The Aardvark Blog

An Artist's Life, tragedy in Yorkshire and France, Folio Society Books
17/06/2016

We have been working very hard this week on the exhibition 'An Actor's Life' about the life and acting career of my stepfather Martin Benson. There are several hundred photographs, programmes, posters and other ephemera, as well as over 20 of his paintings (many of fellow performers).

Preparing the show has been fascinating and I have learnt an awful lot that I didn't know. For example did you know that immediately after the war Columbia Pictures UK arm produced a series of films now known as 'Columbia Noir'. Martin seems to have appeared in several of them, although interestingly they don't appear in his full list of films produced by IMDB. Other interesting images keep appearing. Martin with the Italian film director Michelangelo Antonioni; Martin with a very young James Garner.

I must admit however  that the material that I find most interesting is that relating to Martin's war career - as both a fighting soldier and an entertainer and director of entertainments for the troops. I also didn't know that one of his early stage appearances was at a theatre down the road in Hereford!

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It is hard not to feel overwhelming sadness at the news of the three murders this week. That such a young MP could be murdered for carrying out her democratic duties in a quiet Yorkshire town, or that two dedicated police officers should be slaughtered in front of their three-year-old child, makes one worry for all of those who are tasked with public facing roles on behalf of their country. In both cases the common denominator (and this would also appear to be a factor in the equally shocking shootings in America), is that people with mental health issues have been led into violence by hateful and nihilistic ideologies. We need to have a far better understanding of mental health than we do have, we need to address more attention and resources to it, and we need to make sure that vulnerable people are not led into violence against themselves or others by people of ill-will.

Reading the tributes to Jo Cox, one realises how someone of whom many of us were only dimly aware (and I had only heard of her recently in relation to her work on the All-Party Syrian Parliamentary Group), can work so hard behind the scenes to seek to improve the lives of people whom they have never met and have no close connection with. Next time one hears references to Duck Houses and comments about how MPs are only in it for themselves, one should remember the majority of MPs who are actually in politics to help others, and not themselves.

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To end with bookish matters, I am quite quickly working through the hundreds of Folio Society titles that I recently purchased, and we have started another Folio overflow section. This is the best collection of Folio titles I have ever had, and they are selling fast - both in the shop and online. If you have titles that you are looking for, now is the time to come in to see us, or visit our website. It will take me a few weeks to put out all the stock, so the selection is changing daily. Also in stock are a large number of very reasonably priced classical CDs. From opera to symphonies and chamber music, all tastes are catered for (there are also a lot of new music books in stock).