Toast and A Ham

A quick phone call and I had the facts I needed. It did indeed appear that I had a great great great uncle who crafted false limbs from cork to enable pirates to float should their ships sink. It’s a fantastic story which I intend to write up into a book. ‘Pirates & Stumps’ will be my next best seller and I hope to have it ready in time for summer.

The research will take me some weeks, which delays the real pleasure of sitting down with my laptop and crafting words. I take so much satisfaction from writing about my family that I found it somewhat disappointing that Alan Titchmarsh should bad mouth my attempts this morning.

It happened at a breakfast held in Westminster that brought together the nation’s best selling writers to celebrate our past glories and look to ways to boost the economy in these difficult times. The government had organised the event to promote the fact that more books were sold this Christmas than during any previous year. I, of course, didn’t labour the point that it was the first Christmas that a book was out under the Madeley name. Which made it all the more annoying when Titchmarsh piped up.

‘By ek!’ he said from the top table, ‘it’s so good to see you all here at this special event. It reminds me of the day my Aunt Glady’s petunias bloomed early one warm January morning up there in Yorkshire. To see all your radiant faces... Well, it makes an old gardener’s heart melt. It really does.’

I had to sip my water at this point. I’d been struck by an unexpected rise of bile in my throat.

Titchmarsh turned cards and continued his speech.

‘There are so many good things to say about the past year’s work. We writers are a special breed. We require special soil, just the right balance of shade and sunlight, and a firm hand when we begin to sprout in the wrong direction.’ He then began to quote some W.B. Yates before he paused for laugher. There wasn’t any. Nobody laughed at W.B. Yeats. Not even Mrs. W.B Yeats who’d probably heard them all before.

Titchmarsh was unmoved. I’d hoped he’d have taken the hint and cut his speech short. It wasn’t to be. He carried on squealing like a fire in a dry compost heap filled with hedgehogs.

‘But from where I’ve been sitting in my shed, I’d say it’s been a good year. I’ve finished writing three new novels, which should be coming out soon. “The Maltese Fuchsia” will be the first in a series of detective stories I’m setting in Yorkshire about Sam Spade, a private eye and expert in shrubs. My next book is a sequel to “Trowel and Error” which I’ve called “Throwing In The Trowel”.’

Again, he paused for laughter. I examined my nails as I waited for the silence to die down.

Titchmarsh cleared his throat and seemed to mutter another ‘by ek’ before he was on to his next card.

‘I have big hopes for “Throwing in the Trowel”,’ he continued. ‘It’s a gentle story set in Yorkshire about a gardener whose battle with depression takes a comic turn when he discovers a secret formula for growing giant sprouts.’ He flicked cards. I wondered how many cards he had in the pile that ran an inch thick. ‘Finally, there’s “Hoe Down”, a story set in Yorkshire about a working girl who finds therapy and just a touch of romance in a herbaceous border. I might have broken a few taboos with this one and it will be the first of my books to have a warning sticker on the cover. So if you don’t want to read some quite graphic descriptions of petticoats and ankles, you better not read it.’

‘Good idea!’ shouted somebody.

Titchmarsh looked my way as though suspecting it was me. I couldn’t deny it. It might have been me.

‘Yes, it’s been a good year, all told,’ he said. ‘We’ve had some bumper blooms and some quality books. But I’d like to make special mention of Dick Madeley’s “Fathers & Sons”.’

I sat up in my chair. I hadn’t expected that. I had expected a twenty minute snooze before Titchmarch finished and they served bacon. I gave a wave to the crowd and looked up at Titchmarsh, though I didn’t like the tone in his voice when he piped up again.

‘Ooh, ay! I see that Dick is with us today. And looking as tanned as a proper apricot. We don’t get sun like that up Yorkshire way...’

‘You don’t get apricots either,’ I said. I don’t quite know what I meant by that but I’d been caught rather flat footed.

‘I wanted to mention Dick’s book because it has outsold all the other celebrity blockbusters this year,’ he said. ‘I think that deserves a round of applause.’

I gave another wave as the collected great and good of showbiz, publishing, and politics honoured me by slapping their paws together.

