Alan Titchmarsh reveals his antidotes for depressing headlines
The gardening guru, TV presenter and writer talks about controlling his news intake and following his Nimby instincts.
Gardening guru, TV presenter and writer Alan Titchmarsh may be famed for his horticultural expertise, but his forthright opinions also seem to sow the seeds of many a headline these days.
First it was avocados, which he said in his Gardeners’ World magazine column he avoids because of their “enormous carbon footprint” (and also called “insipid”). Then he lamented the “unremitting diet of tragedy and despair” of TV dramas, seeking out lighter programmes like Emily In Paris and Would I Lie To You?
“We are allowed ‘comfort food’. We need reassurance that being pleasant, nice and unadventurous is not dull. It’s an antidote to the hysteria that we seem to have to live with,” the proud Yorkshireman tells me today from his Hampshire home.
The Ilkley-born broadcaster’s numerous novels seem to support that viewpoint. They’re often romantic, nostalgic reads harking back to the days of chivalry, good manners and happy families. The sex is left largely to the imagination and there’s not a swear word, not a hint of a dysfunctional family in sight.
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“Other people are doing that,” he observes. “I write about what I call normal families. They’ve all got difficulties and they have moments when they fall out and difficulties they have to surmount. They are not families without troubles or problems.”
His 12th novel, The Gift, is in a similar vein, about young shepherd raised on his parents’ remote Yorkshire farm, who has a gift, a healing touch which enables him to help both ailing animals and people.
“I wanted to do something which is at one with the land, which is my thing anyway. It’s the ultimate reality. With all this that’s going on in the Ukraine, you look out of the window and see a piece of grass, a bit of water and some trees growing and think, ‘They will be there – it goes on.’”
There’s fantasy, a sprinkling of romance, a happy marriage and the triumph of good over evil in the pages. Yet while his gentle, romantic novels frequently become bestsellers, he rarely gets reviewed.
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“I tend not to get reviewed much, which suits me fine,” he says dismissively. “Novels which get reviewed are dramatic or gritty but at the moment we need a loving, gentler side of life to be highlighted and that’s what I hope my books do.
“I write the kind of book I like reading. It doesn’t mean they are without substance, point or depth of feelings but they tend to be of a more benign nature.”
And families in his novels don’t tend to have dramatic fall-outs or break-ups.
“One in three marriages ends in divorce. I’m writing about the other two – nobody ever talks about them,” he states. “Two out of three marriages last. Now there’s a headline you’ll never see. I try a little to redress the balance.”
You can see why he so loves his garden, which gives him an escape from the daily onslaught of depressing reports. He stops himself watching endless disturbing news bulletins, but it takes effort.
“Returning a sense of proportion and perspective is fiendishly difficult in these times and we owe it to ourselves to do that. A lot of people talk about mindfulness – well gardening has been mindful for me forever. You don’t have to call it anything. You can just drink it in and be calmed by it.
“Yes, I do watch the news, but it tends to be the headlines and then I turn it off.
“But you know, we were never made to take on our shoulders as individuals the worries of the world. It’s only been 200 years since we could only take on the worries of the village.
“In a way, because news gathering is such a big thing, it is assumed that we all want it and need it and I don’t think we do need as much as we get.”
He agrees that we live in a much brasher society now. “The news is far more shrill than it ever used to be. Since Brexit and Covid, it seems to me that news stations are unable to do anything that isn’t sensationalist and shrill, and now they’ve got the (situation in) Ukraine, which is a huge tragedy. ”
Titchmarsh, 72, lives in his Georgian farmhouse with Alison, his wife of 46 years, with whom he has two grown-up daughters who live nearby. He manages to see quite a lot of his four grandchildren and is clearly a devoted family man.
“Every marriage has its ups and downs. It has to be worked at and you’ve to decide if it’s worth the work or not. You don’t go through 46 years without a cross word,” he reflects.
Alan Titchmarsh and his wife, Alison
His main character in The Gift also faces ups and downs, as his mystical healing powers see him lauded by those who seek his help but victimised by others who don’t understand them.
“Maybe the idea had its foundation in the rising intolerance that certain groups seem to feel, but things that we don’t understand doesn’t mean they don’t exist,” Titchmarsh says.
He’s not just talking about sceptics of alternative therapies.
“It’s broader than that. There’s (this attitude of) ‘there’s my way of doing it and there’s the wrong way of doing it’,” he offers. “Strangely enough, it comes a lot from extremist groups who are fighting their corner thinking that’s the only way of doing it, when there are so many ways of approaching life.”
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While Titchmarsh made the news over his views on avocados and gritty TV dramas, he has also recently hit the headlines over a cause closer to home, protesting against plans for a raised incinerator half a mile from his house.
“Call me a Nimby (Not In My Back Yard) if you want. I will only protest about things in an area I know. I’m careful what I do. The other thing I’m on the side of is not putting solar farms up on good farmland and carpeting the country with these panels. I want sustainable energy but not at the price of covering the entire country in solar panels.”
He says he’s approached by environmental groups several times a week but can’t support every campaign.
“We all need to be Nimbies and look after the area of the countryside in which we live, but for the right reasons.
Meeting the Queen in 2012
“I will fight the corner of things I really believe in but I have a family to think of and look after, and if going out on a limb about something which is enormously contentious would threaten their equilibrium, then I wouldn’t do it.”
Titchmarsh is hoping to slow down on TV work after this year. He starts filming another series of Love Your Garden in April, while his Sunday morning ITV show Love Your Weekend has been recommissioned and he’ll be narrating the Royal Windsor Horse Show in May.
And what of the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee? Having made numerous documentaries featuring the royals, and being a self-confessed monarchist, he won’t be drawn on the monarch’s latest difficulties with her family.
“It’s been a difficult year for the Queen but I hope we’ll get to the stage whereby she can just have a proper celebration and put it to one side,” is all he will say on the matter.
There are at least two further novels planned – although they will be at two-year intervals, so retirement isn’t on the cards.
“I’ll never retire because the nice thing about writing is that I can sit there and do it on my own. But I am going to slow down a bit telly-wise after this year. I want to be in my garden more.”
The Gift by Alan Titchmarsh. Available now.
The Press Association
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