Earlier this month the Government announced that poetry would no longer be a compulsory subject in English schools. This is a regressive step and it will have a severely deleterious effect upon our culture, in fact without poetry the English language will die. Poetry revives and alters language, once poetry is removed from our discourse this language is dead.
However there is evidence that English is already in terminal decline. Journalism is one example, as it has drifted further away from its origins as a witty and original form of writing. Today`s journalists lack the poetic sensibilities that once amused and engaged the populace, instead their writing is both staid and bland. The title of this Blog post is an allusion to the Michael Longley poem “The Candlelight Master”. The theme behind the poem is drawing out obscurity into light.
Some of the most obscure and rare ephemera in our lives are also the most beautiful and captivating, yet without poetry we will never experience these, at least in a philosophical sense. Plato understood this when he wrote “The Allegory of the Cave”, which was a study on enlightenment. The allegory focusses upon a community of cave dwellers who have never experienced anything outside, their only perceptions are of shadow and illusion, and the echoes of their own voices.
However these people only knew this one existence and for them this was complete reality. This is almost an analogy for our contemporary experience. The majority of people, especially the young only perceive reality from the cold, blue light that emits out of screens. The poet-philosopher in contrast reflects upon life as soon as he strikes the match to illuminate his candle lit dwelling. Candles cast a distinctly different sense of perception, they lend a radiance to the world. “The Candlelight Master” is almost a metaphor for a society that is growing rapidly unenlightened and ignorant, we must preserve our poetic tradition before we lose our dwindling civilisation completely.
Chris Lambert`s “Black Meadow Archive” is incredibly evocative, merging the uncanny with the modern sensibility. It also taps into a very English feeling, an atavistic stirring to return to nature before the malevolence of geopolitics threatens to overwhelm and ultimately vanquish the populace. I lived in the North East as a very young child, it was the late 1970s and I was aware of a growing threat as it was the height of the Cold War. I did not fully understand the significance of R.A.F Fylingdales but I had a naive but imaginative gift for confabulation. This is the essence of this work.
Some artists create a distinctive sound, others an accompanying persona and backstory. Kev Oyston and Chris Lambert have gone one further: their ‘Black Meadow’ project has seized control of a real-life area of the North York Moors and used it as the backdrop for a deliberately confusing, unsettling multi-media mix of disturbing folklore and Cold War paranoia.
75 years ago the Second World War came to a final if macabre conclusion with the Allied bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The devastating attack on Hiroshima killed over 80,000 people while the attack on Nagasaki cost the lives of at least 35,000 people.
The conflict in the Pacific was catastrophic in terms of American and Allied soldiers deaths. It was estimated that more were killed by the Japanese during the final year of War than were killed in three years of conflict in Europe. However with the knowledge and hindsight that we have now, such a violent act seems inhumane especially in the light of apparent evidence that Japan was closer to surrender than once was believed. Attitudes were completely different at that time. Most of the world was consumed with disgust at the perceived collective villainy of the Japanese. Consequently this dehumanising act of political expediency was accomplished.
There is another story of the Japanese people. The writer and artist Shigeru Mizuki was a conscripted Japanese soldier deployed to Papua New Guinea. He detailed his experiences in his book “Showa”. He reveals a different kind of courage in battle. He is brave enough to stand up for himself and resist conformity. He refuses to take the orders of his superior officers, even to the extent of enduring savage beatings. Instead he empathises with the indigenous people and wins their trust, and is accepted into the community.
Mizuki was a vehement opponent of the colonial mind-set that prevailed over Imperial Japan during the 1940s. This situation changed dramatically when Japan formally surrendered on August 15th 1945 and a democratic process was initiated to supplant the autocratic rule of Emperor Hirohito. The Hiroshima and Nagasaki attacks were the culmination of a secret plan known as “The Manhattan Project”. At the eve of World War Two scientists had gathered to establish an atomic weapons development programme. They were comprised of American and British scientific experts who were concerned about the nuclear threat from Germany.
