Thread 15: To feel disappointed after reading this in The Observer about the author and her husband from The Salt Path book and film?

[DisappointedReader]

The Observer's original exposé: The real Salt Path: how a blockbuster book and film were ...

The 14 Observer items currently available on their online 'The real Salt Path' page: The real Salt Path | The Observer

4 more from The Observer:
‘Hope is extinguished’: CBD patients respond to Salt Path...

The real Salt Path | The Observer (The Slow Newscast)

(Live/online event)

The Observer YouTube Channel: The Observer UK - YouTube

Raynor Winn/Sally Walker's statement: Raynor Winn

Thread One ^www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5368194-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?^

Threads 2-11: Links all in the OP of Thread 12

Thread 12: www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5384574-thread-12-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?

Thread 13: www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5386458-thread-13-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?

Thread 14: www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5388981-thread-14-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?

New posters joining us in the genuine spirit of our civil discourse welcome. It would be helpful to get the background from at least some of the Observer items above before posting. There are currently a number of interesting items on The Observer website and linked to above.

To all - Please be extremely cautious when it comes to naming or implicating people and addresses not in the public eye or with no direct connection to the story, and around the understandable health speculations, especially where details are unclear or still emerging. Remember, even Hollywood rabbits attract the odd flea. Please do not engage with visitors who seem to have their own agenda and seek to derail. Avoid @'ing and quoting them as - from experience - this will only encourage them back to the threads. We have done amazingly well together for fourteen very interesting, very serious and very silly threads so far. I can't be here as much as I'd like so all help with keeping our discussion walking along in our usual reasonable and respectful fashion is very welcome.

#Pinchofsaltpath
#Fudge
#Cider
#OurChloe
#OurSimon
#Correspondents
#Salray
#Timmoth
#MistakesWereMade
#EmbellishedBollox
#JustBollox
#DriveByScolding
#Glumwashing
#ThereBeSharks
#Scones
#NakedHikers
#TurquoiseGString
#BudleighSalterton
#SallyForth
#YesItReallyIsThread15
#Rabbits

Keep to the path. No saltiness. May the fudge be with you.

First read TSP 2 yrs ago, received as a gift. Assumed it was true (but subject of course to the disclaimers). What annoyed me the most was the name "Moth" constantly repeated in the text, with no explanation forthcoming. So I read TWS which my DW had obtained S/H - part way through RW writes "Mothman BSc" - so I stupidly concluded that that was his surname, and so Raynor Winn a pen-name. (Maybe I've led a sheltered life so that's why I've have never come across a Timothy nicknamed Moth.)

You should be applauded for your broad-mindedness. (Though my own DH got a First for an essay on Henry James when I know perfectly well he hadn't read The Golden Bowl, on which he had a lot of opinions.)

I have known several people who go by different names in different contexts, for various non-dodgy and non-secretive reasons (including, but not limited to, women who use their husbands' surnames for some purposes and their own/original surnames for others). It can be strange when people from different bits of their lives meet and take a while to work out that they are talking about the same person! So initially I thought this was the one bit of SW's explanation that made sense. But her very obvious discomfort and resistance in interviews when asked about Moth's given name made it all seem much more dodgy.

@UpfromSomerset It was sold as a work of non-fiction by a trusted publisher.
If the author did not explain the unusual name - you were not at all stupid to think it was from his surname.
Do have a listen to some of the links, that have been shared previously, where she stumbles and obfuscates over the name Moth.
It is to pull the wool over our eyes.

(oh no, didn't even mean to suggest sheep this time, slinks away)

There's a lot of Henry James you could write about, to be fair, without needing to include The Golden Bowl...

My youngest daughter has been mistaken for being several different people! She has a (really very unusual) first name, which she only uses with people who don't know her well and for legal documents. Then she has the abbreviation which she is generally known as. Then there's a diminutive which she is called by her siblings and a completely random and different name which I call her. When people who know her meet in a group, you will often find that they know her by a variety of names and don't always realise that they all know the same person!