When I sat back down, I noticed the look in Alan’s eyes. I realised that I knew what a plant must feel like when he comes as them with a fork.

‘Yes, Dick has outsold all of you this year. Except, of course, Julie Walters, Dawn French, Alan Carr, and Paul O’Grady.’

I gave a shrug. There was no shame in coming fifth in that list but I had wished that he’d mentioned it earlier.

Except he wasn’t finished.

‘Bill Oddie, Jimmy Savile, James May, Eric Idle, Paul Young, Richard Hammond, John Prescott, Simon Cowell, Terry Wogan, Eric Sykes, Norman Wisdom, Tom Jones, Jeremy Clarkson, Esther Rantzen, Cleo Lane, John Humphries, Shirley Bassey, Roger Moore, Simon Clegg, Gloria Hunniford, and Ross Kemp.
I sank lower into my chair.

‘And that’s not to mention a humble gardener from Yorkshire. Like I said, a good year for Dick and a good year for all of us. I think we all deserve a round of applause.’

After such a public humiliation, I could hardly be expected to stay for the whole breakfast. I slipped out once they began to dish out the crusty bagels. It was half a mile to the station and I walked through a rather grey London morning simmering with resentment and vowing that with ‘Pirates & Stumps’ they’d have a literary masterpiece that even malicious Yorkshire gardeners couldn’t ignore from their sheds.

The Economic Crisis Finally Hits The People That Matter

Dark days, my friends. These are dark days. You don’t need Bryan Appleyard to know which way the wind blows. The signs are more ominous than that. Last night I saw an Elberry with cloven hooves. He was riding a horse and his name was Discount and Bargain Buckets followed with him.

You might wonder about this apocalyptic talk. There is a reason for it. I saw ‘Fathers & Sons’ discounted at Borders yesterday. ‘50% off cover price’ was a wounding blow and I was lucky to have Judy there to catch me before I cracked a brow on a stack of hardbacked Jamie Olivers. I know we’re going through difficult financial times but I never thought it would get as bad as this. Japan’s economy might have collapsed, along with the world’s banking system, but the readership for heartening tales of families hasn’t diminished. In fact, it’s probably grown as people look to invest in the old favourites such as love, friendship, and all things that come with the Richard&Judy seal of approval.

To make matters worse, as I lay on my back and Judy dragged me heel first from the shop, I looked up at the passing shelves of bargain books and saw Bill Oddie’s new autobiography piled high.

‘Bill,’ I said, some hours later when the pethidine had kicked in. ‘You’ve been discounted. You’re 50% off at all Borders stores.’

There was a thud on the line and some minutes of silence.

‘Bill?’ I said. And then I repeated myself with a few more urgent ‘Bill’s.

Finally, there was a sound of some movement and the phone made a scraping sound as Oddie’s weak voice came back on the line.

‘Sorry, Dick,’ he said, ‘I seemed to have blacked out there for a moment. You said my book has been discounted?’

‘Not only yours but mine as well. 50% off “Fathers & Sons”, that beautifully crafted tale of family relationships, that has had reviewers writing odes of praise to its goodness. Half price for a book that highly valued is a crime. In fact, it’s so good, I wouldn’t even send a complimentary signed copy to sympathetic bloggers who might have spent years working to help my improve my image among the British public. I say they can queue up with the rest of Normality Street and pay at the counter for the honour of reading my words.’

‘As they should, Dick. As they should. It makes me think that books as good as ours should have price protection. I can’t believe they could have been discounted so quickly. This is terrible!’

‘Yet it’s not all bad news,’ I said, trying to ease Oddie’s concerns. ‘They were discounting all the celebrity autobiographies. O’Grady was marked down, so was Jonathan Ross, Dawn French, Julie Walters, and that Alan Carr, who, between you and me Bill, I wouldn’t cross the road to hit with a claw hammer.’

‘Stuff the lot of them,’ agreed Bill, who was sounding much more like the Oddie we’ve come to know and love and feed with peanuts. ‘But what I want to know is what we’re going to do, Dick? I had planned to invest my book money into a new owl sanctuary for the south west. I even had a name for it. Bill Oddie’s Owl Sanctuary Trust. BOOST would put owls on the map. Nige had even agreed to work there weekends, running classes in cravat management and advanced owl nurturing.’

