Kenneth Branagh
Born in Belfast, Kenneth was educated at Grove Primary School.
Though his family left for England when he was nine, his first
great success as an actor was as the title character in a BBC
television production of Graham Reid’s acclaimed ‘Billy’ plays, set
in Belfast. Since then he has won worldwide fame, and Oscar
nominations, as an actor and director. He is probably best known
for his film adaptations of the works of William Shakespeare,
beginning with ‘Henry V’ in 1989 and followed with ‘Hamlet’, ‘Much
Ado About Nothing’, ‘Othello’, ’Love’s Labour’s Lost’ and ‘As You
Like It’.
I was born in
Belfast and lived there with my family until I was nine years
old. The city I remember growing up in seemed to be full of parks.
The nearest to our house and my favourite, was Alexandra Park. It’s
still there today, and still divided in two, between the more
formal northern part with lawns, flower beds and bowling
green, and the southern part, which is more of a glen. I
loved this slightly wilder part, which constituted the more
interesting part of my daily walk to and from the Grove
Primary School.
In the evenings, and at
the weekends, it was where my friends and I played football and
tried to catch tiny fish and gather frogspawn. Today the wildlife
in this part of the park is sufficiently interesting for a
conservation area to be planned. Bird spotters should look out for
the dippers. Just a walk away, across the Antrim and Cavehill
roads, is the Waterworks, an even bigger park, where as the name
suggests, there is plenty of water. This park provided a childhood
playground for my father, who sailed his first paper boats here.
Then there’s Dunmore, and Grove Park
Gardens, and many more.
As children, we walked
everywhere, and where sensible, I would encourage visitors to do
the same thing. Aside from the parks in this tiny part of
north Belfast, there are so many places to
explore on foot, and the obvious ones are no bad place to start.
Belfast Castle, for instance, and the favourite of many;
‘Napoleon’s Nose’ – the great Cave Hill itself. Enjoy your
Belfast!