November 4, 1956 is a day that retired Fife community worker and poet Ian Nimmo White will never forget.
Despite being only eight years old at the time, the then pupil of the John Neilson Institution in Paisley remembers being “horrified” at news of Soviet tanks rolling into Budapest to viciously crush a spontaneous national uprising.
Thousands were killed and wounded and nearly a quarter-million Hungarians fled the country.
Memories rekindled by Ukraine
Memories of those Cold War days came flooding back to Ian in February when Russia launched its latest invasion of Ukraine.
The sight of millions of women, children and men being displaced amid a sea of indiscriminate carnage and misery again left him questioning the human condition.
As he considered making a personal donation to one of the charities collecting aid for Ukrainian refugees, he decided that he’d actually be better to organise a fundraising event himself.
He came up with the idea of doing readings of his poems and short stories for the Ukraine Crisis Relief Fund.
Fife and Angus events
He now has fundraising events planned for Glenrothes on August 31 and Forfar on September 30.
“I’m concentrating on poems and short stories where you can entertain an audience,” explains the 74-year-old, who devoted his working life to public service in Fife and who now lives in Forfar.
“I basically do quite a lot of stuff which is about the business of growing old and try to see the funny side of it. Some of the images will hopefully make people laugh.
“But the stark reality is that with Ukraine, 5.5 million women and their children is the equivalent of the entire population of Scotland being displaced from their homeland and their culture.
“It’s a hell of a thing really.”
Social conscience
Ian says he’s always had what could be regarded as a “social conscience”.
He traces this back to his parents, whose “greatest quality”, he says, was their capacity to care for other people.
“It’s something I suppose which just rubs off on you,” he says.
“A social conscience as it was called in its hey day! That was always upper most in my make-up I suppose. So I suppose I was predestined into doing some form of community work.”
Getting into poetry
Ian started writing poetry in 1994, aged about 45. Eventually he was good enough to be accepted onto the Writers’ Register in Edinburgh in 2001.
His first poetry collection called Standing Back was published that year, followed by Symmetry in 2007.
His poetry went “off the boil” for a number of years.
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He became a leading force in the campaign to erect dignified and long overdue memorials for the Tay Rail Bridge Disaster.
He also led a campaign in 2011 for a memorial at the unmarked grave of train driver David Mitchell in Leslie Cemetery, and had the honour of his ‘Untitled’ poem being inscribed on the memorials at Dundee and Wormit in 2013.
Latest book
Then more recently, London-based publisher Austin Macauley, took an interest in his work and agreed to publish a manuscript which turned into his latest book – The Shell of Stone’ – published last year.
A keen genealogist, many of the 40 poems it contains resonated with Ian’s passion for heritage, some marking major events of the 20th century, with other poems travelling even further back to previous centuries.
Ian says his working life exposed him to the “full spectrum of the human condition”.
The medium of poetry also helps him deal with ageing and the inevitable passing of time.
During his days as a youth and community officer, Ian recalls how communities would look to him as a person who’d help their children.
The process worked both ways, however. While he helped create opportunities for young people, he learned from communities himself all the time.
Ian’s poems are flavoured with mischief and fun, and while there is always a presence of nostalgia, sometimes sadness, he balances this with poems about the joy of having grandchildren, observations of wildlife and the ever increasing amount of time he is spending in his garden.
The reader is left with respect for the past and hope for the future.
Amongst all this, he also laces the poems with a good helping of his native Scottish humour.
Tickets for Glenrothes and Forfar events
Well known in Glenrothes, and having previously been involved with events to mark the 60th and 70th anniversaries of the Fife new town, Ian’s first Ukraine event is being hosted by Glenrothes Art Club.
It takes place at Caledonia House, Saltire Centre, Glenrothes, at 7.30pm on Wednesday August 31
Tickets costing £10 per head are available via glenrothesartclub.org.uk or people can pay on the door on the night, subject to availability.
The second event, hosted by Forfar Dramatic Society, takes place at Studio 132, East High Street, Forfar, at 7.30pm on Friday September 30.
Tickets for that event are also £10 per head and available through www.ticketsource.co.uk/forfardramatic
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