Double ditched

"There was there a fair castle,
A little within the wood;
Double-ditched it was about, And walléd, by the rood." 

- The Geste of Robyn Hode (mid-15th century)

This verse describes the castle of Sir Richard Atte Lee, who gives Robin Hood and his men sanctuary from the wicked High Sheriff of Nottingham. This tale was possibly inspired by Wellow or Jordan Castle near Rufford Abbey in the heart of Sherwood Forest. Wellow was a ringwork castle of the motte and bailey type, updated in 1252 with the addition of a fortified manor house on the motte. It was protected by a moat and the nearby village was surrounded by a ditch, so Wellow was 'double ditched', just like the ballad.

In 1272 Sir Richard Foliot, a former Montfortian-cum-royalist who could never quite make up his mind, was accused of harbouring outlaws on his estates. This was the band led by Roger Godberd, one of the legion of real-life Robin Hoods. Foliot probably sheltered them at Jordan, since it lay midway between his other manors at Fenwick and Grimston.

In the ballad Sir Richard Atte Lee takes the outlaws into his castle and proudly defies the sheriff to do his worst. In the real world Sir Richard Foliot went grovelling to Henry III, who rolled his eyes a bit and pardoned him. Godberd and the lads made themselves scarce.

The Hooded Man cometh (again)

After claiming I rarely write reviews, I now find myself writing two in a row. This one is for Robin Hood and the Knights of the Apocalypse, a brand-new audio episode of Robin of Sherwood. For those who don't know, RoS (to use a convenient acronym) was a British TV series back in the 80s that offered a very different take on the legend of Robin Hood. More realistic in some ways - the outlaws were a convincing bunch of roughnecks living inside a damp English forest, a world away from the sun-drenched Californian redwoods of the 1938 Errol Flynn flick -  it was also the first screen version of the tale to introduce pagan elements. Unlike the devout Catholic outlaw of the medieval ballads, this Robin served Herne the Hunter, an ancient spirit of the forest, and took on the guise of The Hooded Man in the fight against Norman oppression.

For many Robin of Sherwood is *the* definitive screen version of the tale, and certain elements have influenced almost every version since: for instance, it was the first to introduce the idea of a deadly Saracen warrior among Robin's band of freedom fighters. This notion was picked up - or ripped off, to be unkind - and recycled in Kevin Costner's Prince of Thieves (1991) and the more recent BBC Robin Hood (2006-09). Alan Rickman's notoriously over-the-top turn as the evil Sheriff of Nottingham also owed much to Nickolas Grace's villainous Sheriff in RoS, though for my money Grace's performance was far more subtle and interesting.

So to Robin Hood and the KOTA. Before I go any further, I should acknowledge the huge degree of love and care and effort that went into this project. It was no mean feat on the part of Barnaby Eaton-Jones and his friends at Spiteful Puppet to gather all the surviving cast, raise the money needed to fund the recording (via crowdfunding), as well as hack through the legal jungle simply to persuade ITV (who own the rights to the series) to allow the project to go ahead. Also worth mentioning is that all the money raised from sales of the recording will go to charity.

Now for the difficult bit. I'm a fan of the original show - though nowhere near as devoted or knowledgeable as many fans - and my expectations for the actual quality of the new episode were modest. Granted, Spiteful Puppet were using a leftover script by the show's creator and original screenwriter, the late Richard Carpenter, but after thirty years could they really hope to recapture the magic? Early reviews were extremely positive, bordering on the ecstatic, so my hopes were raised a little.

After listening to KOTA twice, I have to say my reaction is mixed. It's not the car crash I was dreading, far from it, but nor does it come anywhere close to the heights of the first two seasons of RoS. Part of the problem is the awkwardness of fitting a script intended for a feature-length screen film into audio format. The action scenes in particular suffer, though the producers did their best by adding swishing arrows, clanging swords, galloping hoofs etc. None of these studio tricks, impressive as they are - and KOTA is very well produced - can suppress the unintentional comedy of actors describing the action as it happens: "my sword is at your neck," Nasir grimly informs a defeated opponent at one point. Unless he's fighting a blind man, his opponent would presumably know that already.

