Sir Michael Parkinson and his son Mike write a book: ‘Uncomfortable’ truths are a necessary part of family memories

By RNZ

At its best, Sir Michael Parkinson’s eponymous British television talk show drew more than eight million viewers a week, making “Parky” a household name.

The son of a Yorkshire coal miner, he dropped out of school early and joined the BBC with a northern accent and without the benefits of an Oxbridge education.

He had to fight imposter syndrome and people’s preconceptions while doing it as an interviewer, and then he spoke to thousands of the biggest celebrity names.

While writing his latest book, “Like Father, Like Son: A Family Story”, Sir Michael (now 85 years old) spent some time in the hospital. But when it came out, it was difficult for him to write again.

“I didn’t have an idea in my head, I could spell and all that, but I just didn’t have an idea, I had no way to get down to writing,” he said.

So he recruited his son Mike, who rephrased the book and gave it a definition.

“He started writing about the miners themselves, about the work itself, what it was about, and he brought a different kind of serious and beautifully written account of this extraordinary tribe of men who got into a hole in the ground, like my father , and 40 years later he emerged with pneumoconiosis and died. “

‘A forgotten town’

Reflecting on his research for the book, Mike said that there were two things that particularly horrified him: the physical aspects of work and working in the dark.

“The horrible thing about them is that they were a forgotten people, everything happened underground,” he said. “If you passed in front of them, you would only see the pit head workers, you would not understand that below that, 1000 meters underground, people work in unimaginable conditions.”

It was work that broke men physically, mentally and spiritually, he said.

“And the only thing he did to my grandfather, he could have physically diminished him, but he never broke it mentally, he never broke it spiritually and that’s an extraordinary testimony of him.”

Above all, he took on the difficult job out of love for his family.

“He loved us both beyond measure, he treated us both with great respect and love. He never pointed a finger at me,” Sir Michael said.

He came to experience the nature of his father’s work around the age of 14 or 15, when he was taken to the well.

“I’ve never been so scared in my life,” he said. “What horrified me the most was the scene they worked on. My father worked on a scene about three feet, maybe a little less.”

To start working, he would have to crawl on his stomach for about an hour and then work another eight or nine hours, “digging for coal in his belly.”

“He never complained and all he could think about was making me and my mom happy, because that would have been his greatest satisfaction in life.”

Hard truths

Sir Michael’s relationship with his father would also affect his son Mike. Moving from his working-class background to the upper echelons of the BBC gave him a “huge boost,” according to his son.

“That makes it harder for me to become that kind of loving father that my grandfather was, because in the end, my grandfather, when he came out of the hole, he breathed a sigh of relief and all he wanted to do was spend time on a cricket pitch. with his son.

“When my dad was at work, all he wanted to do was make sure he kept going, keep pushing, because he thought he shouldn’t be there, and that makes him a very neurotic person and I think that doesn’t mean anything.” biological father “.

While Sir Michael said he was a bit upset by what Mike wrote about him and also about his mother, whom his son described as having “ruthless ambition” for him to succeed, he thought it important that the book be a honest account. .

“I came to the conclusion, if I was honest, that it was true and there were no good writings in this book on family life unless it allowed observations that were uncomfortable.”

According to Mike, his experience with the book was “to separate the figure of a father from that of a human being.”

“It is made up of forces far beyond you or what you have thought,” he said. “And when you are born to that man, you can’t expect him to suddenly become the father of a Dr. Spock parenting manual.”

Like father Like Son

In becoming a father himself, Mike said it was common to continue in the early days that you will never be like your own father.

“But then you find yourself posting didactics and comments and you think, ‘God, I sound exactly like my father.’

However, when it came to parenting advice, she found that her father had become the “perfect person to turn to.”

“My mother tends to be full of Celtic sadness and emotion, while my father can say, ‘I understand why you’re upset, but let’s think about it,’ and he’s very good in that regard.”

Despite his father’s shortcomings, Mike said he had a happy childhood, with only a few caveats.

“Generally speaking, I had a happy childhood, because I never felt abandoned, isolated or unloved, and I honestly think that’s all a child can feel.”

And for Sir Michael, remembering his own father, he said that he felt “very fortunate to have been born of such a good man.”

“When Piers Morgan asked me what I thought at the end of the interview last year about my father, I said that he is a better man than I could have been.

“He had a simplicity around him that I don’t have. I’m a much more complicated person than he is, and often, because of those complications, I think I secretly wish I was like you.”

– RNZ