‘Wight,’ said Mr Filshie ominously, ‘I have always thought that you were just an amiable idiot and have treated you accordingly, but now that I see you have come out top of the class in your English paper, I can only conclude that you have not been trying for me. Hold out your hands!’
Although doing nothing to improve Alf’s Maths, this painful means of maintaining control worked and there was a record of excellent discipline within the school. It was this, perhaps, that stimulated the young Alf Wight to keep, for the first time, a diary.
One of the most intriguing aspects of James Herriot’s writing was his ability to reproduce incidents that occurred many years before. His attention to detail is so authentic that one would be forgiven for thinking that they happened only yesterday. Many people, when discussing his work, assumed that he meticulously kept diaries to which he referred when he began writing in earnest. Alf often stated, in his many interviews with the media, that he did not keep a diary and that he could remember the old days clearly, right down to the smallest detail. Despite these assertions, he was widely disbelieved, but, in fact, Alfred Wight was not quite the organised and methodical man that many believed him to be. Apart from two brief periods in his life, he did not keep a diary but he was a great observer, especially of anything that interested him, and had an excellent photographic memory. The fascinating vagaries of human nature and the humorous incidents that unfolded before his eyes remained firmly in his mind; this, combined with his gift as a writer, provided a recipe for success.
The first time he kept a diary was from 1933 until 1935 – during his last year at Hillhead School and his first two years at Glasgow Veterinary College. His mother preserved these old diaries, and they have provided an insight into the enthusiastic approach to life that Alf exhibited as a young man.
He used his diary to poke fun at his teachers at Hillhead. ‘Miss Chesters (Sophy), endeavours to pump French into us. Chesters is frank and almost boyish and I like her very well. Twice a week, we get Mr (Tarzan) Brookes for Elocution. This bird, tho’ probably well meaning, is nothing but a funiosity.’ And he wrote about his Latin master: ‘Buckie was in a terrible mood today. Roaring and bellowing at us like a rogue elephant. Today, I was amazed to see the length to which his eyes could boggle without falling out.’
As is hinted by these humorous swipes at his teachers, he enjoyed his time at Hillhead. He loved English and Latin, reading widely around both subjects in his spare time at home. He read ancient writers such as Cicero and Ovid, saying later that so well-versed was he in Latin that he reckoned he could carry on a conversation with an ancient Roman. Alf’s English, too, benefited from the hours of reading that he put in, and the great enthusiasm he showed for his subjects meant that his school studies were a pleasure.
I always knew that my father was a well-read man. Our home in Thirsk was always bulging with books and almost all of them had been read. His love of reading stemmed from his schooldays – days during which, whenever he had a spare hour or two, he had a book in his hand. He did not just enjoy reading adventure stories; he devoured the classics avidly. By the age of fifteen, he had read the entire works of Charles Dickens, and his diaries substantiate this. Throughout, there are references to Dickens, Scott, Pepys and, on a more lyrical note, Shakespeare and Milton. ‘Got Dickens’ Tale of Two Citiesout of the library as we have to read it for school. That suits me down to the ground as I am a great admirer of Dickens.’ Dickens gets another mention: ‘Dad is smoking Kensitas. They give coupons and I sent away for a catalogue; included is the works of Dickens in 16 superb volumes for 10 shillings. I’m going to get them.’
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, H. G. Wells and H. Rider Haggard were amongst his favourite adventure writers and he wrote that O’Henry was ‘a joy to read’. The Kensitas coupons came in very useful; as well as the complete works of Dickens, volumes of O’Henry and Shakespeare were obtained with their assistance. On the lighter side, P. G. Wodehouse was his number one author, and the Jeeves Omnibushis favourite book of all. He read and re-read this book throughout his life, the antics of Jeeves, Bertie Wooster, Young Bingo and others invariably rendering him helpless with laughter.
P. G. Wodehouse must have had a profound effect on young Alf. Some turns of phrase that he used in his diaries smack of passages from Wodehouse’s books. While on holiday in West Kilbride in July 1933, he wrote the following about some people he had met: ‘David Somerville seems to be crackers over Evelyn, the poor fish! Monty and I regard Dorothy as a fairly decent spud.’ This style appears frequently in his diaries, revealing evidence of his admiration for Wodehouse’s work.
As a boy, he shared these moments of laughter over Wodehouse with his own father who was also an avid reader and whose home was always full of books. The high quality of the English teaching at Hillhead under ‘Johnny’ Gibb and ‘Big Bill’ was a great stimulus but Pop was also very influential in steering Alf towards the joy of reading, deserving a great deal of credit for the encouragement he gave his son in those formative years.
As well as encouraging his son to read, Pop was largely responsible for instilling in him a great love of music. The intense satisfaction his father gleaned from both playing and listening to it did not go unnoticed by the young boy who grew up to appreciate good music every bit as much as his father. Pop loved all kinds of music. During our many visits to Glasgow in my younger days, I used to be fascinated by the old gramophone player that stood in a corner of the house next to the grand piano. This venerable machine had to be wound up by hand, after which the turntable began to revolve and a huge steel arm with a wicked-looking needle would be lowered onto the record. The result was a wild crackling, behind which could be heard some music. It was, however, Pop’s pride and joy. One of his favourite operatic records was of the great Caruso singing ‘Vesti la Giubba’ from I Pagliacci. One of Alf’s enduring boyhood memories was of his father, sitting night after night next to the old gramophone, listening to this great performer. When Caruso’s magnificent voice began to slip into a lower gear, Pop would leap to his feet and crank vigorously at the handle of the gramophone until musical perfection was restored. That overworked record is still in my possession.
Alf’s parents first started him at the piano at the age of six. He had years of lessons – his teacher being none other than his father – but he was a poor pupil and practised with little enthusiasm. This became a source of intense frustration for Pop, and many hours of raised voices and discordant notes were endured by father and son before Pop finally conceded defeat. Alf did perform, at the age of thirteen, at a concert in Clydebank Town Hall but that was to be the pinnacle of his piano-playing career.
None of this lessened Alf’s love of music. Although he was never to be the accomplished player his father had been, he had inherited his, and his mother’s, ear for music – something that would give him untold pleasure throughout his life.
It was not only the academic and cultured side of his schooldays that Alf enjoyed; he loved playing sport and Hillhead had a proud reputation on the playing fields of Scotland. Cricket, athletics and tennis were Alf’s favourites and in the 1931–2 year he won an athletics medal, coming second in the Inter-scholastics Sports. His main achievement was in the long jump – known as the broad jump in those days – where he produced a jump of over nineteen feet.