Ben Watt's vivid memoir about his bohemian parents captures their decline and the people they once were
Most famous for being one half of pop duo Everything But the Girl with his wife, Tracey Thorn, musician and DJ Ben Watt has plunged into his past before. In 1996, he wrote Patient, documenting his battle with Churg-Strauss syndrome, an autoimmune disease that often proves fatal. In short, perfect misery memoir stuff.
But Watt's prose was different – elegant, crisp and clean. His approach to tough subjects was also unflinchingly unsentimental. His second book, a memoir about and named after his parents, has a similar tone. Fans of Watt's music will recognise its mood: melancholic, but with a definite edge.
Romany and Tom's story begins near its end. It's May 2006, and Tommy Watt, Ben's father, now 80, is in hospital. The wearing details of age are on display: a pyjama jacket "misbuttoned and stretched open", his breathing "a flimsy wheeze of air". Memories creep into Watt's mind of childhood holiday weekends as he watches his father: "empty motor-oil bottles on the tideline, a stretch of beach, salt rime, gulls squabbling". The past keeps invading the present as it inevitably does in times of crisis.
Then his mother arrives, prompting other buried memories. Her face has the same look Watt remembers when he himself was in hospital: "half connected and involved; half ready to go home". She's a complicated character, brought to life brilliantly here. This scene also prepares us for the structure of Watt's memoir, which moves between now and then constantly, but dreamily, woozily. Such a timeline should be hard to follow, but it's not. Our hand is always in their son's hand.
We slowly discover that Watt's parents were formidable sorts in their prime. Tom was a working-class jazz musician who became a successful band leader, winning an Ivor Novello in the late 50s, and leading the Centre 42 big band in the early 60s. Romany was a Rada-trained actor whose career was cut short during her first marriage; after having her first child, she unexpectedly had triplets. She later became a successful feature writer and broadcaster, before her fortunes, as well as those of her second husband's, slowly trickled away. In Watt's recollections, their later years together are marked by mutual discord and the constant consumption of "large tumblers of brandy, not poured as a shot or even a double, but like full glasses of water".
Watt holds back the main mystery about his parents until later on, though – the circumstances under which these very different people came together. This is a difficult thing to pull off, but Watt achieves it, keeping our interest sustained in the rich, raw descriptions of their deteriorating worlds. It's all there in the tiny details Watt captures perfectly: empty fridges, crumpled clothes, the blood pooling on a bathroom floor. He's also good at the lighter moments. Romany's interview with Richard Burton and Liz Taylor shows the joy his mother used to exude, while stories from her life now, dented by dementia, remind us of who she once was. It's hard not to moved by his stories of her at her husband's funeral: "Thank you for a lovely day, whoever you are."
When we find out how Romany and Tom got together, however, and how Ben Watt came to be, the effect is like a blow to the heart. Here were two people who were once, inexplicably, deeply in love, who struggled to make everything work, whose past still can't be touched by the son who clearly thought the world of them. Near the end of the book, he writes: "They just let me be to get on with it, working things out for myself." The result of their love, on this evidence, has worked things out very well. Reported by guardian.co.uk 17 hours ago.
Most famous for being one half of pop duo Everything But the Girl with his wife, Tracey Thorn, musician and DJ Ben Watt has plunged into his past before. In 1996, he wrote Patient, documenting his battle with Churg-Strauss syndrome, an autoimmune disease that often proves fatal. In short, perfect misery memoir stuff.
But Watt's prose was different – elegant, crisp and clean. His approach to tough subjects was also unflinchingly unsentimental. His second book, a memoir about and named after his parents, has a similar tone. Fans of Watt's music will recognise its mood: melancholic, but with a definite edge.
Romany and Tom's story begins near its end. It's May 2006, and Tommy Watt, Ben's father, now 80, is in hospital. The wearing details of age are on display: a pyjama jacket "misbuttoned and stretched open", his breathing "a flimsy wheeze of air". Memories creep into Watt's mind of childhood holiday weekends as he watches his father: "empty motor-oil bottles on the tideline, a stretch of beach, salt rime, gulls squabbling". The past keeps invading the present as it inevitably does in times of crisis.
Then his mother arrives, prompting other buried memories. Her face has the same look Watt remembers when he himself was in hospital: "half connected and involved; half ready to go home". She's a complicated character, brought to life brilliantly here. This scene also prepares us for the structure of Watt's memoir, which moves between now and then constantly, but dreamily, woozily. Such a timeline should be hard to follow, but it's not. Our hand is always in their son's hand.
We slowly discover that Watt's parents were formidable sorts in their prime. Tom was a working-class jazz musician who became a successful band leader, winning an Ivor Novello in the late 50s, and leading the Centre 42 big band in the early 60s. Romany was a Rada-trained actor whose career was cut short during her first marriage; after having her first child, she unexpectedly had triplets. She later became a successful feature writer and broadcaster, before her fortunes, as well as those of her second husband's, slowly trickled away. In Watt's recollections, their later years together are marked by mutual discord and the constant consumption of "large tumblers of brandy, not poured as a shot or even a double, but like full glasses of water".
Watt holds back the main mystery about his parents until later on, though – the circumstances under which these very different people came together. This is a difficult thing to pull off, but Watt achieves it, keeping our interest sustained in the rich, raw descriptions of their deteriorating worlds. It's all there in the tiny details Watt captures perfectly: empty fridges, crumpled clothes, the blood pooling on a bathroom floor. He's also good at the lighter moments. Romany's interview with Richard Burton and Liz Taylor shows the joy his mother used to exude, while stories from her life now, dented by dementia, remind us of who she once was. It's hard not to moved by his stories of her at her husband's funeral: "Thank you for a lovely day, whoever you are."
When we find out how Romany and Tom got together, however, and how Ben Watt came to be, the effect is like a blow to the heart. Here were two people who were once, inexplicably, deeply in love, who struggled to make everything work, whose past still can't be touched by the son who clearly thought the world of them. Near the end of the book, he writes: "They just let me be to get on with it, working things out for myself." The result of their love, on this evidence, has worked things out very well. Reported by guardian.co.uk 17 hours ago.