‘Another blow,’ I said, really feeling for Bill’s loss. ‘You’re not alone in regretting the news. I had plans for my royalties too. The Richard Madeley Commando Training School was going to be the ground-breaking initiative for spreading the news that going without underwear is both hygienic and comfortable.’

‘Oh,’ groaned Bill.

‘Oh, indeed,’ groaned I in reply.

‘Oh, for goodness sake!’ groaned Judy who had at that moment walked into the room, carrying her laptop and the 1700 pages of the manuscript to her new novel. ‘Won’t you hang up that phone and stop being so bloody ridiculous? When my book comes out, I’ll be sure to earn a fortune. What are you worrying about? The world is crying out for an epic tale of miniature horses, Cornish smugglers, cross-dressing Dukes, harpsichord salesmen, and the Irish turnip industry. We’ll make millions, Richard. Millions!’

I shrugged as I hung up the phone. There was nothing else I could do. I would sink or swim based on the public’s love for tales of turnips. It is as it is and it’s never been any other way.

Slipping Up On Radio One

You might say that being a best-selling author is all glitz and book signings but let me tell you about the significant chafing around my right buttock which is making it difficult to type tonight. Not only is it typical of the things they fail to mention when you sign your publishing deal but I’m also having flashbacks of the time when Judy and I rode a camel across Southport beach for Granada Reports. Judy thrashed our Bactrian one too many times and I slipped from the second hump. This went out live to the North West and I suffered a terrible wound caused by an impacted mollusk.

This time, the damage was inflicted over a long morning sitting on a PVC chair in a hot Radio One studio while Chris Moyle interviewed me over his breakfast of Sugar Puffs and scintillating wit. It was the latest part of the press junket for my book, ‘Fathers and Sons’ and I continued to rack up the mistakes.

Last week, I told a woman from 'The Guardian' that sherbet was poisonous to tadpoles (it isn’t, I was confusing it with tapioca), and only yesterday I told a crowd of shoppers at a W.H. Smiths book signing that earwigs are the only insect to have an odd number of elbows (they don’t, I was thinking of the Slovakian cockroach). This time, I went and let slip about my blog. Judy thinks it was a stroke of genius. I say it was something much more significant.

It came about because the early viewing figures from ‘Watch’ are only respectable. The pale somewhat beside the figures for the Appreciation Society which is clearly where all the Madeley action is to be found. With readership numbers peaking in the high hundred thousands, it’s here that the hard core Madeley fan comes to smell my musk. And a powerful agent it most certainly is. Moyles was soon under the spell of my aroma. With a large kernel of puffed wheat hanging from his second or third chin, he asked me if I hate Channel 4. It was an unscripted question and I made a glib comment about my blog. You can hear it here (thanks to David over at The Spine for bringing the recording to my attention) or here (about 1h 57m 20seconds) where the BBC have the full show.

‘Brilliant!’ said Moyles.

Well, it was like steaming custard poured on the large pudding of my satisfaction. And as soon as the skin thickened, I set this official recommendation in the middle of a line and pointed at it, thus:

What People Say About 'The Richard Madeley Appreciation Society'
‘Brilliant’ -- Chris Moyles

I came off the show happy but concerned by the damage done to my right buttock by the PVC chair. We Madeleys have always perspired heavily around the flanks but this flood had spread to outlying regions that normally favour dry conditions. The chafing was more toxic that a North American housing market. Yet even as I applied a soothing balm I’d fashioned from the coconut from a dark chocolate bounty mixed with a can of diet Tango (thank you Ray Mears!), I was already having doubts. ‘Well you’ve done it now, Dick!' I thought. 'Your postmodern game of hide and seek has gone too far. This time you’ve locked yourself in the coal cellar and the latch has fallen outside. This is a darkness from which you might not escape. People will never believe in your now...’

Which is why I have to post tonight without a care about the damage I’m doing to the right lower side of the left-hand of the ampersand. I just wanted to let you know that I’m as real as I sit here in my grey flannel trousers, smelling quite manly but vaguely like a taste of paradise. Sorry for what I said and I’ll try to be on my best behaviour tomorrow when I’m off to sign copies of my book for the people of Monken Hadley. Be sure to pop across to Chingford in the afternoon when, buttocks permitted, I’ll be joining other celebrities as we shin up palm trees in aid of the local West Indian community.

