Bank holidays in Britain are famous for several things. Atrocious weather is one of them, and it is typical that the films scheduled for broadcast fall into the category of family favourites.
This recent Monday May bank holiday has been exceptional as far as the weather has been concerned. And I was fortunate to catch an early morning film, one which I almost certainly have seen before, but which this particular viewing somewhat astonished me for its capacity to evoke an emotional response.
Quite simply, I think it is the fact that we are in the centenary year of the commencement of the Great War.
The BBC has been remarkable at the range and number of extraordinary documentaries looking at different aspects of this important historical moment.
It is only a couple of years since the last of the surviving soldiers that fought in the trenches died. It is now only something that can be remembered through the recorded reminiscences of those that experienced life at the frontline, and there is an added poignancy to the relics of this period in our history, such as the medals and trench art that have survived to come down to us.
It is sobering to think that it will be shortly similarly the case for the Second World War, as those that served in this conflict age sufficiently so that they have become a tiny minority of the population.
And so perhaps it is possible for me to have seen this film before and for it to have changed its significance viewing it now, when so much seems present in our minds.
One of the most moving documentaries that I have recently viewed is a dramatisation of the 37 days leading up to the declaration of war in 1914, subsequent to the assassination of the Archduke Ferdinand.
This has been an exceptionally well realised programme, that has essentially sen the whole of the complex political story from the viewpoint of a lowly clerk in one of the foreign office departments, giving an interesting perspective on the way in which Britain was at the centre of an extraordinary empire at the time of the events that led inextricably toward the chaos of the war to end all wars.
What I suppose I had forgotten was the way in which this particular film captured a sense of the world that was destroyed by that conflict, as it amounts to the story of an elderly master at an English boys school, who is invited to become the headmaster of his school as a consequence of the decimation of his peers and the younger masters, called up to fight for King and country.
The achievement of one man’s lifetime ambition is related in the context of his own personal story, including the loss of his wife and child during childbirth.
The sense of the history of the time suddenly becoming more relevant, makes it emotionally compelling in a way that I could not have appreciated at previous viewings.
And I have just discovered that the film was made in 1939, almost certainly during that period of impending war. Perhaps that it should have won five Oscars is a fitting tribute to its quality, and perhaps a deep wish that the lessons of the history that it contains should not be forgotten.
Tuesday, 6 May 2014
Monday, 31 March 2014
Time And Space
So you think the clocks going back Is Difficult
Spare a thought for those that were living in 1582 when the Gregorian calendar reform took place.
We might think that we are hard done by in the United Kingdom, when the clocks are reset by an hour and in effect we have two get up an hour earlier.
Of course, this is balanced by the fact that at the autumn equinox, when the clocks go forward, we feel as if we have gained an extra hour of sleep.
Of course, few of us will ever think about the reason for this, and least of all, connect this shift in our management of time to the Gregorian calendar.
But the fact is that in truth our calendar is founded on the solar year, and we have the church of Rome to thank for the reform to that calendar in 1582, undertaken primarily so that the calculation for the date of Easter could be more accurately connected with the lunar calendar.
There is an interesting connection between the lunar calendar and the solar, but it is a connection that we are not fully conscious of.
But the truth of the matter is that the old Julian calendar, introduced by Julius Caesar, failed to take account of small inaccuracies in the differences between the two.
The consequence of this was that lunar and solar had become unsynchronised, and the adjustments made were intended to bring things back into order.
And so the length of the solar year was properly recognised to be 365.25 days in duration, with alternate leap years providing the additional necessary time between the two.
But in addition, there was a 10 day difference to be taken into account, and the solution to this was simply to forget 10 days of the calendar, which as you can imagine, for a mostly illiterate population, felt a little bit like losing 10 days of your life.
And if your birthday happened to fall in one of those 10 days, it must have felt as if you had been deprived of an entire year of your life.
And so, whilst we cope with this simple daylight saving means of adjusting our clocks, spare a moment for those mediaeval folk, who must have pondered hard as to the way in which they were being dealt with by the church, and all for the sake of calculations concerning which they would have found mystifying.
