Bernard Feilden

I note the passing of Sir Bernard Feilden, architect with much significant church conservation to his name, including at Norwich cathedral and York Minster. He was also Surveyor of the Fabric of St Paul's, and a member of the Cathedrals Fabric Commission (1990-95). See the obituary in the Guardian

The Language of Things

I note the appearance of a new study of design in the twentieth century by Deyan Sudjic, director ot the Design Museum. From the reviews, it looks to contain all sorts of interesting material on changing ideas of permanent value, design obsolescence and the contemporary love affair with shiny things; all of which issues have significant quasi-religious contexts to consider.
It is reviewed by Fiona MacCarthy in the Guardian and by Stephen Bayley in Building Design.

Chagall

I note the appearance of a new study of Chagall by Jackie Wullschlager; it is reviewed by Andrew Motion in the Guardian, and Alex Danchev in the Independent.

Rowan Williams on Dostoevsky

For information, some of the early reactions to Rowan Williams' new book on Dostoevsky. The Guardian reviewer finds much interesting thinking in it, but wonders whether it contains "the worst prose ever written by a poet." A.N. Wilson is rather more engaged in the TLS, as is Salley Vickers in the Times. Williams has given interviews to the Guardian and the Telegraph (A.N. Wilson again).

Gregory Bateson

An interesting recent Guardian article by Tim Parks on the anthropologist Gregory Bateson and his view of the arts and their possible effect on social life; I know nothing at all of Bateson, but his views are an interesting part of the background noise about what the arts might be made to do in mid-twentieth century Britain.

Auden's prose

Following on from an earlier post, another review of the third volume of Edward Mendelson's edition of Auden's prose, this time by Sean O'Brien, reflecting on the cultural distance now evident between Auden and our contemporary life.

Dallas Sweetman

I note the premiere this week of this new play by Sebastian Barry, reviving the commissioning of new plays by Canterbury Cathedral. The heyday of the Canterbury plays was between 1928 and the years immediately after the war; my own article on the first of these, John Masefield's The Coming of Christ, is forthcoming in Humanitas. The Journal of the George Bell Institute.
A preview has appeared in the Telegraph.
[October 10th: reviews in the Times, Observer, Guardian and Telegraph; overall conclusion: nice building, difficult acoustics.]

The Golden Generation

I note a new exhibition at the British Library on the abolition of the Lord Chamberlain's powers of theatre censorship in 1968; it is due to run until the end of November.
There was also a conference to coincide with the exhibition, marking the end of an AHRC-funded research project, details of which are available on the project website.

The Lady Chatterley trial

Have recently read a splendid article by Mark Roodhouse on the Anglican involvement in the Chatterley trial of 1960, and in particular the role of Mirfield father and literary critic Martin Jarrett-Kerr. It is particularly interesting on the tensions between Christian emphasis on the integrity of the creative act and the perceived need for censorship to avoid harm or scandal both within the church and in wider society. Jarrett-Kerr's 'peculiar vocation' to the literary world, in the eyes of some, forced him to negotiate between the literary reputation of Lawrence and the welfare of souls, as one colleague put it.
It's in the Journal of Ecclesiastical History, 59; 3 (July 2008), 475-500 (available online, by subscription.).

The Word made art

I note an interesting-looking event in London on November 1st: a series of three lectures by Neil McGregor (director of the British Museum) on artistic responses to themes related to the social implications of the Incarnation. Details on the Scott Holland Trust site.

Literature and religion

I note from a week or two ago a report in the Guardian Review (July 4th) on an interesting exchange at a University of Manchester event between Martin Amis, the theologian Graham Ward and the critic James Wood.

Charles Williams

I note in passing a review by Rowan Williams of a new book on Charles Williams by Gavin Ashenden, from the TLS; the subject is described as "a deeply serious critic, a poet unafraid of major risks, and a theologian of rare creativity". Ashenden is chaplain to the University of Sussex.

Bob Dylan and 60s religion

After listening on Saturday morning to a Radio 4 programme considering the importance of Bob Dylan, I'm reminded of Hugh McLeod's recent observation on the quasi-prophetic status given to Dylan, in his recent book on the religious crisis of the Sixties. He only raises the point briefly, but there is much work to be done on the gradual widening of the sphere of 'religiously significant' music to include pop.
See my review of McLeod's book, in Reviews in History.

