I have a confession: I just love Joe Bennett. His books - published every few years - and his columns are a constant delight; a bit like a favourite meal you always look forward to and are never disappointed by.
Yet when I came to read his latest book - a memoir called From There to Here - it was quite a surprise. It begins in England where he was born and closes in the late 1980s when he is teaching in Christchurch. (Hopefully there is a sequel to come.) From There to Here has a new emotional honesty and a certain vulnerability that shows so much of the man and how he was shaped by the class and country he grew up in. The wit and the wisdom are still there but there is another layer - one of the acute observers of his middle England. Post WW2 Britain - a society that was by the 1960s in tumultuous change. Joe was there watching and analysing.
However young Joe made sure he was not going to be a reincarnation of Mum and Dad - he had a rebellious streak and a restlessness that propelled him to new challenges (rugby, Cambridge University), new countries (France, British Columbia, USA, Spain) and new schools to teach in. His confidence and happiness in the schoolroom never seem to leave him. He can always see the silliness and childishness of his peers - especially in the English private school system - but an appreciation of the dignity and innocence of the kids he teaches is always paramount. You just know it would have been wonderful to have been taught by him.
Jenny Ainge