The real human cost of nuclear strike did not become real until the aftermath of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki attacks. In the modern imagination “The Manhattan Project” became the inspiration for the cold, inhuman and alien character of “Doctor Manhattan”.
This was a character written by Alan Moore and he features in the graphic novel “Watchmen”. This is a story set in an alternate universe of deliberate moral ambiguity. Dr. Manhattan was previously the atomic scientist Dr. Jon Osterman but he mutated after a horrific laboratory accident. The character and his role in a modern post-nuclear world is an allegory. It is a warning of the dangers of mindless conformity and a reminder of the subtleties at play when considering various political and cultural conventions.
We need to become much wiser and responsible as a collective human species and revive our humanity rather than leave it buried underground.
The 1984 television adaptation of John Christopher`s Tripod series was culturally significant as it illustrated the fears of a nation. British television had also adapted the work of Terry Nation, Nigel Kneale and most pertinently John Wyndham.
Wyndham was born in Knowle, Solihull and it is easy to perceive how the well manicured lawns and hedges of his childhood home could be turned into nightmarish zombie plants. With the Soviet threat looming, an increasingly paranoid populace with an overactive imagination could breathe life into such a world.
Similarly a post-apocalyptic world as envisioned by Christopher could have easily materialised itself into a quiet village in the West Midlands. Tripods animated my imagination.
If the most potent elements of a creative work are those left unseen and unstated, then The White Mountains – the first of John Christopher’s Tripods trilogy – should be intoxicating to the point of coma. Actual white mountains, for a start, are at a premium, only fleetingly glimpsed at the book’s conclusion. Even the Tripods themselves are restricted to fleeting cameos. But the existence of both – offering tantalising refuge and dire peril respectively – overshadow and drive the events of this languidly atmospheric novel.
J.G. Ballard was the infamous chronicler of “dark history”. His stories and novels are set in the years that followed World War Two. This period of history was marked by immense social and cultural change, but in Ballard`s fiction his characters are almost hermetically sealed off from the rest of the world. The results are unsettling.
Their lives are bizarre, perverse and barely human. However this bizarre and perverse universe has been revived for the twenty first century. Shamima Begum is the creation of a modern technocratic society that is almost entirely insulated from humanity.
Her fait accompli has been sealed through the combination of a weak, prevaricating Government and a section of liberal appeasers. Her appeasers have chosen to indulge her self-centred adolescent arrogance and immaturity and excused her aberrant behaviour.
Her life story resembles a notorious terrorist from an earlier time. Ulrika Meinhof was a violent anarcho-communist who, in cahoots with her partner in crime Andreas Baader sought to rid Germany and its allies of “fascism”.
Meinhof, like Begum was a cold hearted fanatic indifferent to suffering and seemingly devoid of pity. It did not matter to her if innocent people died, in her mind anyone living a bourgeois life was a legitimate target. The Baader-Meinhof gang were responsible for a wave of bombings and murders, but they were indulged by naive liberals who were easily manipulated. As a result they grew bolder and more savage in their attacks against the West. They were the major players behind the massacre that occurred at the Munich Olympic Games in 1972. A defiant German government intervened decisively to detain Meinhof and Baader and denounce their ideology. Meinhof took her own life in Stammheim Prison on 9 May 1976. She was 41 years old.
In hindsight the reign of terror unleashed by Meinhof and her associates seems incoherent and unnecessary but it was almost allowed to happen by a weak and fragile country struggling to rebuild itself. Germany as a nation was still dealing with the past and feared a return of the tyranny that almost destroyed them. It is easy to see now that monsters can dominate when there is a cultural void. The Millennial years have reanimated the monsters that we thought had disappeared, but for our own sakes we must quell the monsters.
In every historical epoch there are unsettling undercurrents that threaten the stability of our nation state. Today a tiny sect is dominating our discourse, in the mass media as well as online. In spite of the fact that the majority of the people in this country are Conservative and loyal, there is a preponderance of aggressive left-wing ideologues who want to destroy rather than attempt to build upon the foundations of our nation.
The pervasive myth of “structural and institutional racism” has imbued every area of life. As someone who could be classed as a “Red Tory” I find it astonishing that my level headed assessments of this country and its history are continually dismissed and even censored online. It is as if I am in a boxing ring and the opponent is my own shadow. This is a phenomenon which is escalating at a frightening pace.
David Starkey, the curmudgeonly historian, is the latest victim of the so-called “cancel culture”. Starkey`s adversaries have censored him due to a misplaced turn of phrase, despite the fact that they themselves have spread all kinds of dangerous propaganda about White British people. I am a Red Tory so I do not agree with Starkey, his views appear reactionary to me but I still believe that he is allowed a platform. Everyone is allowed a platform, even those on the Left. However the Left are imposing their view of the world through explicitly violent means and that is objectionable.
I also believe that Harry and Meghan should be allowed to share their views. Many of us will disagree but we need to hear their opinions so that we can contest them.
Harry is just one of our national figureheads to ponder upon our values, identity and troubling history. Shakespeare was acutely aware that Harry`s Royal forebears had the same preoccupations. In the play “Henry IV Part 1” Prince Hal has retreated into a kind of self-imposed exile. He feels that he is no longer part of his father`s Court. The vast Imperial excesses of the Plantagenet’s loom heavily in his mind, as at their peak they conquered Ireland as well as half of France.
He is uncomfortably aware of the events that lead up to the deaths of the Princes In The Tower. The dark and dastardly machinations of Court are alien to him, the only refuge from this is Eastcheap. Here he finds companionship, and most importantly distraction. But Hal has a debt that he cannot ignore, and the days are fast upon him. Duty is simply a curse, for him it is far from being a privilege. The dive bars of Eastcheap reveal a side of humanity which is intensely alluring to him but he will never be a part of that society. He knows that he is the inheritor of an often bloody and wicked legacy. His destiny awaits him on the battle fields of Agincourt.
I believe that history will judge Prince Harry more kindly. Kindness is in mercilessly short supply in this so-called “culture war”. This war is unfair because the Left keep changing the frontiers of battle so that it becomes impossible for either side to win the conflict. Reconciliation is not something the Left seem particularly concerned about. Their opponents are much more dignified and quietly acquiesce to this temporary defeat, so perhaps the Left need to dial down their aggression if and when any detente is to be reached.
Last weekend the BBC broadcast a special compilation programme of the Glastonbury festival. Glastonbury itself has a unique place within English legend as it is situated on the Vale of Avalon. According to legend Avalon was the place where King Arthur forged his sword Excalibur and as a consequence it is an area with a strong and enduring connection to magic. This aspect to our culture is barely recognised or celebrated and some of our proudest stories and traditions have been ignored. The renowned musicologist Joscelyn Goodwin once decried this stating that,
“(The Legend of) Albion stands for the soul of Britain, which like every race and nation, has its own potential perfection that enables it to sing its own melody in the chorus of humanity”.
An entirely new generation is now consumed with bitterness and hatred. The marches that we have witnessed recently are entirely negative and appear to focus entirely on the destruction of our heritage.
It is a uniquely modern and nihilistic movement and a stark contrast to the youthful idealists of the past. In the twentieth century at least young people sought connection and solidarity with each other and any notion of “race” was disregarded as divisive and unhelpful in the larger fight for human rights. When I was 16 or 17 I had cultivated a political conscience and became an activist of sorts. That time was very heady and rather strange and I encountered a distinctly different group of people with roots in a quintessentially English sensibility.
These were people who were rather unkindly dubbed “crusties”. They were mainly middle class kids who dropped out of college and lived an itinerant life, they would often appear at political rallies. They would also haunt the Glastonbury festival as if it was a church or holy place. During the early nineties the festival had a harder edge to it and the music was defiantly anti-establishment and raucous.
Crusties sought alliances with New Age Travellers and Anarchists as they shared similar values. They were often from similar communities and unlike today they believed in a world of peace and harmony. The Stonehenge site also held a festival which attracted generations of young English dreamers. It was a symbol of our ancient past and also a holy gathering for those who yearned for unity and simplicity.