Henry Chadwick

The 20th June edition of the Church Times carries the obituary of Henry Chadwick, one of the 20th Century's leading historians of early Christianity. Many undergraduate students of theology or church history will be familiar with his book 'The Early Church'. Less known to the wider public was that Chadwick was an influential figure in church music: a member of the editorial committee of Hymns Ancient and Modern and chair of the committee that produced Common Praise. The Church Times obituary includes a nice tribute from Lionel Dakers who recalls, amongst other things, how Henry Chadwick, an accomplished pianist, once had Zoltan Kodaly turn the pages for him!

[Peter adds]
See also other obituaries: Rowan Williams in the Guardian, and another in the Telegraph. The Telegraph author makes the following waspish but apposite observation:
"After religion, the great passion of Chadwick's life was music. Unlike those Anglicans who persist in confusing aesthetic sensation with religious experience, however, Chadwick never raised his musical interests to the level of dogma. It was a civilised entertainment shared, happily, by his wife Peggy, whom he married in 1945. "

The visual arts in the Church of England, 1935-56

I'm bound to draw attention to a new article of mine in the new Studies in Church History (volume 44, 2008). It examines the attempts made by an informal but determined coalition of clergy, artists and critics to revive the connection between church patronage and the contemporary arts. The two most prominent clergy were George Bell (Bishop of Chichester), and Walter Hussey,(St Matthew Northampton and Dean of Chichester.)

Sunday theatre

Yesterday's Guardian carried a short note about the National Theatre's decision to begin performances on Sundays. It's interesting that the theatres have been the last of the artistic institutions to bow to the pressure of Sunday opening.
See also Michael Billington in the Guardian, who welcomes the change, and his interview with Nicholas Hytner two years ago, who saw the main barrier as the theatre unions, rather than any lingering Sabbatarianism.

See also the report in the Telegraph.

James Macmillan

Rather belated, but I note various things related to Macmillan's recent setting of the Passion, premiered at the Barbican at the end of April. The piece is interesting since it is one of the very few attempts to write an English language passion setting for a hundred years or more.
It was reviewed in the Times and Telegraph. Macmillan himself published a set of programme notes on the LSO site, and elsewhere, a diary of its composition, beginning in 2005.

John Dillenberger

I note the recent death of John Dillenberger, prominent theologian of the arts. Obituaries have appeared in the Times and the Boston Globe. A tribute also appeared from the Graduate Theological Union, of which he was founding President.

Mary Berry

I note the passing of musicologist and champion of plainsong Mary Berry - see an obituary in the Times. It notes the impetus given to preservation by the liturgical changes within the Catholic church during the 1960s and early 1970s.

Contemporary Church Music

I note the current London Festival of Contemporary Church Music, happening at St Pancras' church on Euston Road in London. An annual event, it has commissioned new work from many of the most prominent British composers, and there are several premieres this time. Full programme details are available from the festival site, and Radio 3 will be broadcasting a Festival Eucharist on Sunday, at 4pm.

Sacred Music

I've recently been following the BBC4 series on sacred music, presented by Simon Russell Beale. The series, whilst not quite being a 'history' as such, spent time on Perotin, Palestrina, Byrd, Tallis and Bach. Russell Beale presented most engagingly, with an enthusiasm hard to resist, and the performances from The Sixteen were splendid, as usual.
The series has been trenchantly criticised by Peter Phillips in the Spectator, and many of his criticisms of it are justified, although, with a later letter writer (23rd April, not on the website), I rather doubt the appeal of his proposed TV music history, with lots of straight-to-camera discussion of musicological detail from a group of experts, after Ken Burns.
Most interesting for me was the near-constant urge, never quite indulged, to say something theological about the music itself. In many places the music was described as 'spiritual' (whatever that means, really), and the final sign-off was (quoting from memory) to the effect that when this music is performed "it's as if someone is listening." It is symptomatic of the general vagueness in our public discussion about the nature of sacred music, and testament to the degree to which most theological discussion of the problem has never really been communicated outside the academy.

The poetics of Nonconformity

I note a couple of recent items in connection with Tom Paulin, and the relationship between English Nonconformity and its poetic results. Paulin touches on it in a review of the recent edition of the letters of Ted Hughes, in which it is Hughes' religious background which allows him to write in a "spontaneous, direct, unforced and unflinching manner." See also a review of Paulin's own work in the Dublin Review of Books, and most recently, Terry Eagleton on Paulin, the "Puritan at play", and its political subtexts, in the Guardian Review.
I should be very interested to learn of any work that has tried to explore such a relation more generally, as I'm not aware of much to date. It could have interesting implications for thinking about religious poetry, but also more broadly about liturgical change and other religio-cultural issues. That a connection between background and poetic output can be made is evident from a recent article on George Barker.

