:30:46 > 0:30:50Miss J Hunter Dunn, Miss J Hunter Dunn,
0:30:50 > 0:30:54Furnish'd and burnish'd by Aldershot sun
0:30:54 > 0:30:58What strenuous singles we played after tea
0:30:58 > 0:31:02We in the tournament - you against me!
0:31:02 > 0:31:06Love-30, love-40 Oh, weakness of joy
0:31:06 > 0:31:10The speed of a swallow, the grace of a boy
0:31:10 > 0:31:15With carefullest carelessness, gaily you won,
0:31:15 > 0:31:19I am weak from your loveliness, Joan Hunter Dunn.
0:31:21 > 0:31:24But there was much more to the writing of Betjeman
0:31:24 > 0:31:27than this seeming levity.
0:31:27 > 0:31:32His poems also reflect darker, more adult preoccupations.
0:31:32 > 0:31:35There was always lots of sex in them, for example.
0:31:37 > 0:31:40In Betjemanland, there's a strong tolerance
0:31:40 > 0:31:44and understanding of our sexuality, which was way ahead of its time.
0:31:44 > 0:31:49For instance, in that poem Invasion Exercise On A Poultry Farm,
0:31:49 > 0:31:52a lesbian trusses up a paratrooper
0:31:52 > 0:31:56while verbally abusing the object of her lust, a Land Girl.
0:31:56 > 0:32:01In Senex, there are some pretty kinky erotic goings-on out of doors.
0:32:01 > 0:32:07And in that tender poem Monody On The Death Of A Platonist Bank Clerk,
0:32:07 > 0:32:10we see Betjeman's sympathy with homosexuals.
0:32:10 > 0:32:14He himself had a gay life as a schoolboy and an undergraduate.
0:32:14 > 0:32:16He had many gay friends
0:32:16 > 0:32:19and he was always made furious by their persecution.
0:32:27 > 0:32:31One love affair was a constant thread throughout his life,
0:32:31 > 0:32:34and that was with London.
0:32:34 > 0:32:38Betjemanland always had a cockney heart to it.
0:32:38 > 0:32:41After the Second World War,
0:32:41 > 0:32:46attempts by what he called the "plansters of the new slave state"
0:32:46 > 0:32:50to finish what the bombing of the Luftwaffe had begun
0:32:50 > 0:32:53made Betjeman very angry indeed,
0:32:53 > 0:32:57and he fought back to protect the city of his childhood
0:32:57 > 0:33:01against what he saw as pure and simple vandalism.
0:33:03 > 0:33:08Snow falls in the buffet of Aldersgate station
0:33:08 > 0:33:13Toiling and doomed from Moorgate Street puffs the train
0:33:13 > 0:33:17For us of the steam and the gas-light, the lost generation
0:33:17 > 0:33:21The new white cliffs of the City are built in vain.
0:33:24 > 0:33:28But it wasn't just words that were Betjeman's weapons.
0:33:28 > 0:33:32Now there were deeds, as a very public role
0:33:32 > 0:33:34as a campaigner for conservation began.
0:33:40 > 0:33:44One celebrated battle was to save what had proudly stood
0:33:44 > 0:33:48here on the busy Euston Road for over 100 years.
0:33:51 > 0:33:55In 1838, outside the old Victorian Euston station,
0:33:55 > 0:33:59they built a 70-foot high Doric Arch of iron and brick
0:33:59 > 0:34:01and faced it with stone.
0:34:01 > 0:34:04It was one of the glories of the Greek Revival,
0:34:04 > 0:34:07truly one of the great buildings of London.
0:34:07 > 0:34:11Nearly 100 years later in 1933, the young John Betjeman wrote,
0:34:11 > 0:34:15"If vandals ever pulled down this lovely piece of architecture,
0:34:15 > 0:34:20"it would be as though the British Constitution had collapsed."
0:34:20 > 0:34:24In 1961, British Rail wanted to do just that,
0:34:24 > 0:34:27and demolish the arch as part of their plans to create
0:34:27 > 0:34:31a new Euston Station, fit for an age of electrification.
0:34:31 > 0:34:35But Betjeman disagreed, arguing there was no worthier memorial
0:34:35 > 0:34:38to Britain having built the first railways.
0:34:38 > 0:34:41He lobbied vigorously to save it.
0:34:41 > 0:34:47It could be, if it were moved forward in front of the new Euston Station,
0:34:47 > 0:34:51it would be the most magnificent public monument in London.
0:34:51 > 0:34:53And how do you hope to find this money, sir?
0:34:53 > 0:34:56We could start a public fund, and I have no doubt,
0:34:56 > 0:34:59we've got so many sympathisers - we've had letters in already,
0:34:59 > 0:35:03hundreds of them - that we could easily raise a large part of it,
0:35:03 > 0:35:07but I think, really, it should be a public monument.
0:35:07 > 0:35:10Do you think this is a good use of public money?
0:35:10 > 0:35:12It would look marvellous. It would be beautiful, you see.
0:35:12 > 0:35:16And of course, people always think if you have anything beautiful,
0:35:16 > 0:35:18it's wicked, nowadays. It has to be cheap.
0:35:19 > 0:35:21In the end, money talks.
0:35:21 > 0:35:24British Rail decided it was cheaper to demolish the arch
0:35:24 > 0:35:27than to reconstruct it in a slightly different place,
0:35:27 > 0:35:30and the Prime Minister of the day, Harold Macmillan,
0:35:30 > 0:35:33I think to his eternal shame, agreed with them.
0:35:33 > 0:35:38The battle was lost, the Euston Arch was demolished.
0:35:59 > 0:36:03Five minutes down the Euston Road, another building was under threat.
0:36:08 > 0:36:12The Midland Great Hotel, a work of Gothic-inspired genius,
0:36:12 > 0:36:15was designed by Sir George Gilbert Scott
0:36:15 > 0:36:17and finished in 1873.
0:36:20 > 0:36:23This had been one of the grandest hotels in Europe,
0:36:23 > 0:36:25serving St Pancras Station next door.
0:36:25 > 0:36:29But by the 1960s, it showed a faded glory,
0:36:29 > 0:36:33had gone down in the world and was now the offices of British Rail.
0:36:38 > 0:36:41Though it might seem incredible to us today,
0:36:41 > 0:36:43this crowning glory of Victorian architecture
0:36:43 > 0:36:45was faced with oblivion.
0:36:47 > 0:36:51In 1957, Betjeman and others had founded the Victorian Society
0:36:51 > 0:36:54to preserve jewels of the age like this.
0:36:57 > 0:37:00Betjeman wrote of his fear that the whole building was simply
0:37:00 > 0:37:04"too beautiful and too romantic to survive".
0:37:04 > 0:37:09But after losing the Euston Arch, Betj and his allies were determined
0:37:09 > 0:37:13to save Scott's masterpiece - and they did.
0:37:14 > 0:37:20In 1967, it was given a protected Grade I listing.
0:37:30 > 0:37:33The fight then continued next door,
0:37:33 > 0:37:36where the railway station was also in danger of demolition.
0:37:37 > 0:37:40Great Victorian termini like St Pancras
0:37:40 > 0:37:43were for Betjeman secular cathedrals.
0:37:43 > 0:37:46They were part of the lives of the nation,
0:37:46 > 0:37:50where he saw the smile of welcome and the sadness of goodbye,
0:37:50 > 0:37:52so they must be saved too.
0:38:03 > 0:38:06Betjeman admitted he was a romantic for a railway network
0:38:06 > 0:38:10of charming branch lines that were soon to disappear forever.
0:38:11 > 0:38:14I say, I hope you're enjoying this journey as much as I am.
0:38:15 > 0:38:19But if we listen to his views about the value of rail,
0:38:19 > 0:38:22spoken at the moment when the car was becoming the star,
0:38:22 > 0:38:26he seems so common-sensical - prophetic, even.
0:38:27 > 0:38:31You know, I'm not just being nostalgic and sentimental
0:38:31 > 0:38:34and unpractical about railways.
0:38:34 > 0:38:39We all of us know that road traffic is becoming increasingly hellish
0:38:39 > 0:38:43on this overcrowded island and that in ten years from now,
0:38:43 > 0:38:47there will be three times as much traffic on English roads
0:38:47 > 0:38:49as there is today.
