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Mummy’s working-class relations
Didn’t get invited to dinner or tea
But Uncle Bill dropped in
From time to time, to see Nanna
Because she was his sister.
‘Hello Uncle Bill,’ we’d say
As he passed through the hall
On his way to the kitchen
Or Nanna’s room.
He didn’t stay long. When he left
We said goodbye. And that
Was all we ever saw of Uncle Bill.
Except that sometimes we’d be on a bus—
You got on at the back
And didn’t see the driver—
And, even though we pinged to get off,
It went past our stop
Until it reached our house.
We jumped off, my sister and I,
And ran along to the driver’s cab.
‘Uncle Bill! Uncle Bill!’
He waved back and drove away.
British poet Wendy Cope is best known as a witty, light verse
writer who, like our own Billy Collins, has managed to make
poetry more relevant, accessible, and entertaining, and in doing
so has attracted a large, more diverse audience than is usual for a
contemporary poet. AI notes that Cope is often described as “one
of Britain’s most popular poets, to the point that some
commentators and audiences have likened her to a rock star.”
Although outwardly humorous, her light verse usually has what
Frost calls “inner seriousness.” Uncle Bill, however, written in
open form, dispenses with Cope’s usual rhyme, surface wit, and
regular meter in favor of a simply expressed story that viewed a
certain way can bring tears to readers’ eyes.
In just 22 lines Cope creates a poignant portrait of a dysfunctional
British family. The story is told by an adult who is recalling his
and his sister’s fleeting childhood memories of a relative who
they know only as Uncle Bill
.
He is one of their Mummy’s working-class relations.
The
cold technicality of the words describing their mother’s kinship
with Bill should not obscure the fact that, as the brother of
Nanna
, he is both Mummy’s
uncle, and her children’s great
uncle.
Like his sister, Bill is of the older generation and, more
significantly, a bus driver (I can almost hear Kurtz shouting “The
Horror!”). Their mother has moved up socially and shows no
interest in, let alone affection for Bill. If she had fond memories
of her uncle while growing up they have been long forgotten. Bill
is one the family’s black sheep, an outcast in her eyes. He never
gets invited to dinner or tea
.
To his great nephew and niece Bill probably feels more
grandfatherly than avuncular. They have an intuitive affection for
him, and as the poem evolves we learn that he feels affection for
them as well. Were his relationship with their
Mummy
still
warm Uncle Bill might have taken them on fishing jaunts or to
cricket games.
I love the word Mummy
for the children’s mother. It suggests
buried Egyptian royalty, someone as disdainful of Bill’s lower
class as the Pharaohs were of the slaves who built their pyramids.
Although Mummy is a favorite affectionate nickname for mother
among the English, applied to this snobbish mother it makes us
wonder how warm her relationship is with her children.
When Bill visits Nanna
, their time with their uncle is limited to a
hello
and goodbye
as he passes through the hall
to the kitchen
or to the room where
his sister is sequestered,
presumably drinking her tea alone. If E.M. Forster’s Howard’s
End is built around the phrase “Only connect,” the imperative for
this mummy-driven family is “Always disconnect.”
Still, their mother’s attempt to keep Bill from contaminating her
children has unintended consequences. For them, Uncle Bill
becomes an exciting, mysterious, almost mythic figure. The most
memorable words in the poem are their chant
Uncle Bill! Uncle Bill!
as they run towards someone who is always leaving,
always moving away from them. Their cry makes the words feel
as much like a plea as a greeting.
If we have any doubt as to whether Bill would like to spend more
time with his young relatives Cope finds a quiet, but touching
way, to answer that question in her second stanza. (I’m reminded
of Kitty Kallen’s mid-1950’s hit song “Little Things Mean a Lot.”)
Looking through his rear-view mirror, Bill can see the youngsters
on infrequent occasions when they happen (wholly by chance) to
get on his bus when returning home from a jaunt.
That the driver was their
Uncle Bill
only dawned on them when
they pulled the string to get off at the stop nearest their home and
the bus continued on, stopping with a happy surprise in front of
their house.
We jumped off, my sister and I,
And ran along to the driver’s cab.
‘Uncle Bill! Uncle Bill!’
He waved back and drove away.
Bill, of course, cannot leave his bus to spend time with them. Still,
his kindness in taking care to break bus etiquette and drop them
almost on their doorstep speaks volumes for what their
relationship might have been had
Mummy
been a warmer
person. Recalling that little act of kindness, our narrator knows
that he and his sister only had a few glimpses of
Uncle Bill
—but
longed for more of his company.
The Roman poet Horace argued that the best art is the art that
conceals art. Wendy Cope’s “Uncle Bill” illustrates that aesthetic
principle. Its refusal to call attention to its own cleverness can
lead us to toss the poem off as just an amusing story, not unlike
an anecdote a friend might casually tell us over the dinner table.
Cope simply gives us the physics of disconnection: Uncle Bill
passing through the hall
, separated from his niece in the parlor
, who is serving tea to his “betters”; his great niece and nephew
simply saying hello & goodbye as he flits back & forth in the hall;
and repeatedly running towards his bus, shouting his name, as it
pulls away from them.
The only full connection, the one between Bill and his sister that
he continues to nurture, happens off-stage when he closes the
door to Nanna’s room
or the kitchen
(a word that‘s loaded
with class implications as servants spend much of their time
there). Cope gives us just enough to let us know that Bill is
probably the only adult who pays attention to
Nanna
, although
she may enjoy the company of her grandchildren.
But all is not sad here. The word indefatigable could not exist in
this poem but nevertheless perfectly describes the children’s
response to being deprived of their uncle. The less they know
about him, the more he excites them. The image the poem quietly
builds is of the two always running towards him, always delighted
by his presence, always thirsting for more of
Uncle Bill
.
Wendy Cope turned eighty in 2025
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