An Editor’s Day Out

 

cover by Claudia Myatt

The Deben magazine is a modest publication. Just A5 size, 40 pages (unless it bursts its bounds to 44, potentially upsetting both the treasurer and the envelope stuffers), it appears twice a year and is supplied on subscription to members of the River Deben Association.

I am its fortunate editor and sometimes like to think of it as the parish magazine of the river. Except that, unlike a parish mag, it doesn’t carry advertising and local event notices are posted by monthly email. So, almost all of those 40 pocket-sized pages are available for contributor articles and photos. As editor I find it endlessly fascinating to read about the different ways people relate to the river – whether they walk by it, sail on it, swim in it, paint it, observe the birds, beasts, plants, fish, creepy-crawlies that live in it. One of my favourite articles was when someone started identifying what might wriggle out when you pull up a mooring rope that hasn’t been used for some time. 

A colonised mooring warp

The choice of front cover is always a big moment. The river, in all its moods, is beautiful (I think) and it would be easy to have some glorious photo every issue There are plenty of photos inside the magazine and on our Facebook page but for the front cover we present the river through the eyes of a local artist. Yesterday I went to meet Jackie Brinsley who was born by the river at Waldringfield, married a boy from another river family and has lived in the Deben area all her life – except for years spent living in Rhodesia and Swaziland, and annual holidays in the isles of Scilly. She’s taught generations of children at the local school but, now retired, is pouring her energy and passion into paint. 

cowrie shells
collected by Jackie

The sketch books she had piled on her table were a feast of colour: blues of more shades than any paint chart could find words for, astonishing vibrant reds and oranges that I know to be true because those are also the colours the river can reflect. There were louring grey and purple skies and beautifully observed river birds and plants. Jackie is an amateur rather than a professional artist so shows her work very rarely. She was fizzing with enthusiasm for involvement with the magazine and showing her work at our AGM. Her spiky hair seemed to crackle with energy and I loved the lavishness with which she pulled out painting after painting to help us make our choices. When I left her house, the world seemed a brighter place.

I also edit the Deben magazine’s more serious sister, the RDA Journal. This is a fortnightly article posted online with greater detail and more scope for photos and diagrams than is possible in the mag. I tend to think of the Journal articles as having more archival value and interest for researchers in the future. A year ago I thought it would be interesting to collect information about the older boats on the river, those built before 1950, which were still on the river during 2025. I wrote an article for the Journal  devised a form and waited for responses. https://www.riverdeben.org/rda-journal/pre-1950-boats-still-floating-2025/ 

Some came - two Dunkirk boats, a class of dinghies built immediately after WW2 and still sailing every week, a yacht that had been in the same family for 100 years, a Danish fishing boat, the charming Deben-built Cherubs, my own Peter Duck  but I began to realise that I wasn’t really hearing from as many people as I’d expected, particularly from the people who live aboard the many former working boats which spend their retirement here. I had a sinking feeling that my approach was wrong – people living on boats are often trying to get away from the world of forms and data collection. Did it feel intrusive?  These boats were also people's homes. What to do for the best? 

Lightcliffe - a barge which carried cargo
 for 84 years on the Humber
 and now makes the basis for a home on the Deben

It’s long been a maxim of mine that a couple of turns up and down the River Wall in Woodbridge will provide answers to most of life's problems. Or at least people to help solve them. Yesterday I decided to begin by wandering Martlesham Boatyard, ready with my notebook. It was icy and apparently deserted but then I met Mike, the boatyard owner, who introduced me to his daughter Charlotte. It was cold but she took time to talk. 

Charlotte lives on board a type of barge I’d never seen before. The original part is the hull, built in 1924 and working  in the river Humber area until 2008 when Charlotte and her partner bought it and began the two year process of converting it into their home. It’s an impressive achievement. She’s very knowledgeable about the distinctive Humber keel barges built to standard Sheffield measurements  and inspired me with a wish to learn more. I noticed other barges with similar hull shapes. Charlotte had opened my eyes. 

Aenna te Gondern in Germany

Later in the afternoon I headed for Woodbridge and walked the river wall. There as ever I found friends, information, conversation. So many helpful suggestions for my article. So many vessels to photograph and write about. As I stood in the gathering dusk admiring the magnificent, somewhat enigmatic former cargo vessel Aenna Te Gondern (built Gouda 1890)  I thought once again, how thrilling it is that these boats, from so many different places, with many different stories, can end up on one small Suffolk river, as people’s homes. 

I walked on with my notebook and camera until it was too dark to see any more, went to a meeting and then came home to write.

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