Such criticism is perhaps unfair, since the only remedy would be to cut out the action scenes altogether. Sadly there are other issues. The script itself is derivative of earlier TV episodes, and at times comes across like an edited highlights package: Robin is once again captured by insane cultists, as he was in The Time of the Wolf, and once again has to fight a manifested demon, as he did in The Swords of Wayland (though to be fair that was Robin of Loxley, rather than his successor Robert of Huntingdon). Some of the dialogue is very clunky by Carpenter's standards, and the banter between the Merries largely falls flat. Little John and Will Scarlet, played by Clive Mantle and Ray Winstone, are given some deeply unfunny jokes to work with, while the clumsy dialogue is not helped by a hefty slice of ham acting. Colin Baker is far too shrill as the villain Gerard de Ridefort, which makes his character come across as a dull, pompous buffoon. Fortunately Anthony Head rescues the situation with a nicely understated performance as the chief villain, Guichard de Montbalm, though even he occasionally breaks into some startling Dr Evil-style peals of maniacal laughter.

Elsewhere the cast suffers from one unavoidable omission. The late Robert Addie, so memorable as the Sheriff's blustering right-hand man Guy of Gisburne, was replaced by Freddie Fox. Fox is by no means bad as Guy, and has a certain sneering menace all of his own, but he sounds nothing at all like Addie. The difference jars, at least to my ears, and it might have been a better idea to omit Guy altogether and invent a new character for Fox. Nickolas Grace as the Sheriff initially sounds uncertain, as though he struggled to re-inhabit a character left behind thirty years ago (he isn't alone in this) but by the end of the episode he's back to his best, coldly informing the wounded Guy that he 'was never any good' and leaving him to bleed.

In case all this negativity sounds depressing or infuriating, I should point out some good bits. Jason Connery is very good as Robert of Huntingdon, and perhaps gives his best performance in the role. Connery's performance in the old series still divides opinion among fans, some of whom maintain he was too young and callow for the part and not a patch on his predecessor, Michael Praed. Now, three decades on, his voice has a deeper timbre and he carries it with more authority. At times he comes across like an exasperated staff officer, curtly snapping orders at the Merries, which makes him less charming but more realistic: Robert is supposed to be a young nobleman turned outlaw in charge of a bunch of unruly wolfsheads, not all of whom welcomed his leadership at first.

Robert's relationship with Marion is kept firmly in the background, perhaps wisely since the slightly unconvincing nature of it was one of the problems of the show. However this undercuts the big dramatic moment at the end of the third season when a heartbroken Marion, thinking Robert was dead, chose to go into a convent. Her decision to come out again and rejoin him in Sherwood is dealt with in just a couple of passing lines, which is a bit of a letdown - at least for those of who enjoy wallowing in melodrama (as I do).

A mention should also go to Mark Ryan as Nasir. The brooding Nasir was given hardly any lines in the original show, but here he is almost chatty and surprisingly engaging. His brief monologue with a bird in a tree, turning to rage when the birds are all frightened away by de Ridefort, is one of the best moments. Phil Rose as Friar Tuck gets a nice scene where he baptises infants in defiance of the Interdict, but otherwise has little to do except a few fat jokes.

Another nice feature is an enlarged role for Michael Craig as Robert's father, the Earl of Huntingdon. At one point the earl is called David, pretty much confirming that he is supposed to be the historical David of Huntingdon (1144-1219), brother to a King of Scotland. This in turn makes Robert an immensely powerful man if he wants to be, not only the heir to an earldom but with a decent claim to the Scottish throne. Disappointingly - at least for a history nerd like me - little is ever made of these connections, or the potentially fascinating narrative arc. As earl, with money and power and soldiers and a king for an ally, Robert would stand a far better chance of defeating injustice and curbing the excesses of King John. Instead he chooses to wander back to Sherwood and spend his days mooning over Marion and listening to some laddish banter. Oh well.

