Hay author Bridget Asthon said she was surprised to read the headline in the Sunday Times on Sunday, 25 May: “Ask Grandma for a glimpse into women’s lost history, urges author.”
English Novelist Philippa Gregory was speaking at Hay Festival and called for more attention to be be paid to the ordinary lives of women in history. She said: “Just ask your grandmother for her diary. These stories are actually history. They are as interesting as what Winston Churchill was doing in the war.”
Author Bridget Ashton who grew up in Hay-on-Wye says her books were inspired by her mother’s diaries. Ashton said: “I agree. I used my mother’s 1953 diary in my book Hay Before the Bookshops or The Beeman’s Family. This is the daily life of an ordinary woman in post-war Hay.
“Cooking on a Rayburn and watching the Star grocery man cutting cheese and butter off big lumps. Mending the children’s clothes. Buying a boiling hen from the farm woman from Dorstone. The new National health Service so no need to worry about paying the doctor. The nit nurse at school. The gas mask and the false teeth at the dentist. The steam train to Hereford or Brecon. Hay’s public library certainly, but ne’er a bookshop in town. Hay without a bookshop? This is indeed history.
“So thank you Philippa Gregory for pointing this out at the Hay Festival.”
Hay Before the Bookshops or The Beeman’s Family and the Hay Girl Trilogy are available on Amazon: