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Aug 18, 2023

Pam Ayres: ‘I inherited a love of English from my mother’

The poet, 76, talks about deference, dialect and her dreams of becoming a ballerina, and reveals the secret of a happy marriage It’s important to be yourself in life. Don’t think you have to adapt

The poet, 76, talks about deference, dialect and her dreams of becoming a ballerina, and reveals the secret of a happy marriage

It’s important to be yourself in life. Don’t think you have to adapt according to the people or situation you’re in. It’s perfectly all right to be exactly who you are, to like what you like. That’s a lesson it took me a long time to learn.

I grew up in a very feudal village [Stanford in the Vale, Oxfordshire] where a lot of forelock tugging went on. My dad, who worked for the electricity board, would touch his cap to the local landowners, and often apologised for speaking in dialect, as if it was something to be ashamed of. I felt I wasn’t as good as other people – like I was on a lower tier.

I am the youngest of six children. My childhood was crowded and noisy and loving. My siblings and I were a gang, which I loved – everywhere I looked I could see a brother or sister.

My parents’ marriage was troubled, because my dad had awful experiences in the Second World War. He was in the thick of the fighting for four years. There were explosive rows, which frightened us, and he used to have terrible rages. But he was lovely most of the time. He was never strict with me, until I became interested in boys. Then he was very strict indeed.

My mother went into domestic service at 14 and hated it. It was the only option open to her. She had been offered a scholarship to a good school. But her own mother was widowed, with five children, and couldn’t afford to equip my mum to go. It was sad for her. She was capable of a lot more, in my opinion.

I inherited a love of English and writing from my mother. I loved writing from the time I could do it. Mum encouraged me and I got lots of praise. My writing usually finished up on the wall of the classroom, which made me want to do it even more.

I really wanted a pony when I was a child. Of course, there was no hope. I also wanted a dog, but Mum felt she had enough to look after. Instead I had rabbits, chickens, Bantams, a tortoise and various injured birds I didn’t know how to look after properly. My mum used to call it my menagerie. I always loved animals.

I dreamed of becoming a ballerina. As I turned out to be a 5ft 9in Amazonian, it didn’t work out.

I started learning to play the piano at 75 and I recommend it to everyone. I practise every day on a baby grand. I find it so distracting. I can’t think about problems or anything I’m worried about – or frightened of – because I’ve got to think about how these little black dots relate to my fingers. It’s very good for me.

The thing I’m most scared of is losing my capabilities. I have one arthritic finger but I can write, draw, paint, play the piano, read music, sew, knit and garden. I’m afraid of succumbing to the diseases of old age, losing the ability to do those lovely things.

I’m grateful I lived in the era I did. When I was a child, I would hear the cuckoo in the spring, I’d see swifts and swallows migrate and frogspawn in ponds, water voles in streams. And it’s all gone.

If I’m proud of anything I’ve done in my life, it is that I have overcome terrible fear to perform things I’ve written in front of big audiences. Because I won a TV talent show in the 70s, I went from performing my poems and songs to small, friendly audiences in pubs to braving paying audiences of thousands in huge theatres. It was a terrifying transition. My advice for any poet is that you’ve got to be brave and perform your work. The more you do it, the more you can do it.

I’ve been married to my husband for 40 years. The secret to a happy marriage? A good sense of humour.

I’ve never broken the law. I got told off by copper for letting go of the handlebars while riding my bike when I was about nine. Since then, I haven’t even had a speeding ticket.

I’d like to be young and lustrous. I’d rather not look like such a craggy old bird. But there’s not much you can do about getting older.

I Am Oliver the Otter: A Tale from our Wild and Wonderful Riverbanks by Pam Ayres, is out now (£12.99, Macmillan Children’s Books). Buy it for £11.43 at guardianbookshop.com