But there is something of poetic beauty in the way in which time has been distilled from an observation of the way in which the Earth moves in space, in the context of our solar system.
And although time is a particularly human means of making sense of things, it is ultimately something outside of ourselves, and immutable.
Spare a thought for those that were living in 1582 when the Gregorian calendar reform took place.
We might think that we are hard done by in the United Kingdom, when the clocks are reset by an hour and in effect we have two get up an hour earlier.
Of course, this is balanced by the fact that at the autumn equinox, when the clocks go forward, we feel as if we have gained an extra hour of sleep.
Of course, few of us will ever think about the reason for this, and least of all, connect this shift in our management of time to the Gregorian calendar.
But the fact is that in truth our calendar is founded on the solar year, and we have the church of Rome to thank for the reform to that calendar in 1582, undertaken primarily so that the calculation for the date of Easter could be more accurately connected with the lunar calendar.
There is an interesting connection between the lunar calendar and the solar, but it is a connection that we are not fully conscious of.
But the truth of the matter is that the old Julian calendar, introduced by Julius Caesar, failed to take account of small inaccuracies in the differences between the two.
The consequence of this was that lunar and solar had become unsynchronised, and the adjustments made were intended to bring things back into order.
And so the length of the solar year was properly recognised to be 365.25 days in duration, with alternate leap years providing the additional necessary time between the two.
But in addition, there was a 10 day difference to be taken into account, and the solution to this was simply to forget 10 days of the calendar, which as you can imagine, for a mostly illiterate population, felt a little bit like losing 10 days of your life.
And if your birthday happened to fall in one of those 10 days, it must have felt as if you had been deprived of an entire year of your life.
And so, whilst we cope with this simple daylight saving means of adjusting our clocks, spare a moment for those mediaeval folk, who must have pondered hard as to the way in which they were being dealt with by the church, and all for the sake of calculations concerning which they would have found mystifying.
But there is something of poetic beauty in the way in which time has been distilled from an observation of the way in which the Earth moves in space, in the context of our solar system.
And although time is a particularly human means of making sense of things, it is ultimately something outside of ourselves, and immutable.
Friday, 21 March 2014
How well do you speak Klingon?
I don’t often use this blog to talk about my dreams. In the specific sense of what I have been dreaming about.
But last night, I had a dream. One that I find of sufficient interest to want to write about.
They say that sometimes in your dreams you can process ideas that you might otherwise have missed in your conscious waking life.
This perhaps constitutes one such example.
Quite simply, at some point in my dream, I think I woke up, or perhaps at least had a moment of conscious self awareness.
Enough to be able to remember my dream, and to smile at the thought of it.
Quite simply, in my dream, I was reading a lengthy article in some respectable newspaper which was all about the potential to develop communication with an alien race.
And the entire article was written in Klingon.
Now, I first want to make it clear that I do not speak Klingon.
Most of you will know that Klingon is an invented language, created for the purpose of pursuing an unhealthy interest in the Star Trek series.
I haven’t bothered to research Klingon using the Internet, although it would be a fair guess that it would be possible to discover an entire community of people that spend much time spreading understanding and knowledge of Klingon.
But, I am not one of them.
Although I did find it very funny, and interesting, that in the film Paul, the two young men travelling to America for a comic convention were able to speak fluent Klingon.
They were deluded in thinking that this language might be a useful means of communicating when they do not wish anyone else in earshot to understand what they are communicating about.
Since they have just met Paul, the little green alien in the title of the film, one of them uses his Klingon to be able to suggest that they overpower the alien.
Paul, however, asks if those words being spoken are in fact Klingon.
The idea that Paul is actually an alien, and that he is a danger to either of them, becomes quite farcical when it is realised that he recognises Klingon.
And all that this knowledge arouses in him is confirmation that the rescuers that have picked him up our complete nerds.
Now I am a fan of the new Star Trek films, that have given new life to this old idea.
Into the dark, released in 2013, is an exciting rebirth of the Star Trek film series.
But the idea that Klingon might hold some kind of key to alien languages, and that an interesting article in Klingon might be written for a serious newspaper, is in itself entering the realms of farce.
But as in most intense dreams, I read this article with interest, clearly making some sense of this strange language, and being interested in what was being communicated.
I do not recall anything exact of what was being communicated, and my only residual memory is that I was amused at the context of what I had been doing. Reading an article written in Klingon.
And hence this blog entry.
The conclusion of which is I think simply to be amazed at the possibilities in dreaming.
And part of me is simply relieved that I can have such lucid dreams, in spite of the fact that I have multiple sclerosis, and that although physically I am unable to explore the world, I can still travel to extraordinary places in my dreams.
Long may it still continue.
But last night, I had a dream. One that I find of sufficient interest to want to write about.
They say that sometimes in your dreams you can process ideas that you might otherwise have missed in your conscious waking life.
This perhaps constitutes one such example.
Quite simply, at some point in my dream, I think I woke up, or perhaps at least had a moment of conscious self awareness.
Enough to be able to remember my dream, and to smile at the thought of it.
Quite simply, in my dream, I was reading a lengthy article in some respectable newspaper which was all about the potential to develop communication with an alien race.
And the entire article was written in Klingon.
Now, I first want to make it clear that I do not speak Klingon.
Most of you will know that Klingon is an invented language, created for the purpose of pursuing an unhealthy interest in the Star Trek series.
I haven’t bothered to research Klingon using the Internet, although it would be a fair guess that it would be possible to discover an entire community of people that spend much time spreading understanding and knowledge of Klingon.
But, I am not one of them.
Although I did find it very funny, and interesting, that in the film Paul, the two young men travelling to America for a comic convention were able to speak fluent Klingon.
They were deluded in thinking that this language might be a useful means of communicating when they do not wish anyone else in earshot to understand what they are communicating about.
Since they have just met Paul, the little green alien in the title of the film, one of them uses his Klingon to be able to suggest that they overpower the alien.
Paul, however, asks if those words being spoken are in fact Klingon.
The idea that Paul is actually an alien, and that he is a danger to either of them, becomes quite farcical when it is realised that he recognises Klingon.
And all that this knowledge arouses in him is confirmation that the rescuers that have picked him up our complete nerds.
Now I am a fan of the new Star Trek films, that have given new life to this old idea.
Into the dark, released in 2013, is an exciting rebirth of the Star Trek film series.
But the idea that Klingon might hold some kind of key to alien languages, and that an interesting article in Klingon might be written for a serious newspaper, is in itself entering the realms of farce.
But as in most intense dreams, I read this article with interest, clearly making some sense of this strange language, and being interested in what was being communicated.
I do not recall anything exact of what was being communicated, and my only residual memory is that I was amused at the context of what I had been doing. Reading an article written in Klingon.
And hence this blog entry.
The conclusion of which is I think simply to be amazed at the possibilities in dreaming.
And part of me is simply relieved that I can have such lucid dreams, in spite of the fact that I have multiple sclerosis, and that although physically I am unable to explore the world, I can still travel to extraordinary places in my dreams.
Long may it still continue.
Tuesday, 4 March 2014
The Lady Vanishes (1938)
It strikes me as a particularly relevant that this film by Hitchcock should have been shown recently.
Events in the news have been surprisingly reminiscent of some of the issues raised in this wartime propaganda film, which I found amusingly described on the BBC as a humorous thriller.
It is some measure of the quality of the film that it has been remade, and although I have only seen one of the remade versions, it is just as successful as the original.
Although there are aspects of the original that make it preferable, as ever, over subsequent remakes.
Hitchcock is not terribly well known for his humorous films, but this certainly has its moment of finding humour in the way that it pokes fun at two cricket obsessives.
But humour that is balanced perfectly with the deportment of those two otherwise laughable characters when confronted with danger.
This is as much part of the critical message of the film, in the same way that the ‘pacifist’ that is killed by a ruthless foe makes it clear that this is not the way of dealing with such an enemy.
