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It was good to see, and hear, that Bells on Sunday this week came from Crediton, more specifically the Church of the Holy Cross and the Mother of Him who Hung Thereon.
I remember some of the names of the churches when we went to Prague, in the last millennium, such as Our Lady of the Snows but Crediton is not intimidated by such poetry and goes for some syntactical exactitude.
The ringers from Exeter went and did that old party favourite, Cambridge Surprise Maximus. When all else of a fondly imagined old England has finally gone, let there still be Bells on Sunday, with its details of the bells, their tuning and history and well done to John Taylor of Loughborough for making so many of them.
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It was good to see Montaigne keeping up his own good work as he made passing comment on poetry.
I'm sure all his readers like to recognize themselves in Montaigne and think themselves like him because, like Shakespeare, he puts into words what they thought but had ne'er so well expressed.
We can't be sure that he quite lived up to all his ideals but he is modest in his claims for how well he succeeds and they aren't really 'ideals' as much as ways to live, sensible and sceptical of others. While the essays might be full of him, he's not 'full of himself' and I can only join in the chorus of approval that comes from everybody, it seems, who has read him.
What he says about poetry is that it's a 'frivolous, subtle art, all disguise and chatter and pleasure and show', which is useful to remember when its readers and writers sometimes imagine it to be profound, 'the music of being human' and the deeply meaningful gift bestowed upon only a handful of special people. It isn't really that, is it. Not most of the time.
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But it was good to see the Thom Gunn book grow to 1250 words.
It is my second attempt at such a thing, the first having been twenty years ago. It's a retirement project, really, but one must make a start or perhaps one never will.
It hasn't got a title but it has got a plan. Having read Ian Sansom's work of fan appreciation about Auden last year, September 1, 1939, I thought I could do that about Gunn. So I'm giving it a go. There's no saying how long it will be before I realize it's beyond me.
I suppose it's 3/1 that I'll soldier on and finish it, 10/1 that I'll be satisfied with it and make it available and 33/1 that I'll be so pleased with it that I'll show it to a publisher who agrees with me and it sees print.
In the meantime, I have something to say I'm working on.
The Ted Hughes evening went very well with the good people of Portsmouth Poetry Society last week and, as often happens, I came back with an improved opinion of the subject under discussion having seen what others appreciated about it, which is always a Good Thing To See.
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It was good to see the arrival of the John Eliot Gardiner L'incoronazione di Poppea having heard this devastating final love duet on the wireless,
except that Monteverdi operas are not quite as full of highlights as those of Mozart or Puccini. While the music is a very pleasant accompaniment to reading, it distracts one not very often. I should have known that from when I saw Il ritorno d'Ulisse in Patria, which tells the long story before giving you a tune at the end. Monteverdi is a fine thing at his best and undeserving of the comparison I'm going to make. It's called 'Lost in Translation' Syndrome in which one sits through an hour and a half of inconsequential film before it inexplicably finishes with a Jesus & Mary Chain track.
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It was good to see the faces of various real people incorporated into the architecture of Chichester Cathedral last week, having previously been introduced to Doug, who is one of them, aged 93 and the only person still living to have been so honoured. He was in charge of Works there for thirty years. I can't be sure that he's any of the three in this picture.
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And finally, it will be good to see the arrival of John Carey's A Little History of Poetry that Amazon e-mailed to say would arrive today but as yet hasn't. But it usually does if they say it will.
86 this year, John Carey is the doyen of doyen literary commentators - I try to avoid the overtones of the word 'critic'- and famous for the essential book on Donne, Life, Mind and Art, as well as his less essential opinion of Bob Dylan as a poet. I'm sure his book, however little, will raise big questions and I'm looking forward to it. It might be reviewed here by Friday if it's short enough and it rains sufficiently to keep me happily excused from outdoors.
Because it's good to see exactly what I want of a week off. Cheltenham on the telly, the music library at hand, the books throughout with Montaigne, Rilke and Graham Swift's essays close by, the one to write on the computer, where the chess set also is. It reflects what Montaigne says about his library although he is sensible enough to warn that one does need to get out a bit, too.
