TAKE YOUR CHILD
w*
HOLIDAY
EASY COOKING
December 291
«E
World^ Best-Selling^ Woman's \Magazin %>
FOR BUSY PEOPLE Horoscope Spectacular
YOUR NEW YEAR REVEALED NOW TRADITIONAL
TURKEY delicious recipes insid CHRISTMAS SAFETY
40 IMPORTANT FACTS EX-'LIVER BIRD' NERYS HUGHE FLAIR FOR BEING MUM
MEN AND MODERN MARRIAGE Part 2 Fun Spot 'M GAMES & PUZZLES FOR THE FAMILY
15 II 010791 II 00111:
CHIRPYROBIN: fun to make tasty to eat recipe inside
VOLUME NUMBER 13 VULUIVIC 19 l» INUIVIDtM IO
Welcome tommily Circle •wr
~v-
~y
^
<«-~v
f
^
.^"""'Y •
W
THE MAGAZINE THAT'S ALIVE WITH IDEAS Itcte-- -•*: 5 BUS* peopvi
111 Under Five: table manners 147 Economy Tips 153 Full Circle: your letters 154 Last Word: Christmas thoughts of the famous
CRAFT" 31 Decoration Inspiration! 13 ways to brighten up Christmas 38 Santa Drops In... with a special delivery 64 Make A Magical Nativity Scene 110 Knit A Ted!
15 Happy New Year? John Naylor's predictions 22 Mary O'Hara: her life, her songs, her books 44 Christmas games and puzzles: six pages of fun 73 Nerys Hughes: A Liver Bird's flair for being a mum 117 Men And Modern Marriage: part two 122 Forty Tips For A Safer Christmas 124 Have You Got A Family Favourite? Don't feel guilty about it, says Tom Crabtree
HEALTH AND BEAUTY 8 Looking After You 10 Make It Your Loveliest Christmas Ever 121 Do You Need A Tonic? And will it do you any good? 126 Spare A Thought For Feet!
COOKERY 40 Take A New Look At Turkey And All The Trimmings
OFFERS 67 Salton Tea Or Coffee Maker: only U8.95 99 Books For Your Home 113 Take Your Child On Holiday Free, with Family Circle and Portland Holidays 149 Unusual Parsley Jewellery: from only 16.95
Christmas turkey with all the trimmings— page 40 50 Cheery Novelty Cakes: including our Cover Recipe 68 Coffee Carnival: delicious liqueur coffees 70 Eat, Drink And Be Merry: treats to buy 77 Scarlet Berry Cake: for cooks in a hurry 79 Easy Cooking For Busy People: meals in a pot 86 Select Spuds: toppings to pep up baked potatoes 91 The Chocolate Feast: A new book for chocolate addicts
HOUSE AND HOME 42 Alternative Trees: to fake or make 61 Piles Of Presents with the family in mind 97 For Pulling Corks And Cracking Nuts: the latest gadgets
REGULARS 5 Our Lifecircle 93 Wine Circle 94 Diabetics' Diary 103 Dr Bursteln's Problem Page 105 Motoring Circle: car rescue services 107 Money Matters: Christmas presents 109 Peter Seabrook's Garden Notebook
YOUR NEXT FAMILY CIRCLE IS ON
KNITTING AND DRESSMAKING 56 Five Styles For Partygoers: our Christmas fashion guide 130 Be A Close-Knit Family: two classic designs to suit everyone 137 Instant Sparkle: simply add sequins OUR STAFF EDITOR Christine Brady ASSISTANT EDITOR (VISUALS) Paul Larkin COPY EDITOR Andrew Taylor CHIEF SUBEDITOR Janet Murphy ART EDITOR Michael Leaman COOKERY EDITOR Pam Dotter DRESSMAKING EDITOR Christine Baddeley HOME EDITOR Tessa Evelegh KNITTING AND CRAFT EDITOR Caroline Sullivan HEAD OF ADMINISTRATION Bob Hawkes ADVERTISEMENT MANAGER Julie Ferguson PUBLISHER Stuart Thomas MEMBER OF THE AUDIT BUREAU OF CIRCULATIONS Elm House, Elm StreeL London WC1X OBP Tel: 01-
Christmas party wear — page 56
4f
SALI DECEMBER 30
&
oo
ARYO'HMUV Talking to Eithne Power about her songs, her homes, her books—and how she copes with a chaotically busy life
ary O'Hara's life story makes dramatic reading. She tragically lost her husband after only 18 months of blissfully happy marriage, then entered a closed Benedictine order where she spent 12 contemplative years before returning to the world of entertainment. She's been tearing at her audience's heartstrings ever since with the delicate, haunting singing she accompanies on her harp. Now she's made an anthology of her songs—around 200 of them—in A Song For Ireland, with the words, songs' historical background and, most fascinating of all, the story of how she came to sing them. This book follows her successful autobiography, The Scent Of The Roses, written in laborious longhand at the kitchen table in her Hampshire cottage. This second book has been a long haul, nearly two years of work—and she still can't type. During that time she's been touring in New Zealand and Canada, and her publishers kept summoning her to urgent meetings in London when she
'I go hell for leather at things, I push myself to the limit' 22
There's a serenity no outside events can disturb was up in Inverness or wrestling with bindweed in her Hampshire garden . . . And she's coming into London's Tara Hotel any minute to talk about the book. Any minute? Well, any half hour, because she's stuck in a traffic jam coming in from the airport, where she's been dropping a homeward-bound friend. (Mary has friends everywhere between here and Zanzibar.) She arrives, very late, beaming serenely as if to say The man who made time made plenty of it', rushes off to phone her father who's come over for his birthday, says Thank God you're still here', and 'Would you happen to have any face powder or something in your bag?' The years have rolled by, there are lines around the sensitive mouth with the crooked teeth, the glowing fires in the hair are banked down, but elements of the skittery girl lurk in the soft green eyes, the sudden smile, the talent she has for bumping into furniture like an untried colt.
And there are traces of Sister Miriam (her religious name) in the tall, slim woman who runs around the hotel room switching off lights. 'Waste not, want not,' she says, narrowly escaping cracking her ankle against an occasional table as she sits down thankfully. How she managed to contain all that physical energy within the monastery walls for 12 long years must have been a miracle of the spiritual order. 'I go hell for leather at things, I push myself to the limit,' she says. 'I had all the spiritual freedom I wanted in the monastery, but I missed the physical freedom. There's nothing like getting out on a tennis court and bashing a ball around to get rid of tension. But I've been so busy with the book and singing engagements that I've only got on the courts six times this year. There were proofs flying back and forth between me and the publisher, with all sorts of corrections and comments and notes in balloons from me, which they weren't always able to interpret. At one stage I was working on three
There are hostile forces at work when I try to organise myself
sets of proofs—all different!' It's a mystery how she manages to stay on her feet, do extensive tours, write books, keep her garden at bay, plan a Harlech TV series about the quality of life. She's not, it would seem, the most organised person, in spite of her 12 years of discipline. 'You've hit the nail on the head,' she beams. 'I do have a diary and I do fill it up—but then I can't find it. I make shopping lists faithfully and find they've vanished by the time I get to the shops. There are hostile forces at work when I try to organise myself.' Hostile forces at work, too, when she went to Ireland to do the pictures for A Song For Ireland. It was no dry-as-dust piece of research but a very personal view of the country she grew up in. 'It rained in Dingle, it poured in Wicklow, and we didn't even attempt to get out to the Aran Islands, which was a great disappointment because
'If only everyone were a little quieter, we'd have a lovely world to live in' 24
'I had all the spiritual freedom... but I missed the physical freedom' it was there Richard and I had our honeymoon. We travelled over on an old Galway hooker which was used to carry turf from the mainland, and swam in thrashing seas all that week.' (The Queen OfConnemara in the anthology is a song about just such a fishing boat.) But she did get to the scene of Caoine Cill Cats, a lament for the beautiful forests cut down in County Tipperary and the passing of the old order. It was that song that led to her meeting with her husband: he'd heard her singing it on Irish radio and in his forthright way phoned and asked her out to dinner. She was sick and tired of persistent Americans, so she told him she was disfigured with freckles and drooled. He said he had freckles too, and a pea green suit, so they met and the course of her life was set. Shortly after that Aran Island honeymoon, Mary O'Hara left for America and since then has returned to Ireland only intermittently. In her Hampshire cottage with its buddleia and its glowing herbaceous border and its bindweed she is, to all intents and purposes, an exile. So it's perhaps in the last section of her book (Songs Of Exile) that she writes particularly poignantly. 'My favourite song of all is The Quiet Land Of Erin—it was written by a Gaelic poet during enforced exile in Scotland. There is a great
stillness about Ireland—like the inner stillness of someone who's suffered beyond all telling and emerged with trust intact.' A bit like Mary O'Hara herself. Even as she rushes to answer a knock on the door (bumping into a corner of the dressing table en route), even as she scrabbles in her bag for an elusive lipstick, or stares doubtfully at what might be a clump of weeds or, then again, might be flowers, there's a serenity that no outside events can disturb. 'I don't have to be in the country to find stillness, I can find it here in this hotel,' she says. 'I don't quite subscribe to the idea of being nearer God's heart in a garden than anywhere else on earth—I'm always too busy grappling with foreign bodies. But I feel the same way about noise as I do about throwing rubbish on the streets—if only everyone were a little quieter, we'd have a lovely world to live in.'
She is, to all intents and purposes, an exile
Now here's a glimpse of 'A Song For Ireland', a personal view in words, pictures and songs
If you'd like a copy ol the book yourself, it's published by Michael Joseph at 19.95. Mary's autobiography, 'The Scent Of The Roses', is also published by Michael Joseph at '.9.95.
There's a great stillness about Irelandâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;like the inner stillness of someone who's suffered beyond all telling and emerged with trust intact' 25
• .-*',#£' g^
>;-
This land follows me wherever I go. I carry it round in my head'
There is a rather special charged silence about some of our more ancient prehistoric places and ruins in Ireland' 26
* »J *^ •
'We spent our honeymoon on inishere. We travelled to the island in a sailing boat which was carrying turf'
'Gaelic and Anglo-Irish vocal music has an abundance of beautiful being-in-love songs, very often laced with references to nature'