Top man, lives up on Richmond Hill and absolutely loves it - when asked about his travels and adventures and where he would choose to live, he replied, "I already live there"
Fairly well-known locally is that my favourite bookshop, The Open Book in Richmond, stocks signed copies of all his books. They used to be signed directly on the page, but since he got to the mid-to-late nineties in age, tons of hardbacks are too much, so Helena wanders up there to get a load of bookplates signed these days.
Apart from that, I order all my books from them when I'm in London and a subsequent chat with Madeleine usually lasts ten times as long as the book shopping.
Anyway, I digress, yes, Sir David, amazing body of works and the books are wonderful.
I always find it really weird when somebody on the anonymous internet talks about local places as if we're all neighbors or something. Googling "Richmond Hill" gave me multiple pages of results that had nothing to do with the one that Attenborough lives at.
You had context, it piqued your interest and you did a tiny amount of work to figure it out. You could have quit without all three but you didn't; I wish the internet had a lot more of these types of experiences. It's only in the last ~25 years when the Internet became an anonymous place where we aren't all neighbours, and I mourn the loss.
Not to sound hipster about it, but if it's done in this way I find it charming. I also had to piece it together, which took me on a little virtual travel tour, and had me wonder about what Richmond Hill means to the locals. Rather fitting in context, too.
The "everyone on the internet is American" stuff in e.g. politics or job market convos is a lot more grating.
I really enjoyed OP's story, and the way they told it. Knowing the location of Richmond Hill is really not the point.
Well yes but it does open the question for me as to what the place is like and why he'd like it so much.
Yes, but it’s refreshing that for once it isn’t a San Francisco neighbourhood!
If you're familiar with London, you know where Richmond is and that it's a wealthy area. A search confirms there's a Richmond Hill in Richmond.
Or if you've seen Ted Lasso
In hindsight it maybe should have also been obvious from the language alone. "Richmond Hill" feels a bit like saying "Rich Hill Hill" which is basically like saying "Wealthy Desirable Area."
BTW there is a linguistic tradition of “hill hill”. When new immigrants come to an area and ask the locals what that hill is called, the locals say “big hill” in their language. The newcomers call it “bighill” hill in their language. I forget the examples but this has happened enough in England that there are places whose names are five hills deep (Brythonic -> Latin -> Saxon -> Norse -> Norman).
One of my favourite quotes from the late Terry Pratchett:
> When the first explorers from the warm lands around the Circle Sea travelled into the chilly hinterland they filled in the blank spaces on their maps by grabbing the nearest native, pointing at some distant landmark, speaking very clearly in a loud voice, and writing down whatever the bemused man told them. Thus were immortalised in generations of atlases such geographical oddities as Just A Mountain, I Don't Know, What? and, of course, Your Finger You Fool.
These are known as tautological place names: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tautological_place_nam...
Thanks for sharing!
My contribution to this discussion is the place in BTTF which makes fun of this concept, the home of Marty McFly: Hill Valley
Not a tautological name but an oxymoronic one!
Aa in the the old English folk song "The lass of Richmond Hill".
That's about Yorkshire, but yes
London isn’t exactly a small “local place” and there is only one Richmond Hill in London. So I’m not sure what the issue you’re having is.
Less than 0.2% of the world's population lives in the wider metropolitan area of London.
I live in Europe, I've been to London a few times, I have no idea what "Richmond Hill" is or whether Sir Attenborough actually lives in London.
I get where he's coming from, Attenbrorough is vocal about being a londoner to the point he has a whole documentary about the city, and he's very present in UK media.
I get why it doesn't seem so obvious from the outside, but for British people it's as obvious as Apple headquarters being in California.
You didn’t need to know any that because the GP literally referenced London in their comment.
The second sentence was unnecessary.
It's in the Richmond that's in London, not the one in Yorkshire.
would you rather less anecdotes or more hard coordinates?
I'd bet "Richmond Hill, London" would have been geographically adequate. Don't we criticize USAians for their provincialism?
For me, I know "Richmond" is used numerous places near me locally, so my assumption would've been that "Richmond hill" is too generic a query.
"David Attenborough Richmond hill" would've been the way. I'd hardly fault OP for my own choice in query.
Try this search: The Open Book in Richmond UK
Richmond Hill, London
Now I just hear the Cinema Sins "ding!".
and when you googled the book shop name?
Whilst we're doing random anecdotes that vaguely link to him, my late grandfather remembered David from his Wyggeston days as a good rugby player, which is a funny way to imagine him. Apparently he had the voice even then, but not so much to say about the world.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richmond_Hill,_London