tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-40702346997248864782024-03-29T05:26:32.866-07:00Index Reruma blog about books, book-collecting, William Blake, and lots of other thingsKerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.comBlogger70125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-59755401970875501482024-01-18T07:37:00.000-08:002024-03-27T15:48:55.137-07:00George Whitefield, the Moravians, and “Andrew the Negro boy”A version of this paper was presented to the Bethlehem Conference on Moravian History & Music in Bethlehem PA in October 2010. It was my second attempt at a Bethlehem Conference paper; I had tried to get to the history conference of 2008, but a broken ankle kept me away. On that earlier occasion a paper on Moravians and Swedenborgians in 18th-century London was read on my behalf by Lorraine Parsons, archivist to the Moravian Church Centre in Muswell Hill. The 2008 paper was later published in a collection of essays issued by the Swedenborgian Society in London. It, coincidentally, incorporates some account of the Moravian minister Francis Okely, also referred to in the following.<br /><br />This second conference paper represents a first tentative exploration of the vexed issue of George Whitefield and the Moravians. It examines an incident in the career of the evangelist George Whitefield, the eighteenth century’s most sensational preacher—the incident of “Andrew the Negro boy” and the Moravian Church. (On his return to England from the American colonies in 1742, Whitefield brought with him a twelve-year old black boy, Andrew, whom he left with the Moravians to bring up and educate until Andrew was twenty-one. “Negro” was the term most often used by Whitefield in speaking of enslaved blacks. In this paper it is employed only within the context of his and his contemporaries’ discourses.)<br /><br /><a name='more'></a>The story casts light on Whitefield’s own attitude to slavery and on the changing roles of Christian churches in complicity with and opposition to slavery—but also can be read as part of the history of the Moravian Church in Fetter Lane in relation to the African Diaspora—and ultimately to Zinzendorf’s conception of “First Fruits”—that there were a few special individuals in every land who were eagerly waiting for the gospel and would accept it readily. Such was Andrew.<br /><br />The paper explores Whitefield’s motives in entrusting “Andrew the Negro Boy” to Moravian care, expands on previous accounts, and shows how this relates to other episodes in Whitefield’s relationship with the Moravian Church before the decisive violent break following the publication of his Expostulatory Letter of 1753. In addition to my text presented in Bethlehem PA, I have added comments (<i>Scholia</i>) not explored on that occasion and a biographical listing (<i>Prosopography</i>) of persons mentioned in the text.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br />George Whitefield was born on 16 December 1714 at The Bell Inn, Gloucester, the youngest child of Thomas Whitefield, proprietor of the inn, and his wife Elizabeth. In November 1732, Whitefield became a student at Pembroke College, Oxford, and through a fellow student, Charles Wesley, joined the “Holy Club”, a group practising lengthy devotions, and meticulous self-examination, led by Charles’s elder brother John. Whitefield himself took on the leadership of the Oxford Holy Club in March 1736, when the Wesleys departed for Georgia.<br /><br />George Whitefield’s friendship with the future Moravian leader James Hutton began when they were both in their early twenties. In 1735 Hutton had met the Wesleys, was “awakened” by them, and, being unable (since he was then still a journeyman-apprentice) to accompany them to Georgia, saw them off at Gravesend. Hutton read the journal which John Wesley sent to the Methodist religious societies and collected money for the poor. When Hutton established himself as a bookseller with a shop at the Bible and Sun in Wild Street, London it was only natural for Whitefield to publish through his friend’s shop, and to visit the new Christian fellowship group with premises at Fetter Lane (his own bookshop being too small for the intended meetings) that Hutton had established in 1736. <br /><br />Whitefield’s earliest surviving letter to Hutton is dated October 15th 1736:<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">At length I have gotten a little leisure to return d[<i>ea</i>]r Mr Hutton my hearty thanks for his last kind letter particularly for the excellent advice therein contained, w[<i>hi</i>]ch I hope through divine Grace I shall endeavour to follow.</blockquote>This, I think, is the only occasion on which Whitefield writes of taking someone else’s advice. In subsequent letters to Hutton, he hands it out.<br /><br />Whitefield had been ordained deacon on 20 June 1736 in Gloucester Cathedral by the bishop, Martin Benson. Most of 1737 was devoted to preaching charity sermons for Georgia; he collected £1,000 for English charity schools and £300 for Georgia. In his first publication--his subsequently most widely distributed sermon, <i>The Nature and Necessity of our New Birth in Christ Jesus</i> (published of course by James Hutton)—he castigated fellow clerics for presenting only “the shell and shadow of religion”.<br /><br />Even when the Fetter Lane Society had taken a decidedly Moravian turn, Whitefield continued to attend meetings and occasionally preached at Fetter Lane before his own departure for America. It was at Fetter Lane that on 1 May 1738 Peter Böhler established a Moravian-style band, Hutton being one of nine founder members.<br /><br />Whitefield had sailed for Georgia in February 1738. To promote and finance his work, Whitefield had already began publishing journals of his ministry, and seven volumes appeared from 1737 to 1741 with Hutton as publisher. As in England, he aimed attacks at Anglican clergymen, publicly portraying them as God’s persecutors. He told Americans that the bishop of London, Edmund Gibson, knew “no … more of Christianity, than Mahaomet, or an Infidel”. In Charleston, South Carolina, the bishop of London’s commissary, Alexander Garden, determined to put a stop to “the fascinating Gibberish of Young Geo”. When Garden suspended him from the Anglican Ministry, Whitefield published a letter attacking all of South Carolina’s clergy, for which he was arrested and granted bail; to colonial clerics, he became “the Noisie Mr. Whitefield”.<br /><br />When Whitefield arrived in Georgia in May 1738, he secured the trustees’ approval and energetically solicited funds for an orphanage. His inspiration was the Halle Orphanage in Germany—the powerhouse of German pietism. (Missions both in Europe and abroad were supported by the resources Halle generated.)<br /><br />He returned to England after four months in Georgia. Bishop Benson ordained Whitefield priest on 14 January 1739, but later wrote to caution against his acting contrary to the purpose of that ordination: to undertake settled service in a Georgia parish. Rejecting any ecclesiastical authority restricting his actions, Whitefield, six weeks after his ordination, declared that “the whole world is now my parish”. (This apparently antedates by a month John Wesley’s similar statement.)<br /><br />Whitefield’s plan for a Georgia orphanage was central to his preaching, and the basis of his fundraising. On 25 March 1740, he laid the first brick for what he called Bethesda, ten miles from Savannah. But when the Georgia trustees asked Whitefield to submit financial accounts, he replied that he would never feel obliged to do so. One of the Georgia trustees’ objections to his control of Bethesda was that “a wrong Method” was taken with the children who “are often kept praying and crying all the Night”.<br /><br />Whitefield took an energetic role with children. During the 1738 crossing, he beat a four-year-old boy until he recited the Lord’s Prayer:<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Last Night, going between Decks, as I do every Night, to visit the Sick, and examine my People, I asked one of the Women to bid her little Boy, that stood by her, say his Prayers: She answer’d, his elder sister would, but she could not make him. Upon this, I bid the Child kneel down before me, but he would not, till I took hold of his Feet, and forc’d him down. I then bid him say the Lord’s Prayer, being informed by his Mother, he could say it if he would; but he obstinately refused, till at last, after I had given him several Blows, he said his Prayers as well as I could expect.</blockquote><br />His preaching made Whitefield the most famous person in America, but he faced serious difficulties upon his return to England in March 1741. He was more than £1,000 in debt for Bethesda. He wrote:<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">As yet we have no Advantage from our Stock, it being a very dry Season last Summer. So that our Cattle of all Kinds have scarce food to eat. But in a Year or two, We hope, by the divine Blessing, to have a considerable Quantity of Fresh Provisions for our Family.<br />As for manuring more Land than the hired Servants and great Boys can manage, I think it is impracticable without a few Negroes. It will in no wise answer the Expence.</blockquote><br />Zeal for Bethesda led to a fateful course of action. Whitefield published in 1740 a criticism of slaves’ treatment in the southern colonies and occasionally preached to slaves. Nevertheless, as early as 1738, Whitefield had called for an end to General Oglethorpe’s and the Georgia trustees’ prohibition of slavery. Within eleven years, Whitefield himself owned slaves at Bethesda. Whitefield saw himself as a model and well-loved slave-owner, providing his slaves with what was just and equal, knowing that he also had a master in heaven. Of his experience during a period of grave sickness, he reports, “The poor negroes crowded round the windows, and expressed a great concern for me. Their master had acquainted them, I believe, that I was their friend”.<br /><br />Meanwhile, Whitefield purchased 5,000 acres, in Pennsylvania, ostensibly to establish a school for black slaves (but also as a bolthole for English Methodists if they faced persecution). In a letter to England Whitefield explained further:<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Pennsylvania seems to be the best Providence for such an undertaking. The negroes meet there with the best usage, and I believe many of my acquaintance will either give me or let me purchase their young slaves at a very easy rate.</blockquote><br />His Journal entry of April 22 [<i>1740</i>] reads:<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">This day I bought five thousand acres of land on the forks of the Delaware, and ordered a large house to be built thereon, for the instruction of these poor creatures. The land I hear is extremely rich … I took up so much because I intend settling some English friends there, when I come next from England. I have called it Nazareth.</blockquote><br />In South Carolina, the Bishop of London’s commissary, Alexander Garden, remained Whitefield’s chief opponent. Garden was opposed to Whitefield’s evangelical fervour, though he too believed that each large plantation should have a black schoolmaster, a slave like those whom he taught, but one trained to read the Bible, to say the catechism by heart, and to use the Book of Common Prayer. Garden hoped to train some slaves, who would then be sent out through the neighbouring parishes to teach the other slaves. In 1740, the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel set aside £1,500 so that he might purchase two slaves and open a school. The schoolhouse was erected in 1743 on the glebe land near the parsonage house in Charleston. Spelling books, Psalters, Bibles, and prayer books were sent over, and soon sixty scholars were at work. The “Negroe School House” was operative for twenty-two years, with slaves serving as teachers under the direction of the rector of St. Philip’s, Charleston. Whitefield’s “negro school” at Nazareth was in some sense a riposte to Garden.<br /><br />It is thus not entirely surprising that when Whitefield returned from a preaching tour of America in March 1742, he brought with him a twelve-year-old slave child, Andrew. The episode is ignored by Whitefield’s biographers, but a brief account is given in Daniel Benham, Memoirs of James Hutton. We find Whitefield united in conference with Spangenburg, Viney, Schlicht, and the English Moravian brethren, apparently on the subject of this black boy, whom he offered to commit to the care of the Brethren to bring up and educate until he was twenty-one. From Paul Peucker’s assiduous research, we learn that Andrew was born 19 February 1730 in Charleston, South Carolina. His father was a carpenter and slave to an Englishman, his mother was baptised.<br /><br />The Fetter Lane Archives include some brief notes about Andrew:<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Mr Whitefield has given A Negro Boy to the Brethren, who is bound to Him till the Boy shall become 21 Years of age, should not some Indenture be? perhaps it is not necessary. Sp[<i>angenberg</i>] will speak to Cennick about this Boy. Whitef[<i>iel</i>]d has left orders with Cennick about Him.</blockquote>Concern for an indenture, that is, a formal written contract, perhaps acknowledging Andrew’s slave status, seems to have been brushed aside. Certainly, nothing of the sort survives nor is mentioned later. Slavery was, it seems, an embarrassing topic some thirty years before Lord Mansfield's judgement in the James Somerset Case established that slavery in England was prohibited under common law tradition. <br /><br />Thus, in June 1742<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">B[<i>rothe</i>]r Spangenberg got this morning a present for the Br[<i>ethre</i>]n from Mr Whitefield namely; his negro boy whom he has given to the Brn to bring up for the Lord and to dispose of him as they shall find fit<br />It would be well if an English Br could go along, to take care of the Negro boy because Br Thiele (who was to take him to Rotterdam) could not talk with him.</blockquote>and <br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Br Bowes goes along with Br Thiele & the Negro-Boy to Herrendyke tomorrow. … Somebody should go to see the Boy Br Cennick offer’d for the Brn perhaps Br Gussenbouer.<br />There is a great Deal in the Physiognomy tho’ a spiritual Judgement is required in it.</blockquote>The reference to Andrew’s physiognomy is striking. The Moravian leader, Zinzendorf, believed that facial expressions reveal the state of our souls and our relationship with Jesus Christ, and in a sermon regarding “The Health of thy Countenance” declared that true Christians should “never be out of countenance”.<br /><br />The boy was committed to the care of Br. Thiele, accompanied by Br. Bowes, who embarked wih him for Heerendijk in the Netherlands. Again the Fetter Lane archive includes some brief notes<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Thursday June 17. [<i>1742</i>] … the Negro Boy has wrote some Strange Letters</blockquote>and<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Tuesday June 22d [<i>1742</i>] … A Letter from the Negroe-Boy to his Mother at Carolina. Teach, dear Lord, thy [<i>illegible</i>] Mystery &c.</blockquote>and <blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">Thursday July 8. [<i>1742</i>] … Several Letters from Andrew the Negro were read.</div></blockquote><div>This, of course, is firm evidence of Andrew’s literacy. But Andrew it seems was to be educated beyond the role of simple catechist envisaged by Alexander Garden for the pupils of the slave-school in South Carolina. Was it Whitefield’s intention that, his education at Marienborn completed, Andrew would return to as a preacher to the slaves? Or a teacher at that “negro school” in Nazareth? Did the Moravians understand and acquiesce with Whitefield’s intentions?<br /><br />Another Fetter Lane diary entry notes that<br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">Friday Jul 30. 1742 … Andrew Reid the negro boy has wrote a L[<i>ette</i>]r to Ockershausen.</div></blockquote><div>This is the only occasion on which he is granted a surname, presumably that of the plantation-owner in South Carolina. (I have found reference to a “Reid Plantation” in South Carolina in the late eighteenth century but not so far in the first decades.)<br /><br />And the last of the sequence <br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">Friday Oct: 1st [<i>1742</i>] … Read a Letter from ye Negro Boy to Ockershousen. D[<i>itt</i>]o from ye same to Spangenberg –</div></blockquote><div>Apparently, none of these letters have survived. Though who knows what may yet turn up in some unexpected Moravian archive.<br /><br />On 3 August 3 1742, Andrew moved from Heerendijk to Marienborn in Saxony, where he was placed in the Kinderanstalt (Children’s House).<br /><br />But in December 1743, Fetter Lane sources reveal:<br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">Mr Whitefield wants to have Andrew the black boy again, he himself going soon to Carolina; and the mother of the boy would be sadly displeased if he should not bring the boy along. He insisted upon the boy’s return from Germany in a very unfriendly manner, he being at present prejudiced against us. It is a great disappointment, he having made a present of the boy to our Church that he should be brought up there ‘till he should be of age, and the boy was not being quite settled, can be quite spoiled.</div></blockquote><div>Then, in January 1744<br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">In the Helpers Conference Br Hutton told us that Mr Whitefield, who has returned to Town, has sent him Word that he has thought better of it & will allow the Negro Boy Andrew to remain longer in Germany.</div></blockquote><div><br />By the end of March 1744, Andrew was seriously ill. The one-time “Cambridge Methodist”, Francis Okely, then in Marienborn, wrote to James Hutton translating “A Letter from Andrew, the black boy in Marienborn, to Br Saalwächter [<i>literally “</i>hall guardian<i>”</i>] the Governour of the School there.”<br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">[<i>recto</i>] I’ll write you a line or two, how it goes with me in my heart, I feel myself very poor, but I feel too that our Saviour is unspeakably nigh to me. When I think of Salvation I can’t express how it is in my heart. I pray the Sav[<i>iou</i>]r that he would be pleased to take me soon to himself. I often think of John ((i e Peter the Black Boy, that was baptized here last Winter by Br Jno Nitschmann, and went to our Savr a few days after)) and I think the Savr will take me also to himself soon: It makes me very glad. I also beg him to let me be baptized soon, if it is time. My dear Saalwächter, entreet the Savr for me that he may soon take me into the Cong[<i>regatio</i>]n above. I often think how when I come to my Savr I’ll put my hand into the Prints of the Nails, and kiss his feet; and I’ll rejoice with the Angels. I often think of Conrad ((Conrad Frey, who went to our Savr very lately)) I’ll kiss him too. I can’t express how it is in my heart I am quite happy, I am always satisfied and chearful. O may the Savr never leave me a poor sick child. Sung, his Eyes, his Mouth, his Side. No 234. Hymn CL.</div></blockquote><div>Okely continues:<br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">D[<i>ea</i>]r Br Hutton, Br F: Marshall put it into my Mind to translate and send you the Letter above, sc it was read at the Children’s Prayer Day here in Marienborn. I dare say it will not be unacceptable to those Brn that know him in [<i>verso</i>] London.</div></blockquote><div>I’ve quoted Andrew’s letter in full. Even mediated through Okely’s translation and interpellations, here indicated in ((brackets)), I think we can still hear Andrew’s voice.<br /><br />When there was no hope of recovery, Andrew was baptised by Johannes von Watteville on 7 August 1744 with the name of Johannes. He died the next day and was buried on 9 August in Marienborn while verses written by Zinzendorf were sung: “O Ihr wunden J<span style="font-size: x-small;">ESU</span>, wo wir drein begraben! Wollt diess schwartze Hüttlein haben.”. A burial hymn in the 1754 English hymnal paraphrases it as “O ye Wounds of Jesus! | Into which we bury; | Take ev’n this frail Corpse quite near ye”, though Zinzendorf, using a curious Pietist metaphor, called Andrew’s remains a little black hut (“diess schwartze Hüttlein”).<br /><br />In March 1745, Whitefield wrote to James Hutton a short letter with news of the Moravian Brethren in Pennsylvania. He concludes:<br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">I rejoice that Andrew went home so happy.</div></blockquote><div>This is almost the last we hear of Andrew.<br /><br />After 1750, the Georgia trustees sanctioned slavery, and Whitefield developed a fulsome defence of the institution, claiming its full scriptural justification. “As for the lawfulness of keeping slaves, I have no doubt”. Over the coming years, he added to his stock of slaves, with preaching tours focused on raising money for that purpose. “Blessed be God for the increase of the negroes.” Whitefield had emerged as perhaps the most energetic, and conspicuous, evangelical defender and practitioner of slavery.<br /><br />On his death in 1770, Whitefield bequeathed sums to friends and family members totalling nearly £1,500. Questions concerning the source of his personal wealth dogged his memory. Bethesda still bore a debt of £1,235, and soon it lay in ruins. Despite the enormous total of £16,000 expended, only 180 children had at various sporadic times been resident since its founding. He willed everything in Georgia to the countess of Huntingdon, including 4,000 acres of land and fifty slaves. Two years after Whitefield’s death, his first biographer, John Gillies, wrote specifically to counter negative images of his ministry, not least concerning financial affairs. There is no mention of Andrew. Of the numerous subsequent biographies, all of them tarred with the brush of hagiography, only Tyerman, in 1876, in a footnote, even acknowledges Andrew’s existence.<br /><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmaRENozlTXjnrVBnNy_BBRwnAuWyeBUl6FjMupnQ1PnZshWC9bUvh-ny33ffNAuGxswkmaBTzX0Xn9sekuzMnkk6Xsj0mFeT5N2tQz_QsvrqbouzArOEMEHolyy5Wyv0CvY-LP6lt79Dp7FNcs4AqI86yxgFl-IjjxOV1EgRI6_EzmFOW9a6W2pnW_VjR/s1376/Haidt_First_Fruits%20(2).jpg"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmaRENozlTXjnrVBnNy_BBRwnAuWyeBUl6FjMupnQ1PnZshWC9bUvh-ny33ffNAuGxswkmaBTzX0Xn9sekuzMnkk6Xsj0mFeT5N2tQz_QsvrqbouzArOEMEHolyy5Wyv0CvY-LP6lt79Dp7FNcs4AqI86yxgFl-IjjxOV1EgRI6_EzmFOW9a6W2pnW_VjR/w640-h416/Haidt_First_Fruits%20(2).jpg" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Johann Valentin Haidt. Erstlingsbild ("The First Fruits"). Evangelische Broedergemeente, Zeist.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Easel Painting, oil on canvas, 1747. 2520 x 3940 mm.</i></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><i>Inscription forming the lower border, from left to right: </i>"Der Mingrel: Thomas Mamucha. Guly von Schamuchie in Persien. Samuel Kajarnak von stra. David. Sam der wilde von Boston. Der Armenier Christian. der [?] Thomas von den Hurons. Gracia.Die Mulattin Cathrin S. Jan mit [?] Rebecca [?] das Zigeuner Mad [?]. Neben dem [?]eyland unter hand. Carmel aus Guinea. Jupiter aus Newyork. Der Bilden-lehrer Johanas. Der Floridaner Francesco. ind. Andreas [?] [?]. A. Maria u. Michelgm. Die Bilwe Hanna von Guinea. Der Caroline Neger Johannes. Der Hottentot Kibbobo. Die Bildin Ruth."</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Andrew was not quite forgotten. On 15 March 1747, news reached Herrnhaag that the Mahican Indian, Johannes (formerly Tschoop), the first of his people to be baptised, had died. Upon hearing this news, Zinzendorf counted “eighteen first fruits from all our heathen nations” that had died and were in heaven with Christ. Whereupon the “painting preacher”, Johann Valentin Haidt, began work on a painting that would become one his best-known pieces of art: the First Fruits or Erstlingsbild. This enormous painting depicts Zinzendorf’s vision of a group of converts from many different nations (including Andrew) standing around the Saviour on his heavenly throne. These were “the first fruits” of Moravian missionary work. “They were purchased from among men and offered as first fruits to God and the Lamb” (R<span style="font-size: x-small;">EVELATIONS</span> 14:4). Haidt could have met Andrew in London in 1742, so it may be a portrait. Andrew’s memory then is preserved by the Moravian church in a few diary entries, a single letter, and a much-copied painting.</div><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br /><b>Scholia</b></div><div><b><br /></b>Whitefield clearly knows and remains in touch with Andrew’s enslaved mother. My assumption is that she is probably one of his slaves and Whitefield’s sexual partner in Georgia where sexual relations with an enslaved woman would not be regarded as adulterous. A century or more later, Harriet Jacobs spells out what had become now established practice:<br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div><div style="text-align: left;">Southern women often marry a man knowing that he is the father of many little slaves. They do not trouble themselves about it. They regard such children as property, as marketable as the pigs on the plantation; and it is seldom that they do not make them aware of this by passing them into the slave-trader's hands as soon as possible, and thus getting them out of their sight.</div></div></blockquote><div><div style="text-align: left;">Whitefield had married a young widow, Elizabeth James, at Capel Martin, Caerphilly, on 14 November 1741. Rather than honeymoon, the newlyweds went off on a preaching tour. For Whitefield, fornication with an enslaved woman was much less of a sin than adultery; and much more easily concealed.</div></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div>In 1743 Elizabeth gave birth to their son John in London. Whitefield was away preaching in Northampton. At John’s baptism at the Moorfields Tabernacle, Whitefield pronounced that John would grow to be a great preacher of the gospel. John, sadly, died in Gloucester aged just 4 months. The Whitefields were to have no further children. The constant travelling took its toll on Elizabeth and she remained in the chapel house in London while Whitefield toured Britain and America. Elizabeth wrote to a friend that she was remaining in London because she had in the previous 16 months suffered four miscarriages. She was to become pregnant yet again, and the pregnancy appears to have reached full term, but the child was stillborn. Elizabeth died on 9 August 1768 after a short illness.<br /><br />One wonders if Elizabeth knew of Whitefield’s liaison with an enslaved woman, or how she reacted when her husband returned from America accompanied by twelve-year old Andrew. Did Andrew replace the lost son for Whitefield himself? Andrew also was intended to be a preacher of the gospel. Though Whitefield seems to have had no great fondness for children.<br /><br />William Blake’s mother, Catherine, joined the Moravians at Fetter Lane in the 1750s. There were effectively three categories of worshippers at Fetter Lane. There were those who came regularly to the Preaching Services; these people were known as the “constant hearers”. Then there were the members of the Fetter Lane Society—the fellowship group which actually predated the formal establishment of the Moravian Church in London. Both John and Charles Wesley had been members of the Fetter Lane Society before they left to establish their separate Methodist movement. Members of the Society could also request individual one-to-one spiritual counselling—there’s a note in one of the church diaries of Catherine doing precisely that. It was an intense experience which would often lead to a wish for a closer association. Catherine, Blake’s mother, was allowed full communicating membership in the Moravian church, the “Congregation of the Lamb” in November 1750.<br /><br />Catherine’s first husband, Thomas Armitage, died in 1751 after which she left the Congregation, and eleven months later married James Blake. They probably remained “constant hearers”. For a year or so she had been part of a Congregation which still vividly remembered Andrew. Later at Lindsey House, the Moravian headquarters in Chelsea, her young son William could have seen Haidt’s painting of the “First Fruits”. Was Andrew, indeed, the “Little Black Boy” of Blake’s <i>Songs</i>? Though the song was written decades later, Andrew’s story fits so well.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br /><b>Prosopography<br /></b><br />Benson, Martin (1689–1752), Oxford Dictionary of National Biography; bishop of Gloucester. In a sermon before the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in February 1740, he highlighted the damage done to the church in America through the lack of a resident episcopate.<br /><br />Blake, Catherine (1725?-1792), Moravian sister. Born the daughter of Gervas Wright and his wife Mary, in Walkeringham, Nottinghamshire. Married a hosier Thomas Armitage in London in 1746. Thomas died November 1751. She married another hosier James Blake in 1752 and her son William was born in 1757, the third of the five children of James and Catherine Blake.<br /><br />Blake, William (1757-1828), OxfordDNB; engraver, artist, and poet. Still under discussion is the extent to which his Songs may have been influenced by the Moravian hymns Blake would have learned from his mother.<br /><br />Böhler, Peter (1712-1775); superintendent of the Moravian Church in England from 1747 to 1753, bishop of the church from 1748.<br /><br />Bowes, George (d. 1757); Moravian brother. Accompanied Andrew to the Netherlands. Died 10 January 1757. Buried 17 January 1757 at Sharon, the Moravian burying ground in Chelsea.<br /><br />Cennick, John (1718–1755), OxfordDNB; lay preacher and Moravian minister of Bohemian descent, served the Methodist movement and the Moravian Church in England and Ireland. By the time of his death at age thirty-six, he had helped establish more than forty churches.<br /><br />Frey, Conrad (d. 1744); Andrew’s fellow student at the Marienborn school.<br /><br />Gussenbauer, John Balthasar (1711-1789); Moravian brother, Viney’s brother-in-law.<br /><br />Garden, Alexander (1685-1756); Anglican clergyman and rector of the most important parish in Charleston from 1724 to 1754. His encounter with Whitefield's evangelicalism in the early I740s led to sometimes vitriolic exchanges between Garden and Whitefield.<br /><br />Gibson, Edmund (bap. 1669, d. 1748), OxfordDNB; bishop of London.<br /><br />Haidt, Johann Valentin, otherwise John Valentine Haidt (1700-1780), Moravian artist, painter of portraits and religious subjects. Grew up in Berlin where his father was court goldsmith. Studied at Berlin Academy and travelled widely in Europe. Joined the Moravian Church in London about 1725 (the German-speaking congregation) and in 1754 went to America to join the Moravian community at Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.</div><div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglNk7RbjbR4nl0dw54wyokIo8RykPudTXpPtG5L-IWIo0FCHeRkcGHHxZEPuTKr1kcXU1P_gPYWQYm1JPzRJX5gZKHa8gETDd65lPsCp8EXdIbrswJEtuBVccp4lf4GS4CSDkrLjabXB0rVhrKPZck9LzNZdBW6baPoRgj98TXO5YnVoDz5dQf_z8s7ZML/s1252/Huntingdon.jpg"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglNk7RbjbR4nl0dw54wyokIo8RykPudTXpPtG5L-IWIo0FCHeRkcGHHxZEPuTKr1kcXU1P_gPYWQYm1JPzRJX5gZKHa8gETDd65lPsCp8EXdIbrswJEtuBVccp4lf4GS4CSDkrLjabXB0rVhrKPZck9LzNZdBW6baPoRgj98TXO5YnVoDz5dQf_z8s7ZML/w222-h320/Huntingdon.jpg" width="222" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><i><div style="text-align: center;"><i>The Right Hon.ble Selina Countess Dowager of Huntindon Engraved for the </i>Gospel Magazine</div></i><i><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Publish’d as the Act directs, by Vallance & Simmons No 120 Cheapside July 1776. </i><i>Engraving, platemark 145 x 100 mm</i></div></i><i><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Anonymous engraving derived from a painting by John Russell (1745-1806).</i></div></i></div><div><br />Hastings, Selina, countess of Huntingdon (1707–1791), OxfordDNB; founder of the Countess of Huntingdon's Connexion, her own society of preachers, and known for her philanthropic support of the Evangelical Revival. After an initially close relationship with John Wesley, she moved towards the ideas of George Whitefield before his departure for America in 1751. She provided funds for the establishment of sixty-four chapels, missionary work in America, and Trefeca College, the first Methodist theological college. In 1783 the rigidly Calvinistic Countess of Huntingdon's Connexion was formed when several Trevecca students were ordained. Left fifty slaves in George Whitefield’s will, which she subsequently added to. In her final years she was sceptical about further work in England and was concentrating on sending a mission to the South Seas.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLDwk6s-FOYei0_IkkLWfXnNmoBGBvhcw9n0M0y1qmcEe15zg5F8U-H1YR0eeU0OKYEHz9csHQi4B5kP20woNb9MCHOPPLfTEHTI6vloPH9lzry3_PbTbWx1H6rUmWkhpTELjhJpbNxhIFVP2PbRu7UGYqkeBQhROKd_YP3NogaBMk0_AVwANhIZSPeHff/s800/James-Hutton.jpg"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLDwk6s-FOYei0_IkkLWfXnNmoBGBvhcw9n0M0y1qmcEe15zg5F8U-H1YR0eeU0OKYEHz9csHQi4B5kP20woNb9MCHOPPLfTEHTI6vloPH9lzry3_PbTbWx1H6rUmWkhpTELjhJpbNxhIFVP2PbRu7UGYqkeBQhROKd_YP3NogaBMk0_AVwANhIZSPeHff/w237-h320/James-Hutton.jpg" width="237" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><i>James Hutton </i><i>by and published by John Raphael Smith, and published by John Stockdale, after Richard Cosway; </i><i>mezzotint, published 22 February 1786; </i><i>382 x 277 mm plate size; 404 x 297 mm paper size. National Portrait Gallery.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><br /></i></div><div><div><div><div>Hutton, James (1715–1795), OxfordDNB; Moravian minister and bookseller. Publisher and friend of Whitefield.</div><br />Marshall, Frederic William (1721–1802), senior civilis (administrator) of the Moravian church. Born in Germany, his given name was Friedrich Wilhelm von Marschall. Frederic Marshall joined the Unity of the Brethren (Moravian church) in 1739, and travelled to Holland and England in the service of the church. Marshall assisted in negotiations with the English Parliament, culminating in the Act of 1749 which encouraged Moravians to settle in the American colonies.<br /><br />Ockershausen, John (1710-1777); Moravian pastor. We know very little about John Ockershausen's early life. He came to London from Germany, probably in the 1730s, and worked there as a merchant. Like a number of Germans living in London, he was soon drawn to the Fetter Lane Society, eventually becoming the leader of a "band" for some of the younger men.<br /><br />Oglethorpe, James Edward (1696–1785), OxfordDNB; army officer and founder of the colony of Georgia. Opponent of the introduction of slavery into the colony.<br /><br />Okely, Francis (1719–1794), OxfordDNB; Moravian minister and translator of mystical writings.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGWls-C4IjWqjtpTytlac-xM6JpUQSDqiP6huJycRdAdxsyKX3sbrqkwb3do2YCQbseBMBSuNM10XA18Kn2xC8YWSujOJGwlSUMS1-bIM6nU8abTemPQLpfMLIAcUdCOJKmi8gmGb2UFZqBk0EgerNKxyYVwWQOdXeOtMu1R-lBh0kb-psq0E0yafKiuqC/s290/Andrew.jpg"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGWls-C4IjWqjtpTytlac-xM6JpUQSDqiP6huJycRdAdxsyKX3sbrqkwb3do2YCQbseBMBSuNM10XA18Kn2xC8YWSujOJGwlSUMS1-bIM6nU8abTemPQLpfMLIAcUdCOJKmi8gmGb2UFZqBk0EgerNKxyYVwWQOdXeOtMu1R-lBh0kb-psq0E0yafKiuqC/w213-h320/Andrew.jpg" width="213" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><i><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Der Caroline Neger Johannes [i.e. Andrew Reid]. (Detail from Haidt, </i>Erstlingsbild<i>.)</i></div></i></div><div><br /></div><div>Reid, Andrew (1730-1744); “Andrew the Negro Boy”. On his deathbed baptised as Johannes.<br /><br />Schlicht, Ludolph Ernst (1714-1769); Moravian minister, musician, and hymn writer.<br /><br />Spangenberg, August Gottlieb (1704-1792); Moravian bishop. While in England, Spangenberg helped organize the growing Moravian work in London and Yorkshire. He was also involved in a futile attempt to heal the breach between John Wesley and the Moravians. <br /><br />Thiele (fl. 1742); German-speaking Moravian brother. Accompanied Andrew to the Netherlands.<br /><br />Tschoop, or Job, later baptised as Johannes (died 1747); the first of the Mahican Indians in Shekomeko, New York, to be baptised.<br /><br />Viney, Richard (fl. 1742-1748); Moravian brother, later Methodist, staymaker.<br /><br />Watteville, Johannes von, born Johannes Langguth (1718-1788); Moravian bishop, Zinzendorf’s son-in-law, married to Zinzendorf's daughter Benigna. Wattevillle originated the Christingle tradition in 1747 when he gave each child in his church a lighted candle wrapped in a red ribbon with a prayer that said "Lord Jesus, kindle a flame in these dear children's hearts".<br /><br />Wesley, Charles (1707–1788), OxfordDNB; Church of England clergyman and a founder of Methodism. Brother of John.</div><div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1JFbBy8gz5PZ11i-Y98Gwo3DZZ9YoOfN1GBgJJbG1oT21IGaY76V8gvrkHq5n3l43graL_cqYyhqyU6zVcmnhhNd3lhr-w7k_A7e1klEV07FPcyK15gE3_UrCMSvLGlrPkO84N4WM0cUiBhaZUYxP6BJ189tTe25UKXPLn64MyCETn8Hg35HzTnLxCvf3/s1432/Wesley.jpg"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1JFbBy8gz5PZ11i-Y98Gwo3DZZ9YoOfN1GBgJJbG1oT21IGaY76V8gvrkHq5n3l43graL_cqYyhqyU6zVcmnhhNd3lhr-w7k_A7e1klEV07FPcyK15gE3_UrCMSvLGlrPkO84N4WM0cUiBhaZUYxP6BJ189tTe25UKXPLn64MyCETn8Hg35HzTnLxCvf3/s320/Wesley.jpg" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><i><div style="text-align: center;"><i>John Wesley, A.M. </i>European Magazine. <i>W.m Bromley Sculp.t. </i><i>Published by J. Sewell Cornhill April 1; 1971. </i><i>Engraving. 175 x 115 mm.</i></div></i></div><div><br />Wesley, John (1703–1791), OxfordDNB; Church of England clergyman and the founder of the Methodist movement which, under his organisation, grew from the 'Holy Club' of his Oxford friends into a great religious movement. An indefatigable traveller, preacher and writer, Wesley averaged 8,000 miles a year on horseback and gave 15 sermons a week. Wesley expressed his opposition to slavery in a tract, Thoughts upon slavery, of 1744, denouncing slavery as “that execrable sum of all villainies”. Note that in this publication, the citation of Scripture, which dominates most of Wesley's writings, is intentionally muted because a common Biblical justification was made by Whitefield and others in support of the institution of slavery.</div><div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8GuFdhjAVXoeoFWf6r838qTZcwwpmF0ISBXl4EdWj-IB3cKzDyTQJDN6c_FGoSkuaWTs0YmNF1oCA-2WEqYU2xiX0_EQn7abOxQW62a6_XSt6jvj_DgiW7g9vpJGoTzTtNdNqDD3mWdRP9TiXfLNco5-7nrP34xfC8AW53kGdKBJL4HRIjmgHZhUJ5PZV/s2338/Whitefield.jpg"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8GuFdhjAVXoeoFWf6r838qTZcwwpmF0ISBXl4EdWj-IB3cKzDyTQJDN6c_FGoSkuaWTs0YmNF1oCA-2WEqYU2xiX0_EQn7abOxQW62a6_XSt6jvj_DgiW7g9vpJGoTzTtNdNqDD3mWdRP9TiXfLNco5-7nrP34xfC8AW53kGdKBJL4HRIjmgHZhUJ5PZV/s320/Whitefield.jpg" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><i><div style="text-align: center;"><i>The Reverend Mr. George Whitfield. A.M. Chaplain to the Countess of Huntingdon. [</i>Detail<i>]. </i><i>N.Hone pinx.t Carington Bowles Excudt. J. Greenwoood Fecit. </i><i>London Published as the Act diects July 1st, 1769. Printed for carington Bowles, No.69. St .Paul’s Church Yard. </i><i>Mezzotint. 350 x 250 mm.</i></div></i></div><div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>Whitefield, George (1714–1770), OxfordDNB; Calvinistic Methodist leader. In his adult life he was as famous as any man in the English-speaking world. From his early twenties he was the foremost figure in a religious movement that swept Britain and its thirteen North American colonies, the Great Awakening.<br /><br />Zinzendorf, Nikolaus Ludwig, Graf von (1700-1760); German religious and social reformer, bishop of the Moravian Church, founder of the Herrnhuter Brüdergemeine, Christian mission pioneer and a major figure of 18th-century Protestantism. John Wesley travelled to Germany to meet Zinzendorf and to observe his community at Marienborn.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br /><b>Sources and Further Reading<br /></b><br />Daniel Benham.—Memoirs of James Hutton : comprising the Annals of his Life and Connection with the United Brethren Daniel Benham.—London : Hamilton, Adams, 1856.<br /><br />Kenneth Coleman, ed.—The colonial records of the state of Georgia, 30 : Trustees' letter book, 1738–45.—Athens GA : University of Georgia Press, 1985.<br /><br />A Collection of Hymns of the Children of God in All Ages, From the Beginning till Now. In Two Parts. Designed Chiefly for The Use of The Congregations in Union With The Brethren’s Church … --London Printed; And to be had at all the Brethren’s Chapels, M DCC LIV.<br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">Compiled and edited by John Gambold.</div></blockquote><div><br />Frederick Dalcho.—An historical account of the Protestant Episcopal Church in South Carolina.—Charleston : published by E. Thaer, 1820.<br /><br />Arnold Dallimore.—George Whitefield: the life and times of the great evangelist of the eighteenth-century revival.—2 vols.—Edinburgh : Banner of Truth trust, 1970-1980.<br /><br />Keri Davies.—"‘The Swedishman at Brother Brockmer’s’: Moravians and Swedenborgians in eighteenth-century London” in Stephen McNeilly, ed.—Philosophy, Literature, Mysticism: an anthology of essays on the thought and influence of Emanuel Swedenborg.—London : Swedenborg Society, 2013.<br /><br />John Gillies.—Memoirs of the life of the Reverend George Whitefield, MA.—London, 1772.<br /><br />Timothy D. Hall.—Contested Boundaries: Itinerancy and the Reshaping of the Colonial American Religious World.—Durham NC : Duke University Press, 1994.<br /><br />Leon O. Hynson.—“Wesley's 'Thoughts upon Slavery': a Declaration of Human Rights”.—Methodist History, vol. 33 no 1 (October 1994).<br /><br />Harriet Jacobs.—Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. Written by Herself. Boston, MA. 1861.<br /><br />William Howland Kenney, III.—“George Whitefield, Dissenter Priest of the Great Awakening, 1739–1741”.—William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd series, 26 (1969).<br /><br />Roger H. Martin.—"John Ockershausen's Ockbrook Diary: The First Three Years of a Derbyshire Moravian Community 1750-1753”.— Transactions of the Moravian Historical Society , 1996, Vol. 29 (1996),<br /><br />Moravian Church Archive and Library.—Archives Book (AB), Folder 14: Letters (53) from George Whitefield, 1736-1749.<br /><br />Moravian Church Archive and Library.—Archives Book (AB), Folder 15: Francis and John Okely (13 items), Letters and copies of letters:.<br /><br />Moravian Church Archive and Library.—C/36/11/1: Daily Helpers Conference Minute Book, 29 April 1742—24 August 1742.<br /><br />Moravian Church Archive and Library.—C/36/11/4: Helpers Conference Minute Book, 19 September 1743—11 October 1744.<br /><br />Moravian Church Archive and Library.—C/36/14/2 : Labourers Conference Minute Book, 10 January 1744—23 January 1751<br /><br />Moravian Church Archive and Library.—Daniel Benham: Collections respecting James Hutton 1856. MS notes. 2 vols.<br /><br />Moravian Church Archive and Library.—Pilgrim House Diary (Provincial), 27 July 1743—30 Oct ’48.<br /><br />Paul Peucker.—“Aus allen Nationen: Nichteuropäer in den deutschen Brüdergemeinen des 18. Jahrhundert”.—Unitas Fratrum (2007).<br /><br />George C. Rogers, Jr.— Charleston in the age of the Pinckneys.—[<i>New ed</i>.].—Columbia SC : University of South Carolina Press, 1980.<br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">Originally published.—Norman IL : University of Oklahoma Press, 1969. </div></blockquote><div><br />Boyd Stanley Schlenther.—"Whitefield, George (1714–1770), Calvinistic Methodist leader”.--Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.--Published online: 23 September 2004.<br /><a href="http;//www.oxforddnb.com">http;//www.oxforddnb.com</a><br /><br />W. Stephens.—A journal of the proceedings in Georgia, 2 vols. (1742).—Vol. 2.<br /><br />Luke Tyerman.—The Life of the Rev. George Whitefield, B.A., of Pembroke College Oxford.—In two volumes.—London : Hodder and Stoughton, MDCCCLXXVI-MDCCCLXXVII.<br /><br />Richard Viney.—“Richard Viney’s Memoranda [Diary] 1744”, Proceedings of the Wesley Historical Society, vols XIII-XV (1921-1926), 122-25, 189-95.<br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">Transcribed and introduced by Marmaduke Riggall.</div></blockquote><div><br />John Wesley.—Thoughts upon slavery.—London : printed by R. Hawes, 1744. <br /><br />George Whitefield.—An account of money received and disbursed for the orphan-house in Georgia.—London : printed by W. Strahan for T. Cooper, 1741.<br /><br />George Whitefield.—An expostulatory letter, addressed to Nicholas Lewis, Count Zinzendorff and Lord Advocate of the Unitas Fratrum.—London : Printed for G. Keith, MDCCLIII [<i>1753</i>].<br /><br />George Whitefield.—George Whitefield's Journals; introduction by Ian Murray.—London : Banner of Truth Trust, 1965.<br /><br />George Whitefield.— A journal of a voyage from Gibraltar to Georgia.—London : T. Cooper, 1738.<br /><br />George Whitefield.—Three letters from the Reverend Mr. G. Whitefield: viz. Letter I. To a friend in London, concerning Archbishop Tillotson. Letter II. To the same, on the same subject. Letter III. To the inhabitants of Maryland, Virginia, North and South-Carolina, concerning their Negroes.—Philadelphia : Printed and sold by B. Franklin, at the new printing-office near the market, M.DCC.XL. [<i>1740</i>].<br /><br />Fred E. Witzig.—Sanctifying Slavery and Politics in South Carolina: The Life of the Reverend Alexander Garden, 1685-1756.—Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2018.<br /><br />Nikolaus Ludwig, Graf von Zinzendorf.—Hauptschriften [<i>von</i>] Nikolaus Ludwig von Zinzendorf Reden in und von Amerika.—G. Olms Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1963.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><div><br /></div><div>My thanks to Ted Ryan and Andrew Tems for their comments on an earlier draft of this blogpost.</div><div><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><div><br /></div></div><div><br /></div></div></div></div>Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-7553990302932319212023-08-23T08:32:00.041-07:002023-09-07T04:05:31.765-07:00Another Engraver in South Molton Street<p>I recently purchased the engraved trade-card of John Claude Nattes, (<i>c</i> 1765-1839), topographical draughtsman, drawing master, print dealer, and occasional print-maker, who lived in South Molton Street from <i>c</i> 1787 to some time after 1795. The card shows a monument with two hooded figures on top flanking a group of art-related objects including a palette and brushes, a pyramid behind; trees in the foreground to the left. The plinth of the monument is inscribed "Mr Nattes, 49 South Molton Strt.".</p><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5yEga90__d8jJkLPKvPrAKjtfqMtXINCPRH5YSubwxMaFeQM0Sp0sXeTQ6zxzPT_q9LQMXteY6xlzo5k5jdVfk0BxNs78z9_cSa8ZlwQ7JL4jGia6X7dsfvK6DwbsAycj_RUUooHPB-nTCiXg-Xu3ThUa48iJHHiGCFmE5GHZZOb_vwrc74MOsW8Oc10X/s633/Nattes_trade-card.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="396" data-original-width="633" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5yEga90__d8jJkLPKvPrAKjtfqMtXINCPRH5YSubwxMaFeQM0Sp0sXeTQ6zxzPT_q9LQMXteY6xlzo5k5jdVfk0BxNs78z9_cSa8ZlwQ7JL4jGia6X7dsfvK6DwbsAycj_RUUooHPB-nTCiXg-Xu3ThUa48iJHHiGCFmE5GHZZOb_vwrc74MOsW8Oc10X/s320/Nattes_trade-card.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The card has been trimmed to the image (50 x 79 mm.) but other copies now in the British Museum supply an imprint: "C.N. [i.e. <i>Claude Nattes</i>] del.<span> </span>W. Angus sc.".</div><span><a name='more'></a></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">●</div></div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">John Claude Nattes was one of the most remarkable English watercolourists of the late 18th and early 19th centuries, a talented painter of the landscapes of England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and Northern France. He was a pupil of the Irish landscape painter Hugh Primrose Dean and exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1781, when he was sixteen, to 1814. Joseph Farington noted (diary entry for 31 July 1797) that he was a Frenchman and that he had been a servant of Dean's at Rome.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"> </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">The date and place of birth of John Claude Nattes however remain unknown. (Alexander's suggestion that he was Jean Naty, born 9 October 1765, at Beaulon, Allier, France, the son of Claude Naty and Jeanne Dessauges is refuted by the death of Jean Naty with the same parents, 21 May 1766.)</div></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Trade-cards in the British Museum (Heal,56.10 and Banks,56.17) advertise "Monsieur Nattes No.41 Charles Street, Westminster. Pupil of Mr. Dean, respectfully acquaints the Nobility & Gentry that he teaches Drawing in the manner of that celebrated Master, on moderate terms, he also teaches Perspective so very essential in taking Local Views. Monsieur Nattes likewise continues to decorate Drawings & Prints in the most elegant manner & has a very superior method of fixing or binding Drawings in Chalks or Lead to prevent them from being Effaced." </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"></div></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Nattes exhibited regularly at the Royal Academy, initially from 41 Charles Street, Westminster, then Parliament Street, and from 1787 at 49 South Molton Street, off Oxford Street. It is unclear when he left South Molton Street. He was certainly still occupying property there in 1797 despite recording other addresses at 14 Queens Buildings, Knightsbridge, in 1795 and 92 New Bond Street in 1797.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">In 1789 he was commissioned by Sir Joseph Banks to record the buildings of Lincolnshire in</div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i>A Collection of Views of the Seats of the Nobility and Gentry of Castles Churches and Chapels The Ruins of Ancient Buildings and other objects within the County of Lincoln Executed at the latter end of the Eighteenth Century by Claude Nattes & others Artists under the superintendence of Sir Jos: Banks The whole Alphabetically arranged according to the Names of their respective Parishes in Four Volumes.</i></div></blockquote><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The set of some 700 drawings was completed in 1805 and is now housed in Lincolnshire Archives. The Archives also hold a few etchings of Lincolnshire buildings prepared by Nattes.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglX1pbFvJkwvPS01mn5ZtK2nUNKBLMEAa872Kr53rYDCJ2GOiRknfTu6t7IODif7LhOL9YFAPE2zUjRCpUv9QgPPbrbaM_B3Ii9ihU-rMWxdTm-FneYbhlBD0nZ1qXz33JDw9kRC49dSUN_ayHWlw7YPpwFO3h6Vht1kqxx1IPK94pUDnffui3JZopZmD0/s999/Nattes_Revesby_Abbey.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="634" data-original-width="999" height="254" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglX1pbFvJkwvPS01mn5ZtK2nUNKBLMEAa872Kr53rYDCJ2GOiRknfTu6t7IODif7LhOL9YFAPE2zUjRCpUv9QgPPbrbaM_B3Ii9ihU-rMWxdTm-FneYbhlBD0nZ1qXz33JDw9kRC49dSUN_ayHWlw7YPpwFO3h6Vht1kqxx1IPK94pUDnffui3JZopZmD0/w400-h254/Nattes_Revesby_Abbey.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i>(Revesby Abbey, Lincolnshire, by Nattes for Joseph Banks.)</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">He was married from his South Molton Street address to Sarah Barber, by Licence at Saint Botolph Bishopsgate, in the City of London, on 30 March 1793 . They had two children during their marriage: Charles Claude Nattes, born 13 January 1794, and John William Nattes, born 1796. His last recorded address was at Welbeck Street, Cavendish Square. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Following the Treaty of Amiens (1802) he was able to make frequent visits to France preparing a series of large French views, eventually published as <i>Versailles, Paris, et Saint Denis; ou une Suite de Vuës d'apres des desseins par J. C. Nattes, pour servir à l'illustration de la capitale de France et des environs. Avec une description historique</i> (Londres, 1806?).</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Nattes was a founding member of the Old Watercolour Society, artists who seceded from the Royal Academy in 1804 where they felt that their work commanded insufficient respect and attention. The society was originally the Society of Painters in Water Colours, founded by William Frederick Wells, and its original membership was William Sawrey Gilpin, Robert Hills, John Claude Nattes, John Varley, Cornelius Varley, Francis Nicholson, Samuel Shelley, William Henry Pyne and Nicholas Pocock. In 1831 a schism created another group, the New Society for Painters in Water Colours, and so the 1804 group became known as the Old Watercolour Society.</div></div></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Nattes was expelled from the Old Watercolour Society in 1807 after being accused of presenting watercolours which were signed by him but were thought not to be his work. Sadly from the point of view of his reputation, the accusation laid against him does not appear to be unfounded. He then resumed exhibiting at the Royal Academy.</div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div>His younger son John William Nattes, a lieutenant in the Madras Engineers, was killed 29 May 1818 at the Siege of Mallegoan, India at the age of 22. His elder son Charles Claude Nattes, also of the Madras Army died suddenly 21 December 1818 at the age of 24, at the house of the Governor, on Prince of Wales Island (now Penang, Malaysia),. Charles Claude was said to have died from grief at the loss of his brother John.</div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">For a long time John Claude Nattes was assumed to have died around 1822. He may instead have been out of England, again travelling in France. It is now known that he died in Dover 7 September 1839 and was buried 14 September 1839 at St. Mary the Virgin, Dover. His will is dated 19 March 1812 and probate was granted 25 September 1839 to Joseph Barber (brother-in-law and executor) and Sarah Nattes (widow and executrix). The <i>Death Duty Registers</i> of 1839 note his residence in St Germain (presumably Saint-Germain-en-Laye, west of Paris). Sarah died in 1845 at Clapham.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div></div></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">●</div></div><div><br /></div><div>In September 1803, after an absence of three years in the Sussex village of Felpham, William and Catherine Blake returned to London. Initially they lodged with William's brother and sister, James and Catherine Elizabeth Blake, at James's hosiery shop at 28 Broad Street, Carnaby Market. Less than a month later, William and Catherine moved into lodgings at 17 South Molton Street. Prior to their sojourn in Felpham, William and Catherine had lived comfortably in a substantial three-storey house, 13 Hercules Buildings, Lambeth. Why the move to a small flat in a fashionable and more expensive district? As printseller and occasional printmaker, Nattes was certainly part of Blake's professional world. But if we note the presence among the founding members of the Old Watercolour Society of Cornelius and John Varley, friends of William Blake, and of Samuel Shelley, close acquaintance of George Cumberland, it is indeed likely that Nattes was one of Blake's social circle. I suggest, however tentatively, that Nattes alerted William and Catherine Blake, looking for a permanent residence on their return from coastal Sussex, that there was an apartment to rent in South Molton Street with the good north-east light an engraver required.</div><div><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">●</div></div><div><br /></div><div><b>Sources and further reading</b></div><br />John Aldred.—"John Claude Nattes: an Anglo-French artist in Lancashire in 1807".—The British Art Journal, vol. 4, no. 2 (2003) 91-2.<br /><br /><div>David Alexander.—A biographical dictionary of British and Irish engravers, 1714-1820.—London : Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, 2021.<br /><br />E.A.B. Barnard.—"John Claude Nattes, artist (1765?-1822)".—Notes and Queries (2 October 1948).</div><div><br /></div><div>Harold B. Carter.—Sir Joseph Banks, 1743-1820.—London : British Museum (Natural History), 1988.</div><div><span> </span>Details Nattes's work for Banks, 1789-1797.</div><div><br /></div><div>Angus Whitehead.—"'I write in South Molton Street, what I both see and hear': reconstructing William and Catherine Blake's residence and studio at 17 South Molton Street, Oxford Street".—The British Art Journal, Vol. 11, No. 2 (2010/11), 62-75.</div><div><div><br /></div></div><div><div><div style="text-align: center;">●</div></div><div><br /></div></div>Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-25275317487523961082023-08-17T08:44:00.168-07:002023-09-18T04:31:55.728-07:00The Whore Next Door: William Blake’s Neighbours in South Molton Street.<blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">I write in South Molton Street, what I both see and hear</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">In regions of Humanity, in Londons opening streets.</blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">William Blake, <i>Jerusalem</i> (E 180)</blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><br /><div style="text-align: center;">●</div><br />In September 1803, after an absence of three years in the coastal village of Felpham in Sussex, William and Catherine Blake returned to London. Initially they lodged with William's brother and sister, James and Catherine Elizabeth Blake, at 28 Broad Street, later Broadwick Street, Carnaby Market. Less than a month later, William and Catherine moved into a two-room flat on the first floor of 17 South Molton Street, off Oxford Street. During their 17 years of residence there, the Blakes printed and coloured their most ambitious illuminated books.<div><br />The house was shared with their landlords, successively the tailor William Enoch (<i>c</i> 1803-4) and his family, and the staymaker Mark Martin (<i>c</i> 1805-21), his wife Eleanor and their family. There were presumably other lodgers on the upper floors.<br /><span></span><br /></div><div>In 1958 the Westminster voters’ list records the following persons as resident at 17 South Molton Street: Ida Golz, Anthony S. Gotlop, Frank Holland, Leah Laden, Minnie Sandground, and Stanley V. Sandground. I believe at this time the residents occupied cold-water flats on the upper floors, with commercial premises on the ground floor and basement.<br /><span></span><br /></div><span><a name='more'></a></span><div>By 1965 the sole resident remaining, at least as shown on the electoral register, was Anthony S. Gotlop. (Anthony Saul Gotlop was born 21 Nov 1928 in Hendon. From South Molton Street, Mr Gotlop moved to Nether Street, Finchley, where he died, aged 88, on 24 Oct 2016.)<br /><span></span><br /></div><div>Subsequently 17 South Molton Street changed largely to commercial use but with an otherwise unidentified prostitute occupying the top floor. It was she who installed the shower.<br /><span></span><br /></div><div>Following Reed International’s acquisition of a fifty-year sub-lease of the property, usage became completely commercial but with some upper floors left vacant, enabling Tim Heath to gain a toehold for the Blake Society (initially on the first floor).<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">●</div><br /><div>There is, it seems, a long history of sex-workers in South Molton Street.</div><div><br /></div><div>Harris's <i>List of Covent Garden Ladies</i>, published from 1760 to 1795, was a directory of the more up-market prostitutes then working in Georgian London. Each annual edition usually contained no more than 150 pages on which are printed the details (addresses of course, but also the physical appearance and sexual specialities) of between 120 and 190 prostitutes then working in and about Covent Garden. A small pocketbook, it sold for two shillings and sixpence. A contemporary report of 1791 estimates its circulation at about 8,000 copies annually.<br /><span></span><br /></div><div>Harris's <i>List</i> was published for a city rife with prostitution, an undeniable feature of life in eighteenth-century London; its conspicuousness was frequently commented on by both foreign and domestic visitors alike. William Blake's friend John Gabriel Stedman noted in his diary in August 1795: “Met 300 whores in the Strand”. The Scottish statistician and magistrate Patrick Colquhoun estimated in 1806 that of Greater London's approximately 1,000,000 citizens, perhaps 50,000 women, across all walks of life, were engaged in some form of prostitution. Perhaps responding to the moral panic of the time, Colquhoun’s estimate is a gross exaggeration. The real figure was probably never more than 6,000 or 7,000 individuals.<br /><span></span><br /></div><div>In 1795 the Proclamation Society, created several years earlier to help enforce King George III's proclamation against “loose and licentious Prints, Books, and Publications, dispersing Poison to the minds of the Young and Unwary”, and “to Punish the Publishers and Vendors thereof”, brought those involved in the publication of Harris's <i>List</i> to be fined and imprisoned. After these trials, the list was no longer issued. Only seven editions of Harris’s <i>List</i> currently appear in the <i>English Short-Title Catalogue</i> (1761, 1773, 1774, 1788–90, and 1793), but at least seventeen, as well as one edition of the spurious Harris's <i>List Newly Revised</i> published by John Sudbury, can be located in public collections in Europe and the United States. No copies survive of the 1760 first edition.<br /><span></span><br /></div><div>Early editions stick closely to the Covent Garden area of its title. Only in 1788 do prostitutes located further afield, such as in the fashionable and expensive South Molton Street, make their appearance. We can now read of<br /><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">Miss G--rge at a Grocer's Shop, South Moulton-street. [<i>The British Library copy </i>(P.C.22.a.12-15) <i>adds a handwritten </i>“no. 39”.]</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Hast thou beheld a fresher, sweeter nymph,</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Such war of white and red upon her cheeks,</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>What stars do spangle, Heaven, with so much beauty,</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>As those two eyes become that Heav'nly face.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><span> </span>At the tempting luscious age of nineteen, this lovely girl presents us with a face well worth the attention of the naturalist; She is of a fine fair complexion, with light brown hair, which waves in many a graceful ringlet, has good teeth, and her tell-tale dark eyes, speak indeed, the tender language of love, and beam unutterable softness; she is tall of stature; and of the most tempting en bon point; plump breasts, which in whiteness surpass the driven snow, and melt the most snowy of mankind to rapture. Her name she borrows from a gentleman, who, some little time ago, possessed her (as he thought) entirely for some time, but finding himself mistaken, and tired with the cornuted burthen on his brows, he left her about six months ago, to seek support in this grand mart of pleasure; and as she has been remarkably successful, and still remains a favourite piece for the enjoyment of her charms, and the conversational intercourse, with a temper remarkably good, for a whole night she expects five pounds five shillings. (Harris's <i>List</i> for 1788, pages 41-42.)</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><br />Then in Harris’s <i>List</i> for 1789:<br /><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Page 46</div><div style="text-align: left;">Miss Maria Sp-nc-r, No.59, South Moulton Street.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Page 54</div><div style="text-align: left;">Miss Ch-rl--n, No. 59, South Moulton Street, Grosvenor Square.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Page 63-64</div><div style="text-align: left;">Mrs. S-lt-r, No. 15, South Moulton Street.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><br />If still there in 1803, Mrs. S-lt-r would have been the Blakes' next-door neighbour. Her account reads as follows:<br /><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">If lovely youth, with potent wine inspir’d,</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Whose blood is fond and generously fir’d;</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Must have a wanton, sprightly, youthful wench;</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">In equal floods of love his flame to quench;</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">One that will hold him in her clasping arms,</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">And in that circle all his spirits charms;</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">That with new motion, and unpractis’d art,</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Will raise his soul, and reinsnare his heart.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><span> </span>Let him visit the agreeable Mrs. S—r, who received her infant training in the West of England, where she learned the art of cap-making, &c. Her pride and wantonness lost her the affections of her parents, and they readily consented o her leaving the country; and in Cranbourn Alley, round the experienced female circle, she soon learned how best to dispose of her maiden treasure. A young surgeon was the happy man, he lived with her till every purse was drained; after him a certain foreigner of particular note, and now she trades the independent lass, always agreeable, chatty, lively, and entertaining, with charming eyes, fair complexion, and tho’ little in every respect, she possesses a mouth that will swallow the largest morsel, and loins that she is ever ready to bet a couple of guineas, will heave up the heaviest burden. (Harris’s <i>List</i> for 1789, pages 63-64.)</div></blockquote></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhN0WvRwVpkf6qm3xwdnBZ13iBKXxroUBw8S61arBdTZWYnE_ZsPGpH9Ac5TF1zJNjQOtXr6Li0Ug2IKOvza-ter2jX8SHp-MG67H6oaMNNetqZziRMF5lOoc6wS5VmwYQU07Ngl-3tfFONJW0qKkcPUhPPT4srcyZrsAKf9QbaKBac0oUBq8xRwz6PQ_FW/s2932/Harris's%20List%201793_frontis%5Biece.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2932" data-original-width="1999" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhN0WvRwVpkf6qm3xwdnBZ13iBKXxroUBw8S61arBdTZWYnE_ZsPGpH9Ac5TF1zJNjQOtXr6Li0Ug2IKOvza-ter2jX8SHp-MG67H6oaMNNetqZziRMF5lOoc6wS5VmwYQU07Ngl-3tfFONJW0qKkcPUhPPT4srcyZrsAKf9QbaKBac0oUBq8xRwz6PQ_FW/w218-h320/Harris's%20List%201793_frontis%5Biece.jpg" width="218" /></a> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHUCAf_NpRztUMoan--U1nr2bSCoil8tGdyBaRnOumusDHCoUJYi0Awkp8T-qe9rp1L-QvSPJVbpefCuHB6pX-Mchupq3h4CaZZDVbaOY9bvTsVHo8hWGHasyWSMnt20CYsRE3hZTw0zVcNiZ470g0vVAdXRu48LIQDVlQs6qNCffTvJxcLvKncMsh9EV9/s2156/Harris's%20List%201793_titlepage.jpg" style="clear: left; display: inline; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2156" data-original-width="1370" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHUCAf_NpRztUMoan--U1nr2bSCoil8tGdyBaRnOumusDHCoUJYi0Awkp8T-qe9rp1L-QvSPJVbpefCuHB6pX-Mchupq3h4CaZZDVbaOY9bvTsVHo8hWGHasyWSMnt20CYsRE3hZTw0zVcNiZ470g0vVAdXRu48LIQDVlQs6qNCffTvJxcLvKncMsh9EV9/w203-h320/Harris's%20List%201793_titlepage.jpg" width="203" /></a></div></div></blockquote><div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>(Harris's </i>List<i> 1793, frontispiece and engraved title-page. Click on the image to enlarge.)</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">And finally, in Harris's <i>List</i> for 1793<br /><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Page 22-23</div><div style="text-align: left;">Miss Br—ley, No. 61, South Moulton-street.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Page 30-31</div><div style="text-align: left;">Miss Gronmos—d, No. 59, South-Moulton-street.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Page 43-44</div><div style="text-align: left;">Miss Wa—s, No. 60, South Moulton-street.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Page 49-50</div><div style="text-align: left;">Mrs. G——ge, No. 13, South Moulton-street.</div></blockquote></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div></div><div><div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixuIu0ALOK9arg4OZnJy8r2JalKqfbuL6_Ms5XNQZB7JADUiUGBGmDwZF71NGW2tfh-xkUUenskfo-2znbqUJLDZW2YLtD2DLFnUCzSYGx9LufX8p0LsJS1H9heLMgW4dD0GESbIDbjMbX7w32cubQXHvKcjmRiaW_8snl6naXkZXtdbUKy5F0qvSxupKg/s1797/Harris's%20List%201793_page%2049.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1797" data-original-width="1075" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixuIu0ALOK9arg4OZnJy8r2JalKqfbuL6_Ms5XNQZB7JADUiUGBGmDwZF71NGW2tfh-xkUUenskfo-2znbqUJLDZW2YLtD2DLFnUCzSYGx9LufX8p0LsJS1H9heLMgW4dD0GESbIDbjMbX7w32cubQXHvKcjmRiaW_8snl6naXkZXtdbUKy5F0qvSxupKg/w191-h320/Harris's%20List%201793_page%2049.jpg" width="191" /></a> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfrcscM4iMDpnvhuVWXT2QdA_-c_J2lesMPHUYad8eviWu9nale3b_ZPigRg3NPJnVeQ4KQ7BHDhL99C8AJkHeYNT_b1GVyigGQnhQAOZvzctX3xlPSsM0iaix4XguikO9QxeAk_QdbJpQlT_kZ5AIOHvyAn-ixii8n0rcNM9qhAVYDf5jI3ZRyDjcrjHw/s1549/Harris's%20List%201793_page%2050.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1549" data-original-width="1149" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfrcscM4iMDpnvhuVWXT2QdA_-c_J2lesMPHUYad8eviWu9nale3b_ZPigRg3NPJnVeQ4KQ7BHDhL99C8AJkHeYNT_b1GVyigGQnhQAOZvzctX3xlPSsM0iaix4XguikO9QxeAk_QdbJpQlT_kZ5AIOHvyAn-ixii8n0rcNM9qhAVYDf5jI3ZRyDjcrjHw/w237-h320/Harris's%20List%201793_page%2050.jpg" width="237" /></a></div></div></div><div><div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div style="text-align: center;"><i>(Harris's </i>List<i> 1793, pages 49-50.)</i></div></div></div></div></blockquote><div><div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br />Could this last be the same Miss G—rge formerly at No. 39 but now two doors away from the Blakes? Her account reads as follows.</div></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;"> This lady has not been in business long; she surrendered her citadel to a captain of the navy, who in his attack upon her, united the seaman with the lover, and the ingenuity of the one won her heart as much as the passion of the other. As a specimen of his epistolary method of corresponding with her, we shall subjoin a part of one of his letters to her, which runs exactly thus; he tells her that he had often thought to reveal to her the tempests if his heart by word of mouth, to scale the walls of her affection, but terrified with the strength of her fortifications, he had concluded to make more regular approaches, to attack her at farther distance, and to try what a bombardment of letters would do, whether those carcases of love thrown into the sconces of her eyes, would break into the midst of her breast, beat down the out-guard of her aversion and indifference, and blow up the magazine of her cruelty, that she might be brought to terms of capitulation; which indeed she soon was, and upon reasonable terms. The captain was with her but a short time, being obliged to repair to his station; and after his departure, she was kept by one in the army, who was obliged to give way to the more powerful solicitations of one of greater force. She is just thirty, pretty and amorous, has a charming lively eye and a handsome mouth; she is rather short but very delicately made, a charming colour which seems to be natural, is finely diffused over her cheeks, and sets her face off to great advantage, and she has fine brown hair, is good temper’d, and very free and merry.</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span> </span>She drives a very handsome curricle, and is in keeping by a Mr. C-----ns. (Harris’s List for 1793, pages 49-50.)</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">●</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>Thanks to Harris's <i>List</i>, the whore next door now has a name and a story.<div><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div>Truly My Satan thou art but a Dunce</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div>And dost not know the Garment from the Man</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div>Every Harlot was a Virgin once</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div>Nor canst thou ever change Kate into Nan</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div>William Blake, <i>For The Sexes <span style="font-size: x-small;">THE GATES OF PARADISE</span></i> (E 269)</div></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">●</div></div><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><div>In the 1789 edition, these short erotic narratives, microbiographies of named women otherwise lost to history, are preceded by a pointed political justification.</div><div><br /></div></div></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div><div style="text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">It is not only in the purlieus of Covent-Garden that prostitutes are to be found. They flourish in courts, in senates, in halls of justice, in fleets and armies; nor is the sacred porch secure from the approach. Is the soft, the gentle minion of love, so great a prostitute, as him who, beneath a scarlet robe, and the dignity of lordships, conceals a mind fraught with corruption? Is not the minister of state who sacrifices his country's honour to his private interest; the admiral whom venality teaches to avoid the reflects of an enemy; or the general, whom gold allures from the path of conquest, more guilty than her? These are the real prostitutes that defile streams of public virtue, and taint a nation's glory.</div></div></div></blockquote><p>And today, in 2023, what has changed? Our government is now squalid and corrupt on a scale inconceivable in the eighteenth century.</p><p>The First Fleet of convicts deported to Australia sailed from England on 13 May 1787 and arrived at Botany Bay eight months later, on 18 January 1788. The Rwanda Deportation Scheme (announced 13 April 2022), is a policy whereby people identified as being illegal immigrants or asylum seekers will be deported to Rwanda.</p><p>Prison hulks were decommissioned ships extensively used in England as floating prisons in the 18th and 19th centuries. For example, <i>HMS Ceres</i> was a prison hulk on the Thames at Woolwich from 1787 to 1797. In April 2023, the Government of the United Kingdom announced plans to use the <i>Bibby Stockholm</i> barge to house asylum seekers at Portland Port in Dorset.</p><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">The Beast & the Whore rule without controls </blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">William Blake, <i>Annotations to</i> An Apology for the Bible by R. Watson, Bishop of Landaff. (E 611)</blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><p style="text-align: center;">●</p><div><br /><div style="text-align: left;"><b>Sources and further reading</b><br /><br />Elizabeth Campbell Denlinger.—“The Garment and the Man: Masculine Desire in ‘Harris's List of Covent-Garden Ladies,’ 1764–1793”.—Journal of the History of Sexuality, vol.11, no. 3 (2002), 357–394<br /><br />David Erdman.—Blake: Prophet against Empire: a poets’ interpretation of the history of his own times.—3rd ed.—Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press, 1977.<br /><span> </span>See page 291 for the extracts from Stedman’s Journal.<br /><br />Janet Ing Freeman.—“Jack Harris and 'Honest Ranger': The Publication and Prosecution of Harris's List of Covent-Garden Ladies, 1760–95”.—The Library, 7th ser., vol. 13, (2012), 423–456.<br /><span> </span>With a census of the surviving editions.<br /><br /><div>Harris's list of Covent-Garden ladies: or, man of pleasure's kalender, for the year, 1788. Containing the histories and some curious anecdotes of the most celebrated ladies now on the town, or in keeping, and also many of their keepers.—London : printed for H. Ranger, (formerly at No. 23, Fleet-Street,) at No. 9, Little Bridges-Street, near Drury-Lane Play-House Where may be had, The seperate Lists of many preceding Years, [1788]..—x,[1],14-146p. ; 12°.—ESTC Number T187027</div><div><br /></div>Harris’s list of Covent-Garden ladies: or, man of pleasure’s calendar, for the year 1789. Containing the histories and some curious anecdotes of the most celebrated ladies now on the town, or in Keeping, and also many of their keepers.—Printed for H. Ranger, (formerly at No. 23, Fleet Street,) at No. 9, Little Bridges-Street, near Drury-Lane, Play-House. Where may be had, The separate Lists if many preceding Years, [1789].—[3],vi-x,133,[1]p. ; 12°.—ESTC Number T187063.<br /><br />Harris's list of Covent-Garden ladies Or man of pleasure's kalender for the year 1793. Containing the histories and some curious anecdotes of the most celebrated ladies now on the town, or in keeping, and also many of their keepers.—London : printed for H. Ranger (formerly at No. 23. Fleet Street.) at No. 9 Little Bridges Street, near Drury Lane Play House. Where may be had The separate lists of many preceding Years, [1793].—[2],viii,124p.,plate ; 12°.—ESTC Number T187066.<br /><br />Hallie Rubenhold.—The Covent Garden Ladies.—Stroud: Tempus Publishing, 2005.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><span> </span>Identifies Samuel Derrick (1724–1769) an Irish hack writer, as the original author of <i>Harris's List</i>.<br /><br />Hallie Rubenhold.—Harris's List of Covent Garden Ladies.—Stroud: Tempus Publishing, 2005.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><span> </span>Reprints the 1793 edition.<br /><br />Angus Whitehead.—“'I write in South Molton Street, what I both see and hear': Reconstructing William and Catherine Blake's residence and studio at 17 South Molton Street, Oxford Street”.—The British Art Journal, vol. 11, no. 2 (2010/11), 62-75.<br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: center;">●</div><br /></div></div>Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-74354772537522389872022-06-05T10:42:00.013-07:002023-01-04T17:06:21.197-08:00William Blake and smallpox : the disease in Blake’s London and in Blake’s artSmallpox was the single most lethal disease in eighteenth-century Britain, accounting for more deaths than any other infectious disease, even plague and cholera. In London, Europe’s largest city by 1700, smallpox increased from 4-6% of all burials in the mid-seventeenth century to over 10% in the third quarter of the eighteenth century, and the frequency of epidemics increased from roughly four-yearly to a biennial cycle over the same period.<br /><br /><div>Smallpox was an acute, highly contagious, and frequently fatal disease (killing one-seventh to one-quarter of its victims) but conferring lifelong immunity on survivors. It appeared initially as an infrequent epidemic disease affecting all ages, but as the frequency of epidemics increased, a growing proportion of the adult population acquired immunity to the disease, and smallpox was clearly a childhood disease in the London-born population of the eighteenth century, with children under five the main victims. Among those who survived it, morbidity from smallpox was severe in many cases; victims could be left blind or disfigured for life. Few native Londoners would have survived to adulthood without encountering smallpox.</div><div><br /></div><div>[Indeed, are there any depictions of smallpox in Blake’s work?]<br /><br /><a name='more'></a><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"></blockquote>Treatment was non-existent in the early years of the eighteenth century and London’s few existing hospitals refused to accept patients with infectious diseases. The earliest attempts to reduce morbidity and mortality from smallpox were by a method known as inoculation, or sometimes by the more specialized term variolation. Inoculation involved deliberately infecting a healthy individual with virus taken from a scabbed pustule of a person suffering from smallpox. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu (1689-1762), who had learned of the procedure during her time in Constantinople (Istanbul) as wife of the British Ambassador, is credited with the introduction of smallpox inoculation to Britain and Western Europe. In Constantinople, the British Embassy’s surgeon had inoculated her young son, and she had her daughter (born in Turkey) professionally variolated in London in April 1721. This medical breakthrough, which she promoted widely (though it was later superseded by Edward Jenner’s vaccination), was the first time in Western medicine that antibodies were created to secure immunity from disease. Opponents of the procedure derided it as oriental, irreligious, and a fad of ignorant women.<br /><br />The first English medical practitioners to implement variolation did so very crudely with deep incisions that could cause severe symptoms, morbidity, and a mortality rate of up to 2%. It was usually preceded by four to six weeks of preparation, which included purging, bleeding, and a restricted diet, as well as expensive aftercare. Only 857 people were variolated in the whole of Great Britain from 1721 to 1727 and only 37 in 1728, since only the rich could afford it.<br /><br />The preparation period was shortened after Robert Sutton’s introduction of a safer and more effective procedure in 1762 using very light incisions. The “Suttonian method” dramatically decreased the severity of symptoms and risk, and reduced the cost. Poor Londoners could now be variolated through the Smallpox Charities. The charities performed public variolation in batches, separately for adult males and adult females, 8 to 12 times a year. The number of variolated individuals increased dramatically from 29 in 1750, to 653 in 1767, and 1084 in 1768.<br /><br />In 1740 Dr Robert Poole raised the money to create the first specialist hospital, the London Smallpox Hospital. Originally a 13-bed hospital in Windmill Street, Fitzrovia (opposite where the Fitzroy Tavern now stands), it both treated smallpox patients and provided free inoculations for the poor. The Smallpox Hospital, like the charities, did not admit children under 7 years of age even though most smallpox cases at that time were in infants and young children.</div><div><br /></div><div>[This is an area Blake would have known well. His early patrons the Mathews lived just a little way south in Rathbone Place, and the Rev. A.S. Mathew ministered at the Percy Street Chapel in the road parallel. It was at Mathew’s chapel, in 1785, that Richard Watson, Bishop of Llandaff, preached his notorious, if misunderstood, sermon “The Wisdom and Goodness of God in having made both Rich and Poor”.]<br /><br />By 1750 the hospital was running premises at three locations: an inoculating-house in Old Street; a house in Frog Lane, Islington (now Popham Road), for receiving inoculated patients once symptoms had appeared; and a receiving-house nearby for patients afflicted with the full-blown disease, in Lower Street (now Essex Road). In 1752 the trustees of the institution acquired the lease of a property in Coldbath Fields. The new 130-bed hospital opened in March 1753, taking patients from both Frog Lane and Lower Street. <br /><br />There was immediate opposition. The Clerkenwell Vestry filed a bill of injunction in Chancery to stop the hospital going ahead, citing the “terror” of the disease in the neighbourhood and threats by tenants to leave. Lord Hardwicke, presiding, refused an injunction, instead praising the new establishment and the appropriateness of its location. Opposition persisted once it had opened; discharged patients came in for abuse and were obliged to leave under cover of darkness for their safety.<br /><br />[Redundant by the 1790s, the Coldbath Fields building was subsequently used for other commercial purposes, and eventually demolished in the 1860s for an extension to the nearby Coldbath Fields Prison, now under Mount Pleasant Postal Sorting Office. The prison was where Colonel Edward Despard of the London Corresponding Society, along with around thirty others, was detained without charge for three years (1799-1802). John Hunt was also imprisoned here for a libel, in the <i>Examiner</i>, 22 March 1812, on the Prince Regent, the “fat Adonis”, afterwards George IV. Unlike the cramped and squalid conditions suffered by Ned Despard, Hunt had a lofty and comfortable apartment at the top of the prison and the privilege of walking for a couple of hours daily in the governor’s garden. The Hunt brothers, Leigh, John, and Robert, are commonly identified with the villainous “Hand”, of Blake’s later mythology.]<br /><br />There were, however, other institutions that did inoculate poor children. The Foundling Hospital was doing this already in 1743; in 1749 the governors advertised that all the children who had not had smallpox when at nurse would be inoculated on their return to London. William Blake’s home parish of St James, Westminster, sent its workhouse children to be fostered at Wimbledon, and entered in their standing orders in 1756:<br /><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0 0 0 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">All the Children are inoculated for the Small-Pox when deemed proper by the Surgeon, and he is paid Ten Shillings and Sixpence for each Child who survives that Disorder.</div></blockquote><div><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">The Nurse is likewise paid Ten Shillings and Sixpence for every Child that has it in the natural Way, or is inoculated and survives, but not else.</div></blockquote><div><br />The Vestry minutes, cited by Gardner, record the Surgeon, James Swift, living at Putney, recommending accommodation for the workhouse children at Holloways at Lord Spencer’s farm and taking them there ten at a time for inoculation.</div><div><br /></div><div>[For many years, the Blake family shop provided haberdashery (worsted stockings and such) for the St James’s workhouse and charity school.]</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQjxkdtBpUPBiauHkuTlzF15UGURChG0-pdP692ABTm3uKGPNvPsxxRMnRAx0EYQwQwM0dzy7ipZc-UXG1SCMJkBIBM_gQSA4x5mLab1hR-6jZlf1SrBIyrxYWT1ywHBPwZ37dbeoL-It7SHFX6wW19p3zGgky4QHypJQt30VGafbWDCZEQ7GsVAY5Kg/s880/Hospital.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="604" data-original-width="880" height="275" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQjxkdtBpUPBiauHkuTlzF15UGURChG0-pdP692ABTm3uKGPNvPsxxRMnRAx0EYQwQwM0dzy7ipZc-UXG1SCMJkBIBM_gQSA4x5mLab1hR-6jZlf1SrBIyrxYWT1ywHBPwZ37dbeoL-It7SHFX6wW19p3zGgky4QHypJQt30VGafbWDCZEQ7GsVAY5Kg/w400-h275/Hospital.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><i>View of the S<span style="font-size: x-small;">MALL</span>-P<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> H<span style="font-size: x-small;">OSPITAL</span> near St Pancrass.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div>By 1793, the Smallpox Hospital had moved again to a large purpose built hospital in Battle Bridge, St Pancras, where the Great Northern Hotel is currently located. In the early nineteenth century it played an important part in the development of vaccination as a replacement for inoculation.</div><div><br /></div><div>[Blake would have been driven past the London Smallpox Hospital at Saint Pancras when visiting John Linnell and his family at Hampstead.]</div><div><br /></div><div>The building of the railway station at Kings Cross forced the hospital to move again to Highgate Hill in 1850, to a building still existing as a wing of Whittington Hospital. Its final move was to South Mimms, now a UCL Biosciences Lab.<br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><div><br /></div><div>Smallpox epidemics in Europe in the late Middle Ages encouraged recognition of the disease in relation to the B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OOK OF </span>J<span style="font-size: x-small;">OB</span>, specifically the verses from chapter 2: <br /><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>7. So went Satan forth from the presence of the L<span style="font-size: x-small;">ORD</span>, and smote Job with sore boils from the sole of his foot unto his crown.</div><div>8. And he took him a potsherd to scrape himself withal; and he sat down among the ashes.</div><div>9. Then said his wife unto him, Dost thou still retain thine integrity? curse God, and die. </div></blockquote><div><br />A long history of medical Job traditions has derived from these verses, the “sore boils” being interpreted as smallpox pustules. There was a St. Job hospital in Utrecht from the sixteenth century; Hamburg had a St. Job’s hospital, founded in 1505, specifically for smallpox patients; and another such hospital was established near the church of San Giobbe in Venice. <br /><br />The name “small-pox” was first used in England at the end of the 15th century to distinguish it from syphilis, which was known as the “Great Pox”. Perhaps consequentially, there is an ambiguity in the possible representation of smallpox in Blake’s work. He writes in “Night the Third” of T<span style="font-size: x-small;">HE</span> F<span style="font-size: x-small;">OUR</span> Z<span style="font-size: x-small;">OAS</span><br /><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>And Luvah strove to gain dominion over the mighty Albion</div><div>They strove together above the Body where Vala was inclos’d</div><div>And the dark Body of Albion left prostrate upon the crystal pavement</div><div>Coverd with boils from head to foot. the terrible smitings of Luvah.</div></blockquote><div><br />William Blake’s preoccupation with the B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OOK OF </span>J<span style="font-size: x-small;">OB</span> extended throughout his creative life. Quotations from, and echoes of, the B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OOK OF </span>J<span style="font-size: x-small;">OB</span> abound in Blake’s works, as in the quoted lines identifying the sickness of Albion with the sickness of Job. The reference to Job’s sufferings here is obvious. But is Blake citing a venereal disease, as suggested by Damon, or the common epidemic? <br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJcsCvMpU3261K8k5NlM85ZWGPdeupX2JZ_7LP2NbPAy5ddIxZ_YzK4N57mTUZu5HvFSwxFnyJI2ljkQRjSKgl17j_V_isIFLw7FAu8TUhakjHJQ3kdR5sWuQY6oxIst0ZSS16zASI-wzwmrp9IYkJ6kw85cWmzAzfMkgQV0OWv91HU3kU-fPoanMYYQ/s1641/15_Gerssdorff%20(Blake).png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1641" data-original-width="1044" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJcsCvMpU3261K8k5NlM85ZWGPdeupX2JZ_7LP2NbPAy5ddIxZ_YzK4N57mTUZu5HvFSwxFnyJI2ljkQRjSKgl17j_V_isIFLw7FAu8TUhakjHJQ3kdR5sWuQY6oxIst0ZSS16zASI-wzwmrp9IYkJ6kw85cWmzAzfMkgQV0OWv91HU3kU-fPoanMYYQ/w255-h400/15_Gerssdorff%20(Blake).png" width="255" /></a></div><br /><div>Hans von Gerssdorff’s <i>Feldtbuch der Wundartzney</i> (Field Manual for Wound Doctors) of 1532 includes this image of Job, his wife, and a hovering Satan. I don’t know if Blake could have seen this, but it includes all the elements of the traditional iconography of Job on his dungheap with sores, very like the sores of smallpox, on his body. Blake’s wide if eccentric reading makes acquaintance with Gerssdorff’s book at least possible or even plausible. We do not know the extent of Blake’s reading; he presumably had access to William Hayley’s library from 1797; he probably had access to the remarkable libraries of those who interacted with Blake as friends and as collectors of his work.</div><div><br />What can be decried as parochial patterns of reading (for example, the survival of the emblem tradition outside the world of polite literature, of alchemical works in an age of science) might be in fact an essential strategy for survival, says Bernstein, to have a deep immersion in a contemporaneity and history that are difficult to locate. Did Blake have access to the medieval manuscripts and oriental books in the Rebekah Bliss collection? Did friendship with Alexander Tilloch provide access to Tilloch’s alchemical books, theology, texts and editions of the Bible, and Greek and Hebrew dictionaries? Blake had access to a wealth of recondite materials that can illuminate his work, perhaps even the medical texts of his patron Dimsdale.</div><div><br />The illustration introduces the third “Tractat” of Gerssdorff’s work, in a section of the text dealing with leprosy, though actually showing the biblical Job as a victim of smallpox. He has no covering apart from a cloth draped across his loins, revealing his whole body covered with smallpox pustules. Above his head a cockatrice grasps in each hand a long, bifurcated whip. Job’s wife stands before him at the viewer’s left.<br /><br />At the top of the engraving two couplets, inscribed in German confirm the identification of Job and smallpox.<br /><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Got gab, got nã huss, hoff, kind, gůt,</div><div>Und satzt mich unders teüfels růt</div><div>(God gave, God took away property, children, goods,</div><div>And set me under the devil’s rod.)—a loose translation of J<span style="font-size: x-small;">OB</span> 1:21.</div></blockquote><div><br />and<br /><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Mein weyb, uñ blonẽ peingten mich,</div><div>Noch lyde ichs alles gdultigtlich.</div><div>(My wife and my blisters afflict me</div><div>Yet I suffer all things in patience.)</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div> </div></blockquote><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqL_PGHI5HQ2tTDNYwW06NWJL2CKIwQNagDtwK1DqN9LKYRKcAgHZuD4XBrdm0HiYEvcPkbdn7Tyx7O5gk5yQBS7DSDUSaP0h9LRu3n55MHvJbkIwisYT1cKRNmOpaIuug9gmBbCG7IvbKf_5H7uYb6z9QCjMInD_ovtp_TU06Ki7uqlcC4sxB75G9sQ/s883/16_Job%20(Blake).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="883" data-original-width="694" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqL_PGHI5HQ2tTDNYwW06NWJL2CKIwQNagDtwK1DqN9LKYRKcAgHZuD4XBrdm0HiYEvcPkbdn7Tyx7O5gk5yQBS7DSDUSaP0h9LRu3n55MHvJbkIwisYT1cKRNmOpaIuug9gmBbCG7IvbKf_5H7uYb6z9QCjMInD_ovtp_TU06Ki7uqlcC4sxB75G9sQ/w315-h400/16_Job%20(Blake).jpg" width="315" /></a></div><br /><div>Let’s turn now to Blake’s <i>Illustrations of the Book of Job</i>, plate VI: “Satan smiting Job with Boils”, where he makes significant changes to the traditional iconography. Job, sick nearly to death, swoons. The sores and scabs of smallpox are barely visible. Satan stands on his body, pouring the pox on Job’s head. Satan is no longer a monstrous cockatrice but a heroic nude, given the halo that tells you he’s angelic, but with his genitals scaled over. He stands with joyful triumph on an anguished Job. Satan’s arms are extended in the cruciform position; Job’s god has become devilish. Job wears the sackcloth of which the Biblical Job speaks. His feet rest upon the knees of a grieving wife, who is no longer at his side for she is beyond being able to bring comfort to her husband. <br /><br />Druidic ruins—”the Patriarchal courts ... ruined and deserted” (Wicksteed)—are scattered over the landscape, and the sun sets beyond black water (Wicksteed holds the setting sun to be emblematic of Job’s wife’s despairing soul). In the sky, the black and billowing clouds all centre on Satan; they look to be the clouds of fire that are being funnelled through Satan’s’ phial.<br /><br />In Satan’s left hand is the phial with which he is smiting Job with sore boils. Behind Satan’s right hand are four flaming arrows, unquestionably the arrows of the Almighty later referred to by Job in reply to the comfort of Eliphaz: “The arrows of the Almighty are within me, the poison whereof drinketh up my spirit; the terrors of God do set themselves in array against me” (J<span style="font-size: x-small;">OB</span> 6:4).<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2yjG_pNnkwmXt2VyN20JqxvaNuDyokxn4VbSSnaW67BoluGGZEQaUfVG9l4uL8veyXyAtXtx65pMlV-xb_RKxoJQuo_3xq1krp7RVS7N2hTMAYJy4VKt2chOL78pG3GvdqX8c3DTJMHtBZFOt-V2AtO4WW9ruxPMmSLMEGgnwUw4lEA089iwPewHkmQ/s486/17_Sherd%20(Blake).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="143" data-original-width="486" height="118" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2yjG_pNnkwmXt2VyN20JqxvaNuDyokxn4VbSSnaW67BoluGGZEQaUfVG9l4uL8veyXyAtXtx65pMlV-xb_RKxoJQuo_3xq1krp7RVS7N2hTMAYJy4VKt2chOL78pG3GvdqX8c3DTJMHtBZFOt-V2AtO4WW9ruxPMmSLMEGgnwUw4lEA089iwPewHkmQ/w400-h118/17_Sherd%20(Blake).jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>In the lower border are a couple of steps leading nowhere, a broken shepherd’s crook, a grasshopper, and—in the centre—an earthenware pot from which a fragment has been broken, doubtless the potsherd used by Job to scrape himself in his agony, to relieve the pain of his boils. The fountain is now choked with rubbish and identifiable only by the frog still dwelling there. Bat-winged angels lower poisonous spiders. Damon points out that some of these symbols appear in E<span style="font-size: x-small;">CCLESIASTES</span> 12, where the preacher warns of the day when “the grasshopper shall be a burden, and desire shall fail … the pitcher be broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the cistern”.<br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><div><br /></div><div>The lines cited from <i>The Four Zoas</i> also appear with minor variations in <i>Jerusalem</i>, where they read<br /><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGOTPh0hrVltQXGr4YVUlfVC5oEvrU1vfc20sGkhCapDU98dlRfeV50IsJ4mgzkf8h-u8_FgWhTOppWQY_rIq0WlT-4U3HluiIOIzZlzh0j2MaWW2fM7M988D4YjCRmem4QnCSDElFLGobeT6afXzpORMh1MDQqjypzuD4haNhKxnwmigdeOR4OVjyeQ/s629/19_Jerusalem_detail%20(Blake).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="60" data-original-width="629" height="39" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGOTPh0hrVltQXGr4YVUlfVC5oEvrU1vfc20sGkhCapDU98dlRfeV50IsJ4mgzkf8h-u8_FgWhTOppWQY_rIq0WlT-4U3HluiIOIzZlzh0j2MaWW2fM7M988D4YjCRmem4QnCSDElFLGobeT6afXzpORMh1MDQqjypzuD4haNhKxnwmigdeOR4OVjyeQ/w400-h39/19_Jerusalem_detail%20(Blake).jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>And Luvah strove to gain dominion over Albion</div><div>They strove together above the Body where Vala was inclosd</div><div>And the dark Body of Albion left prostrate upon the crystal pavement,</div><div>Coverd with boils from head to foot. the terrible smitings of Luvah.</div></blockquote><div><br />Damon interprets this passage as implying that Albion is “coverd” with syphilitic sores. However, the words clearly echo the B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OOK OF </span>J<span style="font-size: x-small;">OB</span>’s “sore boils from the sole of his foot unto his crown” where the tradition is of smallpox. And when we also read in <i>Jerusalem</i><br /><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>The disease of Shame covers me from bead to feet: I have no hope</div><div>Every boil upon my body is a separate & deadly Sin</div></blockquote><div><br />the boils may be each a “separate & deadly Sin”, but they are such spiritual sins as “Doubt” and “Shame”. Is it possible that Blake scholarship sees sexual imagery where none was intended? Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.<br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><div><br /></div><div><b>Sources and further reading</b><br /><br />Charles Bernstein.—A Poetics.—Cambridge MA : Harvard University Press, 1992.<br /><br />Nick Black.—Walking London’s Medical History. 2nd ed.—London : Hodder Arnold, 2012<br /><br />S. Foster Damon.—A Blake dictionary : the Ideas and Symbols of William Blake.—Providence RI : Brown University Press, 1965. <br /><br />R. Davenport, L. Schwarz, J. Boulton.—“The decline of adult smallpox in eighteenth-century London 1”.— Economic History Review, 64, 4 (2011), 1289–314. <br /><br />Eugenie R. Freed.—“‘In the Darkness of Philisthea’: The Design of Plate 78 of Jerusalem”.—Blake/An Illustrated Quarterly, Volume 32, Issue 3 (Winter 1998/99), 60-73.<br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">My source for the Gerssdorf illustration.</div></blockquote><div><br />Stanley Gardner.—Blake’s Innocence and Experience retraced.—London : Athlone Press, 1986.<br /><br />Hans von Gerssdorff.—Feldtbuch der Wundartzney.—Strassburg : Joanne Schott, 1517.</div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">2nd ed., 1532.</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">Facsimile of 1517 edition reproduced for Editions Medicina Rara Ltd. under the supervision of Agathon Presse, Baiersbronn, West Germany, 1970. </div></blockquote><div><br />Peter Razzell.—“The decline of adult smallpox in eighteenth-century London: a commentary”.—Economic History Review, 64, 4 (2011), 1315-335.<br /><br />Sketch of the state of the children of the poor in the year 1756 and of the present state and management of all the poor in the parish of Saint James, Westminster, in January 1797 .—s.p. : s.n., s.d.<br /><br />Joseph Wicksteed.—Blake’s Vision of the Book of Job.—London : Dent, 1910.<br /><br /></div>Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-50738849210237635602022-06-05T10:34:00.012-07:002022-06-10T04:39:46.754-07:00William Hayley and SmallpoxWilliam Hayley (1745-1820) is remembered today chiefly as the much-derided Felpham Billy, the Bard of Sussex, the friend or enemy of William Blake. But he was a generous and effective patron and friend to Cowper, Romney, Flaxman, and Blake, as well as many others; and it is perhaps unjust that his name should chiefly live in the spiky epigrams which Blake jotted down in his notebook<br /><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Thy Friendship oft has made my heart to ake<br />Do be my Enemy for Friendships sake.</blockquote><br /><div>In his lifetime, Hayley was an acclaimed poet, a scholar who achieved both commercial and critical success before, towards the end of his life, his work fell out of fashion. He was the first person to publish a substantial extract of Dante’s <i>Divine Comedy</i> in English translation, declined the offer of the poet laureateship (partly for political reasons), and, in his biographical writings, often explored issues of mental health. His literary efforts extended to drama, biographies of Milton and Cowper, an essay on sculpture, and endless epitaphs (many of them accompanying monuments in Chichester cathedral). He was also an amateur physician, treating himself, his household, and the villagers of Felpham with the then-fashionable electrical cure.<br /><br /></div><div>Despite having written a bestselling and highly influential book advising young women on how to attract and keep a husband (<i>The Triumphs of Temper</i>, 1781, and innumerable subsequent editions), Hayley’s own romantic life was a failure, with two disastrous marriages. <br /><br /></div><span><a name='more'></a></span><div>Hayley had married his first wife Eliza on the rebound from a broken engagement. He had been tutoring Eliza, the daughter of his family friend Thomas Ball, the Dean of Chichester, and Eliza had also been ferrying correspondence between him and Fanny Page, the girl with whom he had contracted a secret engagement. When Fanny broke off the engagement, Hayley turned to Eliza, and they married within months, in October 1769. Fanny Page conferred her blessing on the match.</div><div><br /></div><div>But it transpired that Eliza couldn’t bear to be touched. After Eliza’s death, the poet Anna Seward, a friend of both the Hayleys, wrote of Eliza’s aversion to physical contact: <br /><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">Fire in her affections, frost in her sensations, she shrank from the caresses of even the husband she adored.</div></blockquote><div><br /></div><div>Despite the Hayleys’ <i>mariage blanc</i>—a phenomenon sufficiently common in England to warrant a French name—William and Eliza still wanted children and sought a surrogate mother to produce a “ready-made” child. (You may think of surrogacy as a late twentieth-century practice, but it was not uncommon in the eighteenth century if never spoken about. If only Mr and Mrs Bennett had considered surrogacy, <i>Pride and Prejudice</i> would have had a very different plot.) For his first child, Hayley approached a young Dutch woman, who gave birth to their daughter, Selina, in 1776 or 77. Tragically, Selina died of smallpox, following inoculation while still a baby. (I must thank Dr. Lisa Gee for information about Selina and her mother and much else.)<br /><br />Thomas Dimsdale, in his treatise <i>The Present Method of Inoculating for the Small-Pox</i> (London, 1767), notes<br /><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">In regard to age, where it is left to my choice, I decline inoculating children under two years old. I know the common practice is against me in this particular; but my reasons for rejecting such are founded on observation and experience (9).</div></blockquote><div><br />Indeed, Prince Octavius (1779-83, George III’s 13th child and 8th son) and Prince Alfred (1780-2, the king’s 14th child and 9th son) both died after being inoculated against smallpox when small children. In his later madness George hallucinated conversations with his lost sons.<br /><br />After Selina died, her mother apparently wanted to return to Holland and disappears from the record. <br /><br /></div><div>Hayley’s twentieth-century biographer, Morchard Bishop, makes reference to an unusual feature of the Hayley household, his “valet in petticoats”. This was Mary Cockerell, valet and general factotum to both the Hayleys, who also functioned as William’s secretary. She was to become the surrogate mother of his second child, Thomas Alphonso, born in 1780. Tom was brought up to regard Eliza as his mother, his letters to her addressed to his “Dear Mamma”, though Mary remained part of the Hayley household and involved in Tom’s care. <br /><br /></div><div>On Thursday 24th May 1782, Hayley wrote from Eartham to his great friend Anna Seward at Lichfield. <br /><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">… you will pardon me, when I tell you in how anxious a scene I have been lately engaged—The prevalence of the small-Pox all around us obliged me at last to resolve on that measure which I thought of with so much sollicitude, [<i>sic</i>] while under your hospitable roof—I accordingly inoculated six of my dependents in my own House about a Fortnight ago, 2 Women, 3 little Girls, & Alphonso—I thank Heaven I can now give you the pleasure of knowing that they are all in a very prosperous Way, but many alarming circumstances arose to harrass me, & particularly some appearances of Contraction & Spasm in the bowels of the poor little Alphonso, which we could only relieve by Opiates—I think the Earth can afford no spectacle so affecting as the sufferings of children—Heaven preserve all we love from such Sights! I have fortunately saved Eliza both from the Pain, to which this scene would have exposed her, & from all sollicitude about it, for she is yet a Stranger to the business & I propose to myself infinite delight in surprizing her on Sunday next, (when I am to meet her in Surry [<i>sic</i>]) with the glad Tidings of my recovered Patients … </div></blockquote><div><br />He does go on. By 1782. William and Eliza Hayley were already leading very separate lives.<br /><br /></div><div>Hayley writes to Anna Seward again on the 23rd June<br /><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">… your kind letter found me returned to my fav’rite Retirement, where I had the Comfort of finding my Household quite well, & my little inoculated Flock free from all Traces of the distemper, thro’ which they had passed … </div></blockquote><div><br />It is curious that in these letters, Hayley never mentions any third-party involvement in inoculating the household at Eartham, not even Dr. William Guy, his Chichester physician. Did he perhaps carry out the variolations himself, with Dimsdale’s treatise as guide? Though he ignored Dimsdale’s advice not to inoculate children under two years of age.<br /><br />When, in spring 1789, Hayley and Eliza finally separated, Mary Cockerell accompanied Eliza to Derby, where Hayley had placed his estranged wife under the care of Martha, the widow of John Beridge, one of his university friends. A few months later, Eliza happily settled, Mary returned to Eartham. (Eliza died, unreconciled, in 1797.)<br /><br />Early in 1798, Thomas Alphonso, who was apprenticed to the sculptor John Flaxman, was sent home to Sussex, seriously ill. Over the next two years his condition deteriorated slowly and painfully. (Twentieth-century observations on people recovering from smallpox recorded three notable sequelae, or symptoms that followed upon the disease. These were, in order of frequency, facial pockmarks, blindness, and limb deformities. Is it possible that Tom’s fatal illness, linked to his curvature of the spine, may have been a long-term effect of his childhood illness following inoculation?) Mary Cockerell cared for Tom until he died in May 1800, remaining at Eartham after Hayley moved to his new house in Felpham. She subsequently moved to a cottage Hayley had procured for her on the edge of the Eartham estate, where she stayed until she died in November 1810. (I presume William Blake would have met Mary Cockerell on his occasional trips to Eartham with Hayley. But was he aware of the role she had played in Hayley’s life?) It remains only to note that Hayley had married his second wife Mary Welford in March 1809; and separated from her early in 1812.<br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><div><br /></div><div>By the late eighteenth century, a handful of physicians in England and Germany had noticed that people infected with the milder cowpox seemed to be immune to smallpox, and there were a couple of early vaccination tests in humans. For instance, in 1774, a farmer named Benjamin Jesty in Dorset, successfully vaccinated his wife and children with cowpox. But it was the English physician Edward Jenner who is credited with bringing the smallpox vaccine into mainstream medical practice after giving a cowpox inoculation against smallpox to the son of his gardener in May 1796.<br /><br /></div><div>Edward Jenner’s discovery of a smallpox vaccine in 1796 was a major milestone, not only for smallpox control but also for modern medicine more generally, as it inspired the development of vaccines for many other pathogens. Jenner’s vaccine provided a safer, cheaper, and more effective alternative to variolation. The existence of a smallpox vaccine was the key factor that made eradication of the disease an achievable goal. This was the first disease to be eradicated entirely by human efforts.<br /><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEu-AFi4kXEKDkNQXzxN25K-nWuRdXjBDjyEf1wwUlL1mUHKG64JEhm241hPIwIQplFvfadRlC4x_xd5uKA7jNvK6kIHPlb0AKEOx8ugi3HHpPjMcYxEmKrD8n2DSuEvRKAQjiDggWpRaZQe6IfIw0gnzDpURu8_5YiGn0DebtRULfAMO1E3ixBLyUow/s1920/14a_Jenner_and_his_two_colleagues_seeing_off_three_anti-vaccinat_Wellcome_V0011075%20(Hayley).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1323" data-original-width="1920" height="276" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEu-AFi4kXEKDkNQXzxN25K-nWuRdXjBDjyEf1wwUlL1mUHKG64JEhm241hPIwIQplFvfadRlC4x_xd5uKA7jNvK6kIHPlb0AKEOx8ugi3HHpPjMcYxEmKrD8n2DSuEvRKAQjiDggWpRaZQe6IfIw0gnzDpURu8_5YiGn0DebtRULfAMO1E3ixBLyUow/w400-h276/14a_Jenner_and_his_two_colleagues_seeing_off_three_anti-vaccinat_Wellcome_V0011075%20(Hayley).jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i>Jenner and his two colleagues seeing off three antivaxxers.</i></div><br /><div>The idea of vaccination was initially met with scepticism by the scientific and medical communities. Jenner “was advised not to send a record of his observations to the Royal Society, which was prepared to refuse it, but to publish it as a pamphlet; and as a pamphlet it appeared in 1798”. Unlike variolation, vaccination came with relatively little risk to the vaccinee, no preparatory period, and much lower cost. Vaccination was adopted by the public more quickly and more widely than variolation ever was.<br /><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTzgQDzBdyKjAD7jiJ3X_6A6srFCqZtehKhc04dxR8FB-5vyjCVs1QWXU8OzJZBnjPkHrvOrgKxlm5cvSmC_8_ljhUOhSzU0wlk4sjFqSARolaPDB6_GCeORUEaH208GR6N6f7fxxPmw22sRgyeSMEQ1jnNAIHTNkNP5lwCx0AEPwdqPMsYRVchLG0AA/s1000/14_Gillray%20(Hayley).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="717" data-original-width="1000" height="286" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTzgQDzBdyKjAD7jiJ3X_6A6srFCqZtehKhc04dxR8FB-5vyjCVs1QWXU8OzJZBnjPkHrvOrgKxlm5cvSmC_8_ljhUOhSzU0wlk4sjFqSARolaPDB6_GCeORUEaH208GR6N6f7fxxPmw22sRgyeSMEQ1jnNAIHTNkNP5lwCx0AEPwdqPMsYRVchLG0AA/w400-h286/14_Gillray%20(Hayley).jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="text-align: left;">“</span>The Cow-Pock___or___the Wonderful Effects of the New Inoculation.<span style="text-align: left;">”</span></i></div><br /><div>Thomas Dimsdale, expert inoculator, lived to see the publication in 1798 of Jenner’s work on vaccination. It led at first to an unseemly conflict between supporters of variolation and supporters of vaccination. The latter eventually triumphed and put an end to the earlier practice. Gillray here satirises the Anti-Vaccinationers, allegedly supposing that vaccination with cowpox will cause an eruption of cows.<br /><br /></div><div>And Hayley, who knew everybody, appears to have been personally acquainted with Jenner himself. He had probably met Edward Jenner at Petworth, where Lord Egremont was a friend and strong supporter of Jenner. Hayley maintained a sporadic association with Edward Jenner for many years.<br /><br />Hayley was even involved in the publication of a memorial volume for John Dawes Worgan, Jenner’s protégé, tutor of Jenner’s children, and public eulogist of his patron, whose “Essays on Vaccination” appeared in the <i>Gentleman’s Magazine</i> of 1808-9 under the nom de plume “Cosmopolites”.<br /><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_xX8H6BsKH4daK74vGqpAwTAGtcEcnnQh_G1RGXcVc_IVxNHlc_oI9mpudoVrk5iW8vA_8P1hpliFv948obw-Qf_lTM6SRgGpzTpjazrf55254DT6Yxed1UYQkCExEVjMvDjbxx4mWvUjOK0a5wd0HjAiU0UwTaEpDIi1F1funZXN7mRZX3H5HBGSVw/s2593/Worgan_t.p.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2196" data-original-width="2593" height="339" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_xX8H6BsKH4daK74vGqpAwTAGtcEcnnQh_G1RGXcVc_IVxNHlc_oI9mpudoVrk5iW8vA_8P1hpliFv948obw-Qf_lTM6SRgGpzTpjazrf55254DT6Yxed1UYQkCExEVjMvDjbxx4mWvUjOK0a5wd0HjAiU0UwTaEpDIi1F1funZXN7mRZX3H5HBGSVw/w400-h339/Worgan_t.p.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div>Jenner’s biographer, Baron, also notes<br /><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">During the year in which he [<i>Worgan</i>] became an inmate in Dr. Jenner s house, the Spanish vaccine expedition, under Balmis, had returned to Europe: his [<i>Jenner’s</i>] correspondent, the late Mr. Hayley, had suggested this as a fit subject for the muse of Worgan, who almost from his infancy had shewed a decided taste for metrical composition.</div></blockquote><div><br />Hayley himself picks up the theme in his <i>Stanzas of an English Friend to the Patriots of Spain</i> (London, 1808), perhaps his only poetical allusion to Jenner and vaccination against smallpox:<br /><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>And not with Freedom’s arms alone,</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Does liberal Spain with transport own</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>She emulates the warmth of Britain’s heart:</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>In mild Humanity’s exploit</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Bravely, and tenderly, adroit,</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>She follows England’s life-preserving art,</div><div>And bids from rescu’d earth one loathsome pest depart.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Honour, with shouts of praise, will mark</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">The course of that Iberian bark,</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">That round the globe spread Vaccination’s name;</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">O’er every clime, to which she flew,</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">She shed the blessing, hail’d as new,</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">And with Philanthropy’s and Friendship’s aim,</div><div style="text-align: left;">On Jenner fix’d the crown of medicinal fame.<span style="font-size: x-small;">3</span></div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Angelic friends to Nature’s weal!</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Progressive science! truth! and zeal!</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">We hail your progress with a grateful mind:</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Though Rapine’s dark, and rapid, storm</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">May many an injur’d land deform,</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Yet Heaven, in mercy with its wrath combin’d,</div><div style="text-align: left;">Still bids your influence grow, to meliorate mankind.</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">(<i>lines</i> 169-189)</div></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><p><span style="font-size: x-small;">3</span>An allusion to the voyage of Dr. Francis Xavier Balmis (Surgeon Extraordinary to the King of Spain), who sailed from Corunna on the 30th of November 1803, to circumnavigate the world in the cause of vaccination. He is said to have successfully vaccinated 230,000 persons in the course of his expedition. See a note to the elegant and animated poem entitled, An Address to the Royal Jennerian Society, by Mr. Dawes Worgan, printed for Longman, 1808. [<i>Hayley’s note</i>]</p><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><div><br /></div><div><b>Sources and Further Reading</b><br /><div><br /></div><div>John Baron.—THE LIFE OF EDWARD JENNER, M.D. LL.D., F.R.S. PHYSICIAN EXTRAORDINARY TO HIS MAJESTY GEO. IV. FOREIGN ASSOCIATE OF THE NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF FRANCE, &C. &C. &C. WITH ILLUSTRATIONS OF HIS DOCTRINES, AND SELECTIONS FROM HIS CORRESPONDENCE. BY JOHN BARON, M.D., F.R.S. LATE SENIOR PHYSICIAN TO THE GENERAL INFIRMARY, AND CONSULTING PHYSICIAN TO THE LUNATIC ASYLUM AT GLOUCESTER, FELLOW OF THE ROYAL MEDICAL AND CHIRURGICAL SOCIETY OF LONDON, &c. &c. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I[-II].—LONDON : HENRY COLBURN. PUBLISHER, GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET. 1898</div><div><br /></div><div>Evelyn Morchard Bishop.—Blake’s Hayley: The Life, Works, and Friendships of William Hayley.—London : Victor Gollancz Ltd, 1951.</div></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div><div style="text-align: left;">Real name: Oliver Stoner. An amusing read but Bishop persists with the myth that Thomas Alphonso’s mother was a “Miss Betts”, daughter of Sarah Betts, Hayley’s former wetnurse.</div></div></blockquote><div><div><br /></div><div>Thomas Dimsdale.—The Present Method of Inoculating for the Small-Pox, to Which Are Added Some Experiments Instituted with a View to Discover the Effects of a Similar Treatment in the Natural Small-Pox.—London : W. Owen, 1767.</div><div><br /></div><div>William Hayley.—The Stanzas of an English Friend to the Patriots of Spain.—London : 1808. </div><div><br /></div><div>Edward A. Jenner.—An inquiry into the causes and effects of the variolae vaccinae, a disease discovered in some of the western counties of England, particularly Gloucestershire, and known by the name of the cow pox.—Printed , for the author, by Sampson Low: and sold by Law; and Murray and Highley; 1798.</div><div><br /></div><div>Deborah Oxley.—"The seat of death and terror’: urbanization, stunting, and smallpox”.—Economic History Review, Vol.56, no 4 (November 2003), 623-656.</div><div><br /></div><div>Most Sacred Things: A Museum of Relationships.</div></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div><div style="text-align: left;"><a href="https://amor.fitz.ms/">https://amor.fitz.ms/</a></div></div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div><div style="text-align: left;">A pilot project for the organisation and display of William Hayley’s correspondence. My source for the quoted letters. The Fitzwilliam Museum holds the world’s largest collection of manuscript material relating to William Hayley. </div></div></blockquote><div><br /></div>John Dawes Worgan.—SELECT POEMS, &c. BY THE LATE JOHN DAWES WORGAN, OF BRISTOL, Who died on the 25th of July 1809, Aged Nineteen Years. TO WHICH ARE ADDED SOME PARTICULARS OF HIS LIFE AND CHARACTER, BY AN EARLY FRIEND AND ASSOCIATE; With a preface, BY WILLIAM HAYLEY, ESQ.—LONDON : PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, HUR5T, REES, AND ORME, PATERNOSTER-ROW 1810.—S. GOSNELL, Printer, Little Queen Street, London<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Contents: Dedication (“To Edward Jenner, M.D. F.R.S. &c. &c. &c.”).—Preface.—Particulars of the life of John Dawes Worgan.—Letters, &c., selected from his papers.—Poems.—Six essays on vaccination.—Lines to the memory of John Dawes Worgan.<br /> Dedicated to Jenner by Hayley, with a long preface.</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Worgan’s collected writings, comprising the letters, essays, poems, and sonnets of a short life, make up a substantial book of 310 pages published posthumously. </blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">I can only guess that it was Hayley’s name on the titlepage that encouraged an American edition: Philadelphia : Published by Kimber & Richardson; Merritt, printer, 1813.</blockquote><br />Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-65734770872786759502022-06-05T03:37:00.014-07:002022-11-27T14:35:51.708-08:00Blakespotting<div class="separator"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZaNvDnLQL3q4nwN1k_v4haEUbzDu_bZFQyMPW47Uu3wOIet8bi3xOycBOTjTpG2wT3thHmG9B8yjJR2931tuyWGRFJovufMY5DLBHOUvLZXgkF3t_m9idp0oVfRl8GImVzmg8NxmUJpzHpJOpS1-a-6k2Q3AAApwVopUhIcDE9GKiwBTVe_LYQKjXVQ/s793/19175320-7526615-Visitors_at_the_Tate_Britain_in_London_are_being_told_William_Bl-a-76_1569964421501.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="793" data-original-width="634" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZaNvDnLQL3q4nwN1k_v4haEUbzDu_bZFQyMPW47Uu3wOIet8bi3xOycBOTjTpG2wT3thHmG9B8yjJR2931tuyWGRFJovufMY5DLBHOUvLZXgkF3t_m9idp0oVfRl8GImVzmg8NxmUJpzHpJOpS1-a-6k2Q3AAApwVopUhIcDE9GKiwBTVe_LYQKjXVQ/w320-h400/19175320-7526615-Visitors_at_the_Tate_Britain_in_London_are_being_told_William_Bl-a-76_1569964421501.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />Visitors to the Tate Britain <i>William Blake</i> exhibition of 11 September 2019—2 February 2020, were met by a sign reading<br /><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">CONTENT WARNING</blockquote><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">The art of William Blake contains</div><div style="text-align: left;">strong and sometimes challenging</div><div style="text-align: left;">imagery, including some depictions</div><div style="text-align: left;">of violence and suffering.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Please ask a member of the staff if </div><div>you would like more information.</div></blockquote><div><br />I thought this a reasonable warning to any parent taking a child to the exhibition. But a handful of journalists reporting on the exhibition tried to make hay out of this sign, claiming that it was tantamount to censoring Blake, seemingly unaware of Blake’s Stedman engravings and the horrors they depict in such careful detail.</div><span><a name='more'></a></span><div><br /></div><div>In the <i>Telegraph</i>, Frank Furedi asked</div><div><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">Do visitors need to be told at the William Blake exhibition at Tate Britain that his art contains “strong and sometimes challenging imagery” and “depictions of violence and suffering”?</div></blockquote><div><br /></div><div>and<br /><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">Since when has it been the business of public institutions in a free society to instruct its citizens how they should react to an exhibition and what they should think?</div></blockquote><div><br /></div><div>Furedi, emeritus professor of sociology at the University of Kent, appears frequently in the media, pushing his thesis that the Anglo-American world has become obsessed with risk. There is no evidence that he ever visited the exhibition, relying, as is his wont, just on comments in the press.</div><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><div><br /><div>There is an element of the English right for whom Blake is above all the author of the patriotic hymn <i>Jerusalem</i> (“And did those feet”). Earlier this year, the MP Andrew Mitchell published a curious memoir: <i>Beyond a Fringe : Tales from a Reformed Establishment Lackey</i>. You may recall him as the man who came up hard against the bastions of class, power and privilege during “Plebgate”, following his altercation with police officers who tried to prevent his cycling through the Downing Street gates. Mitchell claimed he never called the officers “plebs” and that the evidence against him was falsified. Has he, (and here I quote his reviewer in the <i>TLS</i>), “found cause to reassess the other pillars of the British establishment through which he has passed: prep school, public school, the army, Cambridge, the City, the Tory Party? The answer is of course: no.” This is a man who—after Plebgate no less—is able to write, with a straight face the following passage</div><div><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">The Deputy Chief Minister of Guernsey, Gavin St Pier, invited me to the Trafalgar Day dinner at the East India [<i>and</i>] Public Schools Club. This was a first for me. Union Jack waistcoats predominated and we sang Jerusalem at least twice.</div></blockquote><p>This anecdote makes me wonder if I’ve got Blake completely wrong. Perhaps Blake really was the Kipling of 1804. But then any attentive reader of Rudyard Kipling’s <i>Barrack-Room Ballads</i> (1892 and after) will be aware of how Kipling himself skewers the cruelty and rapacity of Empire.</p><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><div><br /></div><div>Tabloid protests at the alleged censoring of Blake were followed by another outbreak of indignation at the Tate Britain exhibition, <i>Hogarth and Europe</i>, 3 November 2021—20 March 2022. The indignation was even more heated this time because the painter is so strongly identified with the “Roast Beef of Old England”. Even respectable art critics, who should have known better, took part in the brouhaha. Jackie Wullschläger of the <i>Financial Times</i> lamented the fact that the exhibition catalogue cover has no picture, prompting her to declare: “Hogarth cancelled”.</div><div><br /></div><div>Protests this time were directed at the wall texts appearing next to Hogarth’s paintings by 18 “commentators” (academics and artists); analyses that inflamed the critics. For example, a wall text written by the artist Sonia E. Barrett, alongside a 1757 self-portrait showing Hogarth sitting on a mahogany chair, suggested that it should be seen within the context of slavery. “The curvaceous chair literally supports him and exemplifies his view on beauty,” she wrote. “The chair is made from timbers shipped from the colonies, via routes which also shipped enslaved people. Could the chair also stand in for all those unnamed black and brown people enabling the society that supports his vigorous creativity?” Jamaican mahogany was harvested by enslaved Africans (the human cost) and cutting down the trees contributed to island deforestation (an environmental cost).</div><div><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><div><br /></div></div>These hostile press comments were in turn to engender Craig Brown’s satirical piece in which the most unlikely Tate paintings were given progressive labels alert to racial prejudice and discrimination.<br /><div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4D6nMKUnPHMOa2sn4QiP7sdj-2LGmoB_SbXE9xJUhSXGdUjUtkH5tk1JqT8j1Vtk9vdqlrNrnks_t0JDloS5ZbUde_OtSB29LfiazzgDuGvazqm-ucFBsM3U3hmUYPyvbvQulVR1NUAXElWG4ZJk53Hyt-Apdi3RJnvyrbWHj7aIKxqzWNIYCT5bdfQ/s3475/Image%20(7)%20(Blakespotting).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3475" data-original-width="2467" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4D6nMKUnPHMOa2sn4QiP7sdj-2LGmoB_SbXE9xJUhSXGdUjUtkH5tk1JqT8j1Vtk9vdqlrNrnks_t0JDloS5ZbUde_OtSB29LfiazzgDuGvazqm-ucFBsM3U3hmUYPyvbvQulVR1NUAXElWG4ZJk53Hyt-Apdi3RJnvyrbWHj7aIKxqzWNIYCT5bdfQ/w454-h640/Image%20(7)%20(Blakespotting).jpg" width="454" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>Including, as we see, Blake’s “Satan Smiting Job with Sore Boils”.<br /><a href="#"><br /></a><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifht3WdPt_pobpBgjZq26gVJo8IKxKtq9Uo55ta8uE17EYtlyVi9G7YLFBnZyFh86m-RbBqIfKZLL88m-AuLLb4nRddnkfQZ8Qj6mSeTPB7lYn7mc9CzldEqtiHf1Ah-lgSnwwzUmhRVeJ93e8ckf8brK-0vl4xCU75QeISiXNAYZcYu2IycdZT7HFAQ/s858/Image%20(8)_detail%20(Blakespotting).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="858" data-original-width="751" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifht3WdPt_pobpBgjZq26gVJo8IKxKtq9Uo55ta8uE17EYtlyVi9G7YLFBnZyFh86m-RbBqIfKZLL88m-AuLLb4nRddnkfQZ8Qj6mSeTPB7lYn7mc9CzldEqtiHf1Ah-lgSnwwzUmhRVeJ93e8ckf8brK-0vl4xCU75QeISiXNAYZcYu2IycdZT7HFAQ/w350-h400/Image%20(8)_detail%20(Blakespotting).jpg" width="350" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>The associated text reads</div><div><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">Deprived of funding by successive Conservative governments, our NHS continues to struggle to provide an adequate service for millions of sick and elderly citizens. William Blake’s powerful portrait of a health service driven to its knees, in the person of Job, stands as stark testament to the artist’s place in society, and his responsibility to convey the message of the necessity of social change. A specially commissioned Lavender and Basil Tate Ointment for Boils, Chilblains and Blisters is on special offer at £19.89, 10 percent off for members, in the Tate shop, with a Blake-themed tube design by Dame Tracey Emin.</div></blockquote><div><div><br /></div><div>Craig Brown is always fun to read. I laughed out loud at the suggestion of the Tate shop flogging boil balm.</div><div><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><div><br /></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-aghDv4F_u3M/YalKYyLodyI/AAAAAAAABG4/M65xFt4uJoss1yFzjDLycBH0sFa3ZOVYwCNcBGAsYHQ/s1536/Tate.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="483" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-aghDv4F_u3M/YalKYyLodyI/AAAAAAAABG4/M65xFt4uJoss1yFzjDLycBH0sFa3ZOVYwCNcBGAsYHQ/w640-h483/Tate.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div></div><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>William Blake, “Satan Smiting Job with Sore Boils”, c.1826; ink and tempera on mahogany. Tate.</i></div><div><br /></div><div>(Mahogany again—the fashionable wood of the eighteenth century and the emblematic timber of Empire—whose hard, tight, even grain provides a suitable surface for Blake's tempera painting technique.)</div><div><br /></div><div>Blake’s prophetic image (illustrating B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OOK OF </span>J<span style="font-size: x-small;">OB</span> 2:7) shows Satan pouring infection from a phial, a symbolic representation of an airborne disease, traditionally identified as smallpox (the most significant epidemic disease of the eighteenth century). Today, the airborne disease is Covid-19 while Fatty Johnson and his gang fulfil Craig Brown’s entirely apposite comment.</div><div><br /></div><div>My thanks to Susan Matthews for spotting the page in <i>Private Eye</i>.</div><div><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><div><b><br /></b></div><div><b>Sources and further reading</b></div></div><div><br /></div><div>Craig Brown.—“Diary. Tate: The Authorised Interpretations”.—Private Eye (26 Nov 2021).</div></div></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div><div><div style="text-align: left;">Reprinted in <i>Private Eye Annual 2022</i>. Edited by Ian Hislop.—London: Private Eye, 2022.</div></div></div></blockquote><div><div><div><br /></div><div>Frank Furedi .—“Our right to free expression is in crisis—can we call ourselves a democracy if we don’t encourage open debate?”.—Telegraph (30 December 2019).</div><div><br /></div><div>Gareth Harris.—“Tate Britain director defends museum against accusations of ‘cancelling Hogarth’”.—The Art Newspaper (24 November 2021).</div><div><br /></div><div>Andrew Mitchell.—Beyond a Fringe : Tales from a Reformed Establishment Lackey.--London : Biteback 2022.</div></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div><div style="text-align: left;">Reviewed in the <i>TLS</i> (18 March 2022).</div></div></blockquote><div><div><br /></div><div>Wayne C. Ripley.—“Checklist of Scholarship in 2019”.—Blake Quarterly (23 Jul 2020).</div></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div><div style="text-align: left;">Ripley discusses reactions to the content warning sign at the entrance to the Tate Blake exhibition, as well as the reception of the exhibition more generally.</div></div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div><div style="text-align: left;"><a href="https://blakequarterly.org/index.php/blake/article/view/ripley541/497">https://blakequarterly.org/index.php/blake/article/view/ripley541/497</a></div></div></blockquote><div><div><br /></div><div>Jason Whittaker.—Jerusalem : Blake, Parry, and the Fight for Englishness.—Oxford : Oxford University Press 2022.</div></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div><div>A comprehensive history of one of the most famous poems in English literature. Whittaker traces the complex social, political, and cultural contexts in which the hymn has been used over a hundred years.</div></div><div><div>(Due for publication in July 2022.)</div></div></blockquote><div><div><br /></div></div></div>Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-52649943597558047392022-01-26T04:24:00.009-08:002022-06-05T06:46:28.789-07:00“Inoculation should be common everywhere”<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhZiTdyr2N82uTWLJLwYei-lXzzVo_S9ScdJp9jyWUWye9U4r4wPxtm5qIO7YLCVmd5V--Bzc0wucF6B2W7llFzMoV59QMNb4o2-BLYR51FdnJ0y3hmHXMcoSdyW3UF6ucm6rQzwh7Yq9O3AVgv_QZFo11ZuYn7fShhuspMErCpIct48BTBJYf4pn4YqA=s800" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="668" data-original-width="800" height="267" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhZiTdyr2N82uTWLJLwYei-lXzzVo_S9ScdJp9jyWUWye9U4r4wPxtm5qIO7YLCVmd5V--Bzc0wucF6B2W7llFzMoV59QMNb4o2-BLYR51FdnJ0y3hmHXMcoSdyW3UF6ucm6rQzwh7Yq9O3AVgv_QZFo11ZuYn7fShhuspMErCpIct48BTBJYf4pn4YqA=w320-h267" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><i>MacDougall Arts, “Important Russian Art”, auction sale 1 December 2021. Lot 14: “Portrait of the Empress Catherine the Great by Dmitry Levitsky, with Letter from Catherine the Great to Count Piotr Aleksandrovich Rumiantsev on vaccination [</i>sic<i>] against smallpox, 20 April 1787”.</i></span></div><p></p><p>Just over a month ago, on 1st December 2021, MacDougall Arts, of St. James's Square, held one of their regular sales of Russian works of art. Included in the auction was a portrait of Catherine II, Empress of all the Russias, otherwise Catherine the Great, by Dmitry Levitsky (1735-1822), together with a letter from Catherine to Count Piotr Aleksandrovich Rumiantsev outlining her inoculation strategy against smallpox. (The two items together sold for £951,000, if that’s of any interest.) This sale was the impetus or trigger for a talk I gave to the Blake Society AGM (19 January 2022). The title I gave it : “Inoculation should be common Everywhere”, derives from this letter by Catherine the Great.</p><span><a name='more'></a></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhQ9NAvEwFDPCvfwrRkOpfJKlw9lr_f6VCjsXK3yAmvoY874qEPH-EXZPScrVoZ0I_2v0dKAvE6dJXbnl8K8B-CqZPOgV-XVMLofS7HG-YNWtVkjDlt33cfoo9HZ42Ku6OxTeQVLoZkCP2j2wLFDkBN3a0dl15sdiYo4loazM5COQokIO9QsKWFmQx_Bw=s651" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><br /><img border="0" data-original-height="651" data-original-width="500" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhQ9NAvEwFDPCvfwrRkOpfJKlw9lr_f6VCjsXK3yAmvoY874qEPH-EXZPScrVoZ0I_2v0dKAvE6dJXbnl8K8B-CqZPOgV-XVMLofS7HG-YNWtVkjDlt33cfoo9HZ42Ku6OxTeQVLoZkCP2j2wLFDkBN3a0dl15sdiYo4loazM5COQokIO9QsKWFmQx_Bw=w308-h400" width="308" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><i>Dmitry Levitsky, “Portrait of the Empress Catherine the Great”. Oil on canvas, 81.5 by 64 cm.</i></span></div><p>Catherine is depicted half-length, wearing the tiniest crown with a laurel wreath and the ribbons of the most important Russian decorations—the Orders of Saint Andrew the First-Called, Saint Vladimir 1st class and Saint George 1st class. Levitsky created some twenty images of the Empress, although there is no evidence to suggest that Catherine ever posed personally for him. In keeping with a practice that was widespread at the time, the painter used earlier portraits by the Austrian Johann Baptist Lampi the Elder as templates when working on his compositions. What looks like a good naturalistic portrait in Western European style has been developed within the traditions of icon painting.</p><p>Remarkably, Levitsky has managed to represent a real person and not merely copy the template offered to him. The Empress as portrayed by Levitsky looks more youthful than in Lampi’s canvases; the modelling of the face has been slightly altered and its oval shape softened, the figurative treatment made less formal, and the monarch’s lips have taken on a restrained half-smile.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhDxMo2EI9vaiBj-2XggATaIAlcLPi8_xpV4dbaiXAXWr4p2kyw1DmLAVxx-her_wfv2uFCoKN-JwVUE3ZsQJ_Ps6xosMq37t1BZIyZmsYZbYhRcXZUA_CSSkSiFWewVzRnxmoZOnxq8PL7Ny2sZ3kP9bgw6JPk7A3Ld6BUKRSxWc7MBvWcYBRaawpX-w=s660" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="660" data-original-width="580" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhDxMo2EI9vaiBj-2XggATaIAlcLPi8_xpV4dbaiXAXWr4p2kyw1DmLAVxx-her_wfv2uFCoKN-JwVUE3ZsQJ_Ps6xosMq37t1BZIyZmsYZbYhRcXZUA_CSSkSiFWewVzRnxmoZOnxq8PL7Ny2sZ3kP9bgw6JPk7A3Ld6BUKRSxWc7MBvWcYBRaawpX-w=w351-h400" width="351" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><i>Letter from Catherine the Great to Count Piotr Aleksandrovich Rumiantsev on inoculation against smallpox dated 20 April 1787. Ink on paper. Recto.</i></span></div><p></p><p>But of greater significance on this occasion is Catherine’s letter on inoculation against smallpox. The letter was signed by her on 20 April 1787 and contains an instruction to Count Rumiantsev in Kiev, as governor-general and vice-regent of Malorossiya (“Little Russia”, a name for Ukraine used in official documents of tsarist Russia) to treat smallpox inoculation in the province as one of the main “duties” of his position, so that “such inoculation should be common everywhere”. </p><p>Smallpox was one of the most feared illnesses of the eighteenth century, when epidemics ravaged Europe in the 18th century and often claimed the lives of entire villages. It is said that in one year in the second half of the eighteenth century, two million people died of smallpox in Russia. Smallpox began with a high fever and severe vomiting, followed by a skin rash. The victim would next develop sores, which eventually scabbed over and fell off, scarring the skin. About three out of 10 of those infected died, and the survivors were typically badly scarred for life, sometimes even blinded, or permanently disabled. Scars from earlier encounters with the disease covered the bodies and faces of people in all social classes. Indeed, Catherine’s future husband, Grand Duke Piotr Fedorovich, later Tsar Peter III, fell victim to smallpox just before their wedding, and was left permanently disfigured by the pockmarks.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEi-PHlsvElnrnCSeeIHMfYVchjYtJBr8oRrC3AQloNYLg8QpQX0zXYhDORpToKt0e6fVrCprrhW3bgIhjDujEyqp2ljkJJWRr3lcX8n7fBoeqNxQHOAKxwx4IVp5MqYUSGekmll4ILKzpaCdoKI3EyzrmJyUofqwPZ_JulPMOxfGWzMslaVF7K4mtBchQ=s669" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="669" data-original-width="568" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEi-PHlsvElnrnCSeeIHMfYVchjYtJBr8oRrC3AQloNYLg8QpQX0zXYhDORpToKt0e6fVrCprrhW3bgIhjDujEyqp2ljkJJWRr3lcX8n7fBoeqNxQHOAKxwx4IVp5MqYUSGekmll4ILKzpaCdoKI3EyzrmJyUofqwPZ_JulPMOxfGWzMslaVF7K4mtBchQ=w340-h400" width="340" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><i>Letter from Catherine the Great to Count Piotr Aleksandrovich Rumiantsev. Ink on paper. Verso. Signed "Iekaterina", inscribed "V Kiev" and dated "Aprelia 20. 1787. goda".</i></span></div><p></p><p>The 1787 letter predates Edward Jenner’s medical breakthrough of vaccination by cowpox by nearly 10 years. Before Jenner, European physicians followed Turkish practice in relying upon variolation (<i>variola</i> is Latin for smallpox), a deliberate infection with a mild form of the disease. While those who received the treatment did go on to develop common smallpox symptoms like fever and rash, the death toll following variolation was significantly lower. Typically, mortality after inoculation by the “variolation” method was 2%, some 20 times less than from natural infection. But the risk remained, and there were many opponents of variolation.