See also an earlier post on William Empson.

Pentecost Festival

I note in passing some events relating to the arts as part of this Festival in London, on the weekend of May 9th-11th. There is a day event on 'Sacred Spaces', focussing on the new interior of St Martin-in-the-Fields. There is also the grand final of the Hope Academy competition (a Christianised Fame Academy) and Luv Esther, which is described as a pop opera.

George Bell, Bishop of Chichester

2008 sees the fiftieth anniverary of Bell's death, and there are two strands of academic events dealing with his legacy, which includes his work as patron of the arts. Chichester Cathedral are to hold a series of lectures, including one by Sir Christopher Frayling on the arts.
There is also to be a major conference in June, also in Chichester, organised by the George Bell Institute and the University of Chichester. I myself will be speaking at that event, on Bell's work in religious drama, and in particular on The Coming of Christ, the 1928 play that Bell commissioned from John Masefield for Canterbury Cathedral.

Conference on twentieth century stained glass

I note this conference, due to happen in London in July/August this year - details available on the site of the British Society of Master Glass Painters. I would be particularly interested to hear the contribution from Patrick Reyntiens.

Post-1945 war memorials

I'm bound to draw attention here to my own article on the Church of England and war memorials after 1945, which is now available online (to subscribing libraries), ahead of print publication in the Forum for Modern Language Studies. I've tried to explore the debates that took place between planners, artists, architects and clergy between 1940 and 1947, and the differing emphases on beauty and utility. Despite the relatively small number of new memorials that were actually built, there seems to have been a much livelier debate than was often supposed; the question was not at all settled in favour of new village halls or social clubs, and against new lumps of 'useless' carved stone. It also in passing suggests that the war had not been a straight-forwardly 'secularising' influence on elite discourse.

The next stage in the enquiry is to conduct some local research into the processes by which the advice coming from the 'establishment' is received and enacted or ignored at a local level. I shall be presenting some initial findings from Sussex to the IHR Locality and Region seminar at the beginning of May.

Auden's religion

A couple of interesting recent items on Auden. The first is the Guardian's decision to ask Rowan Williams, a poet himself, to write a preface to the Auden booklet in their recent series. The second thing is the recent publication of the third volume of Edward Mendelson's edition of Auden's prose (1949-55), which covers some of the most interesting of Auden's theological writing. It was reviewed by Frank Kermode in the LRB (subscription needed for full article)

Ralph Beyer

I note an obituary of Ralph Beyer, the inscription carver whose work features in Coventry Cathedral. Basil Spence, the architect of the cathedral, praised Beyer's work very fulsomely in his Phoenix at Coventry.

Being the son of a German art historian, and coming to England at the age of 16, he is another of the surprisingly large number of 'refugee artists' who made significant contributions to church art in the years after the war. Another name that springs to mind is Hans Feibusch. For more see the exhibition catalogue Art and Migration, edited by Jennifer Powell and Jutta Vinzent (George Bell Institute, Humanitas subsidia series, 2, 2005).
There has of course also been some recent general interest in the influence of migrants on a receiving culture: see Daniel Snowman, The Hitler Emigres, and, more recently, Lesley Chamberlain's The Philosophy Steamer.

Larry Norman

I note the recent death of Larry Norman, one of the pioneer figures in Christian rock music in the 1970s. Obituaries have appeared in the Guardian, Times, New York Times and Christianity Today. There's also been some blogging activity concerning his importance.

Barenboim's Beethoven

Some interesting examples of quasi-religious language creeping into some of the discussions of the recent Barenboim Beethoven sonata cycle. A Guardian reviewer thought that ‘something akin to a canonisation’ was taking place (Erica Jeal, 8th Feb.); Martin Kettle has asserted a ‘moral and even religious element to the ritual’ (Prospect, February 2008), and the performances have been accompanied by debates on the ‘Artist as Leader’ (see Anthony Holden in the Guardian, 3rd Feb). It’s not clear what this means (religiously), but Kettle has enlarged on his view of the enduring worth of the music elsewhere (Guardian 16th Feb)

Fantasy and C.S. Lewis

A fascinating three-part documentary on fantasy fiction is under way on BBC4. The first part on Wednesday dealt with children’s fiction in particular. I was interested by the pasting dished out to C.S Lewis, a proponent of ‘bullying Anglicanism’ (surely a contradiction in terms); a propagandist and ‘warper of children’s minds’ who purveyed a brutal and cruel creed quite unlike that of the Jesus of the Gospels. Will Self thought the Christian allegory the thing that made the novels interesting, but Philip Pullman thought them not Christianity but something quite different: a ‘high-minded exclusion’ of normal children from salvation.
The open season on Lewis was in contrast to the lengthy treatment afforded to Philip Pullman and the notions of ‘dust’, sin and experience in the His Dark Materials trilogy. I’m bound to note Bernice Martin’s article in Redefining Christian Britain on Pullman’s religion.
The series continues tomorrow night with the epic tradition, including Tolkien and Lewis.

