NATIONAL LIFE STORIES Science and Religion: Exploring the Spectrum. Life Story Interviews Mary Midgely Interviewed by Paul Merchant C1672/05 IMPORTANT This interview and transcript is accessible via http://sounds.bl.uk. © The British Library Board. Please refer to the Oral History curators at the British Library prior to any publication or broadcast from this document. Oral History The British Library 96 Euston Road London NW1 2DB United Kingdom +44 (0)20 7412 7404 [email protected] Every effort is made to ensure the accuracy of this transcript, however no transcript is an exact translation of the spoken word, and this document is intended to be a guide to the original recording, not replace it. Should you find any errors please inform the Oral History curators. The British Library National Life Stories Interview Summary Sheet Title Page Ref no: C1672/05 Collection title: ‘Science and Religion: Exploring the Spectrum’ Life Story Interviews Interviewee’s surname: Midgley Title: Interviewee’s Mary Sex: Female forename: Occupation: Philosopher Date and place of birth: 13th September 1919, East Dulwich, London Mother’s occupation: Father’s occupation: curate Dates of recording, Compact flash cards used, tracks (from – to): 17/04/2015 (track 1-4), 11/05/2015 (track 5-9) Location of interview: British Library, London Name of interviewer: Paul Merchant Type of recorder: Marantz PMD661on compact flash Recording format : audio file 9 WAV 24 bit 48 kHz 2-channel Total no. of tracks 9 Mono or stereo: Stereo Total Duration: 4 hrs. 16 min. 31 sec. Additional material: Copyright/Clearance: OPEN Interviewer’s comments: Mary Midgley Page 1 C1672/05 Track 1 [Track 1] Could I start by asking when and where you were born please? 1919, in East Dulwich, a part of London where my father was then a curate. And I know from reading your autobiography that you spent a short time in Cambridge very early on. That’s right. The first things I can remember are from Cambridge. I have a vague impression of Cambridge. And when I go to Cambridge it looks a bit familiar, you know. And I was there from, about six months or something, to five years. [00:45] I wondered, at one point in your autobiography you talk about a family acquaintance who put a sort of, brace of rabbits in your pram, and you were very hard to console. And you say that this wasn’t a memory, but something that someone had told you. I think it’s… No, I was told it by other people. Yes. Yes. I was interested in who had told you that story. Oh, one of my parents told me, my mother told me. I’ve no doubt my nurse told me, because she had had the pram out, and, it was an obvious thing in those days, if you had got, been shooting, [laughs] that you would hand over some, you see. [laughs] I can’t think who it was that we knew that shot rabbits, but somebody did. Yah. And you suggest that this might explain your dislike of fur in later life. Yes. I had, for a long time, I mean, and to some extent still I dislike fur, you know, it gave me the horrors. So, that probably accounts for it. And my parents thought it accounted for it. Mary Midgley Page 2 C1672/05 Track 1 And, another thing which you say is that, the teaching of drawing that you had, and in particular of perspective in drawing, led you later on to like to look at things from different positions, or to appreciate the difference in looking at things from different positions. Yah. Which raised the question of, how you think about the influence of your childhood generally on you as, as an adult. What kind of, I suppose it’s a sort of philosophical question really, what sort of idea of the self are you working… when you think about the influence of childhood on you as an adult? I can’t give you anything terribly general about that I think. I can only say that there isn’t, I think, any particular strong prejudice so to speak. I had quite a nice time as a child, and I wasn’t thinking [laughs] what an extraordinary life I have. in any kind of way. It seemed to me to be a normal, normal way to live, you know. [02:49] Thank you. Could you, could we go straight… Because, as you say, your memories of Cambridge are vague, could we go straight to Greenford? Yes. And, to Greenford rectory, where your father worked next. Yes. And I wonder whether you could say more about, give us more descriptions of the way in which you played with your brother in the sort of disused farmland with neglected buildings that surrounded the rectory. Well, I’m sorry to say, it was all fairly straightforward to me. [laughs] Yes, we moved into, I do remember moving into this house, because it was something bigger and grander. A big garden, rather neglected, where we could play as we chose, and we went into the neighbouring fields as well. So, there was a lot of space, and, I was just thinking there, saying these days that it’s good for your health if you got messy Mary Midgley Page 3 C1672/05 Track 1 when you were young. Well I did. You know, we were very very much into mud pies in the garden [laughs], and, it’s a rather clay-ey kind of neighbourhood, Greenford, and was muddy. And the… Yes, from time to time we had floods, so, we were aware of the possibility of flooding. My brother was usually around. We did not see many other children. There were some who we played with, and after a bit we went to school in Ealing, both of us, so we began to meet other children. But, my parents hadn’t friends living immediately around, so, it was in a way a slightly isolated childhood, which accounts for us reading a great deal. I realise not everybody does. [laughs] Yes, you say you read especially when your brother went away to, to boarding school. Yes. Yes. But do you remember particular things that you did, in this landscape with your brother, particular games? At one point you mention a, a penknife, and, you also mention, let me see, pampas grass, which you said was good for darts and plumes. Pampas grass. Very good, yes. I wondered what plumes was. Oh, do you not know the plumes on pampas grass? Yah, well I mean you, you can pick these big, flower stalks really, off the pampas frond, and you can throw them. They, they act as spears, really good, because they flew [laughs] as directed. We were being, I have to say, cowboys and Indians a lot of the time, we had suits for being cowboys and Indians, and threw these things about. We had a rather good swing down the garden on a tree. I’m sorry, it all sounds to me so obvious, but I can’t pick things out very easily. I mean there’s nothing, I don’t think there’s anything dramatic about it. I think it’s, I think it’s of interest to people listening now, because it’s a kind of exploratory play that children often don’t have now, so… Mary Midgley Page 4 C1672/05 Track 1 Well I think so. I think we were lucky, not only could we potter around the local fields, we could go further, we could go and find ponds in which there were newts and we could catch the newts. And this was absolutely a matter of course. If you wanted to wander across any piece of country, mostly you could. Yes, and it was very important to me, yes. Were there other adults in the landscape walking about that you interacted with while at play? I’m saying, not very many, because my parents’ friends were not local; they gradually got to know people of course, and they… but mostly their friends were either in Cambridge or London or somewhere else. So, there weren’t a lot of influential adults at that point I think. The school did, of course. [07:15] And, in terms of character, personality, how were you like, and how were you not like your brother Hugh? I think he, somehow, was always rather frightened of life and particularly of people. And I wasn’t. I think, I mean, an older child often does have that situation, don’t they. But I particularly remember at some point, he was teenage, we were being told that somebody, some visitors were coming. ‘Oh God, not another!’ says Hugh, you see. He was a bit like that. And he remained a bit like that, although he, you know, was quite a successful director of art galleries in his later life. I didn’t have that trouble, I was always quite pleased to see people and talk to them, unless they frightened me in some way, as they sometimes did. [08:15] And how were, how were you and your brother treated differently, if you were treated differently, by your parents, on account of he being a boy and you a girl? Oh no, I don’t think there was much, certainly not much objectionable sex difference made. Both my parents’ families were already feminist, quite keen. I don’t mean that they’d been suffragettes, but they, they felt strongly about the education of women.