</p><p>The Empress herself and the heir to the throne, Grand Duke Paul, had been inoculated against smallpox some twenty years before she wrote this letter, but the task of inoculating the population of the Empire remained incomplete and was still meeting with resistance on the ground.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Before her own inoculation, Catherine had confessed in a letter to another enlightened despot, Frederick the Great of Prussia:<br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Ever since my childhood, I was aware of the horror of smallpox, and at a more mature age it took a great deal of effort to alleviate that horror ... Last spring, when the disease was rampant here, I used to run from house to house ... not wanting to endanger my son or myself. I was so struck by the vileness of such a situation that I considered it a weakness not to avoid it. I was advised to inoculate my son against smallpox. I used to reply that it would be shameful not to start with myself, and how could I introduce smallpox innoculation without setting a personal example? I began to study the subject ... Should I remain in real danger, together with thousands of people, throughout my life, or should I prefer a lesser danger, a very brief one, and so save many people? I thought that by choosing the latter, I was selecting the best course ....</div></blockquote><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.blogger.com/#"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg7__5IsMe2DCgwGIj-cMt1iWDplXptBFgAsPKfb2l7VYmWkmtD73Th3JRS5wXWGZHcTieHJlv-1s8cRVEHiFJ640jRkhrqB251LHVjCq_H4yEn0rwmmm1OPZOWttj3in_c4GtSY8_zQ4x5-tZDChV9IvIDhh6yfsNdM-LjalBfkEzpLYqFmPZSduqD0Q=w275-h400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Henry Bone, Portrait miniature of Thomas Dimsdale. Enamel on porcelain. Victoria & Albert Museum (Rosalinde & Arthur Gilbert Collection).</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">On the advice of the then Russian ambassador in London, an English doctor, Thomas Dimsdale, who had a high reputation in the field of smallpox inoculation (and with an exceptionally low mortality rate), was invited by Catherine to travel to Russia and inoculate herself and her son, Grand-Duke Paul. Accordingly, Dimsdale and his second son Nathaniel, at the time still a medical student at Edinburgh, who served as his assistant, attended Catherine in St Petersburg in 1768, and inoculated the Empress, her son, and over 140 members of the Court. Such was the anxiety surrounding the event that the Empress arranged for relays of post-horses to be ready to carry the two men rapidly to safety, should the inoculation produce adverse effects, incurring the wrath of the Russian people. </div></div><p>In October 1768, Catherine started the preparatory diet and medicinal treatment. Dimsdale harvested the contents of a smallpox pustule from the young son of a sergeant-major and used it to inoculate the Empress. </p>Horace Walpole gives an account in a long gossipy letter, 2 December 1768, to his friend Horace Mann in Florence:<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">We have a new Russian Embassador, who is to be Magnificence itself. He is wonderfully civil and copious of words. He treated me t'other night with a pompous relation of his Sovereign Lady's [<i>that is, Catherine’s</i>] heroism<i style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13.2px;">—</i>I never doubted her courage. She sent for Dr Dimsdale; would have no trial made on any person of her own age and corpulence: went into the Country with her usual company; swore Dimsdale to secrecy, and you may swear he kept his oath to such a Lioness. She was inoculated, dined, supped, and walked out in public, and never disappeared but one day; had a few [<i>pustules</i>] on her face and many on her body, which last I suppose she swore Orloff [<i>her lover, Count Grigor Grigor’evich Orlov</i>] likewise not to tell. She has now inoculated her Son—I wonder she did not, out of magnanimity, try the experiment on him first.</blockquote><p>The Empress was inoculated secretly in the night between Sunday and Monday, 12-13 October. Everything turned out well and, after a week of mild discomfort, the Empress’s recovery was triumphantly announced on 29 October. Her son was inoculated soon after. The Synod and the Senate sent greetings to Catherine, and 21 November 1768 was declared a day of celebration in Russia to honour Her Imperial Majesty’s “magnanimous, unparalleled and illustrious deed”.</p><p>An allegorical ballet, <i>Prejudice Defeated</i>, was staged at the court theatre, while, for the common people, a start was made on producing pictures in popular prints that promoted inoculation. Unfortunately, the fashionability of being inoculated against smallpox amongst the nobility did not trickle down to the Russian population at large, particularly in the outer regions of the empire. The Empress’s letter of 1787 shows again that the problem of smallpox inoculation in the outlying parts of the Empire was still acute and called for administrative intervention and supervision.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEihXzccfqtjHb0o8CM6QZDpSWlACqRB-lQuQZ3M_HeCGlD3SKV8mTMe-g6x1sGILuPNNM_3bWv13YNW5zXMTm4HznWT3VPUDq4nd9H1WsSP7It44Q4N8Pgr3YNvlvJNSj_Oxrw3jVzByS5XK9HNiW5QQ8-t0VWhookHOqgvEBYZQTwaj58mOESDYWZe3g=s517" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="517" data-original-width="448" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEihXzccfqtjHb0o8CM6QZDpSWlACqRB-lQuQZ3M_HeCGlD3SKV8mTMe-g6x1sGILuPNNM_3bWv13YNW5zXMTm4HznWT3VPUDq4nd9H1WsSP7It44Q4N8Pgr3YNvlvJNSj_Oxrw3jVzByS5XK9HNiW5QQ8-t0VWhookHOqgvEBYZQTwaj58mOESDYWZe3g=s320" width="277" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><i>The Dimsdale arms.</i></span></div><p></p><p>Dimsdale was rewarded with the rank of Baron of the Empire, Counsellor of State, and Physician to the Empress, besides a reward of £10,000, a pension of £500 per annum, and £2,000 expenses. He had also permission to add to his arms a wing of the Russian eagle in a gold shield. His son, Nathaniel, shared his honours; he too received a Barony, and was also presented by the Grand Duke Paul, “as a testimony of his regard”, with a gold snuffbox.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhD7WCFbxh2Nd31F6qS5U3om3OO9-A-evqll9xK7_JBMp8vGrt9QEpcwPhcu55n0VDfrFjNzDnZsi-VkTwRxUkwbBVM7cU7OPI1cTS9UUsdeKvIH2dutBOniBlGgj-VUErSK1jd1WzWz9rTT3j0BHB_eXox3kgEVfEeEkUyp5dy4Yq8kj8rhIx7AeDIJw=s564" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="488" data-original-width="564" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhD7WCFbxh2Nd31F6qS5U3om3OO9-A-evqll9xK7_JBMp8vGrt9QEpcwPhcu55n0VDfrFjNzDnZsi-VkTwRxUkwbBVM7cU7OPI1cTS9UUsdeKvIH2dutBOniBlGgj-VUErSK1jd1WzWz9rTT3j0BHB_eXox3kgEVfEeEkUyp5dy4Yq8kj8rhIx7AeDIJw=s320" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><i>Nathaniel was given this magnificent diamond-encrusted, varicoloured-gold snuffbox, decorated with figures in neo-classical landscapes. The box may have been made in either St Petersburg or Berlin. The snuffbox is now in the possession of the Victoria and Albert Museum (Rosalinde & Arthur Gilbert collection).</i></span></div><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">And the convalescent six-year-old Alexander Markov, the donor of infected lymph for the Empress, returned to hospital, where he made a full recovery and was later ennobled for his services: his crest an arm bearing a rose in the hand, and an inoculation incision. Catherine wrote in a letter to Count Chernyshev, now Russian ambassador in London:<br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Starting with me and my son, who is also recovering, there is no noble house in which there are not several inoculated persons, and many regret that they had smallpox naturally and so cannot be fashionable. Count Orlov, Count Razumovsky and countless others have passed through Mr Dimsdale’s hands—and even renowned beauties... Here is what example means.</div></blockquote><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj1vhk-1_BOYlUx0ubUMXP_hyl--Bk3i2lsWJX-vV9QoycFLct2jqtNOZXeRmWQyr1zJxBHJkJALfbCSsyK3-7mEkOOHYhBsyHDzvw2bNxI-ugGf6wygOSrKm26cxk_TvAKo3eF3wTjRF4l61ZH1-ntVYeqReiq6zOIOvwvDvCpiGSpBx1VR_BQ-uYYsg=s783" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj1vhk-1_BOYlUx0ubUMXP_hyl--Bk3i2lsWJX-vV9QoycFLct2jqtNOZXeRmWQyr1zJxBHJkJALfbCSsyK3-7mEkOOHYhBsyHDzvw2bNxI-ugGf6wygOSrKm26cxk_TvAKo3eF3wTjRF4l61ZH1-ntVYeqReiq6zOIOvwvDvCpiGSpBx1VR_BQ-uYYsg=s783" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="783" data-original-width="645" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj1vhk-1_BOYlUx0ubUMXP_hyl--Bk3i2lsWJX-vV9QoycFLct2jqtNOZXeRmWQyr1zJxBHJkJALfbCSsyK3-7mEkOOHYhBsyHDzvw2bNxI-ugGf6wygOSrKm26cxk_TvAKo3eF3wTjRF4l61ZH1-ntVYeqReiq6zOIOvwvDvCpiGSpBx1VR_BQ-uYYsg=s320" width="264" /></a></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><i>Dimsdale in old age.</i></span></div><p></p><p>On his return to England Dimsdale was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society and, sometime after this, Dr or Baron Dimsdale, as he was now called, opened a banking house in Cornhill, in partnership with his sons and other relatives. Although he himself retired from the firm in 1776, the business was continued by his descendants. The success of the Dimsdale bank rested on its appeal to a clientele which was largely upper-middle-class, nonconformist, and often related by blood or marriage to the partners.</p><p>In 1780 he was elected member of parliament for the borough of Hertford, after which he declined all medical practice except for the relief of the poor. He went once more, however, to Russia in 1781, when he inoculated Catherine’s grandchildren, the Princes Alexander and Constantine. He was re-elected to parliament in 1784, but did not stand in 1790, and was succeeded by his son Nathaniel. Dimsdale died at Hertford on 30th December 1800, aged eighty-nine. He came from a long line of Quaker medical men (his grandfather Robert Dimsdale, surgeon, had accompanied William Penn on a visit to America in 1684) and was interred in the Quaker burial ground at Bishops Stortford. Dimsdale had lived to see the publication in 1798 of Edward Jenner’s work on vaccination, which eventually triumphed and put an end to the earlier practice of variolation.</p><p>Nathaniel himself died in 1811 with no male heir and his Russian title lapsed. The Barony awarded to his father, however, descended via his eldest son John (1747–1820) to succeeding generations. The current Baron Dimsdale is Edward, the 10th baron.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjtf7JXG948x_ix8O1Hl_0a7si48plm9HBb7dUp3RfLS_CcADRt6E7zapRIFMKRbm00eb4jeHmwQ89gOAkFjAeVB7jNkmZzAqdtA3QG7WzunIbfakDpD-T_lKnR_vCNpuPYUD9RLfr69MEKlMB58o2Mu5raSJQ36St9HpHqgrrm1zugLkDekeptCrSrZQ=s2176" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2176" data-original-width="1216" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjtf7JXG948x_ix8O1Hl_0a7si48plm9HBb7dUp3RfLS_CcADRt6E7zapRIFMKRbm00eb4jeHmwQ89gOAkFjAeVB7jNkmZzAqdtA3QG7WzunIbfakDpD-T_lKnR_vCNpuPYUD9RLfr69MEKlMB58o2Mu5raSJQ36St9HpHqgrrm1zugLkDekeptCrSrZQ=w224-h400" width="224" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><i>Thomas Dimsdale</i></span><i style="text-align: left;">.—</i><span style="text-align: left;"><i>The Present Method of Inoculating for the Small-Pox, to Which Are Added Some Experiments Instituted with a View to Discover the Effects of a Similar Treatment in the Natural Small-Pox.—London : W. Owen, 1767.</i></span></div><p></p><p>In 1767 Dimsdale had published an important treatise on variolation: <i>The Present Method of Inoculating for the Small-Pox</i>, a work which became very popular and in the course of three years ran through at least seven large editions, and was translated into Russian in 1770. Dimsdale’s later treatises on inoculation included <i>Thoughts on General and Partial Inoculation</i> (1776), <i>Observations on the Plan of a Dispensary and General Inoculation</i> (1780) and <i>Tracts on Inoculation</i> (1768 and 1781). </p><p>One might note here that Dimsdale’s notable clients included Omai (c.1753-c.1780), the first Tahitian to visit England. Omai arrived in Britain on 14th July 1774 and was taken by Joseph Banks to see the king on the 21st (there were newspaper accounts the next day). Shortly afterwards (possibly at King George's urging) he was taken by Banks to Baron Dimsdale in Hertfordshire to be inoculated against smallpox. It's not certain whether it was the King or Banks who suggested Omai be taken to Dimsdale, but, as George definitely paid for the treatment, it was most likely he. Banks (then still plain Mr Banks, he didn't become Sir Joseph until 1781) took Omai to Hertford on 4th August and stayed with him until Omai was well enough to return to London on an uncertain date between 14th and 17th August 1774. (Dimsdale stressed the need for rest before as well as after inoculation.) Smallpox had killed Omai's compatriot Ahutoru, the first Tahitian to visit Europe, who had been taken to France in 1769 by Bougainville and died of the disease on his voyage home.</p><p>Dimsdale’s work on smallpox inoculation was not original but built on the achievements of an Essex family named Sutton, who despite the absence of any formal medical qualifications had achieved outstanding success with their techniques. These consisted of a 2-3-week preparatory diet and drug preparation followed by puncture of the skin with a lancet dipped, to use their own description, “in the smallest possible quantity of the unripe crude or watery matter from the pustules” from a patient suffering from the disease. The incision, one in each arm, was minute: it was not to exceed one eighth of an inch in length nor one sixteenth of an inch in depth. The Suttons operated an Inoculation House at Ingatestone in Essex. They inoculated about 17,000 persons, with only five or six fatalities. Without acknowledging the Suttons by name, Dimsdale established the “Suttonian” method as the standard mode of inoculation for smallpox.</p><p>So what has all this to do with William Blake? </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhE48ekqGPbm-SB-P41DDMMUYlcj6dYU8LGvYo8MTU6aHivcggtcHF_SNa4LKLS1L7lRIPMdmeKD5ju7r3TDMMspi2QwYfucVP0oCaxcxALt-QdxpUxCk_ztgV9Z33Sz3DgP8ZtEFLpipW5E9o5l9EnFwKirX3gLjCVP25mQiYTUNc7N5OVGFBcfCpglA=s624" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="624" data-original-width="442" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhE48ekqGPbm-SB-P41DDMMUYlcj6dYU8LGvYo8MTU6aHivcggtcHF_SNa4LKLS1L7lRIPMdmeKD5ju7r3TDMMspi2QwYfucVP0oCaxcxALt-QdxpUxCk_ztgV9Z33Sz3DgP8ZtEFLpipW5E9o5l9EnFwKirX3gLjCVP25mQiYTUNc7N5OVGFBcfCpglA=w284-h400" width="284" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><i>Urizen (copy A). Titlepage. </i></span></div><p></p><p>In February 1956, Sotheby’s sold at auction Blake’s First Book of Urizen. Identified as copy A, it was formerly in the possession of Major T.E. Dimsdale, the eighth Baron. It was acquired by Paul Mellon; and given by Mellon to the Yale Center for British Art in 1992. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgv6W4arv6sJaVrqeTMbhY_UzFe2e3V3pDsciTctHrZJHnQWO6x14QaB8NC1-EO8SU-St97rc-uZq4EkgNgIo_vRfWRHkjwUaNR81xJ5LqyNUDc2uFnAtjQI_XCaLhlzjITb9J92sFzMkhYiX4fvPBlcoSISGVYlDkDlsH_RelbvOkHjGKuG3_JWv-eTg=s639" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="639" data-original-width="432" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgv6W4arv6sJaVrqeTMbhY_UzFe2e3V3pDsciTctHrZJHnQWO6x14QaB8NC1-EO8SU-St97rc-uZq4EkgNgIo_vRfWRHkjwUaNR81xJ5LqyNUDc2uFnAtjQI_XCaLhlzjITb9J92sFzMkhYiX4fvPBlcoSISGVYlDkDlsH_RelbvOkHjGKuG3_JWv-eTg=w270-h400" width="270" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i style="text-align: left;">Urizen (copy A). </i></div><p>This copy, originally printed in 1794, remains one of the most striking—as well as most complete—versions. The Sotheby’s catalogue cites a family tradition that the first Baron Dimsdale had acquired the book directly from Blake.</p><p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjdHFERrsQkScW0JyWYlVyWLvGa0JS8xGn_GWMYsK_0i9W9OPMBvYPGX8KbOwWhhbrpAn6LCJ7VjqQvP5ZpJJEYS7Q4NKjf6ws9VJFspJkqjNyHaIyinaAaEf96id2X2yJ-SG_iEJ7rHdFMP0cQXL_OPoPlZICFi6p8d5CLi1t0fd2mki7F30RaRX5zfQ=s612" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="612" data-original-width="395" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjdHFERrsQkScW0JyWYlVyWLvGa0JS8xGn_GWMYsK_0i9W9OPMBvYPGX8KbOwWhhbrpAn6LCJ7VjqQvP5ZpJJEYS7Q4NKjf6ws9VJFspJkqjNyHaIyinaAaEf96id2X2yJ-SG_iEJ7rHdFMP0cQXL_OPoPlZICFi6p8d5CLi1t0fd2mki7F30RaRX5zfQ=w259-h400" width="259" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i style="text-align: left;">Urizen (copy A). </i></div><br />It had previously been issued in colour facsimile with an accompanying note by Dorothy Plowman.<div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiYMZq5ZsLa2H8lhdhnMN23ouZZnh_NqdMgYM9spygelX8yIEjg628HyGjfW8irrA8UPwSbgE8sfuhmKkl07rRPntKjxfxF0zSduALEkKHqmhlscSRkbpSgBwM7CwBArdusmS6X4NqLqY6BFNRArBSG9xXSRIMF_iPOhJJTrzX1Oq0QfrsWh2y_A7oy9Q=s2835" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2835" data-original-width="2189" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiYMZq5ZsLa2H8lhdhnMN23ouZZnh_NqdMgYM9spygelX8yIEjg628HyGjfW8irrA8UPwSbgE8sfuhmKkl07rRPntKjxfxF0zSduALEkKHqmhlscSRkbpSgBwM7CwBArdusmS6X4NqLqY6BFNRArBSG9xXSRIMF_iPOhJJTrzX1Oq0QfrsWh2y_A7oy9Q=s320" width="247" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i>The Book of Urizen by Willliam Blake. Reproduced in facsimile from an original copy of the work printed and illuminated by the author in 1794, formerly in the possession of the late Baron Dimsdale. With a note by Dorothy Plowman. London & Toronto : Dent; New York : Dutton, 1929. </i>Page 7.</div><br /><div>(Reasonably-priced copies of the facsimile can still be found on the second-hand market.)<br /><p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgcHY4iGjD1SCeO5QbEY6iD1wFctM9QYDTD733jFKtOXG9iMfMtRXGg6l7a0zpw6CFMt52KCcIxQYgR1jB_wfBh5jAXJa2XtNyYZ1O0eAJ6ervCN-Re2tlKazxpHZg_x_vfJu8cOcTI74rbyWWj8Jt3n6T0algBh3_XL_FRDY8XtwW1zmMIYJkW2Q8R0w=s1116" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1116" data-original-width="787" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgcHY4iGjD1SCeO5QbEY6iD1wFctM9QYDTD733jFKtOXG9iMfMtRXGg6l7a0zpw6CFMt52KCcIxQYgR1jB_wfBh5jAXJa2XtNyYZ1O0eAJ6ervCN-Re2tlKazxpHZg_x_vfJu8cOcTI74rbyWWj8Jt3n6T0algBh3_XL_FRDY8XtwW1zmMIYJkW2Q8R0w=w283-h400" width="283" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i>Songs of Innocence (copy R). Fitzwilliam Museum.</i></div><br />Previously, in 1952, Sotheby’s had sold a fragmentary copy (Copy R) of Blake’s <i>Songs of Innocence</i>. Again, the family tradition, reported in the catalogue, cites the original purchaser as the first Baron Dimsdale. This copy of <i>Innocence</i> shows some signs of fire damage. It was acquired by Geoffrey Keynes and bequeathed by him to the Fitzwilliam Museum in 1985. The museum notes that “This copy was printed and coloured c. 1794”, though Joseph Viscomi suggests a later date of production. To my mind, the light watercolour washes agree with a 1794 date; copies from 10 years later are much more richly coloured. Another fragmentary copy of <i>Innocence</i> (Copy Y, again with fire damage) was acquired by a German collector and is on loan to the Wallraf-Richartz Museum in Cologne. It is now clear that these two fragmented copies once formed a single copy. Copy R/Y was presumably broken up while in the Dimsdale family collection, perhaps at the time it was rescued from a bonfire. It may also be the earliest example of a Blake illuminated book decorated with gold leaf.<p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEixlS-6IxoJbM2PcjdkYhlj4sAQRwZjQX1L49hvo-SVR5xysZnjRLw5UlqCHIQZ0bv5lumHtPljjxr_yCWryeFmhYc0GhMg3qQ7QXFjXtXC8FKozjqR7edF5RIsLojxFWxKFkwZMzAIJEsLK8kbZlaRKu5j9bWqLcd-5i1yUNJpdUKXWqXJgPVmiu1oEw=s896" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="896" data-original-width="689" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEixlS-6IxoJbM2PcjdkYhlj4sAQRwZjQX1L49hvo-SVR5xysZnjRLw5UlqCHIQZ0bv5lumHtPljjxr_yCWryeFmhYc0GhMg3qQ7QXFjXtXC8FKozjqR7edF5RIsLojxFWxKFkwZMzAIJEsLK8kbZlaRKu5j9bWqLcd-5i1yUNJpdUKXWqXJgPVmiu1oEw=w308-h400" width="308" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i>Edward Young</i><span style="text-align: left;">.—</span><i>Night Thoughts. Hand-coloured engravings.</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div>Most recently, Sotheby’s (17 December 1984) sold as Lot 318, <br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">… The Complaint and the Consolation, or Night Thoughts, [<i>with</i>] 43 pictorial borders designed and engraved by William Blake and coloured by hand, … red straight-grained morocco gilt, uncut, folio, R. Noble for R. Edwards, 1797.</blockquote>Inscribed on the verso of the title page in pencil in the upper left-hand corner is “Baron Dimsdale”. It was sold to the dealers Sims, Reed & Fogg, for £13,750. The dealers then sold it to an anonymous collector for £20,000. It is now listed as Copy X of the coloured Night Thoughts. Bentley suggests that Blake was given copies of the <i>Night Thoughts</i> to colour as part payment for his work. The coloured engravings, of a luminous beauty like that of the original watercolours, would have been sold directly to Blake’s patrons.<br /><p>There’s thus a Dimsdale provenance for the <i>Book of Urizen</i> (copy A), <i>Songs of Innocence</i> (copy R/Y), and the hand-coloured copy of Young’s <i>Night Thoughts</i> (copy X). This, surely, is a significant Blake collection, almost certainly bought directly from the poet-painter and thus strong evidence of at least acquaintanceship and probable friendship between Blake and the first Baron Dimsdale. (Of course, Thomas and Nathaniel Dimsdale were both the first Baron, of separate creations; but that doesn’t really alter the picture of a strong link between Blake and the Dimsdales.)</p><p>It’s puzzling that so little has been written on the Blake-Dimsdale connection. I suppose that Blake’s friendship with a fashionable society physician, banker, and member of Parliament doesn’t fit the standard picture that puts Blake firmly within the circle of Joseph Johnson (what Richard Cobb dismissed as a mere bunch of “misfits, cranks, dreamers, and dissenting radicals”). One imagines the Communist Party Historians Group (E.P. Thompson, A.L. Morton, and the rest) sitting around talking about the Johnson circle: “Ooh, they’re just like us”. As indeed they were.</p><p>Dimsdale was a Quaker, and the Friends’ London Meeting for Sufferings had first petitioned parliament against the slave trade in 1783. He was one of the initially small group of MPs who supported the Society for the Purpose of Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade from its inception in 1787. And also as a member of parliament, the Quaker Dimsdale consistently voted against the Pitt government’s war plans. Unlike the Johnson circle which just talked about it, Dimsdale was actively trying to do something.</p><p>So were William and Catherine Blake inoculated? I think they must have been. Dr Dimsdale as friend and patron would surely have encouraged it. I am tempted to suggest that maybe approaching Dr Dimsdale for inoculation was the occasion of their meeting and the start of their friendship. Extraordinary as it seems, there’s a real possibility that an obscure physician in Hertfordshire had inoculated both Catherine Blake and the Empress Catherine of Russia.</p><p><b>Sources and Further Reading</b></p><p>Philip H. Clendenning.—“Dr. Thomas Dimsdale and Smallpox Inoculation in Russia”.—Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences, Vol. 28,No. 2 (April 1973) 109-12.</p><p>John Griffiths.—“Doctor Thomas Dimsdale, and Smallpox in Russia: The Variolation of the Empress Catherine the Great”.—Bristol Medico-Chirurgical Journal (January 1984).</p><p>E.H. McCormick.—Omai, Pacific envoy.—Auckland University Press, 1977.</p>MacDougall Arts.—Important Russian Art: auction sale.—1 December 2021.<br />https://macdougallauction.com/en/catalogue/43<p>Karen Mulhallen.—“The Crying of Lot 318; or, Young’s Night Thoughts Colored Once More”.—Blake/An Illustrated Quarterly, Volume 19, Issue 2 (Fall 1985) 71-72.</p>Lucy Ward.—The Empress and the English Doctor : how Catherine the Great defied a deadly virus.—London : Oneworld, 2022.—333 pages : illustrations (black and white), facsimile, portraits ; 24 cm.<br /><span> </span>Published in April 2022, long after I had completed this post. Will fill in much of the detail that I omitted or simplified.<p><b>Other names that I could have mentioned</b></p><p>Lady Mary Wortley Montagu (1689-1762), who introduced variolation (smallpox inoculation) into England; Onesimus (fl. 1706-1721), African-born slave, who introduced smallpox inoculation into North America; Cotton Mather (1663-1728), Puritan minister, who took the credit.</p><p><br /></p></div></div>Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-71163422208527303092021-11-21T07:39:00.008-08:002021-11-21T13:02:26.550-08:00Milton: titlepage or frontispieceThe Blake Society Zoom meeting of October 15, 2021, was devoted to MILTON AND THE COTTAGE. The following notes are a response to the first part of the discussion and are concerned with the titlepage (some think of it as a frontispiece; it has elements of both) to Blake’s <i>Milton a Poem in 2 Books</i> (1804).<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7813iPzU_Bc/YZpeJJ4s2QI/AAAAAAAABGA/QbBFN66tHHoLpD6qnN8ZAcTMuT_BUTSjACLcBGAsYHQ/s650/milton.a.p1.100.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="650" data-original-width="458" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7813iPzU_Bc/YZpeJJ4s2QI/AAAAAAAABGA/QbBFN66tHHoLpD6qnN8ZAcTMuT_BUTSjACLcBGAsYHQ/w450-h640/milton.a.p1.100.jpg" width="450" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Milton</i> plate 1; copy A, British Museum.</div><br />Plate 1 of <i>Milton</i> presents a nude man, the spiritual form of the poet John Milton, against a background of smoke and flames. In copy A, the vortex of billowing smoke is clearly shown emerging from Milton’s left palm and, to a lesser extent, from his right wrist. (It is not so obvious in some later impressions; and is ignored by many commentators.) At the bottom is Milton’s motto from <i>Paradise Lost</i>: To Justify the Ways of God to Men.<br /><a name='more'></a><br /><div>Source-hunting, searching for the origin of elements of an image in an earlier artist’s work, is one of the most maligned activities in art scholarship. When it is merely an end in itself, then it very much takes its place at the lower levels of the art-historical enterprise. But it seems to me that William Blake’s extraordinary visual memory (paintings seen just once provoke ideas years later), means that source-hunting in Blake provides a much-needed contextualisation of his work in both the visual and the literary resources that were available to him.<br /><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ThgOfQTrAD8/YZpl1wxPWdI/AAAAAAAABGI/0nP8hKbJpYAyHOm4TrGVIDc29HWK7-UBACLcBGAsYHQ/s600/Emblem%2BI.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="600" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ThgOfQTrAD8/YZpl1wxPWdI/AAAAAAAABGI/0nP8hKbJpYAyHOm4TrGVIDc29HWK7-UBACLcBGAsYHQ/w400-h400/Emblem%2BI.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i style="text-align: left;"><br />Atalanta fugiens</i><span style="text-align: left;">, E</span><span style="font-size: x-small; text-align: left;">MBLEMA</span><span style="text-align: left;"> I. </span><i style="text-align: left;">De secretis naturæ</i><span style="text-align: left;">. Portavit eum ventus in ventre suo.</span></td></tr></tbody></table><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>Nelson Hilton has remarked the strong resemblance between the titlepage of Blake’s <i>Milton</i> and E<span style="font-size: x-small;">MBLEM</span> I, “The wind hath carried it in his belly”, of Michael Maier’s <i>Atalanta fugiens</i> (1617). In Maier’s E<span style="font-size: x-small;">MBLEM</span> I, a pregnant man stands, his hands and head emitting currents of wind, cloud, or smoke. Within his belly we see a child beginning to form. Maier’s wind (or <i>anima</i>, or <i>spiritus</i>), notes Hilton, “carries its potential for dynamic expression to term, as the Word bears its vortex”, a vortex which the reader of <i>Milton</i> is about to enter. But how likely is it that Blake might have access to this rare alchemical emblem book? Quite plausibly it seems.<br /><br /><i>Atalanta fugiens</i> is the best-known work of Michael Maier, Lutheran physician and alchemist, often credited with bringing Rosicrucianism to England. Its fifty emblems combine words, images, and music, in a <i>Gesamtkunstwerk</i>. There are resemblances between other of Blake’s designs and the emblematic images of <i>Atalanta fugiens</i> besides that spotted by Nelson Hilton. Suzanne Sklar and Paul T. Miner have also drawn our attention to Blakean imagery probably deriving from Maier’s book. I hope to return to this in a later post.<br /><br />We do not know the extent of Blake’s reading; he definitely had access to William Hayley’s library from 1797; could he also have had access to the remarkable libraries of those who met with Blake as friends and as collectors of his work? Two of the most significant would have been Rebekah Bliss (1749-1819) and Alexander Tilloch (1759-1825).<br /><br />In 1797, Blake, with a host of other engravers, was co-signatory to a testimonial in favour of an approach to printing banknotes devised by Tilloch, inventor, publisher, newspaper editor, Biblical controversialist, and member of a Rosicrucian order. Blake, I would suggest, had known Tilloch from his arrival in London in the 1780s (Tilloch may be identified as the character Tilly Lally in Blake’s <i>An Island in the Moon</i> of 1788 or so) and they had common friends and theological interests. Tilloch’s library, sold shortly after his death in 1825, reflected his many intellectual interests with an extensive collection of alchemical printed books and manuscripts. Lot 232: <i>Majeri Secreta Naturæ Chymica</i>, 1687, was a posthumously published abridgement of <i>Atalanta fugiens</i>.<br /><br />The Bliss and Tilloch libraries are important indications of the intellectual and cultural context of Blake’s circles of friendship. Did Blake have access to the medieval illuminated manuscripts and Oriental books in the Bliss collection? Did friendship with Tilloch provide access to Tilloch’s alchemical books, theology, texts and editions of the Bible, and Greek and Hebrew dictionaries? Whether or not he had direct access to these libraries, acquaintanceship with their owners could well have influenced him. <br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br />The elements that make up the <i>Milton</i> titlepage clearly have Biblical connotations. The clouds of smoke and flames bring to mind the wanderings of the Children of Israel.<br /><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">E<span style="font-size: x-small;">XODUS</span> 13:21 And the L<span style="font-size: x-small;">ORD</span> went before them by day in a pillar of a cloud, to lead them the way; and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light; to go by day and night:</blockquote><br />Note too, how the image is centred on Milton’s buttocks (which appear again on plates 8 and 15) and which, with the E<span style="font-size: x-small;">XODUS</span> theme already established, recall how G<span style="font-size: x-small;">OD</span> appeared to Moses. <br /><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">E<span style="font-size: x-small;">XODUS</span> 33:22 And it shall come to pass, while my glory passeth by, that I will put thee in a clift of the rock, and will cover thee with my hand while I pass by:<br /> 23 And I will take away mine hand, and thou shalt see my back parts: but my face shall not be seen.</blockquote><br />Christians hope to see the L<span style="font-size: x-small;">ORD</span> face to face, but all Moses and the Jews get is J<span style="font-size: x-small;">EHOVAH</span>’s enormous bottom wobbling into the distance. We shouldn’t be po-faced about this. Readers of the Bible have long found G<span style="font-size: x-small;">OD</span>’s “back parts” (Vulgate: <i>posteriora</i>) irresistibly comic. For instance, Chaucer in the “Summoner’s Tale” employs scriptural allusions in his tale of the bedridden Thomas’s gift and its codicil. He develops both the characters and the plot around the scatological scenes. Chaucer also employs scatology to emphasize his theme of just rewards. In doing so, he relies heavily upon biblical parallels that satirize the friars’ hypocrisy. Typological exegesis demonstrates that, if the squire Jankin’s division of the fart with a cartwheel suggests the H<span style="font-size: x-small;">OLY</span> G<span style="font-size: x-small;">HOST</span>’s windy descent to the Apostles at Pentecost, Thomas’s first gift recalls the events in the lives of Moses and Elijah that Pentecost fulfills. The “Summoners Tale” can thus be seen as an intentional perversion of scriptural history. For every religious reference, there’s a bum joke; scatology follows eschatology. And we know Blake had read Chaucer attentively. Chaucerean scatology is much written-about; Blakean scatology remains a theme but little explored. <br /><br /><div><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br />There’s another possible source for figures with smoke emerging from their hands in the library of Rebekah Bliss. Mrs Bliss, our earliest known collector of work by William Blake (she had copies of the <i>Songs</i>, and <i>For Children: The Gates of Paradise</i> as early as 1794), had a serious interest in Indian culture and her library reflected her passionate interest in the art of the Orient with Mughal miniatures, Persian poetry, and Sanskrit scrolls. Printed books on India in the posthumous sale of Mrs Bliss’s <i>Bibliotheca splendidissima</i> (1826) include as lot 345, Balthazard Solvyns, <i>Les Hindous</i> (Paris, 1808), elaborately bound in four volumes. A plate in Vol. I shows the expiatory festival of Neela Pooja. The participants burn incense in the palms of their hands and it would have been in her library that Blake could have seen this work.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-z6uC9vgwo2U/YZpmTtlFPSI/AAAAAAAABGQ/9q96PWQoDHgCpDWZ6-M7HZgjAF9sZbtiACLcBGAsYHQ/s612/Nila-Pooja.%2BVarious%2BExpiations%2Bof%2Bthe%2BHindoos_II-192.gif" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="450" data-original-width="612" height="470" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-z6uC9vgwo2U/YZpmTtlFPSI/AAAAAAAABGQ/9q96PWQoDHgCpDWZ6-M7HZgjAF9sZbtiACLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h470/Nila-Pooja.%2BVarious%2BExpiations%2Bof%2Bthe%2BHindoos_II-192.gif" width="640" /></a></div><br /><span style="text-align: left;">F. Balthazard Solvyns, </span><i style="text-align: left;">Les hindoûs</i><span style="text-align: left;">. 2 vols. (Paris, 1808): [1re Section Livraison IIme]; No 1. Double-plate: N<span style="font-size: x-small;">ILA</span>-P<span style="font-size: x-small;">AYAH</span>: N<span style="font-size: x-small;">YLAR</span>-P<span style="font-size: x-small;">OUDJAH</span> = N<span style="font-size: x-small;">ILA</span> P<span style="font-size: x-small;">OUJA</span> | V<span style="font-size: x-small;">ARIOUS</span> E<span style="font-size: x-small;">XPIATIONS OF THE </span>H<span style="font-size: x-small;">INDOOS</span>.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><br /></span></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-jSnLNFcM5_Q/YZpmjJgf47I/AAAAAAAABGY/2GhdvfZ0q7EWHnQBC70_AcsTmunrluZjACLcBGAsYHQ/s324/Nila-Pooja._detail.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="324" data-original-width="288" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-jSnLNFcM5_Q/YZpmjJgf47I/AAAAAAAABGY/2GhdvfZ0q7EWHnQBC70_AcsTmunrluZjACLcBGAsYHQ/w568-h640/Nila-Pooja._detail.jpg" width="568" /></a></div><br /><span style="text-align: left;">Detail showing devotees of the Goddess holding smoking incense in the palms of their hands.</span></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br /><b>Sources and Further Reading</b><br /><br />Elizabeth C. Effinger.—”Anal Blake: bringing up the rear in Blakean criticism”, in Queer Blake. Edited by Helen P. Bruder and Tristanne Connolly.—Houndmills, Basingstoke : Palgrave Macmillan, 2010.—pp. 63-73.<br /><br />Nelson Hilton.—Literal imagination: Blake’s vision of words.—Berkeley CA: University of California Press, 1983.<br /><br />Ian Lancashire.--”Moses, Elijah and the Back Parts of God: Satiric Scatology in Chaucer’s ‘Summoner’s Tale’“.--Mosaic 14 (1981, 17-30.<br /><br />Michael Maier.—Atalanta fugiens.—Frankfurt am Main, 1617.<div><span> </span>Reissued at Oppenheim in 1618, with corrections and a portrait. <i>Secreta Naturæ Chymica</i>, otherwise <i>Scrutinium chymicum</i>, 1687, is a posthumously published abridgement.<br /><span> </span>There are several modern editions. In 1964 the music publisher Bärenreiter of Kassel issued a facsimile of the 1618 edition, with an Afterword by L.M. Wüthrich. A French version by Etienne Perrot (<i>Atalante fugitive</i>, 1969) is scrupulously accurate and carries excellent notes. Perrot has also published a commentary on the work entitled <i>Les trois pommes d’or: commentaire sur l’Atalante fugitive de Michel Maier</i> (Paris, 1981). An English summary (an abbreviated translation) is contained in H.M.E. de Jong, <i>Michael Maier’s Atalanta fugiens: Sources of an Alchemical Book of Emblems</i> (Leiden, 1969). This book, based on her doctoral thesis, situates Maier in a context of medieval alchemical writings and imagery. More recently, Joscelyn Godwin in <i>Michael Maier’s Atalanta fugiens (1617), an Edition of the Fugues, Emblems and Epigrams. With an Introductory Essay by Hildemarie Streich</i>. Magnum Opus Hermetic Sourceworks; 22 (Oxford : Adam McLean, 1987) has produced a performing edition of the music accompanied by a cassette-recording. The complete series of emblems is reproduced in Stanislas Klossowski de Rola, <i>The Golden Game</i> (London, 1988), but without the epigrams or the discourses.<br /><br />F. Balthazard Solvyns.—Les hindoûs.—2 vols.—Paris : chez l’auteur, place Saint-Andre-des-Arcs, no 11, et chez H. Nicolle, rue de Seine, no 12, à la librairie stèrèotype, de l’imprimerie de Mame frères, 1808.<br /><br /></div></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">◆◆</div></div><div></div><span><br /></span></div>Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-65994043267964734252021-11-05T10:14:00.196-07:002021-11-07T05:34:58.489-08:00Blake's Cottage at FelphamThe Blake Society’s Zoom meeting on Wednesday 20 October was devoted to MILTON AND THE COTTAGE. This is my belated response.<br /><br />The climactic moment of Blake’s <i>Milton</i> is precipitated when the female figure Ololon appears as “a Virgin of twelve years.” <br /><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">For Ololon step'd into the Polypus within the Mundane Shell<br />They could not step into Vegetable Worlds without becoming<br />The enemies of Humanity except in a Female Form<br />And as One Female, Ololon and all its mighty Hosts<br />Appear'd: a Virgin of twelve years</blockquote><br />Ololon is the spiritual form of Milton’s Sixfold Emanation; she is the truth underlying his errors about woman. And there’s that striking designation of Ololon as “a Virgin of twelve years,” with its Biblical resonance and its evocation of the Virgin Mary. Ololon, like Mary, is a bearer of deliverance.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-uxHllbwDu0c/YYWrf1QzzuI/AAAAAAAABEc/ULV5oYnmvuMM6qswhBTHknnrkGGYuz6tgCLcBGAsYHQ/s575/milton.a.p36.100.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="575" data-original-width="412" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-uxHllbwDu0c/YYWrf1QzzuI/AAAAAAAABEc/ULV5oYnmvuMM6qswhBTHknnrkGGYuz6tgCLcBGAsYHQ/w458-h640/milton.a.p36.100.jpg" width="458" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><span><a name='more'></a></span><div style="text-align: center;">(Plate 36 of <i>Milton</i> shows the cottage at Felpham of William and Catherine Blake. The image shown is from Copy A of the poem, now in the British Museum, Department of Prints and Drawings.)</div><div> <br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-qwc4BK89NNo/YYWtGTSGvjI/AAAAAAAABEo/loV-up3exZkBvboZBk9A8lPBeoceu1-NQCLcBGAsYHQ/s395/milton.a.p36.100%2B%25282%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="215" data-original-width="395" height="348" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-qwc4BK89NNo/YYWtGTSGvjI/AAAAAAAABEo/loV-up3exZkBvboZBk9A8lPBeoceu1-NQCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h348/milton.a.p36.100%2B%25282%2529.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><span style="text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: center;">(Plate 36 <i>detail</i>: the cottage.)</div></span></div><div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Walking in my Cottage Garden, sudden I beheld<br />The Virgin Ololon & address’d her as a Daughter of Beulah</blockquote><br />The illustration of “Blakes Cottage at Felpham” is clearly stolen from Tolson’s <i>Hermathenae.</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-H2zjZAmqjrw/YYWx3yxJlfI/AAAAAAAABFE/GS-Oz_7Em8o_zc39rzTNMctE_HuIdaxugCLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/Tolson_Hermathenae%2BXLI.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1054" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-H2zjZAmqjrw/YYWx3yxJlfI/AAAAAAAABFE/GS-Oz_7Em8o_zc39rzTNMctE_HuIdaxugCLcBGAsYHQ/w330-h640/Tolson_Hermathenae%2BXLI.jpg" width="330" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;">(Francis Tolson, </span><i style="text-align: left;">Hermathenae</i><span style="text-align: left;"> (1740), page 120: E<span style="font-size: x-small;">MBLEM</span> XLI. <i>No</i> R<span style="font-size: x-small;">EASON</span> <i>above</i> FAITH.)</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><br /></span></div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-4_OweXfJkf0/YYWyx_vs2hI/AAAAAAAABFM/SDDAxi4BlzctYGUc9RL0QQVFQqibV5LmwCLcBGAsYHQ/s995/Tolson_Hermathenae%2BXLI%2B%25282%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="925" data-original-width="995" height="371" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-4_OweXfJkf0/YYWyx_vs2hI/AAAAAAAABFM/SDDAxi4BlzctYGUc9RL0QQVFQqibV5LmwCLcBGAsYHQ/w400-h371/Tolson_Hermathenae%2BXLI%2B%25282%2529.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;">(Emblem XLI, </span><i style="text-align: left;">detail)</i></div><div><div><br />The engraving illustrates an episode in the life of St. Augustine of Hippo (“Austin” in the poem). The saint is shown in a seashore landscape with a humble cottage, an angel above. The third figure is of a boy emptying the ocean into a hole in the sand.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">⬧</div></div><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Lesser artists borrow, great artists steal—I<span style="font-size: x-small;">GOR</span> S<span style="font-size: x-small;">TRAVINSKY</span>.</blockquote><br />The basic idea implicit in this aphorism is the contrast between “borrowing” as slavish imitation that actually diminishes both the original and the imitator, and “stealing” which results in the significant transformation of the original artist’s work.<br /><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal; bad poets deface what they take, and good poets make it into something better, or at least something different. The good poet welds his theft into a whole of feeling which is unique, utterly different from that from which it was torn; the bad poet throws it into something which has no cohesion.—T.S. E<span style="font-size: x-small;">LIOT</span>.</blockquote><br />In <i>Milton</i>, Blake sees artistic creation as renewal, one that creates “new flesh”, from older material.<br /><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Milton took of the red clay of Succoth, moulding it with care<br />Between his palms: and filling up the furrows of many years<br />Beginning at the feet of Urizen, and on the bones<br />Creating new flesh upon the Demon cold, and building him<br />As with new clay a Human form in the Valley of Beth Peor.</blockquote><div><br /></div><span style="text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: center;">⬧</div></span><br />Tolson’s <i>Hermathenae</i> has sixty emblems, each consisting of title, copperplate engraving, and verse <i>subscriptio</i>. It is heir both to that neo-classical, humanist tradition which goes straight back to Alciato in the sixteenth century, and also to the type of spiritual and devotional emblem which had emerged in the seventeenth century. It adapts the materials of the Renaissance emblem to English Augustan taste. <br /><br />Tolson writes lucid, polished and competent verse, much of it in heroic couplets of a quality which would not have disgraced Dryden or Pope, though with occasional octosyllabics (where appropriate) or quatrains. The title suggests the elegant expression of difficult subjects in its hybridisation of the characters of Hermes and Athena, wit and wisdom. Pagan gods of Greece are identified as symbols of the transcendent powers of the Divinity, and the emblematic mode justified as a way of giving concrete form to metaphysical ideas.<br /><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">The double form united virtue shews,<br /> So Hermathena to the world arose;<br /> Learning and wit their flowing streams unite;<br /> And mingle grave instruction with delight. </blockquote><br />The eighteenth century saw itself as the Age of Reason; Blake’s antagonism to Reason arose from his awareness of its shortcomings. Tolson’s verses attached to Emblem XLI prefigure some Blakean ideas:<br /><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Boasting the Strength of Reason, they destroy<br />That Reason they so impiously employ;<br />Put out the Light of Nature in the Soul,<br />And tempt Heav’n’s Vengeance by a second Fall.</blockquote><br />There is one further feature of <i>Hermathenae</i> to mention, the addition to each emblem of a prose commentary consisting of extremely learned notes keyed to particular words and phrases in the verse subscription; these gloss not only the classical allusions but also technical terms from philosophy, divinity, and philology, providing a highly erudite <i>vade mecum</i> for the “Minds of Youth” to whose needs the book is largely if not wholly directed.<br /><br />The engraved illustrations to <i>Hermathenae</i> are the work of John Devoto, decorative history and scene painter, born in France but documented in England 1708-52. He merits an entry in the <i>Oxford DNB</i>. However, Tolson himself has no entry in the <i>Oxford DNB</i>, so I append here a brief biographical summary.<br /><br />Francis Tolson (1694—1746), emblematist, poet, and dramatist, was the author of<br /><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div><i>Octavius Prince of Syra: Or, a Lash for Levi</i>. A Poem (1719)</div><div><i>The Earl of Warwick: Or, British Exile</i>. A Tragedy. As it is Acted at the Theatre Royal in Drury-Lane (1719)</div><div><i>A Poem on His Majesty's Passing the South-Sea Bill</i> (1720)</div><div><i>Proposals for Printing, </i>Hermathenæ<i>: Or, One Hundred and Twenty Moral Emblems, and Ethnick Tales</i>. With Notes (1739)</div><div><i>Hermathenæ, Or Moral Emblems, and Ethnick Tales, with Explanatory Notes</i> (1740).</div></blockquote><div><br />Tolson was born 27 January 1693 <span style="font-size: x-small;">O.S.</span> (1694 <span style="font-size: x-small;">N.S.</span>) in Albemarle Street, in the City of London, and baptised 3 February. He was the son and heir of Richard Tolson (1656-1720), of Lincoln's Inn, London, and Sarah Woodroffe (1656-1726).<br /><br />Tolson was admitted to Trinity College, Cambridge, 26 July 1710, having previously been a pupil at Charterhouse school. He was married 6 April 1713 to Catherine Riches Puckle (born 1694) at Grays Inn Chapel, London. They had children: Catherine, Sarah, and Mary. His wife died December 1730 at Blackfriars, London. Tolson was swiftly remarried 2 February 1731 (<span style="font-size: x-small;">N.S.</span>) to Mary Remington in the village of Bolton, East Riding of Yorkshire. Charlotte and Wilfred were the children of the second marriage.<br /><br />Francis Tolson was ordained deacon at Lincoln cathedral, 12 June 1720, and priest, 25 September. Appointed curate of Easton, Northants in 1732 and Vicar of Easton Maudit in 1737, he also held the vicarages of Grendon, 1737-46, and Market Harborough, Leicestershire. Additionally, he served as Chaplain to the Earl of Sussex.<br /><br />The death of “Franciscus Tolson” is recorded on 1 Mar 1746 (<span style="font-size: x-small;">N.S.</span>) at Easton Maudit, Northamptonshire, where he was buried in St Peter and St Paul, the church where he had been vicar since 1737.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">⬧</div><br />There’s another Blake drawing of the cottage at Felpham in a faintly sketched and unfinished “Landscape at Felpham”.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/--RLfIFsTBTg/YYW5nkGNT9I/AAAAAAAABFU/xCx8z2nqmykX_mYLRFIvvJxf7ZxA3dOVQCLcBGAsYHQ/s1536/Felpham%2BLandscape.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1043" data-original-width="1536" height="434" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/--RLfIFsTBTg/YYW5nkGNT9I/AAAAAAAABFU/xCx8z2nqmykX_mYLRFIvvJxf7ZxA3dOVQCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h434/Felpham%2BLandscape.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;">(“Landscape at Felpham”; pencil and watercolour on paper; Tate.)</div><div style="text-align: center;">Click on image to enlarge.</div><br />The blue expanse is not the sea but the faded green of the cornfield between the cottage and the seashore.<br /><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7mS6sDBYcK4/YYW5sc0vi3I/AAAAAAAABFY/m-lcmxyv0QUxSRjGI8oWGcrOb_Ne6WBNgCLcBGAsYHQ/s1536/Felpham%2BLandscape%2BKey.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1043" data-original-width="1536" height="434" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7mS6sDBYcK4/YYW5sc0vi3I/AAAAAAAABFY/m-lcmxyv0QUxSRjGI8oWGcrOb_Ne6WBNgCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h434/Felpham%2BLandscape%2BKey.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">(“Landscape at Felpham”: <i>key</i>.)</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Click on image to enlarge.</div><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>1. Windmill (lost to the sea by 1879).</div><div>2. Church.</div><div>3. The Turret House (Hayley’s residence).</div><div>4. Blake’s cottage hit by a shaft of sunlight.</div></blockquote><div><br />The faint pencil drawing is simple, direct, and uncorrected, quite unlike Blake’s usual drawing style or, indeed, that of anyone sketching a landscape freehand. The perspective seems exaggerated; note the bulk of the windmill looming on the left. This convinces me that the drawing was rapidly executed on the dry seashore with the aid of a portable camera obscura, probably borrowed from Hayley. (One would expect William Hayley, or perhaps his late wife, Elizabeth, to have possessed such an aid to landscape-sketching. It’s what the eighteenth-century English middle-classes did. And not only amateur artists. Sir Joshua Reynolds was an enthusiastic user of the camera obscura. )</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-qOLj2Wh5s5w/YYfTVQgC02I/AAAAAAAABF0/LW-YdcIo62oOHSbpcrvCnCCyfoE_hqiggCLcBGAsYHQ/s804/Camera%2BObscura%2B%25282%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="804" data-original-width="717" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-qOLj2Wh5s5w/YYfTVQgC02I/AAAAAAAABF0/LW-YdcIo62oOHSbpcrvCnCCyfoE_hqiggCLcBGAsYHQ/w356-h400/Camera%2BObscura%2B%25282%2529.jpg" width="356" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;">(Sir Joshua Reynolds’ portable camera obscura; </span><span style="text-align: left;">Science Museum, London</span><span style="text-align: left;">. </span><span style="text-align: left;">The device is fitted with a mirror and lens that allows an image to be projected onto a piece of paper inside the darkened box. </span><span style="text-align: left;">It folds neatly into a book-shaped box.)</span></div><div><br /></div><div>Art historians have long argued that certain painters used the camera obscura in their work—Canaletto and Vermeer, in particular, are often cited. No one before, as far as I am aware, has suggested that William Blake used optical aids. Some indeed, would be horrified. Is this not “cheating”. Where’s the innate artistic genius? But the optical device doesn’t produce the drawing, only the skilled hand of the artist can do that.<br /><br />Moreover, many of Blake’s own drawings, the visionary heads produced in late-night seances held with John Varley, were copied using an optical device, the “graphic telescope”, a form of camera lucida, invented by John’s brother, Cornelius Varley, in 1809. Martin Butlin suggests that these copies were made by either John or Cornelius as preparation for publication in John Varley’s <i>Treatise on Zodiacal Physiognomy</i>. But I don’t think we can rule out the copies having been made by Blake himself. <br /><br />Blake studies have been bedevilled by sentimental myths. First that he was an uneducated working man, an auto-didact. (Blake had, I would suggest, as good or better schooling than Alexander Pope who had no formal education after the age of twelve. No-one ever calls Pope an auto-didact.) Personally, I hold Blake to have been astonishingly well-read and here I cite his acquaintanceship with Tolson’s <i>Hermathenae</i>. Second, that with Blake the visual artist, there was an identity of invention and execution; that what was seen in the mind’s eye flowed effortlessly on to the copper plate. This ignores the evidence from Blake’s drawings of how the firm deliberate line emerges from a maze of incoherent scribbling or how the surviving copperplates of “Job” reveal the extensive use of <i>répoussage</i>—hammering the back of the plate, burnishing and re-engraving repeatedly. I think we can now add the use of camera obscura, Graphic Telescope, and maybe other optical devices to the Blakean skillset.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">⬧</div><br /><b>Sources and further reading</b><br /><br />Michael Bath.—Speaking Pictures : English Emblem Books and Renaissance Culture.—Longman medieval and renaissance library.—London : Longman, 1994.<br /><span> </span>Bath provides an introduction to the emblem’s importance in English renaissance culture, examining the relationship between emblem and formal rhetoric and exploring the place which the emblem occupied in the theoretical treatises on symbols of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In the eighteenth century, Methodist and Evangelical communities fostered a tradition of Christian emblematics and allegory, and the emblems of Francis Quarles were adopted alongside the work of John Bunyan as a major part of the cultural inheritance of dissenting and nonconformist congregations. <br /><br />Martin Butlin.—“Blake, the Varleys, and the Graphic Telescope”, in William Blake: Essays in Honour of Sir Geoffrey Keynes; edited by Morton D. Paley and Michael Phillips.—Oxford: at the Clarendon Press, 1973.—pp. 294-304.<br /><br />David Hockney.—Secret knowledge: rediscovering the lost techniques of the Old Masters.—London : Thames & Hudson, 2001.<br /><br />Jonathan Roberts.—“William Blake’s Visionary Landscape near Felpham”.—Blake/an Illustrated Quarterly, Volume 47, Issue 2 (Fall 2013).</div><div><span> </span>I include Roberts’s essay, not because I think it worth reading. It isn’t. But if omitted, someone might think that it needed to be drawn to my attention.<br /><br />Mei-Ying Sung.—William Blake and the Art of Engraving.—The history of the book, number 4.—London : Pickering & Chatto, 2009.<br /><span> </span>In particular, Chapter 1: The history of the theory of conception and execution. Pp. 19-43.<br /><br />Francis Tolson.—October 8, 1739. PROPOSALS For PRINTING, HERMATHENÆ: OR, ONE HUNDRED and TWENTY MORAL EMBLEMS, AND ETHNICK TALES. With NOTES, Explaining the more difficult Passages in Divinity, Philosophy, History, Mythology, &c. Necessary for the Imprinting RELIGION, VIRTUE, and a Knowledge of ANTIQUITY, in the Minds of YOUTH, and Others who have neither time nor Opportunity for deeper and more particular Enquiries. By F<span style="font-size: x-small;">RA</span>. T<span style="font-size: x-small;">OLSON</span>, Vicar of Easton-Maudit, in the County of Northampton and Chaplain to the Right Hon. the Earl of Sussex. Resicer Exemplar Vitæ, Morumq; jubelo. H<span style="font-size: x-small;">OR</span>. de Arte Po.—[London, 1739].<br /><i>ESTC</i>: t089310<br /><span> </span>The purposes of Tolson’s emblem book are identified in this sixteen-page advertisement, published the previous year in order to raise subscriptions. The <i>Proposals</i> print samples of five of the emblems in <i>Hermathenae</i> complete with engraved illustrations and notes.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-aT_1h8X9PUE/YYawZgt50yI/AAAAAAAABFk/hUecv7a0ISodPrHVVB8P4ec3g4qRX1fNwCLcBGAsYHQ/s1022/Tolson_Hermathenae_titlepage%2B%25283%2529.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1022" data-original-width="610" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-aT_1h8X9PUE/YYawZgt50yI/AAAAAAAABFk/hUecv7a0ISodPrHVVB8P4ec3g4qRX1fNwCLcBGAsYHQ/s320/Tolson_Hermathenae_titlepage%2B%25283%2529.jpg" width="191" /></a></div>Francis Tolson.—HERMATHENÆ, <span style="font-size: x-small;">OR</span> Moral emblems, <span style="font-size: x-small;">AND</span> Ethnick Tales, with Explanatory Notes; V<span style="font-size: x-small;">OL</span>. I. By F. Tolson Vicar of Easton Maudit and Chaplain to the Rt Honble the Earl of Sussex. Respicere Exemplar Vitæ, Morumq; juvebo. Hor: de Art: Poet.—[London, 1740].<br />Engraved titlepage: “I. Devoto Sculpt”.<br /><i>ESTC</i>: t089308; <i>Foxon</i> T405.<br /><span> </span>Sixty pictorial emblems each followed by a poem and explanatory notes. Woodcut tailpieces. The <i>Proposals</i> (1739) had announced that the work would eventually consist of two volumes, totalling 120 emblems, but the second volume was never printed.<br /><br /></div></div><div style="text-align: center;">⬧⬧</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-63124357014631016272021-05-26T10:09:00.917-07:002021-09-22T15:15:16.795-07:00Benjamin Heath Malkin, 1769-1842 : a Bio-Bibliography.P<span style="font-size: x-small;">REFATORY</span> N<span style="font-size: x-small;">OTE </span><br /><br />This “bio-bibliography”—a chronology of principal events in Malkin’s life and incorporating a list of his publications—was prepared many years ago for an abortive web project. It is presented here with additions and amendments, but remains a work in progress.<br /><br />Benjamin Heath Malkin, antiquary and author, born in London in 1769, was headmaster of King Edward's School, Bury St Edmunds for many years, and later, more briefly, Professor of History at London University. He lived part of each year in Cowbridge, his wife’s home in the Vale of Glamorgan, from where he pursued his interests in local history and topography, and died there in 1842.<br /><br />G.E. Bentley Jr. suggests that Malkin made the acquaintance of William Blake in 1803, soon after Blake returned to London from his three years in Felpham. But it is also possible that the two men were previously acquainted through the publisher Joseph Johnson for whom Blake had worked. William Godwin reports meeting Malkin at dinner at Horne Tooke’s in 1796 and 1797 and at Fuseli’s Milton Gallery in 1800, which suggests that Blake and Malkin may have shared some political and artistic sympathies. Malkin also lived close to Blake’s patron Thomas Butts in Hackney, and knew George Cumberland, another friend.<div><br /><a name='more'></a>Malkin is remembered today chiefly for his book <i>A Father’s Memoirs of his Child</i>, a personal record of his eldest son, Thomas, a gifted child who died in 1802 at the age of six. Malkin’s “introductory letter”, dedicated to Thomas Johnes of Hafod, discourses at some length (xviii-xli) on Blake, his life and his poetry. Blake is an example of unregarded genius to put alongside the unrealised genius of the lost son. Malkin reflects here on the sad fate of “men of transcendent faculties” (xvi); Blake’s is a case in point and Malkin uses this, bitterly, to console himself for his son’s early death. This opening preamble is of interest in giving us the first and fullest account of Blake’s early life, one that derives directly from Blake himself, and one that includes a selection of Blake’s poems, which it brought to the attention of the general public. Malkin prints for the first time outside of the privately circulated <i>Poetical Sketches</i> and the illuminated book <i>Songs of Innocence and of Experience</i>, six poems (including “The Tyger”). Blake’s opinion of Master Malkin’s artistic talents is quoted on pages 33-4, and Malkin makes reference to Blake’s designs to Robert Blair’s <i>The Grave</i> on pages xxiv-xxv. Malkin did much to promote Blake’s later career and is thought to have been the author of the texts accompanying Blake’s illustrations to <i>The Grave</i>.<br /><br />Malkin’s other publications include a travel book (1804), several collections of essays, literary, political and economic (1795, 1825, 1831), a play (1804), and a translation (1809) of Le Sage’s <i>Gil Blas</i>, reprinted several times.</div><div><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">IO</span>-B<span style="font-size: x-small;">IBLIOGRAPHY</span><br />(Title-pages illustrated are from books in my possession.)</div><div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1769</b></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">MARCH 23</span><br />Benjamin Heath Malkin, born 23 March 1769, in London, only son of Thomas Malkin (1738–1805) of St Mary-le-Bow and his wife Mary Heath (1735-1811). (His birth was registered at Dr Williams’s Library on 18 October 1771, but with his date of birth recorded as 23 March 1770.)<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1779</b></div>In 1779, Benjamin Heath Malkin was admitted to Harrow School where his godfather, his mother’s brother Benjamin Heath (1739-1817), was headmaster. Malkin was head boy of the school in 1787.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1788</b></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">JANUARY 5</span><br />Malkin entered Trinity College, Cambridge, as a pensioner on 5 January 1788, matriculated Michaelmas Term 1792, and graduated B.A. (1792) and M.A. (1802). <br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1791</b></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">FEBRUARY 3</span><br />Malkin was admitted to Lincoln’s Inn on 3 February 1791. <br /><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1793</b></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">MARCH 4</span><br />On 4 March 1793 Malkin was married at Cowbridge Church in the Vale of Glamorgan to Charlotte Williams, the daughter of Thomas Williams, B.D., of Llanblethian, master of Cowbridge grammar school and curate of Cowbridge. Thomas Williams had been headmaster of the local grammar school from 1764 until his death in 1783. Some two months previously Charlotte’s sister, Elizabeth, had been married in the same church to William Williams, a young Oxford graduate from Dolgellau, Merionethshire, appointed headmaster at Cowbridge in 1787 and remaining in that post until he died sixty years later.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1794</b></div><i>title</i> : <b>CONSIDERATIONS ON THE C A U S E S AND ALARMING CONSEQUENCES OF THE PRESENT WAR, AND THE NECESSITY OF IMMEDIATE P E A C E. [</b><i>swelled rule</i><b>] BY A GRADUATE OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE. [</b><i>swelled rule</i><b>] Tolerabilius esset, si res Eorum, quorum interest, monomachiis finiretur. Sed quid commeruere cives et agricolæ, qui spoliantur fortunis, exiguntur sedibus, trahuntur captivi, trucidantur, ac laniatur? O ferreos principum animos, si hæc perpendunt, ac ferunt: ô crassos, si non intelligunt; supinos, si non expendunt. ERASMUS TO BERALDUS. [</b><i>double rule</i><b>] L O N D O N: PRINTED FOR J. S. JORDAN, NO. 166, FLEET-STREET. [</b><i>double rule</i><b>] M DCCXCIV.</b><br /><i>physical description</i> : viii, 9-151, [1] p. ; 21 cm. ; 8vo. [A]4 B-T4.<br /><i>reference</i> : ESTC T52995.<br /><i>contents</i> : iii-viii, Preface.—9-60, Chapter 1. On the situation and resources of England.—61-108, Chap. II. On the situation and resources of France.—109-113, Chap. III. Recapitulation.—114-141, Chap. IV. Conclusion.—143, Appendix. <br /><i>note</i> : Author’s Preface is dated May 1, 1794. The authorship is attributed to Benjamin Heath Malkin on the basis of an inscribed copy now in Trinity College, Dublin (OLS L-2-213 no.10) : “The Dublin Library Society from the author Benj. Heath Malkin”.<br /><i>note</i> : Jordan’s advertisements, verso of final leaf (T4). The publisher, Jeremiah Samuel Jordan, was the bookseller who took over the sale and distribution of Thomas Paine’s Rights of Man (1791) when the intended publisher, Joseph Johnson, got cold feet.<br /><i>note</i> : The epigraph derives from Erasmus <i>De conscribendis epistolis</i> (1522). In his dedicatory epistle to Beraldus (Nicolas Berauld), Erasmus writes with grief and detestation of the wars between France and the Empire. He wishes that ambitious princes could terminate their quarrels in duelling, and not involve their innocent and unhappy subjects in such misery.<br /><i>note</i> : A riposte to Malkin came from William Hunter, <i>Considerations on the causes and effects of the present war, and on the necessity of continuing it, till a regular government is established in France</i> (London: printed for John Stockdale, 1794). Hunter continued to express similar views in later years, being also the author of <i>Reasons for not making peace with Buonaparte</i> (2nd ed. London, 1807).<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1795</b></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">OCTOBER 30</span><br />His first-born child, a son, Thomas Williams Malkin, was born 30 October 1795. His name commemorates both grandfathers and probably also indicates that Malkin’s brother-in-law, William Williams, stood godparent.<br /><br /><i>title </i>: <b>E S S A Y S ON SUBJECTS CONNECTED WITH CIVILIZATION. [</b><i>double rule</i><b>] BY BENJAMIN HEATH MALKIN, TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. [</b><i>d</i><i>ouble rule</i><b>] London: PRINTED BY E. HODSON, BELL-YARD, TEMPLE-BAR, FOR C. DILLY, IN THE POULTRY. [</b><i>double rule</i><b>] 1795</b>.<br /><i>physical description</i> : [4], ii, [2], 293, [1] p. ; 19 cm. ; 8vo.<br /><i>note</i> : Errata before page 5 [first sequence]. With additional half-title page. Final page is blank.<br /><i>reference</i> : ESTC T100702.<br /><i>contents </i>: Essay I. Introductory. — Essay II. On education. — Essay III. The same subject continued. — Essay IV. On government. — Essay V. The same subject continued. — Essay VI. On religious establishments. — Essay VII. On manners and amusements. — Essay VIII. On the arts. — Essay IV. [<i>i.e</i>. IX] On the female character. — Essay X. Conclusion.<br /><i>price </i>: 4s.-<br /><i>note</i> : This collection of <i>Essays</i> is one of Malkin’s most revealing achievements. They show Malkin to be an enthusiast for perfectibility. “The history of the world”, he says in “Essay X, Conclusion”, “undoubtedly confirms the probability of such a termination to terrestrial evil. When we reflect on the vices of enormous magnitude, which were prevalent in ancient times; we can scarcely doubt the progressive improvement of the human race”. Advocacy of equal education was one of his principal commitments, for “the pleasing prospect” of “continual approximations to perfection” (5), depended on nurturing women’s reason, for “intellect admits of no sexual distinction” (258).<br /><span> </span>“Essay IX, On the Female Character” includes one of the earliest critiques of Mary Wollstonecraft’s <i>Vindication of the Rights of Woman</i>, published just three years previously. Malkin supports some of Wollstonecraft’s ideas but is unconvinced by others. “There is no subject, which has been more uniformly and even wilfully misunderstood, than the appropriate character of the female sex”, claims Malkin. “Mrs Wollstonecraft has been successful in setting those prejudices in a strong point of view, which have prevailed to the exclusion of half our species from the common rights of humanity, and the unfettered exercise of reason” (257). “On the whole,” Malkin concedes, “the author of <i>The Vindication</i> has rectified many erroneous principles on the subject of female manners and character, has displayed a meritorious zeal for justice and for liberty, and has produced a work, which properly qualified may be productive of beneficial effects”.</div><div><i>review</i> : “Malkin's Essays on Civilization”, <i>The Monthly Review; or, Literary Journal, Enlarged</i>: From May to August 1796 with Appendix, Volume XX.—Published by R. Griffiths, London, 1796</div><div> <br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1797</b></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">SEPTEMBER 29</span><br />Birth of his second son, 29 September 1797, at Grove Place, Hackney and named Benjamin Heath Malkin like his father. The birth was registered at Dr Williams’s Library, 20 October 1800.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1800</b></div>Birth of his third son, Frederic Malkin, at Hackney, in 1800 or 1801. (This is as much as I currently can find; my guess is that, in their distress at his eldest brother’s death in 1802, his parents forgot to register Frederic’s birth at Dr Williams’s Library.)<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1802</b></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">JULY 31</span><br />Thomas Williams Malkin died at Hackney, aged six years and nine months, on 31 July 1802, from what would now be called peritonitis due to a ruptured appendix, though “water on the brain” was at one time suspected.<br /><span> </span>Dinah Craik, “A Child’s Life Sixty Years Ago”, in <i>The Unkind Word & Other Stories</i> (London: Hurst & Blackett, 1870), criticizes Malkin for acceding to Thomas’s requests to be educated at an early age and believes it did overtax his brain and contribute to his death; but she also admits that the other boys did well in life.<br /><br /><span style="font-size: x-small;">NOVEMBER 1</span><br /><i>title</i> : <b>ACCOUNT <i>of</i> THOMAS WILLIAMS MALKIN, <i>a</i> CHILD <i>of extraordinary</i> ATTAINMENTS, <i>who lately died at</i> HACKNEY</b>.