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THE ENGLISHMAN WHO WENT UP A HILL BUT CAME DOWN A MOUNTAIN.
1917. The peace of a remote Welsh village, nestling comfortably in the shadow of what the inhabitants reverently call their 'mountain', is rudely shatterred by the arrival of two English mapmakers who have the temerity to announce that the 'mountain' is merely a 'hill' in geographical terms.
It is a difference of only twenty feet - but a greater injustice than the villagers can bear. With smarting pride they band together to keep the mapmakers occupied whilst they set about putting the situation to rights... whatever it takes.
Written and directed by Christopher Monger, The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill But Came Down a Mountain is a beautifully observed romantic comedy, which proves that mind over matter is still a powerful force for change...
It is a difference of only twenty feet - but a greater injustice than the villagers can bear. With smarting pride they band together to keep the mapmakers occupied whilst they set about putting the situation to rights... whatever it takes.
Written and directed by Christopher Monger, The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill But Came Down a Mountain is a beautifully observed romantic comedy, which proves that mind over matter is still a powerful force for change...
252 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1995
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Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews
July 24, 2024
This was a quick and funny story about a little Welsh village. I thought the story as told from the first-person perspective with effective elements of comedic delivery: timing, brevity, and even paced transitioning. Christopher Monger (himself Welsh) wrote a funny story centered on the village people, the two English outsider government surveyors, and the hill that would become a mountain.
The hill acted as a metamorphic catalyst from a couple vantage points: Anson and Betty who's romance blossomed (they went up the hill a couple and came down engaged). The 82-year old village Reverend Jones (who spent his whole like hiking and walking up the 980-ft hill who suddenly died of a heart attack at the summit). Lastly the hill itself that tranbformed into a mountain at the hands of the village peoples' hardwork and dedication to keeping the mountain on Unitied Kingdom surveying maps.
Overall I enjoyed the humor, the subtle romance element, and the resolution the story played out. I have not seen the movie but I would be interested to see how they compare. Recommended for a quick and funny read. Thanks!
The hill acted as a metamorphic catalyst from a couple vantage points: Anson and Betty who's romance blossomed (they went up the hill a couple and came down engaged). The 82-year old village Reverend Jones (who spent his whole like hiking and walking up the 980-ft hill who suddenly died of a heart attack at the summit). Lastly the hill itself that tranbformed into a mountain at the hands of the village peoples' hardwork and dedication to keeping the mountain on Unitied Kingdom surveying maps.
Overall I enjoyed the humor, the subtle romance element, and the resolution the story played out. I have not seen the movie but I would be interested to see how they compare. Recommended for a quick and funny read. Thanks!
October 18, 2022
A great little book that has humour and romance and also a serious message. The description of life in the Welsh village is quite captivating and the plot about adding height to their mountain so that it can be measured as a mountain is funny but also tinged with sadness when the wiser minister dies and also as some of the characters are suffering post traumatic stress because of WW1. I am looking forward to watching the film.
June 27, 2017
I saw the movie for this book a few years ago and I found it cute and fun. When I saw this book at my library's book sale, I decided to read it, but with a little trepidation. I was worried the movie would have ruined the book for me. Well, I was wrong. The book was a lot of fun, and I will be keeping it to reread. While not for everyone, this book definitely made it on my "great" list. The book is set in a small town in Wales and is written by a Welsh author about a story he was apparently told as a child in Wales. Because of this, the narration has an authentic feel. The characters all have their own voices and quirks, which made the story fun. It is a meandering story that should be read with patience. Don't read it if you want a fast or exciting plot.
June 4, 2024
This is a novelisation of a film. Unusually, the author of the book is also the director and co-writer of the film, so they match quite closely. However, the book goes into more detail, and it feels like these are scenes which were cut from the film.
I watched the film at the cinema in 1995, then I re-watched it more recently via a streaming service. Based on that, I decided to track down a second hand copy of the book. I'd recommend watching the film first, because it helps to be able to visualise the characters and hear the actors' voices while reading the book.
Nowadays, there's an unfortunate trend where film trailers give away too much about the film. However, in this case the title is effectively a spoiler! The basic premise is that a hilltop is raised (by adding a pile of earth), so when the eponymous Englishman (from the Ordnance Survey) measures it again, it becomes a mountain. So, it's a fairly slight story, but it's pleasant enough.
The book cover (and the film posters) emphasised this as a romantic comedy, with a photo of Hugh Grant and Tara Fitzgerald. In the film, Hugh Grant basically played the same character as he did in "Four Weddings and a Funeral": young, floppy hair, posh without being rich/nobility, and stammering over his words in a charming way. However, the story isn't really about the romance: it's about the villagers who decide to make the hill bigger and the challenges that they face.
The book gives a bit more insight into the main couple, and makes their romance a bit more plausible (rather than simply being a case of "they're the main characters and they're pretty so they end up together").
The more interesting aspect (for me) is that the book goes into more detail about how the measurements were done. In particular, the film mentions that they counted steps, but the book clarifies that they used pedometers and calibrated their stride before setting off. The book also talks about using barometers to measure atmospheric pressure (i.e. there's less air pressing down on you as you get higher up), which weren't mentioned at all in the film.
The book and the film both talked about using a transit (theodolite) with other trig points, i.e. calculating the height of a new location based on the known heights of other hills. Characters then asked who measured the first hill, and this was dismissed by the Reverend as "God did!" I assume that this would actually have been done either by starting at sea level or by using a ruler, but I would have liked the book to expand on that point. (There's a separate question of how rulers get measured, i.e. where the "official foot" was stored/defined.)
The book and the film both claim that this is based on a true story. At the very least, it's been fictionalised, e.g. there's no such place as Ffynnon Garw, but the nearest real-life equivalent is Garth Hill (aka Garth Mountain). Likewise, I assume that the names of real people have been changed, and there are some things which must have been invented (e.g. what George Garrad was dreaming about on a particular day), since there were no witnesses.
The story is set in 1917, where two (ex?) Army officers are now working for the Ordnance Survey so they travel to Wales. However, the Principal Triangulation of Great Britain was done in 1783-1851, and the Retriangulation of Great Britain was done in 1935-1962. As far as I can tell, any new surveys done in 1917 were focussed on France, i.e. where the war was taking place.
The author was born in 1950, and he says that he heard this story for the first time when he was 10 years old (i.e. in 1960). He then realised that one of his teachers ("the middle aged, grey haired lady who taught me geography") was Betty from Cardiff. If she was born in 1900 (i.e. 17 years old when the events of the story took place) then she'd have been 60 years old when Monger heard the story, and eligible for a state pension. I'd actually assume that she was at least 5 years older, but either way I think it would be charitable to describe her as "middle aged"!
If you assume that the survey actually took place in 1937 rather than 1917 (and get rid of all the references to the Great War), the timescale becomes more plausible. Betty could have been in her early 20s at that point, and then in her mid 40s in 1960.
The problem then becomes the definition of a mountain. As I understand it, the current threshold is roughly 600 metres or 2000 feet. So, 1000 feet isn't even close! I've seen some websites which say that the Americans used to use 1000 feet in the 1920s (copied from the Ordnance Survey), but I haven't found an official source for that. So, that would either mean that the story was set earlier, or that the numbers were fudged to make it simpler for the audience (i.e. 1000 is an "easier" number than 2000).
It's also possible that the whole story is entirely fabricated, and the "true story" is simply a conceit. There's precedent for this, e.g. The Time Machine was written as a first person narrative, where H G Wells claimed that he'd been present at the events, but we're not actually expected to believe that.
In any case, I think I'll visit Garth Hill. I've heard that it's a nice place for a visit, regardless of the real history around it.
I watched the film at the cinema in 1995, then I re-watched it more recently via a streaming service. Based on that, I decided to track down a second hand copy of the book. I'd recommend watching the film first, because it helps to be able to visualise the characters and hear the actors' voices while reading the book.
Nowadays, there's an unfortunate trend where film trailers give away too much about the film. However, in this case the title is effectively a spoiler! The basic premise is that a hilltop is raised (by adding a pile of earth), so when the eponymous Englishman (from the Ordnance Survey) measures it again, it becomes a mountain. So, it's a fairly slight story, but it's pleasant enough.
The book cover (and the film posters) emphasised this as a romantic comedy, with a photo of Hugh Grant and Tara Fitzgerald. In the film, Hugh Grant basically played the same character as he did in "Four Weddings and a Funeral": young, floppy hair, posh without being rich/nobility, and stammering over his words in a charming way. However, the story isn't really about the romance: it's about the villagers who decide to make the hill bigger and the challenges that they face.
The book gives a bit more insight into the main couple, and makes their romance a bit more plausible (rather than simply being a case of "they're the main characters and they're pretty so they end up together").
The more interesting aspect (for me) is that the book goes into more detail about how the measurements were done. In particular, the film mentions that they counted steps, but the book clarifies that they used pedometers and calibrated their stride before setting off. The book also talks about using barometers to measure atmospheric pressure (i.e. there's less air pressing down on you as you get higher up), which weren't mentioned at all in the film.
The book and the film both talked about using a transit (theodolite) with other trig points, i.e. calculating the height of a new location based on the known heights of other hills. Characters then asked who measured the first hill, and this was dismissed by the Reverend as "God did!" I assume that this would actually have been done either by starting at sea level or by using a ruler, but I would have liked the book to expand on that point. (There's a separate question of how rulers get measured, i.e. where the "official foot" was stored/defined.)
