Free Writing Home by Alan Bennett Page B

corner.
    ( Lobby .)
    RECEPTIONIST: What sort of accommodation do you require?
Twin-bedded room, and is it for anything special at all or … oh that’s lovely. I can offer you – we actually do extra special-occasions Leisure Break weekend that weekend, which is £ 173 …
    The end of a Leisure Break for one couple, but for some it was once all leisure.
    UPPER-CLASS MAN: I never see a hotel like this but I see my father walking about, smoking a cigar with a glass of whisky in his hand.
    UPPER-CLASS WOMAN: Oh yes.
    UPPER-CLASS MAN: The ruination of our home.
    UPPER-CLASS WOMAN: Some memories never die, do they?
    UPPER-CLASS MAN: No.
    ( Another part of the lobby .)
    TIMID WOMAN: Do you want to … All right, do you want any jam?
    HER MOTHER: No.
    TIMID WOMAN: Eat it, don’t leave it.
    HER MOTHER: Well, I can’t eat it all …
    TIMID WOMAN: Oh you mustn’t leave it.
    HER MOTHER: I can’t eat it all …
    UPPER-CLASS MAN: Is it possible to have scones and butter and jam and a pot of tea, and toast. Is that possible?
    WAITERESS: Yes.
    UPPER-CLASS MAN: Scones and butter and jam, and some nice toast.
    WAITERESS: White or brown bread?
    WOMAN SMOKING: This used to be all in one before they put the bar there …
    WAITERESS: White or brown bread?
    WOMAN SMOKING: And this hotel – I’ve seen this altered quite a lot. I was in here one morning having coffee and there was Lord Hailsham in, and he came across and shook hands with me.
    ( Dining-room. Hotel pianist playing .)
    When we were at home we always had our dinner at lunch-time. For my parents, anything that came after that was never more than a snack. But when I was at university and they came to see me, we’d go into the hotel dining-room at night and the waiter would present the menu, and my Mam would say the dread words, ‘Do you do a poached egg on toast?’ and we’d slink from the dining-room, the only family in England not to have its dinner at night.
    GUEST: Yes, I’ll have a small piece – very tiny.
    ‘Would you like the wine list?’ the waiter would ask. ‘Not really,’ Dad would say, and one had to be quick in order to stop Mam explaining about his duodenal ulcer. Mind you, whatwine was there that would go with spaghetti on toast? ‘Which is really all we want at this time in the evening. Mr Bennett has to watch his tummy.’
    WAITRESS: Potatoes?
    DINER: Yes please, I’m a growing lad, you know.
    WAITRESS: Yes.
    As I grew older and came to delight in these eccentricities and ceased to be embarrassed by them, my parents still struggled to fulfil what they imagined were my aspirations for them. ‘We’ve found an alcoholic drink that we like,’ my mother said. ‘It’s called Bitter Lemon.’ Of course by this time my aspirations for them had changed anyway. Now I wanted them to stay the same as they’d been when I was a child. It didn’t matter any more.
    Once, when I had a play on in the West End, they came to a matinée and I took them afterwards to the Savoy Grill, where there was no set menu and it was all à la carte. They appreciated this. ‘Oh it’s a grand place,’ my mother told my brother. ‘You can have anything you want. Well, you can have poached egg on toast, which is what we want.’
    GIRL REP: I can’t wait, I can’t wait … I’ve got into the swing of doing speeches now.
But when you’ve to follow you it’s a bit hard.
    These are TV-rental reps, and, reluctant though I am to admit it, I can see that with their conferences and camaraderie and their leisurewear it’s business people like this who are banishing class from hotels and elsewhere.
    The snobbish bit of me regrets this, but it’s a small regret. If you want a poached egg, you can have a poached egg, and there’s no nonsense about ties or even jeans. This is what they put on after a day at the office, so this is what they put on here.They’re at home in hotels; they’re at home everywhere. I envy them.
    ( Lounge Bar .)
    BUSINESSMAN: … was on an innovator, so I