That the vanished lady is an amiable elderly lady is another aspect in which characters are painted so as to be different from the stereotype.
The subtle message is perhaps that it is important not to underestimate the capacity of those that we might otherwise find humorous.
The McGuffin in this film is the notion that the contents of a secret treaty can be contained in a snatch of music, music that is smuggled out of the country in which the action takes place, and music which then unites Miss Froy with those who in turn have saved her from the clutches of foreign agents.
That it is a love story as well as at turns a spy thriller and a comic portrayal of the English abroad is part of the genius of the director.
Events in the news have been surprisingly reminiscent of some of the issues raised in this wartime propaganda film, which I found amusingly described on the BBC as a humorous thriller.
It is some measure of the quality of the film that it has been remade, and although I have only seen one of the remade versions, it is just as successful as the original.
Although there are aspects of the original that make it preferable, as ever, over subsequent remakes.
Hitchcock is not terribly well known for his humorous films, but this certainly has its moment of finding humour in the way that it pokes fun at two cricket obsessives.
But humour that is balanced perfectly with the deportment of those two otherwise laughable characters when confronted with danger.
This is as much part of the critical message of the film, in the same way that the ‘pacifist’ that is killed by a ruthless foe makes it clear that this is not the way of dealing with such an enemy.
That the vanished lady is an amiable elderly lady is another aspect in which characters are painted so as to be different from the stereotype.
The subtle message is perhaps that it is important not to underestimate the capacity of those that we might otherwise find humorous.
The McGuffin in this film is the notion that the contents of a secret treaty can be contained in a snatch of music, music that is smuggled out of the country in which the action takes place, and music which then unites Miss Froy with those who in turn have saved her from the clutches of foreign agents.
That it is a love story as well as at turns a spy thriller and a comic portrayal of the English abroad is part of the genius of the director.
Wednesday, 5 February 2014
Mathematics in Animals
Some time ago I wrote a blog about how my dog tends to bark in prime numbers.
In the morning when she is let into the garden, she runs the length of her domain and barks as if to reiterate that she is the master of her territory.
It was of course a playful piece, drawing upon the way in which a Hollywood film, Contact, uses the fact that prime numbers do not occur naturally.
However, watching a BBC documentary recently, has reminded me of how shortsighted sometimes we can be when it comes to observing the world around us.
The documentary was about much more than simply the capacity that some animals have for using mathematics.
But it is sobering to realise that something as simple as its a honey bee can measure the angle of the sun in the sky, and communicate through this information the location of food that may ensure the survival of the hive over winter.
It was claimed in the programme that the waggle dance, which is the means by which one bee can communicate to others this information, is hardwired into the genetics of the animal.
This may be so, but it is no less amazing that a simple insect is capable of measuring the angle of the sun in relation to the horizon, and also the distance from the hive, two pieces of information which together are sufficient to locate a source of food.
It is fascinating to become aware of how complex and diverse nature can be, and although the programme was by no means simply about the way in which animals make use of mathematics in their survival.
This revelation was one of many that came about because of the way scientists have been observing complex behaviour in a range of animals.
Though there may not be some arcane significance to my dog barking in prime numbers every morning, it does demonstrate the importance sometimes of paying attention to what we can learn of the world around us beyond ourselves.
In the morning when she is let into the garden, she runs the length of her domain and barks as if to reiterate that she is the master of her territory.
It was of course a playful piece, drawing upon the way in which a Hollywood film, Contact, uses the fact that prime numbers do not occur naturally.
However, watching a BBC documentary recently, has reminded me of how shortsighted sometimes we can be when it comes to observing the world around us.
The documentary was about much more than simply the capacity that some animals have for using mathematics.
But it is sobering to realise that something as simple as its a honey bee can measure the angle of the sun in the sky, and communicate through this information the location of food that may ensure the survival of the hive over winter.
It was claimed in the programme that the waggle dance, which is the means by which one bee can communicate to others this information, is hardwired into the genetics of the animal.
