Kirjahaku

The rural landscape of John Phillpott's boyhood has changed irrevocably over the last half-century. The elm - that celebrated 'Warwickshire Weed' of folklore - has been lost to disease, urban sprawl continues apace and motorways now disturb the tranquillity of fields that once knew only the sound of cattle, birdsong and the rumble of the farmer's tractor. But paradise lost? Not quite, because the river flows on through the valley as it has done for millennia, the rook 'parliaments' can still be seen high overhead and the bells of the church that has stood on the hill looking out over the Swift Valley for a thousand years still call out to the faithful. Beef Cubes and Burdock is an affectionate glance over the shoulder back to a time when the pace of life was still dictated by the rhythm of the seasons rather than the touch of a computer keyboard.

BEATLE haircut, one set of smart clothes to his name… and with a rock 'n' roll attitude hewn out of five resentful years at a boys' grammar school. This was the 16-year-old John Phillpott who, in that long-lost summer of 1965, started out on a life-long career in Midlands journalism. It was the era when a young trainee reporter could be sent to a fatal road accident one moment and ordered to make the tea for the entire editorial staff the next. These were the days when a young journalist might cover a budgerigar show on a Saturday afternoon and a few hours later interview Ray Davies of the chart-topping Kinks. Yes, it's all there in Go and Make the Tea, Boy! The reprobates, drunks and various other paid-up members of life's Awkward Squad all splash across these pages in glorious technicolor, as this no-holds-barred narrative of life on a provincial newspaper back in the Swinging Sixties gets into gear.