My Yorkshire: The Right Reverend Stephen Platten

What's your first Yorkshire memory?

A field trip to Coverdale and around the Settle area when I was about 17. I remember camping in some huge ex-army tents in a field near Braithwaite Hall. The rain lashed it down and the wind howled, but I loved it all. I was born in north London and I went to the Stationer's Company School, so Yorkshire was an eye-opener for me.

What's your favourite part of the county – and why?

I love both the Dales and the North York Moors with a passion and it is a joy to be able to stop the car sometimes, and just go for a walk and explore. I am a great railway person (I've just dedicated one of the locomotives at Pickering) and I love the Settle to Carlisle railway.

What's your idea of a perfect day, or a perfect weekend, out in Yorkshire?

My wife Rosslie and I would have a marvellous time if we had guests staying with us (as we often do). I'd put together an itinerary which would include a visit to either Byland Abbey or Rievaulx then we'd go over to Thirsk, which is a perfect little market town and have a coffee. Then across the moors to Whitby, where we'd get some sea air, and have a pleasant dinner.

Do you have a favourite walk or view?

The walk would be the one from the car park alongside the B1248 (about six miles south of Malton) and down into the deserted medieval village of Wharram Percy, which thrived from the 12th to the 14th centuries, and which was abandoned in the 15th. The ruins of the church are pretty substantial, and you can make out the lines of the many dwellings – people had lived there since prehistoric times. My view would be from Ainley Top on the M62 across to Halifax.

Which Yorkshire sportsman, past or present, would you like to take for lunch?

I would be honoured to invite Dickie Bird – and not just because he lives in our diocese. Did you see that recent TV programme that followed the lives of people who had been huge names in the Sixties and Seventies, and showed how they were coping with old age? It was a revelation, and compelling television, and Mr Bird came across with dignity, compassion, a sense of humour and some style.

Which Yorkshire stage or screen star, past or present, would you like to take for dinner?

May I invite the late Ian Carmichael? I had the pleasure of meeting him at the Yorkshire Post's 250th anniversary lunch, and that was a great pleasure. He was a terrific actor, with impeccable comic timing, and one of the people who I greatly admired in my childhood.

If you had to name your Yorkshire "hidden gem", what would it be?

Wentworth Woodhouse, towards Rotherham, one of the greatest houses in all of Britain, and indeed, the largest one – far bigger than Buckingham Palace. If you haven't read it, try and find a copy of the book Black Diamonds, which is all about the house and its former owners, the Earls Fitzwilliam, a fated family.

What do you think gives Yorkshire its unique identity?

The first of many are its dramatically contrasting and challenging landscapes. The sheer size of it, the no-nonsense "what you see is what you get" quality of the people. When I say "the sheer size", let me give you an example. My wife and I were invited for dinner to the home of some friends, after a carol service. They live in Aysgarth. Where else in England would you drive 140 miles there and back to a dinner?

Do you follow sport in the county, and if so, what?

I enjoy cricket at every level. I am terrible at playing it, but I still love it. Whisper it softly, but as a north London lad I follow the fortunes of Arsenal, but I am also a fan of Huddersfield Town and have been to a few matches. And didn't Huddersfield once give the great Herbert Chapman to Arsenal, thus founding the fortunes of the team, and for which, many thanks.

Do you have a favourite restaurant, or pub?

It is always an experience to dine out at the Weaver's Stone at Golcar in Huddersfield and I love the place. My favourite pub has to be The King's Arms at Heath, which is set on a lovely green, and adjacent to some fine old 18th century houses.

Do you have a favourite food shop?

Whenever my wife and I are out and about in North Yorkshire, we make a point of stopping off at Ken Warne's shop in Richmond. It's a very old-fashioned style grocer's, and it has just about everything you can think of under one roof. Things that you'd never dream that they stocked, and Aladdin's cave for foodies. The service is second to none.

How do you think that Yorkshire has changed, for better or for worse, in the time that you've known it?

For the better and I take Wakefield as an example. We have the new Pinderfields Hospital, we have the Barbara Hepworth Gallery about to open in May, and we have all sorts of improvements to the shopping and leisure areas. When I first came here, I thought to myself, "Gosh, some money needs to be spent on this city", and slowly but surely, it has.

Who is the Yorkshire person that you most admire?

Richard Hoggart, who wrote The Uses of Literacy, half a century ago. Think of another Alan Bennett, a man who came from a poor family in Hunslet, but through education and hard work, became a professor at Hull University and then the Principal of Goldsmiths College in London. He argued that literature improves us all and enhances our lives.

Has Yorkshire influenced your work?

Quite a lot, in that I moved 250 miles to be here. Before becoming Bishop in Wakefield, I was the Dean of Norwich, which has one of the finest cathedrals in Europe. But this post has provided me with so many new and exciting challenges, and has opened my eyes to a lot of things. Worklessness in our diocese is a very serious issue, and one that deeply concerns me. I don't think that things will get better in the near future, but one can pray.

Name your favourite Yorkshire book/author/artist/CD/performer.

I love the poetry of both Philip Larkin and Simon Armitage, I love the art of David Hockney, the wonderful wit of Ian McMillan, and the voices of Wakefield Cathedral Choir – especially on the CD of Christmas songs and carols. That is a shameless plug, and I am not going to deny it.

If a stranger to Yorkshire only had time to visit one place, it would be?

Apart from our cathedral here in Wakefield, or any of the diocese churches? I'll go for Malham Tarn. The waterfall where you least expect it, the limestone pavements, the sheer and stunning beauty of the place. I'd be amazed if anyone going there would come away with a shrug and a "so what?" It is one of the world's greatest geographical sites, right here in Yorkshire.

YP MAG 24/12/10