William Horwood is a novelist who grew up in Deal in the 1950s within sight of the Goodwin Sands. His mother was instrumental in saving the now-beloved "old town" area of Middle Street from developers who made applications to raze the historical buildings after the Second World War in the name of modernisation. Here he discusses his boyhood on the beach, befriending the local fishermen, class differences and what he has referred to elsewhere as "genteel poverty". Among his works are The Boy With No Shoes, a fictionalised memoir about his childhood in Kent, and the novel Skallagrigg which was adapted into a BBC film in 1994.
This is an interview conducted as part of the Goodwin Sands Oral History Project, a podcast series which speaks with those who have grown up within sight of the Sands, who make their living upon or around them, or who have been creatively inspired by the air of uncanny mystery they invoke. The Goodwin Sands are a pair of large sandbanks of the south-east Kent coast which offer both shelter and a dangerous hazard to unwary shipping or those caught in storms, and are the site of great historical importance and maritime archaeology.
This podcast project was undertaken as a response to an application to dredge the Goodwin Sands for aggregates and building materials to expand Dover Harbour, a proposition vehemently opposed by local residents and the Goodwin Sands Conservation Trust, who have created this podcast series. It is hoped that through hearing the voices of the people connected with the Sands their cultural status might be raised and further industrial interference might be avoided in the future.
Credits:
Presented and interview conducted by Joanna Thomson, co-founder of the Goodwin Sands Conservation Trust.
Production, editing, sound design and music by Ben Horner.
For more about the Goodwin Sands Conservation Trust please see https://goodwinsands.org.uk/, and please see https://theaudiosphere.com for more on our producer.
