Writers Review: MODERN NATURE by Derek Jarman, reviewed by Linda Newbery

"The New York Times described his film The Garden as 'a peculiar blend of reflectiveness and fury', which could apply equally well to this journal."

Linda Newbery edits Writers Review.

"I have re-discovered my boredom here," Derek Jarman writes, finding at Prospect Cottage, his Dungeness home, an escape from the celebrity he earned through his films and his activism. "All around the traps were set. Traps of notoriety and expectation, of collaboration and commerce, of fame and fortune. At first a welcome trickle, something new. Then a raging flood of repetition, endless questions that eroded and submerged my work, and life itself. But now I have re-discovered boredom, where I can fight 'what next' with nothing."

Well, not exactly nothing. Beginning after Jarman's diagnosis as HIV positive (which gave, at that time, a grim outlook) his 1989-90 journal conveys a time filled with interviews, film projects and visits to London exhibitions and social events, interspersed with the making of his iconic Dungeness garden, constantly planting, propagating and making sculptures from objects found on the shore. The contrasts are stark, moving from the many demands on him in London to the quieter, reflective times at Dungeness. He writes of "the separation of my two lives ... work here (in London), sunsets and sunrises there." Always in the background is his sorrow at the death of friends from AIDS and the foreboding of his own, which by the end of the journal seems close, although he lived for another three and a half years, regaining enough health and energy to film Edward II, Wittgenstein and Blue.

Having visited Prospect Cottage and somewhat fallen under the strange spell of Dungeness, its flat horizons, big sky and sparse vegetation, I found that these sections appealed to me most, beautifully evoking that distinctive terrain with the nuclear power station looming in the background. "There are no walls or fences. My garden's boundaries are the horizon," he writes, and of the night sky: "So flat is the Ness that those stars that lie at the horizon touch your very feet and the moon tips the waves with silver ... The nuclear power station is an ocean liner moored in the firmament, ablaze with light: white, yellow, ruby." Both my visits have been in calm July sunshine; the place must be very different in harsh winter weather. Once in this memoir Jarman feared that the cottage roof would be torn off in a gale, while on another occasion a lightning strike at the power station sent him and other residents into a panic, rushing to pack for a hasty evacuation (which, fortunately, wasn't needed).

Derek Jarman is an engaging diarist, full of contradictions and charm. The boldly unconventional film-maker, rebellious activist and one of the first public figures to be open about his HIV diagnosis expresses a wistfulness for pre-decimal coinage and describes himself as too shy to try on clothes in shops; as a student at King's College in London he felt "frightened and confused," convinced that he was the only gay in the world. Almost every writer or artist will identify with the self-doubt he experiences: "All the way back on the train I was plagued with misgivings about The Garden. Looking at the rushes over the last six days, I discovered not one sequence that worked. Glaring faults everywhere ..." At the same time he feels a compulsion to write. "I find it difficult to write each day, but if I don't I'm swamped with guilt. Where does the compunction come from?" So strong was it that even when he temporarily lost his sight while being treated in hospital he dictated his journal entries to his devoted companion Keith Collins (referred to by his nickname HB in the book).

Those us who were around in the 80s may remember how the AIDS epidemic was viewed by some who saw it as a punishment for homosexuals. "Last week a doctor in the mainstream of research with a leading drug company said that looking for drugs to combat the virus and to prolong the lives of those already infected posed an ethical problem, as keeping them (read me here) alive only exacerbated the situation. Better we should all die quickly. Every day, in many little ways, we are subjected to this terrorism. Our relationships unsanctioned, beyond the law." No wonder there is always anger simmering beneath the surface of Jarman's writing.

As it's a journal, events are understandably related without context, which can sometimes confuse the reader with a great many names, places, and visits whose purpose is unclear. Interspersed with these almost daily records are reminiscences from his childhood, spent in various countries with the RAF father with whom he had a difficult relationship. But it was early in childhood that his fascination with plants and gardening began: at four his parents gave him an illustrated Edwardian book, Beautiful Flowers and How to Grow Them, an unusual gift for so young a child but one which provided a lasting influence: "Flowers spring up and entwine themselves like bindweed along the footpaths of my childhood." The early part of Modern Nature refers constantly to plants in folklore, in herbalism, in classical literature. "If fate had turned out different," he writes, "I am sure I would have been a professional gardener, rather than an enthusiastic amateur."

In between making videos for the Pet Shop Boys, filming The Garden, beginning to research Edward II and frequently staying at his London flat, he spends his time at Prospect Cottage walking the shores of the Ness, collecting and arranging the driftwood, stones and found objects which give his garden its unique character. He reports constantly on the progress of his seedlings and cuttings. Even at his lowest, when friends' deaths are reported with horrible frequency, he finds solace in his plants. "I plant my herbal garden as a panacea, read up on all the aches and pains that plants will cure - and know they are not going to help. The garden as pharmacopeia has failed. Yet there is a thrill in watching the plants spring up that gives me hope."

The New York Times described his film The Garden as 'a peculiar blend of reflectiveness and fury', which could apply just as well to this journal.