Call the Midwife ~ Jennifer Worth

A few weeks ago, at the end of another memorable series of Call the Midwife on BBC 1, I had a bit of a pang. And whilst I dare say plenty of people switch the TV off the minute they hear the theme music followed by the dulcet tones of the Vanessa Redgrave voice-over, Bookhound and I are settling down to watch in that Never Miss An Episode way that we do with a series that we really enjoy. We’ve watched every episode of every series, and all the Christmas specials.

The babies slither out week after week and cords will be cut, there will be traumas in the clinic, Doctor Turner will diagnose something else obscure ( for the era) and I'll try to beat him to it , Sister Monica Joan will wander off on another amusing frolic of her own, Nurse Crane (we adore Phyllis) will be a right softie underneath her no-nonsense exterior.

Meanwhile caretaker and handyman Fred will sort yet another plumbing disaster and we love it all.

I'm always intrigued by the old midwifery ways...remember Chummy delivering the breech baby, letting it dangle by its head for a while, and I'm hard-pushed (sorry) not to think I see real joy on everyone's faces when a baby is born.

There have been weddings and funerals and personal crises galore (come back soon Cynthia) and real life weddings and births; the vicar (Jack Ashton) and Trixie (Helen George) have had a beautiful baby of their own, and somehow I'm in danger of conflating the original book, with the fiction of the series, with the reality of the now.

It is sixteen years since I bought and read Jennifer Worth’s book in its very first edition published by Merton Books.  My copy quickly did the rounds of the health visiting team at the time, because two of my colleagues had worked as midwives with those very same nuns in the East End of London. We had some fascinating diversions at our team meetings for a while as they shared their memories. So it has been a fine refresher to take the book off the shelf and look at it again, not least to be reminded of Jennifer Worth's preface...

'In January 1998 the Midwives Journal published an article by Terri Coates entitled Impressions of the Midwife in Literature. After careful research Terri was forced to the conclusion that midwives are virtually non-existent in literature.

Why, in heaven's name? Why in heaven's name? Fictional doctors strut across the pages of book in droves, scattering pearls of wisdom as they pass. Nurses, good and bad, are by no means absent. But midwives? Whoever heard of a midwife as a literary heroine?

Yet midwifery contains within itself the very stuff of drama and melodrama every child is conceived either in love or lust, is born in pain and suffering followed by joy and elation or tragedy and anguish. A midwife attends every birth; she is in the thick of it, she sees it all. Why, then, does she remain a shadowy figure hiding behind the delivery room door. Terri Coates ended her article with the words : " Maybe there is a midwife somewhere who can do for midwifery watch James Herriot did for veterinary practice."

I read those words and took up the challenge

Jennifer Worth

July 2002 

In the book, all names were changed and The Midwives of St Raymund Nonnatus was also a fictional name. The 'real' Nonnatus House was actually St Frideswide’s Mission House, and the nuns were from the Community of St John the Divine; there is a very revealing and interesting first-hand account  of life working with the nuns here.

But how real it all seems now as I browse the pages and read about  Sister Julienne, (small and plump in the book in contrast to Jenny Agutter's screen portrayal) . And remember awkward but adorable Chummy (Miranda Hart.)

 

Here is Chummy, desperate to be a missionary, being kitted out with a bike...

'Cynthia, Trixie and I went with her to the bicycle shed and selected the largest - a huge old Raleigh of about 1910 vintage, made of solid iron, with a scooped out front and high handlebars. The solid tyres were about three inches thick, and there were no gears. The whole contraption weighed half a ton, and for this reason no-one rode it. Trixie oiled the chain and we were ready for the off.'

Now Chummy must learn to ride it...

'Several times she fell heavily to the ground. She hit her head on the kerb and said " Not to worry - no brains to hurt." She cut her leg, and murmured : " Just a scratch." She fell heavily onto an arm and proclaimed : " I have another..."

 

Nicola Beauman once told me that Persephone Books had turned the book down when offered it for publication. I seem to remember thinking at the time (and maybe even saying) 'If only you'd asked me.' Oh how the long arm of coincidence works in such mysterious ways when I read that Chummy was almost certainly a character based on the real-life midwife Fiona...

I was convinced that Fiona’s legs seemed to go on forever. The bike was called Persephone as it came from the underworld. 

Fiona on Persephone which was the only bike that would fit her long legs.

 

Reading the book again I find that everyone's there, except this time around I know them. Sister Monica Joan, Sister Evangelina, Conchita Warren expecting her twenty-fourth baby and there they are all fixed in my imagination thanks to the TV series. I would rarely go back to re-read a book once the TV has got its hands on it but I think Call The Midwife might be the exception. Jennifer Worth wrote a really excellent starter for ten which has become a hugely popular best-seller.

Now I'm sure plenty of you will either be of the 'Never watch it' category, or the 'Loath it' category, and for reasons various which is fine, it's not for everyone, but if anyone is in the 'Never miss an episode' of Call the Midwife category please do leave a comment... or is it just us.

 

 FOOTNOTE : Please be aware that we have had a jolly good discussion in comments since this post was published and you may find SPOILERS. If you are only just starting to watch the most recent series maybe read on with your eyes closed.