ANTON HODGE 

Biography

Early Years

Born in Dunfermline on May 13th 1969, I grew up in the fair city of Perth, as Anthony (the "th" was pronounced correctly). As a teenager Saturday mornings were spent visiting jumble sales, buying the second-hand clothes of genteel Perthshire ladies (deceased or otherwise). Saturday evenings were spent in front of the mirror, trying the frocks on, dyeing my now sadly-gone hair and applying lipstick and blusher, then off to the pubs to pout and, inevitably, be beaten up. Sundays were spent reading good classical poetry then writing my own bad version, addressed (despite what you might think about the women's clothes) to various young ladies who had stolen my heart. On  Sunday evenings my band, The Rantan Plan, practiced in a musty church hall and prepared for world domination.

Student Life - Edinburgh

Abandoned Perth in 1987 for the pubs and chip shops of Edinburgh, where I studied Latin, Ancient History, Greek and Scottish Ethnology and joined the University Poetry Society. Attended Anne Stevenson's poetry workshops with Andrew Jackson, Roddy Lumsden and Matthew Fitt amongst others. The Rantan Plan played a couple of gigs and won a rubber snake in a talent contest. The various members turned to women (the reason why the band was set up in the first place?) and we split up on the cusp of regional domination.

 Family and Working Life - Cambridge and Cumbria

Due to a small mix up at a careers fair and a bigger mix up with a woman, I found myself in the autumn of 1991 in Cambridge, a trainee accountant with the County Council, but managing to spend some of my time in Germany, and cavorting with all sorts of fellow Europeans. I became Anton. In 1994, I married my housemate Jo. The other housemate, Radar, was the best man. I developed all sorts of ideas for novels, poems, etc and wrote very little. In 1996, Jo went to Japan for a year and I got a job in Cumbria. Radar wrote a poem about my four an half year stay.

A new job, a new county and suddenly wifeless, I was the Schools' Accountant for Cumbria County Council. In Jo's absence I sold our Cambridge house and bought one in Corby Hill, just east of Carlisle. Meanwhile Rufus was born in August 1998. His brother, Leon, appeared in February 2005. Jo and I have since separated but remain on good terms.

In July 2008 I became Chairman of the new Gretna Football Club.

Writing

One day I might work up enough courage to put on here some of the "juvenalia" I wrote in the earlier part of my life. My output between 1984 and 1992 was intense and prolific, and some of it isn't bad (most is of course dreadful). Then I discovered women and spent the next ten years with my eyes agog and nothing going on paper.

In 2002, I began writing "the novel", redrafting and redrafting and trying not to make it sound like an autobiography. Fed up with it, I decided on a new tract and walked along Hadrian's Wall, fully expecting to write a short book which would take my mind off the novel. Thus The Great Wall of Britain, which Hayloft liked enough to publish.

Since then, I have restarted the novel, Blame, and just completed a second history/walking book, this time about the Border, which is now available.

Future plans include a biography of the River Eden.