<br /><i>in</i> : Monthly Magazine, XIV (1 November 1802), 329-31.<br /><i>note</i> : “In a former Obituary we had occasion notice the death of Thomas Williams Malkin, at the early age of six years and nine months. The bare mention of such an event would, in an ordinary case, be deemed sufficient; but we cannot pass over a circumstance which equally arrests the attention of the moralist and the sympathy of the philanthropist, without observing how suddenly and unexpectedly the brightest prospects vanish, which depend on the precarious tenure of human life, however bright and promising the dawn of intellect—however encouraging the appearances of corporeal stability.” (329)<br /><span> </span>This first version of <i>A Father’s Memoirs</i> appeared in the <i>Monthly Magazine</i>, and “S.P.” asked for further memoirs in the 1 December 1802 issue (page 409). “I transmitted a short sketch of this little life, to be inserted in a periodical publication, and meant with that to have closed the subject on my part for ever.”—<i>Memoirs</i>, iii-iv.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1803</b></div><div style="text-align: left;">Birth of his fourth son, Arthur Thomas Malkin in Hackney, Middlesex. Baptism, 22 Jul 1807,at Plaxtol, Kent.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><div><span> </span>We know next to nothing of Malkin’s career between his marriage in 1793 and his appointment as headmaster of the Free Grammar School at Bury St. Edmund’s in 1809; but it was doubtless through visits to Cowbridge, associating with men such as his brother-in-law William Williams and the scholarly stonemason Edward Williams (Iolo Morganwg) that he acquired an interest in Welsh history and literature—an interest that was to culminate in two excursions through South Wales in the year 1803 and soon afterwards in his narrative account of <i>The Scenery, Antiquities, and Biography of South Wales</i> published in a quarto volume in 1804 and in smaller format in 1807. Both editions were dedicated to William Williams, and no reader will fail to observe how much Malkin owed to the help of Iolo Morganwg. (However, Malkin is not listed among the subscribers to Edward Williams, <i>Poems, Lyric and Pastoral</i>, London, 1794, which probably indicates that his friendship with Iolo began some years later.)</div></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1804</b></div><i>title</i> : <b>ALMAHIDE AND HAMET, A TRAGEDY. BY BENJAMIN HEATH MALKIN, ESQ. M.A. LONDON: PRINTED BY T. BENSLEY, BOLT COURT, FOR LONGMAN AND REES, PATERNOSTER ROW. 1804</b>.<br /><i>physical description </i>: 158 p. ; 25 cm. ; 8vo.<br /><i>contents</i> : 1-57, To John Philip Kemble, Esquire.—58-158, Almahide and Hamet.<br /><i>price </i>: 6s.<br /><i>note</i>: The play (in five acts and in verse), which was never acted, is founded on Dryden’s <i>Conquest of Granada</i> (1672).<br /><i>reviews </i>: The play was reviewed in <i>Poetical Register</i>, 4 (1804), 507; I<i>mperial Review</i>, 1 (Mar. 1804), 433-36; <i>The Annual Review & History of Literature, A. Aikin, editor</i>, 3 (1805), Chap. X, 605; <i>Monthly Review</i>, ns, v46 (Feb. 1805), 188-92; <i>British Critic</i>, 25 (June 1805), 683-84; <i>Monthly Magazine</i>, Suppl. v19 (July 28, 1805), 660; <i>Monthly Mirror</i>, 22 (July 1806), 42.<br /><br /><i>title </i>: <b>THE SCENERY, ANTIQUITIES, </b><span style="font-size: x-small; font-weight: bold;">AND</span><b> BIOGRAPHY, OF South Wales, FROM MATERIALS COLLECTED DURING TWO EXCURSIONS IN THE YEAR 1803. [</b><i>double rule</i><b>] </b><i style="font-weight: bold;">By BENJ. HEATH MALKIN, Esq. M.A. F.S.A.</i><b> [</b><i>double rule</i><b>] EMBELLISHED WITH VIEWS, DRAWN ON THE SPOT AND ENGRAVED BY LAPORTE; AND A MAP OF THE COUNTRY. [</b><i>double rule</i><b>] LONDON: PRINTED FOR T. N. LONGMAN AND O. REES, PATER-NOSTER ROW, </b><i style="font-weight: bold;">BY T. BENSLEY, BOLT COURT, FLEET STREET.</i><b> 1804</b>. <br /><i>physical description </i>: vii, 634, [2] p: fold map, 12 plates; 28 cm. ; 4to <br /><i>price </i>: 52<i>s</i> 6<i>d</i>.<br /><i>illustrations </i>: 12 plates “Drawn & Engraved by J. Laporte” distributed through the text, and a folded map facing page 1. Each plate is “Published by Longman & Rees, London, March 20, 1804” with the exception of “Pembroke Castle and Town”, which is “Published by Longman & Rees, London, March 1, 1804.”<br /><span> </span>Plates are as follows: “The Fall of the Rydoll” (frontispiece); “New Bridge” (facing page 83); “Caerphilly Castle” (facing page 161); “The Pass from Pont Neath Vechan to Merthyr” (facing page 208); “Aberedwy” (facing page 282); “Rhayader” (facing page 298); “The Upper Fall at Havod” (facing page 345); “Havod Inn” (facing page 368); “Pembroke Castle and Town” (facing page 496); “Laugharne Castle” (facing page 543); “Melincourt” (facing page 597); “Britton Ferry” (facing page 609).<br /><i>note </i>: page 635: “Directions to the Binder for placing the Plates.”—page 636: “Lately published by the same Author, ALMAHIDE and HAMET ...”<br /><i>note</i> : For a long time Malkin’s best-known work (the only Malkin title in the <i>New Cambridge Bibliography of English Literature</i>, III, #1681), and dedicated to his brother-in-law, the Revd. William Williams, now prebendary of Llandaff. Pages 126-130 contain a brief biography of Edward Williams, “a man who is capable of doing the world more service, than the world seems willing either to receive or to return” (126). Malkin’s encomium on Williams’s various talents concludes “I am sorry to say that the proverb of a prophet in his own country is but too much verified in him; for while Mr. Williams the antiquarian is mentioned elsewhere with the respect due to the attainments, without the estate, of a gentleman, there are few in Glamorganshire who know him by any other name than that of Ned Williams the stonecutter” (129).</div><div><i>review</i> : A<span style="font-size: x-small;">RT</span>. X. <i>The Scenery, Antiquities, and Biography of South Wales, from Materials collected during two Excursions in the Year </i>1803. <i>By</i> B<span style="font-size: x-small;">ENJAMIN</span> H<span style="font-size: x-small;">EATH</span> M<span style="font-size: x-small;">ALKIN</span>, Esq. M.A. F.S.A. <i>Embellished with Views, drawn on the Spot, and engraved by Laporte; and a Map of the Country</i>. 4to. pp.641.</div><div><i>in</i> : The Annual Review & History of Literature. Arthur Aiken, editor (1805), 890-98.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1805</b></div>Malkin’s 1803 tour of South Wales had included a visit to Cardiganshire which brought him into friendly relationship with Thomas Johnes of Hafod. In 1805 Malkin purchased a copy of Blake’s <i>Songs of Innocence</i> which he then gave to Johnes. Now designated as copy P of <i>Innocence</i>, with Johnes’s crest (two battle-axes saltireways sable) on the cover, it is preserved in the Beinecke Library at Yale University.<br /><br /><span style="font-size: x-small;">NOVEMBER</span><br />Cromek issued a prospectus: “Blair’s Grave, Illustrated with FIFTEEN PRINTS FROM DESIGNS INVENTED AND TO BE ENGRAVED BY <i>WILLIAM BLAKE</i>; with a Preface CONTAINING AN EXPLANATION OF THE ARTIST’S VIEW IN THE DESIGNS, and a critique on the poem ... The Preface will be contributed by B<span style="font-size: x-small;">ENJAMIN</span> H<span style="font-size: x-small;">EATH</span> M<span style="font-size: x-small;">ALKIN</span> .... The work will be printed by T. B<span style="font-size: x-small;">ENSLEY</span>, in Imperial Quarto. The Price to Subscribers will be T<span style="font-size: x-small;">WO</span> G<span style="font-size: x-small;">UINEAS</span> ...”.<br /><span> </span>There is no “Preface” to the published work, and nothing is signed by Malkin, but the description “Of the Designs”, included in the published work, gives “the artist’s view in the designs” (as Malkin’s preface was said to do in this 1805 prospectus), thus is probably by Malkin.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1806</b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cRaodqJNknY/YLNniQoBRII/AAAAAAAABBI/tThsSdZDYLc76YoL-AYl-6TN3gtDANTvgCLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/1806%2B%25281%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1162" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cRaodqJNknY/YLNniQoBRII/AAAAAAAABBI/tThsSdZDYLc76YoL-AYl-6TN3gtDANTvgCLcBGAsYHQ/w228-h400/1806%2B%25281%2529.jpg" width="228" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">FEBRUARY 1</span><br /><i>title</i> : <b>A FATHER’S MEMOIRS OF HIS CHILD. BY </b><i style="font-weight: bold;">BENJ. HEATH MALKIN, ESQ</i><b>. M.A. F.A.S. [</b><i>double rule</i><b>] Great loss to all that ever him did see; Great loss to all, but greatest loss to me. A</b><span style="font-size: x-small; font-weight: bold;">STROPHEL</span><b>. [</b><i>double rule</i><b>] LONDON: PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, AND ORME, PATERNOSTER ROW; </b><i style="font-weight: bold;">BY T. BENSLEY, BOLT COURT, FLEET STREET</i><b>. 1806</b>. <br /><i>physical description</i> : [4], xlviii, 172 p. : ill., port., facsims, fold. map; 26 cm. ; 8vo. <br /><i>price</i> : 10<i>s</i>. 6<i>d</i>.<br /><i>note</i> : <i>A Father’s Memoirs of his Child</i> is an account of the life and death of Malkin’s son Thomas Williams Malkin, who along with his brother Benjamin is described as a child prodigy with an insatiable thirst for knowledge. He apparently learned the alphabet from blocks as an infant and would point to the correct letters when they were named. He did not speak until he was about two years old. Before he was three, he taught himself to write by copying print in books. Malkin insists that he did not push Thomas but followed his lead and taught him subjects such as Latin or mathematics only by request. Thomas also invented an imaginary country called Allestone, including details of its history, geography and monetary system, and an elaborate (for a five-year-old) map. Much of this material is included in the book, partly as proof that Thomas acted independently and was not coerced to achievements. <br /><i>note</i> : Dedicated to Thomas Johnes, of Hafod : “My pen seems destined to owe its employment, in some shape or other, to Hafod. ... The fever of authorship never preyed upon my better sense, till your magic creation in the wilds of Cardiganshire gave vent to its fury.” <br /><i>printing</i> : Bensley printed 1,000 copies of Malkin’s <i>Memoirs</i> for the author in January 1806. Bentley in <i>Blake Books</i> (1977), #482, transcribes the expenses of the book as entered in the records of Longman, Green, and Co.<br /><span> </span>Between 7 February 1806 and 1810, Malkin took 52 copies of the book himself; in August 1811, 540 copies were pulped; and by June 1815, 445 copies had been sold, leaving 53 on hand. The book clearly sold very slowly—about 45 copies a year for ten years.<br /><i>illustrations</i> : There are four plates, three of them (at pages 33, 54, 95) after the child T. W. Malkin; though they are unsigned, we may be confident that they, like the fourth plate, were engraved by Cromek. The frontispiece engraved by Cromek after Paye and Blake shows an angel taking a child to heaven from its mother, and is inscribed : “Wm Blake invt”, “R.H. Cromek sc”, “London Published by Longman Co February 1st 1806” (plate size : 21.7 X 14.5 cm). Inset into this design is an oval portrait (7.7 X 6.0 cm) of Thomas Williams Malkin when two years old, painted, according to the introductory letter (xliv), by Richard Morton Paye.<br /><i>epigraph</i> : From “Astrophel. A Pastoral Elegie upon the Death of the most noble and valorous Knight, Sir Philip Sidney” by Edmund Spenser. The full stanza points up the relevance.<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">What cruel Hand of cursed Foe unknown,<br />Hath cropt the Stalk which bore so fair a Flowre?<br />Untimely cropt, before it well were grown,<br />And clean defaced in untimely howre.<br />Great loss to all that ever him did see,<br />Great loss to all, but greatest loss to me.</blockquote><i>reviews</i> : While seemingly interested enough in the <i>Memoirs</i> themselves, contemporary reviewers poured scorn on Malkin for bestowing his patronage on such a wayward individual as Blake. The reviews suggest that his contemporaries were willing to tolerate Blake as a Michelangelesque artist but not as a religious poet.<br /><i>review</i> : “Art. II. A Father’s Memoirs of his Child. By Benjamin Heath Malkin ...”, <i>Literary Journal</i>, 2 S., II (July 1806), 27-35.<br /><span> </span>Concludes by quoting “Laughing Song” as an example of “modern nonsense”.<br /><i>review</i> : “Art. 40. <i>A Father’s Memoirs of his Child. By Benjamin Heath Malkin, Esq. M.A. F.A.S</i>. Royal 8vo. 172 pp. 10s. 6d. Longman and Co. 1806”, <i>British Critic</i>, XXVIII (September 1806), 339. <br /><span> </span>“In a very long and elaborate address to a valuable friend ... another supposed prodigy is celebrated ... He is celebrated both as an artist and as a poet; but so little judgment is shown, in our opinion, with regard to the proofs of these talents, that we much doubt whether the encomium will be at all useful to the person praised ...” About half this rude review is devoted to a denigration of Blake, who as a poet “seems chiefly inspired by ... Divine Nonsensia”. As an artist, Blake to judge from his frontispiece, “mistakes extravagance for genius”, though the reviewer grudgingly concedes “the kneeling figure is elegant, and that of the child passable”.<br /><i>review</i> : [Christopher Lake Moody], “Monthly Catalogue. Biography. Art. 37. A Father’s Memoirs of his Child. By Benj. Heath Malkin, Esq. M.A. F.A.S. Royal 8vo. 10s. 6d. Boards. Longman and Co 1806”, <i>Monthly Review</i>, n.s. LI (October1806) 217.1 <br /><span> </span>“In the long dedication to Mr. Johnes of Hafod, a biographical notice is inserted of Mr. William Blake the artist, with some selections from his poems, which are highly extolled : but if Watts seldom rose above the level of a mere versifier, in what class must we place Mr. Blake, who is certainly very inferior to Dr. Watts?” An analogy between Blake’s <i>Innocence</i> and Watts’s hymns has been reintroduced into twentieth-century Blake criticism, where it comes up as an ironic illumination about some of the <i>Innocence</i> poems. <br /><i>review</i> : “Half-Yearly Retrospect of Domestic Literature.” <i>Monthly Magazine</i>, Supplementary Number, XXII (25 Jan. 1807) 621-46.<br /><span> </span>The reviewer of Malkin steps aside to assert that while Blake’s poetry “does not rise above mediocrity; as an artist he appears to more advantage” (633). <br /><i>review</i> : “Art. XIV. <i>A Father’s Memoirs of his Child,</i> by Benjamin Heath Malkin ...”, <i>Annual Review</i> ... for 1806, V (1807), 379-81. <br /><span> </span>According to the anonymous reviewer, Blake’s “poems are certainly not devoid of merit ...”.<br /><i>note</i> : The 20th-century revival of interest in William Blake led to a number of reprints of the pages from Malkin’s <i>Memoirs</i> dealing with Blake’s biography. Malkin’s important account of Blake is reprinted by A.J. Symons (1907), in Bentley’s <i>Blake Records</i> (1969) and 2nd ed. (2004), and by J.A. Wittreich (1970). The whole work has been reprinted just once (in 1997).<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1807</b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-G19xxEjfWgo/YLNqJ7u0YZI/AAAAAAAABCI/nfkMr8RiSjYbc31w6hcwjbyZc2LvkFtFQCLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/1807%2B%25281%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1179" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-G19xxEjfWgo/YLNqJ7u0YZI/AAAAAAAABCI/nfkMr8RiSjYbc31w6hcwjbyZc2LvkFtFQCLcBGAsYHQ/w230-h400/1807%2B%25281%2529.jpg" width="230" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div><i>title</i> : <b>THE SCENERY, ANTIQUITIES, AND BIOGRAPHY, OF South Wales, FROM MATERIALS COLLECTED DURING TWO EXCURSIONS IN THE YEAR 1803. BY BENJAMIN HEATH MALKIN, ESQ. M.A. F.A.S. [</b><i>double rule</i><b>] THE SECOND EDITION, WITH ADDITIONS. [</b><i>double rule</i><b>] VOL. I. [</b><i style="font-weight: bold;">VOL. II</i><b>.] [</b><i>swelled rule</i><b>] LONDON : PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, AND ORME, 1807</b>. <br /><i>physical description</i> : 2 v. ([3], xi, 473; iv, 555 p.): 22 cm. ; 8vo.<br /><i>note</i> : This second edition published in two volumes of smaller format contains additional material but is much poorer from the point of view of illustration. <br /><i>note</i> : H.D. [i.e. Richard Gough], Gentleman’s Magazine Vol. 77 No i (1807), 296: “April 10. Mr. Malkin, in his “Scenery, Antiquities, and Biography of South Wales,” p.110, has hazarded a conjecture which I wish to see ascertained.” A communication to the editor regarding Malkin’s discussion of “stone heaps” in this work.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1808</b></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">APRIL 22 </span><br />Birth of Malkin’s youngest son, Charles Johnes Malkin, 22 April 1808. He was baptised 31 May at St John at Hackney. Thomas Johnes stood godfather.<br /><br /><i>title</i> : <b>THE GRAVE, A POEM. BY ROBERT BLAIR. ILLUSTRATED BY Twelve Etchings EXECUTED FROM ORIGINAL DESIGNS. LONDON : <i>PRINTED BY T. BENSLEY, BOLT COURT,</i> FOR THE PROPRIETOR, R.H. CROMEK, No 64, NEWMAN STREET; AND SOLD BY CADELL AND DAVIES, J. JOHNSON, T. PAYNE, J. WHITE, LONGMAN, HURST, REES, AND ORME, W. MILLER, J. MURRAY, AND CONSTABLE AND CO. EDINBURGH. 1808</b>.<br /><i>physical description</i> : xiv, 35 p. ; front., engraved t.p., 2pl.; 37 cm. ; 4to. [a]\2 b\4 c\1 B-F\4.<br /><i>note</i> : Also issued as a folio “proof” <br /><i>note</i> : A six-page “List of Subscribers’ records 578 subscribers (including “Benj. Heath Malkin, Esq. M.A. F.S.A. Hackney”) for 688 copies.<br /><i>note</i> : There is no “Preface” (as announced in the 1805 prospectus), and nothing is signed by Malkin, but the description “Of the Designs” (pages 33-6) gives “the artist’s view in the designs” (as Malkin’s preface was said in the 1805 prospectus to do), and is probably by Malkin.<br /><br /><i>title</i>: <b>ACCOUNT OF A NEW TOUR IN WALES ... BENJ. HEATH MALKIN</b>. <br /><i>in</i> : J. Pinkerton, A General Collection of Voyages, etc. Vol. ii (1808, &c.) 4to.<br /><i>note</i> : An extract from Malkin’s The Scenery, Antiquities, and Biography of South Wales.2nd ed. 1807.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1809</b></div>In 1809, Blake apparently presented Malkin with a copy of his <i>Descriptive Catalogue</i>, though this cannot be identified with any surviving copy.<br /><span> </span>From 1809 to 1828 Malkin was headmaster of the grammar school at Bury St Edmunds, where his pupils included Edward Fitzgerald (1809-1883), John Mitchell Kemble (1807-1857), and James Spedding (1808–1881). The last mentioned was later to pay a warm tribute to Malkin as an inspiring and liberal, if idiosyncratic, teacher who encouraged independence of mind and character. The attention he gave in the curriculum to essay-writing and the study of English literature was unusual for the time.<br /><br /><i>title</i> : <b>THE ADVENTURES OF GIL BLAS OF SANTILLANE. TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH OF LE SAGE BY B. H. MALKIN, ESQ</b>. <br /><i>publisher</i> : London Printed for Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, Paternoster-Row; and G. Kearsley, Fleet-Street 1809.<br /><i>physical description</i> : 4v. plates : ill. ; 8vo.<br /><i>note</i> : With 24 plates from the designs of Robert Smirke. The Large Paper edition (29 cm. ; 4to.) has the plates on India paper.<br /><i>note</i> : 1749 had seen the publication, with an attribution to Tobias Smollett, of <i>The Adventures of Gil Blas of Santillane, a new translation from the best French edition</i> (4 vols.). Smollett’s responsibility for the translation was disputed, as claims surfaced that he had simply directed the work of others. Although Smollett, in a letter of 8 May 1763, includes “A translation of Gil Blas”, among the items in a “genuine List of my Productions”, doubts continued to persist about <i>Gil Blas</i> and in 1809 Benjamin Heath Malkin, in the “Advertisement” to his own translation , declared, “It is now understood to be indebted to that popular writer only for his name”. Malkin goes on to contrast his “more easy and spirited transcript” with the translation “published under the name of Smollett”. But Smollett’s identification with <i>Gil Blas</i> was strong enough that, ironically, the title pages of some editions of Malkin’s translation attribute the work to Smollett.<br /><i>note</i> : On 19 August 1810, Dorothy Wordsworth told her brother that she was “reading Malkin’s Gil Blas—and it is a beautiful Book as to printing etc but I think the Translation vulgar”.<br /><i>note</i> : Malkin’s translation of <i>Gil Blas</i> was reprinted in 1822, 1866, 1881, 1885, 1910, 1913, 1918, and 1922; on more than one occasion with the translation attributed to Tobias Smollett. <br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1810</b></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">MARCH 3</span><br />On 3 March 1810 Malkin was incorporated of St Mary Hall, Oxford, and there, a few days later, he graduated B.C.L. and D.C.L. He was also a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1812</b></div><i>title</i> : <b>THE PROLOGUE AND CHARACTERS OF Chaucer’s Pilgrims, SELECTED FROM HIS CANTERBURY TALES : INTENDED TO ILLUSTRATE A PARTICULAR DESIGN OF M</b><span style="font-size: x-small; font-weight: bold;">R</span><b>. WILLIAM BLAKE, WHICH IS ENGRAVED BY HIMSELF. And may be seen at Mr. C</b><span style="font-size: x-small; font-weight: bold;">OLNAGHI</span><b>’s, Cockspur Street; at Mr. B</b><span style="font-size: x-small; font-weight: bold;">LAKE</span><b>’s, No. 28, Broad Street, Golden Square; and at the Publisher’s, Mr. H</b><span style="font-size: x-small; font-weight: bold;">ARRIS</span><b>, Bookseller, St. Paul’s Church Yard [</b><i>swelled rule</i><b>] </b><i style="font-weight: bold;">PRICE TWO SHILLINGS AND SIXPENCE.</i><b> [</b><i>swelled rule</i><b>] M.DCCC.XII </b><br /><i>physical description</i> : iv, 61, [3] p., [1] leaf of plates : ill. ; 20 cm. ; 8vo.<br /><i>note</i> : The preface, signed by “THE EDITOR”, contains a puff for Blake’s “Canterbury Pilgrims” engraving (pages iii-iv) and states that “The original reading is copied from the edition of Thomas Speight, printed Anno. 1687; and the Translation from Mr. Ogle’s edition, 1741”. The Prologue’s preface announces that the engraving could be purchased at Blake’s brother’s shop, Colnaghi’s printshop, and at Harris’s bookshop, probably that of John Harris, who operated at 21 Ludgate St., corner of St. Paul's Churchyard.<br /><span> </span>Gilchrist plausibly suggests that the Prologue’s anonymous editor and publisher may be Benjamin Heath Malkin (Gilchrist, 1863, vol.1, page 243).<br /><i>illustrations</i> : The engraved detail and the accompanying (unsigned) vignette of a cathedral are dated 26 December 1811.</div><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1814</b></div><div><span style="font-size: x-small;">J<span>ULY-</span><span>A</span><span>UGUST</span></span></div><div><div>On Saturday 2 July 1814, Malkin, accompnied by his wife Charlotte, their son, Benjamin, and a family friend (an otherwise unidentified “Miss Hall”), left Bury St Edmunds on a tour of Scotland. Over the following weeks they reached Skye, Mull, and Staffa, and completed extensive circuits of the central belt and southern Highlands, taking in Edinburgh and Glasgow, the Trossachs, parts of Perthshire and Strathearn. In contrast to the tour of South Wales in 1803, this time it was Charlotte who kept a detailed travel diary. They returned to Suffolk on Wednesday 31 August.</div></div><div><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1819</b></div><i>title</i> : <b>THE CYCLOPÆDIA; OR, UNIVERSAL DICTIONARY OF Arts, Sciences, and Literature. BY ABRAHAM REES, D.D. F.R.S. F.L.S. </b><i style="font-weight: bold;">S.Amer.Soc.</i><b> WITH THE ASSISTANCE OF EMINENT PROFESSIONAL GENTLEMEN. [</b><i>swelled rule</i><b>] ILLUSTRATED WITH NUMEROUS ENGRAVNGS, </b><i style="font-weight: bold;">BY THE MOST DISTINGUISHED ARTISTS</i><b>. [</b><i>swelled rule</i><b>] IN THIRTY-NINE VOLUMES. VOL. I. [</b><i style="font-weight: bold;">etc</i><b>.] [</b><i>swelled rule</i><b>] LONDON: P</b><span style="font-size: x-small; font-weight: bold;">RINTED FOR </span><b>LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, & BROWN, P</b><span style="font-size: x-small; font-weight: bold;">ATERNOSTER</span><b>-R</b><span style="font-size: x-small; font-weight: bold;">OW</span><b>, F. C. AND J. RIVINGTON, A. STRAHAN, PAYNE AND FOSS, SCATCHERD AND LETTERMAN, J. CUTHELL, CLARKE AND SONS, LACKINGTON HUGHES HARDING MAYOR AND JONES, J. AND A. ARCH, CADELL AND DAVIES, R. BAGSTER, J. MAWMAN, JAMES BLACK AND SON, BLACK KINGSBURY PARBURY AND ALLEN, R. SCOLEY, J. BOOTH, J. BOOKER, SUTTABY EVANCE AND FOX, BALDWIN CRADOCK AND JOY, SHERWOOD NEELY AND JONES, N. SAUNDERS, HURST ROBINSON AND CO., J. DICKINSON, J. PATERSON, E. WHITESIDE, WILSON AND SONS, AND BRODIE AND DOWDING. 1819</b>.<br /><i>physical description</i> : in 39 vols.<br /><i>note</i> : Malkin contributed biographical articles to Rees’s <i>Cyclopædia</i>. No further data.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1822</b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rHrSs3AaiSw/YLNqmmRE-UI/AAAAAAAABCQ/4_ftQiYJC0svibDO2V2A5wmwxjJpRiywACLcBGAsYHQ/s1936/1822.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1936" data-original-width="1188" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rHrSs3AaiSw/YLNqmmRE-UI/AAAAAAAABCQ/4_ftQiYJC0svibDO2V2A5wmwxjJpRiywACLcBGAsYHQ/w245-h400/1822.jpg" width="245" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div><i>title</i>: <b>THE ADVENTURES OF GIL BLAS OF SANTILLANE. TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH OF LESAGE. [</b><i>rule</i><b>] A NEW EDITION: WITH ILLUSTRATIONS FROM PAINTINGS BY ROBERT SMIRKE, Esq. R.A. [</b><i>swelled rule</i><b>] IN FOUR VOLUMES. VOL. I. [</b><i style="font-weight: bold;">etc</i><b>.] [</b><i>rule</i><b>] LONDON: PRINTED FOR HURST, ROBINSON AND CO. CHEAPSIDE. [</b><i>rule</i><b>] 1822</b>.<br /><i>physical description </i>: 4 vol. ; 12mo.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1825</b></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">NOVEMBER 23 </span><br />Charles Johnes Malkin, his youngest son, died 23 November 1825, aged 17. Buried 25 November 1825, Saint James in Bury Saint Edmunds. (At Bury school 1817-25. Four years in sixth form. Second in the school in May 1825.)<br /><br /><i>title</i> : <b>CLASSICAL DISQUISITIONS AND CURIOSITIES, </b><i style="font-weight: bold;">CRITICAL AND HISTORICAL</i><b>. BY BENJAMIN HEATH MALKIN, L.L.D. & F.S.A. HEAD MASTER OF BURY SCHOOL. [</b><i>rule</i><b>] LONDON; PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, BROWN, AND GREEN, PATERNOSTER-ROW. 1825</b>.<br /><i>physical description</i> : xxvi, 460 p.; 23 cm. ; 8vo. A-Z Aa-Hh4.<br /><i>note</i> : originally issued with blue paper sides, brown paper spine with printed paper spine label.<br /><i>summary</i> : An eloquent apologia for a traditional classical education as distinct from a more “professional” one. Malkin argues against those who believe that a conventional education in “the humanities” must be of limited utility in the modern world. He is out of sympathy with the current craze for “experimental philosophy”, commending instead a balanced programme of instruction. By implication Malkin defends the public school system from the attacks of contemporary progressive educationalists. <br />note : Republished under a pseudonym in 1826. Reissued under Malkin’s authorship in 1830. <br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1826</b></div><i>title</i> : <b>CLASSICAL DISQUISITIONS AND CURIOSITIES, HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL BY THE REV. EGERTON BRIDGEWATER MONTAGUE, A.M. LATE OF TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE, VICAR OF SANDON, BERKS</b>.<br /><i>publisher</i> : London : Burgess and Smith, Bishopsgate; Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, Brown, and Green, Paternoster Row; Whitmore and Fenn, Charing Cross; Nicholls, Parliament Street 1826<br /><i>physical description</i> : [4], xxv-xxvi, 460p. ; 8vo.<br /><i>note</i> : Imprint on p. 460: London: Printed by A. & R. Spottiswoode, New-Street-Square.<br /><i>note</i> : A pseudonymous re-issue of the 1825 edition published under Malkin’s name (by Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme & Green only), with the removal of the original title-page and preface “To my former pupils”(pages [xxv]-xxvi); pages 1-460 remaining as in the original. With a new dedication leaf following the new title-page. I have no explanation for this curious publication.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1828</b></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">MARCH 22</span><br /><i>title</i> : <b>CATALOGUE OF THE VALUABLE LIBRARY OF BENJAMIN HEATH MALKIN, ESQ. LL.D. HEAD MASTER OF BURY SCHOOL, INCLUDING Galerie du Palais Royal, 5 vol. <span style="font-size: x-small;">LARGEST PAPER, PROOFS BEFORE THE LETTERS, VERY RARE</span>. Galerie de Florence et du Palais Pitti, 4 vol. <span style="font-size: x-small;">VELLUM PAPER, PROOFS BEFORE THE LETTERS</span>. Bartoli Recueil de Peintures Antiques, 3 vol. in 2, <i>original Edition, fine copy from the Lamoignon Collection</i>. Chamberlaine’s Imitations of Drawings, by Hans Holbein, 2 vol. <i>very fine copy in morocco</i>. Lodge’s Portraits, 29 Numbers, <span style="font-size: x-small;">LARGE PAPER, PROOFS ON INDIA PAPER</span>. Macklin’s Bible, with the Apocrypha, 8 vol. <i>in blue morocco</i>. Dugdale’s Monasticon Anglicanum, 49 Parts, <span style="font-size: x-small;">LARGE PAPER</span>. Virgilii Opera, 3 vol. <span style="font-size: x-small;">ILLUSTRATED WITH ABOVE 600 PRINTS</span>. Psalterium Latinum, <span style="font-size: x-small;">A RICHLY ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPT UPON VELLUM</span>. Homeri Opera, <span style="font-size: x-small;">EDITIO PRINCEPS</span>, 1488. Anthologia Græca, <span style="font-size: x-small;">PRINTED IN CAPITAL LETTERS</span>, 1494. Luciani Opera, <span style="font-size: x-small;">EDITIO PRINCEPS</span>, 1496. Cebes, <span style="font-size: x-small;">EDITIO PRINCEPS</span>. Aulus Gellius, <span style="font-size: x-small;">EDITIO PRINCEPS</span>, 1469. Delphin Classics, 63 vol. complete. Villoison Anecdota Græca, 2 vol. <span style="font-size: x-small;">PRINTED UPON VELLUM</span>, D<span style="font-size: x-small;">IBDIN’S</span> B<span style="font-size: x-small;">IBLIOMANIA</span>, and all his other works on <span style="font-size: x-small;">LARGE PAPER</span>. Britton’s Architectural and Cathedral Antiquities, <span style="font-size: x-small;">LARGE PAPER</span>. Strutt’s Works. Academie des Inscriptions, 51 vol. Philosophical Transactions at large, 116 vol. Many of the earliest productions of the Aldine Press, &c. &c. WHICH WILL BE SOLD BY AUCTION, BY MR. EVANS, AT HIS HOUSE, No. 93, PALL MALL, On Saturday, March 22, and Six following Days, (Sunday excepted) 1828</b>. <br /><i>note</i> : It would appear that the sale of Malkin’s library took place on the relinquishment of his post of headmaster at Bury. It was a typical eighteenth century library, strong in classical and English literature, travel and topography, backed by a strong section on art. Many books were in large paper, special editions, and the earliest productions of the Aldine Press were well represented.<br /><span> </span>Highlights of the sale were<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Lodge’s Portraits, large paper, 1821-7; bought by Colnaghi for £84.<br />The 1798 Didot Paris edition of Virgil’s Works, 3 vols. folio, illustrated with above six hundred plates, realised £42.<br /> Stuarts Antiquities of Athens, 4 vols. folio 1762 made £29. 8. 0.<br />116 vols. of Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, 1665 to 1820 made £56.<br />A Psalter of the fifteenth century, 172 leaves all richly illuminated, and including the portraits of Lord Lincoln and his wife, for whom this manuscript was executed, sold for £13. 5. 0d.<br />Monstrelet’s Chronicles made £10. 2. 6.<br />HAKLUYT’S Voyages. 3 vols. Small folio. 1599-1600. With the Map. This fetched £8. 15s</blockquote><span> </span>There are no important books on Wales, but the main productions of the Hafod Press are featured at surprisingly high prices for this date:<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Brocquiere Travels £3. 13. 6.<br />Froissart’s Chronicles £14. 14. 0.<br />Joinville’s Memoirs £7. 0. 0.</blockquote><span> </span>And at the lower end of prices realised<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Blake’s Illustrations of Blair’s Grave — 1808; sold to “Hillman” for 17/-.<br /> Brothers’s Prophecies, — — — 1794; sold to “Cochran” for 1/6. </blockquote><span> </span>And an exceedingly rare early topographical work, Lambarde’s Perambulation of Kent, 1576, was sold for only 4/6d. <br /><span> </span>The library was dispersed in 1660 lots over seven days. The “End of the Sale” raised £3,539.1.6. The library in due course was followed by another sale of his collection of prints. <br /><br /><span style="font-size: x-small;">MARCH 31</span><br /><i>title</i> : <b>CATALOGUE OF THE COLLECTION OF ENGRAVINGS OF BENJAMIN HEATH MALKIN, ESQ. LL.D. HEAD MASTER OF BURY SCHOOL, CONSISTING OF SPECIMENS OF DISTINGUISHED ARTISTS OF THE VARIOUS SCHOOLS; WORKS OF MARC ANTONIO, JULIO BONASONE WOOLLETT, STRANGE, BARTOLOZZI, &c. INTERESTING BRITISH PORTRAITS, ALSO A LARGE COLLECTION OF FINE ENGRAVINGS FRAMED AND GLAZED. WHICH WILL BE SOLD BY AUCTION, BY MR. EVANS, AT HIS HOUSE, No. 93, PALL MALL, On Monday, March 31. The Sale will commence at Half-past Twelve. 1828</b>.<br /><i>note</i> : 110 lots; at “End of the Sale”, £169.13.-. The only Blake item was [<i>lot</i>] 41 Strolling Actresses dressing in a Barn, Hogarth. Beggar’s Opera, after Ditto, by Blake, fine, &c., which sold to “Roth” for 15/-.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1829</b></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">DECEMBER</span><br />In December 1829 Malkin was appointed to be the first professor of history, ancient and modern, at the newly-established University of London.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1830</b></div>From about 1830 Malkin lived part of each year at the Old Hall, Cowbridge, Glamorgan, his wife’s home, from where he pursued his interests in local history and topography. He interested himself in the life of Glamorgan, founded “The Society for the Improvement of the Working Population in ... Glamorgan” (of which he was president and secretary), and edited its twelve pamphlets (the “Cowbridge Tracts”); he also published separately a lecture delivered by him to the Society (not traced).</div><div><br /><span style="font-size: x-small;">MARCH 11</span><br />Inaugural lecture at University College, London. Malkin was Professor of History, Ancient and Modern at the University of London, 1830-33. <br /><br /><span style="font-size: x-small;">MAY 22</span><br />His third son, Frederic Malkin, also a fellow of Trinity, died on 22 May 1830, aged 28.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-HD_v_bmaD1Y/YLLA1WB7HqI/AAAAAAAABAE/r2MmTRs5SYEndZQXAOjhvlMn0kflaQUZQCLcBGAsYHQ/s573/1830.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="573" data-original-width="350" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-HD_v_bmaD1Y/YLLA1WB7HqI/AAAAAAAABAE/r2MmTRs5SYEndZQXAOjhvlMn0kflaQUZQCLcBGAsYHQ/w244-h400/1830.jpg" width="244" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><i>title</i> : <b>AN INTRODUCTORY LECTURE ON HISTORY, DELIVERED IN THE UNIVERSITY OF LONDON, ON THURSDAY, MARCH 11, 1830. BY BENJAMIN HEATH MALKIN, LL.D., F.S.A. PROFESSOR OF HISTORY, ANCIENT AND MODERN. [<i>rule</i>] LONDON : PRINTED FOR JOHN TAYLOR, BOOKSELLER AND PUBLISHER TO THE UNIVERSITY, 30, UPPER GOWER-STREET. [rule] 1830</b>.<br /><i>physical description</i> : 23 p. ; 8vo. B, C4.<br /><i>note</i> : LONDON : PRINTED BY THOMAS DAVISON, WHITEFRIARS — t.p. verso.<br />context : Malkin compares the modern age with past eras and declares unequivocally that the days of slavish ignorance are now over and done with; the prospect of further advancement may well be extended so that individuals can become freer and happier, and thus more inclined to embrace the just systems of government.<br /><i>note</i> : The lecture is printed by Thomas Davison of Whitefriars. This is the successor firm, run by his widow, to Thomas Davison (1794-1826), known for his republican and Deist views. Davison’s publication of material critical of the Bible in his <i>Deist’s Magazine</i> resulted in his prosecution in October 1820. Davison was fined £100 and imprisoned for two years. He was also John Murray’s printer for most of Byron in the 1810s (but not after he went to jail). Of course the decision to have his lecture printed by Davison was probably made by the publisher, Taylor, but Malkin’s agreement with the use of a printer of some notoriety must surely, like the 1794 anti-war piece, put Malkin within the social and cultural circles of early nineteenth-century radicalism.<br /><br /><i>title</i> : <b>CLASSICAL DISQUISITIONS AND CURIOSITIES, </b><i style="font-weight: bold;">CRITICAL AND HISTORICAL</i><b>. BY BENJAMIN HEATH MALKIN, L.L.D. F.S.A. [</b><i>rule</i><b>] CAMBRIDGE: PUBLISHED BY J. & J. J. DEIGHTON. 1830</b>.<br /><i>physical description</i> : xxvi, 460 p.; 8vo.<br /><i>note</i> : Reissue of publication of 1825.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1831</b></div><i>title</i>: <b>UNDER THE SUPERINTENDENCE OF THE SOCIETY FOR THE IMPROVEMENT OF THE WORKING POPULATION IN THE COUNTY OF GLAMORGAN</b><br /><i>publisher</i> : Cardiff: printed and sold by W. Bird, 1831<br /><i>physical description</i> : 12 parts. Each tract : 11 p ; 17 cm. ; 12mo.<br /><i>note </i>: Tracts published by the Society; No. [8] lacks collective title.<br /><i>contents </i>: 1. On the principle of compensation, as between the different conditions of human life — 2. On the principle of compensation, as respecting the conditions of the working classes at different periods — 3. On the principle of compensation, as respecting the condition of the working classes in Wales and England — 4. On the institution of property — 5. On the advantages of friendly societies — 6. On the advantages of savings= banks — 7. To the labourers of Glamorganshire — [8]. Story the first: the rich and the poor; Story the second: wages — 9-11. Third story: population, or, Patty’s marriage; Fourth story: the poor’s rate, or, The treacherous friend; Fifth story: foreign trade, or, The wedding gown / by the author of “Conversations on natural philosophy,” &c. — 12. Summary of the objects attained or projected by the Society, in the course of its first year : addressed by the committee to the Members of the Society, and to the public at large. [signed : B.H. Malkin, Chairman]<br /><i>price </i>: 1<i>d</i>. each. <br /><i>note</i> : In retirement Malkin became chairman of the Society for the Improvement of the Working Population in the County of Glamorgan. He was a reformer rather than a revolutionary. The Society issued this series of papers, (the so-called “Cowbridge Tracts”), on various social questions affecting the labourers of Glamorgan.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1832</b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JDVelJEQZuo/YLNsCS29G8I/AAAAAAAABCg/We8i6w9IFwY3-wwzMZzgV5DE0Zan_QIfACLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/1832.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1322" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JDVelJEQZuo/YLNsCS29G8I/AAAAAAAABCg/We8i6w9IFwY3-wwzMZzgV5DE0Zan_QIfACLcBGAsYHQ/w259-h400/1832.jpg" width="259" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">OCTOBER</span><br /><i>title</i> : <b>ART. I.—<i>The Life of Sir Isaac Newton</i>. By D<span style="font-size: x-small;">AVID</span> (now S<span style="font-size: x-small;">IR</span> D<span style="font-size: x-small;">AVID</span>) B<span style="font-size: x-small;">REWSTER</span>, LL.D., F.R.S., 12mo. London: 1831</b>.<br /><i>in</i> : THE EDINBURGH REVIEW. OCTOBER, 1832. [<i>double rule</i>] No. CXI [<i>double rule</i>]<br /><i>physical description</i> : 1-37 p.<br /><i>note</i> : An anonymous review. (This is the only Malkin review listed in the <i>Wellesley index to Victorian periodicals</i>, 1824-1900 [<i>vol. 1</i>] (1966). There must be other book reviews by Malkin, currently untraced.)<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1833</b></div>Retired from professorship. He was succeeded by Dr. Robert Vaughan, editor of the <i>British Quarterly Review</i> (1845), and author of many works on nonconformist history.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1837</b></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">OCTOBER 21</span><br />Death of his second and eldest surviving son, Sir Benjamin Heath Malkin, fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, a friend of Macaulay, and a judge of the Supreme Court at Calcutta, aged 41.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1842</b></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">MAY 26</span><br />Malkin died at Cowbridge and was buried there. He and his wife are commemorated in an inscription in the church.<div><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-aZ5u5NoFCr4/YLLB5Wl8psI/AAAAAAAABAU/rybSfEYj2gIUqzbiipulNu64dY1xiyRlgCLcBGAsYHQ/s560/1842.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="560" data-original-width="390" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-aZ5u5NoFCr4/YLLB5Wl8psI/AAAAAAAABAU/rybSfEYj2gIUqzbiipulNu64dY1xiyRlgCLcBGAsYHQ/w446-h640/1842.jpg" width="446" /></a></div> </div><span> </span>A monument was also erected to his memory in the church of St. James, Bury St. Edmunds, “erected by his pupils as a tribute of gratitude, respect and affection”. It features a medallion profile of him taken from a bust by Chantrey.<br /><br /><span style="font-size: x-small;">JUNE 4</span>.<br />Obituary of Malkin in the <i>Ipswich Journal</i>.<br /><br /><span style="font-size: x-small;">AUGUST</span><br />Obituary of Malkin in the <i>Gentleman’s Magazine</i>, page 211.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1863</b></div><i>title </i>: <b>LIFE OF WILLIAM BLAKE, “PICTOR IGNOTUS.” WITH SELECTIONS FROM HIS POEMS AND OTHER WRITINGS BY THE LATE ALEXANDER GILCHRIST, OF THE MIDDLE TEMPLE, BARRISTER-AT-LAW; AUTHOR OF “THE LIFE OF WILLIAM ETTY, R.A.” ILLUSTRATED FROM BLAKE’s OWN WORKS, IN FACSIMILE BY W. J. LINTON, AND IN PHOTOLITHOGRAPHY; WITH A FEW OF BLAKE’s ORIGINAL PLATES. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. [<i>II</i>.] London and Cambridge: MACMILLAN AND CO. 1863. [<i>The Right of Translation is reserved</i>.]</b><br /><i>note</i> : Malkin references : 9-10, 17, 24, 71, 120-21, 201, 210-12, 243. In his Chapter XIII, Gilchrist writes condescendingly of the Malkins, though he draws directly on Malkin’s account of Blake’s apprenticeship years, paraphrasing it and often quoting directly, though without acknowledgement.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1866</b></div><i>title</i> : <b>THE ADVENTURES OF GIL BLAS ... TRANSLATED ... BY T. SMOLLETT. A NEW EDITION, CAREFULLY REVISED. WITH TWENTY-FOUR LINE ENGRAVINGS AFTER SMIRKE, AND TEN ETCHINGS BY G. CRUIKSHANK </b><br /><i>publisher</i> : London: G. Routledge & Sons, 1866.<br /><i>physical description</i> : xiv, 442 p. ; 17 cm. ; 8vo.<br /><i>note</i> : Actually Malkin’s translation.<br /><i>note</i> : reissued 1881 as part of the “Excelsior Series.”.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1881</b></div><i>title</i> : <b>ALAIN RENÉ LE SAGE [</b><i>rule</i><b>] THE ADVENTURES OF GIL BLAS OF SANTILLANE TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH BY TOBIAS SMOLLETT. PRECEDED BY </b><i style="font-weight: bold;">A BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL NOTICE OF LE SAGE</i><b> By GEORGE SAINTSBURY. With Twelve Original Etchings by R. De Los Rios. IN THREE VOLUMES—VOL. I [</b><i style="font-weight: bold;">etc</i><b>.] LONDON J. C. NIMMO AND BAIN 14 KING WILLIAM STREET, STRAND, W.C. 1881</b>.<br /><i>physical description</i> : 8vo.<br /><i>note</i> : Malkin’s translation.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1885</b></div><i>title</i>: <b>THE ADVENTURES OF GIL BLAS ... Translated by T. Smollett. A new edition, carefully revised. With twenty-four line engravings after Smirke, and ten etchings by G. Cruikshank</b>.<br /><i>publisher</i> : H.G. Bohn, 1885.—Bohn’s Illustrated Library.<br /><i>physical description </i>: xii, 600 p. ; 8vo.<br /><i>note</i> : The translation is by B.H. Malkin.<br /><b><br /></b><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1888</b></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">NOVEMBER 18</span><br />Arthur Thomas Malkin, fourth son of Benjamin Heath Malkin, died 18 November 1888 aged 85.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1907</b></div><i>title</i> : <b>WILLIAM BLAKE. BY ARTHUR SYMONS</b>.<br /><i>publisher</i> : London : A. Constable, 1907.<br /><i>physical description</i> : xviii p., 1 l., 433 p. diagr. 23 cm.<br /><i>contents</i> : Pt. I. William Blake [by A. Symons] — pt. II. Records from contemporary sources : 1. Extracts from the Diary, letters, and reminiscences of H. C. Robinson, transcribed from the original mss. in Dr. William’s library, 1810-1852.—2. From A father’s memoirs of his child. By B. H. Malkin. London, 1806.—3. From Lady Charlotte Bury’s Diary illustrative of the times of George the Fourth, 1820.—4. Blake’s horoscope, 1825.—5. Obituary notices in the Literary Gazette, and Gentleman’s Magazine, 1827.—6. Extract from Varley’s Zodiacal Physiognomy, 1828.—7. Biographical sketch of Blake; extract from v. 2 of Nollekens and his Times. By J. T. Smith. London : H. Colburn, 1828.—8. Life of Blake; extract from v. 2 of Lives of the Most Eminent British Painters, Sculptors, and Architects. By Alan Cunningham. London : J. Murray, 1830<br /><i>note</i> : “List of books consulted”: page xiii-xv.<br /><i>note</i> : also published New York : E. P. Dutton 1907.<br />note : Facsimile reprint Kila MT : Kessinger Publishing, 1997. ISBN 1564595617 <br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1910</b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-pa92ex9VZBY/YLLCMLcsZgI/AAAAAAAABAc/ZefzOS4p-OYDr4laGzSpOsIUF35mH-JrgCLcBGAsYHQ/s1990/1910.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1990" data-original-width="1240" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-pa92ex9VZBY/YLLCMLcsZgI/AAAAAAAABAc/ZefzOS4p-OYDr4laGzSpOsIUF35mH-JrgCLcBGAsYHQ/w249-h400/1910.jpg" width="249" /></a></div><b><br /></b></div><i>title</i> : <b>THE ADVENTURES <i>of</i> GIL BLAS <i>of</i> SANTILLANE VOLUME ONE [<i>TWO</i>] LONDON & TORONTO PUBLISHED BY J. M. DENT & SONS LTD & IN NEW YORK BY E.P. DUTTON & CO</b><br /><i>year of publication</i> : 1910.—Everyman’s Library, 437, 438.<br /><i>physical description</i> : 2v., 17 cm. ; 8vo.<br /><i>note</i> : With an introduction by Anatole Le Braz. <br /><i>note</i> : The translation is by B.H. Malkin:<br /><span> </span>“The chief English translation is that based on Smollett’s, 1749, and still called after him, though freely revised and much improved by B. H. Malkin, whose text is followed in this edition.” (v. 1, p. xv.)<br /><span> </span>I am puzzled by this unwillingness fully to credit Malkin for his translation. Perhaps commercial considerations would justify an attribution to the well-known Smollett rather than the little-known Malkin.<br /><i>note</i> : Reprinted 1914, 1921, 1928, 1938.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1913</b></div><i>title</i> : <b>THE ADVENTURES OF GIL BLAS OF SANTILLANE. TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH OF LESAGE BY TOBIAS SMOLLETT. WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY WILLIAM MORTON FULLERTON</b>.<br /><i>publisher</i> : London : ; George Routledge & Sons New York : E. P. Dutton & Co., 1913.—Library of Early Novelists. Picaresque Section; 2.<br /><i>physical description</i> : xxxviii, 442 p. ; 21 cm.<br /><i>note</i> : Malkin’s translation.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1918</b></div><i>title</i> : <b>THE ADVENTURES OF GIL BLAS OF SANTILLANE. By A.R. Le Sage ; translated by B.H. Malkin ; with a frontispiece by Robert Smirke.</b><br /><i>publisher</i> : London Greening [1918].—The Lotus library<br /><i>physical description</i> : 588 p., [1] leaf of plates : 1 ill. ; 18 cm.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1922</b></div><i>title</i> : <b>THE ADVENTURES OF GIL BLAS OF SANTILLANE by A R. LE SAGE Translated by B.H. MALKIN NEW YORK : BRENTANO’S</b><br /><i>year of publication</i> : [1922?].<br /><i>physical description</i> : 588 p. ;<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1969</b></div><i>title </i>: <b>BLAKE RECORDS [</b><i>rule</i><b>] G. E. BENTLEY, Jr. OXFORD AT THE CLARENDON PRESS 1969</b><br /><i>physical description</i> : xxviii, 678 p., 62 pl : illustrations, facsimiles, plans, portraits ; 23 cm<br /><i>reference</i> : ISBN 019811639X<br /><i>note</i> : “The purpose of the <i>Blake Records</i> is to collect and publish as many as possible of the references to Blake made by his contemporaries” (xxiv), including the biographical essays by Malkin, Crabb Robinson, J.T. Smith, Cunningham and Tatham, with separate sections on Blake’s Residences, Accounts, and Engravings. There are 67 illustrations, including all the plates for Blair’s <i>Grave</i>.<br /><span> </span>Malkin references : 13, 169, 174-7, 181-2, 192, 223, 225, 230, 254, 318, 349, 385, 421-31, 433, 444, 504, 510, 511, 537, 562, 563, 574, 616, 617, 622-3.<br /><i>note</i> : A <i>Supplement</i> was issued in 1988, and a 2nd edition in 2004.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1970</b></div><i>title</i> : <b>WILLIAM BLAKE: SONGS OF INNOCENCE AND EXPERIENCE: A CASEBOOK EDITED BY MARGARET BOTTRALL</b>.<br /><i>publisher</i> : London : Macmillan Education, 1970.— Casebook series.<br /><i>physical description</i> : 245 p.; 21cm.<br /><i>reference</i> : ISBN 0333093925 (pbk), 0333056736<br /><i>note</i> : Includes brief extract from Malkin. <br /><br /><i>title</i> : <b>CRITICS ON BLAKE READINGS IN LITERARY CRITICISM EDITED BY JUDITH O’NEILL</b>.<br /><i>publisher</i> : London : Allen and Unwin, 1970.—Readings in literary criticism; 7.<br /><i>physical description</i> : 120 p; 22 cm.<br /><i>reference</i> : ISBN 0048210250<br /><i>note</i> : Includes passages extracted from Malkin. <br /><i>note</i> : Also Coral Gables FL : University of Miami Press, [c1970], ISBN 0870241893.<br /><br /><i>title</i> : <b>NINETEENTH-CENTURY ACCOUNTS OF WILLIAM BLAKE BY BENJAMIN HEATH MALKIN, HENRY CRABB ROBINSON, JOHN THOMAS SMITH, ALLAN CUNNINGHAM, FREDERICK TATHAM, WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS: FACSIMILE REPRODUCTIONS. EDITED WITH INTRODUCTIONS AND HEADNOTES, BY JOSEPH ANTHONY WITTREICH, JR</b>.<br /><i>publisher</i> : Gainesville, Fla. : Scholars’ Facsimiles & Reprints, 1970.<br /><i>physical description</i> : ix, 289 p.; 23 cm.<br /><i>note</i>: Facsimile of extract from Malkin, <i>Memoirs</i>. The headnotes are perfunctory, there is no new annotation or index.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-KSslpC7FMs4/YLNsVWBdilI/AAAAAAAABCo/kD8xseTdzoUqrYQoaMRpYCrA5H3bDXBlACLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/1970%2B%25281%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1552" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-KSslpC7FMs4/YLNsVWBdilI/AAAAAAAABCo/kD8xseTdzoUqrYQoaMRpYCrA5H3bDXBlACLcBGAsYHQ/w303-h400/1970%2B%25281%2529.jpg" width="303" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><i>title</i>: <b>The Scenery, Antiquities and Biography, of South Wales by B. H. Malkin, M.A., F.S.A. With a New Foreword by T. J. Hopkins, B.A., Archivist at Cardiff Public Libraries [</b>rule<b>] Republished 1970 by S.R. Publishers Ltd. Originally Published London, 1804</b><br /><i>place of publication </i>: Wakefield.<br /><i>description </i>: v, [3], vii, 636 p: 13 plates : illus., fold. map; 25 cm<br /><i>reference</i> : ISBN 0854096124<br /><i>note</i> : “A reprint of the edition published in London in 1804”.<br /><i>note</i> : “The invitation to write a foreword to this reprint of the first edition of Benjamin Heath Malkin, <i>The Scenery, Antiquities, and Biography, of South Wales</i> has given me more than ordinary pleasure. A copy of the second edition was the work which first aroused my interest in local history, and I count the day when I first saw and perused that copy in the library of the University College of Wales, Aberystwyth, as one of the turning-points of my life.<br /><span> </span>“In conclusion I cannot do better than quote the assessment by the late Professor R. T. Jenkins. Writing in the <i>Dictionary of Welsh Biography</i>, he described Malkin’s book as “by far the best of the old travel-books on South Wales—acute and interesting in its observation, usually tolerant in its judgements, with a substantial knowledge of Welsh history and (up to a point) of Welsh literature”. I have many friends who are in full agreement with Professor Jenkins’ opinion, and I very much hope that this reprint of the first edition will keep on doing for its readers what a copy of the second edition once did for me.” (v)<br /><i>review </i>: “Malkin, The Scenery, Antiquities and Biography of South Wales (Book Review)”, <i>Welsh History Review = Cylchgrawn Hanes Cymru</i>, vol. 6 (1972/1973), 230.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1973</b></div><i>title</i> : <b>AN ATLAS OF FANTASY. J. B. POST</b>.<br /><i>publisher</i> : Baltimore MD : Mirage Press, 1973.<br /><i>physical description</i> : xiv, 210 p. : ill., maps ; 22 x 28 cm.<br /><i>note</i> : Reprints the map of Allestone from <i>Memoirs</i> (1806).<br /><i>note</i> : New, revised edition.—New York : Ballantine Books 1979, and London : Souvenir Press 1979. <br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1975</b></div><i>title</i> : <b>WILLIAM BLAKE : THE CRITICAL HERITAGE. EDITED BY G. E. BENTLEY, JR</b>.<br /><i>publisher</i> : London & Boston : Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1975.—The critical heritage series.<br /><i>physical description</i> : xix, 294p, [16]p of plates : ill, facsims, ports; 23cm<br /><i>reference</i> : ISBN 0415134412<br /><i>note</i> : The introduction here is an abridged version of Bentley’s essay “Blake’s Reputation and Interpreters” in <i>Blake Books</i>. Includes Malkin’s account of Blake from his <i>Memoirs</i> (1806), xviii-xli.<br /><i>note</i> : Reissued London : Routledge, 1995.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1984</b></div><i>title</i> : <b>WILLIAM BLAKE’S WORKS IN CONVENTIONAL TYPOGRAPHY : FACSIMILE REPRODUCTIONS OF POETICAL SKETCHES (1783), COPY F, THE FRENCH REVOLUTION (1791) COPY A, APPRECIATION OF MASTER MALKIN IN B. H. MALKIN, A FATHER’S MEMOIRS OF HIS CHILD (1806), ‘TO THE QUEEN’ (APRIL 1807), FROM ROBERT BLAIR, THE GRAVE (1808), ‘EXHIBITION OF PAINTINGS IN FRESCO’ (1809) COPY A, ‘BLAKE’S CHAUCER : THE CANTERBURY PILGRIMS’ (1809) COPY A, ‘A DESCRIPTIVE CATALOGUE’ ADVERTISEMENT (1809) COPY A, A DESCRIPTIVE CATALOGUE (1809) COPY O, ‘BLAKE’S CHAUCER : AN ORIGINAL ENGRAVING’ (1810) COPY C. Ed. and with an Introduction by G. E. Bentley, Jr</b>.<br /><i>publisher</i> : Delmar NY : Scholars’ Facsimiles & Reprints, 1984.—Scholars’ Facsimiles & Reprints; v. 388.<br /><i>physical description</i> : xiii, 210 p : ill; 22 cm.<br /><i>reference</i> : ISBN 0820113883<br /><i>note</i> : Editorial text is on pages ix-xiii, 1-5, 81-3, 103-4, 109-11, 115-16, 119, 129-35, 209-10. The reproductions are not true-size. Reprints Blake’s comments on Thomas Williams Malkin; does not include B.H. Malkin’s words on Blake. <br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>1997</b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-nyIDCM6H3lw/YLNtFfl42PI/AAAAAAAABCw/TCsvQ9T_V6YycQzCCsOtlglCnoI1GjTBwCLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/1997%2B%25282%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1368" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-nyIDCM6H3lw/YLNtFfl42PI/AAAAAAAABCw/TCsvQ9T_V6YycQzCCsOtlglCnoI1GjTBwCLcBGAsYHQ/w268-h400/1997%2B%25282%2529.jpg" width="268" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><i>title </i>: <b>Benjamin Heath Malkin A Father's Memoirs of his Child 1806 Woodstock Books <i>Poole ⋅ Washington, D.C.</i> 1997</b></div><div><i>series</i> : Revolution and romanticism, 1789-1834; a series of facsimile reprints chosen and introduced by Jonathan Wordsworth<br /><i>physical description</i> : xlviii, 172 p., 3 plates : illustrations, 1 map ; 25 cm.<br /><i>reference</i> : ISBN 1854772104 <br /><i>note</i> : One fold-out map between pages 94-95. <br /><i>note</i> : Facsimile of edition originally published: London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, 1806.</div><div> <br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>2004</b></div><i>title</i> : <b>Blake Records SECOND EDITION Documents (1714-1841) Concerning the Life of William Blake (1757-1827) and his Family Incorporating Blake Records (1969) Blake Records Supplement (1988) and Extensive Discoveries since 1988 G.E. Bentley, Jr Published for the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art by Yale University Press New Haven and London<br /></b><i>physical description</i> : xxxviii, 943 p., 32 p. of plates : ill. ; 24 cm.<br /><i>reference</i> : ISBN 9780300096859<br /><i>note</i> : Includes the introductory letter to Malkin, <i>A Father’s Memoirs</i> (1806).<br /><b><br /></b><div><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br /><b>Sources and Further Reading</b><br /><br />G. E. Bentley, Jr.—Blake Books: annotated catalogues of William Blake’s writings in illuminated printing, in conventional typography, and in manuscript and reprints thereof; reproductions of his designs, books with his engravings, catalogues, books he owned, and scholarly and critical works about him.—Oxford : Clarendon Press, 1977.<br /><span> </span>A revised edition of <i>A Blake Bibliography</i> by G. E. Bentley, Jr. & M. K. Nurmi (1964). A <i>Supplement</i> was issued in 1995. <br /><span> </span>Indispensable guide both to Blake’s own works & to all subsequent materials about him & his works, including editions, criticism, etc. My complete indebtedness to Bentley should be obvious.<br /><br />Robert Thomas Jenkins.—“MALKIN, BENJAMIN HEATH (1769-1842), antiquary and author” in Dictionary of Welsh Biography.—London : under the auspices of the Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion, 1958, page 610.</div><div><span> </span>Now available online.<br /><br />Jisc Library Hub Discover<br />https://discover.libraryhub.jisc.ac.uk/</div><div><span> </span>Access to a database of 172 UK and Irish academic, national & specialist library catalogues.<br /><br />Herbert J. Lloyd-Johnes.—“Benjamin Malkin’s Library” (Biographica et Bibliographica).—National Library of Wales Journal, vol.13 no.2 (1963), 197-8.<br /><br />E.D. Mackerness.—“Blake and the Malkins”.—Durham University Journal, vol. LXVI no. 2, New series vol. XXXV no. 2 (March 1974), 179-84. <br /><span> </span>A biographical account of the Malkins and an extended consideration of the Memoirs.<br /><br /><div><span>Charlotte Malkin.—Journal of travels in Scotland 1814. E</span>dited with an Introduction by Alex Deans in Curious Travellers Digital Editions.</div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div><a href="https://editions.curioustravellers.ac.uk/doc/0059">https://editions.curioustravellers.ac.uk/doc/0059</a></div><div>Transcribed from British Library Add Ms 85321.</div></blockquote><div><br /></div>Susan Matthews.—“Blake’s Malkin” in Re-envisioning Blake; edited by Mark Crosby, Troy Patenaude & Angus Whitehead.—Houndmills, Basingstoke : Palgrave Macmillan, 2012, pages 108-129.</div><div><span> Using newly-discovered manuscript material, Matthews examines the reception of Blake's work by Malkin and hs social circle.</span></div><div><br /></div></div></div><div><div>Susan Matthews.—“Charlotte Malkin's Waterloo Diary and the Politics of Waterloo Tourism”.—Literature Compass, vol 11,no 3, (March 2014), 218-231.<br /><span> </span>http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com<br /><br />G. Martin Murphy.—“Malkin, Benjamin Heath (1770–1842)” in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online).<br /><div><br /></div><div>James Spedding.—“Remarks on the character of Dr Malkin” in J.W. Donaldson.—A retrospective address read at the tercentenary commemoration of King Edward’s School, Bury St Edmunds (1850), 77–89.<br /></div></div><div><br /></div></div>Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-8096375022670793062021-03-29T13:57:00.017-07:002021-05-05T06:58:38.137-07:00William Blake’s CatMary Ann Linnell, wife to John Linnell and mother-in-law to Samuel Palmer, recalled in a letter of 1839 that “Mr Blake … used to say how much he preferred a cat to a dog as a companion because she was so much more quiet in her expression of attachment”. <br /><br />It was perhaps in vague recollection of Mrs Linnell’s words that Tim Heath, two weeks ago, just before the Blake Society Zoom meeting, asked me if the Blakes, Catherine and William, ever had a cat. The answer is yes. <br /><br />The Blakes moved to a cottage at Felpham in Sussex in September 1800 where Blake could work under the often burdensome patronage of the wealthy writer William Hayley. There he made the acquaintance of Hayley’s friend John Marsh (1752-1828) of Chichester, attorney, musician, prolific gentleman composer (thirty-nine symphonies), and diarist. Marsh recorded most of his long life in minute detail, in a journal that survives in thirty-seven volumes at the Huntington Library, San Marino, California. <br /><br />In his Journal for 5 April 1802, Marsh wrote: “On Monday the 5th our white Cat produced 4 white Kittens, one of which we saved for Mr Blake of Felpham (Mr Hayley’s friend) but had great difficulty in rearing it, the Cat seeming to have very little Milk—”, and then repeated in his marginal summary: “Bred a White Kitten for Mr Blake”. It is pleasant to picture the white kitten playing with Catherine’s embroidery wool, or William, sitting quietly for once, dozing with a white kitten on his lap. (My understanding is that the gene that causes cats to have completely white fur is also linked to congenital hearing impairment. White cats with blue eyes are commonly deaf. One hopes that the Blakes’ white kitten escaped that disability.) Marsh’s journal also reports visits to Blake on 9th May and 26th June 1801, and gifts of white kittens to others in December 1801. Three years later, on 22th May 1805, he wrote again: “We drove to Felpham & carried our little white kitten to Mr Hayley”. <br /><br /><div><a name='more'></a><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The Blakes would have had to leave the white cat behind when they returned to London in September 1803. Cats like to come and go, and could not have been accommodated in their first-floor rooms in South Molton Street. (The <i>OED</i>’s earliest citation for <i>cat litter</i>—”an absorbent material, typically in the form of coarse grains of dried clay, used in an indoor box to absorb the urine and faeces of a domestic cat”—is 1956. And as for a <i>scratching post</i> to stop your cat destroying the furniture, the <i>OED</i> citation is as late as 1968.)</div></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;">✥</div><br />Early humans were hunter-gatherers, and dogs were domesticated to assist in the hunt. But cats only became useful to humans with the development of agriculture, when people began to till the earth and—crucially—store surplus crops. With grain stores came mice, and when wild cats first wandered into agricultural settlements, the cats were delighted by the abundance of prey in the storehouses; people were delighted by the pest control. Cats, it would seem, domesticated themselves. Cats became such a basic part of human life that they’re hardly noticed or mentioned (there are no cats in the Bible), and yet they are, I would say, necessary to civilization. <br /><br />The <i>Ancrene Wisse</i> or “Guide for Anchoresses” is an anonymous thirteenth-century manual for women who have chosen to live alone, walled up in a cell, devoting themselves to a life of prayer and contemplation. It prescribes an enclosed life of deep austerity. Anchoresses were prohibited from eating meat and are advised to lie on nothing softer than a rush mat and use an arm in lieu of a pillow. They were not allowed any accessories or items of clothing that were decorative rather than practical; rings, brooches, patterned belts and gloves were forbidden. They were allowed one animal companion, a cat. Perhaps the cat, keeping her anchoress’s cell clear of rats and mice, was what protected Dame Julian while the Black Death raged through fourteenth-century Norwich. <br /><br />Certainly, in Blake’s London, every house and shop would have had its cat. He would have known the family cat while growing up in Broad Street, and William and Catherine must have had a cat when at Hercules Buildings in Lambeth. On their return from Felpham to South Molton Street and later Fountain Court, their landlords’ cats would have prowled the house. <br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">✥</div><br />I can count just five mentions of cats in the whole of Blake’s writing. There’s the baffling reference in <i>An Island in the Moon</i>, where Mrs Gimblet “seemd to listen with great attention while the Antiquarian seemd to be talking of virtuous cats, but it was not so. she was thinking of the shape of her eyes & mouth & he was thinking, of his eternal fame”. <i>Virtuous cats</i> is perhaps a comic malapropism but of what I don’t know. Maybe the comedy involves Dr. Gustavus Katterfelto, the German lecturer on the “Philosophical, Mathematical, Optical, Magnetical, Electrical, Chemical, and Pneumatic Arts”, who entertained London in the 1780s. Featuring electrified cats, an arithmetically-adept dog, and giant microscopes, his show reached its high point when his daughter, wearing a metal helmet, was hoisted to the ceiling “by the power of a single magnet”. <br /><br />In <i>Auguries of Innocence</i>, that wonderful summing-up of Blake’s thought, he writes <br /><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">The Beggers Dog & Widows Cat<br /> Feed them & thou wilt grow fat </blockquote><br /> Blake here has spotted the affinity between widows and cats. (For many years, in the 1980s and 1990s, Mrs Cissie Walledge, an elderly widow in Edmonton, organised “Madam Fluffy’s Garden Party” to raise funds for the Cats Protection League. Mrs Walledge kept the annual garden party going long after Madam Fluffy had ascended to kitty-heaven; it became a must for local politicians and aspiring politicians. Michael Portillo was seen there when MP for Enfield-Southgate, though attendance failed to save his political career.) <br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">✥</div><br />In 1797, Blake’s friend, the sculptor John Flaxman, commissioned him to illustrate Thomas Gray’s poems as a present for his wife Nancy. The 116 water-colour illustrations rank among Blake’s major achievements as an illustrator. Gray’s poems include an “Ode on the Death of a Favourite Cat, Drowned in a Tub of Gold Fishes”, linking female and feline attributes in relating the fall of Selima, Horace Walpole’s cat, as she plunges to a watery grave while in pursuit of goldfish. <br /><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">The hapless Nymph with wonder saw:<br /> A whisker first and then a claw,<br /> With many an ardent wish,<br /> She stretch’d in vain to reach the prize.<br /> What female heart can gold despise?<br /> What Cat’s averse to fish? </blockquote><br />Blake provided six symbolic and allusive illustrations of Gray’s cat.<div><br /><div><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-r6vlVSLiyF0/YGIof_XWXEI/AAAAAAAAA-I/EZYro642pxUOh6BUrm3GLAD2Z4NCvDg8gCLcBGAsYHQ/s650/selima_1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="650" data-original-width="512" height="200" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-r6vlVSLiyF0/YGIof_XWXEI/AAAAAAAAA-I/EZYro642pxUOh6BUrm3GLAD2Z4NCvDg8gCLcBGAsYHQ/w158-h200/selima_1.jpg" width="158" /></a>1. “Midst the tide <br />Two Angel forms were seen to glide” <br /><br />The opening design finds Selima perched atop the rectangular window of the text as she gazes intently down toward the bottom of the page. Selima, a fusion of human and animal qualities, crouches on knees and extends her hand toward the limitless ocean below. The goldfish that tempt her also assume figures somewhere between the human and the animal, spectres propelled through the water by a prickly webbed armature of fins. <br /><br /><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-DqvTAH9EpQg/YGI89FViCRI/AAAAAAAAA-Q/l-phH2jHAHEJcreL426mqK0-dM1800feACLcBGAsYHQ/s650/selima_2.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="650" data-original-width="512" height="200" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-DqvTAH9EpQg/YGI89FViCRI/AAAAAAAAA-Q/l-phH2jHAHEJcreL426mqK0-dM1800feACLcBGAsYHQ/w158-h200/selima_2.jpg" width="158" /></a></div><div>2. “Demurest of the Tabby kind”</div><div><br />In the second design, the “pensive Selima” has now a tiny naked woman squatted between her shoulders, and is no longer looking down, where the goldfish swim, unconscious of the danger above. The fish, like Selima above, are split, human qualities riding atop animal qualities. <br /><br /><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_hrbYCdPfvk/YGI9Sp1IiNI/AAAAAAAAA-Y/KkxQrta12BUUEKOI9d8tXZTk7xHKKTEGwCLcBGAsYHQ/s1044/selima_3.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1044" data-original-width="800" height="200" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_hrbYCdPfvk/YGI9Sp1IiNI/AAAAAAAAA-Y/KkxQrta12BUUEKOI9d8tXZTk7xHKKTEGwCLcBGAsYHQ/w153-h200/selima_3.jpg" width="153" /></a></div>3. “The pensive Selima <br /><br />Her Ears of Jet & Emrald Eyes <br />She saw & purr’d applause” <br /><br />On the third page, Selima has become human, but with distinct traces of the feline in whiskers, pointed ears, and “her conscious tail”. She gazes into the vase, where “the azure flowers” painted on the porcelain have come to serpentine life and wave their tendrils in the water. The goldfish have become an embracing human couple, though they still have fins. <br /><br /><br /></div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-vMmrBkrl_mU/YGI9j2pX5pI/AAAAAAAAA-g/NmO7PgVX86o2EtWhs7IHeLt2DvzwxLGEwCLcBGAsYHQ/s650/selima_4.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="650" data-original-width="508" height="200" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-vMmrBkrl_mU/YGI9j2pX5pI/AAAAAAAAA-g/NmO7PgVX86o2EtWhs7IHeLt2DvzwxLGEwCLcBGAsYHQ/w156-h200/selima_4.jpg" width="156" /></a></div><div>4. “Still had she gazd but midst the tide</div><div>Two Angel forms were seen to glide. <br />The hapless nymph with wonder saw <br />A Whisker first & then a Claw &c.” <br /><br />In Blake’s fourth design Selima stalks the “angel forms” that glide carefree through the water. Selima is again a creature of myth, half cat and half woman, but Blake emphasizes the feline. Behind her, Fate, portrayed as an old woman, cuts the thread of life. <br /><br /><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-MtOXalEtmaM/YGI9zlxzJ0I/AAAAAAAAA-o/O3grkvMkujUnh9pn41vH66u_eO34qgrcgCLcBGAsYHQ/s1045/selima_5.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1045" data-original-width="800" height="200" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-MtOXalEtmaM/YGI9zlxzJ0I/AAAAAAAAA-o/O3grkvMkujUnh9pn41vH66u_eO34qgrcgCLcBGAsYHQ/w153-h200/selima_5.jpg" width="153" /></a></div><div>5. “Malignant Fate sat by & smild</div><div>The slippery verge her feet beguild <br />She tumbled headlong in” <br /><br />The very powerful fifth design shows Selima, pushed by “Malignant Fate”, plunging into the water, while the goldfish, now warriors in military garb, dart from her grasp. <br /><br /><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-WljGEMEDWuU/YGI9_wuP_6I/AAAAAAAAA-s/eN1K8RBvmCc4cD1MBcP-IGhvFGRVNlylACLcBGAsYHQ/s650/selima_6.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="650" data-original-width="507" height="200" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-WljGEMEDWuU/YGI9_wuP_6I/AAAAAAAAA-s/eN1K8RBvmCc4cD1MBcP-IGhvFGRVNlylACLcBGAsYHQ/w156-h200/selima_6.jpg" width="156" /></a></div><div>6. “Nine times emerging from the flood</div><div>“She mew’d to every watry God” <br /><br />In the final design, Selima rises, hands clasped in prayer, retaining her fully human form while the fish are reduced to their complete animal state. Selima’s mouth is open and her head is raised to heaven as she sings a hymn “to every watr’y god”. <br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">✥</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><br />Of course the most wonderful poetry about cats comes not from William Blake nor Thomas Gray (and certainly not from T.S. Eliot) but from Christopher Smart when he writes about his cat Jeoffry, his cell companion in the St Luke’s Hospital for Lunatics: <br /><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">For I will consider my Cat Jeoffry.<br /> For he is the servant of the Living God, duly and daily serving him.<br /> …<br /> For when his day’s work is done his business more properly begins.<br /> For he keeps the Lord’s watch in the night against the adversary.<br /> For he counteracts the powers of darkness by his electrical skin and glaring eyes.<br /> For he counteracts the Devil, who is death, by brisking about the life.<br /> For in his morning orisons he loves the sun and the sun loves him.<br /> For he is of the tribe of Tiger.<br /> For the Cherub Cat is a term of the Angel Tiger. </blockquote><br />But there are no cats in the Bible, only the larger felines, lions and leopards. And “tiger” in eighteenth-century usage is a category that can even include the jungle cats native to South America such as jaguars. Blake’s friend John Gabriel Stedman writes in his <i>Narrative of a Five Years Expedition against the Revolted Negroes of Surinam</i> (1796) of a “Tiger-Cat…With its Eyes emitting flashes of Lightning”. <br /><br />This is where we come to Blake’s <i>Song of Experience</i>, “The Tyger”, a likely candidate for the most anthologized poem in English, and for a good handful of the English-speaking, poetry-reading world, one of the earliest poems heard or memorized.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /><div style="text-align: left;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rz_mMx-GM0w/YGI-SdFPJ2I/AAAAAAAAA-4/UBxay5QkFgw1wiu08nlCmopUePc_EwYrgCLcBGAsYHQ/s443/tyger.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="443" data-original-width="259" height="460" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rz_mMx-GM0w/YGI-SdFPJ2I/AAAAAAAAA-4/UBxay5QkFgw1wiu08nlCmopUePc_EwYrgCLcBGAsYHQ/w269-h460/tyger.jpg" width="269" /></a></div></div><div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">The Tyger. </blockquote><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Tyger Tyger, burning bright,<br /> In the forests of the night;<br /> What immortal hand or eye,<br /> Could frame thy fearful symmetry? </blockquote><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">In what distant deeps or skies.<br /> Burnt the fire of thine eyes?<br /> On what wings dare he aspire?<br /> What the hand, dare sieze the fire? </blockquote><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">And what shoulder, & what art,<br /> Could twist the sinews of thy heart?<br /> And when thy heart began to beat,<br /> What dread hand & what dread feet? </blockquote><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">What the hammer? what the chain,<br /> In what furnace was thy brain?<br /> What the anvil? what dread grasp,<br /> Dare its deadly terrors clasp! </blockquote><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">When the stars threw down their spears<br /> And water’d heaven with their tears:<br /> Did he smile his work to see?<br /> Did he who made the Lamb make thee? </blockquote><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Tyger Tyger burning bright,<br /> In the forests of the night:<br /> What immortal hand or eye,<br /> Dare frame thy fearful symmetry? </blockquote><br /></div><div>Such a fierce poem but such a friendly pussy-cat to illustrate it. Saree Makdisi suggests that when we read “Did he smile his work to see? Did he who made the Lamb make thee?” (lines 19-20) we are meant to imagine William Blake himself smiling: <br /><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Of course he did: the maker is Blake himself. He made "The Lamb" and he made "The Tyger," and there can be no doubt whatsoever that Blake smiled as he peeled first the one and then (five years later) the other out of the bed of his rolling press, seeing each one of his inky creations for the first time. </blockquote><br /><div style="text-align: center;">✥</div><br /><b>Sources and further reading <br /></b><br />G.E. Bentley, Jr.—Blake records.—2nd ed.—New Haven ; London : Yale University Press 2004. <br /><br />Thomas Gray.—William Blake’s water-colours illustrating the poems of Thomas Gray; with an introduction and commentary by Sir Geoffrey Keynes.—Chicago ; Paris : J. Philip O’Hara in association with Trianon Press 1972.</div><div><span> </span>Blake's 116 watercolours on 58 sheets for the <i>Poems</i> of Thomas Gray are now in the Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection.<br /><br />John Marsh.—The John Marsh journals : the life and times of a gentleman composer (1752-1828).—Vol. 1 ; edited, introduced, and annotated by Brian Robins.—Sociology of music ; no. 9A.—Hillsdale NY : Pendragon Press 2011. <br /><br />Saree Makdisi.—Reading William Blake.—Reading writers and their work.—Cambridge : Cambridge University Press 2014. <br /><br />Christopher Smart.—Jubilate agno. <br /><span> </span>The poem was written between 1759 and 1763, during Smart's confinement for insanity in St. Luke's Hospital, Bethnal Green. The poem remained in manuscript until 1939, when it was published under the title <i>Rejoice in the Lamb: A Song from Bedlam</i>, and edited by William Force Stead. A subsequent edition, now titled <i>Jubilate agno</i>, was prepared by W.H. Bond in 1954, correctly establishing the order of the text. There have been numerous modern reprints. <br /><br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div></div><br />Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-25627246454836244372020-11-07T16:07:00.016-08:002021-08-01T14:03:22.274-07:00Geoffrey Keynes: Personal Papers and CorrespondenceI have recently rediscovered notes that I made decades ago of the Keynes papers in Cambridge University Library. They will be of interest to a quite limited number of people, but perhaps contain hints for future blog postings.<br /> <span> </span>When I visited Cambridge in 1992, my research interests were very much focused on William Muir (1846-1938), facsimilist, and the Blake Press at Edmonton. (Keynes had met Muir as well as purchasing some of his facsimiles through Quaritch, bookseller.) I was also acquainted with Ruth Lockwood (1914-2004), formerly Ruth Jasper, who had been Keynes’s theatre sister at Barts, so there was an additional sentimental interest.<br /> <span> </span>In 1992, the contents were still in the corrugated cardboard boxes presumably used to move them from Lammas House, the Keynes residence near Newmarket. It looked to me like the family had just popped round to the Newmarket Tesco for any spare grocery boxes.<div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7_UWKE3uWqo/X6h4EE2yfwI/AAAAAAAAA7o/vWmCiv2iBBMU8Bnvkk2uC9QrbCct0C0cwCLcBGAsYHQ/s1086/Barts.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1086" data-original-width="1070" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7_UWKE3uWqo/X6h4EE2yfwI/AAAAAAAAA7o/vWmCiv2iBBMU8Bnvkk2uC9QrbCct0C0cwCLcBGAsYHQ/w394-h400/Barts.jpg" width="394" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Geoffrey Keynes, Donald Fraser and a staff nurse (probably Ruth Jasper), </i>c. <i>1935.The group are pictured at the foot of a patient's bed (patient not visible) in an unidentified ward. </i></div><div style="text-align: center;">(<i>Barts Archive, Photograph Collection: SBHX8/1757.</i>)</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div><a name='more'></a><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br />H<span style="font-size: x-small;">OLDING</span> R<span style="font-size: x-small;">EPOSITORY</span>. Cambridge University Library, Department of Manuscripts and University Archives.<br />T<span style="font-size: x-small;">ITLE</span>. Sir Geoffrey Langdon Keynes: Personal Papers and Correspondence.<br />S<span style="font-size: x-small;">HELF</span> M<span style="font-size: x-small;">ARK</span>. MS Add.8633.<br />C<span style="font-size: x-small;">REATOR</span>. Sir Geoffrey Langdon Keynes (1887-1982), knight, surgeon, author & bibliophile.<br />A<span style="font-size: x-small;">CQUISITION</span> I<span style="font-size: x-small;">NFORMATION</span>. Received from the library of Geoffrey Keynes, 1982.<br />D<span style="font-size: x-small;">ATES</span> <span style="font-size: x-small;">OF</span> C<span style="font-size: x-small;">REATION</span>. <i>c</i>. 1906-1982. Unless otherwise stated, Keynes is the author of manuscripts, compiler of scrapbooks, and recipient of letters.<br />P<span style="font-size: x-small;">HYSICAL</span> E<span style="font-size: x-small;">XTENT</span>. 34 boxes.<br />C<span style="font-size: x-small;">ONDITIONS</span> G<span style="font-size: x-small;">OVERNING</span> A<span style="font-size: x-small;">CCESS</span>. The contents of box 29 are closed to readers until 2025. The rest of the collection is open for consultation by holders of a Reader’s Ticket valid for the Manuscripts Reading Room.<br />F<span style="font-size: x-small;">INDING</span> A<span style="font-size: x-small;">ID</span>. A catalogue is available in the Manuscripts Reading Room. <br />R<span style="font-size: x-small;">ELATED</span> M<span style="font-size: x-small;">ATERIAL</span>. Cambridge University Library holds other papers of Sir Geoffrey Keynes, MSS. Add.8828, 8829 and 9350.<br />C<span style="font-size: x-small;">ONTEXT</span>. Geoffrey Langdon Keynes, surgeon, bibliographer and literary scholar, was born in Cambridge on 25 March 1887, the youngest child of John Neville Keynes, the registrar of Cambridge University, and his wife Florence (née Brown). There were two older siblings, John Maynard and Margaret Neville.<br /><span> </span>Geoffrey Keynes was educated at St Faith’s Preparatory School, Cambridge, then at Rugby, where he was a close friend of Rupert Brooke. He went on to become a foundation scholar at Pembroke College, Cambridge, where he secured a first in the Natural Sciences Tripos in 1909. <br /><span> </span>Keynes won an open scholarship to St Bartholomew’s Hospital in 1910, qualifying with a Conjoint Diploma (FRCS and LRCP) in 1913. He went on to take MD in 1918 and final FRCS in 1920.<br />On the outbreak of World War I, Keynes joined the Royal Army Medical Corps as a surgeon specialist. </div><div><span> </span>It was near impossible to store blood on the Western Front, so a patient-to-patient method of blood transfusion was preferred. A portable apparatus, with a special device in the flask for regulating blood flow, was designed and pioneered by Lieutenant Geoffrey Keynes. In 1921 Keynes co-founded London’s Blood Transfusion Service, and a year later published Britain’s first textbook on the subject.</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JhMo3O0rmAA/X6h6e85Lt_I/AAAAAAAAA70/51YBrtZ4D5kSr3CvXKTQVyfgW4fEgsq_gCLcBGAsYHQ/s1230/Keynes_apparatus.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1230" data-original-width="960" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JhMo3O0rmAA/X6h6e85Lt_I/AAAAAAAAA70/51YBrtZ4D5kSr3CvXKTQVyfgW4fEgsq_gCLcBGAsYHQ/w313-h400/Keynes_apparatus.jpg" width="313" /></a></div><br /><div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>The Keynes apparatus for blood transfusion.</i></div><span><br /></span></div><div><span> </span>After the war he became part of the surgical team at Barts, where he was appointed assistant surgeon in 1928. In a series of papers between 1927 and 1937 Keynes recorded his experiences with irradiation and surgery.<br /><span> </span>He had married Margaret Elizabeth Darwin, the grand-daughter of Charles Darwin in 1917. They had four sons: Richard Darwin (1919-2010), Quentin George (1921-2003), William Milo (1924-2009); Stephen John (1927 2017). A daughter, Harriet Frances (born 1918), died in infancy.<br /><span> </span>On the outbreak of war in 1939, Keynes volunteered for the Royal Air Force Medical Service, serving with it until 1945. When demobilised he became full surgeon at Barts, although approaching NHS retiring age. Keynes, however, was given the title of emeritus surgeon, with 12 beds, and continued surgical practice. In this post, he was the first UK surgeon to undertake thymectomy for previously incurable myasthenia gravis.<br /><span> </span>Keynes was an outstanding surgeon. Seen as less austere and formally dressed than his colleagues, he was a handsome man of tireless energy, though intolerant of the second rate. He finally retired from Barts in 1952, and was made knight bachelor in 1955 in belated recognition of his work.<br /><span> </span>Keynes combined medical skill with a passion for literature and was an avid bibliophile who had started collecting books during his school days. The notes that follow will give some indication of his literary and bibliographic activities.<br /><span> </span>Geoffrey Keynes died suddenly on 5 July 1982. Most of his library passed by bequest and purchase to Cambridge University Library.<br />S<span style="font-size: x-small;">COPE</span>. The majority of boxes, not apparently meeting my research needs at the time, were not examined.<br />C<span style="font-size: x-small;">ONTENT</span>. The following list is based on that compiled by Simon D. Keynes, Trinity College (grandson): “Rough list of papers. March 1982”. I transcribed the list and added further notes when I consulted the file in 1992. It has been further tweaked for this blog presentation.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 1: <br />Typescripts of <i>The Gates of Memory</i>* (“No life is long enough”).<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">*Geoffrey Keynes.—The gates of memory.—Oxford: Clarendon Press; New York: Oxford University Press, 1981.</blockquote><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-WuoJ6P9c-cU/X6h7QdigpxI/AAAAAAAAA78/zuTqPwLoBDEIajS_Am3RhJSuT_qfrKYOQCLcBGAsYHQ/s500/gates%2B%25283%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="375" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-WuoJ6P9c-cU/X6h7QdigpxI/AAAAAAAAA78/zuTqPwLoBDEIajS_Am3RhJSuT_qfrKYOQCLcBGAsYHQ/s320/gates%2B%25283%2529.jpg" /></a></div><br /><div><br /></div>B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 2: <br />Typescript of <i>The Gates of Memory</i>; reviews of <i>Gates</i>; letters to Keynes prompted by its publication.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 3: <br />Original copies of <i>The Enthusiast</i> (schoolboy magazine, see <i>Gates</i>, pp. 31-2), in box; letters from Keynes to his parents, written from Rugby; Rugby School handbooks.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OXES</span> 4-6: <br />Envelopes containing letters to Keynes.<br /><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 4: <br />Envelopes containing letters from<br />Ernest Altounyan (1890-1962), physician; Michael Ayrton (1921-1975), artist; Michael A. Badoo, physician; J. Brian Bamford (1908-1979), physician/Denis F.E. Nash (1913-2000), surgeon; Nicolas Barker, printing historian; William Bateson (1861-1926), biologist; R. Bearman; Esmond de Beer (1895-1990), scholar; John Betjeman (1906-1984), poet; Morchard Bishop (1903-1987), pseudonym of Frederick Field Stoner, otherwise Oliver Stonor, writer; Edmund Blunden (1896-1974), poet, with envelope of pamphlets; Kenneth Brease, botanical painter; archbishop of Canterbury (otherwise unidentified); Sebastian Carter, printer; Louis Chauvois, scientific writer; Lady Sybil Cholmondeley (1894-1989); Sir Sydney Cockerell (1867-1962), museum director; David Lindsay, Earl of Crawford and Balcarres (1900-1975); Harvey Cushing (1869-1939), neurosurgeon; Hugh Dalton (1887-1962), Baron Dalton, politician; Gaius Davies, psychiatrist; Walter de la Mare (1873-1956), poet, letters <i>re</i> R. Brooke; John Dreyfus (1918-2002), book designer & historian of printing; William Sidney, Baron De L’Isle and Dudley (1859–1945); Gordon Evans, medical student; David Findlay; Geoffrey Flavell (1913-1994), surgeon; Capt. C. Ford; Ernest Arthur (“Serge”) Freeman (1900-1975), orthopaedic surgeon; John Farquhar Fulton* (1899-1960), neurophysiologist, and others; David Garnett (1892-1981), writer; Robert Gathorne-Hardy (1902-1973), bookseller & gardener; Denis Geoffroy-Dechaume (1922-2012), painter; Wilfrid Wilson Gibson (1878-1962), poet/Sir Stanley Spencer (1891-1959), painter; Philip Gosse (1879–1959), physician; George Armin Goyder (1908-1997), collector; Brian Cecil Guinness (1903-1985); Peter Gurtner, physician.<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">*Keynes’s work on Robert Boyle (1627-1691), natural philosopher, of whom he had an outstanding collection, was taken up by John Fulton at Yale.</blockquote><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 5: <br />Envelopes containing letters from<br />Sir Rupert Hart-Davis (1907-1999), publisher; Geoffrey Gordon Hartill, physician & surgeon; Christopher Hassall (1912-1963), actor, dramatist, librettist, lyricist, biographer & poet; John Hayward (1905-1965), editor, critic, anthologist & bibliophile; Haro Hodson, cartoonist; James Hubbell; Frank Livingstone Huntley, scholar; John Johnson (1882–1956), printer; Henry James (1843-1916), novelist, with clippings & pamphlets; Richard Jennings; Bent Einer Juel-Jensen (1922-2006), physician & book collector; Piloo Jungalwalla, scholar; Edwin (“Puff”) Kersley, dealer; Leo Kersley (1920-2012), dancer; Robert Wyndham Ketton-Cremer (1906-1969), biographer & historian; Peter King; Kenneth J. Kingsbury, surgeon; R. Le Page; Wilmarth Sheldon “Lefty” Lewis (1895–1979), collector; Sir Owen Morshead (1893-1977), librarian; A.N.L. Munby (1913–1974), writer; Denis F.E. Nash; Hugh Algernon Percy, Duke of Northumberland (1914-1988); Seumas O’Sullivan (1879-1958), pseudonym of James Sullivan Starkey, poet & editor; Kerrison Preston (1884-1974), solicitor; Charles Ryskamp (1928-2010), curator; Walford Graham Robertson (1866-1948), collector, to Frances White Emerson (1860-1957), collector, with 47pp typescript; Hamo Sassoon (1920-2004), archaeologist; Roland Short; Dennis R.W. Silk (1931-2019), cricketer & headmaster; Pradyumna Sinh; Robin Skelton (1925-1997), poet; John (1906-1992), collector; Brian Stock.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 6: <br />Envelopes containing letters from<br />Douglas Cleverdon, bookseller, publisher, radio producer, with copies of his catalogues; Simon Rendall, printer, with copies of his publications; Rex Coleridge Taylor; John Thompson; John Leonard Thornton (1913-1992), librarian; Ruthven Todd (1914-1978), poet; M. Vaughan; Henry Rouse Viets (1890-1969), neurologist; Dame Cicely Veronica Wedgwood (1910-1997), historian; Lawrence Whistler (1912-2000), artist; Edwin Wolf II (1911-1991), librarian.<br />Box of letters, <i>c</i>. 1900-14, from Katherine Laird (“Ka”) Cox (1887–1938).<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 7: <br /><b>Eric Gill (1882-1940), sculptor</b>. Papers concerning Gill; box of unsorted letters, <i>c</i>. 1938-1940. (Keynes was a friend and early patron of Eric Gill.)<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 8: <br /><b>Augustus Theodore Bartholomew (1882-1933), librarian</b>. Bound volume of letters from Keynes to A.T. Bartholomew, 1906-1920, including many written from France and Flanders during World War I. There are letters to Keynes from Cosmo Gordon (1886-1965), collector & scholar, and from Bartholomew, and letters and postcards from Mansfield (“Manny”) Duval Forbes (1889-1936), historian.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 9: <br /><b>Siegfried Loraine Sassoon (1886-1967), poet & author</b>. Letters from Sassoon to Keynes; photos, <i>etc</i>.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 10: <br />Unsorted general personal correspondence, <i>c</i>. 1970-1982. Includes, e.g., postcards from Randal Hume Keynes, grandson, <i>et al</i>.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 11: <br />Unsorted general personal correspondence, 1970s, including several letters from Keynes’s family; plus Simon D. Keynes’s “works”, 1976.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 12: <br /><b>Stephen Frederick Gooden (1892-1955), artist, engraver & illustrator</b>. Box of letters from Gooden to Keynes, with accounts, photographs and other material, mainly from the 1930s. (Keynes had a large collection of Gooden’s work.)<br /><b>John Lawson (1932-2019), bookseller</b>. A large number of Lawson’s catalogues, and letters to Keynes.<br /><b>A.T. Bartholomew</b>. Letters from Bartholomew to Keynes, 1908-1913.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 13: <br /><b>Sir Thomas Browne (1605-1682), knight, physician & author</b>. Files and notebooks relating to Browne; Keynes’s scrapbook of cuttings and other papers on Browne. (Keynes’s <i>Bibliography</i> appeared in 1924, with a 2nd edition in 1968, and his edition of Browne’s <i>Works</i> came out in 1928-31, new edition 1964. In 1975 he gave 250 books on Thomas Browne to the library of the Royal College of Physicians.)<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><div><br /></div>B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 14: <br /><b>William Blake (1757-1827), poet, painter & engraver</b>. A large quantity of files on various aspects of Keynes’s studies of Blake: folders, envelopes, and loose papers. Mostly accumulated correspondence. A file on nightingale poems. (Keynes, during a period of more than 60 years of scholarship, published some 40 books on Blake, and served as a bibliographer, editor, publisher, discoverer, and collector of Blake.)<br /><br />Topics.<br />Blake text; Blake exhibitions; <i>Blake Studies</i>—correspondence relating to the Rupert Hart-Davis publication; Trianon Press, publisher of Blake facsimiles; <i>Blake Letters</i>, 1948; speeches <i>etc</i>. to July 1950; drawings from the collection of Matthew Pryor; Blake bibliography 1921; portraits of Blake; Blake Centenary 1927; “The Phoenix”—poem attributed to William Blake.<br /><br />Letters from<br />G.E. Bentley, Jr. (1930-2017), scholar; David Bindman, art historian; Morchard Bishop; Anthony Blunt (1907-1983), art historian; Samuel Foster Damon (1893-1971), scholar; Frances W. Emerson; David V. Erdman (1911-2001), scholar; Robert Essick, scholar; Arnold Fawcus (1918-1979), publisher; Julie Fawcus, publisher; Darrell Figgis (1882-1925), writer; George Goyder; W.D. Lavender, family friend; T.O. Mabbutt, scholar; Sir Francis Meynell (1891-1975), printer & publisher; Paul Miner (died 2017), scholar; William Muir (1846-1938), facsimilist; Alfred Edward Newton (1864–1940), collector; Morton Paley, scholar; Simon Rendall; Archibald George Blomefield Russell (1879-1955), art historian; John Sampson (1862-1931), librarian; Duncan John Sloss (1881-1964), scholar; Ruthven Todd; Daniel Waley (1921-2017), manuscript specialist at the British Library; Sylvia Townsend Warner (1893-1978), musicologist, novelist & poet; William A. White (1843-1927), collector; Joseph Hartley Wicksteed (1870-1959), scholar; Thomas James Wise (1859-1937), bibliographer & forger; Christopher Wright, art historian; and others.<br /><br />Enclosures.<br />Photographs of paintings and drawings by or attributed to William Blake; photographs of paintings by Edward Calvert (1799-1883), artist; early draft of G.E. Bentley, Jr. and Martin K. Nurmi (1920-2008), <i>Blake Bibliography</i>; typescript notes of portraits of Blake; MS of introductory articles on Blake; engraving and watercolour by W.D. Lavender; photocopies of typescript article “William Blake as Mrs. Butts’s bird”; photocopy of Blake MS poem “The Phoenix”.<br /><br />Three individual items caught my attention<br /><br />(i) Letter from Alec Martin of Christie’s (18 April 1950)<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">“I have received three Blake Books:<br /></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">No Natural Religion</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Marriage of Heaven and Hell</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Songs of Innocence and Experience</blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">From Mrs. Drysdale of Radley, Abingdon, Berks.* Are you likely to be coming this way or may I send them you to look at and give me a brief description for the catalogue with a rough note of what they are worth?”<br />With Keynes’s reply drafted on back of same letter<br /></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">“This is most interesting. Wd you please send the books here, where I can deal with them more easily? I shall be away until Monday 24th April.”</blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">And Keynes’s typed note<br /></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">“W. BLAKE</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Songs of Innocence and of Experience</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">54 plates printed posthumously from the original etched copper-plates on Whatman paper with watermark dated 1831.</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Bound in red mor. gt., g.e, of about the same date.</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Carries the book plate of Samuel Boddington**.</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">The Marriage of Heaven and Hell</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">27 plates in facsimile coloured by hand, issued by Camden Hotten*** in 1868.</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">¼ vellum and blue boards.</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">There is No Natural Religion</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">12 Plates in facsimile, some coloured by hand, issued by Pickering & Co., 1886.</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Cf., with original printed wrappers bound in.”</blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">*Winifred Drysdale (1904-1996), Bromsgrove House, Radley, Abingdon, Berks.</blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">**Samuel Boddington (1766-1843), collector</blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">***John Camden Hotten (1832-1873), publisher</blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><br />(ii) Letter from Laura DeWitt James, 1008 Dobrusky Drive, Bakersfield, Calif. (9 March 1946) giving details of “The William Blake Society” founded in June 1945 (80 members)<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Recently I have sent out a study course for the members to follow, that will advance them through the three degrees, although that is as far as we go in any lodge procedure.</blockquote><i>Prospectus</i> of the Society attached.<br /><br />(iii) Cuttings and correspondence relating to the Blake Centenary, e.g. letter from Keynes to his mother [1927]<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">You see that you will be addressed by Lewis Hind* and Thomas Wright**, both bores of the first water. But I should very much like to have an account of it from you. Meetings of the Blake Soc. are sometimes so futile as to be funny. Introduce yourself to T. Wright. He will blink at you kindly through his spectacles.<br />And Florence Keynes’s*** notes of the speeches in Wesley’s Chapel and in Bunhill Fields.<br /></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">*Charles Lewis Hind (1862–1927), journalist, writer, editor, art critic, & art historian</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">**Thomas Wright (1859-1936), of Olney, founder/secretary of Blake Society, author</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">***Florence Ada (Brown) Keynes (1861–1958), mother </blockquote></blockquote><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 15: <br /><b>William Blake</b>. Various files on the Blake Trust, separate plates, Blake letters (facsimiles and photographs), new Blake letters, <i>Pilgrim’s Progress</i>, the Trianon Press, Blake iconography.<br /><b>William Hazlitt (1778-1830), essayist</b>. MS of a paper on Hazlitt.<br /><b>Bibliographical Society of London</b>. File on the Bibliographical Society.<br /><b>Samuel Palmer (1805-1881), artist</b>. File on Palmer.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 16: <br /><b>William Blake</b>. Box containing a large quantity of accumulated photographs and negatives, <i>etc</i>., of pictures by or related to Blake; file on Blake letters; material for illustrations to Blake letters.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 17: <br /><b>William Blake</b>. Keynes’s MS notebooks and typescripts on Blake. MS of article on Blake for <i>Collier’s Encyclopaedia</i>; MS of lecture to Blake Society, 23 September 1919; notebook containing, amongst much else, Keynes’s draft commentary for <i>Gates of Paradise</i> facsimile; notebooks (list of books with library shelf marks); pages torn from notebooks—poem on larks; <i>Daughters of Albion</i> commentary—photocopy of typescript introduction and plate by plate commentary; proofs of introduction to Trianon Press facsimile of <i>All Religions Are One</i>; typescript of lecture on Blake; typescript of talk to Friends of the Bodleian, library support group.<br /><b>William Harvey (1578-1657), physician</b>. MS notebook on William Harvey, and Blake. (Keynes’s <i>Life</i> of Harvey gained him the James Tait Black memorial prize in 1966. He had already published a <i>Bibliography</i> of Harvey in 1928, revised 1953, and <i>The Portraiture of William Harvey</i>, 1949, revised 1985.)<br />Box of correspondence relating to <i>Blake Bibliography</i> and the Nonesuch Press <i>Milton</i>. (Keynes’s interest in Blake probably inspired his more general interest in book design, helping his friend Francis Meynell design at least 20 Nonesuch Press books; until the mid-thirties, Meynell seldom approved a binding without asking Keynes his opinion on it.)<br />File on “Job” illustrations. Carbons of Keynes’s letters to Philip Hofer (1898-1984), curator & art historian, and Pierpont Morgan Library; Graham Robertson; John Johnson (Oxford University Press); letters from Alice G. E. Carthew (1867-1940), collector; Oxford University Press (publisher); J.M. Dent & Son, publisher; Philip Hofer; Laurence Binyon; Wilfred Martin, of Emery Walker Ltd, specialist printers; Kunstanstalt Max Jaffé, collotype printers, Vienna; letter from Sarah Helen (“Ella”) Pease (1861-1937) to Laurence Binyon (1869-1943), poet.<br /><b>Grolier Club, society for bibliophiles</b>. File on the Grolier Club Blake (<i>Census of Blake’s Illuminated Books</i>)—correspondence with the Club, letter of acknowledgement and thanks for donated copies; correspondence with Cambridge University Press, publisher; correspondence with Edwin Wolf II (joint author); correspondence with owners and dealers regarding Blake’s illuminated books; Keynes’s contract and letter to Grolier Club proposing publication.<br />Letters (mostly letters of congratulation and acknowledgement) from. Henrietta Collins Bartlett (1873-1963), librarian; W. Bateson; Pierre Berger, scholar; Laurence Binyon; Arnold Clarke; Sydney Cockerell; S. Foster Damon; Campbell Dodgson (1867-1948), art historian; Laura Mary Forster (1839-1924); Sir Herbert John Clifford Grierson (1866-1960), scholar; Grolier Club; Hans Hecht, cardiologist; Austin H. Jackson; Charles Thomas Jacobi* (1853-1933), printer; Sir Eric Robert Dalrymple Maclagan (1879-1951), art historian; Elizabeth Malkin; William Edward Moss (1874-1953), collector; A.E. Newton; Alfred William Pollard (1859-1944), bibliographer; Mrs. T.H. Riches, collector; Frank Rinder (1863-1937), collector; John Sampson; Charles Edward Sayle (1864-1924), librarian; General Archibald Stirling (1867-1931), collector; Sir Emery Walker (1851-1933), engraver, photographer & printer; Charles Whittingham & Griggs, printers; J.H. Wicksteed.<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">*See obituary [by Keynes?] in <i>The Times</i>, 6 April 1933.</blockquote>Thanks from assorted libraries and institutions for gift of bibliography—majority of letters are thanks for gift.<br /><b>David V. Erdman</b>. Correspondence from Erdman.<br /><b>Frederick Hollyer (1838-1933), photographer & facsimilist</b>. “Some Reproductions from the works of William Blake by Fredk Hollyer”—press cutting. (Hollyer himself retired in 1916. His sons continued the production of photographs of works of art under their father’s name.)<br /><b>Richard C. Jackson (1847-1923), collector</b>. Correspondence with Jackson (<i>re</i> the William Blake Society of Arts and Letters)<br />Max Plowman’s letters on Blake text, 1920s—some published in <i>Bridge into the Future</i> edited by Dorothy Plowman.<br /><b>Henry Young, book-dealer</b>. Prospectus of <i>Songs of Innocence and of Experience</i> (Liverpool, 1923).<br /><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 18: <br />Files on<br />Edward Collier (active 1662–1708), otherwise Edwaert Colyer, painter; Edward Gibbon (1737-1794), historian; Joseph Glanvill (1636-1680), writer; Robert Hooke (1635-1703), scientist; Martin Lister (1639-1712), naturalist; John Ray (1627-1705), naturalist. (Keynes published bibliographies of John Ray in 1951, revised 1956; of Robert Hooke in 1960; and of Martin Lister in 1980.)<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 19: <br /><b>John Evelyn (1620-1706), diarist, traveller, numismatist, antiquary, & gardener</b>. Papers concerning Evelyn: bound typescript of Keynes’s Sandars Lectures in 1933-1934; box of papers relating to Evelyn bibliography, <i>etc</i>.; other files on Evelyn. (In 1916 Keynes issued a preliminary handlist for John Evelyn, in which he was much helped by A.T. Bartholomew; he developed it into a full bio-bibliography only in 1937. A revised edition followed in 1968.)<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 20: <br /><b>Jane Austen (1775-1817), novelist</b>. Box of miscellaneous papers relating to Austen. (The Jane Austen <i>Bibliography </i>was published in 1929.)</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-yHMYf-w9ehI/X6ku0yfmh5I/AAAAAAAAA8I/xp_rDwy5QmYO5exOO58VrUhTrWEKGetVACLcBGAsYHQ/s1406/austen%2B%25285%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1343" data-original-width="1406" height="383" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-yHMYf-w9ehI/X6ku0yfmh5I/AAAAAAAAA8I/xp_rDwy5QmYO5exOO58VrUhTrWEKGetVACLcBGAsYHQ/w400-h383/austen%2B%25285%2529.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div><br /><b>Izaak Walton (1593-1683), author of <i>The Compleat Angler</i></b>. File of papers relating to Walton.<br /><b>Thomas Willis (1621-1675), doctor & scientist</b>. File of papers relating to Willis. (Keynes’s work on Thomas Willis remained uncompleted at his death.)<br /><b>Timothie Bright (1550-1615), physician & author</b>. Typescript of lectures (1961) by Keynes on Bright; MS in notebook in Box 13.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 21: <br /><b>George Berkeley (1685-1753), bishop of Cloyne</b>. Correspondence, papers, notebooks, and other material, relating to a <i>Bibliography</i> of Berkeley which appeared in 1976.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 22: <br /><b>John Donne (1572-1631), poet</b>. Book of cuttings from booksellers’ catalogues on Donne; Keynes’s scrapbooks of cuttings and other papers on Donne; various other papers relating to Donne and his library. (Keynes’s first author bibliography, of John Donne, was published by the Baskerville Club, a group of Cambridge bibliophiles, in 1914. Revised editions appeared in 1932, 1958, and 1972. Like his subsequent author bibliographies, it was seen as readable and elegant, combining physical description of volumes with biographical material.)<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 23: <br /><b>John Donne</b>. Two of Keynes’s scrapbooks on Donne, <i>c</i>. 1913-1944 and <i>c</i>. 1950-1982.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 24: <br /><b>Rupert Brooke (1887-1915), poet</b>. Papers connected with the edition of Brooke’s letters, royalties, <i>etc</i>.; typescript of a lecture by Keynes on Brooke; Keynes’s two volumes of press cuttings, reviews and other material about Brooke, 1907-1982. (At Rugby, Keynes had been a contemporary and close friend of Rupert Brooke, whose <i>Letters</i> he edited in 1968.)<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 25: <br /><b>William Blake</b>. Ruthven Todd’s typescript on William Blake, dated 28 April 1942, with extensive MS annotations by Keynes and others, in a large bound volume: “William Blake Drawings and Paintings, Draft V”; early scrapbook of cuttings on Blake (not compiled by Keynes); Keynes scrapbook containing reviews and other papers concerning Keynes’s Nonesuch <i>Blake</i> (1925) and the Nonesuch <i>Milton</i>.<br /><br />(i) Typescript.<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">Signed on front free endpaper “Geoffrey Keynes 28 April 1942”. Pasted to front free endpaper: letter from Ruthven Todd (4 April 1942):<br /></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">As you will see, here at last is your lesser M’hill, complete with spare pages after the index …</blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">Letter subsequently annotated<br /></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"> Revised in orange ink, November 1943. Ruthven Todd.</blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">Enclosures<br />Letters from Martin Butlin*, Ruthven Todd, <i>etc</i>.<br />Sale catalogue of William Bell Scott** with letter from H. Buxton Forman***.<br /></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">*Martin Butlin, art historian</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">**William Bell Scott (1811-1890), artist</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">***Henry Buxton Forman (1842-1917), bibliographer & bookseller </blockquote></blockquote><br />(ii) Scrap book (not compiled by Keynes)<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Contents press-cuttings mostly 1880s-1920s. But includes “William Blake: the illustrator of the Grave, <i>&c</i>.” <i>Literary Gazette</i> (11 August 1827). Some publishers’ announcements and cuttings from sale catalogues.</blockquote><br />(iii) In the Keynes scrapbook<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">The new Blake/The Writings of William Bake. Edited in three volumes by Geoffrey Keynes (Nonesuch Press £5 17s 6d)<br />Review signed Thomas Wright<br /><i>Weekly Westminster</i> (12 September 1925)</blockquote><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 26: <br /><b>Thomas Browne</b>. Material relating to Keynes’s work on Browne including MS of edition of letters, <i>etc</i>.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined].</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 27: <br /><b>William Harvey</b>. Keynes’s MS notebook on Harvey; Keynes’s volumes of cuttings, containing reviews, catalogue entries, newspaper articles, and other material, on John Evelyn (3 vols.), Harvey, Thomas Browne (3 vols.), William Hazlitt, and Jane Austen (2 vols.).<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 28: <br /><b>Medical papers</b>. World War II notes on wounded air-crew, in notebooks; MSS of lectures and papers on medical subjects.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 29: <br /><b>Medical papers</b>. Case histories, <i>c</i>. 1930-1950. Notes on thyroid cases and notes of individual cases of breast cancer, <i>etc</i>.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[contents closed to readers until 2025]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 30: <br /><b>Ballet papers</b>. File on Camargo Society, ballet company; envelopes containing accumulated ballet programmes, and Marlowe Society drama club programmes. File on the “Job” ballet; volume of cuttings on the “Job” ballet, 1948 revival, <i>etc</i>.<br />(Keynes, who was a great admirer of ballet, wrote the scenario of “Job: a Masque for Dancing”, based on William Blake’s “Illustrations of the Book of Job”, for which his sister-in-law Gwen Raverat* prepared the designs, and Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958) the music. The ballet was first performed by the Camargo Society in 1931. The John Rylands Library, Manchester, contains the Michael Kennedy* papers including [KEN/3/1/63] his correspondence, 22 Apr 1963-19 Feb 1964, with Keynes relating to the first performance of “Job” on 5 Jul 1931, and the film, “The Vision of William Blake” (1958), initiated by the Blake Bi-Centenary Committee in which he was actively involved.)<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">*Gwen Raverat (1885-1957), wood-engraver<br />** George Michael Sinclair Kennedy (1926-2014), music critic </blockquote><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 31: <br /><b>Miscellaneous papers</b>. Photographs of Keynes, including one at Weston, 1917; envelope of photographs of picnics on Granta, pre-World War I, labelled C.A. Gordon; miscellaneous early family photographs, including the Raverats*, Margaret N. Keynes**, John Maynard Keynes***, et al.; photographs of a holiday in Cornwall, July 1914; other photographs.<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">*Gwen Raverat and her husband Jacques Raverat (1885-1925), painter<br />**Margaret Neville Keynes (1885-1970), married name Hill, sister<br />***John Maynard Keynes (1883-1946), Baron Keynes, economist, brother</blockquote>Keynes’s honorary degrees—speeches, certificates and other papers.<br />File of papers relating to the trustees of A.T. Bartholomew.<br />File of papers relating to the Trustees of the National Portrait Gallery.<br />File of papers relating to bibliographies (contracts, <i>etc</i>.)<br /><b>Erasmus Darwin (1731-1802), physician, natural philosopher & poet</b>. File on Erasmus Darwin letters.<br />“Puff Kersley by Leo.”<br /><b>David Godine, printer & publisher</b>. Godine catalogues.<br /><b>John Maynard Keynes</b>. Files of papers relating to the Keynes [J.M. Keynes] Trustees in the 1950s; the official valuation for probate of J.M. Keynes’s stocks and shares in the U.K. and U.S.; several pages (foolscap) of J.M. Keynes’s MS of a book on Indian Currency, used for drawings by Duncan Grant (1885-1978), painter; booklet, “The Doom according to Keynes”‘, by D.W. Walsh, 1920—a sermon on “The Economic Consequences of the Peace”; file of press cuttings on the death of J.M. Keynes; photocopy of J.M. Keynes’s will as annotated by J.M. Keynes; letters from Sir Roy Harrod (1900-1978), economist & biographer, and others, on the Keynes Estate; numerous letters to G.L. Keynes prompted by the death of J.M. Keynes; carbon copies of letters from J.M. Keynes to T.E. Jessop (1896-1980), scholar, on David Hume (1711-1776), philosopher.<br /><b>Giles Lytton Strachey (1880-1932), writer; John Maynard Keynes; Bertrand Russell (1872-1970), philosopher</b>. Photographs, <i>etc</i>.<br />Addition, 1993. G.L. Keynes and others: correspondence between J.M. Keynes’s executors and publishers about the republication and reprinting of his books, 1946-1952.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 32: <br /><b>Samuel Butler (1835-1902), novelist</b>. Papers on Butler, Edward Johnston (1872-1944), calligrapher, and A.E. Housman (1859-1936), poet; bound volume of Keynes’s cuttings up to 1982 (his own miscellaneous short publications, letters to newspapers, <i>etc</i>.).<br />Box labelled Gwen Raverat, including several woodcuts.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 33: <br />Keynes’s typescript catalogues of his own books at Boundary Road, Arkwright Road, in the 1930s.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">OX</span> 34: <br /><b>Thomas Edward Lawrence (1888-1935), soldier, author & archaeologist</b>. Bound folder on <i>The Seven Pillars of Wisdom</i>, including cuttings; bound volume of (a few) letters from Lawrence to Keynes; press cuttings on Lawrence’s death.<br />Official documents relating to Keynes’s commission in the R.A.M.C., August 1914.<br />Keynes MS, “A Very Modern Utopian”, on H.G. Wells (1866-1946), writer—speech or lecture in booklet.<br />Keynes MS, “Minutes of Climbs in Wales”, with G.H.L.M.* and H.S.W.**, September 1907.<br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">*George Herbert Leigh Mallory (1886-1924), mountaineer<br />*Hugh S. Wilson (1885-1915)</blockquote><b>Margaret Elizabeth (Darwin) Keynes (1890-1974), wife</b>. Margaret Keynes MS “My Canadian Diary”, 1956-1957, 401 pages, bound volume.<br />Keynes, book plates (both types), and “Ex Dono Geoffrey Keynes” labels.<br /><b>Simon Nowell-Smith (1909-1996), book collector</b>. Packet of letters from Keynes to Nowell-Smith, 1929-1982.<br /><div style="text-align: right;">[not examined]</div><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b>Online Resources</b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><div><a href="https://archiveshub.jisc.ac.uk">https://archiveshub.jisc.ac.uk</a></div><div>Use “Archives Hub” to locate Keynes papers elsewhere. For example, Liverpool University Library holds Keynes’s letters to John Sampson.</div><div><br /></div></div><div style="text-align: left;"><div><a href="https://www.bartshealth.nhs.uk/barts-health-archives">https://www.bartshealth.nhs.uk/barts-health-archives</a></div><div>Material, manuscript, printed, and photographic, relating to Keynes's career at St Bartholomew's Hospital. My thanks to Ted Ryan and Tim Lockwood for directing me to this important resource.</div><div><br /></div><div><div><a href="https://janus.lib.cam.ac.uk/">https://janus.lib.cam.ac.uk/</a></div><div>Janus provides access to more than 1800 catalogues of archives held throughout Cambridge.</div></div><div><br /></div></div><div style="text-align: left;"><div><a href="https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/">https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/</a></div><div>Royal College of Surgeons: Plarr's <i>Lives of the Fellows </i>online. Lives of Keynes and many of his medical colleagues. </div><div><br /></div><div><a href="https://wellcomecollection.org/">https://wellcomecollection.org/</a></div><div>Museum collection including the Keynes blood transfusion apparatus.</div><div><br /></div></div></div></div>Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-64410333262652129392020-10-10T10:27:00.026-07:002021-05-22T11:21:24.897-07:00William Blake and Hampstead<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-kMoetWs5DqE/X4Iex-XYkZI/AAAAAAAAA68/d7Q9fD2Vwa0L0JO1mng0u7m1VNBNp78XgCLcBGAsYHQ/s350/blake-linnell-plaque.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="350" data-original-width="350" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-kMoetWs5DqE/X4Iex-XYkZI/AAAAAAAAA68/d7Q9fD2Vwa0L0JO1mng0u7m1VNBNp78XgCLcBGAsYHQ/s320/blake-linnell-plaque.jpg" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>“Old Wyldes”, North End, where the painter John Linnell played host to William Blake, is an early 17th-century house on the edge of Hampstead Heath. Though the present house was probably built soon after 1600, the estate of which it was the farmhouse was very much older, dating back to medieval times when it had been under monastic control. Wyldes was the medieval name of the estate, a name that was revived at the end of the 19th century. In Blake’s day it was known as Collins Farm.<br /><br />The Collinses, father and son (and both called John) had been farming Wyldes since 1793. John Collins, the younger, was a small scale dairy farmer, owning 16 cows which grazed on the heath. He also sold strawberries, apples, currants and fresh water at a penny farthing a pail from one of the wells near the house. It is said that “J. Collins cow Keeper & Dairyman North End” can still be seen scratched on the window of his kitchen.<br /><br /><a name='more'></a>At the end of the 18th century Hampstead was a fashionable playground for the rich, and North Enders cashed in by renting out rooms and even whole houses. Collins soon realised he could do the same. The first tenant we know of came in August 1823. He was John Linnell, the painter, who wanted the house for the summer. He later decided to move his family there permanently. By the time Linnell first came up to Wyldes, he and Blake were already close friends. Blake could be found at Wyldes on most Sundays and quite often during the week as well.<br /><br />On 12th August 1912, the first Blake Society held its inaugural meeting at Old Wyldes. The members of the present Blake Society had the opportunity to visit Old Wyldes in June 1993. The Society was greatly obliged to Mr Bernard Roseborne, the then owner, and his family for their hospitality on that occasion. For our entertainment, I put together a narration/performance about William Blake in Hampstead. Tim Heath and Andy Vernède did the voices. I remain immensely grateful for their assistance. It wouldn’t have worked without them.<br /><br />The text delivered in the garden of Old Wyldes in 1993 was reprinted in the first issue of the Blake Society <i>Journal</i>. For ease of reading, minor changes, mostly of punctuation but also of Blake’s idiosyncratic spelling, were made to the texts quoted. This revised version reverses some of those changes and slightly modifies the narration. The illustrations and commentary are mostly new.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-O3wW15aoSao/X4HkTTig5GI/AAAAAAAAA6w/XkYWU8yWjNIESJ2zghI-na9bw3wi0qFFwCLcBGAsYHQ/s370/Ordnance_Survey_First-Series_Sheet_7.png"><img border="0" height="518" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-O3wW15aoSao/X4HkTTig5GI/AAAAAAAAA6w/XkYWU8yWjNIESJ2zghI-na9bw3wi0qFFwCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h518/Ordnance_Survey_First-Series_Sheet_7.png" width="640" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Ordnance Survey. First series. Sheet 7 (detail)</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br /><span style="font-size: medium;">“All pleasant prospect at North End”: William Blake and Hampstead</span><br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">B<span style="font-size: x-small;">LAKE</span></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>He loves to sit and hear me sing,</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Then, laughing, sports and plays with me;</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Then stretches out my golden wing,</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>And mocks my loss of liberty.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">How sweet I roam’d from field to field,</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">And tasted all the summer’s pride,</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">’Till I the prince of love beheld</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">Who in the sunny beams did glide!</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><br /></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">He shew’d me lilies for my hair,</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">And blushing roses for my brow;</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">He led me through his gardens fair.</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">Where all his golden pleasures grow.</blockquote></blockquote><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">With sweet May dews my wings were wet,</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">And Phoebus fir’d my vocal rage;</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">He caught me in his silken net,</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">And shut me in his golden cage.</blockquote></blockquote><br /> <div>I begin with this remarkable lyric by the 13 year old William Blake, not because of some imagined connection with Hampstead, but rather to suggest that the woods and fields so easy of access in his boyhood were the real basis of his pastoral vision. And when, later, he tries to overcome the traditional distinction between lyric and epic, it’s always London’s countryside beneath his feet.<br /><br />The lyric moment of inspired vision, with its direct intuition of reality, was the beginning of poetry for Blake. Blake’s Victorian biographer, Alexander Gilchrist, tells us that it was in the countryside south of London<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">G<span style="font-size: x-small;">ILCHRIST</span></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">On Peckham Rye (by Dulwich Hill) it is, as he will in after years relate, that while quite a child, of eight or ten perhaps, he has his “first vision.” Sauntering along, the boy looks up and sees a tree filled with angels, bright angelic wings bespangling every bough like stars. … Another time, one summer morn, he sees the haymakers at work, and amid them angelic figures walking. If these traits of childish years be remembered, they will help to elucidate the visits from the spiritual world of later years, in which the grown man believed as unaffectedly as ever had the boy of ten.</blockquote><br />Another vision is associated with the open fields to the north. The lawyer Henry Crabb Robinson, who knew Blake well, notes in his diary<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">C<span style="font-size: x-small;">RABB</span> R<span style="font-size: x-small;">OBINSON</span></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">The wildest of his assertions was made with the veriest indifference of tone as if altogether insignificant—It respected the natural and spiritual worlds—By way of example of the difference between them he said ‘You never saw the spiritual Sun—I have. I saw him on Primrose Hill—He said ‘Do you take me for the Greek Apollo?’ No! I said—That (pointing to the sky), That is the Greek Apollo—He is Satan—’</blockquote><br />But Hampstead, and other locations in London, only enter Blake’s work by name after his return from Felpham in 1803. Urban industry has begun to overshadow agriculture; the loom and the furnace now dominate Blake’s world, as in these lines from <i>Milton</i><br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">B<span style="font-size: x-small;">LAKE</span></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">From Golgonooza the spiritual Four-fold London eternal</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">In immense labours & sorrows, ever building, ever falling,</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">Thro Albions four Forests which overspread all the Earth,</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">From London Stone to Blackheath cast: to Hounslow west:</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">To Finchley north: to Norwood south: and the weights</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">Of Enitharmons Loom play lulling cadences on the winds of Albion</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">From Caithness in the north, to Lizard-point & Dover in the south.</blockquote></blockquote><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Loud sounds the Hammer of Los, & loud his Bellows is heard</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Before London to Hampsteads breadths & Highgates heights To</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Stratford & old Bow: & across to the Gardens of Kensington</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>On Tyburn’s Brook: loud groans Thames beneath the iron Forge</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Of Rintrah & Palamabron of Theotorm[on] & Bromion, to forge the instruments</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Of Harvest: the Plow & Harrow to pass over the Nations.</div></blockquote></blockquote><div><br /></div><div>Now Blake begins to map his private mythology on the city he knew. Hampstead becomes part of a litany of London place names that echoes through both Milton and Jerusalem. And in the compelling prophecy of <i>Jerusalem</i> Chapter 4 he sees the Empire that exploits and extends the commercial power of loom and forge as slaying Jerusalem universally<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">B<span style="font-size: x-small;">LAKE</span></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">. . . Awake</blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Highgate’s heights & Hampstead’s, to Poplar, Hackney & Bow</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">To Islington & Paddington & the Brook of Albions River</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">We builded Jerusalem as a City & a Temple: from Lambeth</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">We began our Foundations: lovely Lambeth! O lovely Hills</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Of Camberwell, we shall behold you no more in glory & pride</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">For Jerusalem lies in ruins & the Furnaces of Los are builded there</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">You are now shrunk up to a narrow Rock in the midst of the Sea</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">But here we build Babylon on Euphrates. compell’d to build</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">And to inhabit, our Little-ones to clothe in armour of the gold</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Of Jerusalems Cherubims & to forge them swords of her Altars</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">I see London blind & age-bent begging thro the Streets</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Of Babylon, led by a child. his tears run down his beard.</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">The voice of Wandering Reuben ecchoes from street to street</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">In all the Cities of the Nations Paris Madrid Amsterdam.</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">The Corner of Broad Street weeps; Poland Street languishes</blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">To Great Queen Street & Lincoln’s Inn. all is distress & woe.</blockquote></blockquote><br />During the years that Blake wrote these lines, Hampstead was prospering as a sedate middle-class resort. The former dwelling of the painter George Romney was converted to assembly rooms in 1807 and the surgeon John Bliss sought to publicize the curative properties of the Hampstead waters. Keats, Hunt, Shelley, Lamb, Coleridge, and Constable were all attracted to Hampstead and its neighbourhood.<br /><br />Blake, following the disastrous reception of his exhibition in 1809, had spent nearly a decade in deep obscurity. Now, his old friend George Cumberland was to introduce him to the young artist John Linnell, who supported him with commissions in his final years.<br /><br />Their friendship began in 1818, when Linnell was living in Rathbone Place in Soho. Linnell’s journal records a visit to Hampstead with Blake in May 1821, perhaps to look for a house for his growing family. For in the summer of 1822 Linnell took lodgings for Mrs Linnell and the children at North End, Hampstead, at Hope Cottage. The following year he took lodgings at Wyldes (then called Collins’ Farm), for a couple of months. He did not stay there all the time himself, but visited Hampstead occasionally and made sketches there. Then, in March 1824, Linnell took his family to live permanently at Collins’ Farm, retaining a house at Cirencester Place, Paddington, as a studio, and going to and fro by coach.<br /><br />Linnell introduced Blake to some of the best friends of his declining years. It was Linnell, at dinners here at Wyldes and at Cirencester Place, who introduced Blake to John Varley, Frederick Tatham, George Richmond, Edward Calvert, and Samuel Palmer. Blake’s impression on all these young men was profound, but no one else was affected by Blake in the same way, to the same extent, or so permanently as Palmer. Despite the differences between nineteen years and sixty-seven, Palmer and Blake rapidly became firm friends. Palmer’s son remembers<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">A. H. P<span style="font-size: x-small;">ALMER</span></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">Fortunately for my father, Broad Street lay in Blake’s way to Hampstead, and they often walked up to the village together. The aged composer of The Songs of Innocence was a great favourite with the Linnell children, who revelled in those poems and in his stories of the lovely spiritual things and beings that seemed to him so real and so near. Therefore as the two friends neared the farm, a merry troop hurried out to meet them led by a little fair-haired girl of some six years old To this day she remembers cold winter nights when Blake was wrapped up in an old shawl by Mrs Linnell, and sent on his homeward way, with the servant, lantern in hand, lighting him across the heath to the main road.</blockquote><br />The little girl was Hannah Linnell, who was to marry Samuel Palmer in 1837. Her son continues<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">A. H. P<span style="font-size: x-small;">ALMER</span><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">The Canterbury Pilgrims was the first work of Art I can remember. Tom Dacre, Little Lamb, & other Songs of Innocence & perhaps of Experience were the first poems I ever heard & . . . she who repeated them had heard them as she sat at the author’s knee at Hampstead & I heard them when I was about the same age. . . .</div></blockquote><div><br />Blake’s visits to the Linnell’s in Hampstead on Sundays were apparently quite regular, even though Blake believed that the air of Hampstead was unhealthy. For even whilst enjoying Hampstead’s quiet in the bosom of his friend’s family, or its beauty from the garden or summer-house, he would sometimes be tempted to inveigh against its unpropitious qualities. And his views on this, as upon other subjects, would be expressed with a brusqueness and force altogether at variance with his usual amiable manner. On one occasion, for instance, when Mrs Linnell ventured to express her humble opinion that Hampstead was a healthy place, Blake startled her by saying<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">B<span style="font-size: x-small;">LAKE</span></div></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">It is a lie! It is no such thing!</div></blockquote><div><br />Gilchrist, Blake’s biographer, describes the scene at North End in 1825<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">G<span style="font-size: x-small;">ILCHRIST</span></div></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">Blake was at this period in the habit, when well, of spending frequent Sundays at his friend’s Hampstead Cottage, where he was received by host and hostess with the most cordial affection. Mr Linnell’s manner was that of a son; Mrs Linnell was hospitable and kind, as ladies well know how to be to a valued friend. The children, whenever he was expected, were on the qui vive to catch the first glimpse of him from afar: One of them, who has now children of her own, but still cherishes the old reverence for Mr Blake’, remember thus watching for him when a little girl of five or six; and how, as he walked over the brow of the hill and came within sight of the young ones, he would make a particular signal; how Dr Thornton, another friend and frequent visitor, would make a different one,—the doctor taking off his hat and raising it on a stick She remembers how Blake would take her on his knee, and recite children’s stories to them all: recollects his kind manner; his putting her in the way of drawing, training her from his own doings . . .</div></blockquote><div><br />Dr Robert Thornton was Linnell’s friend and family physician. In 1821, Blake had completed a series of seventeen tiny woodcuts for Thornton’s school edition of Virgil. Gilchrist continues<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">G<span style="font-size: x-small;">ILCHRIST</span></div></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Mr Linnell’s part of the house . . . commanded a pleasant southern aspect. Blake, it is still remembered, would often stand at the door, gazing in tranquil reverie across the garden toward the gorse-clad hill: He liked sitting in the arbour, at the bottom of the long garden, or walking up and down the same at dusk, while the cows, munching their evening meal, were audible from the farmyard on the other side of the hedge: He was very fond of hearing Mrs Linnell sing Scottish songs, and would sit by the pianoforte, tears falling from his eyes, while he listened to the Border Melody to which the song is set, commencing—</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>O Nancy’s hair is yellow as gowd,</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>And her een as the lift are blue. </div></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>To simple national melodies Blake was very impressionable, though not so to music of more complicated structure. He himself still sang, in a voice tremulous with age, sometimes old ballads, sometimes his own songs, to melodies of his own.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><br />These visits continued on a regular basis until Blake fell ill, early in 1826.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">B<span style="font-size: x-small;">LAKE</span></div></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">I am again laid up by a cold in my stomach the Hampstead air as it always did. so I fear it will do <this> Except it be the Morning Air & That; in my Cousins time I found I could bear with safety & perhaps benefit. I believe my Constitution to be a good one but it has many peculiarities that no one but myself can know. When I was young Hampstead Highgate Hornsea Muswell Hill & even Islington & all places North of London always laid me up the day after & sometimes two or three days with precisely the same Complaint & the same torment of the Stomach. Easily removed but excruciating while it lasts & enfeebling for sometime after Sr Francis Bacon would say it is want of Discipline in Mountainous Places. Sr Francis Bacon is a Liar. No discipline will turn one Man into another even in the least particle. & such Discipline I call Presumption & Folly I have tried it too much not to know this & am very sorry for all those who may be led to such ostentatious Exertions against their External Existence itself because it is a Mental Rebellion against the Holy Spirit & fit only for a Soldier of Satan to perform</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><br />Linnell was becoming more and more concerned about Blake’s health. He received this letter in May 1826.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">B<span style="font-size: x-small;">LAKE</span></div></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">I have had another desparate Shivring Fit. it came on yesterday afternoon after as good a morning as I ever experienced. It began by a gnawing Pain in the Stomach, & soon spread. a deadly feel all over the limbs which brings on the shivring fit when I am forced to go to bed where I contrive to get into a little Perspiration which takes it quite away. It was night when it left me so I did not get up but just as I was going to rise this morning the shivring fit attacked me again & the pain with the accompanying deathly feel I got again into a perspiration & was well but so much weakend that I am still in bed. This intirely prevents me from the pleasure of seeing you on Sunday at Hampstead as I fear the attack again when I am away from home</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;">Throughout July 1826 Blake had been severely ill, and unable to accept Linnell’s pressing invitations to come out to Hampstead on a visit. Linnell proposed to take lodgings for him at Mrs Hurd’s (Hope Cottage), where the Linnells had lodged before they went to Collin’s Farm.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">B<span style="font-size: x-small;">LAKE</span></div></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">This sudden cold weather has cut up all my hopes by the roots. Everyone who knows of our intended flight into your delightful Country concur in saying: ‘Do not Venture till summer appears again’. I also feel Myself weaker than I was aware, being not able as yet to sit up longer than six hours at a time. & also feel the Cold too much to dare venture beyond my present precincts. My heartiest Thanks for your care in my accommodation & the trouble you will yet have with me. But I get better & stronger every day, tho weaker in muscle & bone than I supposed. As to pleasantness of Prospect it is All pleasant Prospect at North End. Mrs Hurd’s I should like as well as any—But think of the Expense & how it may be spared & never mind appearances </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I intend to bring with me besides our necessary change of apparel Only My Book of Drawings from Dante & one Plate shut up in the Book. All will go very well in the Coach. which at present would be a rumble I fear I could not go thro. So that I conclude another Week must pass before I dare venture upon what I ardently desire—the seeing you with your happy Family once again, & that for a longer Period than I had ever hoped in my health full hours</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;">Finally on Tuesday, August 1st he wrote to say that he was well enough to travel<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">B<span style="font-size: x-small;">LAKE</span></div></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">If this Notice should be too short for your Convenience, please to let me know. But finding myself Well enough to come I propose to set out from here as soon after ten as we can on Thursday morning</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Our Carriage will be a Cabriolet. for, tho getting better & stronger, I am still incapable of riding in the Stage, & shall be I fear for some time being only bones & sinews All strings & bobbins like a Weavers Loom. Walking to & from the Stage would be to me impossible tho I seem well being entirely free from both pain & from that Sickness to which there is no name. Thank God I feel no more of it & have great hopes that the Disease is Gone.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><br />During this time he was at work upon his illustrations to Dante. A clump of trees on the skirts of the heath was long known to old friends as the “Dante wood”. Blake did not receive much benefit from his stay. He was, indeed, gradually getting weaker and weaker.<br /><br />The last of his letters to Linnell was written in July 1827<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">B<span style="font-size: x-small;">LAKE</span></div></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">My journey to Hampstead on Sunday brought on a relapse which is lasted till now. I find I am not so well as I thought I must not go on in a youthful Style—however I am upon the mending hand to day, and hope soon to look as I did for I have been yellow accompanied by the old Symptoms</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><br />Six weeks later, on August 12 1827, Blake died.<br /><br />Let us end as we began, with Blake’s pastoral vision—recollected now in late middle age. Blake’s vision of paradise is no lost traveller’s dream but the sunny side of eighteenth-century London life experienced by a boy given to roaming the adjacent fields and living in an indulgent family in a Broad Street on a square named Golden.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">B<span style="font-size: x-small;">LAKE</span></div></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">The fields from Islington to Marybone,</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">To Primrose Hill and Saint Johns Wood:</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Were builded over with pillars of gold,</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">And there Jerusalems pillars stood.</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Her Little-ones ran on the fields</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">The Lamb of God among them seen</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">And fair Jerusalem his Bride:</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Among the little meadows green.</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Pancrass & Kentish-town repose</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Among her golden pillars high:</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Among her golden arches which</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Shine upon the starry sky.</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">The Jews-harp-house & the Green Man,</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">The ponds where Boys to bathe delight:</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">The fields of Cows by Willans farm:</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Shine in Jerusalems pleasant sight.</div></blockquote></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br /><span style="font-size: medium;">Illustrations</span><br /><br />Old Wyldes<br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-q95P9eG86Uk/X4HilUasfeI/AAAAAAAAA50/Y3sXcNUDuoEGDonh4NYkXpEabDOYn4bNgCLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/Old_Wyldes_Helen_Allingham%2B%25282%2529.jpg"><img border="0" height="549" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-q95P9eG86Uk/X4HilUasfeI/AAAAAAAAA50/Y3sXcNUDuoEGDonh4NYkXpEabDOYn4bNgCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h549/Old_Wyldes_Helen_Allingham%2B%25282%2529.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Old Wyldes in 1909. From a watercolour by Helen Allingham.</i></div><br />Wyldes Farm is a Grade II* listed former farmhouse in the hamlet of North End, Hampstead, NW11, in the London Borough of Barnet (right on the boundary with Camden): coordinates: 51.5691°N 0.1817°W<br /><br />The farmhouse is a rare survival of a timber framed building in London. It was weather-boarded externally, probably in the 18th century when a large barn was added to the east. Major alterations were made in the late 19th and 20th centuries, including the full conversion of the barn. In the late 1960s the farmhouse and barn were divided, and today are two separate properties known as Old Wyldes and Wyldes respectively.<br /><br />Built in about 1600, it was the farmhouse for an estate granted to Eton College by Henry VI in 1449, soon after its foundation. The land was held in trust to provide funds for St James’s Hospital, which Henry VII demolished for St James’s Palace. Eton retained the Wyldes estate until 1907, when it was sold to the Hampstead Garden Suburb trust, which had acquired some property from the college in 1906, and to the trustees of the Hampstead Heath Extension.<br /><br />From 1824 to 1828 it was rented by the painter John Linnell to house his growing family, though he continued to maintain a studio at his former residence at Cirencester Place. William Blake was a regular visitor to the house until his death in 1827. Other artists also used to visit, including John Constable, John Varley, and Samuel Palmer, who later married Linnell’s daughter Hannah whom he first met at Old Wyldes.<br /><br />In 1837 Charles Dickens moved in with his wife following the sudden death of his sister-in-law Mary Hogarth. Overcome with grief, he dreamed of Mary every night in the upstairs bedroom at what was still called Collins Farm. He stopped writing <i>The Pickwick Papers</i> and <i>Oliver Twist</i>, and his friends were worried he had given up writing for good. Among those who came to see him at Wyldes were Harrison Ainsworth, Hablot Browne (also known as Phiz), Daniel Maclise, and his future biographer and friend John Forster. But he soon got back to writing and returned to his home in Doughty Street after about five weeks. In <i>Oliver Twist</i>, Bill Sikes sleeps in a field near Wyldes while fleeing from London. And in <i>The Old Curiosity Shop</i>, Dick Swiveller moves to a cottage in Hampstead which is probably based on Wyldes.<br /><br />In 1884 Charlotte Wilson and her husband Arthur moved in. An early member of the Fabian Society, she also ran the Hampstead Historic Club, which mostly met at Wyldes. This socialist study group attracted a range of radical thinkers including Fabians such as Sidney and Beatrice Webb, George Bernard Shaw and Edith Nesbit, who described the kitchen as an idealised farm kitchen, where, of course, no cooking is done. In her history of Wyldes, Mrs. Wilson lists some of the other visitors including Annie Besant, Olive Schreiner, Ford Madox Brown, and Havelock Ellis. In 1886 Mrs. Wilson parted company with the Fabians and, with Prince Peter Kropotkin, founded The Freedom Group of anarchists. In 1895 she quit the movement, and started a programme of repairs and alterations to the house and barn, incorporating it fully into a single property.<br /><br />Mrs Wilson moved out in about 1905 when the Wyldes estate and farmhouse were purchased by Dame Henrietta Barnett and her associates, with part becoming an extension to Hampstead Heath with the further area being developed as Hampstead Garden Suburb. The designer of the garden suburb was the architect and town planner Raymond Unwin, who lived in Wyldes until his death in 1940, using the barn as his office.<br /><br />A Greater London Council blue plaque, placed in 1975, commemorates Linnell and Blake at the house. Another plaque also commemorates Unwin.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br />First meeting of the Blake Society<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rOqzhpdD5gc/X4IfF97tTGI/AAAAAAAAA7E/kGTG2JVGedATwyISdmrcrwgYP8bEL8f3gCLcBGAsYHQ/s1693/Blake_Society_1912.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1195" data-original-width="1693" height="453" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rOqzhpdD5gc/X4IfF97tTGI/AAAAAAAAA7E/kGTG2JVGedATwyISdmrcrwgYP8bEL8f3gCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h453/Blake_Society_1912.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>The photograph shows the inaugural meeting of the first Blake Society, at Wyldes, on 12th August 1912. Thomas Wright, founder and Secretary, is instantly recognisable, second row, extreme right. Next to him, with folded arms is, I think, Geoffrey Keynes. The man in a light suit, behind Keynes, I think is the publisher Herbert Jenkins, who spoke at the meeting on “The teaching of William Blake”. On the left, in profile, and facing Wright, is, I assume, Raymond Unwin. The elderly lady next to Unwin, and seated, I believe is Thomas Wright’s sister, Miss Bessie Wright. Next to her, the lady without a hat must be Ettie, Mrs. Unwin, the hostess on that occasion. (No lady would be expected to wear a hat or gloves in her own home.) Next to Mrs. Unwin is, I guess, Mrs. Angelina Wright, with a spectacular hat. <br /><br />Names of others present include Adeline Butterworth (author of <i>William Blake, mystic</i>, Liverpool, 1911), Dr Wilfrid Hooper (lawyer and local historian), J. Foster Howe (who chaired the meeting), Walter K. Jealous (who spoke on “Blake and Hampstead”), George H. Leonard (spoke on “The art of William Blake”), Greville MacDonald (who addressed the meeting on “William Blake, the practical idealist”), William Muir (facsimilist), Dr Hubert Norman (psychiatrist), and Frederick C. Owlett (“Blake’s burden”). Thomas Wright notes that altogether some fifty persons attended.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br />Coach routes to Hampstead <br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-OsxoWSGJCO8/X4HivzA6PbI/AAAAAAAAA58/1MAEq4NY81IMAA1-XoeDnIuOtzcj2Z2LwCLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/Cary_Roads.jpg"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-OsxoWSGJCO8/X4HivzA6PbI/AAAAAAAAA58/1MAEq4NY81IMAA1-XoeDnIuOtzcj2Z2LwCLcBGAsYHQ/w482-h640/Cary_Roads.jpg" width="482" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Survey of the High Roads from London (London: John Cary, 1801).</i></div><br />This shows the stagecoach route William Blake would have taken from Fountain Court to Old Wyldes, with a bit of walking either end. Later, in 1826, a privately-hired cabriolet would have taken him door to door.<br /><br />I have written before about the long continuities of London life. The 1801 coach route to Hampstead survives as the 24 bus route: Pimlico (Grosvenor Road) to Hampstead Heath. It is believed to be the only route that has never been changed since London Transport established the bus route in 1934.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div>“O Nancy’s hair is yellow like gowd”<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-sDdgJ2uLxm8/X4Hj4gqfkII/AAAAAAAAA6k/PADGXsUotTIe_eGjlCeDSjIA2sN9ZvjFQCLcBGAsYHQ/s1493/nancyshair.jpg"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-sDdgJ2uLxm8/X4Hj4gqfkII/AAAAAAAAA6k/PADGXsUotTIe_eGjlCeDSjIA2sN9ZvjFQCLcBGAsYHQ/w482-h640/nancyshair.jpg" width="482" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Robert Archibald Smith, The Scotish Minstrel: A Selection from the Vocal Melodies of Scotland</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Ancient & Modern Arranged for the Piano Forte by R. A. Smith. Vol. 5</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>(Edinburgh: Robt Purdie, [1820-24])</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>Music is important to Blake, yet the only record we have of his taste in music is a note by his Victorian biographer, Alexander Gilchrist. Drawing on conversations with Blake’s friend and patron, John Linnell, Gilchrist records the poet’s visits to the Linnell family in Hampstead in the 1820s, and tells a story of Blake becoming tearful whilst listening to Mrs Linnell singing a border ballad, “O Nancy’s hair is yellow as gowd”. (Better authorities than I agree that the tune though claimed to be an “Old Border Melody”, is more likely an 18th-century composed air “in the Scottish manner” than an actual Border folk-tune.)<br /><br />As far as I can determine, this song, which moved Blake to tears in 1825 (was he thinking of Nancy Flaxman, whose husband died about this time?), makes its first appearance in Vol.5 of <i>The Scotish </i>[sic] <i>Minstrel</i>. Significantly, the title-page vignettes of all six volumes are engraved by W.H. Lizars, an old friend of the Linnells, and a witness at their wedding in Edinburgh in 1817.<br /><br />Linnell’s Account Book notes that a copy of Blake’s <i>Illustrations to the Book of Job</i> was sent to Lizars as a gift in June 1831. This is evidence, I think, for the continuing friendship between Linnell and Lizars; perhaps the <i>Scotish Minstrel</i> (an expensive engraved work at 48/- for the six volumes) was itself a gift to which Linnell responded with a set of the Job illustrations.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br />The Dante wood<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-yoHOvx9tKh4/X4IfybXbiCI/AAAAAAAAA7M/xJvPSvSSeTMSiI4yX8lb3vmKsv5NwdMXACLcBGAsYHQ/s1200/Firs_Macintyre.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="618" data-original-width="1200" height="330" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-yoHOvx9tKh4/X4IfybXbiCI/AAAAAAAAA7M/xJvPSvSSeTMSiI4yX8lb3vmKsv5NwdMXACLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h330/Firs_Macintyre.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Joseph Wrightson MacIntyre (1842–1897). The Firs, Hampstead Heath</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>(Camden Local Studies and Archives Centre)</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>During his last years, Blake was at work upon his illustrations to Dante, a commission from Linnell. A clump of trees on the skirts of the heath was long known to old friends as the “Dante wood”. This, I take it, is the very same. And, for comparison, Blake’s illustration to <i>Inferno</i> Canto II: 139-142.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-NRw9HEWcbAQ/X4HjrqstGGI/AAAAAAAAA6g/9Hvt4f6_ZloHVADIOUAj80_rTx69SstRQCLcBGAsYHQ/s598/Dante_and_Virgil_Penetrating_the_Forest_Blake.jpg"><img border="0" height="452" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-NRw9HEWcbAQ/X4HjrqstGGI/AAAAAAAAA6g/9Hvt4f6_ZloHVADIOUAj80_rTx69SstRQCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h452/Dante_and_Virgil_Penetrating_the_Forest_Blake.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><i>William Blake. Dante and Virgil penetrating the Forest. Illustrations to Dante’s Divine Comedy; graphite, ink and watercolour on paper, 371 × 527 mm. Tate N03351</i></div><br /></div></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div><div style="text-align: left;">“Go now, for the two of us are of but one will, with you as guide, as lord, as master.” Thus I spoke, and following him, I entered on the steep, sylvan way.</div></div></blockquote><div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />Or in William Hayley’s parallel text of 1782<br /><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">O va, ch’un sol volere è d’amendue:</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Tu duca, tu signore, e tu maestro:</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Così li dissi: e poichè mosso fue,</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Entrai per lo camino alto e silvestro.</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Now lead!—thy pleasure I dispute no more.</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">My lord, my master thou! and thou my guard!—</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">I ended here; and, while he march’d before,</div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">The gloomy road I enter’d, deep and hard.</div></blockquote></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br />Kenwood<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-sYkkw96PXK8/X4Hi6yvmXMI/AAAAAAAAA6M/03KjRgqOWlgD87869nMbGN0OpZDKL60CgCLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/Kenwood.jpg"><img border="0" height="468" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-sYkkw96PXK8/X4Hi6yvmXMI/AAAAAAAAA6M/03KjRgqOWlgD87869nMbGN0OpZDKL60CgCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h468/Kenwood.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><i>“View of Cane Wood [Kenwood], the superb villa of the Earl of Mansfield near Highgate in Middlesex”. Engraving (Roberts, sculpt.) c. 1770. Exterior view of the south or garden front.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>From Old Wyldes it is just a mile or so past the Spaniards Inn to Lord Mansfield’s grand house at Kenwood. (In 1780, a group of Gordon rioters made their way up to Hampstead to attack the Mansfield property, but stopped <i>en route</i> at the Spaniards where the landlord plied them with free beer until the soldiers arrived.) When Blake executed his woodcuts for Thornton’s <i>Virgil</i>, is there perhaps a reminiscence of Kenwood with the girls dancing in front of a country house with a neoclassical façade? <br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-XLG5NBMgyek/X4HjCDr1KcI/AAAAAAAAA6U/T5gYwNPnAx87FwGKg3iUN0nNJS4A5VR3gCLcBGAsYHQ/s1536/Thornton%2527s_Virgil%2B%25282%2529.jpg"><img border="0" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-XLG5NBMgyek/X4HjCDr1KcI/AAAAAAAAA6U/T5gYwNPnAx87FwGKg3iUN0nNJS4A5VR3gCLcBGAsYHQ/s320/Thornton%2527s_Virgil%2B%25282%2529.jpg" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><i>William Blake. “For him Our Yearly Wakes and Feasts We Hold”; </i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>wood engraving on paper, 35 × 75 mm.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>The seated musicians play what appear to be a lyre and a violin—an unlikely combination. Is it possible that the female figure is actually depicted with a lyre-guitar, a type of guitar with a fretboard located between two curved arms recalling the shape of the ancient Greek lyre? A typical product of the neoclassical revival, the lyre-guitar enjoyed great popularity as a salon instrument between 1780 and 1820. It is said that Marie Antoinette played one. (I recall from decades ago, a television production of <i>Antony and Cleopatra</i> with the great Mary Morris as Cleo. All togas, swords and sandals, it managed to include a lyre-guitar in the wouldbe archaeologically-correct set-dressing.) The male figure plays the fiddle with the instrument held folk-style against the collar-bone instead of being tucked under the chin as is modern practice.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br /><span style="font-size: medium;">Sources and Further Reading</span><br /><br />Helen Allingham.—The Cottage Homes of England. Drawn by Helen Allingham and described by Stewart Dick.—London : Edward Arnold, 1909.<br /><br />T.F.T. Baker, editor.—A History of the County of Middlesex.—Volume IX: Hampstead and Paddington Parishes.—The Victoria History of the Counties of England.—London: Oxford University Press, 1989.<br /><br />G.E. Bentley, Jr.—Blake Records.—2nd ed.—New Haven & London: Yale University Press, 2004.<br /><br />Blake Society.—The First Meeting of the Blake Society: Papers read before the Blake Society at the first Annual Meeting, 12th August 1912.—Olney: T. Wright, [1913?].<br /><br />Richard Garnett.—“John Linnell and William Blake at Hampstead”.—The Hampstead Annual (1902), 9-21.<br /><br />Alexander Gilchrist.—Life of William Blake: Pictor Ignotus.—2v.—London: Macmillan, 1863.<br /><br />Alfred Herbert Palmer.—The Life and Letters of Samuel Palmer, painter and etcher. Written and edited by A. H. Palmer.—London: Seeley & Co, 1892. <br /><br />A.J. Story.—The Life of John Linnell.—2v.—London: Richard Bentley & Son, 1892.<br /><br />David Sullivan.—“Old Wyldes and Wyldes”.—Camden History Review (2013).<br /><br />Philip Venning.—Wyldes: a New History.—Privately Published, 1977.<br /><br />Charlotte Mary Wilson.—“Wyldes and Its Story. By Mrs. Arthur Wilson”.—The Hampstead Annual (1903), 110-134.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆◆</div></div></div>Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-83115754445559337922020-09-24T04:35:00.594-07:002020-11-09T15:07:40.674-08:00 The Chamber on the Wall<blockquote></blockquote>2 K<span style="font-size: x-small;">INGS</span> 4: 8-11 (<i>King James Version</i>)<blockquote style="text-align: left;"></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">8 And it fell on a day, that Elisha passed to Shunem, where was a great woman; and she constrained him to eat bread. And so it was, that as oft as he passed by, he turned in thither to eat bread.<br />9 And she said unto her husband, Behold now, I perceive that this is an holy man of God, which passeth by us continually.<br />10 Let us make a little chamber, I pray thee, on the wall; and let us set for him there a bed, and a table, and a stool, and a candlestick: and it shall be, when he cometh to us, that he shall turn in thither.<br />11 And it fell on a day, that he came thither, and he turned into the chamber, and lay there.</blockquote><blockquote style="text-align: left;"></blockquote><blockquote style="text-align: left;"></blockquote><p style="text-align: left;">2 K<span style="font-size: x-small;">ÖNIGE</span> 4: 8-11 (<i>Luther Bibel </i>1545)</p><blockquote style="text-align: left;"></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">8 Und es begab sich zu der Zeit, daß Elisa ging gen Sunem. Daselbst war eine reiche Frau; die hielt ihn, daß er bei ihr aß. Und so oft er daselbst durchzog, kehrte er zu ihr ein und aß bei ihr.<br />9 Und sie sprach zu ihrem Mann: Siehe, ich merke, daß dieser Mann Gottes heilig ist, der immerdar hier durchgeht.<br />10 Laß uns ihm eine kleine bretterne Kammer oben machen und ein Bett, Tisch, Stuhl und Leuchter hineinsetzen, auf daß er, wenn er zu uns kommt, dahin sich tue.<br />11 Und es begab sich zu der Zeit, daß er hineinkam und legte sich oben in die Kammer und schlief darin</blockquote><blockquote style="text-align: left;"></blockquote><blockquote style="text-align: left;"></blockquote><div><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><span><a name='more'></a></span><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I quote these Bible verses in both English and German as I shall other German texts in exploring William Blake’s religious inheritance. The Moravian Church at Fetter Lane, which his mother Catherine Wright Armitage Blake (1725–92) attended, included many German-speaking immigrants including the majority of its early ministers. Catherine’s name first appears in Moravian records on 12 March 1750, in a list of married women to be visited, that is, given one-to-one spiritual counselling. In her letter of application, undated but probably of November 1750, to take communion with the Congregation of the Lamb, Catherine wrote</div><blockquote style="text-align: left;"><div><div>I should be glad if I could allways lay at the Cross full as I do know thanks be to him last friday at the love feast Our Savour was pleased to make me Suck his wounds and hug the Cross more then Ever and I trust will more and more till my fraile nature can hould no more</div></div></blockquote>In this letter we find her using language and imagery typical of German Pietism. She was received into the Congregation on 26 November 1750. </div><div><br /></div><div><div>(All I know of Pietism comes from listening to J. S. Bach. Compare the texts of Bach's cantatas permeated by the spirit of Pietism, such BWV 199: <i>Mein Herze schwimmt in Blut </i>[My heart swims in blood], with its recitative “Ich lege mich in diese Wunden” [I lay myself within these wounds]. Consider later their emphasis on “Christ in us”, especially in the frequent use of bride-bridegroom imagery.)</div></div><div><br />Again, Francis Okely, a Moravian minister in Northampton, was a prolific translator of the sixteenth and seventeenth-century German mystics, not out of antiquarian interest, but because he believed it to be useful for the readership of his spiritually-fallen fellow citizens in eighteenth-century England. Moravian spirituality and Behmenist mysticism seem to have been particularly compatible; at least three English Moravian societies were established on existing Behmenist reading groups. Moravianism helped further spread the influences of Continental mysticism in England.</div><div><br />In 1743, a Fetter-Lane conference agreed that “There shd be always somebody among us to learn German. Br Gottshalk will give the Brn every Day an Hour at 7 in ye Morning after ye Bible-Hour” and also noted “In general an Encouragement was giv’n to ye Brn and Srs to learn German”. Certainly during the time of John Gambold at Fetter Lane (preacher from 1744, Bishop from 1754) I should expect the emphasis on learning German to continue.</div><div><br />Is there a link between his mother’s early contacts with the German community in London and Blake’s own later involvement with German-speaking artists and intellectuals such as George Michael Moser, Keeper of the Royal Academy Schools? Even matters as apparently straightforward as Blake’s reading of the seventeenth-century mystic, Jakob Boehme, his life-long friendship with the Swiss painter Henry Fuseli (Johann Heinrich Füssli), and his interest in the work of the physiognomist, J. C. Lavater (born in Zürich, in 1741), will need to be reconsidered now that we know that Blake’s mother (and perhaps James Blake, too) would have been acquainted with German-speaking disciples of the Moravian leader, Count Zinzendorf, during their founding evangelism in Nottingham, Yorkshire, and London.<br /><blockquote style="text-align: left;"><div><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div></div></blockquote><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-KNC9sk2IwNA/X20YfsOUVII/AAAAAAAAA4o/uiz5Gdn7cJ0mN66MBkGAOG3eknB7PJITQCLcBGAsYHQ/s825/Fetter_Lane%2B%25284%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="651" data-original-width="825" height="505" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-KNC9sk2IwNA/X20YfsOUVII/AAAAAAAAA4o/uiz5Gdn7cJ0mN66MBkGAOG3eknB7PJITQCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h505/Fetter_Lane%2B%25284%2529.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div></div><div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Engraving showing the Communion service at the Fetter Lane Chapel</i>.</div><br />This engraving in the Moravian <i>Zeremonienbüchlein</i> (c. 1754) shows the Holy Communion service at the Fetter Lane Chapel in 1754. The Presbyters and Deacon wear albs with red girdles (not, of course, visible here). The Labourers stand on either side of the Liturgist, facing the congregation. Candidates for communicant status, like Catherine, are allowed to look on from the galleries. Note the separation of the sexes, and that there is no altar rail and no shuffling queue. The bread and the wine were distributed to the communicants in their places. This, as so often in the Moravian liturgy, serves to enhance the dignity and stillness, which was much commented on. In early documents, the Moravians are sometimes referred to as “the still brethren”. For them, stillness, as with the Catholic Quietists around Madame Guyon, consisted in waiting quietly for God’s grace. They regarded excessive prayer, bible-reading, and even church attendance, as supererogatory. (Blake himself is recorded as not having entered any place of worship in the last forty years of his life.) Only when you had experienced God’s grace should you put yourself forward for full membership in the Congregation, and partake of Holy Communion. It was in part his quarrel with the idea of stillness that led John Wesley to withdraw from the Fetter Lane community.</div><div><br />Above the communion table we see the closed doors of the pulpit. At Fetter Lane, the pulpit was entered from the adjoining Hall, not from a staircase within the Chapel, and thus formed a little room within the great room of the Chapel. The resemblance to Elisha’s Chamber on the Wall, as in 2 K<span style="font-size: x-small;">INGS</span> 4: 10, is, I think, quite deliberate.</div><div><br /><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br /><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-fkVxcAF1SXw/X20ZgtGPc9I/AAAAAAAAA44/P57fFaH4OV0T3QH6HcUSrADrc3TCJOV4gCLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/Fetter_Lane%2B%25283%2529.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1340" data-original-width="2048" height="418" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-fkVxcAF1SXw/X20ZgtGPc9I/AAAAAAAAA44/P57fFaH4OV0T3QH6HcUSrADrc3TCJOV4gCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h418/Fetter_Lane%2B%25283%2529.jpeg" width="640" /></a><br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Interior of the Moravian Chapel in Fetter Lane, 1897.</i></div><br />The Fetter Lane Chapel was given a more conventional pulpit arrangement in its late nineteenth-century rebuilding.</div><div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-oMWYfRLAFoU/X25ybLU0qqI/AAAAAAAAA5Q/4J_x3JCcwUgHfoqBk-nPUOzPpw5IY_t3wCLcBGAsYHQ/s1536/Elisha%2527s_Chamber.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="1325" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-oMWYfRLAFoU/X25ybLU0qqI/AAAAAAAAA5Q/4J_x3JCcwUgHfoqBk-nPUOzPpw5IY_t3wCLcBGAsYHQ/w552-h640/Elisha%2527s_Chamber.jpg" width="552" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>William Blake 1757–1827.—A Vision: The Inspiration of the Poet (Elisha in the Chamber on the Wall).—c.1819–20?—Graphite and watercolour on paper.—Image: 244 × 211 mm; frame: 525 × 450 × 30 mm.—Tate T05716.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>Tatham’s inscriptions on this drawing read “William Blake. / I suppose it to be a Vision / Frederick Tatham” and “Indeed I remember a / conversation with Mrs. Blake / about it”. The note about the conversation with Mrs. Blake was obviously written as an afterthought, being placed under and to the side of the original inscription, which records simply the vaguest of guesses at the subject. C<span style="font-size: x-small;">HRISTOPHER</span> H<span style="font-size: x-small;">EPPNER</span>, associating the scene with 2 <span>K</span><span style="font-size: x-small;">INGS</span> and the story of Elisha and the woman of Shunem, argues that the image represents the “chamber on the wall” in which Elisha prophesies that the woman will bear a son; this son will die, and Elisha will resurrect him from the dead. H<span style="font-size: x-small;">EPPNER</span>’s identification of the image is now widely accepted.<br /><br />This drawing, with its reminiscence of the Fetter Lane interior, was created around 1820 at the time of Blake’s renewed friendship with the Moravian preachers Jonathan Spilsbury and James Montgomery.<br /><blockquote style="text-align: left;"><div><p></p><p></p></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div></div></blockquote><blockquote style="text-align: left;"></blockquote>2 K<span style="font-size: x-small;">INGS</span> 4: 32-34 (<i>King James Version</i>)<br /><blockquote style="text-align: left;"></blockquote></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">32 And when Elisha was come into the house, behold, the child was dead, and laid upon his bed.<br /> 33 He went in therefore, and shut the door upon them twain, and prayed unto the Lord.<br /> 34 And he went up, and lay upon the child, and put his mouth upon his mouth, and his eyes upon his eyes, and his hands upon his hands: and stretched himself upon the child; and the flesh of the child waxed warm.</blockquote><div><blockquote style="text-align: left;"></blockquote><blockquote style="text-align: left;"></blockquote><blockquote style="text-align: left;"></blockquote><blockquote style="text-align: left;"></blockquote>2 K<span style="font-size: x-small;">ÖNIGE</span> 4: 32-34 (<i>Luther Bibel 1545</i>)<br /><blockquote style="text-align: left;"><blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>32 Und da Elisa ins Haus kam, siehe, da lag der Knabe tot auf seinem Bett.</div><div>33 Und er ging hinein und schloß die Tür zu für sie beide und betete zu dem H<span style="font-size: x-small;">ERRN</span> </div><div>34 und stieg hinauf und legte sich auf das Kind und legte seinen Mund auf des Kindes Mund und seine Augen auf seine Augen und seine Hände auf seine Hände und breitete sich also über ihn, daß des Kindes Leib warm ward.</div></blockquote><div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">◆</div><br />S<span style="font-size: x-small;">IBYLLE</span> E<span style="font-size: x-small;">RLE</span> points out that a Blakean juxtaposition of life and death is captured in the drawing—the chamber could also be interpreted as a tabernacle, holding the Communion host, the flesh of Christ. The fact that the tabernacle contains the consecrated element would then be indicated by the candle burning above. And Elisha’s story, bringing a dead boy back to life by stretching himself on top of the boy, placing his mouth on the child’s mouth, his eyes on the child’s eyes and his hands on the boy’s hands so that the child’s flesh became warm, becomes an image of the Communion as mystical marriage.</div><div><br />Hymn 2306 from the German Moravian hymnbook of 1748 provides a striking illustration:</div><div><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Mann! Eh-Mann deiner Blut-Gemein, erkenn dein Volk, jeds Seelgen, so menschlich, speciel, allein, o Mann mit einem Höhlgen! O welch incomparabler Strahl! Küß uns, du kaltes Mündgen! O Leichnam! breit dich aus im Saal, wir liegen da, wies Kindgen.</div><div>[Man, Husband of your church of blood, have knowledge of your people and of every soul in such a human way, so specially, alone, O Husband with a hole! O what an incomparable ray! Kiss us, you cold little mouth! O corpse! Spread further in this church hall. We are lying here like the child. .... Kiss us, you cold little mouth!—<i>P<span style="font-size: x-small;">AUL</span> P<span style="font-size: x-small;">EUCKER</span>’s translation</i>]</div></blockquote><div><br /></div><div>The child is the dead boy that Elisha brought to life by lying on top of him. <p style="text-align: left;">(Towards the end of the 1740s and in the early 1750s Moravian spirituality became increasingly focused on the Communion, and their songs and liturgy eroticized with the language of bridal mysticism. The more explicit German hymns were not translated in the Moravian English hymnals which culminated in John Gambold’s hymnal of 1754, though translations may have circulated in manuscript form. Some of the hymns that were included still managed to shock John Sparrow when he wrote about the 1754 hymnal in <i>Hymns Unbidden</i> (1966). The Moravian hymns also managed to upset E. P. Thompson who refers in <i>Making of the English Working Class</i> (1963) to their “perverted eroticism”. The author of this particular hymn was Count Zinzendorf’s son, Christian Renatus (1727-52), idolized by most members of the church. An androgynous and charismatic young man, he was the object of affection of both Sisters and Brethren, and his premature death in 1752 caused near hysterical grief throughout the Moravian Unity.)</p><p style="text-align: left;">In a homily (sermon) in 1747 Zinzendorf spoke thus of the Communion: </p></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Es ist also ein Actus, wenn sich der Heiland über eine Seele breitet, wie Elisa über den Knaben, damit den zweyen, dem Bräutigam und der Braut, dem Lamm und der Seele geschicht, was der Heiland Matth. 19 sagt προσκολληθησεται, sie werden zusammen geleime, sie werden an einander beseftigt, … es wird was neues, es kommt das heraus.</div><div><div style="text-align: left;">[It is therefore an act when the Saviour spreads over a soul, like Elisha over the boy, so that what happens to these two, to the Bridegroom and the Bride, to the Lamb and the Soul, what the Saviour says in M<span style="font-size: x-small;">ATTHEW</span> 19[:5]: προσκολληθησεται, they are glued together, they are attached to each other, ... so that something new comes out.—<i>P<span style="font-size: x-small;">EUCKER</span>’s translation</i>].</div></div></blockquote><div><p style="text-align: left;">Christ and the Christian become one, as was believed to happen in Communion: “the two will become one flesh”. C<span style="font-size: x-small;">OLIN</span> P<span style="font-size: x-small;">ODMORE</span>, essential reading on Moravianism in England, quotes contemporary sources that in the Moravian sacrament “both Corpses died in one another”. Death was the “last Kiss” of the “eternal Bridegroom”.</p><p style="text-align: center;">◆</p><p style="text-align: left;">My friend Bill Goldman, who died earlier this year, once wrote that for Robert Browning, “the poet makes history come alive, resuscitates it as Elisha did the widow’s son”. Here are two other poets following Blake to the story of Elisha:</p><blockquote style="text-align: left;"></blockquote></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Each thought of good, the proverb saith,</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Putteth an evil thought to death.</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Elisha with his shafts of mind</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>Slew the fantasies of the blind. </div></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">R<span style="font-size: x-small;">ALPH</span> N<span style="font-size: x-small;">ICHOLAS</span> C<span style="font-size: x-small;">HUBB</span></div></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">I see Blake sitting in this same room reading</blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">at Elisha’s table a second before he lifts his eyes</blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>toward a friend who has no need to be winged angel.</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>There is no bed. An oil lamp radiates light above</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>somewhat like a dove. No prints hang on the walls.</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>No poison-penned copies of Bacon & Locke & Newton</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>clutter the table. The room is free of ideas</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>of good and evil, man as sane or insane, angel</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>or devil. What’s glimpsed through this peephole</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>is insight greater than any vision: two human</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>beings awakened to each other in “Friendship</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>& Brotherhood”, each enlivened by the other</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>through kindness that in intimate silence</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>and calm opens mouths to taste, eyes to see,</div></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div>hands to feel bodies warm with love.</div></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div><div style="text-align: left;">J<span style="font-size: x-small;">IM</span> M<span style="font-size: x-small;">C</span>C<span style="font-size: x-small;">ORD</span></div></div></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><p style="text-align: center;"> ◆</p><div><b>Sources and further reading</b><p style="text-align: left;">Martin Butlin.—The Paintings and Drawings of William Blake. 2 vols.—New Haven: Yale University Press 1988.</p><p style="text-align: left;">Ralph Nicholas Chubb.—Flames of Sunrise: A Book of the Manchild Concerning the Redemption of Albion.—Fair Oak, Ashford Hill, Newbury, Berks: design’d; illustrated; letter’d; handprinted; & published by the author 1949-53 [1954].</p>Sibylle Erle.—On This Day in 1820 [18 September 2020]. <br />(Part I) William Blake draws Pindar the Greek Poet and Lais the Courtesan (Visionary Heads) for John Varley.</div><div>http://www.bars.ac.uk/blog/?p=3258</div><div>(Part II) The Visionary Heads and William Blake’s attitude towards Death.</div><div><a href="https://www.blogger.com/#" target="_blank">http://www.bars.ac.uk/blog/?p=3260</a></div><div><p style="text-align: left;">Christopher Heppner.—“The Chamber of Prophecy: Blake’s ‘A Vision’ (B<span style="font-size: x-small;">UTLIN</span> #756) Interpreted”.—Blake/An Illustrated Quarterly, Volume 25 Issue 3 (Winter 1991-92), pp. 127-31.</p><p style="text-align: left;">Jim McCord.—“Elisha in the Chamber on the Wall.” (A poem).—Blake Journal: The Journal of the Blake Society at St. James’s, Number 10 (London: Blake Society 2006) pp. 96-7.</p>Moravian Church.—Das Gesang-Buch der Gemeine in Herrn-Huth.—[Halle]: Waysen-Haus [1742- ].<br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">Hymn 2306 is printed in the 4th addition to the 12th appendix, 1748.</div></blockquote><div><p style="text-align: left;">Paul Peucker.—“‘Inspired by Flames of Love’: Homosexuality, Mysticism, and Moravian Brothers around 1750”.—Journal of the History of Sexuality, Vol. 15, No. 1 (January 2006), pp. 30-64.</p><p style="text-align: left;">Paul Peucker.—“In the Blue Cabinet: Moravians, Marriage, and Sex”.—Journal of Moravian History, No. 10, Special Issue: Moravians and Sexuality (Spring 2011), pp. 6-37.</p><p style="text-align: left;">Colin J. Podmore.—The Moravian Church in England, 1728-1760.—Oxford historical monographs.--Oxford: Clarendon Press 1998.</p>Nicolaus Ludwig Graf von Zinzendorf.—Vier-und-dreyßig Homiliae über die Wunden-Litaney der Brüder: gehalten auf dem Herrnhaag in den sommer monathen 1747 von dem Ordinario Fratrum.—Herrnhaag: Brüder-Gemeinen 1747. <br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">I quote from “Die sieben und zwanzigste Homilie.”</div></blockquote><p style="text-align: center;">◆</p>Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-60196550063432086562020-09-14T14:22:00.018-07:002021-11-27T08:24:54.437-08:00Bill Goldman, 1950—2020My friend Bill Goldman died aged 70 in May this year. I have taken far longer to write these notes than I intended thanks to my continuing post-Covid 19 fatigue. I apologise now for any errors, omissions, infelicitous expressions or, indeed, lapses of tone in what follows.<br /><br />William David “Bill” Goldman, Blake scholar, was born in 1950 in St Pancras, London, the first child and only son (there are two younger sisters) of Joan and William Goldman. Bill’s father, Willy, born 1910 in Mile End Old Town, was a significant memorialist of the Jewish East End. Willy Goldman married as his third wife, Mavis Joan Allsop, in St Pancras, London, in 1950. <br /><br />Bill entered Sir William Borlase Grammar School in 1960, a good grammar school in Marlow, Buckinghamshire. He left aged 16 with 7 GCEs and one O/A level (Use of English, A-grade) to work for BBC Publications, sorting and delivering office mail. By 1970 he had acquired the qualifications for university entrance and went to the University of Essex to study English Literature. Bill dropped out after two years. I don’t recall him ever speaking about the period following except that it led to his religious conversion around about 1977, of which he wrote “I met Jesus my Saviour and acknowledged Him as such … I love the Bible and regard it as God’s Word as it claims to be”. (To me, this kind of talk is close to meaningless. If the Bible is God’s word, then God is a really crap mathematician. See 1 K<span style="font-size: x-small;">INGS</span> 7:23.) I can see that conversion gave Bill’s life a stability it might otherwise have lacked but I think it also made him vulnerable to the Christian flat-earthists, worshippers of Blake’s “old Nobodaddy aloft”, who were/are a feature of the Richmond church he joined.<div><br /><a name='more'></a><div>He needed now to gain enough credits to complete his degree. By 1991 Bill had completed 2 credits with the Open University and the final year of a full-time English degree at the University of Roehampton, and both institutions independently awarded him upper second-class Honours. This enabled Bill to study for an MA in Literature & Politics, 1776-1832, at Roehampton (1993-1996). Bill himself would have paid tribute to the encouragement he got from Dr Susan Matthews to keep studying and complete his MA. </div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-NqnqKDdCWXw/X1_n_AHoUzI/AAAAAAAAA4Q/JB6whAwU5A84YpeBYGAtquRYL3BsVlgoACLcBGAsYHQ/s1242/Scan0001.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="908" data-original-width="1242" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-NqnqKDdCWXw/X1_n_AHoUzI/AAAAAAAAA4Q/JB6whAwU5A84YpeBYGAtquRYL3BsVlgoACLcBGAsYHQ/s320/Scan0001.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>I must have met Bill for the first time in 1995. We both started our PhD research around then; and both of us were part-time students. I continued to work as a librarian while Bill earned some income as a private tutor in Richmond. (Richmond being the kind of place it is, Bill taught quite a few children of pop-stars and the like, tutoring for 11-plus, Common Entrance, GCSE, A-level, & beyond.) He continued tutoring privately after his return from China in 2008. <br /><br />In 1996 Bill began work for his PhD at King’s College, London. His research focused on the influence of William Blake on Robert Browning, and on their affinities as poets and their joint legacy to modernism. He wrote<div style="text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div><br /></div><div>These two poets, I argue, profoundly influenced and continue to influence modernist/modern poetry. Moreover, I have established that Browning was influenced by Blake: not least in the sense that Blake provided him with an example of a Romantic poet who was a genuine visionary, and one whose personal and poetic life continued to inspire and with whom Browning never became disillusioned (as he did with Shelley). Blake’s example, his living “in the power and glory” as Browning put it in a letter to Elizabeth Barrett in 1848, encouraged Browning profoundly in persevering with his own essentially visionary poetry, and his own reading of history (given in all its “poetical vigour” to use Blake’s phrase re true history). This visionary quality, and a poetic way of reading history which is ultimately Biblical in its inspiration, is what these two poets passed on to Modernism, which without their influence would arguably have been but a bleak thing. </div></blockquote></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />Bill’s involvement with the Blake Society began in 1997 and lasted until completion of his PhD in 2005 and subsequent move to China. For many of those years Bill was Programme Secretary of the Society, contacting Blake scholars, curators, restorers, and creative artists & writers responding to Blake’s works and inviting them to speak to the Blake Society (mostly at the City of Westminster Archives Centre) in London. I got into the habit of phoning him (often about Blake Society matters) at 11pm or later. Bill loved to talk. After an hour’s conversation, I could politely break off the conversation once “the iron tongue of midnight hath told twelve”. He himself gave a talk to the Society in 2003: “‘Oh Mercy’: William Blake & Bob Dylan”. It made a bit of a change from Robert Browning. Bill’s last involvement with the Society was in 2005, when he was joint-editor of <i>Blake Journal</i>, 9. <br /><br />In 2003, his PhD approaching completion, Bill was found a post as <i>lecteur</i> at Paris X Nanterre (now Université Paris Nanterre), for one year. As might be expected, his French improved quite dramatically but more importantly he gained the experience as a teacher of English to undergraduates that stood him in good stead for later posts as Foreign Expert at Chinese universities. <br /><br />Bill’s thesis: “‘Prophetic History’: Blake, Browning and the Visionary Tradition”, was accepted for a University of London PhD in 2005. I think Professor Leonée Ormond, his eventual research supervisor (an earlier supervisor left for another university and Bill declined to follow), played an important supportive role in encouraging Bill to complete his PhD. <br /><br />He then took up an offer to teach in universities in China, staying for three years. In September 2005, he started work at the University of Science and Technology (Hefei, Anhui Province) as a “foreign expert”, teaching English & American literature, with English conversation, etc. Bill then moved to Tsinghua University (a major research university in Beijing), in 2006, playing a similar role, and to Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, in 2007. Founded in 1897, Zhejiang University is one of China’s oldest institutions of higher education. Late in 2007, Bill was found collapsed in the street in Hangzhou. Rather than submit to treatment in a Chinese hospital, with all the communication difficulties that might pose (he spoke a little but very limited Chinese), Bill opted to return to London where he was diagnosed with a brain tumour (and also prostate cancer). The operation to remove the tumour was successful, and Bill resumed tutoring privately in Richmond, while working on the book of his doctoral thesis. <br /><br />I remember attending several academic conferences with Bill. There was the <i>Millennium Conference </i>on Blake at Essex where his planned paper (on Blake and Browning, of course) was at least twice as long as specified. I helped him cut it down to a twenty-minute paper and it went over really well. Bill and I were also at the <i>BARS Conference </i>at Keele, in 2003, where all the Blake papers were delivered in an obscure room in the old building up three flights of stairs. “Mrs Rochester’s room” I called it. <br /><br />Other conferences followed. In 2007, <i>Blake at 250: Celebrating the 250th Anniversary of the Birth of William Blake</i>, at the King’s Manor, University of York. Bill’s paper was “Blake, Browning and Modernism”. And at <i>Literary London 2009: Representations of London in Literature </i>(an annual conference at Queen Mary, University of London), a paper about the creative work of his late father with the evocative title: “‘... a sort of Proust of the Whitechapel Road’: Willy Goldman and the new writing of the ’30s and ’40s”. (I wish I knew where that quotation came from.) Then in 2010, <i>Blake, Gender and Sexuality in the Twenty-First Century</i>, St Aldate’s Church, Oxford, where Bill’s paper, “Jerusalem the Lilly” went disastrously wrong. With hindsight, I now think that this is when we should have realised the brain tumour was returning. <br /><br />We met up a few times after that. It was clear his condition was deteriorating but Bill seemed unwilling to admit there were any problems and we continued to email each other. Then in May 2016, I went with Valerie Doulton (an old friend of Bill’s and mine) to see Bill at his sheltered accommodation in Twickenham. It was not the easiest of experiences. Apparently he had started having epileptic fits the previous week. Admitted to hospital, he was released with a new series of prescription drugs. He took the drugs for a day or two and then began refusing his medication. Tess, his carer, tried and tried to get him to take his medicine and Bill got angrier and angrier and more and more unpleasant; there was no rationality to what he was saying. Were the personality changes, which we’d not properly understood on previous occasions, caused by the tumour? Or were perhaps a side effect of his drugs? Tess, his carer, was worried that Bill refusing his medication would result in a return of the fits and put him back in hospital. He was very lucky to have Tess looking after him. I couldn’t have coped like she did. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-GxUhKTX3JG0/X1_oOqyvKzI/AAAAAAAAA4Y/Zs0RhTOCg-4h2ZdIEJQpt2ExpLqBvBn6wCLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/IMG_20170201_122551.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="2048" height="625" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-GxUhKTX3JG0/X1_oOqyvKzI/AAAAAAAAA4Y/Zs0RhTOCg-4h2ZdIEJQpt2ExpLqBvBn6wCLcBGAsYHQ/w625-h625/IMG_20170201_122551.jpg" width="625" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>With Leonée Ormond. (Photo by Val Doulton.)</i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />Val and I continued to see Bill, ever more frail, a few times after that until my Christmas card was returned “not known at this address”. Then, in May this year, I got an email from Magnus Ankarsjö in Sweden telling me that Bill had died the previous week. (Magnus has occasional contact with Bill’s sister Emma.) Magnus wrote that Bill “died very peacefully, with Emma by his side holding his hand and speaking consoling words to him. And sad that this is, it was what we have been expecting for quite some time. I’m surprised that he stayed alive for so long, considering his serious condition.” <br /><br />That Emma was with him is some comfort; many people in our current terrible circumstances have had to die alone. <br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;">★</span></div></div><br />B<span style="font-size: x-small;">ILL </span>G<span style="font-size: x-small;">OLDMAN’S PUBLICATIONS</span><br /><br />William David Goldman.—Ladies of my Dreams.—[Hampton]: The author, 1994. [25] p.<br /><span> <span> </span></span>There are probably other poems and short stories that remain untraced. <br /><br />Bill Goldman.—“A Guide to the Books of William Blake for Innocent and Experienced Readers, by Henry Summerfield: [review]”, <i>Blake Journal</i>, 4 (London: Blake Society, 2000), pp. 78-82. <br /><br />Bill Goldman.—“The Archaeology of a Letter: Robert Browning to Elizabeth Barrett Browning, 9 July 1846”, <i>Browning Society Notes</i>, 28 (Nottingham: University of Nottingham, 2003), pp. 18-35. <br /><span> <span> </span></span>An essay on the previously-unknown influence of William Blake on the younger poet, and how the latter mediated Blake’s work to a later generation of modernists. Although he is primarily interested in analysing a letter written by Robert Browning that reveals his response to William Blake, Bill also addresses to some degree Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s view of Blake. In addition, he includes an interesting analysis of the contexts for Barrett Browning’s “Catarina to Camoens” (pp. 29-32), in which some errors in earlier scholarship are corrected. <br /><br />William David Goldman.—“Prophetic History”: Blake, Browning & the Visionary Tradition.—London: University of London, 2005. <br /><span> </span><span> </span>Thesis (Ph. D.)—University of London.—1v. ; 31 cm. <br /><span> </span><span> </span>On his return from China and initial recovery from the brain tumour, Bill began rewriting his thesis for academic publication. I have a copy of his first revision. Unfortunately the recurrence of his illness put a stop to any further work. <br /><br />Bill Goldman.—“The Other Side (one word more for Robert Browning) [a poem]”, <i>Blake Journal</i>, 9 (London: Blake Society, June 2005), pp. 61-62. <br /><br />Bill Goldman.—“Christopher Bush, Ideographic Modernism: China, Writing, Media [review]”, <i>The Glass</i>, number 23 (Oxford: Christian Literary Studies Group, 2011), pp. 57-60. <br /><span> </span><span> </span>How modernist poets invented “China” for their own purposes, and the relation between their concept of Chinese “pictograms” and the reality. <br /><span> </span><span> </span>I believe there was an earlier review in <i>The Glass</i>, on Ruskin and his "baby tawk" letters to Joan Severn, but I have been unable to trace any fuller detail. <br /><br />William Goldman.—“Zoe Bennett & David B. Gowler, editors, Radical Christian Voices and Practice: Essays in honour of Christopher Rowland [review]”, <i>The Glass</i>, number 25 (Oxford: Christian Literary Studies Group, Spring 2013), pp. 65-67. <br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;">★</span></div><br />I give the last word to Magnus Ankarsjö, speaking for all Bill’s friends: <br /><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">Thank you for all the good moments and experiences we shared. It was an honour and a great pleasure to know you. I am glad that you are now at peace. </blockquote><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;">★</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"></div></div>Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-16737657576348870162020-03-04T03:07:00.000-08:002020-03-04T07:19:36.160-08:00The bourgeois BlakeOn 29 November 2019, and coinciding with the <i>Blake</i> exhibition at Tate Britain, I attended “William Blake and the Idea of the Artist”, a conference at the Paul Mellon Centre in Bedford Square. The conference sought to “consider the work of William Blake with the context of Romanticism and the artistic currents of his times, the creative legacies of his work and the contemporary resonances of Blake’s vision”.<br />
<br />
The first speaker, Silvia Riccardi (University of Freiburg), drawing attention to the interlinear squiggles and elaborations of the lettering in, for example, <i>America</i>, made one want to go back to the works in illuminated printing again, and this time take a magnifying glass. The speakers that followed all made similarly thoughtful contributions. But the final speaker, Dave Beech (University of the Arts, London) left me puzzled.<br />
<br />
If I understood his argument, Beech claimed there was an eighteenth-century class distinction between “artisans”, like Blake, who had undergone an apprenticeship, and “artists”, who attended academies. Perhaps it would be anachronistic to point out that Raphael, for example, was apprenticed to Perugino; but surely not anachronistic to note that Sir Joshua Reynolds served an apprenticeship with the fashionable London portrait painter Thomas Hudson. At the age of 10 Blake was drawing from casts of antiquities in the school of Henry Pars, before his apprenticeship to James Basire in 1772. After 1779 Blake was a student at the Royal Academy, where he diligently drew from classical sculpture under the instruction of George Moser.<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>Beech’s assertion reminded me of A.L. Morton who, in his <i>Everlasting Gospel</i>, claimed that William Blake “alone of all the great English poets, was, and remained all his life, a manual worker”. Presumably Blake was a “manual worker” since he pushed a burin through copper. This is a bit like claiming Michelangelo a manual worker since he carved marble with a hammer and chisel. I’m sure some writers have done precisely that but it doesn’t add much to one’s understanding of either Blake or Michelangelo. The imagined proletarian Blake is someone public-school Marxists like Morton can patronise while pretending to admire. Blake, of course, explicitly claimed that engraving was just “drawing on copper”.<br />
<br />
(I was long puzzled that Leslie Morton and Palmer Thompson chose to write as A.L. Morton and E.P. Thompson respectively. Thompson was always called “Palmer” by his parents; he became “Edward” at school lest nasty boys called him “Violet”—after “Parma Violets”, old-fashioned sweets. This is not the same as the use of initials by women authors, notably J. K. Rowling, who worried that boys would not read an obviously female author of adventure stories. I don’t think Enid Blyton suffered from a lack of boyish readership, but that’s apparently what Joanne Rowling thought. One might also note the practice of nineteenth-century women signing business letters with initials. This, I think, is to avoid their concerns being dismissed as those of a mere woman. Thus the letter from H. Boddington cited in <i>Blake Records</i>, is definitely from Hannah and not from Henry James Boddington as Bentley assumes. Morton and Thompson, I suspected, were modelling their <i>noms de plume</i> on V.I. Lenin and J.V. Stalin, and I still think there’s an element of that in it. But replacing given names by initials is an affectation shared by so many English historians: A.J.P. Taylor, G.R. Elton, H.R. Trevor-Roper, J.H. Plumb, J.C.D. Clark, the list goes on. The model is clearly the school or college sporting team. They’re all claiming to be part of the First Eleven of English historians—alongside A.N. Other.)<br />
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What Beech ignored was evidence presented by the Tate exhibition itself. The estimates of how much Blake would have earned from his commercial work show that engraving was well paid. If Blake had stuck to commercial work like his one-time business partner James Parker he might have become quite comfortably off. Parker not only owned his own house in Kentish Town which he shared with his sister, but also a cottage in Highgate, rented out, and a couple of houses in the City, let as offices. Parker had the career Blake’s parents would have wished for their son. There is plentiful evidence that the reproductive work of the engraver could be much better paid than the creative work of the artist. Blake was paid one guinea per drawing for Blair’s Grave while the payment to Schiavonetti for the engravings is likely to have been over £500. When Robert Thornton commissioned the <i>Virgil</i> illustrations, Blake was paid five guineas for the drawings and some one hundred and fifteen guineas for the copper and wood engravings. William and Catherine could live respectably on that income for a year or maybe two.<br />
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<i>Engraving after Phillips's portrait of Blake, 1807.</i></div>
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The other important evidence from the Tate show was Thomas Phillips’s portrait. Blake is clearly dressed as a gentleman, with a black coat, a white waistcoat, white shirt and neckerchief, clutching a <i>porte-crayon</i>, or pencil (not a burin), and with a gold fob seal attached to his waistcoat.<br />
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(I understand that one of the “Druid” orders claims to own Blake’s signet ring engraved with his seal. Of course a working engraver could not possibly wear a ring. Jewellery could catch on the plate when wiping off surplus ink, or acid could get trapped under it. The signet ring first appears in the possession of Richard C. Jackson, the “mendacious Richard C. Jackson” as Bentley calls him, along with other supposed Blake possessions of dubious provenance.)<br />
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There may, of course, be an element of dressing-up in creating this portrait of Blake the visionary artist (and not Blake the working engraver). Was William Blake ever this elegantly attired?<br />
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(It is interesting to compare Blake’s portrait with those of his contemporaries in the National Portrait Gallery. Byron, an aristocrat, wears fancy dress. <a href="https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw01307">John Clare</a>, peasant, is smartly dressed but in a brown coat, with beige waistcoat, and a bright yellow silk neckerchief. He’s clearly not a gentleman. Clare is dressed in what I would term farm-labourer <i>chic</i>, a way of dressing that survived well into the twentieth century. I remember country towns on market day and middle-aged men in teddy-boy jackets, maybe with leopard-skin lapels, all very well turned-out.)<br />
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The <i>bourgeois</i> Blake makes another appearance in the story of Thomas Butts finding William and Catherine naked in their Lambeth garden, reading <i>Paradise Lost</i>. Gilchrist writes<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
At the end of the little garden in Hercules Buildings there was a summer-house. Mr. Butts calling one day found Mr. and Mrs. Blake sitting in this summer-house, freed from “those troublesome disguises” which have prevailed since the Fall. “Come in!” cried Blake; “it’s only Adam and Eve, you know!”</blockquote>
The story is sometimes dismissed as apocryphal or else as a personal idiosyncrasy of the mad poet. But domestic nudism was an enthusiasm of others in the late eighteenth century. Benjamin Franklin took regular “air baths” for his health, believing that nudity was good for you. Domestic nudism was also practised in the Shelley circle. Jeaffreson’s controversial Victorian biography notes<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Another gentlewoman of the circle was chiefly remarkable for holding that, to enjoy perfect health of mind and body, it was necessary for the British matron to begin every day by sitting for three or four hours in unqualified nudity … In society, after telling how she had passed the first three hours of the well-spent morning, she sometimes added, for the edification of listeners, “I feel so innocent during the rest of the day”.</blockquote>
And the practice survives even today. I remember a university friend explaining that his father cooked breakfast in the nude every morning; the rest of the family remaining clothed. And in the 1970s, visiting a friend in Hove, I discovered, with some embarrassment, that his next-door neighbour, a lecturer at Brighton Polytechnic, was a domestic nudist, as was his wife. The two houses were separated only by a narrow drive and their kitchens overlooked. Writing these notes reminded me too that a couple of former work colleagues were themselves occasional practitioners of domestic nudism. Even Stephen Keynes, Sir Geoffrey’s youngest son, was known to his neighbours as “the naked gardener”. Domestic nudity, I would say, is very much an English middle-class thing. <br />
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<br />
<b>Sources and Further Reading</b><br />
<b></b><br />
Adam Eden.—A Vindication of the Reformation among the Ladies, to Abolish Modesty and Chastity, and Restore the Natural Simplicity of Going Naked.—London : Griffiths, 1755.<br />
Apparently it’s all Milton’s fault.<br />
<br />
G.E. Bentley, Jr.—”The Death of Blake’s Partner James Parker”.—Blake/An Illustrated Quarterly, volume 30, issue 2 (Fall 1996), 49-51.<br />
With some errors, including the claim that the bachelor Parker was previously married.<br />
<br />
G.E. Bentley, Jr.—Blake Records. 2nd ed.—New Haven CT : Yale University Press, 2004).<br />
<br />
G.E. Bentley, Jr.—William Blake in the Desolate Market.—Montreal : McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2014. <br />
<br />
Alexander Gilchrist.—Life of William Blake, “Pictor Ignotus”, with Selections From His Poems and Other Writings; Illustrated From Blake’s Own Works, in Facsimile by W. J. Linton, and in Photolithography; with A Few of Blake’s Original Plates.—2 vols.—London & Cambridge : Macmillan, 1863.<br />
<br />
John Cordy Jeaffreson.—The Real Shelley : New Views of the Poet’s Life.—2 vols.—London : Hurst & Blackett, 1885.<br />
<br />
A.L. Morton.—The Everlasting Gospel : a Study in the Sources of William Blake.—London : Lawrence & Wishart, 1958.<br />
<br />
Martin Myrone & Amy Concannon.—William Blake; with an afterword by Alan Moore.—London: Tate, 2019.<br />
Published on the occasion of the exhibition <i>William Blake</i>, Tate Britain, London, 11 September 2019—2 February 2020.<br />
<br />
National Archives.—PROB 11/1433, fols. 342r-43v (Will of James Parker).<br />
<br />
“Obituary : Stephen Keynes”.—The Times (Thursday, 16 November 2017).<br />
<br />Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-68539231706590362882019-11-27T02:52:00.001-08:002019-12-14T15:46:28.615-08:00Bunhill Fields—25 May 1708<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<i>Post Boy, January 10, 1708 - January 13, 1708; Issue 1975.</i></div>
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In early 1708, the religious group known as the French Prophets (a millenarian movement active in London from 1706), sensationally announced in the London newspapers that Thomas Emes, one of their number, who had died at the end of December 1707, would rise from his grave at Bunhill Fields on 25 May.<br />
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The origins of the French Prophets can be traced back to the Camisard uprising in 1702, in the Cévennes mountains in southern France. The Camisards were a radical minority within the wider Huguenot congregation. They were distinctively poorer than their co-religionists and consisted for the most part of illiterate peasants and shepherds. Unlike mainstream Huguenots, they believed in prophecy and miracles, and claimed to be inhabited by the Holy Spirit. Refusing to abjure, they took up arms in 1702 against the religious persecution instigated by Louis XIV following the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. Within two years, hundreds had been imprisoned or killed, including most of their leaders, though sporadic fighting continued until 1710.<br />
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A small number of Camisards found refuge in London late in 1706. They received support from three prominent Huguenots: the lawyer Jean Daudé, the mathematician and natural philosopher Nicolas Fatio de Duillier, and from Charles de Portalès, secretary to Armand de Bourbon, marquis de Miremont—then in charge of Anglo-Dutch military support to the Camisards.<br />
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These Cévenole refugees formed links with members of the Philadelphian Society, who were inspired by a prophecy of their leader Jane Lead to celebrate the Act of Union between England and Scotland as a providential sign of reconciliation. (The Act came into effect on 1 May 1707. Jane Lead had died on 19th August 1704, “in the 81st year of her age and the 65th of her vocation to the inward life” and was buried on the 22nd at Bunhill Fields.) About the same time, Philadelphians and Camisards merged into the French Prophets, an ecumenical attempt to reconcile Judaeo-Christian denominations before the millennium. British millenarians believed Christ’s second coming was imminent, while Camisards anticipated the fall of the Roman Catholic Church. The rise of the French Prophets responded to a sense of urgency in both traditions. Millenarianism and prophetic religion had been culturally prominent in the final quarter of the seventeenth-century and the Camisards found London fertile soil. <br />
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The French Prophets always presented themselves as a non-sectarian religious movement. They did not introduce any doctrine, but emphasized instead religious experience—prophecy, glossolalia, thaumaturgy—singing, and dancing, over liturgy and rituals. This allowed them to reach out to a very diverse audience, whether theologically, socially, demographically, or politically. Thus their followers included such men as Nicolas Fatio who had been admitted as a fellow of the Royal Society on 2 May 1688 and was a close associate of Isaac Newton. It is indeed possible that Sir Isaac Newton himself may have attended a French Prophets’ assembly, given his friendship with Fatio and his own strong millenarian interests, although hard evidence is lacking.<br />
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Although they were referred to as the French Prophets, beside the Philadelphians a number of Anglicans, Quakers, Baptists, Presbyterians, all manner of dissenters, and even Catholics and Jews, joined the group from summer 1707. It may be appropriate to draw attention here to George Hermitage, whose inclusion in <i>Divine Songs of the Muggletonians</i> (1829) led E.P. Thompson into the realms of biographical fantasy. Hermitage was christened in London, on 21 January 1693, at the church of Saint Peter-Le-Poer, the son of Clement and Dorothy. The names very much suggest a Huguenot origin for the family; the surname perhaps originally L’Hermitage or De l’Hermitage. What links there may have been between the French Prophets and the Muggletonians remain to be investigated.<br />
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John Lacy, a London merchant and justice of the peace, was one of several English enthusiasts prominent in the movement. In December 1707, another English member of the sect, Thomas Emes, a medical practitioner, fell sick. He had joined the Prophets earlier in the summer and was playing an increasingly important role among the group. Lacy announced that if Emes died, God would raise him. Emes subsequently died on 22 December 1707 and was buried at six o’clock in the evening on Christmas Day. His death challenged the French Prophets’ confidence in the imminent Second Coming. However, on 23 December, twelve-year-old Anna Maria King prophesied that Emes’s body would be raised from the dead and “that more marvellous Things” should “come to pass in a little Time”. And a few days later the meat-packer John Potter announced that Emes would be raised from the dead by John Lacy between noon and 6 p.m. on 25 May 1708, exactly five months after his burial in Bunhill Fields: “Know ye the Day, the Twenty Fifth Day of May, you shall behold him rise again. One Month above the Number of Days that Lazarus was in his Grave”. (Lazarus was raised from the dead after four days; Lacy said that as unbelievers objected that the time of Lazarus lying in the grave was too short, Dr. Emes would remain five months, at the expiration of which time he, Lacy, would proceed to the grave, and standing thereby, he would then be joined by a great host of angels, who would defend him and his companions, and Emes should be brought again to life.)<br />
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<i>Observator, July 31, 1708 - August 4, 1708; Issue 49.</i></div>
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The prophecy was widely publicized and debated over the following months, sparking a virulent battle of pamphlets on religious enthusiasm. At least 150 titles and dozens of newspaper articles were published by or against the Prophets in England between 1707 and 1710. The Prophets advertised the forthcoming miracle both in print and on the streets, and fasted repeatedly for collective purification, whilst Lacy was healing the blind and sick as evidence of the Spirit’s presence. Yet, as the date of the miracle approached, the Prophets became increasingly divided over the prospect of its accomplishment. By 29 April Lacy was acknowledging that several of his earlier predictions had been mistaken and he indicated that he would not be at the graveside on 25 May. </div>
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Three days before Thomas Emes’s announced resurrection, the government, fearing disturbances, and to prevent any fraud, placed guards at the grave and about the cemetery. Narcissus Luttrell reported about Emes’s resurrection that “two regiments of our train’d bands are ordered upon the guard during the holydayes, to prevent any disorder which may happen by the mobb on that occasion”. Thus, at Whitsun, 25 May 1708, at Bunhill Fields, before some 20,000 spectators, Thomas Emes failed to rise to life. The crowds who went to Bunhill Fields to witness the event were disappointed, but for the faithful there was an acceptable explanation of the failure. The miracle had been cancelled, said John Lacy, because of the danger that the crowd would cause a disturbance and molest the risen Emes. The scornful incredulity of the unruly onlookers was the hindrance which had prevented the miracle. <br />
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The Prophets had actively publicised the miracle in the preceding weeks and months, but the satirical campaign of anti-enthusiasts also contributed to the publicity. The attendance of some 20,000 people for the announced miracle speaks for itself. It meant that about 4 per cent of London’s population were physically present in the Bunhill Fields burying-ground on that day, and at least three or four times more would probably have heard of it. The episode of Dr Emes’s resurrection due at Whitsun 1708 undoubtedly marked the climax of the Prophets’ publicity. When Emes failed to rise from his grave, the Prophets were the object of widespread derision and satire, and opened a period of deep crisis and questioning within the group.<br />
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But far from collapsing in the face of such a public embarrassment, from February 1708 the Prophets travelled relentlessly across Britain; in Scotland they found a receptive audience among the Jacobite mystics. There were French Prophets in Edinburgh as well as in London. In November 1708 the Prophets also launched missions to the continent, starting with Holland. Then in 1711, Portalès and others travelled through Germany to Vienna to warn the Holy Roman Emperor of the impending apocalypse. (Charles de Portalès himself long outlived the active group and was buried 7 December 1763 at Bunhill Fields.) Several communities were born on the continent as a result of these missions, especially in Pietist circles. By 1715 they had created an international millenarian network of some 800 followers scattered across Europe. They remained active on the continent until at least the 1730s, but can be traced in England until nearly twenty years later.<br />
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The late 1710s had marked a period of deep transformation for the group, following the death or departure of several prominent members. After years of scandal, the Prophets withdrew from the public eye and survived as an underground community. But as a religious force in England for forty years, as a spectre haunting subsequent evangelical efforts, the French Prophets were to be etched in many memories. John and Charles Wesley both met the French Prophets in the 1730s. Wesley’s warning that the Methodists should not be like the French Prophets was not a reference to a historical sect but to a still-active group. Later, the Shakers of Manchester under Mother Ann Lee claimed to have derived their illumination from the remnants of the French Prophets. In 1795, Bulkeley’s favourable “Impartial Account of the Prophets” was reprinted (in <i>Prophetical extracts</i>) in connection with the new English prophet Richard Brothers.<br />
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The Prophets also disrupted the Moravians’ meetings at Fetter Lane in the 1740s. Moravian emphasis on the inner workings of the Spirit, their insistence upon a religion of the heart, attracted the French Prophets, who regarded the Moravians as likely converts, believing the Moravian tradition consonant with their own. <br />
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A small group of Moravian missionaries had arrived in London in February 1738. They were not in the British Isles to proselytize; for them England was a staging-post on the way to Georgia. But they made contact with a religious fellowship group, the Fetter Lane Society, meeting at the bookshop of James Hutton; and from this there developed a permanent Moravian Congregation in London. By 1742, the Society’s meeting room had become too small for its membership; Hutton therefore leased a Meeting House, also off Fetter Lane. The Brethren’s Chapel, Fetter Lane (as it became known) was to be the Moravians’ London centre for the next two hundred years. The Prophets made repeated attempts to invade Moravian open meetings as Church Diaries reveal.<br />
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1741</div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Aug: 12 … It was spoken of a person who as it were was possessed of the devil and the Brethren agreed to write to her if there were no opportunity of seeing her. This gave occasion to speak of several such instances and that sometimes it was a beguiling—We praised God for preserving our Brethren that many of them had not got the spirit of the French Prophets to which two years ago several had a great inclination and it was said that the best preservative against other Spirits than Jesus was to remain poor in spirit and humbled at the feet of Jesus Christ.</blockquote>
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1742</div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Monday July 19 … The prophetess at Clarke’s house is dead.</blockquote>
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1743</div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Tuesday Aug. 9th … The prophetess has writ a long Epistle to Brother Hutton & Wife (Louise Brandt, Swiss-born wife of the English Moravian James Hutton, was proud that she had resisted the inspired men who attempted her spiritual “seduction” around Yverdon, Vaud, in the 1720s).</blockquote>
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1744</div>
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
June 25 … Yesterday Mrs Sellers and another came to Fetter Lane chapel and made a great disturbance. They are prophetesses. She would have been acquainted with Brother Hutton but he told her he would have no fellowship with her.</blockquote>
Then on July 15, 1744, worshippers in the Moravian chapel heard the muffled voices of inspired women who stood outside, refused entrance. The worshippers paid no heed and preserved themselves in “Stillness and Grace”. <br />
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1745 </div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Tuesday 2 April … There was 4 French Prophets at the General Meeting yesterday. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Monday 13th May … Yesterday there was many French Prophets at Fetter Lane & many strangers in ye Afternoon</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Tuesday May 28 … Palmer the Carpender who is among the French Prophets has a great Love to Brother Schlicht & wants very much to speak with him & says he could speak all his Heart to him, he says he is much blessed by the Preaching at Fetter Lane.</blockquote>
The Moravians and the French Prophets are the twin poles of eighteenth-century spirituality. The Moravians sought stillness. The French Prophets believed that spiritual experience can take physical form. The prophet John Lacy claimed to effect miraculous cures, all of this accomplished while in a trance state during which he would groan, hiccough, and twitch violently, sometimes hurling his body across the room. The glossolalia, trances, automatic writing and ecstatic convulsions of the French Prophets were not what the Moravians saw as acceptable or authentic of spiritual influx.<br />
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Catherine, William Blake’s mother, then married to Thomas Armitage, joined the Moravian Congregation at Fetter Lane in November 1750. Thomas Armitage died in September 1751, and, according to the Church Book of the Brethren, Catherine “became a widow and left the Congregation”. This means that she left the inner circle (“The Congregation of the Lamb”); it does not necessarily imply that she stopped attending all Moravian services. A year later, Catherine Armitage married James Blake.<br />
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The discoveries of recent decades in Moravian archives raise all sorts of questions about Blake’s childhood, about the milieu in which he grew up, and alert us to the complexities of Blake’s spiritual journey. William Blake, with his family and friends, would have encountered a range of eighteenth-century spiritual movements—including the French Prophets, the Moravians, the Methodists, the Swedenborgians, and the followers of Richard Brothers and Joanna Southcott—as they variously rose, transformed themselves, or declined. <br />
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If an inheritance from the French Prophets can perhaps be found in Blake’s development of automatic writing, the Moravian stillness was an ideal to which he responded sometimes unexpectedly. Amidst the comedy of <i>An Island in the Moon</i>, the singing of “Holy Thursday” brings stillness to the assembled group:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
After this they all sat silent for a quarter of an hour </blockquote>
(There is perhaps a suggestion here of the moment in the Apocalypse of St John where angelic song is followed by silence: “There was Silence in Heaven for about the space of half an hour”.) “Silence” and “silent” are Blakean keywords. Appearing throughout his poetic oeuvre, their usage clusters with deep significance in the late epics: <i>Four Zoas</i> (54 times), <i>Milton</i> (17 times), and <i>Jerusalem</i> (27 times). <br />
<br />
The French Prophets gravitated around an urban middle-class nucleus. Laborie (2015) provides us with a list (“Chronological profile of the French Prophets”) of 665 members up to 1746, including lawyers, teachers and merchants as well as working men and women. The list includes two names of Blakean interest: William Davies (no 389 in Laborie’s “profile”; no further information) and Mr Boucher (no 621; first known appearance among the French Prophets: 3 August 1714; religion: Huguenot). In 1782 William Blake married Catherine Sophia Boucher at St Mary’s, Battersea. Her surname suggests a French ancestry; her grandfathers were Richard Boucher and William Davis. It may be just coincidence but it’s a very striking coincidence.<br />
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<br />
<b>Sources and further reading </b>(including a small selection from the many titles published by or against the Prophets)<br />
<br />
Daniel Benham.—Memoirs of James Hutton : comprising the annals of his life and connection with the United Brethren.—London : Hamilton, Adams, 1856.<br />
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The Christian Pioneer : intended to uphold the great doctrines of the Reformation; the sufficiency of Scripture, the right of individual judgment, and of fearless free inquiry.—Vol. 7 (September 1832-December 1833).</div>
Page 574 : Lacy’s prophecy.<br />
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The Harleian miscellany; a collection of scarce, curious, and entertaining pamphlets and tracts, as well in manuscript as in print. Selected from the library of Edward Harley, second Earl of Oxford. Interspersed with historical, political, and critical annotations, by the late William Oldys, Esq. and some additional notes, by Thomas Park, F.S.A.—10 v.—London : printed for John White, and John Murray; and John Harding, 1808-13.<br />
The original, 1744-1753, edition in eight volumes was reprinted in 1808–1811, with supplementary volumes and indexes.<br />
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<i>Vol. VII (1811), page 194 : John Lacy promises to raise Dr. Emms from the dead.</i></div>
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Samuel Keimer.—A brand pluck’d from the burning : exemplify’d in the unparallel’d case of Samuel Keimer, offer’d to the perusal of the serious part of mankind, and especially to those who were ever acquainted with, or ever heard of the man.—London : printed and sold by W. Boreham, and by the other booksellers, 1718.<br />
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While [Emes] lay ill, he was told, by John Lacy, John Potter, &c. under Agitation, many flattering Stories, that if he dy'd, he should quickly be rais'd again, which the poor Man, as I have reason to think, firmly believ'd. After the Doctor was dead, instead of being laid out, as is usual for a dead Corps, he was kept hot in his Bed, till he stunk so, as there was scarce any enduring it, several imagining he would come to Life again. (12)</blockquote>
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Rigby, a Believer, who deals in Canes, of whom 'tis said, that He laid a great Wager on the Resurrection of Dr. Emes, but lost. (65)</blockquote>
Lionel Laborie.—Enlightening enthusiasm : prophecy and religious experience in early eighteenth-century England.—Manchester : Manchester University Press, 2015.<br />
A major reassessment of prophetic experience restoring the French Prophets to their place in the religious culture of eighteenth century Britain<br />
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Lionel Laborie.—”French Prophets (act. 1706–c.1750)”.—Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, 2018.—Published online: 09 May 2018.<br />
I have drawn heavily on this essential summary.<br />
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John Lacy.—The General Delusion of Christians touching the ways of God’s revealing himself, to, and by the Prophets, evinc’d from Scripture and primitive antiquity, etc.—London : S. Noble, 1713.<br />
A later reprint (London : R.B. Seeley & W. Burnside, 1832) was edited by Edward Irving, preacher and theologian. Irving died on 7 December 1834, and was buried on the 19th in the crypt of Glasgow Cathedral. As the mourners departed, there remained a number of young women dressed in white, confidently expecting Irving to rise again.<br />
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John Lacy.—Mr. Lacy’s Letter to the Reverend Dr. Josiah Woodward concerning his Remarks on the Modern Prophets.—London : Printed for Ben. Bragg ..., 1708.<br />
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cpodBkNSea4/Xd5gv71peTI/AAAAAAAAA14/Jx0adnOl-qIbtynR-pHBo41UtKkK7-F7wCEwYBhgL/s1600/French_Prophets%2B%25284%2529.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cpodBkNSea4/Xd5gv71peTI/AAAAAAAAA14/Jx0adnOl-qIbtynR-pHBo41UtKkK7-F7wCEwYBhgL/s400/French_Prophets%2B%25284%2529.jpg" /></a><br />
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John Lacy.—The prophetical warnings of John Lacy, esq. : pronounced under the operation of the spirit, and faithfully taken in writing, when they were spoken.—3 parts.—London : B. Bragge, 1707.<br />
Parts 2 and 3 have special title-pages : Warnings of the eternal spirit, by the mouth of his servant John, sirnam’d Lacy. The second part. … The third and last part. <br />
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John Lacy.—A relation of the dealings of God to his unworthy servant John Lacy, since the time of his believing and professing himself inspir’d.—London : Printed for Ben. Bragg ..., 1708. <br />
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François Maximilien Misson.—A Cry from the Desart: or, Testimonials of the miraculous things lately come to pass in the Cevennes, verified upon oath and by other Proofs ... Translated from the originals. With a preface by John Lacy.—London B. Bragg, 1707.<br />
A translation by John Lacy of Misson’s Le Théâtre sacré des Cevennes. A second edition was issued the same year.<br />
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Narcissus Luttrell.—A brief historical relation of state affairs, from September 1678 to April 1714.—6 v.—Oxford : Oxford University Press, 1857. <br />
On the French Prophets, see vol. VI, page 307.<br />
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Colin J. Podmore.—The Moravian Church in England, 1728-1760.—Oxford historical monographs.—Oxford : Clarendon Press, 1998.<br />
French Prophets: 10, 13, 14, 55, 56, 62. Podmore provides a modern, comprehensive and scholarly account of the early years of Moravianism in England. The older apologetic history by Daniel Benham (1856) is still valuable.<br />
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Prophetical extracts.—London : printed for G. Terry, [1794-1795].<br />
The publisher is Garnet Terry (1746-1817), banknote engraver to the Bank of England. He became a follower of William Huntington S.S. in the 1780s, publishing a number of his works and reprinting earlier apocalyptic texts.<br />
Contents: [No. I.]. Introduction : containing an impartial account of the prophets of the Cevennes : in a letter to a friend. By Sir Richard Bulkeley ; together with the remarkable vision of Lewis XIV ; for the interpretation of which he offered a reward of 20,000 Louis d’ors, in the Paris Gazette of November 11, 1689 — No. II. Containing a most extraordinary prophecy, delivered near one hundred years ago, before the Senate, at Frankfort in Germany. By J.M. Daut ; concerning the Judgments of God on the whole Roman Empire ; the revolutions of, and the Calamities that are to happen in, the different nations of the world, especially those of Germany, France, Poland, Holland, &c. ; translated from the High Dutch in the year 1711 — No. III. Containing (besides the conclusion of Daut’s prophecies) a very scarce prophetic piece, intitled, A cry from the desart, or, Testimonials of the miraculous things lately come to pass in the Cevennes, or, Southern parts of France, verified upon oath. Translated from the original published in the year 1707 — No. IV & V. Relative to the Revolution in France, and the decline of the papal power in the world : selected from Fleming, Usher, Jerieu, Goodwin, Gill, Love, Daut, Brown, Knox, Willison, More, Newton, Lacey, Owen, Marion, Cavalier, and many more.<br />
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Hillel Schwartz.—The French Prophets : the history of a millenarian group in eighteenth-century England.—Berkeley CA : University of California Press, 1980.<br />
<br />Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-78617685230779714652019-10-16T14:26:00.002-07:002022-06-10T02:50:50.274-07:00Blakespotting: Private Eye<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;">The <i>Private Eye</i> letters pages regularly include “Lookalikes” where sometimes surprising visual resemblances are brought to our attention. The issue of 4-17 October 2019 features, on pages 21-22, no fewer than three Lookalikes and a Moggalike (Jacob Rees-Mogg appropriately paired with a relaxing kangaroo).</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;">Here’s page 22 (click to enlarge)</span><br />
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-QAcYAd826Pc/XaeJhnESWQI/AAAAAAAAA0k/ksTsqxEqmm4MttznszYxOWn7n0HhSmWEQCLcBGAsYHQ/s1600/Scan0002.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1131" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-QAcYAd826Pc/XaeJhnESWQI/AAAAAAAAA0k/ksTsqxEqmm4MttznszYxOWn7n0HhSmWEQCLcBGAsYHQ/s400/Scan0002.jpg" width="282" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;">And a detail comparing David Cameron (our second worse prime minister ever—forget Lord North—Boris Johnson wins that particular contest) with Blake’s image of Capaneus the Blasphemer in Dante’s <i>Inferno</i>, Canto XIV, 46-72. (Not Canopus, as per <i>Private Eye</i>.)</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;">And here’s Blake’s full image currently on exhibition at Tate Britain</span><br />
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-B3to5KiD4K4/XaeJbdgbN6I/AAAAAAAAA0c/8KVCWYr9aH43HmovnIkSajfEIdhKJzsOQCEwYBhgL/s1600/Ff107585.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" data-original-height="907" data-original-width="1280" height="282" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-B3to5KiD4K4/XaeJbdgbN6I/AAAAAAAAA0c/8KVCWYr9aH43HmovnIkSajfEIdhKJzsOQCEwYBhgL/s400/Ff107585.jpg" width="400" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;"><i>“Capaneus the Blasphemer”, pen and ink and watercolour over pencil and black chalk, with sponging and scratching out (374 x 527 mm)</i></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;"><i>National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne (Felton Bequest, 1920)</i></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;">The scene takes place in the third ring of the seventh circle of Hell, where those who have done violence against God, nature or art are punished. Flames rise throughout the design, particularly around the reclining figure of Capaneus. Dante and Virgil stand at the left border of the design; Dante in red, Virgil in blue.</span><br />
<span style="color: #f3f3f3;"></span><span style="background-color: black;"></span><span style="color: black;"></span><span style="background-color: white;"></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;">Dante's portrayal of Capaneus is based on the <i>Thebaid</i> (Thēbaïs), a late Roman Latin epic by Publius Papinius Statius (AD c.45—c.96). The poem deals with the Theban cycle and treats the assault of the seven champions of Argos against the city of Thebes. The theme was earlier dramatized by Aeschylus (c.525/524—c.456/455 BC) as <i>Seven against Thebes</i> (Ἑπτὰ ἐπὶ Θήβας).</span><br />
<span style="color: #f3f3f3;"></span><span style="background-color: black;"></span><span style="color: black;"></span><span style="background-color: white;"></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;">A huge and powerful warrior-king who arrogantly defies his highest god, Capaneus is the archetypal blasphemer. It is striking that Dante selects a figure from pagan mythology to represent one of the few specifically religious sins punished in Hell. Dante describes him as proud and disdainful, apparently unaffected by the flames.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;">I well remember the impact of the great Blake exhibition at Tate in 1978, curated by Martin Butlin, which showed Blake as an “Old Master” and emphasised his work as a visual artist. It was followed by a splendid permanent Blake display, also arranged by Butlin, which was then destroyed on the orders of Nick Serota who thought it made Blake too much of a cult. (Were the special display cases with concave non-reflective glass just thrown away?) Subsequent Blake shows at Tate in 2000-01, in Paris in 2009, and at the Ashmolean Museum in 2014-15, have had different curatorial emphases on Blake as printmaker and poet.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;">With over 300 works on display, the new Tate exhibition (11 September 2019—2 February 2020) is the largest showing of Blake’s work for almost 20 years. It aims to rediscover him as "a visual artist for the 21st century". Particularly noteworthy is a splendid selection from the Dante illustrations. I know it’s such clichéd suggestion, but here I think we find him developing a late style with a new freedom in his handling of watercolour.</span></div>
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<div align="center" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: bookshelf symbol 7;"><span style="background-color: white;"><b>◆</b></span></span></div>
<b></b><i></i><u></u><sub></sub><sup></sup><strike></strike><b></b><span style="color: #f3f3f3;"></span><span style="background-color: black;"></span><span style="color: black;"></span><span style="background-color: white;"></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;">After a Brussels press conference (6 February 2019) in which he again made clear the withdrawal agreement was not up for renegotiation but that—as a gesture of goodwill—he was willing to entertain sensible alternative suggestions from the UK government, Donald Tusk, the EU council’s president, concluded with a simple thought. “I’ve been wondering,” he mused, “what that special place in hell looks like, for those who promoted Brexit without even a sketch of a plan how to carry it out safely.” Name your circle of Hell for Johnson, Gove, May, the rest of the spivs and shysters, and Cameron, originator of the whole Brexit <i>dégringolade</i>.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;">J.I.M. Stewart, Oxford professor who wrote crime fiction as Michael Innes, was a corking snob—to that of his native Edinburgh Morningside he added a distinctively Oxford snobbery. (With our older universities, I make a clear distinction between Oxford snobbery and Cambridge arrogance. I may return to this theme in a later post.) I have long been puzzled by a passage in <i>A Private View</i>, one of the Michael Innes novels</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;">Before the map was a long table with a battery of telephones. Now on one and now on another of these a red light glowed. Three constables were receiving and jotting down messages. Receiving these at a desk was a young man with a public-school face …</span></blockquote>
<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;">What on earth is a “public-school face”? Then I saw photographs of David Cameron. So that’s what he meant! From the Bullingdon Club to the seventh circle of Hell is no great distance at all.</span><br />
<div style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; margin: 0px; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"><span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div align="center" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: bookshelf symbol 7;"><span style="background-color: white;"><b>◆</b></span></span></div><b></b><i></i><u></u><sub></sub><sup></sup><strike></strike><b></b><span style="color: #f3f3f3;"></span><span style="background-color: black;"></span><span style="color: black;"></span><span style="background-color: white;"></span><span></span><span></span><br /><div style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; margin: 0px; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"><span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit;">W</span><span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;">illiam Blake, always relevant, on Brexit</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;"> The Harlots cry from Street to Street <br /> Shall weave Old Englands winding Sheet <br /> The Winners Shout the Losers Curse <br /> Dance before dead Englands Hearse <br /> Every Night & every Morn <br /> Some to Misery are Born <br /> Every Morn and every Night <br /> Some are Born to sweet delight <br /> Some are Born to sweet delight <br /> Some are Born to Endless Night <br /> We are led to Believe a Lie </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit;">William Blake.—<i>The complete poetry and prose</i>; edited by David V. Erdman; with a new foreword and commentary by Harold Bloom.—Newly rev. ed.—Berkeley CA; London: University of California Press 2008.<br />My thanks to the pseudonymous tweep, “OperaCreep”, for reminding me of Blake’s “Auguries of Innocence”.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;">Martin Butlin.—<i>The paintings and drawings of William Blake</i>.—2 vols.—New Haven CT; London: Published for the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art by Yale University Press, 1981.—#812.27.</span><br />
<span style="color: #f3f3f3;"></span><span style="background-color: black;"></span><span style="color: black;"></span><span style="background-color: white;"></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;">John Crace.—“Donald Tusk's special place in hell looks like where we are right now.”—<i>The Guardian </i>(Wednesday, 6 February 2019).</span><br />
<span style="color: #f3f3f3;"></span><span style="background-color: black;"></span><span style="color: black;"></span><span style="background-color: white;"></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;">Michael Innes.—<i>A private view</i>.—London: Gollancz 1952. Also published under the title: <i>One-man show</i>.—New York: Dodd, Mead, 1952.</span><br />
<span style="color: #f3f3f3;"></span><span style="background-color: black;"></span><span style="color: black;"></span><span style="background-color: white;"></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: inherit;">Martin Myrone & Amy Concannon.—<i>William Blake</i>; with an afterword by Alan Moore.—London: Tate, 2019.</span><br />
<span style="color: #f3f3f3;"></span><span style="background-color: black;"></span><span style="color: black;"></span><span style="background-color: white;"></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<span style="color: #f3f3f3;"><span style="background-color: black;"><span style="color: black;"><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>Private Eye</i>, No 1506 (4 October—17 Oct. 2019).</span></span></span></span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #f3f3f3;"></span><span style="background-color: black;"></span><span style="color: black;"></span><span style="background-color: white;"></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span>Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-79867202779976619852019-02-17T16:27:00.000-08:002021-06-03T10:43:05.395-07:00Bunhill Fields—3 September 1688 <br />
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John Bunyan, author of <i>The Pilgrim’s Progress</i>, died in August 1688, at the age of sixty. Drenched in a rainstorm on a rare visit to London for a preaching engagement, Bunyan fell ill while staying at the home in Snow Hill, Farringdon Without, of the grocer John Strudwick. His cold developed into a fever, though he still preached on 19 August to a London congregation, until illness claimed his life on 31 August 1688. He was buried at Bunhill Fields on 3 September.<br />
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Strudwick had already purchased a plot for a family vault in Bunhill Fields and it was his intention that Bunyan’s remains would be placed there too, though Bunyan was initially buried in the “Baptist Corner” at the back of the burial ground. John Strudwick survived another nine years, himself dying in 1697. There is no record of when Bunyan’s coffin was placed in the Strudwick vault although one might guess it was soon after Strudwick’s burial; the surviving burial ground registers only begin in 1713.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>The Strudwick monument (located E. & W. 25, 26—N. & S. 26, 27) took the form of a large Baroque stone chest. The vault beneath would eventually contain, in addition to Strudwick and Bunyan, the bodies of eleven other adults and two infants. Walter Wilson records the inscriptions on the tomb before its later remodelling :<br />
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Here lies the body of Mr. JOHN STRUDWICK, who died the 15th January, 1697, aged 43 years.</blockquote>
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Also the body of Mrs. PHŒBE BRAGGE, who died the 15th of July, 1718, aged 49 years.</blockquote>
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Here also lies the body of the Rev. ROBERT BRAGGE, Minister of the Gospel, who departed this life, February 12, 1737, ætatis 72.</blockquote>
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Mr. THEOPHILUS BRAGGE, died September the 25th, 1768, aged 29 years.</blockquote>
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Dr. ROBERT BRAGGE, died June 13, 1771, aged 77 years.</blockquote>
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Also, Mrs. ANNA JENNION, great grand-daughter of the Rev. ROBERT BRAGGE, died the 9th of February, 1780, aged 62 years.</blockquote>
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Also, Mrs. SARAH POOLE, daughter of Mrs. Anne Jennion, died the 9th of September, 1784, aged 32 years. Also lyeth here two of their infant Children.</blockquote>
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On the Right Side.</div>
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Here also lieth the Remains of Mrs. ANNE HOLYHEAD, Sister of the above-mentioned Mrs. Sarah Poole, who, after laboured above twelve-months through much pain and weakness, from a fatal fall, calmly resigned her breath, the 2d Nov. 1788, aged 33 years.</blockquote>
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Here also lies the precious Remains of a most affectionate Sister, Mrs. ELIZABETH JENNINGS, who died in the Lord the 11th of June, 1798, aged 61 years.</blockquote>
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On the Left Side.</div>
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Mr. JOHN BUNYAN, author of the Pilgrim’s Progress, Ob. 12th August, 1688, æt. 60.</blockquote>
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Undisturbed rests here the unfettered clay of Mr. JOHN JENNINGS, late of Newgate Street, who, after many wearisome days and nights, finished well his course the 6th of March, 1800, aged 57 years.</blockquote>
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Entombed in this vault the Remains of that once blooming young man, Mr. JOHN LONG, late of Abbot’s-Langley, Herts, (a cousin of Mr. Jennings’s) who, after enduring the pains of a deep consumption, a few months, willingly resigned his departing spirit, in view of a better state, the 16th of August, 1804, aged 24 years.</blockquote>
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At the Foot.</div>
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Here rests in hopes of future bliss, the once amiable and much admired youth, Ensign JOSEPH JENNINGS POOLE, of the 3d Regiment of Royal East India Volunteers, who, through a rapid consumption, fell asleep in Jesus, the 31st January, 1799, aged 22 years, and was interred with military honours.</blockquote>
(John Strudwick’s daughter Phoebe had married Robert Bragge in 1698; it is her descendants that fill the vault. Thirteen adults and two children is quite a lot to pack into one tomb, but then the multiple occupancy of burial plots is very much a feature of Bunhill Fields.)<br />
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<i>Frontispiece: </i>The works of John Bunyan<i>. Edited by George Offor</i></div>
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<i>(Glasgow : Blackie, 1853-1854).</i></div>
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Bunyan suffered 12 years imprisonment for preaching without a licence, and his Christian allegory <i>The Pilgrim’s Progress</i>, what some regard as the first great English novel, was probably written during his periods of imprisonment. First published in 1678, it has never been out of print since. Twenty editions had been published by 1695 and at least 1300 by 1938. The book most translated into other languages after the Bible, <i>Pilgrim’s Progress</i> has been translated into more than 200 languages, with Dutch, French, and Welsh editions appearing during Bunyan’s lifetime.</div>
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Illustrations were first added to <i>The Pilgrim’s Progress</i> in 1680, only two years after the book was first licensed for publication. For the fourteenth edition (1695), two sets of designs—the 1680 illustrations and those from a Dutch translation of 1685—were abridged and combined in a sequence of fourteen woodcuts, establishing a standard iconography of the <i>Progress</i> for decades to come. Towards the end of the eighteenth century, Blake’s one-time friend and later rival, Thomas Stothard, made a set of sixteen <i>Pilgrim’s Progress</i> designs that were engraved and issued—separately from the text—in 1788. These proved very popular and influential and were included in various editions of <i>The Pilgrim’s Progress</i> from 1792 onwards. (Stothard was himself buried in Bunhill Fields on 6 May 1834.)<br />
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From childhood, like everyone who grew up in the eighteenth century, Blake would have known the story—Christian with his burden on his journey from the City of Destruction through the Slough of Despond and Vanity Fair to the gates of the Cœlestial City and the Three Shining Ones—which he seems to have admired despite his stated view of allegory as an “inferior kind of Poetry” :</div>
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The Hebrew Bible & the Gospel of Jesus are not Allegory but Eternal Vision or Imagination of All that Exists. Note here that Fable or Allegory is Seldom without some Vision, Pilgrim’s Progress is full of it.—BLAKE. “A Vision of The Last Judgment" (re-punctuated)</blockquote>
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<i>William Blake, “</i>The Man Sweeping the Interpreter’s Parlour<i>”. Relief etching.</i></div>
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About 1824 (though Keynes and Norvig suggest a much earlier date, perhaps the 1790s), when Blake was 67 years old, he made a “woodcut on pewter”, a relief engraving known as “The Man Sweeping the Interpreter’s Parlour” (<i>Pilgrim’s Progress</i>, Part 1). The parlour is the uncleansed heart; the man who raises the dust is the Law, which only revives and increases sin; the maid who allays the dust with her sprinkling is the Gospel. The young disciples (the “Ancients”) who convened around Blake in the 1820s, dubbed him “the Interpreter” and called his London home “the House of the Interpreter”. In addition to this single print, Blake also made a series of twenty-eight watercolour drawings to illustrate the book.</div>
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The honorific title the Ancients gave to Blake points up his affinity with Bunyan. Bunyan imagines the Holy land with a powerful sense of intimacy: his promised land is constructed of everything that is earthly and familiar, and Christian reaches a Jerusalem that is conspicuously similar to Bunyan’s own beloved Bedford. William Blake’s English Jerusalem affirms what Bunyan had already suggested—the unique role played by the “Holy Land”, as both territory and metaphor in English culture—that England and the Holy Land were not the separate places that history and politics might imply :<br />
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The fields from Islington to Marybone<br />
To Primrose Hill and Saint Johns Wood:<br />
Were builded over with pillars of gold,<br />
And there Jerusalem’s pillars stood.—B<span style="font-size: x-small;">LAKE</span>. <i>Jerusalem</i><br />
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One might also note that Blake’s use of the name “Beulah” for the state next to Eternity may well have been inspired by Bunyan’s rapturous description of Beulah, the Earthly Paradise, where his pilgrims dwell before crossing the river of death into Heaven.<br />
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<i>John Bunyan, </i>Divine Emblems : or, Temporal things spiritualized<i>, etc. (London: C. Dilly, 1790)</i></div>
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Bunyan was popular as an author not only of <i>The Pilgrim’s Progress</i>, but also of the first emblem book written expressly for children: <i>A Book for Boys and Girls; or, Temporal Things Spiritualized</i> (1685), which in Blake’s day came to be called <i>Divine Emblems</i>. Bunyan’s emblem sequence has been suggested as one of Blake’s major models for his own series of emblems, <i>For Children: the Gates of Paradise</i>, though Blake’s emblems make their first appearance in his Notebook alongside designs that would reappear in the <i>Songs</i>.<br />
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Bunyan’s <i>Divine Emblems</i>, like Isaac Watts’s <i>Divine and Moral Songs for Children</i> (1715) was a staple of children’s education throughout the eighteenth century. By the time of the tenth edition (1770) of <i>Divine Emblems</i>, the publisher had the pious philanthropist market very much in mind :</div>
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Price 1<i>s</i>. or 10<i>s</i>. per dozen, or 3<i>l</i>. 15<i>s</i>. per hundred to those who buy them to give away.</blockquote>
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In these and other contemporary works for children, the determined focus on indoctrination into moral orthodoxy is painfully apparent. Watts’s influence on Blake’s <i>Songs</i> has long been recognised, but Bunyan has an influence too on the <i>Songs</i>. Of course Blake avoids their insistent moralising.</div>
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To take just one example, Blake’s “Little Black Boy” reads to me as a riposte to Bunyan’s verses about Moses and his Æthiopian wife. I cite the 1793 text:<br />
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XXXII.</div>
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<i>Of Moses and his Wife.</i></div>
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THIS Moses was a fair and comely man; <br />
His wife a swarthy Æthiopian: <br />
Nor did his milk-white bosom change her skin. <br />
She came out thence as black as she went in.<br />
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Now Moses was a type of Moses’ law, <br />
His wife likewise of one that never saw <br />
Another way unto eternal life; <br />
There’s myst’ry then in Moses and his wife. <br />
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The law is very holy, just and good, <br />
And to it is espous’d all flesh and blood: <br />
But yet the law its goodness can’t bestow, <br />
On any that are wedded thereunto. <br />
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Therefore as Moses wife came swarthy in, <br />
And went out from him without change of skin: <br />
So he that doth the law for life adore, <br />
Shall yet by it be left a black-a-more. <br />
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Bunyan here is drawing on the tradition alluded to in N<span style="font-size: x-small;">UMBERS</span> XII. 1 :<br />
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And Miriam and Aaron spake against Moses because of the Ethiopian woman whom he had married : for he had married an Ethiopian woman.</blockquote>
(Moses’s wife is perhaps Zipporah, or, following Josephus, Tharbis.)<br />
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The words of “Moses and his wife” seem to relate to Bunyan’s Calvinist theology. I’m not sure if I properly understand this poem but perhaps Bunyan is saying that Moses’s wife’s black skin is an emblem of a spiritual darkness, while for Blake skin colour is an irrelevance: <br />
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My mother bore me in the southern wild,<br />
And I am black, but O! my soul is white.—B<span style="font-size: x-small;">LAKE</span>. “The Little Black Boy.”<br />
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Bunyan’s Emblem XVIII: The Sinner and the Spider, and Emblem XXIX: Of the Rose-bush, are also worth exploring as possible influences on the <i>Songs</i>. <br />
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Blake’s mother, Catherine, had been a member of the London Moravian Congregation (taking a full part in the life of the church) from November 1750 until her marriage to James Blake in October 1752, and may well have continued to attend services after that. There is, it seems to me, a constellation of Blake, Bunyan, and the Moravian Church (often referred to as a “Pilgrim Church”) that suggests themes for exploration. I list the first few that come to mind.<br />
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—The Moravian poet James Montgomery contributed a long introductory essay to an edition of <i>The Pilgrim’s Progress</i> published by William Collins in Glasgow in 1828. Blake’s “The Chimney Sweeper” from <i>Innocence</i> was reprinted in <i>The Chimney-Sweeper’s Friend and Climbing Boy’s Album</i> (1824), edited by Montgomery, who shared several mutual acquaintances with Blake.<br />
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—The influence on both John Bunyan and William Blake of the mystical thought of the “Teutonic philosopher”, Jacob Boehme. Between 1645 and 1662 most of Boehme’s treatises and the majority of his letters were printed in English translation (they had circulated in manuscript from the 1630s). They constituted, I would suggest, the most significant religious writing circulating in seventeenth-century England; though Boehme’s influence on Bunyan is still largely unexplored.</div>
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—In 1780, the Moravian minister, Francis Okely, issued a translation from the German of the <i>Memoirs of the Life, Death, Burial, and Wonderful Writings, of Jacob Behmen</i>; the life by Abraham von Frankenberg with the narrative of Cornelius Weissner. Blake’s admiration for Boehme is well attested, perhaps an inheritance from his mother; Blake spoke of Boehme as “a divinely inspired man”.<br />
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—Jan Amos Comenius (Jan Amos Komenský), 1592–1670, was the last bishop of the Unitas Fratrum before the re-establishment of the Moravian Church under Count Zinzendorf. Comenius was greatly influenced by Boehme and quoted Boehme in his writings; indeed he may have known not only the published works but also some of Boehme’s unpublished work via his contacts in Görlitz.</div>
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—Comenius, resident in England from September 1641 through June 1642, was the author of <i>Labyrint světa a ráj srdce</i> (“The Labyrinth of the World and the Paradise of the Heart”), a masterpiece of Czech literature (written in the early 1620s), and an allegory with striking similarities to <i>The Pilgrim’s Progress</i>. Comenius wrote five years before Bunyan was born; Bunyan’s <i>Pilgrim’s Progress</i> appeared in 1678, eight years after Comenius’s death. In both books a pilgrim passes through the evil world, with its great suffering and its many temptations. Evil guides lead astray both Comenius’s and Bunyan’s pilgrim, and both finally find perfect happiness and solace of their sorrows by means of God’s grace. It has been suggested that Bunyan may have had knowledge of the “Labyrinth”, and that his words, “Some say the ‘Pilgrim’s Progress’ is not mine, insinuating as if I would shine, in name and fame, by the worth of another”, refer to it. In fact, Comenius’s “Labyrinth of the Heart” was first published in English in 1901. Nevertheless, some scholars continue to allege that Bunyan’s <i>Pilgrim’s Progress</i> bears unmistakeable signs of Comenianism.<br />
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Illustrated London News <i>(27 January 1865).</i></div>
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By the 19th century, Bunyan’s tomb had fallen into decay, but following the closure of the burial ground in 1854 a public appeal for its restoration was launched under the presidency of the 7th Earl of Shaftesbury. This work was completed in May 1862, and comprised a complete reconstruction of the monument, undertaken by the sculptor Edgar George Papworth, senior (1809–66), retaining the basic form of the tomb-chest, and protected by a substantial railing. It is now an impressive memorial, carrying not only a recumbent effigy of Bunyan on the top of it, but also two relief panels to its sides depicting the figure of Christian—one with his burden on his back, and the other with it rolling off at the foot of the Cross. The inscription at the foot is “John Bunyan, author of the ‘Pilgrim’s Progress,’ Obt. 31 Aug. 1688. Æt. 60”; while at the head is another recording the fact that the tomb was restored by public subscription in 1862. The monument was further restored in 1928 (the tercentenary of Bunyan’s birth), and again after World War II (following serious wartime damage to the effigy’s face). Bunyan’s tomb is now listed Grade II*, along with Defoe’s obelisk.<br />
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<i>"Bunyan's Tomb in Bunhill Fields", from </i>The Queen’s London: A Pictorial and Descriptive Record of the Streets, Buildings, Parks, and Scenery of the Great Metropolis in the Fifty-ninth Year of the Reign of Her Majesty Queen Victoria<i> (London : Cassell & Company, 1897), page 271.</i></div>
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Bunyan was the wandering tinker who became the convinced pilgrim, and fought the lion and the giant. To stand by Bunyan’s tomb in Bunhill Fields is to muse on the way his name rhymes with the graveyard’s name—and to remember all those whom he inspired. When the cemetery was still in use, many people desired to be laid as near as possible to the creator of Christian the Pilgrim. Forgetting the medieval origins of Bunhill Fields, some even thought he had given his name to the burying-ground :</div>
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Monday 15 [<i>April 1776</i>] At 6 this evening B<i>rothe</i>r Latrobe … interred the corpse of our late S<i>iste</i>r Eliz<i>abeth</i> Bradshaw in Bunyan (vulgarly called Bunhill) Fields burying ground during our Burial Liturgy.—Moravian Archive. Daniel Benham, <i>MS extracts from the London archives of the United Brethren</i>.</blockquote>
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Bunyan wrote <i>The Pilgrim’s Progress</i> not just as a guide to the Christian life, but to set liberty of conscience against the state’s authority and the conformity of the rich, the corrupt, the careerist, and the spineless. When the <i>Independent</i> newspaper was founded in 1986 with offices overlooking the burial ground, the editor Andreas Whittam Smith led a small delegation to lay flowers at Bunyan’s tomb. Bunyan, who spoke truth to power and was imprisoned for speaking out, still directly addresses anyone who feels they are in the power of Mr Worldly-Wiseman, “my Lord Turn-about, my Lord Time-server, my Lord Fair-speech ... also Mr. Smooth-man, Mr. Facing-both-ways, Mr. Any-thing; and the parson of our parish, Mr. Two-tongues”.</div>
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On 17 April 2013 I sat down to watch the television coverage of Margaret Thatcher’s funeral. Whatever one may have thought of the mad old bat, the not-a-state-funeral made for compulsive viewing, and I was pleased that the Order of Service announced Bunyan’s “Pilgrim hymn”, supposedly one of her favourite hymns. Unfortunately, what the congregation gathered in St. Paul’s Cathedral to sing was not Bunyan’s words, but Percy Dearmer’s bowdlerised version from the <i>English Hymnal</i> of 1906. That’s when I had to switch off. The Thatcher family would have known no better, but the cathedral clergy are supposedly educated men. Oh dear.<br />
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“To Be a Pilgrim” (opening line: “Who would true valour see”) is the only hymn John Bunyan is credited with writing, and is indelibly associated with him. These words were sung by Mr Valiant-for-Truth, “a man with his Sword drawn, and his Face all bloody”, in Part 2 of <i>The Pilgrim’s Progress</i>, and recalls the words of H<span style="font-size: x-small;">EBREWS</span> 11:13: “...and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.” <br />
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Dearmer’s hymn (“He who would Valiant be”) is a softened and modernised version of Bunyan’s poem, replacing the archaic opening of verse 1, losing the lion of verse 2 (but keeping the giant), and disposing of the hobgoblin and foul fiend in verse 3. Its success is more to do with the wonderful tune provided for it by Ralph Vaughan Williams than Dearmer’s flaccid words. Recent hymn books have tended to return to Bunyan’s original. <br />
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So here it is, one of the very greatest of English hymns :<br />
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Who would true valour see,<br />
Let him come hither;<br />
One here will Constant be,<br />
Come Wind, come Weather<br />
There’s no Discouragement<br />
Shall make him once Relent<br />
His first avow’d Intent<br />
To be a Pilgrim. <br />
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Who so beset him round<br />
With dismal Stories,<br />
Do but themselves Confound;<br />
His Strength the more is.<br />
No Lyon can him fright,<br />
He’ll with a Gyant Fight,<br />
But he will have a right<br />
To be a Pilgrim.<br />
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Hobgoblin, nor foul Fiend,<br />
Can daunt his Spirit;<br />
He knows, he at the end<br />
Shall Life Inherit.<br />
Then Fancies fly away,<br />
He’l fear not what men say,<br />
He’l labour Night and Day<br />
To be a Pilgrim.<br />
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<b>Sources and Further Reading</b><br />
<br />
Robert N. Essick.—The separate plates of William Blake : a catalogue.—Princeton NJ : Princeton University Press, 1983.<br />
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Rosemary Freeman.—English Emblem Books.—London : Chatto & Windus, 1948.<br />
Chapter VIII : “John Bunyan, the End of the Tradition”.<br />
<br />
John Andrew Jones, ed.—Bunhill Memorials : Sacred Reminiscences of Three Hundred Ministers and Other Persons of Note, Who Are Buried in Bunhill Fields, of Every Denomination. With the Inscriptions on Their Tombs, and Other Historical Information Concerning Them from Authentic Sources.—London : James Paul, 1 Chapter House Court, North Side St. Paul’s Church-Yard, and Paternoster Row, and Sold by All Booksellers, 1849.<br />
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Maev Kennedy.—”Burial Ground of Bunyan, Defoe and Blake Earns Protected Status : Bunhill Fields in North London, Where Nonconformists, Radicals and Dissenters Are Buried, is Declared Grade 1 Park”.—The Guardian (Tuesday, 22 February 2011).<br />
<br />
Geoffrey Keynes.—Blake Studies. Essays on his Life and Work.—2nd [revised] ed.—Oxford : Clarendon Press 1971.<br />
First edition published under the title : Blake Studies : Notes on his Life and Work, in Seventeen Chapters (London : Rupert Hart-Davies, 1949).<br />
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Gerda S. Norvig.—Dark Figures in the Desired Country : Blake’s Illustrations to The Pilgrim’s Progress.—Berkeley CA : University Of California Press, 1993.<br />
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W.J. Birkbeck and others, eds.—The English Hymnal.—London : Oxford University Press, 1906.<br />
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Walter Wilson.—The History and Antiquities of Dissenting Churches and Meeting Houses, in London, Westminster, and Southwark : including the Lives of their Ministers, from the Rise of Nonconformity to the Present Time. With an Appendix on the Origin, Progress, and Present State of Christianity in Britain. In four volumes.—London : printed for the Author; sold by W. Button and Son, Paternoster Row; T. Williams and Son, Stationers’ Court; and J. Conder, Bucklersbury, 1808-1814.—R. Edwards, Printer, Crane-Court, Fleet Street.<br />
<br />Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-55053749937956773602019-01-22T15:22:00.003-08:002020-02-12T03:41:05.450-08:00Bunhill Fields—the long continuities of London life and death<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Drive your cart and your plow over the bones of the dead.—B<span style="font-size: x-small;">LAKE</span>. </blockquote>
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The Bunhill Fields Burial Ground and the adjacent Artillery Ground are the last large open spaces remaining of the three great fields (Bunhill Fields, Smithfield, and Moorfields) that constituted the Manor of Finsbury. The name Bunhill is a corruption of “Bone Hill”, perhaps implying the presence somewhere on the land of a Saxon burial mound. Another suggestion is that the marshy field was used as a refuse tip—a dumping ground for rags and bones, including animal bones from the Smithfield shambles, but I think the name predates the establishment of the livestock market. The manor was originally the prebend of Halliwell and Finsbury, established in 1104 to provide support for a canon of St Paul’s Cathedral.</div>
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In 1315, in the reign of Edward II, the prebendary manor was granted by Robert Baldock, the king’s secretary, to the Mayor and commonalty of London. This act enabled more general public access to a large area of fen or moor stretching from the City of London’s boundary (London Wall), to the village of Hoxton. Though ownership of Bunhill Fields reverted to the Dean and Chapter of St. Paul’s Cathedral from 1514 to 1867, it continued to be leased and managed by the Corporation of London. The Corporation in turn sublet the field. This pattern of lease and sub-lease (and often sub-sub lease) was customary with Corporation land and persists to this day.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>The name Bone Hill became literally true again in 1549, during the minority of Edward VI. The charnel house at St Paul’s had been used since the 13th Century to house human bones disturbed by later burials. During this period the concept of Purgatory had become an official part of Church doctrine and it became acceptable to disinter human remains when no flesh remained on the skeleton, as it was believed that the soul only remained with the body as long as there was flesh on the bones. The London dead were buried in St. Paul’s Churchyard just long enough for the flesh to rot away, after which the bones were dug up. The old graves were reused for new burials and the dry bones stored in the charnel house (or in the crypts of the City churches). This practice continued in England and Wales until the Reformation, when it came to be regarded as a Popish practice, and permanent interment became more usual. On the orders of Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset (“Protector Somerset”), the Charnel House of St Paul’s Cathedral was pulled down, and the bones that had accumulated over hundreds of years were dumped on Bunhill Fields.<br />
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Over a thousand cartloads of bones were transported out of the city to form a hill of bones on what is now Finsbury Square, with a just a thin layer of soil to consolidate the mound. This new “Bone Hill” was large enough to accommodate three windmills, erected in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, to make the most of the elevated ground which came to be known as Windmill Hill. It was also for some years used as a burial-place for criminals who had perished at the hands of the hangman. The southern extension of Tabernacle Street to Finsbury Square continued to be known as Windmill Street as late as 1912; Windmill Hill and its three windmills were by then long gone.<br />
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James Shirley alludes to these windmills in his comedy, <i>The Wedding</i>, of 1629. Act IV. Scene III, Finsbury : <br />
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<i>Lodam</i>. Is the coast clear, Camelion?<br />
<i>Camelion</i>. I see nothing but five or six—<br />
<i>Lodam</i>. Five or six? treachery! an ambush! ’tis valour to run.<br />
<i>Camelion</i>. They be windmills.<br />
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(Thomas Shelton’s English translation of the First Part of <i>Don Quixote</i> wherein the Don fights windmills that he imagines are giants, had appeared in 1612.)<br />
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<i>"Bunhill Row, where Milton wrote 'Paradise Lost'", from St John Adcock, ed., </i>Wonderful London <i>(London : Educational Book Company, 1926), p, 617.</i></div>
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London was spreading beyond its ancient City boundary; Bunhill Row, to the west of Bunhill Fields Burial Ground, was already built up when Stow compiled his Survey of London in 1598. John Milton was a resident of a house there (long demolished) from the time of his third marriage to Elizabeth Minshull in 1662 until his death in 1674. It was in Bunhill Row that he wrote <i>Paradise Lost</i>, <i>Paradise Regained</i>, and <i>Samson Agonistes</i>. <br />
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On the far side of Bunhill Row lies Banner Street and Bunhill Fields Quaker Meeting-House with a public garden, Quaker Gardens. The gardens are a small fragment of a Quaker burial ground, which, confusingly, was sometimes itself referred to as Bunhill Fields Burial Ground. This was the first freehold property owned by the Religious Society of Friends. It was bought in 1661 and used until 1855 for burials—sadly very little of it remains today due to severe bomb damage during the Second World War.<br />
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In 1664, the physician Dr. Nathaniel Hodges (1629–1688), made a worrying discovery :<br />
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… in the Middle of <i>Christmas</i> Holy-Days, I was called to a Young-Man in a Fever, who after two Days Course of Alexiterial Medicines, had two Risings about the Bigness of a Nutmeg broke out, one on each Thigh; upon Examination of which, I soon discovered the Malignity, both from their black Hue, and the Circle round them, and pronounced it to be the Plague ; in which Opinion I was afterwards confirmed by subsequent Symptoms, although by God’s Blessing the Patient recovered.</blockquote>
Dr. Hodges’ patient survived, but within 18 months, nearly 100,000 others were to die of plague in London. During the second week of April 1665, 398 were officially admitted to have died of plague. May and June were unusually warm months and plague spread rapidly. By the middle of July 1665 more than 1,000 were dying each week. In the first week of August the death roll increased to 2,020. During the third week of September 1665, 8,297 plague deaths were officially admitted; Dr. Hodges calculated that a truer figure would be 12,000 and the French Ambassador reported to Paris that in his opinion the total was 14,000.<br />
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Hodges is an important source for Daniel Defoe’s <i>Journal of the Plague Year</i> (1722). Defoe also records how the Quakers responded :<br />
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I should have mention’d, that the Quakers had at that time also a burying Ground set a-part to their Use, and which they still make use of, and they had also a particular <i>dead Cart</i> to fetch their Dead from their Houses; and the famous <i>Solomon Eagle</i>, who, as I mentioned before, had predicted the Plague as a Judgement, and run naked thro’ the streets, telling the People, that it was come upon them, to punish them for their Sins, had his own Wife died the very next Day of the Plague, and was carried, one of the first in the Quakers <i>dead Cart</i>, to their new burying Ground.</blockquote>
Soon graveyards were filled. With layers of bodies only inches beneath the earth, the “noisome stench arising from the great number of dead” buried in the New Churchyard of St. Paul’s, together with the plea from many parishes that their own churchyards were now full, forced the Mayor and Aldermen to seek new accommodation; huge holes were to be dug in vacant patches of earth and lined with quicklime, for the interment of bodies of inhabitants who had died of the plague in mass graves or plague-pits. The City Corporation decided that part of Bunhill Fields should become a common burial ground. The rural location of Bunhill Fields, only a short distance north of the city, made it an ideal location for mass burials.<br />
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<i>Map of “St Giles Cripplegate without. Old Street. Bunhill Fields.” (detail). From John Strype, A survey of the cities of London and Westminster, 1720.</i></div>
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On 6 September 1665, the City authorities deputed Sir John Robinson, Alderman, to treat with the tenant of Finsbury Fields, to obtain a piece of ground for burial “during this present visitation”. Their intention was that it be “speedily set out and prepared for a burial place”, though not that speedily since the site (“the new burial place in Bunhill Fields”) though walled by 19 October, had no gates until 1666 when the plague was over. A Mr. Tindal or Tyndall took over the lease and managed the cemetery on behalf of the City Corporation. It became known for a time as “Tyndall’s burial ground”.<br />
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There is some confusion over whether or not the ground was used for plague burials; many writers follow the statement in Maitland’s <i>History of London</i> (1739) that it was “not … made use of on that Occasion”, but Defoe refers to Bunhill Fields as one of the burying-grounds made during the Plague :<br />
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The Distemper sweeping away such Multitudes, as I have observ’d, many, if not all the out Parishes were oblig’d to make new burying Grounds, besides that I have mention’d in <i>Bunhil-Fields</i>, some of which were continued, and remain in Use to this Day …</blockquote>
In the last week of September 1665, 4,929 died. By the same week in November, the total was down to 900. On Christmas morning Samuel Pepys was surprised to see a wedding in progress. Life was slowly returning to normal, though a heavy, sweet smell of putrefaction still hung over London. It was proposed that the City graves should be covered with thousands of tons of lime, but this would have taken weeks to dig out from the chalk pits in Kent and bring to London by barges or carts. Nothing was done, and the smell drifted away as the bodies decayed. On 1 February 1666, King Charles felt it safe to return to St. James’s to the peal of church bells.<br />
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Within months the Great Fire was to prove as damaging in terms of property as plague had been in terms of human life. A little before two o’clock on the night of 2 September 1666 a workman in Farriner’s baking house smelt smoke and aroused the household. The baker, his wife and child hurried over the rooftops to safety, but their maid, too timid to follow, was burned to death. Helped by a strong wind, the flames spread quickly. The parish constable and watchmen arrived and called out the Lord Mayor, Sir Thomas Bloodworth, who thought it not worth his attention and went back to bed, grumpily observing, “Pish! A woman might piss it out!” Later that morning Samuel Pepys found that 300 houses, half London Bridge and several churches had disappeared. By 4 September half the City had gone. Nearly 400 acres had been burned within the City walls and 63 acres outside them; 87 churches had been destroyed, together with 44 livery halls and 13,200 houses, but miraculously only nine lives had been lost. Homeless Londoners camped out in Bunhill Fields after the Great Fire while their homes were rebuilt. <br />
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The Act of Uniformity of 1663 had established the Church of England as the national church. Its significance is that it also established a distinct category of Christian believers who wished to remain outside the national church—these became known as nonconformists or dissenters. As Bunhill Fields burial ground was not associated with an Anglican parish church, it became popular with anyone who did not wish to treat with an interfering vicar. Nonconformists could here bury their dead without the use of the Book of Common Prayer. Bunhill Fields was open to persons of any religion, or to nonbelievers such as Joseph Ritson, who was laid to rest with no religious service at all. “Tindal’s Burying Ground” was available for interment to anyone who could afford the fees.<br />
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Bunhill Fields burying-ground developed a reputation as specifically a dissenters’ burial ground: the “Cemetery of Puritan England”. So many historically important Protestant nonconformists chose this as their place of interment that the poet and writer Robert Southey characterised Bunhill Fields in 1830 as the ground “which the Dissenters regard as their Campo Santo”. (This term was also later applied to its “daughter” cemetery, established at Abney Park in Stoke Newington, which opened in 1840, one of the new cemeteries that made up London’s “Magnificent Seven”. All parts were available for the burial of any person, regardless of religious creed. Abney Park Cemetery was the only Victorian garden cemetery in Britain with “no invidious dividing lines” and a unique nondenominational chapel, designed by William Hosking. Charles Reed, a director of Abney Park, was also involved with the preservation of Bunhill Fields and its conversion to a public garden in the 1860s.)<br />
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It is sometimes alleged that Bunhill Fields is unconsecrated ground. But if actual evidence of consecration has been hard to find, it’s worth noting that Tindal and his successors employed an Anglican clergyman for persons who wanted a Church of England funeral. Susannah Wesley, mother of Charles and John Wesley and seventeen other children, was buried here in 1742. The Wesleys would never have countenanced their mother with her high-church Anglican sympathies being laid to rest in unconsecrated ground. John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, is himself buried in a small burial ground to the rear of Wesley’s Chapel across the City Road. Charles, a prolific writer of hymns, remained within the Church of England and is buried in his parish church of St Pancras. (Personally, I believe the suggestion that Bunhill Fields was unconsecrated ground came from the Ecclesiastical Commissioners since that would have made it easier to redevelop the land for building when the lease to the City Corporation ran out.)<br />
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The Bunhill Fields burial ground was in use from 1665 until 1854. At the time of its closure, approximately 123,000 interments were estimated to have taken place (it was allotted more land in 1700). Another 6,000 are buried behind Wesley’s Chapel just across City Road. In the Quaker burial ground to the west of Bunhill Row, lies George Fox (died 1691), founder of the Religious Society of Friends, with perhaps 20,000 others. The exact location of his grave site has been lost.<br />
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The original burial ground registers, from 1713 to 1854, are held at The National Archives at Kew. Other records, including interment order books dating from 1789 to 1854, and a list of the legible monument/headstone inscriptions in 1869, are held at London Metropolitan Archives. Surviving records include name and age of deceased, place from which body was brought, whether vault or grave, whether burial entailed removal of another corpse, minister’s fee, depth and situation of grave or vault, day and hour of burial and undertaker’s name and address, though not every burial, particularly the earliest, can be described in complete detail. The location of the grave is given by a grid reference (N & S, E & W). Traces of the grid numbering survive on the south wall.<br />
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The Baptist minister John Rippon—who was himself buried at Bunhill Fields in 1836—made transcripts of its monumental inscriptions in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, some copied while “laying on his side”. In 1803 he issued a prospectus, unimplemented, for a six-volume publication on the memorials there. The British Library now holds 14 manuscript volumes of his transcripts; a further six volumes are held in the College of Arms.<br />
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<i>Tomb of Dame Mary Page, from St John Adcock, ed., </i>Wonderful London<i> (London : Educational Book Company, 1926) p. 905.</i></div>
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The earliest recorded monumental inscription was that to “Grace, daughter of T. Cloudesly, of Leeds. February 1666”. The earliest surviving monument is believed to be the headstone to Theophilus Gale: the inscription reads “Theophilus Gale MA | Born 1628 | Died 1678”. Perhaps the most curious and certainly the grimmest is the inscription to the monument of Dame Mary Page (died 1729). It reads :<br />
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Here lyes Dame Mary Page. She departed this life March 11, 1728, in the 56th year of her age. | In 67 months she was tap’d [tapped] 66 times. Had taken away 240 gallons of water without ever repining at her case or ever fearing the operation.</blockquote>
Some of the most notable people from British history—especially British Nonconformist church history—are buried and commemorated here. There remain, now shaded by great plane trees, the graves and memorials of John Owen, theologian (1683); Lieutenant-General Charles Fleetwood, son-in-law of Oliver Cromwell (1692); Thomas Newcomen, early developer of steam engines (1729); Susannah Wesley, the “Mother of Methodism” (1742); Dr. Isaac Watts, the “father of the English Hymn” (1748); Thomas Bayes, statistician and philosopher (1761); Richard Price, preacher and pamphleteer (1791). These people represent only a tiny fraction of those buried in Bunhill Fields. There are many others of note, some of whom are better known for their achievements in a wide range of fields than for the nature of their Christian discipleship.<br />
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Buried in Bunhill Fields in 1748, Dr Isaac Watts was one of the most prolific hymn writers in the English language as well as being one of the earliest. Before Watts’s time, people sang psalms in churches rather than hymns; many of his hymns are paraphrases of one or more psalms. Critics have noticed that Blake’s <i>Songs of Innocence and of Experience</i> were influenced by Isaac Watts’s <i>Divine Songs attempted in Easy Language for the use of Children</i> (1715), an early volume of children’s verses, many of them hymns and all of them very moral. In several respects Watts’s verses for children anticipate Blake’s. The following passage comes from “Innocent Play”:<br />
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Abroad in the meadows to see the young lambs<br />
Run sporting about by the side of their dams,<br />
With fleeces so clean and so white;<br />
Or a nest of young doves in a large open cage,<br />
When they play all in love, without anger or rage,<br />
How much may we learn from the sight.<br />
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It’s almost there, but Blake is more succinct than Watts and leaves out the moralizing.<br />
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Thomas Bradbury, an outspoken defender of religious liberty (at least for his own brand of religion) and supporter of the Hanoverian succession, preached his last sermon on 12 August 1759, and fell ill shortly afterwards. He died, aged eighty-two, on 9 September 1759 and was buried in Bunhill Fields on 15 September. At the close of Queen Anne’s reign, Bradbury had occupied the pulpit of a meeting-house off Fetter Lane. In 1732 Bradbury’s congregation moved to a new chapel in Carey Street New Court, to the west of Fetter Lane, and the “Great Meeting House” stood empty until leased by the Moravians in 1742. The Brethren’s Chapel, Fetter Lane (as it became known) was to be the Moravians’ London centre for the next two hundred years. (William Blake’s mother, Catherine, and her first husband, Thomas Armitage, were to join the Moravian Congregation in November 1750.)<br />
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The dissenting churches viewed the Moravian Brethren with hostility. There seems to have been open enmity from Bradbury at Carey Street New Court. The Fetter Lane church diaries note in August 1743 :<br />
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Dr Earle & Mr Bradbury Dissenting Ministers preach’d (as we are told) against the Brethren this Afternoon. </blockquote>
This is the same Thomas Bradbury who, in Queen Anne’s reign, when the government proposed reducing the penalties on dissenters, vehemently opposed the changes since they would have applied to Catholics as well. Even with an old friend, Isaac Watts, there was a serious falling out when Bradbury criticized Isaac Watts’s <i>Psalms of David Imitated in the Language of the New Testament </i>(1719) and forbade the use of Watts’s ‘whims’ (<i>Hymns and Spiritual Songs</i>, 1707) in his services.<br />
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A very different Nonconformist minister, Thomas Bayes, was buried at Bunhill Fields in 1761. Presbyterian minister at Tunbridge Wells, amateur mathematician (and an inveterate gambler), Bayes is remembered for his development of ideas and concepts in the theory of probability. These are described in his “Essay Towards Solving a Problem in the Doctrine of Chances”, published posthumously in the <i>Philosophical Transactions </i>of the Royal Society of London in 1763; his notes were edited and published after his death by his friend Richard Price (also buried in Bunhill Fields).<br />
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Bayes established a mathematical basis for probability inference (a means of calculating, from the number of times an event has not occurred, the probability that it will occur in future trials). This fundamental proposition on probability is called Bayes’s Theorem, after him. The monument to members of the Bayes and Cotton families, including Thomas Bayes and his father Joshua, was restored in recent years at the expense of the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries.<br />
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Sometimes it’s just the mind-boggling numbers that attended a funeral that arouse our interest. Joseph Hart, independent minister and hymn-writer, died at his house at the sign of the Lamb, near Durham Yard, London, on 24 May 1768, aged fifty-six. He was buried in Bunhill Fields, where 20,000 people are said to have listened to Andrew Kinsman’s funeral oration. Could they all have fitted into the burial ground? Or did some view proceedings from Windmill Hill overlooking the graves? Perhaps half-a-dozen attended William Blake’s funeral, plus an Anglican clergyman and the undertaker’s men.<br />
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Robert Winter was pastor of the Independent church in Carey Street New Court from 1806, in succession to his grandfather, Thomas Bradbury, and his uncle, Richard Winter. He was four years younger than Blake, and was born in Brewer Street just around the corner from the Blake family at 28 Broad Street. The Carey Street New Court congregation included Rebekah Bliss, one of Blake’s earliest patrons. Rebekah herself was to remember the various charities associated with New Court in her will and made a substantial bequest to Robert Winter: “to the said Revd Dr Winter One thousand Pounds like 3 pr Cent Annuities”. Winter died in 1833 and Alfred Light records :<br />
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To Bunhill Fields his body was conveyed on August 17, and in the presence of a company of people, estimated to number at least two thousand, it was deposited in the family tomb.</blockquote>
I am tempted into biographical speculation. Could William Blake have known the Winter family from childhood? Was the lawyer James Blake, who had chambers in Carey Street, William’s uncle? Could Blake while visiting his uncle, have also visited the Carey Street chapel? Was it at the chapel that he met his patron Rebekah Bliss?<br />
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In 1769 an Act of Parliament gave the City of London Corporation the right to continue to lease the ground from the prebendal estate for 99 years. The City authorities continued to let the ground to their tenant as a burial ground until in 1778 the Corporation decided to manage it directly.<br />
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In the years before closure, some sixteen hundred burials took place each year. The poet Robert Bloomfield in his <i>Journal of a Tour down the River Wye</i> (written 1807; published posthumously in 1824) compares a Welsh country churchyard favourably with Bunhill Fields<br />
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it was a beautiful, sad, and impressive sight; which will make me detest the unhallowed mob of bones in Bunhill fields more than I ever did before: let me be buried any where but in a crowd! </blockquote>
Bloomfield himself, when he died in 1823, was laid to rest in the quiet burying ground of All Saints, Campton, Bedfordshire.<br />
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By the 1850s, Bunhill Fields was deemed to be full. The burial ground is a vivid example of London’s old cramped cemeteries, with forests of headstones and thousands of graves jammed into every possible space, like all of London’s burial places before large cemeteries further from the centre of the city opened from the 1830s onwards. Bunhill Fields has a very different feel to big Victorian cemeteries such as Abney Park or Kensal Rise, which were intended from the beginning to serve as parks as well as burial grounds.<br />
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<i>"Bunhill-Fields Burial-Ground", from </i>The Illustrated London News<i> (27 January 1865).</i></div>
<i></i><i></i><br />
In 1852 the Burial Act had been passed which enabled burial grounds to be closed once they could accommodate no further burials. An Order for Closure for Bunhill Fields was made on December 29, 1853, and the last burial (that of a 15-year old girl, Elizabeth Howell Oliver) took place on 5 January 1854. Occasional interments continued to be permitted in existing vaults or graves: the final burial of this kind is believed to have been that of a Mrs Gabriel of Brixton in February 1860. By this date approximately 123,000 interments had taken place in the burial ground.<br />
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<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-sfHbyr8oOdw/XExQcIodARI/AAAAAAAAAu0/2Bj_Y_vpaycBUWObEqFo3AZQG8dr2etbwCLcBGAs/s1600/Ticket.jpg"><img border="0" height="301" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-sfHbyr8oOdw/XExQcIodARI/AAAAAAAAAu0/2Bj_Y_vpaycBUWObEqFo3AZQG8dr2etbwCLcBGAs/s400/Ticket.jpg" width="400" /></a><br />
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<i>Bunhill Fields : Ticket to the Opening Ceremony on Thursday October 14th, 1869. At 3 o’Clock Precisely.—Published by Pardon and Son, London, 1869. </i><br />
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CvUNCaOFK2U/XExQfpKzVcI/AAAAAAAAAu4/6-QZnFOK3w0PXFl_3pTB5QrZbt3cT_MZACLcBGAs/s1600/Ticket_verso.jpg"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CvUNCaOFK2U/XExQfpKzVcI/AAAAAAAAAu4/6-QZnFOK3w0PXFl_3pTB5QrZbt3cT_MZACLcBGAs/s400/Ticket_verso.jpg" width="307" /></a><br />
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<i>Bunhill Fields : Ticket to the Opening Ceremony on Thursday October 14th, 1869. (Verso).</i></div>
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Bunhill Fields Burial Ground now comprises 4 acres (1.6 ha) located in the London Borough of Islington but owned and maintained by the City of London as a public open space. The lease for the land was due to be passed to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners for England in 1867; however, fears that the land might be used for building or other secular purposes resulted in the passage of the Bunhill Fields Burial Ground Act of 1867. The Corporation of London undertook to preserve Bunhill Fields burial ground and maintain it for the use of the public. Improvements were made to the cemetery including laying-out of footpaths and the planting of trees. The grounds were re-opened by the Lord Mayor on the 14 October 1869. Bunhill Fields has thus been managed as a public open space by the City of London Corporation for 150 years, first under the 1867 Act and latterly under the City of London (Various Powers) Act of 1960.<br />
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<i>"In the Dissenters' Disused Burial Ground at Bunhill Fields", from St John Adcock, ed., Wonderful London (London : Educational Book Company, 1926), p, 902.</i></div>
<i></i><br />
The current layout of Bunhill Fields Burial Ground was developed in two main phases. The first of these was in the 1860s, when the City of London improved the site: undertaking tree planting with avenues of London planes, paths, seating, raising of tombs, erection of railings, straightening of headstones and deciphering and re-cutting of inscriptions. In the 1960s another layer was added to the site with a sensitively designed public garden by one of the foremost landscape architects of the period, Peter Shepheard.<br />
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Bunhill Fields as we see it today is a postwar creation—the burial ground suffered severe bomb damage during the Second World War. It is also believed to have been the location of an anti-aircraft gun during the Blitz. In 1949 the Corporation recognised that the preservation of the site precluded admitting the general public, as many tombs were in a dangerous condition. Proposals were put forward to clear almost all the headstones and create a public “garden of rest” with just a few of the more “important” monuments preserved. The historian Anthony Wagner was almost the sole voice of protest :<br />
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This treatment of ancient City graveyards is open to objection on three distinct grounds. First, aesthetic: … the strong character of an eighteenth-century graveyard, with its proper touch of grimness, is replaced by a compromise with no character at all. Secondly, historical: this same character is a vivid expression of the age which made it, therefore perhaps antipathetic to our own, but also therefore to be preserved as visible history. Last and most, for the offence to natural piety. What would our forefathers have thought of a posthumous snobbery which, in the face of the Great Leveller, groups burials into three classes, “those of national and international fame . . ., those of eminence in their time: and the remainder in whom interest is largely confined to their descendants”? If the improvers are in doubt as to what would have been the feelings of those who raised these tombs or those whose bones they cover, let them read again Gray’s Elegy or Shakespeare’s epitaph. (Letter to the editor. The Times, 28 November 1949.)</blockquote>
The City of London (Various Powers) Act, 1960, vested the freehold with the City, but transferred responsibility for the 2,333 memorials to descendants of the interned. The City Corporation subsequently sought and obtained the Bunhill Fields Burial Ground Act, 1960, allowed for the clearing of the northern third of the site of most of its monuments. In major landscaping work by the landscape architect Peter Shepheard in 1964–65, the southern area remained dominated by the memorials, fenced off from public access by metal railings while to the north a new open lawn enclosed by shrub planting was created to complement the memorial landscape. With the addition of the new Blake memorial in 2018, the burial ground now contains 2,334 monuments, mostly simple headstones (of which there are 1,920) arranged in a grid formation.<br />
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The most prominent memorials today are those for John Bunyan (died 1688), author of The Pilgrim’s Progress; Daniel Defoe (died 1731), author of Robinson Crusoe and Journal of the Plague Year; and William Blake (died 1827), painter, poet, and prophet. Their graves have long been sites of cultural pilgrimage: Isabella Holmes stated in 1896 that the “most frequented paths” in the burial ground were those leading to the monuments of Bunyan and Defoe. In their present form, all these monuments post-date the closure of the burial ground. Their settings were further radically modified by the landscaping of 1964–65, when a paved north-south “broadwalk” was created in the middle of the burial ground to display them – outside the railed-off areas, accessible to visitors, and cleared of other monuments. Bunyan’s monument lies at the broadwalk’s southern end, and that to Defoe at its northern end, while Blake’s damaged headstone was moved from the site of his grave and repositioned next to Defoe, alongside the headstone to the lesser-known Joseph Swain (d. 1796). This arrangement survives, but in 2018 a second monument to Blake was placed on the actual site of his grave.<br />
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Bunhill Fields Burial Ground provides a valuable oasis of greenery in a highly urban area. It contains grassland, shrubbery, and fine mature trees (mostly London planes) which harbour birds and bats. The memorials, together with the shade provided by the tree cover, provide suitable habitat and micro-climate conditions for lichens, bryophytes and ferns. Its value for biodiversity is indicated by its designation as a Site of Borough Importance for Nature Conservation.<br />
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Whether by accident or sensitive planting, a figtree stands near the resited Blake headstone on the north-south “broadwalk”, reminding us of the figtree that provided shade though no fruit in the Blakes’ Lambeth garden.<br />
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In <i>Jerusalem</i> the puritanical Hand and Hyle condemn the “sinful delights”<br />
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Beneath the Oak & Palm, beneath the Vine and Fig-tree<br />
In self-denial!<br />
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In the <i>Book of Ahania</i>, the fig tree acts as a symbol of prosperity<br />
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Bursting on winds my odors,<br />
My ripe figs and rich pomegranates <br />
In infant joy at thy feet<br />
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And in the <i>Illustrations to the Book of Job</i>, with the advent of Job’s new spiritual awareness, the fig tree flourishes and bears fruit, and Job and his wife sit humbly beneath it upon a grassy mound.<br />
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For some 25 years after Shepheard’s landscaping, it was the Corporation’s policy not to use the powers available to it under the Act to repair memorials, with the result that considerable deterioration, decay and collapse occurred, exacerbated by the storms of 1987 and 1992. However, in November 1994 the Trees Gardens and City Open Spaces Committee reversed its maintenance policy, but allocated only modest resources, which have been used for emergency repairs.<br />
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The significance of the burial ground is recognised by the designation in 2011 of its historic landscape as a Grade I listed entry on the National Register of Historic Parks and Gardens, affording it special protection. In addition to this, 75 individual monuments are also Grade II listed, and Bunyan and Defoe’s memorials are Grade II* listed. The historic significance of the burial ground is further indicated by its designation as part of the Bunhill Fields and Finsbury Square Conservation Area.<br />
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Bunhill Fields Burial Ground has survived threats of redevelopment in the 1860s, neglect between the wars, bomb damage, narrowly escaping conversion to a “garden of rest”, partial demolition in the 1960s (however sensitively done), followed by years of further neglect. It remains still a profoundly moving historical monument and place of pilgrimage.<br />
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<b>Sources and Further Reading</b><br />
<b></b><br />
Paula R. Backscheider.—Daniel Defoe : his Life.—London : Taylor & Francis, 1992.<br />
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James Clare & Martin Holden.—”Rest in Pieces : Bunhill Repairs”.—Cornerstone : the Magazine of the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings.—Vol. 27 no 2 (2006).<br />
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Daniel Defoe.—A journal of the plague year : being observations or memorials, of the most remarkable occurrences, as well publick as private, which happened in London during the last great visitation in 1665. Written by a citizen who continued all the while in London. Never made publick before.—London : printed for E. Nutt at the Royal-Exchange ; J. Roberts in Warwick-Lane ; A. Dodd without Temple-Bar ; and J. Graves in St. James’s-Street, 1722.<br />
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Nathanael Hodges.—Loimologia, or, An historical account of the plague in London in 1665 : with precautionary directions against the like contagion. By Nath. Hodges, M.D. and fellow of the College of Physicians, who resided in the city all that time ...—The second edition.—London Printed for E. Bell, at the Cross Keys and Bible in Cornhill: and J. Osborn, at the Oxford-Arms in Lombard-street 1720.<br />
Though designated the “second edition”, this is the first English-language edition of a work originally published in Latin : Loimologia, sive, Pestis nuperæ apud populum Londinensem grassantis narratio historica.—Londini typis Gul. Godbid, sumptibus Josephi Nevill, 1672.<br />
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Isabella M. Holmes.—The London burial grounds : notes on their history from the earliest times to the present day. By Mrs. Basil Holmes.—London : T. Fisher Unwin, 1896.<br />
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Alfred W. Light.—Bunhill Fields : written in honour and to the memory of the many saints of God whose bodies rest in this old London cemetery.—London : C.J. Farncombe & Sons, ltd, 1915-33.—2 vols.<br />
Vol. I was first published 1913, and revised 1915.<br />
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London (City). Corporation.—Report of Director of Technical Services. Subject: Bunhill Fields conservation management plan.—London : The Corporation, 13 July 2004.—Ref. No.: DTS 064/04. Agenda items for Open Spaces Sub, 26 July 2004, and Finance Committee, 27 July 2004.<br />
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William Maitland.—The history of London : from its foundation by the Romans, to the present time. Containing A Faithful Relation of the Publick Transactions of the Citizens; Accounts of the several Parishes; Parallels between London and other Great Cities; its Governments, Civil, Ecclesiastical and Military; Commerce, State of Learning, Charitable Foundations, &c. With the several Accounts of Westminster, Middlesex, Southwark, And Other Parts within The Bill of Mortality. In nine books. The Whole Illustrated with a Variety of Fine Cuts. With a Compleat Index.—London : printed by Samuel Richardson, in Salisbury-Court near Fleetstreet, MDCCXXXIX.<br />
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Vivian de Sola Pinto.—”Isaac Watts and William Blake”.—The Review of English Studies, Vol. 20, No. 79 (July 1944), 214-223.<br />
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James Shirley.—The VVedding : As it was lately acted by her Maiesties Seruants, at the Phenix in Drury Lane.—London : printed for Iohn Groue, and are to be sold at his shop at Furniualls Inne Gate in Holborne, 1629.<br />
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Henry Wheatley.—London past and present : its history, associations, and traditions.—In three volumes.—London : John Murray, 1891.<br />
“Based upon The Handbook of London by the late Peter Cunningham.”<br />
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Photographs are by John Voos. Probably from <i>The Independent</i>.<br />
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Bunhill Fields is located between City Road and Bunhill Row in London EC1 (the nearest tube stations are Moorgate and Old Street), and it is open all year round. Information about guided tours and access to the fenced-off areas can be found <a href="http://www.cityoflondon.gov.uk/things-to-do/green-spaces/city-gardens/visitor-information/Pages/Bunhill-Fields.aspx">here</a>.Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-28694310523779928302018-12-24T10:55:00.002-08:002019-03-05T16:08:15.019-08:00The Artillery Ground and the long continuities of London lifeThe Bunhill Fields burial ground preserves the name of one of the three large fields (the others being Moorfields and Smithfield) that historically formed the Manor of Finsbury. The term field implies open land—land not used for the cultivation of crops but for the grazing of animals, the tenting of cloth (that is to say, the bleaching of linen in the sun), all kinds of sports and ball games, & so on—any activity that required space. I attribute to Peter Ackroyd the phrase “the long continuities of London life” though I can no longer trace the reference. It just may be that I heard him use the phrase in a lecture twenty or more years ago and it has resonated with me ever since.<br />
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The Finsbury fields were long a noted place for the practice of archery. A Child ballad (No 145B : “Robin Hood and Queen Katherine”), tells of an archery contest at Bunhill Fields :<br />
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In summer time, when leaves grow green,<br />
It is a seemly sight to see<br />
How Robin Hood himself had drest,<br />
And all his yeomandry. <br />
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He cloathed his men in Lincoln green,<br />
And himself in scarlet red,<br />
Black hats, white feathers, all alike ;<br />
Now bold Robin Hood is rid. <br />
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And when he came at Londons court,<br />
Hee fell downe on his knee:<br />
‘Thou art welcome, Locksly,’ said the queen,<br />
‘And all thy good yeomendree.’<br />
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<a name='more'></a> The king is into Finsbury field,<br />
Marching in battel ray,<br />
And after follows bold Robin Hood,<br />
And all his yeomen gay.<br />
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Child ballad 145A (“Robin Hoode and Quene Kath.”) is included in the Percy manuscript. The text I have quoted comes from Ritson’s <i>Robin Hood</i> (1795) “from an old black-letter copy in a private collection, compared with another in that of Anthony à Wood”.<br />
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Now William Blake engraved nine plates after Thomas Stothard for Ritson’s <i>A Select Collection of English Songs</i> (1783), so some personal acquaintanceship between Blake and Ritson is certainly possible, even that Blake himself used characters from these songs, like the “Busy, curious, thirsty Fly”, comparing the life of a fly to the life of man, in his own work :<br />
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Ritson Thine’s a summer, mine no more,<br />
Though repeated to threescore<br />
Threescore summers, when they’re gone<br />
Will appear as short as one.<br />
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Blake Then am I<br />
A happy fly,<br />
If I live,<br />
Or if I die.<br />
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Could Ritson, being an adherent to a “Pythagorean Diet” (the eighteenth-century term for a vegetarian), indeed be “Sipsop the Pythagorean” of Blake’s “An Island in the Moon”? Coincidentally, both Blake and Ritson lie in the Bunhill Fields burying ground.<br />
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By 1315, a much larger (23 acres; 9.3 ha) Bunhill Fields than we see today was leased to the City of London. And it would have been the City Corporation that in the year 1498, says Stow, arranged that<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
all the gardens which had continued time out of mind without Moorgate, to wit, about and beyond the lordship of Fensberry, were destroyed. And of them was made a plain field for archers to shoot in.</blockquote>
In fact, about 11 acres or 4.5 ha of the otherwise unenclosed landscape of Bunhill Fields was set aside to form a large field for military exercise.<br />
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<i>Map of “St Giles Cripplegate without. Old Street. Bunhill Fields.” (detail showing Artillery Ground and Burying Ground). From John Strype, A survey of the cities of London and Westminster, 1720.</i></div>
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As the arquebus and musket replaced the longbow, these eleven acres of Bunhill provided what today has shrunk to an 8-acre, or 3.2 ha, site given to the Honourable Artillery Company in 1638. The Company still occupies the land (the “Artillery Ground”) that it was granted in the 17th century; the Company’s headquarters, Armoury House, overlook the Ground. Contemporary documents often denominate it the New Artillery Ground, to distinguish it from the old one on the eastern side of Bishopsgate Street. South of the Artillery Ground is Chiswell Street and a grand gated entrance. Immediately to the north is the Bunhill Fields Burial Ground.<br />
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<i>Gates to Artillery Ground from Chiswell Street.</i></div>
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As well as the musketry practice implied in the name, the Artillery Ground provided space for other military activities. For mustering of recruits in 1642 :<br />
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On Sunday in the forenoone, the Ministers in the City gave notice in the Churches, that those that were able, and had good Religious affections to this cause, for the maintenance of the Protestant Religion in time of this eminent danger, should repair to the New Artillery Ground the next morning by 8. of the clock in the morning, and they should be listed for that service, under such Commanders as were persons of Worth, Experience and Fidelity. (<i>Perfect Diurnall of the Passages in Parliament</i>, November 14-21, 1642.)</blockquote>
Or celebrating a Parliamentary victory in 1643 :<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Vpon Saturday last Sir William Waller came to the new Artillery ground, accompanied with one of the Sheriffs of London, and attended by many Gallants, Commanders and Gentlemen, and great store of people came thither to be listed ; At the same time Colonel Manwering’s Regiment of Red Coates came home out of Kent, some of them having two Pikes, others two Swords and some of them long Bils, which they tooke from the Kentish Malignants, they also brought away one of their Colours, being red and white, and marched all together into the new Artillery ground, where they gave Sir William a brave volley of shot. (<i>Weekly Accompt of Certain Special and Remarkable Passages from Both Houses of Parliament</i>, July 27-August 3, 1643.)</blockquote>
And in 1650 as a military execution ground :<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Munday 18 Novem. One Johnson was shot to death in the new Artillery ground London, for killing one Williams his fellow Trooper. (<i>Severall Proceedings in Parliament</i>, November 14-21, 1650.)</blockquote>
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These instances remind us of Oliver Cromwell and the English Civil War, and that the Bunhill Fields burial ground contains the graves of Henry and Richard Cromwell, the Protector’s grandsons. The burial ground also contains the tomb of General Fleetwood, Cromwell's son-in-law, and ancestor of Blake’s friends, John and Cornelius Varley.<br />
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David Erdman has suggested that Blake’s intended 12-book <i>Milton</i> contained a prophetic vision of the English Civil War for we find King Charles, Cromwell, and Satan joined on the same battleground. Fragmentary references survive, for example in Plate 5 of the Poem in 2 Books :<br />
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Thus they sing Creating the Three Classes among Druid Rocks<br />
Charles calls on Milton for Atonement. Cromwell is ready<br />
James calls for fires in Golgonooza. for heaps of smoking ruins<br />
In the night of prosperity and wantonness which he himself Created <br />
Among the Daughters of Albion among the Rocks of the Druids<br />
When Satan fainted beneath the arrows of Elynittria<br />
And Mathematic Proportion was subdued by Living Proportion<br />
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Northrop Frye (I can’t now trace the reference) believes Elynittria, the emanation of Palamabron (Blake himself in the poem), bears a name developed anagramatically from artillery, in its original sense of a shower of arrows. And Milton? He lived in Bunhill Row, which forms the western boundary of the Artillery Ground.<br />
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The eighteenth century saw more peaceful uses. The Ground was sublet to a greenkeeper and the sward cropped by sheep to create a playing-surface for games of cricket. The Artillery Ground grew in prominence as a cricket venue when George Smith was keeper in the 1730s. The pattern of lease and sub-lease and sub-sub-lease: the Dean and Chapter of St Paul’s leasing to the City Corporation, who leased to the Honourable Artillery Company, and so on, is itself one of the long continuities of London life.<br />
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The earliest recorded cricket match at the Artillery Ground took place on 31 August 1730, between London and Surrey. London won but no other details are known. The ground quickly became the London Cricket Club’s first choice home venue with five matches recorded there in 1731: three against Dartford and two against Croydon. Cricket at the Artillery Ground had a social status that only Lord’s Cricket Ground subsequently equalled.<br />
<br />
The Ground is famous for being the venue of the first “Great Match” of which the full score has been preserved—Kent v. All England, 18 June 1744. As well as hosting the “Great Matches”, Smith staged more explicitly commercial events such as single-wicket contests in which leading professionals played against each other in teams of fewer than eleven or as individuals.<br />
<br />
By 1732 the playing area had been staked out and roped off. This practice was first reported at Kennington Common the previous year and cricket is believed to be the first sport to enclose its venues. The Artillery Ground was charging spectators a two pence admission fee by the early 1740s; cricket also being the first sport to charge for admission. His biographers record the young William Blake as wandering all over the London of his time. There is certainly the possibility that besides witnessing or, indeed, playing in family and friends cricket, Blake may have witnessed more formal matches at the Artillery Ground. But did he pay the tuppence admission, or like small boys everywhere, find a way of sneaking into the ground or sitting on the surrounding wall?<br />
<br />
Eighteenth-century newspapers had no sports pages. Cricket reports stressed what was newsworthy: violence at matches, freak accidents, and betting odds.<br />
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1747 saw the notorious cricket match between the Women of Singleton & Charlton v. the Women of West Dean & Chilgrove. In advance of the event it was reported that<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Twenty two young Women are coming to Town from Sussex, to play a Match of Cricket in the Artillery Ground, eleven a Side; it is said they play very well, being encouraged to improve themselves in that Game, by a Lady of very high Rank in their neighbourhood, who likes the Diversion. (<i>Whitehall Evening Post</i>, 4-7 July 1747.)</blockquote>
The Lady can only have been Sarah, Duchess of Richmond (and mother of Charles Lennox, the third Duke of Richmond and lord lieutenant of Sussex, who would sit on the bench at Blake’s trial in Chichester). Such was the interest in the game that when it was played at the Artillery Ground on 13 and 14 July, at a cost of some £80, the admission charge for the ground was raised to 6d.<br />
<br />
The first day of play ended in a near riot when many of the large gathering who attended encroached on the field and the players were abused and assaulted :<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
On Monday, in playing the Women’s Cricket Match, the Company broke in, so that it was impossible for the same to be play’d; and some of them [the players] being very much fright’d and others, hurt, it could not be finished till this Morning (July 14), when at nine o’clock, they will finish the same, hoping the Company will be so kind as to indulge them in not walking within the ring, which will not only be a great Pleasure to them, but a general satisfaction to the whole. (<i>Daily Advertiser</i>, July 14 , 1747.)</blockquote>
After completing the first match a second was to be played starting at two o’clock, but there is no report as to the outcome of either match or whether any further trouble occurred.<br />
<br />
Newspapers reported the large sums of money involved in these matches :<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
On Monday a great Cricket-Match was play’d in the Artillery-Ground, for 50l. a Side, between Eleven Men from Surrey, and Eleven pick’d out of London: The Countrymen went in first and brought 84 Notches, the Londoners second and brought 89; then the Countrymen went in and got 126, and it being too late the Londoners went in on Tuesday Morning and brought 71; so that Surrey beat London by 50 Notches, and had six Wickets to knock down. (<i>London Evening Post</i>, July 26-28, 1757.)</blockquote>
£50 in 1757 would be about £9,000 today.<br />
<br />
Also deemed newsworthy were the accidents involved in the game :<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
And Yesterday a young Gentleman, who was playing at Cricket in the Artillery-Ground, had his Eye knocked out by the Ball. (<i>London Chronicle</i>, June 30-July 2, 1757.)</blockquote>
Single wicket was especially popular in the 1740s and vast crowds, gambling huge sums of money were attracted to the Artillery Ground whenever these contests took place. In 1765 a crowd of 12,000 was reported to have attended a match of Dartford against Surrey at the Artillery Ground. Such was the level of gambling and associated riotous behaviour at the Ground that it eventually fell into disrepute and ceased to be used for first-class cricket, the last known such match taking place on 25 September 1778. Of course, single-wicket and five-a-side matches continued there, even after the big matches moved to Hambledon in Hampshire in the 1760s, and later to the Marylebone Cricket Club ground, Lord’s :<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Yesterday was finished, after two days play in the Artillery-ground, the cricket match of five of a side ; the counties of Surry and Hampshire against Kent, which terminated in favour of the former, with one wicket to go down. Odds at starting six to four, and two to one in favour of Kent. (<i>Morning Post and Daily Advertiser</i>, Wednesday, June 9, 1779.)</blockquote>
First-class cricket was reinstated at the Artillery Ground in 1846 but not for what were then known as “important” matches. Stephen Eley, who knows the ground, tells me that it is very compact but “the boundaries are a bit too short”. The Honourable Artillery Company Cricket Club was founded in 1860 and has played on the ground ever since. <br />
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-EcprxD006N0/XEeGjnb0hZI/AAAAAAAAArc/XKEFRob4snw28bVjScsQUe9bj-exhmxlACLcBGAs/s1600/Lunardi.jpg"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-EcprxD006N0/XEeGjnb0hZI/AAAAAAAAArc/XKEFRob4snw28bVjScsQUe9bj-exhmxlACLcBGAs/s400/Lunardi.jpg" width="361" /></a></div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Drawing of Vincent Lunardi copied from the engraving by Bartolozzi after Cosway. The inscription reads : “Vincent Lunardi—Esqr Secretary to the Neapolitan Embassador & the first Traveller ærial in the English Atmosphere 15 Sepr 1784”.</i></div>
<i></i><br />
On 15 September 1784, Vincenzo Lunardi flew a balloon from the Artillery Ground, the first such flight in England, and the balloon hat, a bulky linen case stuffed with hair, like a deflating balloon, came briefly into vogue. In Blake’s “An Island in the Moon” we hear the chatter of Miss Gittipin, a woman eager to emerge into the world of fashion. Her particular envy is the wealthy Miss Filigree-work, who can afford to live up to the moment :<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
she goes out in her coaches & her footman & her maids & Stormonts & Balloon hats & a pair of Gloves every day & the Sorrows of Werter & Robinsons & the Queen of Frances Puss colour & my Cousin Gibble Gabble says that I am like nobody else. I might as well be in a nunnery.</blockquote>
Stormonts were dresses of printed chintz with a stipple ground in pale tint. Stormont grounds became fashionable in the 1780s.<br />
<br />
Miss Filligree-work’s “Sorrows of Werter” are stylish hats and dresses inspired by Goethe’s popular novel. The earliest known reference to such a style appeared in the <i>Gazetteer</i> of December 9, 1784. There the “Werter bonnet” is reported to be “much the rage”.<br />
<br />
Mary “Perdita” Robinson, one time mistress to the Prince of Wales (the future George IV), managed to be a courtesan, a society belle, and a leader of fashion. There was a “Perdita hood” and a “Perdita handkerchief”, a “Robinson hat” and a “Robinson gown”.<br />
<br />
Marie Antoinette introduced a new colour to fashion in the summer of 1775. The dressmaker Rose Bertin made her a gown that blurred the lines between brown and maroon with a hint of pinkish-gray; in a word, “puce”, the French for flea.<br />
<br />
The “air balloon hat” <i>à la Montgolfier</i> is featured in <i>Town and Country Magazine</i> for May 1784. Later that year, the <i>Lady’s Magazine</i>, a publication for which Blake is said to have engraved some plates, discussed it (now <i>à la Lunardi</i>) as an “absurd style” except for women “in affluent circumstances”. (The National Portrait Gallery has a portrait of <a href="https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw00161">Fanny Burney</a> wearing just such a hat.)<br />
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Who knew Blake was such a fashion maven?<br />
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<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-3kTrC-zVbb4/XCFO9btLJ3I/AAAAAAAAAqk/njg0hXmucVsq97_ZOtGOt9UugC64zw8WACEwYBhgL/s1600/Artillery_Ground_Cricket.JPG"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-3kTrC-zVbb4/XCFO9btLJ3I/AAAAAAAAAqk/njg0hXmucVsq97_ZOtGOt9UugC64zw8WACEwYBhgL/s400/Artillery_Ground_Cricket.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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<i>Cricket match at the Artillery Ground, 12 August 2018.</i></div>
<i></i><br />
On 12 August 2018, while we witnessed the unveiling of a memorial to William Blake in the burial ground, a cricket match was underway on the Artillery Ground immediately to the south. Thus, in the long continuities of London life, cricket was being played on the Artillery Ground as it has for the last three hundred years.<br />
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<b>Sources and further reading</b><br />
<b></b><br />
17th-18th Century Burney Collection Newspapers.—<a href="https://www.gale.com/">https://www.gale.com</a><br />
<br />
Anthony Bateman & Jeffrey Hill, eds.—The Cambridge Companion to Cricket.—Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 2011.<br />
<br />
Francis James Child, editor.—The English and Scottish Popular Ballads.—Part V.—Boston : Houghton, Mifflin ; London : Henry Stevens, 1888.<br />
<br />
David V. Erdman.—Blake : Prophet Against Empire : a Poet’s Interpretation of the History of his Own Times.—Princeton NJ : Princeton University Press, 1954.<br />
<br />
David V. Erdman.—The illuminated Blake.—New York : Doubleday, 1974.<br />
<br />
Timothy J. McCann.—Sussex cricket in the Eighteenth Century.—Sussex Record Society.—Vol. 88, 2004.<br />
<br />
Michael Phillips, ed.—Blake’s An Island in the Moon.—Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 1987. With a facsimile of Blake’s manuscript.<br />
<br />
Joseph Ritson.—Robin Hood : a collection of all the ancient poems, songs, and ballads, now extant, relative to that celebrated English outlaw : to which are prefixed historical anecdotes of his life. In two volumes ...—London : printed for T. Egerton, Whitehall, and J. Johnson, St. Pauls-Church-Yard, MDCCXCV.<br />
<br />
Renowned Robin Hood : or, his famous archery truly related : with the worthy exploits he acted before Queen Katherine, he being an out-law man, and how she for the same obtained of the king, his owne, and his fellowes pardon. To a new tune.—Printed at London : for Francis Groue, [ca. 1630].<br />
<br />
R. J. Shroyer.—”Mr. Jacko ‘Knows What Riding Is’ in 1785 : dating Blake’s Island in the Moon.”—Blake/An Illustrated Quarterly, Volume 12, Issue 4 (Spring 1979) 250-256.<br />
<br />
John Stow.—A survey of London, written in the year 1598.—A new edition edited by William J. Thoms.—London : Whittaker, 1842.<br />
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Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-79110422719336943752018-03-08T09:16:00.002-08:002019-02-20T13:20:12.959-08:00A Fugs DiscographyIn this simple discography of The Fugs, Ed Sanders, and Tuli Kupferberg, I attempt to list each recording (LP, Single, CD, tape or cassette) that I have been able to trace, though omitting downloads and online content. Reissues are usually noted with the original publication, but I list separately reissued discs where there is variation of title or of content. There may well be inconsistencies in the coverage. With the ESP recordings in particular, there are numerous variations in the packaging and labelling of the album which I shall not attempt to enumerate here.<br />
<br />
The Fugs themselves were formed in New York City in 1964 by Ed Sanders and Tuli Kupferberg, with Ken Weaver on drums. Later that year they were joined by Peter Stampfel and Steve Weber of The Holy Modal Rounders. Sanders says the Fugs started out with an air of anything-goes possibility—what a show could be and how the band would progress were entirely up for grabs.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
We started out in Greenwich Village, on the Lower East Side, and we were in the middle of a lot of music: the jazz clubs, the civil-rights songs, the folk movement, rock’n’roll. Everyone had guitars in their apartments, and we’d put beat poetry to music. It was a time when you could rent a store front, rent a smoke machine, have someone dancing in a bathtub full of grapes, play some songs, and you could charge admission.—S<span style="font-size: x-small;">ANDERS</span></blockquote>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>1965</b></div>
<a name='more'></a><br />
<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Tb1mlEX_3jc/WqAyvMl0O8I/AAAAAAAAAiU/hGFKmad7H-4LadG6Cd-TjfePUUNxiG_gwCEwYBhgL/s1600/Image_6_The_Fugs.jpg" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: transparent; clear: left; color: #0066cc; float: left; font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; margin-bottom: 16px; margin-right: 16px; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-decoration: underline; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"><img border="0" height="198" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Tb1mlEX_3jc/WqAyvMl0O8I/AAAAAAAAAiU/hGFKmad7H-4LadG6Cd-TjfePUUNxiG_gwCEwYBhgL/s200/Image_6_The_Fugs.jpg" width="200" /></a><b></b><i></i><u></u><sub></sub><sup></sup><strike></strike><br />
The Fugs.—<b>The Village Fugs Sing Ballads of Contemporary Protest, Point of Views, and General Dissatisfaction</b>.—Broadside Records/Folkways, US, 1965.—BR304/FW 05304 (LP, Album, 33⅓ RPM, Mono)<br />
Tracklist: (<i>side</i> A) Slum Goddess—<b>William Blake, Ah! Sunflower, Weary of Time</b>—Supergirl—A. C. Swinburne, Swinburne Stomp—I Couldn’t Get High (<i>side</i> B) <b>William Blake, How Sweet I Roamed From Field To Field</b>—Seize The Day—My Baby Done Left Me—Boobs A Lot—Nothing.<br />
Performers : John Anderson, Tuli Kupferberg, Vinny Leary, Ed Sanders, Pete Stampfel, Ken Weaver, Steve Weber.<br />
“The Village Fugs” was released in 1965 on Broadside Records, a subdivision of Folkways, and reissued in 1966 as “The Fugs First Album” on ESP Disk.<br />
This first album included two William Blake tracks: “Ah! Sunflower”, from Songs of Innocence and of Experience, and “How Sweet I Roamed from Field to Field”, from Blake’s juvenile Poetical Sketches. These were, almost certainly, the first pop or rock settings of Blake’s verse.<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>1966</b></div>
<b></b><br />
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-syxlcPUz7G0/WqF3po5j6NI/AAAAAAAAAig/jws6Jh9aDg05TlbWVL5TPTUTmTaXgpJmwCLcBGAs/s1600/R-844770-1214272674.jpeg.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-syxlcPUz7G0/WqF3po5j6NI/AAAAAAAAAig/jws6Jh9aDg05TlbWVL5TPTUTmTaXgpJmwCLcBGAs/s200/R-844770-1214272674.jpeg.jpg" /></a>The Fugs.—<b>The Fugs First Album</b>.—ESP Disk, US, 1966.—ESP 1018 (LP, Album, 33⅓ RPM, Mono)<br />
Tracklist: (<i>side</i> A) Slum Goddess—<b>William Blake, Ah! Sunflower, Weary of Time</b>—Supergirl—A. C. Swinburne, Swinburne Stomp—I Couldn’t Get High (<i>side</i> B) <b>William Blake, How Sweet I Roamed From Field To Field</b>—Seize The Day—I Feel Like Homemade Shit—Boobs A Lot—Nothing.<br />
Performers : John Anderson, Tuli Kupferberg, Vinny Leary, Ed Sanders, Pete Stampfel, Ken Weaver, Steve Weber.<br />
An uncensored reissue of “The Village Fugs...” (Broadside BR304). Distributed Fontana, UK, 1969.—STL5513888814TY<br />
Reissued on CD with additional tracks, 1993.<br />
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<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-aRdhxTgUikM/WqGY71sMJdI/AAAAAAAAAiw/0MEUR9hCQqw2eUf5tZz2vTnHUOTES6KBACLcBGAs/s1600/R-4710843-1373028526-8321.jpeg.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-aRdhxTgUikM/WqGY71sMJdI/AAAAAAAAAiw/0MEUR9hCQqw2eUf5tZz2vTnHUOTES6KBACLcBGAs/s200/R-4710843-1373028526-8321.jpeg.jpg" width="198" /></a><br />
The Fugs.—<b>The Fugs</b>.—ESP Disk, US, 1966.—ESP 1028 (LP, Album, 33⅓ RPM, Mono)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Frenzy—I Want To Know—Skin Flowers—Group Grope—Coming Down—Dirty Old Man (<i>side</i> B) Kill For Peace—Morning, Morning—Doin’ All Right—Virgin Forest.<br />
Performers : John Anderson, Lee Crabtree, Pete Kearney, Betsy Klein, Tuli Kupferberg, Vinny Leary, Ed Sanders, Ken Weaver<br />
Issued, as usual, with numerous variations in packaging.<br />
Issued in Europe with variant titles “The Fugs II” or “The Fugs Second Album” and reissued on CD with five bonus tracks, 1993.<br />
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The Fugs.—<b>Frenzy</b>.—ESP Disk, US, 1966.—ESP 4507 (Single, 45 RPM)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Frenzy (<i>side</i> B) I Want to Know.<br />
<br />
The Fugs.—<b>Kill for Peace</b>.—ESP Disk, US, 1966.—ESP 4508 (Single, 45 RPM)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Kill for Peace (<i>side</i> B) Morning Morning.<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>1967</b></div>
<b></b><br />
<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-I84g645cSts/WqGZbyz7NnI/AAAAAAAAAi4/P7zI4Ntt2LknRc0pgff1QONsCygwhlWCACLcBGAs/s1600/R-1440745-1321964395.jpeg.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-I84g645cSts/WqGZbyz7NnI/AAAAAAAAAi4/P7zI4Ntt2LknRc0pgff1QONsCygwhlWCACLcBGAs/s200/R-1440745-1321964395.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a><br />
<b>The East Village Other : Electric Newspaper (Hiroshima Day)</b>.—ESP Disk, US, 1967.—ESP 1034 (LP, Album, 33⅓ RPM, Mono)<br />
<APKD><br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Plastic clock radio, Luci’s Wedding—Steve Weber, If I Had Half a Mind—Gerard Malanga & Ingrid Superstar, Gossip—Velvet Underground, Noise—Marion Brown, Scott Holt, & Ron Jackson, Jazz Improvisation—Allen Ginsberg & Peter Orlovsky, Mantras (<i>side</i> B) Plastic clock radio, Luci’s Wedding—<b>Tuli Kupferberg</b>, Love and Ashes, sung by Kupferberg & Vicki Pollon, with Peter Rawson on guitar—Ishmael Reed reading from his novel The Free Lance Pall Bearers—Andy Warhol, Silence—Ken Weaver & <b>Ed Sanders</b>, Interview with Hairy.<br />
This collage/montage documents the electric underground newspaper party the East Village Other recorded to commemorate Hiroshima Day in August 1966 during Luci Baines Johnson's wedding.<br />
The short instrumental “Noise” by the Velvet Underground is their very first recording to be released.<br />
Reissued on CD by Get Back, US, 2000.<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-jtjsss2YN-s/WqG2Wu5MFCI/AAAAAAAAAjI/7tbYhgE9nkkb0jutyXLKcCaaVeOFsq3dACLcBGAs/s1600/R-5579777-1397112154-1102.jpeg.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-jtjsss2YN-s/WqG2Wu5MFCI/AAAAAAAAAjI/7tbYhgE9nkkb0jutyXLKcCaaVeOFsq3dACLcBGAs/s200/R-5579777-1397112154-1102.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a><br />
Tuli Kupferberg.—<b>No Deposit No Return</b>.—ESP Disk, US, 1967.—ESP 1035 (LP, Album, 33⅓ RPM, Mono)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Pubol—Social Studies—The Hidden Dissuaders—Lifetime Guarantee—The Art Scene—Wants Ads 1—Rangoon Rambler—Purina—Lanoflo (<i>side</i> B) The Hyperemiator—The Sap Glove—The Bunny Mother—Auto-Da-Fe—Fields Matrimonial Service—Want Ads 2—Howard Johnson’s Army—No Deposit No Return<br />
Effects: Gary Elton<br />
Spoken Word<br />
“An album of popular poetry. Pop poetry. Real advertisements. As they appeared in newspapers, magazines, direct mail. No word has been added. There [<i>sic</i>] are genuine ads. Parts of some ads have been repeated. Parts of some ads have been omitted. But these are the very texts. These are for real!”<br />
Some copies on yellow vinyl.<br />
<br />
The Fugs.—<b>The Fugs Eat It</b>.—Atlantic Records, US, 1967. Unreleased.<br />
Rejected by Jerry Wexler after completion (tracks later released on CD in 1993 in a partial compilation with “The Fugs” as “The Fugs Second Album”).<br />
<br />
<br />
<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-hWuizM3HZ24/WqJtshPRqTI/AAAAAAAAAjo/djNQcdsrWtMz4eh_FQppPBtDKhho0ThVgCLcBGAs/s1600/R-1439510-1346558425-2165.jpeg.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-hWuizM3HZ24/WqJtshPRqTI/AAAAAAAAAjo/djNQcdsrWtMz4eh_FQppPBtDKhho0ThVgCLcBGAs/s200/R-1439510-1346558425-2165.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a><br />
The Fugs.—<b>Tenderness Junction</b>.—Reprise Records, US, 1967.—RS 6280 (LP, Album, 33⅓ RPM, Mono)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Turn On/Tune In/Drop Out—Knock Knock—The Garden Is Open—Wet Dream—Hare Krishna (<i>side</i> B) Exorcising the Evil Spirits from the Pentagon October 21, 1967—War Song—<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; display: inline; float: none; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;">Matthew Arnold, </span>Dover Beach—Fingers Of The Sun—Aphrodite Mass (In 5 Sections) Litany Of The Street Grope, Genuflection At The Temple Of Squack, Petals In The Sea, Sappho’s Hymn To Aphrodite, Homage To Throb Thrills.<br />
Performers: John Anderson, Lee Crabtree, Stefan Grossman, Danny Kootch, Tuli Kupferberg, Vinny Leary, Charles Larkey, Bob Mason, Ken Pine, Ed Sanders, Ken Weaver, Steve Weber.<br />
“Hare Krishna”, the closing track on side A, features Gregory Corso, Allen Ginsberg, Maretta Greer, and The Fug Chorale.<br />
Richard Avedon photo on cover.<br />
Reissued Wounded Bird Records, US, 2011.—WOU 6280.<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-vYQRsnt5km4/WqMEJX_17ZI/AAAAAAAAAj4/RrW9FQxAAikVMfcWtIb06pP1pSGtj2owwCLcBGAs/s1600/R-11583403-1518910960-4065.jpeg.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-vYQRsnt5km4/WqMEJX_17ZI/AAAAAAAAAj4/RrW9FQxAAikVMfcWtIb06pP1pSGtj2owwCLcBGAs/s200/R-11583403-1518910960-4065.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a><br />
The Fugs.—<b>Virgin Fugs</b>.—ESP Disk, US, 1967.—ESP 1038 (LP, Album, 33⅓ RPM, Mono)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) We’re The Fugs—New Amphetamine Shriek—Saran Wrap—The Ten Commandments—Hallucination Horrors—I Command The House Of The Devil (<i>side</i> B) C.I.A. Man—Coca Cola Douche—My Bed Is Getting Crowded—Caca Rocka—I Saw The Best Minds Of My Generation Rot.<br />
Performers : John Anderson, Tuli Kupferberg, Vinny Leary, Ed Sanders, Peter Stampfel, Ken Weaver, Steve Weber.<br />
A tremendously raw collection of outtakes from the first album that was issued by ESP against the band’s wishes ; the label bootlegged their own band! Disowned by The Fugs and air-brushed out of the official early-years box set “Don’t Stop, Don’t Stop” (2008).<br />
Reissued (digitally restored) ESP Disk, US, 2005.—ESP 1038 (CD, Album).<br />
<br />
<br />
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-2B13uBjokZk/WqMEw7qpWeI/AAAAAAAAAkA/wLBfYDSQZXwS3Ff36uQwF9bstVDkguz3QCLcBGAs/s1600/R-5005766-1381934177-5690.jpeg.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-2B13uBjokZk/WqMEw7qpWeI/AAAAAAAAAkA/wLBfYDSQZXwS3Ff36uQwF9bstVDkguz3QCLcBGAs/s200/R-5005766-1381934177-5690.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a><br />
<b>Poems for Peace</b>.—Broadside Records, US, 1967.—BR 465 (LP, Album, 33⅓ RPM, Mono)<br />
<APKD><br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Allen Ginsberg, Auto Poesy to Nebraska—Peter Orlovsky, June 20, 1961, Tangiers—Allen Katzman, Elegy, Poems from Oklahoma—Harold Dicker, The Mouth is a Zoo, The Prize of War is Always—Jackson Mac Low, Speech—David Antin, from “The Black Plague” (<i>side</i> B) <b>Ed Sanders</b>, Peace Freak Poem—Paul Blackburn, Is any Coherence Worth the Celebration? December Sixth and Seventh—Armand Schwerner, from “The Tablets,” The Emptying—Art Berger, Life has no Dimension—Walter Lowenfels, All Our Valises are Packed—Allen Plantz, Heat Wave (A Discontinuous Poem).<br />
Spoken word.<br />
Booklet containing poems inserted.<br />
“A benefit reading for the New York Workshop in Nonviolence at St Mark’s Church in the Bouwerie.”<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>1968</b></div>
<br />
<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-tzIo0B8tKA4/WqO5ezkzZTI/AAAAAAAAAkQ/TgL0uWPqs4oDIDOyGjSI7cxoNdj6jmxnQCLcBGAs/s1600/R-767632-1438541703-1459.jpeg.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-tzIo0B8tKA4/WqO5ezkzZTI/AAAAAAAAAkQ/TgL0uWPqs4oDIDOyGjSI7cxoNdj6jmxnQCLcBGAs/s200/R-767632-1438541703-1459.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a><br />
The Fugs.—<b>It Crawled Into My Hand, Honest</b>.—Reprise Records, US, 1968.—Reprise Records 6305, RS 6305 (LP, Album, 33⅓ RPM, Stereo)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Crystal Liaison—Ramses II Is Dead My Love—Burial Waltz—Wide River—Life Is Strange (<i>side</i> B) Johnny Pissoff Meets The Red Angel—Marijuana—Leprechaun—When The Mode Of The Music Changes—Whimpers Of The Jello—The Divine Toe (Part I)—We’re Both Dead Now, Alice—Life Is Funny—Grope Need (Part 1)—Tuli, Visited By The Ghost Of Plotinus—More Grope Need (Grope Need ; Part 2)—Robinson Crusoe—Claude Pelieu and J. J. Lebel Discuss The Early Verlaine Bread Crust Fragments—The National Haiku Contest—The Divine Toe ( Part II)—Irene.<br />
Performers : The Fugs Chorus (Barbara Calabria, Bob Dorough, Bob Hanson, Earl Baker, James Jarvis, Jennifer Brown, Kenneth Bates, Leslie Dorsey, Marlys Trunkhill), Danny Kootch, Tuli Kupferberg, Charles Larkey, Bob Mason, Ken Pine, Ed Sanders, Ken Weaver.<br />
A Transatlantic Records reissue (TRA 181) also helped to make them more widely known on the European side of the Atlantic. Reissued on CD, Wounded Bird Records, US, 2011.—WOU 6305.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Meanwhile we were recording what would be our triumphal album of the 1960s, It Crawled into My Hand, Honest. ... I created a lengthy “Magic Rite,” which we recorded. Ken Weaver wrote “Aztec Hymn,” which we also recorded. And I worked with jazz composer Burton Greene on another long work, “Beautyway,” based on a Navajo ceremony. We also recorded a song about poet <b>William Blake</b> walking naked with his wife Catherine, while reading Milton’s Paradise Lost in their garden in 1793. None of these tunes would wind up on the album.—S<span style="font-size: x-small;">ANDERS</span>.</blockquote>
This album can also be found as tracks 11 to 30 on “Electromagnetic Steamboat” (2001).<br />
<br />
The Fugs.—<b>Crystal Liaison</b>.—Big T, UK, 1968.—BIG 115 (Single, 45 RPM)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Crystal Liaison (<i>side</i> B) When the Mode of the Music Changes<br />
<br />
The Fugs.—<b>It Crawled Into My Hand, Honest</b>.—Reprise Records, US, 1968.—R 6305, Playtape No. 0944 (Audio Tape, EP)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Crystal Liaison—Marijuana (<i>side</i> B) Johnny Pissoff Meets the Red Angel—Life Is Funny<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>1969</b></div>
<br />
<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Fqj63h0URoQ/WqO517e9ZEI/AAAAAAAAAkU/bLaKt8eGsGEYxh6THoKueAdpEFnKkVgLACLcBGAs/s1600/R-1747267-1240749389.jpeg.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Fqj63h0URoQ/WqO517e9ZEI/AAAAAAAAAkU/bLaKt8eGsGEYxh6THoKueAdpEFnKkVgLACLcBGAs/s200/R-1747267-1240749389.jpeg.jpg" width="197" /></a><br />
The Fugs.—<b>The Belle of Avenue A</b>.—Reprise Records, US, 1969.—RS 6359 (LP, Album, 33⅓ RPM, Stereo)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Bum’s Song—Dust Devil—Chicago—Four Minutes To Twelve—Mr. Mack (<i>side</i> B) Belle of Avenue A—Queen of the Nile—Flower Children—Yodeling Yippie—Children of the Dream.<br />
Performers : Tuli Kupferberg, Bob Mason, Ed Sanders, Ken Weaver, Bill Wolf.<br />
Reissued on CD by Wounded Bird Records, US, 2011.—WOU 6359<br />
<br />
<br />
The Fugs.—<b>Radio Spots For “The Belle of Avenue A”</b>.—Reprise Records, US, 1969.—PRO 348 (7”, 45 RPM, Promo)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Band One—Band Two (<i>side</i> B) Band One—Band Two<br />
Radio promo spots to advertise “The Belle of Avenue A.” Program repeats on side B. Voiced by various Groupies and then David Ossman of The Fireside Theatre.<br />
<br />
<br />
<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-2qCTmpSWDHY/WqO6P7yQ7eI/AAAAAAAAAkc/AvNWok3_7qgi98l2_MfOeuDGTjfDTXsHQCLcBGAs/s1600/R-866422-1167081152.jpeg.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-2qCTmpSWDHY/WqO6P7yQ7eI/AAAAAAAAAkc/AvNWok3_7qgi98l2_MfOeuDGTjfDTXsHQCLcBGAs/s200/R-866422-1167081152.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a><br />
Ed Sanders.—<b>Sanders’ Truckstop</b>.—Reprise Records, US, 1969.—RS 6374 (LP, Album, 33⅓ RPM, Stereo)<br />
Tracklist: (<i>side</i> A) Jimmy Joe, The Hippybilly Boy—Maple Court Trajedy—Heartbreak Crash Pad—Banshee—The Plaster Song (<i>side</i> B) The Iliad—Breadtray Mountain—The ABM Machine—They’re Cutting My Coffin at The Sawmill—Homesick Blues—Pindar’s Revenge<br />
Performers : David Bromberg, Dan Hamburg, Bill Keith, John London, Ed Sanders, Patrick Sky, Jay Ungar, John Wade, John Ware.<br />
Reissued on CD by Collectors’ Choice Music, US, 2007.—CCM-866.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>1970</b></div>
<br />
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-u_4VWBUaaeY/WqPGRM3l6XI/AAAAAAAAAkw/r4-MJluHNfMF3BxbqeDKv6vAuPsh9LE7wCLcBGAs/s1600/R-1560383-1449312790-9007.jpeg.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="199" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-u_4VWBUaaeY/WqPGRM3l6XI/AAAAAAAAAkw/r4-MJluHNfMF3BxbqeDKv6vAuPsh9LE7wCLcBGAs/s200/R-1560383-1449312790-9007.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a><br />
The Fugs.—<b>Golden Filth : Alive at the Fillmore East</b>.—Reprise Records, US, 1970.—RS 6396 (LP, Album, 33⅓ RPM, Stereo)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Slum Goddess—CCD—<b>William Blake, How Sweet I Roamed</b>—I Couldn’t Get High—Saran Wrap (<i>side</i> B) I Want To Know—Homeade—Nothing—Supergirl.<br />
Performers : Howard Johnson, Tuli Kupferberg, Charles Larkey, Carl Lynch, Bob Mason, Ken Pine, Ed Sanders, Richard Tee, Julius Watkins, Ken Weaver.<br />
Recorded live at the Fillmore East on June 1, 1968.<br />
Also Edsel Records, 1987.—ED217. Reissued on CD by Wounded Bird Records, US, 2011.—WOU 6396.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>1972</b></div>
<br />
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-lQ8hduxnUQ4/WqPGqk7iWBI/AAAAAAAAAk0/fO9gOfifroIBGokq2J8-rdm4DS0xn_K8ACLcBGAs/s1600/R-866830-1224925061.jpeg.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-lQ8hduxnUQ4/WqPGqk7iWBI/AAAAAAAAAk0/fO9gOfifroIBGokq2J8-rdm4DS0xn_K8ACLcBGAs/s200/R-866830-1224925061.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a><br />
Ed Sanders.—<b>Beer Cans On the Moon</b>.—Reprise Records, US, 1972.—MS 2105 (LP, Album, 33⅓ RPM, Stereo)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Rock And Roll People—Nonviolent Direct Action—Henry Kissinger—The Shredding Machine—Pity the Bird—Kaw River Valley Progressive Hempune (<i>side</i> B) Beer Cans On the Moon—<b>Albion Crags</b>—Yodeling Robot—Priestess—Universal Rent Strike Rag—Six Pack Of Sunshine<br />
Performers : Mike Epstein, Dan Hamburg, Jake Jacobs, Rob Rothstein, Ed Sanders, Frank Vicari.<br />
Label says “Ed Sanders and The Hemptones : Beercans on the Moon”.<br />
“Albion Crags” incorporates Sanders’ setting of <b>William Blake’s </b>“The Sick Rose”, with the composer as soloist.<br />
Reissued on CD by Bridge, Japan, 2006.—BRIDGE-069, and by Collectors’ Choice Music, US, 2007.—CCM-865.<br />
<br />
Ed Sanders.—<b>Beer Cans On the Moon : Radio Spots from Warner/Reprise No. MS-2105</b>.—Reprise Records, US, 1972.—R-558 (Reel-To-Reel, 7½ ips, ¼”, