ABOUT US

Our new website is named Quercus but we are retaining our link with the original website, Quercus Publications, by using this as our library – a term which we prefer to the word archive as it can be browsed through at random.

Quercus Publications was set up in order to publish children's poetry books which remain one of the central features of the site.  As a primary school teacher for many years I had enjoyed doing poetry with my pupils and this, together with the subject becoming an important part of the literacy curriculum, was my motivation for compiling the anthologies.  The poems have been carefully chosen to be suitable for different age groups with beautiful illustrations drawn by Sylvia, a local artist who has often found inspiration for her paintings and sketches in the nearby landscape.

The Pied Piper of Hamelin came next with its splendid cover and rat drawings provided by Sylvia.  Plowden’s Progress was written in 2007 and Sylvia and I completed the book on Brent Knoll in 2011.  Forever Learning was published in 2016.

Having written A School Report since the turn of the century, I began to use Quercus Publications as an outlet for my views on all sorts of issues especially those related to politics. I had been a political activist for a long time and a local LibDem councillor but my views tend to challenge the prevailing orthodoxies of the mainstream parties.  Under the heading  “Thoughts on” I wrote numerous short essays on a variety of themes and continue to do so.  As a supporter of Brexit I was able to put the case calmly for leaving the EU and did not join in with the more extreme reactions on both sides of the argument.  

When Covid arrived in 2020 I used my platform to try to persuade the government and our political leaders their approach to

the virus was seriously mistaken. I failed in this, as did others who shared my view, and the result has been the most horrific peacetime tragedy our country has ever known with well over a quarter of a million people dying because of Covid.

I could not possibly have undertaken the writing and publishing I have been able to do without the enormous amount of help and support I have received from other people whom I see as integral to the website. So I must say a sincere thank you to Sylvia for her illustrations, to Fay for all the design work she has done on the new site, to Sue for the typing she did, to Noel for his assistance with printing, and to Freeola for hosting both sites. 

Quercus allows me to continue in the noble business of education and we hope its content will be of interest and contribute to the learning of those who look at it. And, who knows, if people adopt our motto, FOREVER LEARNING, and keep repeating our mantra, BE LOVING, BE KIND, THINK WELL, it may even contribute to a better world.