This may be so, but it is no less amazing that a simple insect is capable of measuring the angle of the sun in relation to the horizon, and also the distance from the hive, two pieces of information which together are sufficient to locate a source of food.
It is fascinating to become aware of how complex and diverse nature can be, and although the programme was by no means simply about the way in which animals make use of mathematics in their survival.
This revelation was one of many that came about because of the way scientists have been observing complex behaviour in a range of animals.
Though there may not be some arcane significance to my dog barking in prime numbers every morning, it does demonstrate the importance sometimes of paying attention to what we can learn of the world around us beyond ourselves.
Tuesday, 28 January 2014
The Best And Worst Of Us
Films often explore ethics and morals.
Quite recently, I watched a film that seems to have examined one extreme of what it is to be human.
Looking at the very worst of what we can imagine to be the consequences of our progression as a race. Not wanting to accept the limitations placed upon us by the lives we lead.
The Island is quite a recent film, and supposes that in the near future, techniques of cloning have been developed that enable those with sufficient resources, money, to purchase duplicates of themselves, that can be used for the transplantation of organs, should an accident occur, or disease threaten the life of the ‘sponsor’.
This kind of medical development is not as far-fetched as we might think.
What is interesting about the film is the way in which the cloned ‘property’ is kept unaware of its purpose and fate, as a means of ensuring that the organs contained within the clone have the kind of resilience that millions of years of human evolution have given ‘ordinary’ people.
The ethical issues involved in keeping to protect people alive simply for the purpose of use as spam parts is well presented.
The clones are kept in an isolated location, where the live their lives as innocent childlike beings, convinced that they are the survivors of a contamination that has destroyed the great majority of the human race.
A lottery is used to determine which of the clones might be transported to the mythical island as the film’s title, which is reckoned to be the place from which the Earth will be repopulated by those that have ‘survived’ the calamitous contamination.
But what the businessmen that have created this financially rewarding experiment I have not taken into account is the notion that the clones might develop something of the personalities of the people that they have replicated.
And one particular person, played by our hero, discovers a flying bug, a butterfly, he begins to question what he has been taught to believe without question.
His curiosity leads to him discovering the fate of lottery winners, as they are euthanised after their organs are harvested.
And when someone that he has against the rules become a little too friendly with is chosen for “relocation” to the island, he makes a desperate bid for freedom, and the two of them escape into the outside world, that they expect to be severely contaminated, but isn’t.
With the threat this poses to the business of providing clones that genetically match their ‘owners’, a hunting party is in hot pursuit of these naive escapees.
They head for a modern futuristic Los Angeles, expecting that confronting their sponsors will result in them achieving some kind of safety.
But of course it is not as simple as that.
Our hero interestingly has started to develop the kind of memories that his wealthy sponsor has developed, which means that he inexplicably is able to drive at speed, knows how to operate this kind of high-speed machinery.
It becomes a fight for survival, when his sponsor reports his arrival to the pursuing hunters.
But in an unexpected twist, it is the sponsor that is gunned down, mistaken for the clone, and suddenly the tables are turned on this morally doubtful business.
Since his clone has been destroyed by the pursuing hunters, he is taken back to the facility where the clones are kept isolated from the world, and just as the disreputable business is about to eliminate several generations of product, manages to free the entire population of clones.
The film ends with several hundred naive clones, escaping from the isolated plant where they have been kept and misled their entire brief lives.
It is impossible not to draw parallels with other failed attempts at eugenics, and whilst there is no complete resolution of what happens next, this is not necessary.
It is enough that the failed contravention of everything that is good about humanity has been ended.
Interestingly, the day after having watched this film, I watched a much older film, Accidental Hero, in which a very different perspective on what it is to be ethically and morally human is presented.
In this film, Dustin Hoffman is a small time crook, who by accident of fate saves 54 people from certain death when their aeroplane crashes on its way across America from the west coast.
Dustin Hoffman is an unlikely hero, and he flees the scene of his heroism.
Because one of the people that he has saved is a television journalist, the action takes on a search for the hero of the day.
Through an accidental misplacing of one of his shoes, when the television company offers a reward of $1 million for the identification of the hero, an indigent friend to whom he has given the one shoe that he retained claims the reward.
What follows is a humorous at times series of events, but the end is somehow resolved, when he is able to agree with the mistaken hero that he can blackmail him, ensuring the future education of his young son.
The film finishes with a tantalising moment when the accidental hero is explaining to his young son what really happened, whilst they are both at the zoo.
The film finishes just at the point where a mother has screamed that her daughter has fallen into the Lions enclosure, and father says to son, “watch my shoes”.
Seen together, the two films represent the extraordinary spectrum of possibilities, for human action to be ethical and appropriate, what we might hope of ourselves or others, and what we would wish to be not even conceived as possible.
Quite recently, I watched a film that seems to have examined one extreme of what it is to be human.
Looking at the very worst of what we can imagine to be the consequences of our progression as a race. Not wanting to accept the limitations placed upon us by the lives we lead.
The Island is quite a recent film, and supposes that in the near future, techniques of cloning have been developed that enable those with sufficient resources, money, to purchase duplicates of themselves, that can be used for the transplantation of organs, should an accident occur, or disease threaten the life of the ‘sponsor’.
This kind of medical development is not as far-fetched as we might think.
What is interesting about the film is the way in which the cloned ‘property’ is kept unaware of its purpose and fate, as a means of ensuring that the organs contained within the clone have the kind of resilience that millions of years of human evolution have given ‘ordinary’ people.
The ethical issues involved in keeping to protect people alive simply for the purpose of use as spam parts is well presented.
The clones are kept in an isolated location, where the live their lives as innocent childlike beings, convinced that they are the survivors of a contamination that has destroyed the great majority of the human race.
A lottery is used to determine which of the clones might be transported to the mythical island as the film’s title, which is reckoned to be the place from which the Earth will be repopulated by those that have ‘survived’ the calamitous contamination.
But what the businessmen that have created this financially rewarding experiment I have not taken into account is the notion that the clones might develop something of the personalities of the people that they have replicated.
And one particular person, played by our hero, discovers a flying bug, a butterfly, he begins to question what he has been taught to believe without question.
His curiosity leads to him discovering the fate of lottery winners, as they are euthanised after their organs are harvested.
And when someone that he has against the rules become a little too friendly with is chosen for “relocation” to the island, he makes a desperate bid for freedom, and the two of them escape into the outside world, that they expect to be severely contaminated, but isn’t.
With the threat this poses to the business of providing clones that genetically match their ‘owners’, a hunting party is in hot pursuit of these naive escapees.
They head for a modern futuristic Los Angeles, expecting that confronting their sponsors will result in them achieving some kind of safety.
But of course it is not as simple as that.
Our hero interestingly has started to develop the kind of memories that his wealthy sponsor has developed, which means that he inexplicably is able to drive at speed, knows how to operate this kind of high-speed machinery.
It becomes a fight for survival, when his sponsor reports his arrival to the pursuing hunters.
But in an unexpected twist, it is the sponsor that is gunned down, mistaken for the clone, and suddenly the tables are turned on this morally doubtful business.
Since his clone has been destroyed by the pursuing hunters, he is taken back to the facility where the clones are kept isolated from the world, and just as the disreputable business is about to eliminate several generations of product, manages to free the entire population of clones.
The film ends with several hundred naive clones, escaping from the isolated plant where they have been kept and misled their entire brief lives.
It is impossible not to draw parallels with other failed attempts at eugenics, and whilst there is no complete resolution of what happens next, this is not necessary.
It is enough that the failed contravention of everything that is good about humanity has been ended.
Interestingly, the day after having watched this film, I watched a much older film, Accidental Hero, in which a very different perspective on what it is to be ethically and morally human is presented.
In this film, Dustin Hoffman is a small time crook, who by accident of fate saves 54 people from certain death when their aeroplane crashes on its way across America from the west coast.
Dustin Hoffman is an unlikely hero, and he flees the scene of his heroism.