Some people seem to acquire different names easily...my older son as a teenager had 2 nicknames completely different from his original name (still plausible names that a person could be called) used by 2 of his groups of friends, plus 2 abbreviations of his name used by other groups of friends, plus his actual name. Plus his legal first name because he goes by his middle name, so maybe we started the whole thing off when we took that decision.

It was Moth using the surname of Winn that has always struck me as deceptive.

I have next to zero knowledge of medical protocols or the byzantine structure of the NHS and it's arcane IT systems (which apparently make it difficult for a GP to access a consultant's notes on a patient).

Nevertheless, I found the following aspects of the interactions between TW and his consultant ( as detailed in TSP, and the 3 letters uploaded onto SW's website) interesting:

• In TSP and subsequent interviews, SW expressed surprise/complete astonishment when after being referred for a "routine hospital appointment" with the top dog in his profession (neurology) some 2.5 hours away from Pen-y-Maes, that Moth's condition (shoulder pain) should not have been related to a previous ligament issue (possibly connected to a fall through a barn roof) but a neurological issue. Hint - you have been referred to the top dog in a neurological unit....

• according to the consultant's letter quoted on SW's website (June 2015) besides offering a tentative diagnosis of indolent and atypical CBS/CBD the consultant notes that TW seems to look young for his age and there is no family history of CBD - his father is alive while his mother died in her 50s. However, TW's mother didn't die until 2018. This suggests that either a) TW lied during the consultation or b) the consultant got things mixed up, begging the question, what else might he have got mixed up?

• according to events described in TSP, by June 2015, Raymoth were fully ensconced in Polruan, Cornwall. So why were they being referred to a neurology specialist in Liverpool, some 3 hours from their old residence near Pwilheli?

• in 2019, despite having been resident in Polruan since 2014 they are still being referred back to a consultant in NW Wales. Why?

• In 2020, in the ACNR journal, a well respected neurologist reviews The Salt Path. This is slightly strange, as despite being the designated book reviewer for the journal, this appears to be just about the only time that he reviews a non scientific journal.

• In Feb 2025, despite having been resident in Cornwall for nearly a decade, TW is still being referred back to a consultant that may be located in NW Wales. The letter includes references to TW's upcoming passive role in a film featuring his walking ventures.

There is evidence to suggest that, if the author of the 2015,2019 and 2025 neurologist letters is one and the same person, that he may have a house located in Pwilheli....

Curiouser and curiouser..... Why after a decade of living in Cornwall isn't TW being referred to a more locally based neurologist who can see him on a one to one basis rather that on zoom calls with a consultant some 330 miles away?

Yes, but the essay was on The Golden Bowl!

Another Inconsistency Alert: to do with opening story of moving camp (when Moth carries the tent above his head) due to a tidal surge at Portheras Cove in the middle of the night. It's also written about later on in the book where it states:

The cliffs that backed the beach were shale and unstable, so we pitched the tent well away from them, on the other side of a stream of fresh water and far above the tideline of seaweed and shells.

There's a photo in the original 2017 Big Issue article (www.bigissue.com/news/housing/rural-england-homeless-problem-hidden/) of a view from the tent captioned as being taken at Portheras Cove, with RW standing on the beach on the opposite, seaward side of this stream (there's only one stream here). So that adds up, although the image shows no seaweed or shells of the hightide line.

However, something else the image shows is that it was significantly foggy. No fog is mentioned in the book. According to TSP, the day they arrive at Portheras Cove they spend drying their clothes on rocks, swimming and seeing dolphins. They then pitch the tent as described above, after which RW described the following:

Darkness fell; the light from Pendeen Lighthouse swung rhythmically over the headland never reaching the beach; the oystercatchers came and with them a biting cold, eating up through the sand, chilling us to the bone.

Still no fog, which one would expect to be included in the above description of other environmental observations.

The photo couldn't be the following morning, because TSP says they moved further along beach to avoid being below cliffs, so nowhere near the stream.

The friends of Portheras Cove FB page suggest that the whole of that week's weather was pretty dire.