[UPDATE: Link now fixed]

A Saint Among Herons

I was standing in the middle of an Essex wildlife sanctuary on Saturday, posing with a copy of my new book, ‘Fathers & Sons’, as a flock of migrating herons few over and broke my concentration.

‘Camera, Richard! Camera! Stop looking at the birdies!’

So shouted the guy 'The Guardian' had sent to photograph me. He was standing on a hide constructed from old railway sleepers and hardened clay. It gave him the proper elevation to photograph me spread out on the sandy bank, the sunlight catching the Vaseline he’d smeared onto my nipples so as to make the shoot feel like a hot summer's day.

‘So sorry,’ I replied, sitting up. ‘It’s just that I’m so used to being with Bill Oddie that I can’t let a heron pass by without my trying to see if it’s been tagged by Katie Humble.’

The cameraman lowered his lens and aimed a pair of wider angles my way. ‘You’re nothing like you are on the telly,’ he said as he jumped down from his perch and wandered over.

‘That’s because we’re two different entities,’ I told him. ‘Don’t let the Vaseline on my nipples mislead you. I’m the Richard Madeley who scoffs at everything I’ve become in the name of fizzing tea-time sofa sex. I’m not just a perfect body trapped within a pair of casual slacks and with a grin that can melt a cushion. I have ambitions to better myself as an artist. I want to transcend the daytime schedules and achieve a blogging omnipotence.’

‘Oh, I have a blog,’ he replied, the statement so flat that it slipped out like a pancake slick with syrup.

‘You do?’

He grew shy. ‘If you can keep a secret,’ he said, ‘I’ll tell you all about it.’

I threw my book to one side and turned my back on the herons.

‘My word is my 007,’ I said. ‘Tell me all...’

He blushed a little. It reminded me a female Tufted Dabchick during courtship and I half expected him to squawk and adopt a pose indicating his willingness to receive the male.

‘The thing is,’ he began, ‘I pretend to be a sexually active young woman from Dagenham. My blog is a series of explicit posts in which I relate the intimate details of my latest conquests. I have quite the readership and a book due out next summer based upon my sultry adventures.’

‘I bet you do,’ I said. ‘I’ve heard things about Dagenham which lead me to think that you’d be highly successful in what you do. You’re certain to top the charts.’

‘Oh, I’m certainly successful. I’ve had quite a few marriage proposals and a gentleman from Humberside recently offered to pay for a holiday in Copenhagen. Of course, I had to refuse. He was already married and I don’t think he had the money to keep me in the luxury to which I’ve become accustomed.’

‘As good a reason as any,’ I agreed, ‘though, if you don’t mind my being so blunt, I would have thought that the biggest hurdle to a freebie holiday like that is the fact that you’re not actually a sexually active young woman from Dagenham. Not unless appearances deceive...’

He dropped the big lens into his bag. I took it as the sign that the shoot had come to an end.

‘That’s just it,’ he said. ‘When I’m writing my blog, I do feel like a sexually active young woman from Daggernam. It’s always a disappointment to look in the mirror each morning and realise that I’m just a balding photographer who occasionally gets a nice celebrity gig from a mate I know at The Guardian.’

‘I face similar problems,’ I told him as I began to wipe the oily residue from my chest. The sensation was not unpleasant, though not exactly the sort of pleasure you want to be caught enjoying in an Essex wildlife sanctuary. ‘Woman are continually writing to me, offering me their bodies in exchange for a stab at the celebrity lifestyle. It’s hard to explain that I’m really after something much more meaningful.’

‘Ah,’ he nodded. ‘You mean love!’

‘I was actually thinking of something more like a publishing contract for my comedy. In exchange for that, the right person could have my body two weekends a month and any three bank holidays of their choosing.’

‘A decent offer,’ he nodded.