Stonehenge and Glastonbury were also regarded as holy places by our ancient Pagan pilgrims who would traverse the land on a spiritual quest. Their faith was so strong that they were convinced that they would uncover the mysteries of the universe. These pilgrims were no strangers to the problems that blight our world today, they too had experienced war and tribal hatred. However they believed that the key to understanding these problems lay deep underground.
These were the “ley lines”, ancient tracks containing all of the mysteries of the universe and ultimately the meaning of human life itself. These ideas were resurrected in the middle of the twentieth century by English hippies and revived again, perhaps by their children who were college kids in the early nineties and in turn became pilgrims themselves. The hippies of the 1960s were inspired by gentle folk melodies and the strident messages of the protest singers. Their children had their own soundtrack, a mixture of raucous punk and the repetitive tones that emerged from the Detroit wastelands. Nonetheless spiritually they all came from the same place.
However the tragedy of young idealists is that they eventually have to face the real world and its problems. I remembered that some of them tried to mask reality by succumbing to the oblivion of drugs, others could not cope with the harsh realities that faced them and were hospitalised in mental health facilities. The most important lesson that I drew from those heady summers of the nineties was that we could all share the same dream and sing our own melody in the chorus of humanity.
The forces of the Left are continuing to have a devastating effect upon our national psyche. These forces are even attempting to erase our culture through the manipulation of history and outright lie. Double standards are also utilised as every other civilisation escapes their opprobrium. This is in spite of the fact that the sins of imperialism were enacted by every Empire throughout history yet this country alone is condemned.
No other nation on Earth receives this kind of condemnation. The emblem of England- the St. George flag is the only one singled out as a supposed far right symbol which is a gross misrepresentation of the legend that lies behind it. In the legend St. George was the saviour of an English village by slaying the dragon and preserving the life of the Princess. The dragon is a generic symbol of evil. It is also a metaphor for plague or natural disaster. The Princess is also a symbol, in this case of honour and purity. The preservation of the Princess from the ravages of nature symbolises loyalty and stability. There is nothing remotely extremist in this simple English folk legend.
I believe that it is time to rehabilitate the reputation of this country and its culture and to tell the real stories of an island people. England has one of the oldest literary traditions in the world, in part due to its unique geography. In the late twelfth century a visiting French cleric remarked that the country was,
“(an) island…surrounded by water, and not unnaturally its inhabitants are affected by the nature of the element in which they live. Unsubstantial fantasies slide easily into their minds. They think their dreams to be visions, and their visions to be divine. We cannot blame them, for such is the nature of their land. I have often noticed that the English are greater dreamers than the French.”
Our literary tradition was borne out of the visions of ancient mystic sages.
These visions in turn inspired two of our greatest poets John Milton and William Blake. Milton`s profound attachment to this land is actually an expression of something which the literary historian Peter Ackroyd defines as “placism, as an antidote to racism”. Milton had a great vision of England and its people.
In his imagination the English were an exiled tribe of Israelites searching for the Promised Land. Milton`s vision was of a heaven realised upon the plains of a country already scarred by religious conflict.
(Illustration of a Cavalier Soldier in battle during the English Civil War)
Blake was inspired by Milton`s mystic sensibility and longed to witness heaven enacted on England`s “green and pleasant land”. However he was far from being a racist. He was a fierce opponent of racism and composed poems focussing upon the plight of African slaves. He was one of the first English poets to compose verse from the perspective of the slaves themselves.
Blake`s most prophetic poem was “and did those feet in ancient time”, which was incorporated into the hymn “Jerusalem”. However most people are unaware that Blake was the original lyricist and are oblivious to the true meaning of the lyrics. There is a general ignorance surrounding it and it is often considered to be jingoistic. Nothing could be further from the truth. There are very few people who are aware that Blake championed the cause of the abolition of slavery and cared deeply about the lives of the poor and oppressed and this is evident in the hymn. It is an anthem for a lost England.
(Photograph is of English hippies in 1971- the hippy movement in England searched for meaning in the ancient features of the land, in this case stones).