Exactly. It’s his wife’s maiden name. I don’t know of any examples of a man using his wife’s maiden name as a nickname. Unless he’s a fraudster.

Following on (had to nip away to eat dinner)...what this suggests to me is that the story of Moth's miraculous heroism never happened. They simply camped by the stream with nothing eventful to report. The story always felt a little odd to me, but as a narrative device it works very well to begin the book and demonstrate Moth's health improvement.

I just read the Wikipedia articles on Raynor Winn, The Salt Path (book) and The Salt Path (film), which read like marketing material. They are all "robustly" edited by "Chiswick Guy", and the Talk pages show his aversion to The Observer articles.

"Chiswick Guy" seems to have lots of time to spend writing Wikipedia pages. Clicking his name takes you to his bio page, which lists botany and literature as interests. He is particularly interested in Beowolf and Simon Armitage, on which he has written/edited several Wikipedia articles.

I wonder if "Chiswick Guy" is Tim Walker. The photo at the end of his bio shows a chap with a white beard and a French beret. It is not of Tim Walker, but that might be un herring rouge.

I do know at least two academics in my field who use their wife's surname, or in one case, have hyphenated their wife's surname with their own. (I assume his wife did the same, but I don't know her.) Not fraudsters, highly reputable senior academics.

@Peladon The phrase 'un herring rouge' is making me giggle so much that the dog is looking at me funny,

I was looking at this ISBN number business yesterday evening, to try to understand how an author can remain anonymous, it seemed to say that you pay for the number, that registering the authors pen name is fine as long as the publisher knows who they are. Does this mean that because Gangani publishing was owned by Tim Walker, he is listed as director, that he would have to know the true identity of the author but that information never has to be revealed?

@Catwith69lives I don't know if he was seeing the same consultant each time, but my DD has one condition that only has one centre for treatment hours away, so usually online consultation, she also has a neurologist who has kept her in her clinic for longer than she had to because she has grown fond of her, and wants to make sure she is referred on to someone who will look after her.

@Peladon so funny, a beret sounds like it would be Moths style :)

Interesting. When do you have them at Portheras Cove? 12/13 Sept?

I also know at least one man who uses his wife's original surname as a professional name / pen name. It's a sensible place to look if you need a different name! The weird thing with TW is that he isn't using it to publish/appear/etc in his own right, he's using it...just to bolster her story? Which isn't even particularly necessary, because it's not THAT unusual for married people to have different surnames, and there's nothing in TSP etc that requires it.

Exactly, I'm sure the respectable academics that @BlueHorses knows are not trying to hide anything, people often double barrel or go for the better sounding name, but Tim Walker had no reason to change his.

Interesting - so it isn’t their legal name but they publish under their wife’s legal name?
And did the couple use his name, from marriage and for the kids for 20-30 years then both change to the wife’s maiden name?
Double-barrel isn’t a consideration, that’s been around for years and TimMoth never claimed to be a Walker-Winn

I've got to admit I've never really understood why the image of Moth carrying the tent up Portheras beach should be so impressive.

He was apparently helped by SW, they only walked/ran a few hundred metres up the beach, the tent weighed 2.5-3kg and Moth was carrying this entirely by himself every day since Minehead. So what's the big deal?

I think I asked this several threads ago, but do we have evidence that he uses the name 'Moth Winn' (which actually sounds a bit inane compared to the undeniably good 'Raynor Winn') himself?

I was amused by this bet-hedging by Noon (as far as I can see a community/postcast/events organiser aimed at 'women in midlife'). RW is still listed as one of their 'Noon Icons' and she was scheduled to do a Noon event, but it was cancelled after the Observer story, and they've put in a bit about the allegations, the responses of Noon members, and how they're keeping an eye, above their original article on her:

https://noon.org.uk/noon-icons/raynor-winn/

Not actually sure about legal name in the example I am aware of. Now I think of it, it's possible that the wife's original name is the legal name of both, but if so was changed a long time after marriage (which could also make sense, people change names for lots of reasons). Anyways it's not really relevant to TW I think.