John Hester

A recent obituary in the Telegraph of Canon John Hester of Chichester Cathedral. He is of interest here on account of his involvement with drama and the theatre: he was from 1963 to 1975 senior chaplain of the Actors' Church Union, an intriguing and under-documented group who acted as chaplains and advocates on behalf of those in the theatrical business. Hester was at the same time rector of Soho, and thus on the doorstep of the West End theatres. (St Anne's Soho had previously had as a churchwarden one Dorothy L. Sayers, incidentally).
He also was connected with the Religious Drama Society (on which I've been doing a little work recently) editing their journal Christian Drama. His later connection with Chichester, and with the Chichester Festival Theatre, connects his story obliquely with another figure, Walter Hussey, former Dean, who was in close touch with the Festival Theatre in its early years (although their tenures at the cathedral did not overlap.)

Rob Warner on worship

I note some recent blog discussion of Rob Warner's recent book on Reinventing English Evangelicalism, 1966-2001, particularly his views on the changes in church music. It reflects significant reservations about much that has happened in the last twenty years.
I'm bound to draw attention here to Ian and my own forthcoming article on music and evangelical identity, and the relationship between charismatics and evangelicals in the Church of England to 1991, soon to appear in Mark Smith (ed.), British Evangelical Identities.

Further information on Warner, including further publications, and reviews of this book, at his web page at Lampeter.

Christian Pop

I wonder if anyone caught Paul Bayley's fascinating BBC Radio 4 documentary 'The Strange Parallel World of Christian Pop' on Tuesday 12th February? The title and the trailers made it sound as though this might be another example of the 'see how weird these religious people are' genre of programming, but in fact the programme was a well-researched and even-handed account of the development and motivations of early pop and beat groups formed by younger Christians of the 1960s and 1970s. Band members interviewed on the programme explained how their music was partly missionary in intent - designed to present the Christian message in a form accessible to a rising generation fed on the Mersey Beat, folk rock and psychedelic rock sounds of the early sixties to early seventies. However, the motivation was not purely evangelistic, but contained a more general desire to make religious music in the style of the kind of music they might usually listen to. This is significant, given that critics of the music (both religious and secular) have often tended to assume that the missionary motive predominates, making for a product which is less satisfying both musically and spiritually. In fact, Bayley (who discovered Christian pop through the rare vinyl collector's scene) argues that amidst the mass of average recordings there is some genuinely original material which is the equal of its 'secular' contemporaries (its continuing appeal demonstrated by the fact that some records are changing hands in the wider rare vinyl market for hundreds of pounds).

If anyone who was involved in the contemporary Christian music scene of the late fifties to early seventies reads this blog and would like to add their own thoughts, it would be very interesting to read them!

[Peter adds:] A short description of the programme is available on the Radio 4 website. Bayley is loans officer for Art and Christianity Enquiry

The death of the book review ?

As something of a footnote to the various posts on the difficulties of assessing artistic worth, a piece in Prospect by William Skidelsky on reviewing and the authority of the critic in a blogging culture. Particularly interesting is his discussion, picking up the historical work of Ronan McDonald (The death of the critic, 2007), on the disengagement of academic criticism from literary journalism.
See earlier posts: Culture counts and From measurement to judgment

Crusaders

I've just begun reading a new novel; Crusaders by Richard T. Kelly (Faber, 2008). I note it here as an interesting, if uncommon, example of a novel with a clergyman as a central character. One thinks immediately of the various priests and ex-priests in David Lodge, but the recent portrayals of Anglicans are I think few.

I shall reserve any comment on it until I've finished reading it. There are in the meantime some reviews available online: in the TLS, Times and Sunday Times, two of which cast doubt on the strength of the characterisation of the priest, John Gore; and a very negative Adam Mars-Jones in the Guardian.

Culture counts

I note in passing two recent books which deal with the past and future of the relationship between religion and culture. Peter Conrad's Creation: Artists, Gods and Origins is reviewed by Terry Eagleton in the London Review of Books. David Martin reviews Rogers Scruton's Culture Counts for the TLS. Both reviews are in fact useful and important contributions in themselves.

