talking verse at 7.30 a.m.

Been reading an interview with the actress Andrea Riseborough in the 'Sunday Times'. She says she adores Peter Hall, because you can wake him up at 7.30 a.m. and he will talk verse. I spoke before of my 'secret companions' with whom I can quote poetry. It's great if you also can find living people to do that with.

I found one or two on our Workshop last weekend. I'd quote Shakespeare, say, and they could carry it on. And if they weren't sure, they'd instantly google the quote on their laptop. Quoting verse to one another is a rare experience these days, because so few people, even if they're readers, have learned poetry by heart. When you find someone who has done so --out of love for poetry-- it's a very heartwarming, intimate experience.

'Talking verse' also means knowing something about form and metre - which is rare too. It's fine gushing about a poem's 'feeling' or 'emotion' or 'symbolism'; quite another to be able to distinguish between an iambic pentameter and a trochaic tetrameter.

Though I'm a zombie at 7.30 a.m., I would talk verse with someone who could quote back at me. In my normal life I'm virtually a mute until about eleven, after mid-morning coffee. The only subjects I would talk about over breakfast are sex, verse, cricket, rugby and, er, sex.

So you've been warned if you ever sit down to breakfast with me.