‘More than generous,’ I said as I began to put on my shirt. ‘But that’s the problem with the world. Nobody wants me for my wits. They just want me to break their hearts with stories from my unfortunate upbringing and tales of the strap. My new book will be a chart success, of course, but it’s hardly going to make people feel like they’ve just wandered through a ray of sunshine. And that’s all I really want. I want people to associate my name with laughter and feeling good about the world.’ I sighed as I finished buttoning up my shirt. ‘But enough about me... Show me these photographs you’ve taken.’

He played with the back of his camera a moment and then broke out into a smile. ‘Would you look at that!’ he declared.

I examined the back of his Nikon. ‘That’s typical of the heron,’ I explained. ‘Bill Oddie once told me why they fly in such a tight formation but I’ve forgotten the details.’

‘But it’s such a fortunate coincidence how they form a natural halo above your head,’ he laughed.

‘Quite fitting,’ I said. ‘But then, the heron is a perceptive creature. They see things hidden from the human eye.’

My Letter To The Organizers of the Cheltenam Literary Festival

Being in the public eye means that I occasionally have to bow to the wishes of the people in marketing and promote products. I received a helpful reminder from the people at the Cheltenham Festival and reproduce the details here along with my reply.

Richard Madeley
Sun 19 Oct

"TV presenter Richard Madeley explores how being a father has changed over the last four generations in his uniquely honest and touching book Fathers and Sons. He joins expert and author Frank Furedi to discuss the speed of change in family life and the challenges facing fathers today".

The Times Cheltenham Literature Festival 2008

10 - 19 October

With its signature blend of award winning writers, world-renowned thinkers and international star names The Times Cheltenham Literature Festival is a hotbed of debate and discussion with a unique regency style. In this year’s literary line-up Man Booker Prize winners rub shoulders with the finest classically trained actors, whilst top class comedians appear alongside leading political figures. With more than 450 writers and over 350 events this promises to be an exhilarating ten day celebration of the written word.

For more information visit http://cheltenhamfestivals.com

Or call the box office on 0844 576 7979

And my reply:

Dear Organizers of the Cheltenam Literary Festival,

It’s so good to hear from you again. I can’t believe that the moment is so nearly upon us. I’m honoured to be headlining your festival and the thought of standing up there on the world famous Pyramid Stage leaves me quivering with excitement. And if you would like me to hang around after the festival and help you milk your cows, you need only ask. I know my way around an udder and have been fully trained in teat management.

As you know, ‘Fathers and Sons’ has taken remarkably little time to write. One moment I was writing a comedy about the Cornish herring fleet and then, lo and behold, out pops an autobiography I knew nothing about! Once I'd borrowed the title from Turgenev, the thing was done. You might say that it happened overnight and I would be very grateful if you could snag me a complimentary copy. You probably know that my debut novel was cancelled a month before publication so this time I’m certainly doing my very best to advertise your festival. There will be no repeat. Dick Madeley will see print! Even as I speak, Judy is training her troop of midget Shetland ponies to perform an interpretive dance routine based around Faulkner’s ‘As I Lay Dying’, with Denise Robertson playing the corpse of Addie Bundren. I swear that there won’t be a dry eye in the house by the time I run out on stage wearing my spandex cycling shorts. I’m also delighted that Pam Ayres has now confirmed that she’s available for the duet.

Your news about Oddie does disappoint. He was recently boasting that he attends your festival every year and was there when Shirley Bassey read from her autobiography whilst wearing Wellington boots. It is, however, very gratifying to hear that his stand selling ornamental owl jewellery is so popular with the hippies.

I hope that you and yours are well and that the current dry weather hasn’t affected milk production. Both Judy and I feel that it’s so important that we support a festival in which lactation plays such a vital role.

Best wishes,

Dick Madeley.

PS. Is it too late to change the promotional literature to include some puff about my being the spiritual successor to Conrad, a modern Nabokov, and literary heir to P.G. Wodehouse? At the very least, can you mention that my wife plays bridge with Jilly Cooper?

PPS. I’ve just visited your website and I’m astonished to find that I’m not listed on the front page. Roger Moore is a saint, a real mensch, but has he or Ben Okri ever discussed a particularly painful vasectomy on live TV? I think not. Did all my swelling mean nothing to you?

PPPS. You wouldn’t do this to Clive James.