Book review: From the Senedd to the Rooftops by Ben Wildsmith

Jon Gower

I knew I would end up crying as I re-read ‘The Gambler,’ one of the Ben Wildsmith’s consistently probing and morally questioning bi-weekly columns for Nation.Cymru.

Tenderly powerful and powerfully tender it’s an account of the 46 year long life of a woman called Louise who had a difficult upbringing, was street-homeless and thankfully ended up living in a small flat which she kept as neat as a pin.

In just a couple of pages Wildsmith captures her indomitable, feisty spirit, not least in one of Louise’s funniest stories, in what is often a darkly and sometime bleakly funny collection:

‘I was in prison, right and I didn’t have any burn. So I find the nearest muppet, not a tooth in her head, and sell her my false teeth! She comes back half an hour later and tells me they don’t fit! Well you can’t have your money back I tell her. I can’t have them now can I? That would be unhygienic!’

Those looking after her find out that Louise has never tasted steak, so they buy her some. She is taken for a walk on the beach where she collects pebbles which she then arranges on her mantlepiece, marking each one with the name of one of her seaside companions and the date of the visit. They’re small details of a testing life finally redeemed by a modicum of care.

The image of her being serenaded at her death bed with a Kenny Rogers song is both beautiful and dismantling to read. No wonder the tears flowed.

Compassion and care

I dwell on this story because it goes to the heart of what you might see as Wildsmith’s project, and what a capacious, caring project it is, full to bursting point with compassion for those such as the neglected folk he cares for in his day job.

He represents them, stands up for them while also taking an anatomist’s care to dissect the icily heedless hearts of politicians who are meant to look after the most vulnerable in our society. As he puts it, noting the malignant division in our communities, first seeded in 2016:  ‘There are only two kinds of people in this world: those who care and those who don’t.’

Dog whistling

So, knowing precisely which side he’s on, he takes up his cudgel for what he freely admits is Tory-bashing, noting how Rishi Sunak’s appointment of Suella Braverman – with her dog whistles and ‘fascist-adjacent takes on immigration’ – firmly put the pedal down on the accelerator of the UK’s death spiral.

Elsewhere he exposes the latest inanity or untruth from Andrew “Reliable Target” Davies as if he is wielding the searching, blazing arc-lamp of truth.

He is that sort of writer, Wildsmith: entertaining, exposing, illuminating, forever shining light into the darkest and murkiest corners, even into the Conservative aorta, long clogged with a dark bile (see, it’s catching, whatever he’s got. )

But this does not mean that New Labour escapes his ire or scathing attention as he dissects Mark Drakeford’s stance on devolution or calibrates New Labour’s slide away, not just from the left but from the centre even as it chases right wing votes at any, any cost.

What’s most remarkable about this writer is how he produces work of quality and meaning twice a week – the flash of his scalpel words never dulled by over-use in columns as original in their approach as they are passionate in their purpose.

His image of Boris Johnson as a rutting dog shaken off the leg of British politics is deftly memorable and cartoonish although it may be a tad too memorable as you’d like to eventually shake it off.

Silver lining chasing

Wildsmith can sometimes find solace in Welsh rugby. He is, after all, self-described as the most ‘irritatingly positive silver lining-chaser in the Welsh rugby media, possibly in Wales full stop.’

He has found a great way to commentate on games by taking himself off to watch matches in clubs and pubs.

He watches Wales taking on the flying Fijians in Ponty’s District Club or the ambitious Georgians down his local, always proving to be a very astute observer, even as he tries to shore up his enthusiasm for a game withering at its grass roots, left untended by the WRU gardeners, who long ago forgot where they left the watering can or how it works.

Tragic drama

Wildsmith watches it as a tragic drama, with lead actors such as Dan Biggar and lesser roles such as Sam Costelow all leading to the current farce penned by Warren Gatland before he finally, finally left the stage. But even when he watches Italy beat Wales in the warmth of a new Bracchis in Tylorstown he manages to find some hope when almost every other fan in the country have long abandoned theirs.

Losing our marbles

Wildsmith ranges widely when it comes to the occasional subject matter of his columns. We have the long, long game involving the Elgin marbles or a fine evocation of a concert by The Pogues. We are taken into the hell of Christmas shopping and the equally Dantean tale of Tata steel in Port Talbot. He writes about the horror of Gaza, defence spending, addicted youth and the lurch to the right in British politics with both acuity and perspicacity as he reports on the post-truth world and its chasmic inequalities.

To be able to process the craziness of the world is one thing: to make sense of it is quite another. And then to write about it in coruscatingly brilliant, blistering prose is altogether something else.

Wildsmith is a supremely talented wordsmith, as this second collection of columns so amply attests.

Over the course of 300 pages this is consistently entertainingly and, well, punitive prose, punishing the heartless for their disregard and fundamental lack of care for those who need it most, which, in the case of politicians, is what they’re paid for. Which means they simply are not doing their jobs. Wildsmith is.

From the Senedd to the Rooftops by Ben Wildsmith is published by Cambria Books and is available here.