Royal School of Church Music Fellowships

The Church Times of 25 January 2008 lists new fellowships of the Royal School of Church Music, to be presented in Liverpool Cathedral on 17 May. It's a measure of how far the stylistic range of church music has broadened over the past four to five decades that the fellows-elect include both leading figures in the Anglican choral tradition (Stephen Cleobury) and influential songwriters in a more contemporary/popular style (Graham Kendrick).

Kendrick is a particularly interesting choice, having been at the forefront of the contemporary Christian music scene in the 1970s and 1980s, but within his stylistic range has always sought to write contemporary hymns as well as choruses and worship songs with the rock/pop song's verse-chorus format. In addition, his career/ministry mirrors (and indeed has helped to shape) many aspects of the recent history of evangelical Christianity in Britain: a willingness to embrace and work with elements of youth and counter-cultures in the sixties and seventies; the growth of new sorts of Christian publishing and recording industry in the 1970s and 1980s in which evangelicals were disproportionately prominent (Kendrick has been a prolific producer of songbooks and worship collections); the resurgent confidence of evangelical Christianity in the 1980s (Kendrick's 'Marches for Jesus' arguably capture this mood better than almost anything else in the period); the broadening of the evangelical movement in the 1990s (reflected in several Kendrick re-workings of traditional hymns); a corresponding 'mainstreaming' of evangelicalism since the 1980s (Kendrick's 'The Servant King', 'Shine Jesus Shine' and others were amongst the first of their kind to make their way into the new generation of denominational hymnals created in the 1990s and subsequently - although by no means the first to be written in a popular style). Perhaps we should not be surprised at the number of parallels here given Pete Ward's comment that the heart of charismatic-influenced evangelical experience is to be found in music and singing.

The reading cure

I note a recent piece by Blake Morrison on bibliotherapy, in which he makes a number of passing comments on the impact of the Holocaust on the idea that great art could make 'better people' (concentration camp guards being fans of Goethe and so on.) I note the similarity with John Carey's recent What Good are the Arts ? (see a Guardian review and Observer article), but wonder whether there isn't a subtler story to be written about this.

I realise that Morrison is compressing here as part of the background to his main argument. I do wonder, though, whether this supposed causal link between knowledge of this aspect of the Holocaust and wider attitudes to art has not come about by the gradual metamorphosis of a convenient illustration ("Not all art lovers are good people - see these examples") into an active cause ("Knowledge of the concentration camps made (or should have made) such a belief impossible".) I suspect that just such an understanding of the power of art persisted, in the full knowledge of these crimes. We need a fuller historical account of understandings of the nature of art, in which to place the impact of the Holocaust.

The History Man

A most stimulating reflection by David Lodge on Malcolm Bradbury's 1975 novel, carried in the Guardian. Lodge argues that a novel that was a critique of left-wing radicalism from a liberal humanist perspective was subsequently appropriated and (in Bradbury's view) misused by the Thatcherite right as evidence of danger in the universities.

Lodge notes the reaction of 'moralists' to the sexual content of the novel. I wonder, though, whether there was any wider reaction than this amongst Christian commentators. To what degree (if any) was the novel taken as evidence of secularisation ? It seems to me that it might have on the one hand been mistaken as propaganda for the views of Howard Kirk, but on the other hand been welcomed as a diagnosis of a problem.

From measurement to judgement

Culture secretary James Purnell has been widely reported as signalling a new approach in the funding of the arts, as laid out in a review by Sir Brian McMaster, to be published this week. It is trailed as marking a shift away from the pursuit of audience targets towards judgement of worth, and a focus on "excellence." (See an interview in Saturday's Guardian.) One of McMaster's former colleagues at the Arts Council, Paddy Masefield, has described the views expressed as "elitist and now out-of-touch and ageist".

Historically, what I think is interesting is how we got to this point. In the very early wartime and post-war days, the Arts Council, and its predecessor CEMA, would have made no bones about the primacy of 'excellence', and would have had no qualms about who should adjudicate. We knew what art was, and who was good at it. For religious commentators, this consensus was founded on the enduring core of 'Christian civilisation', although many thought it under threat even then. With the enormous diversification in artistic activity since then, there would seem to have been a catastrophic loss of confidence in the criteria by which 'excellence' might be judged. That story, of the disintegration of an integral idea of culture, is one that is yet to be written.
It remains to be seen how easy it is now to recover that confidence in our judgement. (For what it's worth, I think it high time that the word "elitist" be gracefully retired. It now serves no useful non-polemical purpose.)