The book and the film both claim that this is based on a true story. At the very least, it's been fictionalised, e.g. there's no such place as Ffynnon Garw, but the nearest real-life equivalent is Garth Hill (aka Garth Mountain). Likewise, I assume that the names of real people have been changed, and there are some things which must have been invented (e.g. what George Garrad was dreaming about on a particular day), since there were no witnesses.
The story is set in 1917, where two (ex?) Army officers are now working for the Ordnance Survey so they travel to Wales. However, the Principal Triangulation of Great Britain was done in 1783-1851, and the Retriangulation of Great Britain was done in 1935-1962. As far as I can tell, any new surveys done in 1917 were focussed on France, i.e. where the war was taking place.
The author was born in 1950, and he says that he heard this story for the first time when he was 10 years old (i.e. in 1960). He then realised that one of his teachers ("the middle aged, grey haired lady who taught me geography") was Betty from Cardiff. If she was born in 1900 (i.e. 17 years old when the events of the story took place) then she'd have been 60 years old when Monger heard the story, and eligible for a state pension. I'd actually assume that she was at least 5 years older, but either way I think it would be charitable to describe her as "middle aged"!
If you assume that the survey actually took place in 1937 rather than 1917 (and get rid of all the references to the Great War), the timescale becomes more plausible. Betty could have been in her early 20s at that point, and then in her mid 40s in 1960.
The problem then becomes the definition of a mountain. As I understand it, the current threshold is roughly 600 metres or 2000 feet. So, 1000 feet isn't even close! I've seen some websites which say that the Americans used to use 1000 feet in the 1920s (copied from the Ordnance Survey), but I haven't found an official source for that. So, that would either mean that the story was set earlier, or that the numbers were fudged to make it simpler for the audience (i.e. 1000 is an "easier" number than 2000).
It's also possible that the whole story is entirely fabricated, and the "true story" is simply a conceit. There's precedent for this, e.g. The Time Machine was written as a first person narrative, where H G Wells claimed that he'd been present at the events, but we're not actually expected to believe that.
In any case, I think I'll visit Garth Hill. I've heard that it's a nice place for a visit, regardless of the real history around it.
April 9, 2010
Charming book about the collective afford to make something good in the year 1917, which was otherwise full of pain and war. Small village put afford in making their hill in to the mountain and found something very important.
January 6, 2022
Quite lovely. I saw the film adaptation years ago, and have always been curious about the manuscript (and family story) that it was based on. Monger's excellent writing is funny, earnest and full of quiet insight as he introduces readers to this small Welsh village and the two Englishmen who cause such a stir. The film version (released the same year, in 1995) is fairly faithful to its source material, but the book has additional scenes, characters and dialogue to enjoy. It had me laughing often. If you're looking for a good light read, this book is well worth tracking down.
February 25, 2024
Fun little story of a true event in a Welsh village. The story has been gradually gathered from conversations among the author’s grandfather, parents, aunts and uncles.
If you descend from Welsh ancestors, you should read it!
If you descend from Welsh ancestors, you should read it!
February 18, 2019
Charming.
September 4, 2013
Wundervolle Geschichte über zwei Engländer, die im Jahr 1917 in ein kleines walisisches Dorf kommen, um den Hausberg Ffynnon Graw zu vermessen. Das ganze Dorf steht Kopf als die erste Messung ergibt, dass ihr Berg kein Berg, sondern lediglich ein Hügel ist. Jetzt gilt es die Ehre des Dorfes zu retten, denn mit ihrem ‚Berg‘ beginnt Wales und so wird ein schweißtreibender Plan der Kraft und Hinterlist vereint geschmiedet.
Ich habe zuerst den Film mit Hugh Grant in der Hauptrolle gesehen und wollte danach unbedingt das Buch lesen. Die Geschichte des Dorfes, das aus einem Hügel einen Berg macht ist sehr schön erzählt. Feiner britischer Humor und jede Menge Teamgeist machen dieses Buch zu etwas ganz besonderem. Allein die Namen sind göttlich. So gibt es Morgan den Ziegenbock, Johnny die Briefmarke, Thomas Twp und Thomas Twp II, Williams die Zapfsäule und andere liebenswerte Charaktere. Der Roman soll auf einer wahren Begebenheit basieren, ist aber doch zumeist fiktiv. Wer das Dörfchen Ffynnon Graw auf einer Karte sucht, wird wohl nicht fündig werden, aber es gibt eine Erzählung über ein Dorf und dessen Berg in der Nähe von Cardiff, das zur Inspiration diente. Besonders humorvoll ist die tiefe Abneigung von Morgan dem Ziegenbock und Reverend Jones, die scheinbar unüberbrückbar ist. Ich musste sehr häufig schmunzeln über die kleinen und großen Tricks, die Morgan anwendet und über seine amourösen Verwickelungen.
