A funny valentine - review of Sandi Toksvig

Sandi Toksvig at The Anvil, Basingstoke on Saturday, September 15

COMEDIANS often rave about the warm and friendly atmosphere at The Anvil, but Sandi Toksvig’s visit  generated such a tangible glow of love radiating towards her from the audience, that she probably could have spent the whole show explaining the rules of Mornington Crescent (the unfathomable parlour game played on I’m Sorry, I Haven’t A Clue) and still have been adored by every person present.

In fact, Toksvig gave us much more than that. Entitled “My Valentine”, the loose theme was a love letter from Toksvig to life; what inspires her to still find “delight in the day”. Much of her daily pleasures arise unexpectedly via her wholehearted love of books - not just literature of quality, but the fun to be had from dubious book titles, and a gem about the rules of golf during wartime, found while thumbing through an old golfing almanac (“A player whose stroke is affected by the simultaneous explosion of a bomb may play another ball from the same place. Penalty, one stroke.”)

It is no wonder that Toksvig has little trouble finding ideas for her novels, the most recent of which is Valentine Grey, and she explained the various inspirations for the plot, including the several women who are known to have disguised themselves as male soldiers (and many who were probably never discovered), and the horrors of the generally forgotten Boer War at the turn of the 20th century.

Toksvig’s anecdotes included touching tales about Toksvig’s late “showbiz husband” Alan Coren “We used to lie on his hotel bed eating burgers... it was like being an old married couple without the sex - hang on, that is being an old married couple”, her long-term friendship with John McCarthy, dating back to before he was taken hostage in the Lebanon, and her parents, who met at the BBC - “I have the BBC running through my veins”.

It was interesting to hear in Toksvig’s voice, not just the hint of Denmark of her birth which I always suspected bubbled just under the surface of her clipped English accent, but also the broad New York drawl which she brought to the UK as a teenager after years living in the USA. Such a globetrotting past hasn’t stopped Toksvig from becoming a truly British institution, but her description of Danish as a “peasant language with one word to describe one thing - although we have lots of words for ‘herring’” may go some way to explain her love of the intricacies and delights of the English language.

However, it was fun to learn some Danish essentials - if I am ever in Denmark to find that I have been made king, and need to convey my love of strawberries, I am sorted. There was also audience participation with a Q&A session, a silly little history quiz (I say “silly” only because I got knocked out on the first round) with the prize being not the expected signed copy of Valentine Grey, but a Moleskine notebook, beloved of many writers, to allow the winner to begin her “own writing journey”. 

The evening’s fun rounded off with a mass audience conducting of Beethoven’s Ode To Joy, commissioned by The Philharmonic Society of London in 1817 for £50 - “surely the best 50 quid ever spent”. I suspect everyone in the audience felt the same about the £18.50 they spent on their tickets.

• First published in the Newbury Weekly News on Thursday, September 22, 2012

Hearts and Bones - interview with Sandi Toksvig

WITH her fifth book out on September 6, radio comedy doyenne SANDI TOKSVIG is launching it with a touring show direct from Edinburgh Fringe mixing in stand-up, storytelling and hopefully some hot gossip centred around her career and her love of writing. CATRIONA REEVES spoke to her about her historical novel Valentine Grey, and the live show it has inspired.

CATRIONA REEVES: Your new book, Valentine Grey, is about a girl who dressed as a man to enrol as a soldier in the Boer War. Did you enjoy writing it?

SANDI TOKSVIG: Very much so. It’s taken about four years in total, and has involved a massive amount of research - probably too much, but it helps give a three-dimensional feeling to the book. I became totally immersed in its world; I even broke down in tears because I killed a character.

It’s a very odd feeling now that I’ve finished writing it - I’ve been working on it for such a long time, and I’ve had stuff all over my desk to do with it, which I only finally tidied away yesterday

CR: Part of the story focuses on Valentine’s cousin Reggie. She disguises herself as him to join the fighting, leaving him free to stay with his male lover in Victorian London. Was it important to you to have gay characters in the book?

ST: The gay element to the story wasn’t central to it to begin with - that evolved later on. I started with the central story about Valentine, but then I became interested in the character of Reggie as well, and his own battle developed. I find that happens with character; they take over and create their own story.

CR: Your live show is called My Valentine - is it all about the novel?

ST: The show does involve me talking about the book, but there will also be jokes and silliness; I’ll look at why people write and what they write about, and there will be a bit about silly book titles. It’s a mix of sensible and silly.

There will also be a question and answer session - I’ve got some good gossip if people ask the right questions.

CR: Do you consider yourself to be mainly a writer, performer or comedian?

ST: I like all of it - I get to do so many different things; writing the books,the radio shows [Toksvig is chairman of Radio 4’s The News Quiz] and television [she is a regularly panellist on QI]. I’ve got a play opening soon, and a new quiz show for Channel 4... I like the variety. I do also love writing; in a room on my own, enjoying the peace and quiet.

CR: You pop up quite regularly on the BBC comedy panel show QI, but not many women do - why do you think that is?

ST: I really don’t know - I think they must fear us. I’m good friends with some of the other women who appear on QI, including Jo Brand, but they never put us on together. It’s very rare that there are two women on the same panel. It’s odd, because there’s lots of women who appear on the News Quiz.

CR: You’ve had a long and successful television and radio career, but a lot of people in their 30s or so fondly remember you for your time on No. 73, the 1980s ITV Saturday morning show. Did you enjoy being involved in children’s television?

ST: No 73 was the most fun I’ve ever had with my clothes on. I was fresh out of uni, straight into a TV job that lasted six years. I didn’t particularly aim to work in children’s television - I never really had a career plan. I’d been in Footlights at Cambridge, and joined The Comedy Store Players [an improvisational comedy group based at London’s Comedy Store club]. Whose Line Is It Anyway? [Channel 4’s long-running improv show] came out of that, and one thing led to another.

My secret is that I never say no to anything. Well, it has to be of a certain standard; I avoid anything with “celebrity” in the title. I was asked to do the dancing one, but I decided that I’ve coped so far without learning how to tango, so I can probably live without it.

Sandi Toksvig will perform My Valentine at The Anvil, Basingstoke on Saturday, September 15.

• First published in Newbury Weekly News on August 23, 2012