Because one of the people that he has saved is a television journalist, the action takes on a search for the hero of the day.
Through an accidental misplacing of one of his shoes, when the television company offers a reward of $1 million for the identification of the hero, an indigent friend to whom he has given the one shoe that he retained claims the reward.
What follows is a humorous at times series of events, but the end is somehow resolved, when he is able to agree with the mistaken hero that he can blackmail him, ensuring the future education of his young son.
The film finishes with a tantalising moment when the accidental hero is explaining to his young son what really happened, whilst they are both at the zoo.
The film finishes just at the point where a mother has screamed that her daughter has fallen into the Lions enclosure, and father says to son, “watch my shoes”.
Seen together, the two films represent the extraordinary spectrum of possibilities, for human action to be ethical and appropriate, what we might hope of ourselves or others, and what we would wish to be not even conceived as possible.
Thursday, 23 January 2014
An Excellent Lunch Companion
I recently discovered that a poem I wrote in commemoration of the death of writer Francis King was still available on the PEN website.
English PEN is part of a worldwide network of writers, and the fact that my poem was accepted at all I considered a prestigious honour.
Discovering it is still alive and available for perusal three years after it was written and sent when I had received news of the writers’ recent death at the age of 88.
Francis King was someone that I only met briefly, but I am sure like many, meeting with him has remained in my memory. He was an excellent lunch companion.
Few people can have so many interesting anecdotes drawn mostly from a life well lived.
His circle of friends was extraordinary, and when he mentioned someone that he called Morgan, it took a later gentle reminder that he was talking about EM Forster, a writer that most of us will have heard of, but few will count as close friends.
There is the generational thing, of course. Francis King was of an older generation. A very different generation, in which being homosexual was itself considered criminal.
Impossible for most people to understand in these very different times.
And he moved in a circle where he knew WH Auden, he of the famous funeral poem from Four Weddings and a Funeral.
It is ironic that my life should have crossed with that of Francis when it did, and that I should have even been able to write that poem in honour of his memory.
That it can be viewed on the English PEN website is an added bonus, but it reminds me that I have written many poems in the context of Humanist funerals, some of which are published in my collection, 50 x 50 -Useful Poetry For Troubled Times.
It is not so much that I have a particular fascination for memorial poems, but simply that I had a Humanist Celebrant friend for whom I wrote to order a number of such poetic expressions.
I suppose I had, and still have, the time to be able to respond quickly. Funerals of course are never planned far in advance.
But this is certainly the most prestigious opportunity to have the last word.
My style as a poet lends itself perhaps, unpretentious, and when I worked closely with my humanist celebrant friend, she was grateful to have someone at that could take a simple narrative of someone’s life, and frame it within blank verse, that came across as a poetic expression of those things that had been communicated to me.
This facility of mine became the focus of my application to the Arts Council of England for a small grant. The first and only time that I have received funding from this source for my own work.
I mentioned in the poem I wrote that was simply entitled Francis King CBE that he had been generous enough to have read some of my poetry and commented positively on it, and said that he would write on my behalf to the Arts Council. It was how he himself had started out as an author, in very different times, with the receipt of an award from that body.
But Francis spent most of his long life working for the British Council, often overseas, and he had a particular liking for Japan.
Which was something we could talk about, because I had the good fortune to travel to Japan when I worked as the Development Director for the Scottish Chamber Orchestra.
My week in Japan is one of the highlights of a life that is far more constrained these days, and such travel would simply be impossible these days.
But I am glad to have done it when I could, and in some style too.
It is a simple fact that when you work for a National orchestra, that when you stay abroad, you stay in five-star hotels. And a size star hotel in Japan is quite an experience.
But that lunch with Francis King was an excellent one, and he was an extraordinary raconteur.
Francis King CBE
The family has gathered, the struggle ceased
but sadness should not cloud the day.
Your life must end, but it has been long
and filled with so many friends along the way
who have already sung their song.
I like to think that you will soon be drinking tea
with many of them, Japanese style
- and how you will admire the waiters!