0:38:58 > 0:39:01When the moment came to fight for St Pancras,
0:39:01 > 0:39:06Betjeman was able to engage both his head and his heart,
0:39:06 > 0:39:09and this combination was highly effective.
0:39:11 > 0:39:15We can still enjoy what he campaigned for today
0:39:15 > 0:39:18and, here, a statue commemorates his victory.
0:39:19 > 0:39:24"John Betjeman, poet,
0:39:24 > 0:39:29"who saved this glorious station."
0:39:34 > 0:39:39But it was not only shared public places that Betjeman wanted to save.
0:39:39 > 0:39:44He feared that a dull concrete conformity and ugliness
0:39:44 > 0:39:47was being imposed on the very homes that people lived in.
0:39:49 > 0:39:51There's the little house, with its chimneypots.
0:39:51 > 0:39:57That's what they were replacing with these improved industrial dwellings.
0:39:57 > 0:40:01The beginning of flats, the beginning of the end of street life,
0:40:01 > 0:40:05and over there on the horizon,
0:40:05 > 0:40:09a still greater inhumanity - the tall towers,
0:40:09 > 0:40:13and not a tree and no grass anywhere.
0:40:15 > 0:40:17Ah, what a change.
0:40:19 > 0:40:22Breadth, leafiness, space.
0:40:26 > 0:40:29The struggle for a humane architecture was the reason why
0:40:29 > 0:40:34Betjeman came here, to Bedford Park in West London.
0:40:34 > 0:40:38# We are the Village Green Preservation Society
0:40:38 > 0:40:43# God save Donald Duck vaudeville and variety
0:40:43 > 0:40:48# We are the Desperate Dan Appreciation Society
0:40:48 > 0:40:53# God save strawberry jam and all the different varieties... #
0:40:55 > 0:40:57Here was the first ever garden suburb.
0:40:57 > 0:41:01Built in the 1880s, Bedford Park was designed
0:41:01 > 0:41:03by the architect Norman Shaw and his disciples
0:41:03 > 0:41:07on the principles of the Arts and Crafts movement,
0:41:07 > 0:41:10that emphasised simple, traditional forms.
0:41:10 > 0:41:14This became the example for all the Metrolands that followed.
0:41:16 > 0:41:20When, in 1963, houses in this remarkable architectural development
0:41:20 > 0:41:23faced demolition, Betjeman readily agreed
0:41:23 > 0:41:26to become president of the Bedford Park Society
0:41:26 > 0:41:28that was formed to rescue them.
0:41:34 > 0:41:38What so appealed to Betjeman about the Arts and Crafts domestic style
0:41:38 > 0:41:41was it was architecture for real people to live in.
0:41:41 > 0:41:43These were houses with warmth,
0:41:43 > 0:41:47with distinctive, quirky features, even with a bit of humour.
0:41:47 > 0:41:49He thought that was worth fighting for.
0:41:49 > 0:41:51So when they were threatened, he fought
0:41:51 > 0:41:54and, with John Betjeman as a figurehead,
0:41:54 > 0:41:57the Battle for Bedford Park was decisively won.
0:41:57 > 0:42:02# Preserving the old ways from being abused
0:42:02 > 0:42:07# Protecting the new ways for me and for you
0:42:07 > 0:42:09# What more can we do?
0:42:09 > 0:42:14# We are the Village Green Preservation Society... #
0:42:15 > 0:42:19By the 1970s, Betjeman was receiving 50 letters a day
0:42:19 > 0:42:21from all around the country,
0:42:21 > 0:42:25begging for his help for this or that campaign of conservation.
0:42:25 > 0:42:27"I was made to be a writer,
0:42:27 > 0:42:32"and I'm being turned into a Post Office", he said with a sigh.
0:42:35 > 0:42:37Some of these appeals were for churches
0:42:37 > 0:42:39that faced the wrecking ball.
0:42:39 > 0:42:42One was for Holy Trinity, close to Sloane Square.
0:42:47 > 0:42:50It was designed by John Dando Sedding
0:42:50 > 0:42:53and, for Betjeman, it was a late Victorian masterpiece.
0:42:53 > 0:42:56As he wrote: "Holy Trinity is a celebration
0:42:56 > 0:42:58"of the Arts and Crafts Movement.
