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Authors: Sue Townsend
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hoping to get published either in The Literary Review or The Leicester Mercury , whichever pays the most. ‘Tadpole’ is the story-in-rhyme of a tadpole’s difficult journey to froghood. It is 10,000 words in length so far and the tadpole in question is still in the canal squirming about. So, Baz, as a fellow poet, you can see my problem. All my waking hours – apart from those in the stinking library where I am forced to earn my living – are spent writing. I care nothing for food or rest or taking hot baths. I haven’t changed my clothes in months (apart from socks and underpants); what care I for the outward trappings of petit bourgeois society?
There have been complaints at work about my appearance: Mr Nuggett, Deputy Librarian, said yesterday, “Mole, I am giving you the afternoon off. Go home, bathe, wash your hair and change into clean clothes!”
I replied (with dignity), “Mr Nuggett, would you have spoken to Byron, Ted Hughes, or Larkin as you’ve just spoken to me?” He was dumbfounded. All he could think to say eventually was: “You used the wrong tense as far as Ted Hughes is concerned, because, unless there has been a tragic accident or a sudden illness, I believe Mr Hughes to be most vigorously alive.”
What a pedant!
Your poem ‘Banged Up’ was quite nice. Must stop now, ‘The Tadpole’ calls.
Hey ho.
A. Mole
PS. Cindy has called the baby Carlsberg.
∨ The True Confessions ∧
Adrian Mole Leaves Home
June 1988
Monday June 13 th
I had a good, proper look at myself in the mirror tonight. I’ve always wanted to look clever, but at the age of twenty years and three months I have to admit that I look like a person who has never even heard of Jung or Updike. I went to a party last week and a girl of sixteen felt obliged to tell me who Gertrude Stein was. I tried to cut her off – inform her that I was conversant with Ms Stein, but I started to choke on a cheese and tomato pizza so the opportunity was lost.
So, the mirror showed me myself, as I am. I’m dark but not dark enough to be interesting: no Celtic broodiness. My eyes are grey. My eyelashes are medium length, nothing exciting here. My nose is high-bridged, but it’s a Roman centurion’s nose, rather than a senator’s. My mouth is thin. Not cruel and thin, and it gets a bit sloppy towards the edges. I have got a chin, though. No mean achievement considering my pure English genes.
Since I was a callow youth I’ve spent a fortune on my skin. I’ve rubbed and applied hundreds of chemicals and lotions onto and into the offending pustulated layer of epidermis, but alas! to no avail. Sharon Botts, my present girl friend, once described my complexion as being like ‘one of them bubble sheets what incontinent people use to protect their mattress’.
As can be seen from the above reproduction of Sharon’s speech her knowledge of correct English grammar is minimal, therefore I have taken it upon myself to educate her. I am Henry Higgins to her Eliza Dolittle.
She is worth it. Her measurements are 42–30–38. She’s a big girl. Unfortunately she measures thirty inches round the tops of her thighs, and fifteen inches round her ankles. But isn’t that just like life? The most beautiful and exotic places on earth also attract mosquitoes don’t they? Nothing and nobody is perfect, are they? Apart from Madonna, of course.
Anyway, I suggested to Sharon that she would look wonderful in floor-length skirts but she said, “Who the bleedin’ hell d’you think I am, sodding Queen Victoria?”
Summer will soon be here and I have a recurring nightmare that Sharon decides to buy and wear a miniskirt. In my dream she takes my arm and we stroll down the crowded high street. The public stop and stare, guffawing breaks out. A three-year-old child points at Sharon and says, “Look at the lady’s fat legs.” At this point I wake up sweating and with a pounding heart.
You may be wondering why I, Adrian Mole, a provincial intellectual working in
There have been complaints at work about my appearance: Mr Nuggett, Deputy Librarian, said yesterday, “Mole, I am giving you the afternoon off. Go home, bathe, wash your hair and change into clean clothes!”
I replied (with dignity), “Mr Nuggett, would you have spoken to Byron, Ted Hughes, or Larkin as you’ve just spoken to me?” He was dumbfounded. All he could think to say eventually was: “You used the wrong tense as far as Ted Hughes is concerned, because, unless there has been a tragic accident or a sudden illness, I believe Mr Hughes to be most vigorously alive.”
What a pedant!
Your poem ‘Banged Up’ was quite nice. Must stop now, ‘The Tadpole’ calls.
Hey ho.
A. Mole
PS. Cindy has called the baby Carlsberg.
∨ The True Confessions ∧
Adrian Mole Leaves Home
June 1988
Monday June 13 th
I had a good, proper look at myself in the mirror tonight. I’ve always wanted to look clever, but at the age of twenty years and three months I have to admit that I look like a person who has never even heard of Jung or Updike. I went to a party last week and a girl of sixteen felt obliged to tell me who Gertrude Stein was. I tried to cut her off – inform her that I was conversant with Ms Stein, but I started to choke on a cheese and tomato pizza so the opportunity was lost.
So, the mirror showed me myself, as I am. I’m dark but not dark enough to be interesting: no Celtic broodiness. My eyes are grey. My eyelashes are medium length, nothing exciting here. My nose is high-bridged, but it’s a Roman centurion’s nose, rather than a senator’s. My mouth is thin. Not cruel and thin, and it gets a bit sloppy towards the edges. I have got a chin, though. No mean achievement considering my pure English genes.
Since I was a callow youth I’ve spent a fortune on my skin. I’ve rubbed and applied hundreds of chemicals and lotions onto and into the offending pustulated layer of epidermis, but alas! to no avail. Sharon Botts, my present girl friend, once described my complexion as being like ‘one of them bubble sheets what incontinent people use to protect their mattress’.
As can be seen from the above reproduction of Sharon’s speech her knowledge of correct English grammar is minimal, therefore I have taken it upon myself to educate her. I am Henry Higgins to her Eliza Dolittle.
She is worth it. Her measurements are 42–30–38. She’s a big girl. Unfortunately she measures thirty inches round the tops of her thighs, and fifteen inches round her ankles. But isn’t that just like life? The most beautiful and exotic places on earth also attract mosquitoes don’t they? Nothing and nobody is perfect, are they? Apart from Madonna, of course.
Anyway, I suggested to Sharon that she would look wonderful in floor-length skirts but she said, “Who the bleedin’ hell d’you think I am, sodding Queen Victoria?”
Summer will soon be here and I have a recurring nightmare that Sharon decides to buy and wear a miniskirt. In my dream she takes my arm and we stroll down the crowded high street. The public stop and stare, guffawing breaks out. A three-year-old child points at Sharon and says, “Look at the lady’s fat legs.” At this point I wake up sweating and with a pounding heart.
You may be wondering why I, Adrian Mole, a provincial intellectual working in
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