Mir hat das Buch ebenso viel Freude bereitet wie der Film. Es ist eine Geschichte ohne große Action, dafür mit ganz viel Herz und großartigen Charakteren.
Ich habe zuerst den Film mit Hugh Grant in der Hauptrolle gesehen und wollte danach unbedingt das Buch lesen. Die Geschichte des Dorfes, das aus einem Hügel einen Berg macht ist sehr schön erzählt. Feiner britischer Humor und jede Menge Teamgeist machen dieses Buch zu etwas ganz besonderem. Allein die Namen sind göttlich. So gibt es Morgan den Ziegenbock, Johnny die Briefmarke, Thomas Twp und Thomas Twp II, Williams die Zapfsäule und andere liebenswerte Charaktere. Der Roman soll auf einer wahren Begebenheit basieren, ist aber doch zumeist fiktiv. Wer das Dörfchen Ffynnon Graw auf einer Karte sucht, wird wohl nicht fündig werden, aber es gibt eine Erzählung über ein Dorf und dessen Berg in der Nähe von Cardiff, das zur Inspiration diente. Besonders humorvoll ist die tiefe Abneigung von Morgan dem Ziegenbock und Reverend Jones, die scheinbar unüberbrückbar ist. Ich musste sehr häufig schmunzeln über die kleinen und großen Tricks, die Morgan anwendet und über seine amourösen Verwickelungen.
Mir hat das Buch ebenso viel Freude bereitet wie der Film. Es ist eine Geschichte ohne große Action, dafür mit ganz viel Herz und großartigen Charakteren.
September 1, 2009
Again, I think, this book met me in the right place at the right time, though it would be charming at any time. There aren't a ton of surprises in the plot, but how it gets where it's going is a lot of fun to watch. It's been said that a man's character is his destiny. In this story, a village's character is its destiny. I read this faster than I read most books because it was consistently entertaining. And on a deeper level, it's a lovely story about community, heroism found in everyday situations, and beautiful changes coming to people when they least expect it.
May 29, 2011
Charming and witty tale of how a small tale in Wales is rattled together when two pretentious Englishmen declare their mountain a hill.
Reminded me of the beautifully innocent Waking Ned Divine movie which strays from the typical Hollywood plot line to offer something sweet and memorable.
Reminded me of the beautifully innocent Waking Ned Divine movie which strays from the typical Hollywood plot line to offer something sweet and memorable.
July 3, 2012
I really enjoyed this quick but cheerful read. The story is about a Welsh village, nearly a century ago, during The Great War, and how a community crisis brings everyone together. Comedy, romance, and some wonderfully human characters. (...Page numbers in one of the most ridiculous fonts I've ever seen!)
Want to read
August 30, 2013I love the film so much, it's such a wonderful story and about the ever charming Welsh and their hurt pride over a couple of Englishman announcing that the mound which has always been "the first mountain in Wales" is in fact 20 metres short of being a mountain.
The Welsh didn't take kindly to this and planned a mission to rectify this problem.
The Welsh didn't take kindly to this and planned a mission to rectify this problem.
November 15, 2016
I have read and reread this book so many times. As a child, my mother used to climb the Garth, as she grew up in the neighbouring village to Taff's Well -Tongwynlais; the author's father was her family doctor.
Having spent a lot of time in this area, an area very close to my heart, I can hear the Welsh lilt in the characters as they speak. It is charming and heartwarming, and well worth a read.
Having spent a lot of time in this area, an area very close to my heart, I can hear the Welsh lilt in the characters as they speak. It is charming and heartwarming, and well worth a read.
April 10, 2012
I decided to pick this book up after remembering how much I enjoyed the movie and was so happy I did. It's funny, quick, and a happy read. My husband went out a bought the movie for me since I enjoyed it so much and I was happy to hear a lot of the same dialogue as I watched.
February 28, 2021
Přesně tohle jsem potřebovala na zahnání trudnomyslnosti. Bylo mi původně smutno, ale při poslechu jsem dočista zapomněla na svoje problémy a jediné, co mě rozesmutňovalo, je to, že Vladimír Čech už nic dalšího nenačte.
August 30, 2009
I actually laughed out loud!
September 10, 2010
Sweet story. Makes me want to go to Wales and indulge my Wales obsession.
June 6, 2015
The story was kind of cute. I wonder if Monger meant for it to be a movie from the beginning because it reads more like a slightly edited screenplay than a novel.
June 12, 2011
A rather sweet story. You find yourself rooting for the main characters.
Read
March 2, 2012Don't remember
Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews