If you lived in London in the early 19th Century, the chances are you would have visited Greenwich Fair in the south east of the metropolis.
It even attracted the famous. It was Charles Dickens' favourite fair. In Sketches by Boz (1836), he declares “we were a constant frequenter of Greenwich Fair, for years”. In his article he describes the fair in great detail and even describes the forms of transport making their way across what was then the largest city in the world to the fair - “Cabs, hackney-coaches, 'shay’ carts, coal-waggons, stages, omnibuses, sociables, gigs, donkey-chaises”.
But Greenwich Fair was closed down, upon petition to the Home Secretary Sir George Grey, in 1857. It had become too teeming (visitor numbers in excess of 200,000) and the debauchery was becoming too much for the wealthy gentlemen and ladies.
But this coming weekend, it will be born again, as part of the Greenwich and Docklands International Festival 2011.
“It’s really important for us to have an idea of where we came from,” says the festival director Bradley Hemming, who, to the tune of several hundred thousand pounds, is filling the centre of Greenwich with free outdoor acts in what he’s describing as a modern-day response to this bygone facet of London life.
Needless to say, gone are the naval pensioners, who’d tell hair-raising tales and - for a penny a pop - offer peeks through their telescopes of the Isle of Dogs gibbet, where rotting pirate corpses would hang. Gone, too, is the notorious Crown and Anchor dancing-booth, in which cross-dressing and all kinds of transgressive carry-on would take place.
Greenwich Fair: Where Dickens let his hair down
150 years after it was shut down for debauchery, Charles Dickens’ favourite fair is back. Roll up, says Dominic Cavendish .
Wheee!: visitors enjoy a spot of "tumbling" at Greenwich Fair, 1804 Pic: National Maritime mMuseum/John Marshall & Co
By Dominic Cavendish
18 Jun 2011
The Telegraph
What would one give to be transported back in time to experience Greenwich Fair at its giddy height? As it gathered force in the early 19th century – having begun life, judging by earliest mentions, a century earlier – it prompted visitors of a literary disposition to reach for their pens in wonder.
Dickens plainly adored the multitudinous spectacle that seized Greenwich every Easter and Whitsun. In Sketches by Boz (1836), he declares “we were a constant frequenter of Greenwich Fair, for years” - and confesses that if the memory of the high times enjoyed in earlier, youthful years is cloudy, that has much to do with the befuddling effect of late nights and too much drink. But, of course, his memory isn’t cloudy; distilling into 3,000 words or so the essence of all the fun and frolics, which he likens to “a sort of spring-rash: a three days’ fever, which cools the blood for six months afterwards”, his article is packed with keenly observed details.
He describes the unruly mass migration across London by every mode of transport - “Cabs, hackney-coaches, 'shay’ carts, coal-waggons, stages, omnibuses, sociables, gigs, donkey-chaises”. And then he pitches us into the fray, conjuring the hawkers and sharps who haunted the park and its surrounding area by day.
He also relays the most eagerly indulged pastime in the park - that of “tumbling”: “The principal amusement is to drag young ladies up the steep hill which leads to the Observatory, and then drag them down again, at the very top of their speed, greatly to the derangement of their curls and bonnet-caps, and much to the edification of lookers-on from below.”
Such barely respectable daytime pleasures gave way in the evening to the full licentious, thrill-seeking glory of the fair itself. “Imagine yourself”, he continues, “in an extremely dense crowd, which swings you to and fro, and in and out, and every way but the right one; add to this the screams of women, the shouts of boys, the clanging of gongs, the firing of pistols, the ringing of bells, the bellowings of speaking-trumpets, the squeaking of penny dittos, the noise of a dozen bands, with three drums in each, all playing different tunes at the same time, the hallooing of showmen, and an occasional roar from the wild-beast shows; and you are in the very centre and heart of the fair.”
Greenwich Fair was closed down, upon petition to the Home Secretary, Sir George Grey, in 1857; it had become too teeming (visitor numbers in excess of 200,000) and too debauched for the better-heeled locals. But this coming weekend, it will be born again, as part of the Greenwich and Docklands International Festival 2011.
“It’s really important for us to have an idea of where we came from,” says the festival director Bradley Hemming, who, to the tune of several hundred thousand pounds, is filling the centre of Greenwich with free outdoor acts in what he’s describing as a modern-day response to this bygone facet of London life. “I’m after that sense of being able to feel the different layers of the past - and engage with the ghosts of the 19th-century,” he continues. “Can we remember it and can we do something that’s as exciting for the 21st century? I want to create an atmosphere of there being more on offer than you can possibly see.”
Greenwich, in south east London, will host the equestrian disciplines of Eventing, Dressage and Jumping at the 2012 Olympics and the Paralympic Dressage
What he can’t do is wave a wand, undo “progress”, and allow today’s youth to go hurtling downhill from the top of Observatory Hill en masse, endangering life and limb – “We can’t risk-assess that,” he jokes. Gone are the naval pensioners, who’d tell hair-raising tales and - for a penny a pop - offer peeks through their telescopes of the Isle of Dogs gibbet, where rotting pirate corpses would hang. Gone, too, is the notorious Crown and Anchor dancing-booth, in which cross-dressing and all kinds of transgressive carry-on would take place; and Richardson’s, a travelling theatre - where, according to Dickens, “you have a melodrama (with three murders and a ghost), a pantomime, a comic song, an overture, and some incidental music, all done in five-and-twenty minutes.”
Hemming and his team have come up with a programme that echoes all that. “Contemporary artists will be exploring links with the past”, he says. On Friday, a promenade at the Old Royal Naval College, co-produced with the European arts festival FiraTarrega, will combine dance, circus and theatre in a celebration of the force of gravity. Running into July, Rachel Henson’s Greenwich Fair Flickers will set punters off with flick-books to act as guides to “remnants of past revels”, including tumbling. Of the many sideshows, That’s The Way To Do It! will unleash Punch and Judy from their booth, while Imaginary Friends will see life-sized puppets roaming the crowds. There are 35 companies taking part in total - and Hemming hopes that, far from being a one-off, the Fair will turn into an annual fixture.
What’s faintly astounding, still, is that the Docklands side of the festival will continue in high style too – allowing visitors to hot-foot it, for example, on Saturday from the organised misrule in Greenwich across the river to witness a spectacular event, created by Nigel Jamieson, the man behind the 2000 Sydney Olympic Opening Games Ceremony. With so much to choose from, it should really seem, strangely, as if you’re able, every time you hop the Greenwich meridian line, to jump back and forth in time.
Greenwich Fair: Fri – next Sun, as part of Greenwich and Docklands Festival until July 4 (www.festival.org; 020 858 7755)
telegraph.co.uk
It even attracted the famous. It was Charles Dickens' favourite fair. In Sketches by Boz (1836), he declares “we were a constant frequenter of Greenwich Fair, for years”. In his article he describes the fair in great detail and even describes the forms of transport making their way across what was then the largest city in the world to the fair - “Cabs, hackney-coaches, 'shay’ carts, coal-waggons, stages, omnibuses, sociables, gigs, donkey-chaises”.
But Greenwich Fair was closed down, upon petition to the Home Secretary Sir George Grey, in 1857. It had become too teeming (visitor numbers in excess of 200,000) and the debauchery was becoming too much for the wealthy gentlemen and ladies.
But this coming weekend, it will be born again, as part of the Greenwich and Docklands International Festival 2011.
“It’s really important for us to have an idea of where we came from,” says the festival director Bradley Hemming, who, to the tune of several hundred thousand pounds, is filling the centre of Greenwich with free outdoor acts in what he’s describing as a modern-day response to this bygone facet of London life.
Needless to say, gone are the naval pensioners, who’d tell hair-raising tales and - for a penny a pop - offer peeks through their telescopes of the Isle of Dogs gibbet, where rotting pirate corpses would hang. Gone, too, is the notorious Crown and Anchor dancing-booth, in which cross-dressing and all kinds of transgressive carry-on would take place.
Greenwich Fair: Where Dickens let his hair down
150 years after it was shut down for debauchery, Charles Dickens’ favourite fair is back. Roll up, says Dominic Cavendish .
Wheee!: visitors enjoy a spot of "tumbling" at Greenwich Fair, 1804 Pic: National Maritime mMuseum/John Marshall & Co
By Dominic Cavendish
18 Jun 2011
The Telegraph
What would one give to be transported back in time to experience Greenwich Fair at its giddy height? As it gathered force in the early 19th century – having begun life, judging by earliest mentions, a century earlier – it prompted visitors of a literary disposition to reach for their pens in wonder.