Despite my many criticisms of KOTA, it did leave me wanting more. There is life in this old dog (or wolfshead) yet, and plenty more scope for further adventures. Further audio episodes, provided the demand exists for them, would actually be written for audio and thus remove the problems of retro-fitting a screenplay. I see no reason why a team of able writers, steeped in RoS lore, couldn't produce quality scripts that would do the story justice and bring it to an intelligent conclusion. Now we just need to find an eccentric millionaire or two to fund it...

Rise of the Wolf!

I don't usually do book recommendations and/or reviews, but couldn't ignore the new Robin Hood novel by Steven McKay, titled Rise of the Wolf. McKay has done something very different with the ancient story, as I tried to do with my own Robin Hood mini-series, and given Jolly Robin a much-needed shot in the arm.

Rise is the third in the Forest Lord series - the first two were called Wolf's Head and The Wolf and the Raven - and follows the further adventures of Robin Hood and his gang as they are hunted by the nefarious Guy of Gisburne. So far, so standard, you might think: Gisburne has been Robin's stock enemy since the Errol Flynn movie back in the 1930s, and featured as such in almost every version of the tale ever since. Perhaps the most memorable screen Gisburne was Robert Addie in the 1980s ITV series Robin of Sherwood, though McKay's version is very different from Addie's inept blusterer: the Gisburne in Rise of the Wolf is a snarling, deadly, one-eyed mercenary, burning for revenge on Robin and willing to do anything to get it. 

Mr McKay...

McKay's masterstroke was to pluck Robin from his comfort zone of the Richard I/John era and propel him forward in time to early 14th century, and the troubled reign of Edward II. Robin and his men are outlawed as a result of their part in the failed rebellion of Thomas of Lancaster, Edward's cousin, and condemned to be hunted like animals in Barnsdale Forest. This is true to the oldest surviving medieval ballads, in which Robin meets 'Edward, our comely king' - probably supposed to be Edward II, who was said to be very 'comely' or handsome, and who did embark on a tour of the northern forests towards the end of his reign. Intriguingly, there was a man named Robyn Hode among Edward's retinue when he went north, though he is described as a porter or 'valet de la chambre' rather than a former outlaw.

By placing Robin Hood in an entirely new environment, McKay succeeds in shaking off most of the well-worn clichés: Robin is still hunted by the Sheriff and Gisburne, but the story takes place in a grim, gritty and entirely believable historical and political framework. This is no pantomime with men in green tights bounding through the sunny greenwood, waiting for their heroic king to come home and pardon them. The king is an incompetent, albeit a likeable one, and his nobles a bunch of bloodthirsty, self-interested marauders. England itself is a dirty and wretched place, which is no more than a faithful portrayal of the unspeakable conditions of the time: the early 1300s witnessed several terrible famines in England, appalling weather conditions, and a drawn-out, unwinnable war with Scotland that left much of the north country desolate and stripped of life.  

McKay's novels are the first (that I'm aware of) to relocate the legend in Edward II's reign. This is perhaps a bit surprising, since the theory of the 'historical' Robin Hood being one of Lancaster's rebels has been around for almost 150 years. It was first suggested by Joseph Hunter, a 19th century antiquarian, who claimed to have discovered proof that one Robert Hood of Wakefield, a Yorkshireman living in the early 14th century, was the real man behind the legend. Sadly, on closer analysis Hunter's theory doesn't stand up, for there is no proof that Robert Hood was ever an outlaw or rebel. 

That said, there remains the coincidence of Edward II's progress in the North, and the presence of a Robyn Hod in his household. Recent research has uncovered a man named John Littiljon, of Methley in Yorkshire, serving as a captain of archers in Lancaster's rebel army, as well as a William Scarlet, another Yorkshireman, among the rebel host. In purely historicist terms, then, it seems the early 1300s did have some kind of influence on the content of the ballads, though the actual process of history melding into fiction remains a mystery. 

So much for the history. Whatever the truth behind the legend, McKay's series is a brave, uncompromising step in the right direction, and the perfect antidote to recent feeble screen Robin Hoods. If there was any justice - which, as Robin Hood could tell you, there isn't - these books would be turned into a series of films. Until then, enjoy the printed word, and the rise of the wolf...

Rise of the Wolf on Amazon