From Beyond the Portal
Angels, Kings, and a Messenger
(about Mithridates' facilitator, Paul Rapley)
Awed by the authority in the voice of a girl no more than a year older than he, overheard during rehearsals for his first nativity play, Paul succumbed early to the cadences of—as he was to learn many years later—the writer who’d been killed for publishing them, William Tyndale.
However, by recusing himself from the part of angel for reasons he was unable to articulate aloud, he scuppered his chances of ever playing a king—'he may look like an angel (eheu, fugaces!) but he certainly isn’t one’—chances that had already been low because the kings’ parts always went to dominating boys.
Paul was cautiously granted the role, not of shepherd but of the shepherds’ messenger who comes on late to facilitate their meeting with…?
You gottit: the angels.
Kings, Wise Men, Magi - and Mithridates
When not day dreaming, Paul spent much of his school time correcting others on abstruse, and to them, irrelevant matters, such as insisting that the travellers from ‘the east’ were not kings but ‘wise men’ (later, Magi), and that the number is not stated.
A position that rested uneasily with his delight in the Aeolian mode and the lyrics of We Three Kings of Orient Are.
A Life in Facilitation
After, at Cambridge, sabotaging his own academic prospects, Paul reentered secondary education for a couple of years, sharing classrooms with pupils who probably facilitated as much learning for him as he for them— which, to be frank, was not a lot either way.
Next, having tried jobs that facilitated other people’s journeys—in taxis, on hospital trolleys, and, once again, along the school corridor—Paul stumbled into the National Film (& now TV) School with the aim of becoming a movie director.
To read about the rest of Paul's scintillating life...
...and Mithridates' far more magnificent one...
...buy the book.
Some Likes
Paul's fav. young adult & children's tales first encountered as an 'adult'
- Chemistry - Graham Swift, 2008 (Picador)
- The Mouse and his Child - Russell Hoban, 1967 (Faber & Faber)
- Holes - Louis Sachar, 1998 (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
- Trash - Andy Mulligan, 2010 (Random House)
- Wonder - R.J. Palacio, 2012 (Borzoi Books, Alfred A. Knopf)
- I Was a Rat! - Philip Pullman, 1999 (Doubleday; Puffin)
- Skellig - David Almond, 1998 (Hodder)
- Stone Cold - Robert Swindells,1995 (Puffin)
- The Joy Luck Club - Amy Tan, 1989; 2006 (G.P. Putnam's Sons; Penguin)
- Spies - Michael Frayn, 2002 (Faber & Faber)
- One fish two fish red fish blue fish - Dr. Seuss, 1960 (Random House; HarperCollins)
- Green Eggs and Ham - Dr. Seuss, 1960 (Random House; Harper Collins)
- The Tale of Two Bad Mice - Beatrix Potter, 1904 (Frederick Warne)
- The Tale of Mr. Jeremy Fisher - Beatrix Potter, 1906 (Frederick Warne)
- The Lion in the Meadow - Margaret Mahy, 1969 (Puffin)
- Wim is weg - Rogier Boon; Annie M.G. Schmidt, 1959 (De Bezige Bij; The Busy Bee)
- Slinky Malinki - Lynley Dodd, 1991 (Gareth Stevens Publishing; Puffin)
- TBC
Some of Paul's favourite illustrated story books
- Treasure Island - Robert Louis Stevenson - Illus: Robert Ingpen, 1883; 1992 (Dragon's World)
- Spirited Away - Hayou Miyazaki, 2002 (Viz Media, Subs. of Shogakukan Inc)
- The Steadfast Tin Soldier - Hans Christian Andersen; Naomi Lewis; Illus: P.J. Lynch, 1838; 2005 (Andersen Press)
- Alice's Adventures in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll; Illus (pop-up): Adam Sabuda, 1865, 2003 (Simon & Schuster)
- Goud aan het eind van de regenboog - Wolfram Hanel; trans. Jetty Krever - Illus: Loek Koopmans, 1997 (De Vier Windstreken)
- Paddy's Evening Out - John S. Goodall, 1973 (Macmillan)
- The Midnight Adventures of Kelly, Dot and Esmeralda - John S. Goodall, 1973 (Macmillan)
- The Rime of the Ancient Mariner - Samuel Taylor Coleridge; Illus: Gustave Dore, 1798; 1877 (Harper & Bros)
- (The Young Folks') Pilgrim's Progress - John Bunyan; Illus: Fred Barnard & Others, 1678; 1890 (Hutchinson)
- TBC
The young male reader
Some favourite books first read as a child>mid-teen
Sons and Lovers - D.H. Lawrence
The Dream of Fair Women - Henry Williamson
Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
The Thirty-Nine Steps - John Buchan
Animal Farm - George Orwell
Lord of the Flies - William Golding
How Green Was My Valley - Richard Llewellyn
I Bought a Mountain - Thomas Firbank
Three Men in a Boat - Jerome K. Jerome
Short Stories - H.G. Wells
Treasure Island - Robert Louis Stevenson
The Hornblower Series- C.S. Forester
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (etc.) - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
Black Beauty - Anna Sewell
Grimms' Fairy Tales - Jacob & Wilhelm Grimm, ed. by Eleanor Graham
The Jungle Books - Rudyard Kipling
Jennings & Derbyshire (stories) - Anthony Buckeridge
King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table (derived from Malory)
Robin Hood and his Merrie Men (children's version)
The Eagle Annual (& weeklies)
Just William (etc.) - Richmal Crompton
The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
The Railway Stories - Rev W. Awdry
Jimmy John's Journey - Mabel Esther Allan
The Weeping Pussy Willow - Tamara Frankel
Many books fondly remembered; titles forgotten.
Other media with unexpectedly Mithridateian links
- Spongebob Squarepants - the Movie 'Dad! Dad! Can we see this!' they cried. I'd recoiled from the posters, plastered a-plenty around London. 'No way,' I said. But they prevailed. If you'd seen Spongebob's gaudy, faux naif portrait, just like the untutored me you'd've said, 'What rubbish.' But you - like me - would've been so, so wrong. The movie is brilliant (well, very many parts of it are). The opening is totally sublime: Spongebob's overwhelming ambition to be granted the job of his dreams, plus his ecstasy when he achieves it... and the scene with the good ol' boys at the border... and the escalating sequence of th e crushing boots... I loved Finding Nemo, but SBSPs is caviar for the life-diminished intellectual. [Sorry if you viewed it & despised it - perhaps better to avoid Mithridates' story, too.] 2004; Directed by Stephen Hillenburg; Written by Derek Drymon, Tim Hill, Stephen Hillenburg, Kent Osborne, Aaron Springer, Paul Tibbitt. [Dunno who was responsible for the really funny bits - prob a joint rib-fest.]
- The Traitors (BBC TV)
- The Jungle Book, written & directed by Ayeesha Menon, Goldhawk for BBC Radio 4 https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000sxy3
Pic: Facilitator with MGJ
Being kind to the reading eye
To enhance the actual experience of reading, we've had Mithridates' Book printed & published in 'Royal' dimensions - 234mm x 156mm - using a generously-sized font, and with a layout designed to rest easily on the eye.
Consequently, it's a tangible 30mm thick.
My Glorious Journey... is designed as a volume to treasure, re-read, and pass on down the line.
A big shout-out for our typesetter
Our warm thanks to Beth Langley of Bristol for the clarity of the textual presentation.
A big shout-out for our printers
Our warm thanks also to the excellent, professional and supportive folk at ImprintDigital of Exeter:
https://digital.imprint.co.uk/
(these words of appreciation are not sponsored)