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So here I am...My life can be summed up - as much as any life can be summed up, which is not at all - under the following headings. What they don't say about me is probably greater than what they do say. But for what it's worth, here I am: [Vital Statistics] - [Words] - [Music] - [Dates and seasons] Vital Statistics
Words"J'ai commencé ma vie comme je
la finirai sans doute : au milieu des livres" My sister started teaching me to read before I started school - she must have been about 6 at the time - and since then I haven't stopped. Our house was always full of books, everything from "The Armada Book of Cartoons" to Churchill's "History of the English Speaking Peoples". I read just about anything I could get my hands on, and still do. Like most readers, however, I went through som "phases". At one stage the big hero was Arthur Ransome, author of "Swallows and Amazons", perhaps helped by the fact that Dad took us sailing in a dinghy at the local sailing club. Then there were CS Lewis' Narnia books, of course, which led inevitably to JRR Tolkien. Which led me eventually to Linguistics. In the meantime the 'O' and 'A' level curricula introduced me to Shakespeare, Keats, TS Eliot, Huxley and Waugh - and the masters of French, German and Latin literature: Gide, Moliere, Brecht, Virgil and Ovid. And some deliciously juicy epigrams by Martial. I still read all of those, occasionally, supplemented by newer discoveries like Salman Rushdie and Sartre and Fay Weldon. But then came Linguistics. I discovered Philology by reading a Readers Digest Encyclopædia, and was soon as interested in the form of words as in their content. On long car trips I invented languages based on the licence plates of passing cars, and I started collecting dictionaries and Teach Yourself Books, comparing words, and learning which languages were most closely connected. Picking up an Anglo-Saxon reader at a jumble sale, I discovered that Tolkien's world was not just put together at random, but was itself a major piece of philology, with many names and words derived directly from Anglo-Saxon, and other languages which he had simply invented himself. So when the time came to pick a university degree, the choice was between Anglo-Saxon at Cambridge, or Linguistics. Well, not being the most disciplined of students, Cambridge turned out to be over my head, and I ended up in Reading, doing Linguistics. Thanks to Peter Trudgill, one of the lecturers there, I got sent on a year out to Norway - and the rest is history. But whatever happens - I am still fascinated by words, whether they're put together in a poem or a novel, or dissected on the Linguist's operating table Click here for some of my favourite books Music"...and a sound arose of endless
interchanging melodies woven on harmony..." Our home was not filled with music. The radio was mostly tuned to Radio 4 (all talk, for the non-Brits), and the record player was a clapped out portable from the sixties that very rarely got used. Except to play our two family singles (at least, the only two I remember) - Rolf Harris' "Two little boys" and The Goons "I'm walking backwards to Christmas"! Apart from that, music in my childhood came in two categories: Top of the Pops on the telly, and the band and songsters at the Salvation Army. Well after a while we got a better record player - they were still called "records" in those days :-) and I started to learn the violin, being thereby introduced to classical music (of a sort). So as a teenager I was still participating in the "band and songsters" world of the Army, now supplemented by various school orchestras and choirs, and the LVYO (Lea Valley Youth Orchestra), while I and my mates were getting into progressively heavier varieties of rock music, ending up with Motorhead and Hawkwind. I doubt whether there are many Salvation Army officers who have seen those two, as well as Deep Purple and Pink Floyd, "live in concert", but I've got the tinnitus to prove it. As a student I was introduced to jazz and swing - which left me listening to almost any kind of music you care to play. Except that... well, I'm getting old. So all this trans, hiphop, whatever just sounds like a rather ill drum-machine to me, and the newer heavy metal bands are just not up to Led Zep and Rainbow. But hey - where would we be without a generation gap :-) Dates and Seasons"I have measured out my life
with coffee spoons;" This quote is almost literally true. As a student, then a teacher and finally a Salvation Army officer I have probably spent more time drinking coffee than any other activity (except sleeping). In between cups, I found time for some of this:
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© 1998 - 2001 Paul M Waters
1989-1991 Moved to Bergen, Norway.
Worked with the Salvation Army and taught evening
classes for Friundervisningen. While I was there
my Mum died of cancer. I was fortunate to be able
to be by her side for the last week, but I still
regret not "being around" in the
preceding months. But at the same time I met Jane
Brakstad and eventually fell in love. We were
married in April 1991. The best and worst years
of my life...