Harriet Lane
NOTES FROM A BIG COUNTRY by Bill Bryson (Doubleday)
Bill Bryson, an American who settled in North Yorkshire and wrote – affectionately and very successfully – about the vagaries of the British, appears to have moved back to the States almost by accident.
Having written 77 Mail on Sunday columns about the eccentricities of his new habitat in Hanover, New Hampshire, he chose the 78th to explain why he came home. His children were growing up, and he was required to travel for work, so he and his wife decided to move somewhere “a little more urban and built-up. And then – this is the part that gets hazy – somehow this simple concept evolved into the notion of settling in America for a time”.
Of course, Bryson being Bryson, his current life in Hanover has proved an extremely rich seam. In effect, he is again the outsider, perplexed by things everyone else takes for granted, finding – like Rip van Winkle – that the basics, such as television, bureaucracy and supermarkets, have changed beyond recognition in his absence.
Mrs Bryson, who is British, is delighted: “The people are friendly, the weather is glorious, and you can walk everywhere without having to look out for cowpats.” Her husband’s feelings are more mixed. Hanover sounds like a sweet place, where no one bothers to padlock their bikes, but it is still an American town, and America is bonkers.
Bryson loves statistics: the average American citizen eats 17,8 pounds of pretzels a year, walks 350 yards a day, and is exposed to 1 000 commercials a week. Yes, yes, familiar stuff, but few commentators can rival Bryson’s mild, wry, quizzical tone, and he’s good at the unexpected, too. Who’d have thought that a eulogy to the waste-disposal unit would be so engrossing? “Chopsticks give perhaps the liveliest response … cantaloupe rinds make the richest, throatiest sound.”
The same applies to his excitable column describing autumn in New England, with “air so clean and clear that you feel as if you could reach out and ping it with a finger, as you would a polished wine glass”. Or Bryson steps out when it’s 19 below zero and files a front-line report.
This may be a slow tour, with seatbelt and airbag, of a quiet neighbourhood, but the view is always unusual.