Sir Gawain and the Green Knight as a new comic-book, November 2021.

A glowing review indicates that the unpromising cover does not reflect the fine interior artwork.

It’s not on Amazon but elsewhere I found out that it’s 44 pages in total and, with the above review mentioning the long footnoted essay at the end… it’s not actually the graphic novel I initially thought it was. Still it looks excellent, if you can get past that cover, and is just £5 direct from the author. I assume it’s a paper booklet-comic, but it might be digital at that price.

A new ‘Gawain Country’ picture, not seen before. The ‘Castle Rocks’ near Ludchurch, seen here before overgrowth and perhaps circa 1920 judging by the girl’s attire.

A natural formation. Though perhaps slightly ‘enhanced’ with antiquarian stone-repositioning for visual impact, and denuded by stone-cutting for local walls (see the long groove on the right). It’s relevant to Ralph W. V. Elliott’s 1980s claims for the location of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight at and around the nearby Swithamley (see maps below). Actually that claim is not inconsistent with my recent detailed investigation of the medieval Alton Castle and its family. Because it may have been that the young Gawain poet was educated by boarding a little away from home and in a lower-ranking but worthy house, as was then often the custom. Thus Swithamley — some 14 miles north along the Earlsway from Alton Castle, and on the direct route to the family’s Irish holdings — would seem a possibility for that, and could give the writer a lengthy and formative immersion in the required dialect micro-region. This does, however, of course assume that a substantial house of some kind was at Swithamley before the dissolution of the monasteries.

Popping up on eBay, the programme for the Arthur Berry play Dr. Fergo’s Last Passion (aka Doctor Fergo’s Last Passion) from 1979, later followed by Dr. Fergo Rides Again in 1982. New to me. Described as “a rude ballad opera” with comedic songs, by a snippet from one old paywalled newspaper review. It has a local Potteries setting.

Regrettably there never seems to have been a recording or a radio version. Presumably the scripts and staging directions are still available. Might it then be revived? Possibly it would be too bawdy and ‘incorrect’ for our censorious times, but perhaps it could be done as a full-cast audio-only recording?