You were kind to me, and read my words
for which I am so grateful. Better still
you said you liked them, and wrote as much
to those that gave you your first start
for which I'm truly humbled.
But then, you are a gentleman, and a nearly-knight
though a sword, in truth, wouldn't suit you quite
for it would clash with your convictions.
The conversations over tea
would be well worth overhearing.
Such a literary gathering it will be
and a library's worth of worthies.
Besides, so many shelves across the world
will keep your memory fresh
for you chose for your profession
one in which death is only the beginning.
English PEN is part of a worldwide network of writers, and the fact that my poem was accepted at all I considered a prestigious honour.
Discovering it is still alive and available for perusal three years after it was written and sent when I had received news of the writers’ recent death at the age of 88.
Francis King was someone that I only met briefly, but I am sure like many, meeting with him has remained in my memory. He was an excellent lunch companion.
Few people can have so many interesting anecdotes drawn mostly from a life well lived.
His circle of friends was extraordinary, and when he mentioned someone that he called Morgan, it took a later gentle reminder that he was talking about EM Forster, a writer that most of us will have heard of, but few will count as close friends.
There is the generational thing, of course. Francis King was of an older generation. A very different generation, in which being homosexual was itself considered criminal.
Impossible for most people to understand in these very different times.
And he moved in a circle where he knew WH Auden, he of the famous funeral poem from Four Weddings and a Funeral.
It is ironic that my life should have crossed with that of Francis when it did, and that I should have even been able to write that poem in honour of his memory.
That it can be viewed on the English PEN website is an added bonus, but it reminds me that I have written many poems in the context of Humanist funerals, some of which are published in my collection, 50 x 50 -Useful Poetry For Troubled Times.
It is not so much that I have a particular fascination for memorial poems, but simply that I had a Humanist Celebrant friend for whom I wrote to order a number of such poetic expressions.
I suppose I had, and still have, the time to be able to respond quickly. Funerals of course are never planned far in advance.
But this is certainly the most prestigious opportunity to have the last word.
My style as a poet lends itself perhaps, unpretentious, and when I worked closely with my humanist celebrant friend, she was grateful to have someone at that could take a simple narrative of someone’s life, and frame it within blank verse, that came across as a poetic expression of those things that had been communicated to me.
This facility of mine became the focus of my application to the Arts Council of England for a small grant. The first and only time that I have received funding from this source for my own work.
I mentioned in the poem I wrote that was simply entitled Francis King CBE that he had been generous enough to have read some of my poetry and commented positively on it, and said that he would write on my behalf to the Arts Council. It was how he himself had started out as an author, in very different times, with the receipt of an award from that body.
But Francis spent most of his long life working for the British Council, often overseas, and he had a particular liking for Japan.
Which was something we could talk about, because I had the good fortune to travel to Japan when I worked as the Development Director for the Scottish Chamber Orchestra.
My week in Japan is one of the highlights of a life that is far more constrained these days, and such travel would simply be impossible these days.
But I am glad to have done it when I could, and in some style too.
It is a simple fact that when you work for a National orchestra, that when you stay abroad, you stay in five-star hotels. And a size star hotel in Japan is quite an experience.
But that lunch with Francis King was an excellent one, and he was an extraordinary raconteur.
Francis King CBE
The family has gathered, the struggle ceased
but sadness should not cloud the day.
Your life must end, but it has been long
and filled with so many friends along the way
who have already sung their song.
I like to think that you will soon be drinking tea
with many of them, Japanese style
- and how you will admire the waiters!
You were kind to me, and read my words
for which I am so grateful. Better still
you said you liked them, and wrote as much
to those that gave you your first start
for which I'm truly humbled.
But then, you are a gentleman, and a nearly-knight
though a sword, in truth, wouldn't suit you quite
for it would clash with your convictions.
The conversations over tea
would be well worth overhearing.
Such a literary gathering it will be
and a library's worth of worthies.
Besides, so many shelves across the world
will keep your memory fresh
for you chose for your profession
one in which death is only the beginning.
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