Snippets from Outstanding Talks

Radio Record, Volume VII, Issue 6, 18 August 1933, Page 9

Snippets from Outstanding Talks

MISS PHYLLIS HOLLOW (3YA). PAris still remains the most charm. ° ing and most beautiful of the cities i visited, Every here and there, at intersections or on corners, you come across fountains or groups of statuary. while the public gardens and parks are full of marble or stone figures from Greek legend or from history. The beautifully-carved stone and wroaughtiron gateways, too, are among the lovely things of Paris. ‘T night Paris is wonderfully lighted, buildings on the main Boulevards are floodlit, as are many of the fountains, which gives an effect of great brightness. In fact, the whole atmosphere of Paris is bright and gay and the place is full of moyement. Taxis whizz down the cobbled streets, cut corners, defy the traffic police, who wave their arms and their batons, ring electric bells, and blow whistles-all at once and to no purpose. I DID not see nearly so many hawkers and pivement artists as I saw in Lohdon, but the streets are thronged with flower-sellers, who have quaint little stands-like miniature ticket boxes-and with chestnut sellers. These last have barrows with charcoal braziers ovet which they roast chestnuts which you can buy for 1 franc. JOTRE DAME-best known to Wnglish people as the scene of Victor Hugo’s novel, "The Hunchback of Notre Dame," is one of the oldest and most beautiful of Parisian cathedrals. Inside all is gloom and mystery-the light comes through richly coloured windows and at times the air is heary with incense. F Parisian night-life I saw nothing except the theatres. These begin any time between 7.30 and 9 p.m. and generally ended at midnight, when the theatrical quarters of Paris are very gay indeed. The opera season was in full swing during the month (from the middle of November to the middle of December) during ‘which I was in Paris, and I went several times to hear German Grand Opera. J

MR, J. T. BURROWS (3YA). N an edition of "Punch," April 4, 1860, an illustration shows a sérious governor giving one of his ministers a dréssing down because the latte? was showing a keen interest in the néwspaper account of the great fight. Iieenan vy. Sayers. We dre all like the serious governor. No matter how gory the description may be, no matter what statements we may make to the contrary, we are all interested in an account of a good fight. OR accounts of really early fights, we must turn to tales of classical mythology. Hercules, the god of

strength, seems to have been the first world’s champion heavy-weight., pus first mention of a fight betwee mere mortals is to be found in the 28rd Book of Homer's Tliad There must have been some remarkable exhibitions of courage and endurance in fhe days when men fought. often with fatal results, with the heh thier nenneay

cestus bound to their hands. A certain Eurydamas, we are told, receiving a terrible blow in the mouth while fighting, preferred to swallow his broken teeth rather than show that he was hurt. SOME writers have been at pains to prove that boxing was popular in King Alfred’s time as part of the manual exercises of the army, One historian records that Richard III "was particularly distinguished with a clenched fist when opposed to an antagonist."" But the fitst publie champion of the ring of whom we haye uuthentic record is one James Figg. who was champion from 1719-1734. T is difficult to know which fights to select for description amongst the many epics of the old prize-rivg days. But there is one which is gener ally recognised to be the greatest fight that ever took pluce on English soil. This was the memorable one fought in 1859 between.Tom Sayers the Wnglishman, and John Heenan, a young giant from America. MR. JOHN PATRICK (3YA). "THSRE is a strange magic about Chinese poetry, The more you read it the more fascinating it hecomes, and once it has cast its-spell over you its charm never fades. There is magic, of course, in the lines themselves. Listen to this description of an Emperor’s favourite: This pearl of beauty for whose sake did haste The camels’ golden-gleaming caravan. HEY were great lovers. Some of the poets were soldiers, and muny of them spent long periods as commanders of small inilitary outposts on the Jonely cnravan routes leading to (Chinese Turkistan. -and the West. There was alwayS & Woman, away back in China, of whom they were a-thinking. Memories of her were often woven into their poems, suggesting the unattainable and the un-possessed-the world of beauty and reality so far beyond mortal reach.