A welcome breeze plays among the reeds and carves ripples on the canal. Tonight, the Erica is moored on a perfect summer’s night. We welcome you to join us as enjoy the quiet and go searching for older attitudes to summer, the shifting dates of Midsummer's Eve, and just why Midsummer Night’s Dream was so unsummery.

Journal entry:

10th July, Friday

“Sitting chatting over a mug of tea
On the stern of the boat
The sound of music and children playing
A swirl of energy at the end of day.

Voices float across the water
That dances with light.
A mother with six newly hatched ducklings
The sun sinks behind Horse Hill.”

Episode Information:

In this episode I read short extracts from Miles Hadfield’s (1950) An English Almanac published by Dent, and Alexandra Harris’ (2015) Weatherland: Writers and artists under English skies published by Thames and Hudson.

I also refer to Hana Videen’s (2022) The Word Hord: Daily life in old English published by Princeton University Press, Eleanor Parker’s (2022) Winters in the World: A journey through the Anglo-Saxon year published by Reaktion Books, and Lia Leendertz’s (2024) A Year in Story and Song: A celebration of the seasons published by Hatchette UK.

You can find Karen and Jason's YouTube channel here: Just Two People.

With special thanks to our lock-wheelersfor supporting this podcast.
Ana McKellar
Susan Baker
Mind Shambles
Clare Hollingsworth
Kevin B.
Fleur and David Mcloughlin
Lois Raphael
Tania Yorgey
Andrea Hansen
Chris Hinds
Chris and Alan on NB Land of Green Ginger
Captain Arlo
Rebecca Russell
Allison on the narrowboat Mukka
Derek and Pauline Watts
Anna V.
Orange Cookie
Mary Keane.
Tony Rutherford.
Arabella Holzapfel.
Rory with MJ and Kayla.
Narrowboat Precious Jet.
Linda Reynolds Burkins.
Richard Noble.
Carol Ferguson.
Tracie Thomas
Mark and Tricia Stowe
Madeleine Smith

General Details

The intro and the outro music is ‘Crying Cello’ by Oleksii_Kalyna (2024) licensed for free-use by Pixabay (189988).

Narrowboat engine recorded by 'James2nd' on the River Weaver, Cheshire. Uploaded to Freesound.org on 23rd June 2018. Creative Commons Licence.

Piano and keyboard interludes composed and performed by Helen Ingram.

All other audio recorded on site.

Support the show

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Would you like to support this podcast by becoming a 'lock-wheeler' for Nighttime on Still Waters? Find out more: 'Lock-wheeling' for Nighttime on Still Waters.

Contact

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I would love to hear from you. You can email me at nighttimeonstillwaters@gmail.com or drop me a line by going to the nowspod website and using either the contact form or, if you prefer, record your message by clicking on the microphone icon.

For more information about Nighttime on Still Waters

You can find more information and photographs about the podcasts and life aboard the Erica on our website at noswpod.com.