“Jerusalem” is a stirring patriotic hymn but it is also a plea for pacifism. It is a vision of heaven on Earth where all of humanity is unshackled from suffering. It is an anthem which truly represents the spirit of the people of England. I believe that it should be played more often and played in a way that is conscious of its real message.
Unsettling. Impassive. Slightly… well, haunted. The face of Tom Baker in that iconic 1970s Doctor Who opening title sequence left an indelible impression on so many of our childhoods. The more sensitive of TV viewers even found it scary, but Tom’s penetrating stare nevertheless providing the gateway to a giddy cavalcade of teatime thrills: the Doctor’s daring battles with Daleks, Zygons and Cybermen proving the perfect Saturday accompaniment to fishfingers, marrowfat peas and Mr Kipling’s Cherry Bakewells. Preferably not all on the same plate.
150 years ago today Charles Dickens died. He is now regarded as one of the greatest writers of the English literary Canon. His great vision for highlighting the social issues of his day is encapsulated in his fiction and remembered in his epitaph as a writer who was,
“a sympathiser for the poor, the suffering, and the oppressed”.
I believe that Dickens is an unmistakeably English writer as his imagination stems from the uniqueness of this country`s culture. Dream is a recurring motif in his fiction, and this is something common to English literary tradition in general.
This is something that I can relate to, as my imagination derives from the deep roots of England. When I was a small child I would experience vivid dreams about returning to the dark woods that were once inhabited by my Celtic ancestors.
Now, with the advent of a unhinged political cult which seeks to erase national identity these dreams have returned. The difference is that there is an ending to them which is surprisingly comforting. I dream about returning to the lands of my ancestors and I meet their ghosts, as if they are the spirit of something profound to my existence.
Sometimes I can see them dance and frolic in unrestrained happiness. They are unselfconscious people but regal and dignified in the way they carry themselves, and as with all lost families they are overwhelmed with relief when they meet me again. Then at the end of the dream they guide me back home which is under the branches of a giant English Oak tree. Beneath this tree I am reconnected to my history and heritage which is undefiled and pure, and untainted by any malice.
It is where all English people began, as simple people who lived in peace and did not seek to threaten anyone. The sins of colonialism were enacted by those with evil intent and were not synonymous with these self-effacing people. It is difficult to discern reality in our contemporary world. Martin Luther King was a sincere and honourable man who preached love, peace and unity. His infamous “I have a dream” speech was in part an acknowledgement that to imagine a world free from racial prejudice was fanciful. His vision of a world where people are judged for their character rather than the colour of their skin has been ignored by the Black Lives Matter movement. These protests are fixated by divisive notions about white people. Most of the people involved cannot perceive that white people are not their enemy. Their actions besmirch the legacy of people like Martin Luther King who remained calm and peaceful, even as he and his community experienced violent racism.
Black people endured centuries of exploitation and subordination under the slave trade. However some of the greatest champions for their emancipation were religious Quakers from white communities. Christianity preaches love and unity. As fellow humans we can empathise with pain and struggle and desire that we should all be free. Benjamin Lay was one Quaker who was a fierce opponent of the slave trade but he was forced into exile because his views were deemed abhorrent.
(Picture is of Benjamin Lay.)
However before he left his coup de grace arrived when he announced to his brethren that the enslavement of Africans was,
“as justifiable in the sight of the Almighty, who beholds and respects all nations and colours of men with an equal regard, as if you should thrust a sword through their hearts as I do through this Bible”.
He then held up a hollowed out Bible which was filled with fruit juice. He took out a sword and sliced it through the Bible. Red juice splattered everywhere. His point was clear to everyone, but shortly afterwards he became very sick. He lived just long enough to hear that a new assembly would be created to preach against the evils of slavery.
I am a white British person with a distinct culture and heritage, that is an immutable fact. However it is pertinently non exclusionary and undiscriminating. History is complicated and Britain`s shameful role in slavery was not unique in the world at that time. Slavery was not synonymous with a specific race and nationality it was an evil ideology which belongs to the past. I hope that this awful dream of racial violence will conclude and we can all be free to live our lives.
Octavia's Odyssey 