Stories of a City: It’s Bonfire Night and we’re off to Midsummer Common

Cambridge novelist Susan Grossey takes us to a different city destination each month and tells us their stories - past, present and personal. This month, we’re off to Midsummer Common for the fireworks Illustrated by Lucy Jones of Poppet Pics

We all have something in our annual calendar that is fixed in stone – that cannot be missed no matter what. It may be the family walk on Boxing Day or the pilgrimage to the Edinburgh Fringe or the greeting of the summer solstice at Stonehenge (that one’s quite literally fixed in stone).

For me, it’s the November fireworks on Midsummer Common. I first went when I was a student at the university; having been brought up in Singapore, with its Chinese culture of new year celebrations, I was missing my fix of what I still called firecrackers. Plus it gave me the perfect excuse to snuggle up to my new boyfriend. (Reader, I married him.)

And if you are still looking for proof of climate change, I can report that in those distant days we wore every item of clothing that we owned to the event, in order not to perish as we waited for the first whoosh-whoomph of the display. Last year, I didn’t even bother with gloves.

Much is made of the town/gown split in Cambridge, but the fireworks display is completely egalitarian. Anyone can go because it’s free – donations are required but certainly not obligatory. Upwards of 25,000 people attend each year, and in the darkness, with everyone

in puffy jackets, it is the perfect example of town meets gown. We’re all there for the same reason: to have fun and, for half an hour, to remember the wonder of childhood. Even the most cynical fashionista, even the most hardened scientist, even the most world-weary teenager will go “oooo aaaaah” at that firework that rises almost stealthily and then erupts into a giant chrysanthemum-shaped cloud of colour.

That said, not everyone is a fan. Local dog owners find it a trying evening, and with our first cat we had to draw all the curtains and leave Radio 1 on very loud to distract her. Our current cat, however, has always enjoyed the fireworks: the first year we had her we took our usual precautions, and came home to find her sitting on the windowsill, curtain pushed aside, watching our neighbour’s display.

From an historical point of view, having fireworks and a bonfire in early November is quite divisive. It marks – and I have chosen that word carefully, rather than “celebrates” or even “commemorates” – the attack on Parliament in 1605 by Guy Fawkes and his band of Catholics who disagreed with the Protestant King James I sitting on the throne and wanted to restore a Catholic monarch.

As you can imagine, there is lots to argue about here, depending on your religious sympathies, and your position on monarchy versus republic, and your thoughts on whether Mr Fawkes was a freedom fighter or a terrorist. Some other cities – notably Lewes in Sussex – use the night to make current political statements (last year they burnt an effigy of Nigel Farage alongside that of Guy Fawkes). But here in Cambridge it is a much more celebratory event.

For me, that celebration starts when we find our little spot. I prefer to be just over the river from the common, near the boathouses – it’s solid underfoot, and the reflection of the fireworks in the river is always lovely. I don’t bother taking my phone: it’s hard to get good pictures of fireworks, and who looks back at them anyway? The joy is in the shared experience: the anticipation, the colours, the sounds, the smells. Oh, I can’t wait – see you there.

Susan Grossey is the author of many historical crime novels, including the Hardiman books, set in Cambridge in the 1820s, the third volume of which, Whipster, is out next month. See susangrossey.com

For more about Lucy and her work, follow @lucyjonespoppetpics on Instagram.