0:42:58 > 0:43:03"It only lacks a bishop's throne to be the Cathedral of West London."
0:43:04 > 0:43:07He loved this great stained glass window by Burne-Jones,
0:43:07 > 0:43:10he loved all the metalwork in the choir,
0:43:10 > 0:43:12the carved angels by Pomeroy,
0:43:12 > 0:43:15the great hammered screens by Henry Wilson.
0:43:15 > 0:43:18For Betjeman, this was an "irreplaceable church".
0:43:21 > 0:43:24In June 1971, it was announced
0:43:24 > 0:43:26that the Sedding Church would be demolished
0:43:26 > 0:43:29and its works of art destroyed or dispersed
0:43:29 > 0:43:32to be replaced by a more modest place of worship.
0:43:32 > 0:43:36The proposal made a rather chilling reference to Holy Trinity
0:43:36 > 0:43:39as "obsolete plant".
0:43:39 > 0:43:42Betjeman thought all this the "height of irresponsibility"
0:43:42 > 0:43:45and, with the architectural writer Gavin Stamp,
0:43:45 > 0:43:49once again went to war, and once again won.
0:43:50 > 0:43:53The paradox is that I don't suppose there's anyone in Britain today
0:43:53 > 0:43:56who does not support Betjeman in the preservation debates.
0:43:56 > 0:44:00But while we all want to save lovely old buildings,
0:44:00 > 0:44:04do we understand why Betjeman so violently objected to the vandals?
0:44:04 > 0:44:05It was their greed.
0:44:05 > 0:44:09It was their pernicious belief in progress, in growth,
0:44:09 > 0:44:14in worshipping economic good as the highest of all human ambitions.
0:44:14 > 0:44:16And if we understand that about Betjeman
0:44:16 > 0:44:20then he's a prophet who speaks to us more vividly today than ever.
0:44:20 > 0:44:23We humbly beseech thee most mercifully
0:44:23 > 0:44:25to receive these, our prayers,
0:44:25 > 0:44:28which we offer unto our Divine Majesty.
0:44:28 > 0:44:32An act of vandalism against Holy Trinity hurt Betjeman deeply.
0:44:32 > 0:44:36Not only was it was a place of aesthetic beauty,
0:44:36 > 0:44:38but he worshipped here as well.
0:44:39 > 0:44:41The body of our Lord Jesus Christ...
0:44:41 > 0:44:45So now we can understand another part of Betjemanland -
0:44:45 > 0:44:47one that was a place of deep faith.
0:44:47 > 0:44:51- CONGREGATION: - Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil
0:44:51 > 0:44:53For thine is the kingdom
0:44:53 > 0:44:54The power and the glory
0:44:54 > 0:44:57For ever and ever, amen.
0:45:00 > 0:45:05Throughout his life, he described himself as a religious maniac
0:45:05 > 0:45:08under the command of the "Management",
0:45:08 > 0:45:11at whose mention he would gaze piously heavenward.
0:45:11 > 0:45:15You see, even God had a nickname.
0:45:15 > 0:45:18But for John Betjeman, this was serious.
0:45:18 > 0:45:23CHORAL SINGING
0:45:26 > 0:45:30His formal religious life began when, as an undergraduate,
0:45:30 > 0:45:33he was confirmed into the Church of England
0:45:33 > 0:45:36here at Pusey House in Oxford.
0:45:37 > 0:45:41This religious establishment had been created in the 19th century
0:45:41 > 0:45:45to promote the beliefs of the Anglican High Church,
0:45:45 > 0:45:47at that time believed to be under threat.
0:45:49 > 0:45:52Here in this chapel, Betjeman began to understand
0:45:52 > 0:45:56the importance that the High Church rituals of the sacraments,
0:45:56 > 0:46:01liturgy and the act of confession had for him.
0:46:01 > 0:46:04They became central to his spiritual life.
0:46:04 > 0:46:07And, though he always had doubts about his faith
0:46:07 > 0:46:11that greatly tortured him, sacred places like this
0:46:11 > 0:46:15were a sanctuary against the arbitrary cruelties of this world.
0:46:17 > 0:46:22One of his friends once asked him how he could possibly believe.
0:46:22 > 0:46:26And this is how Betjeman replied in a wonderful letter:
0:46:26 > 0:46:28"I choose the Christian's way
0:46:28 > 0:46:30"(and completely fail to live up to it)
0:46:30 > 0:46:33"because I believe it true and because I believe -
0:46:33 > 0:46:37"for possibly a split second in six months, but that's enough -
0:46:37 > 0:46:40"that Christ is really the incarnate son of God
0:46:40 > 0:46:43"and that Sacraments are a means of grace,
0:46:43 > 0:46:45"and that grace alone gives one
0:46:45 > 0:46:48"the power to do what one ought to do.
0:46:48 > 0:46:50"I feel this will shock you,
0:46:50 > 0:46:53"you dear Liberal intellectual old thing".
0:47:03 > 0:47:06By the 1960s, Betjeman the snob
0:47:06 > 0:47:09must have taken immense satisfaction in the fact
0:47:09 > 0:47:12that he was now a friend to royalty, the great and the good.
0:47:14 > 0:47:22# Well, sir, all I can say is if I were a bell, I'd be ringing... #
0:47:22 > 0:47:24He was soon to be knighted,
0:47:24 > 0:47:27and the mantle of Poet Laureate placed on his shoulders.
0:47:27 > 0:47:30So naturally, as part of the Establishment,
0:47:30 > 0:47:35Betj lived it up in Clubland - the Garrick, the Athenaeum,
0:47:35 > 0:47:38and here at the Royal Automobile Club.
0:47:41 > 0:47:47# Well, sir, all I can say is if I were a gate, I'd be swinging... #
0:47:47 > 0:47:52And how Betjeman enjoyed good company and conversation,
0:47:52 > 0:47:54wining and dining.
0:47:54 > 0:48:00# Or if I were a bell, I'd go ding-dong, ding-dong, ding... #
0:48:01 > 0:48:03He had literally hundreds of friends.
0:48:03 > 0:48:05And what fun to have been one of them
0:48:05 > 0:48:07and have lunch with John Betjeman.
0:48:07 > 0:48:09Because he so enjoyed his food, and he loved getting drunk
0:48:09 > 0:48:14and he loved a good claret - not that he was a wine snob.
0:48:14 > 0:48:16And they would have enjoyed all the jokes
0:48:16 > 0:48:19and the mimicry and the self-deprecating stories,
0:48:19 > 0:48:22and the laughter, which they said
0:48:22 > 0:48:24rose to a high pitch like a dog whistle.
0:48:24 > 0:48:27And sometimes, when greatly amused at the table,
0:48:27 > 0:48:30he would throw back his head and cover his face with his napkin
0:48:30 > 0:48:33and literally howl with mirth.
0:48:33 > 0:48:35Such warmth of character, I think.
0:48:35 > 0:48:38Betjeman used to say he didn't like people without fingertips,
0:48:38 > 0:48:42by which he meant people without sensitivity or empathy.
0:48:46 > 0:48:48By now, his television appearances
0:48:48 > 0:48:51had made this affable side to Betjeman's character
0:48:51 > 0:48:53very familiar indeed.
0:48:53 > 0:48:57The performer who had entertained drawing rooms since his Oxford days
0:48:57 > 0:49:01was now doing the same for millions watching in their living rooms.
0:49:02 > 0:49:05How beautiful the London air
0:49:05 > 0:49:07How calm and unalarming
0:49:07 > 0:49:10This height about the Archway where
0:49:10 > 0:49:12The prospects round are charming.
0:49:13 > 0:49:15And Betj was a television natural -
0:49:15 > 0:49:20warm, accessible and, unlike so many presenters then and now,
0:49:20 > 0:49:23not in the least condescending to viewers.
0:49:24 > 0:49:28Let's mount the 16 bus with care
0:49:28 > 0:49:30It's empty, wide and free
0:49:30 > 0:49:33It will take us out of everywhere
0:49:33 > 0:49:35To the days that used to be.
0:49:39 > 0:49:41So here was the public persona.
0:49:41 > 0:49:45Yet there was a different, private side, revealed off camera.
0:49:46 > 0:49:48After Betj had made all his friends laugh
0:49:48 > 0:49:50and they saw him walk away,
0:49:50 > 0:49:53they watched the shoulders slump down,
0:49:53 > 0:49:55and the melancholy madness take over.
0:49:55 > 0:49:58He was very sensitive in the face of criticism.
0:49:58 > 0:50:01He was thin-skinned, he was paranoid, he was full of fears.
0:50:01 > 0:50:03He thought he was a failure.
0:50:05 > 0:50:09And Betjeman fretted and agonised.
0:50:09 > 0:50:12Was he really that good a writer?
0:50:12 > 0:50:15Was he just a little too frivolous and fun-loving,
0:50:15 > 0:50:17really just not serious enough?
0:50:18 > 0:50:24I can only say how very thankful I am to have survived so long
0:50:24 > 0:50:31and how very thankful I am that people still haven't seen through me.
0:50:33 > 0:50:36I always feel rather a fraud.
0:50:48 > 0:50:50And there was yet more darkness
0:50:50 > 0:50:53that came from Betjeman suffering tremendous guilt.
0:50:55 > 0:50:58Betjemanland is full of it.
0:51:01 > 0:51:06To understand this, I'm back to the defining place of his childhood,
0:51:06 > 0:51:11Highgate, and the lush beauty of its cemetery.
0:51:11 > 0:51:14Here is the family plot of the Betjemanns.
0:51:14 > 0:51:18This is where his grandfather John and father Ernest are buried.
0:51:20 > 0:51:22Betjeman wrote this granite obelisk
0:51:22 > 0:51:25points an accusing finger to the sky.
0:51:25 > 0:51:28He had a very stormy relationship with his father,
0:51:28 > 0:51:31and when Ernest Betjemann died,
0:51:31 > 0:51:33Betjeman snobbishly refused to go into trade
0:51:33 > 0:51:35and take on the family firm.
0:51:35 > 0:51:38He wound up the works in Pentonville Road,
0:51:38 > 0:51:42the workers were put out of their jobs and he felt immense guilt.
0:51:45 > 0:51:49Perhaps the only way he could reconcile himself with his father
0:51:49 > 0:51:50after the death of Ernest
0:51:50 > 0:51:53was through the remembrance that poetry offered.
0:51:53 > 0:51:56..Of maggots in his eyes
0:51:56 > 0:51:59He liked the rain-washed Cornish air
0:51:59 > 0:52:02And smell of ploughed-up soil
0:52:02 > 0:52:05He liked a landscape big and bare
0:52:05 > 0:52:06And painted it in oil
0:52:06 > 0:52:09But least of all he liked that place
0:52:09 > 0:52:11Which hangs on Highgate Hill
0:52:11 > 0:52:15Of soaked Carrara-covered earth
0:52:15 > 0:52:16For Londoners to fill.
0:52:35 > 0:52:39But there was a guilty secret Betjeman harboured
0:52:39 > 0:52:40that might have greatly damaged
0:52:40 > 0:52:43the relationship he had with his adoring public,
0:52:43 > 0:52:46if it had become public knowledge.
0:52:47 > 0:52:52By the early 1960s, he was so busy that he needed a London pad.
0:52:52 > 0:52:55So while his wife Penelope remained behind in Berkshire,
0:52:55 > 0:52:58he came to live here at number 43, Cloth Fair,
0:52:58 > 0:53:00just next to Smithfield Market.
0:53:00 > 0:53:02He'd always loved this part of the city.
0:53:02 > 0:53:05And it seemed as though this was the scene
0:53:05 > 0:53:08of a happy, carefree bachelor life.
0:53:08 > 0:53:11But since the early 1950s, he had begun a love affair
0:53:11 > 0:53:13which was something much more serious
0:53:13 > 0:53:16than his usual flirtations and infatuations.
0:53:16 > 0:53:20And this love would last until his dying day.
0:53:33 > 0:53:37The affair was with Lady Elizabeth Cavendish,
0:53:37 > 0:53:40lady-in-waiting to Princess Margaret.
0:53:40 > 0:53:44Typically, they met at an exclusive London dinner party.
0:53:44 > 0:53:49Betj wrote excitedly to a friend, "She's just our kind of girl.
0:53:49 > 0:53:53"She is bracing and witty and kind and keen on drink."
0:53:55 > 0:53:57Out of this relationship with Elizabeth came
0:53:57 > 0:54:00some of his greatest love poems.
0:54:00 > 0:54:04Applaud the tenderness of In Willesden Graveyard,
0:54:04 > 0:54:08or the agonies of The Cockney Amorist,
0:54:08 > 0:54:11and appreciate how Betjeman beautifully captures
0:54:11 > 0:54:15the everyday ecstasy and pain of our own love affairs.
0:54:18 > 0:54:21Betjeman was living a double life,
0:54:21 > 0:54:25but this was no secret to his wife, who knew all about Elizabeth.
0:54:25 > 0:54:30But Penelope early in their marriage had converted to Roman Catholicism
0:54:30 > 0:54:33so, for her, divorce was out of the question.
0:54:34 > 0:54:37Betj himself simply couldn't face it.
0:54:40 > 0:54:43For Penelope, the pain and humiliation were dreadful.
0:54:43 > 0:54:46For Elizabeth, his refusal to leave his wife
0:54:46 > 0:54:49and give her a baby was painful in the extreme.
0:54:49 > 0:54:51The situation never resolved itself,
0:54:51 > 0:54:54and however happy Betjeman seemed on the surface of things,
0:54:54 > 0:54:58for the rest of his life, he was in a torment of indecision.
0:55:10 > 0:55:13John Betjeman spent the last days of his life with Elizabeth,
0:55:13 > 0:55:16not Penelope, in Cornwall.
0:55:16 > 0:55:19Once again by Daymer Bay, the one place in Betjemanland
0:55:19 > 0:55:22that could guarantee him solace and peace.
0:55:27 > 0:55:31The money from many verses sold had allowed him
0:55:31 > 0:55:33to buy a holiday home of his own.
0:55:33 > 0:55:35And this is it -
0:55:35 > 0:55:37Treen.
0:55:38 > 0:55:44Here, Betjeman died on the 19th of May, 1984.
0:55:52 > 0:55:54He'd always feared death,
0:55:54 > 0:55:57and he wrote about it constantly in his poetry.
0:55:57 > 0:55:59He also had a lifelong dread,
0:55:59 > 0:56:02instilled in him by his Calvinist nursemaid,
0:56:02 > 0:56:04of going to hell to be punished for his sins.
0:56:05 > 0:56:09But Elizabeth recalled that in the last two months of his life
0:56:09 > 0:56:14he was calm and serene, and she was at his side
0:56:14 > 0:56:16when he died quietly here at Treen,
0:56:16 > 0:56:19with Jumbo and Archie in either arm.
0:56:48 > 0:56:53Here in the churchyard of St Enodoc, amidst the Celtic crosses,
0:56:53 > 0:56:57Betjeman is buried with a headstone of Cornish slate.
0:57:13 > 0:57:16So why is it worth commemorating John Betjeman
0:57:16 > 0:57:1830 years after he died?
0:57:18 > 0:57:22First, because he was a poet. I would say a highly original poet.
0:57:22 > 0:57:25Unlike most poets, he had the capacity
0:57:25 > 0:57:29to communicate with the needs and the griefs
0:57:29 > 0:57:33and the pleasures of millions of his fellow human beings.
0:57:33 > 0:57:37And Betjeman helped us to see beauty in railways, in buildings,
0:57:37 > 0:57:39in landscapes that the money men
0:57:39 > 0:57:42and the politicians don't see the point of.
0:57:42 > 0:57:45And Betj the emotional chaotic helped us -
0:57:45 > 0:57:46helped me at any rate -
0:57:46 > 0:57:50come to terms with our own muddled lives and loves.
0:57:50 > 0:57:53But let the last word be his.
0:57:53 > 0:57:57This is the last poem in his final published collection.
0:57:57 > 0:57:59It's called The Last Laugh.
0:58:00 > 0:58:02I made hay while the sun shone
0:58:02 > 0:58:04My work sold
0:58:04 > 0:58:07Now, if the harvest is over
0:58:07 > 0:58:09And the world cold
0:58:09 > 0:58:11Give me the bonus of laughter
0:58:11 > 0:58:13As I lose hold.