Wednesday, April 05, 2006

So true

I don't need Wikipedia to tell me that my home town is indeed a grim place but the following excerpt from it's entry about it made be giggle, probably because it's so true.

With some prescience, the great eighteenth century writer Daniel Defoe passed through Mansfield in 1725, noting only that:

"...I came to Mansfield, a market town but without remarkables." (A Tour Through The Whole Island of Great Britain, 1724 - 1726)

Yep, he's right, there's nothing remarkable about it at all

and it also goes on to say,

Mansfield, which D.H. Lawrence described as "that once romantic now utterley disheartening colliery town" in Lady Chatterley's Lover until recently did not, apart from a small section in W H Smith, have a bookshop.

and the best till last....

In Nottinghamshire, Mansfield is regarded with some disdain, being as it is a working class town with little in the way of culture or scenery. The town's bus station is often cited by locals as one of the very worst places in England to spend time waiting for transport. The town, like many others, continues to suffer from glaring problems with drugs, alcoholism and antisocial behaviour, possibly a legacy of its close links to the now almost defunct coal mining industry.

4 comments:

pat said...

it seems to suit you though.

ems said...

I thought you were trying to convince me that Nottinghamshire was The Real Capital?

Shep said...

I used to live in Tooting, which apparently translated as "Dwelling of Thieves".

Anyone who has been to the New Fountain pub will know just how true this is. I went in with a friend once for a quiet drink and she said "Fuck me this is awful, what must the Old Fountain have been like..."

ems said...

You've gone very quiet - hope all is well.