Dickens plainly adored the multitudinous spectacle that seized Greenwich every Easter and Whitsun. In Sketches by Boz (1836), he declares “we were a constant frequenter of Greenwich Fair, for years” - and confesses that if the memory of the high times enjoyed in earlier, youthful years is cloudy, that has much to do with the befuddling effect of late nights and too much drink. But, of course, his memory isn’t cloudy; distilling into 3,000 words or so the essence of all the fun and frolics, which he likens to “a sort of spring-rash: a three days’ fever, which cools the blood for six months afterwards”, his article is packed with keenly observed details.
He describes the unruly mass migration across London by every mode of transport - “Cabs, hackney-coaches, 'shay’ carts, coal-waggons, stages, omnibuses, sociables, gigs, donkey-chaises”. And then he pitches us into the fray, conjuring the hawkers and sharps who haunted the park and its surrounding area by day.
He also relays the most eagerly indulged pastime in the park - that of “tumbling”: “The principal amusement is to drag young ladies up the steep hill which leads to the Observatory, and then drag them down again, at the very top of their speed, greatly to the derangement of their curls and bonnet-caps, and much to the edification of lookers-on from below.”
Such barely respectable daytime pleasures gave way in the evening to the full licentious, thrill-seeking glory of the fair itself. “Imagine yourself”, he continues, “in an extremely dense crowd, which swings you to and fro, and in and out, and every way but the right one; add to this the screams of women, the shouts of boys, the clanging of gongs, the firing of pistols, the ringing of bells, the bellowings of speaking-trumpets, the squeaking of penny dittos, the noise of a dozen bands, with three drums in each, all playing different tunes at the same time, the hallooing of showmen, and an occasional roar from the wild-beast shows; and you are in the very centre and heart of the fair.”
Greenwich Fair was closed down, upon petition to the Home Secretary, Sir George Grey, in 1857; it had become too teeming (visitor numbers in excess of 200,000) and too debauched for the better-heeled locals. But this coming weekend, it will be born again, as part of the Greenwich and Docklands International Festival 2011.
“It’s really important for us to have an idea of where we came from,” says the festival director Bradley Hemming, who, to the tune of several hundred thousand pounds, is filling the centre of Greenwich with free outdoor acts in what he’s describing as a modern-day response to this bygone facet of London life. “I’m after that sense of being able to feel the different layers of the past - and engage with the ghosts of the 19th-century,” he continues. “Can we remember it and can we do something that’s as exciting for the 21st century? I want to create an atmosphere of there being more on offer than you can possibly see.”
Greenwich, in south east London, will host the equestrian disciplines of Eventing, Dressage and Jumping at the 2012 Olympics and the Paralympic Dressage
What he can’t do is wave a wand, undo “progress”, and allow today’s youth to go hurtling downhill from the top of Observatory Hill en masse, endangering life and limb – “We can’t risk-assess that,” he jokes. Gone are the naval pensioners, who’d tell hair-raising tales and - for a penny a pop - offer peeks through their telescopes of the Isle of Dogs gibbet, where rotting pirate corpses would hang. Gone, too, is the notorious Crown and Anchor dancing-booth, in which cross-dressing and all kinds of transgressive carry-on would take place; and Richardson’s, a travelling theatre - where, according to Dickens, “you have a melodrama (with three murders and a ghost), a pantomime, a comic song, an overture, and some incidental music, all done in five-and-twenty minutes.”
Hemming and his team have come up with a programme that echoes all that. “Contemporary artists will be exploring links with the past”, he says. On Friday, a promenade at the Old Royal Naval College, co-produced with the European arts festival FiraTarrega, will combine dance, circus and theatre in a celebration of the force of gravity. Running into July, Rachel Henson’s Greenwich Fair Flickers will set punters off with flick-books to act as guides to “remnants of past revels”, including tumbling. Of the many sideshows, That’s The Way To Do It! will unleash Punch and Judy from their booth, while Imaginary Friends will see life-sized puppets roaming the crowds. There are 35 companies taking part in total - and Hemming hopes that, far from being a one-off, the Fair will turn into an annual fixture.
What’s faintly astounding, still, is that the Docklands side of the festival will continue in high style too – allowing visitors to hot-foot it, for example, on Saturday from the organised misrule in Greenwich across the river to witness a spectacular event, created by Nigel Jamieson, the man behind the 2000 Sydney Olympic Opening Games Ceremony. With so much to choose from, it should really seem, strangely, as if you’re able, every time you hop the Greenwich meridian line, to jump back and forth in time.
Greenwich Fair: Fri – next Sun, as part of Greenwich and Docklands Festival until July 4 (www.festival.org; 020 858 7755)
telegraph.co.uk
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