The Real James Herriot: A Memoir of My Father
The Real James Herriot: A Memoir of My Father Books
Product Description
No one is better balanced to write the biography of James Herriot than the son who worked alongside him in the Yorkshire veterinary do when Herriot became an internationally bestselling author. Now, in this warm and poignant memoir, Jim Wight discussion about his father–the beloved veterinarian whom his family had to share with half the world.
Alf Wight (aka James Herriot) grew up in Glasgow, where he lived during a pleased rough-and-tumble childhood and then through the challenging years of training at the Glasgow Veterinary College. The tale of how the young vet later traveled to the small Yorkshire town of Thirsk, aka Darrowby, to take the job of assistant vet is one that is well known through James Herriot’s internationally celebrated books and the well loved All Creatures Fantastic and Small television run.
But Jim Wight’s biography ventures beyond the trials and tribulations of his father’s life as a veterinarian to reveal the man behind the tales–the private individual who refused to allow fame and wealth to interfere with his do or his family. With access to all of his father’s papers, correspondence, manuscripts, and photographs–and intimate remembrances of all the farmers, locals, and friends who populate the James Herriot books–only Jim Wight may possibly write this definitive biography of the man who was not only his father but his best supporter.Amazon.com Review
The name Alf Wight may not ring too many bells, but as James Herriot–the author who brought the British countryside into millions of homes–Wight certainly made an impressive mark. He grew up in Glasgow and loved a boisterous childhood before deciding to embark on many years of training at the Glasgow Veterinary College. Wight finally qualified as a vet in 1939 and went to the Yorkshire town of Thirsk to accept a position as assistant to Dr. Donald Sinclair–the man known to millions of readers as Siegfried Farnan.
The tale of the young vet travelling to Thirsk (a.k.a. Darrowby) was immortalized in Herriot’s bestselling books. But The Real James Herriot, Jim Wight’s affectionate biography of his father, tells the tale of the man behind the nom de plume, who worked in the same do for over 50 years and was relatively untouched and unimpressed by his fame as an author. Wight the younger (who followed in his father’s footsteps and later joined the do in Thirsk), is undoubtedly the best person to reveal the depths of a man whose broadcast persona was as respected and trusted as the real man who tended to animals in and nearly the small Yorkshire village where he lived until the day he died. Written with a tenderness that does nothing to detract from the honesty of the book, The Real James Herriot is a fitting, poignant, and often gently humorous portrait of a man who brought so much pleasure through his writing even as remaining consistently faithful to the profession that was, ultimately, his first and last like. –Susan Harrison, Amazon.co.uk
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I never cared for the Herriot books because some comments seemed anti-female. Reading about how Alf Wight’s mother everlastingly told her son he owed everything to his father, I know why he would say some things.
That is my impression, sadness.
Boys and girls, when you place home, place as much distance between your parents and you as possible.
I still want to know where to buy Wensleydale cheese.
Rating: 3 / 5
I found this biography of James Herriot surprisingly gone in new in rank and with disappointingly dull writing. I may possibly tell the author was attempting to emulate his father in his writing style, but the writing did not spring to life the way his father’s did. I was also dismayed by how many scenes and tales James Wight described that were meant to “prove” Alf Wight’s tales were autobiographical seemed to be taken honest from the works of fiction. James Wight seemed to be going to fantastic lengths to prove his father’s tales were autobiographical but I never felt he came up with the hard evidence. I’m still of the persuastion, as Lord Graham concluded in his biography of James Herriot/Alf Wight, that Alf Wight’s novels are frequently fiction, wonderful, wonderful fiction. I didn’t feel James Wight ever gave us much new insight into Mr. Alf Wight, despite having, according to his text, access to a tremendous quantity of material from his father’s life. Perhaps the son was too close to his father and the writing done too soon after the loss of his father for James Wight to be able to really see and know Alf Wight’s life. Finally, and its a small thing, I intensely disliked James Wight’s comments dotted throughout the book to the effect that the bestow day is in some way darker, more perilous and more miserable than a golden age of the past. I don’t agree and they make a weird, miserable undercurrent to the work.
Rating: 3 / 5
I am a huge fan of James Herriot and was looking forward to reading this book. But, it disappointed me in it’s lack of sophistication.
Rating: 3 / 5
I’m a huge fan of the James Herriot books, and I guess to keep rereading them for years. I’m glad I read this one, but I won’t pick it up again. He’s not the same caliber novelist as his dad, and the book may possibly have been 25 percent shorter without bringing up the rear any meat.
Rating: 3 / 5
This book is a fun one to pick up on a rainy day or just to get a small uplift
Rating: 3 / 5