![]() In almost every interview keepers insist that a key benefit of the job is that it is one for life. It (along with the weather) is so crucial to the lives of the keepers and their families that it is perceived as being angry and resentful when it's so fierce that it will not allow the keepers to be relieved from their duties and to be returned home. Some see their place of work as a prison, others as an ivory tower where they go to escape the world and its problems. There is also, of course, differences in perspective among the lighthouse keepers themselves. It’s something of a Venus/ Mars situation and offers an interesting exploration of wildly different marriages. Husbands and wives are shown to be thinking very different things about the situation they find themselves in. The difference in male and female perspective is also very telling. He loves his wife and child but it does not have the same power as the love he feels for his male partners out there waiting for him in the tower. In fact one of the keepers interviewed in the book does question his sexuality. Typically three of them live together at any one time, taking turns to cook for one another, clean up after each other and develop bonds that can seem almost homosexual in their strength. The ones stationed on rock and tower lights (where the real separation from family occurs) are quartered extremely closely with the other keepers. he feels the lighthouse service has saved his life).īut lighthouse keepers aren’t exactly loners. It is apparent that the time away from their families benefits many of their marriages while keeping the men hermetically sealed away from a life of socializing and, dare I say it, “real” life (one man, for instance, is pretty much an alcoholic while on land but is dry when in the lighthouse. On rock or tower lights, for instance, they work 2 months on and 1 month off. As lighthouse keepers they remove themselves from mainstream society. They come across as outsiders who live on the margins of society so they rejoice when, by chance, they see the role of keeper advertised. ![]() More often than not the lighthouse keepers in the book are men who have drifted through life before they took on the job. What came out of the experience is a revealing portrait of a romanticized vocation documented through a whole gamete of personalities. Armed with a tape recorder he visited land lights, rock lights and tower lights, staying in all three types of lighthouse as a guest and encouraging keepers and their families to open up about their lives and their reasons for choosing such an unorthodox, isolating existence. "One of the most fascinating social documents I have ever read" - William Golding.Īs the 1960s turned into the 70s British social documentarian Tony Parker decided to record the lives of lighthouse keepers and their wives.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |