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Shakespeare’s Children
by Danny Keaney
Format: Paperback
Publication date: 7th July 2011
ISBN: 978-1-908282-99-6
Price: €13.99
Shakespeare’s Children begins in the 1950s in the “paradise” of Norfolk where Danny is loved by Grandpa, “Fafa”, the local poacher but moves to the “hell” of a “Shakespeare Free” council estate in Stratford-upon-Avon called “The Arab Camp” – where violence is the norm. His dysfunctional family and harsh teachers at the Roman Catholic school offer little sanctuary from the brutality. This long awaited story is poignant at times but delightfully funny and its characters are the true children of the Bard.
Extract from Shakespeare’s Children
I did very little school work the next day and spent most of it gazing out of the window at the field where we would stalk the birds that night.
“Pay attention Danny Keaney,” the teacher ordered sternly more than once.
I much preferred going out in the evening with Fafa to getting up before dawn in the freezing cold and walking quietly under the canopy of a starlit sky behind him. We would trudge across the frosty fields to a hide, or to check his snares. I’d always be there, mind you, whatever the time he left the cottage.
He never had to wake me up. We’d have a quick cup of tea, a wash with cold water and be off into the dark to pick up his gun from the hollow tree in the lane.
“Sorry Fafa,” I mumbled as we trudged after the partridge debacle across the field to the village and the comfort of the Prince of Wales run by ‘Nibby’, a man of great character and full of bullshit. After concealing his rusty gun carefully in the hollow tree, Charlie imbibed a couple of frothy pints of Bullards bitter. I remained outside in the cart shed with a bottle of Vimto and a packet of Smith’s crisps, the ones with the little blue salt packet.
In a small shed he kept a very long and rather heavy net of about one inch mesh, 20 yards across and 10 yards deep. It took two strong men to operate the net effectively and that night we took Charlie’s brother Wicket. (I’ve no idea why he was called that). Charlie was on one end and his brother on the other. I waited from a few yards away, because I wasn’t tall or strong enough to hold the net up and cover the distance required at netting pace.
Netting required strength, endurance and stealth. They had to hold it very tight and drag it at a height of about four feet over the stubble, until they were on the covey. Then they’d drop the net fast. It would fall heavily on the bewildered partridges, trapping them in the mesh. You could hear the terrified birds several fields away. The secret was to anticipate exactly where the birds were jugging up and in Charlie’s case it was his instinct and years of experience. It was my job to jump on the net and kill as many as I could.
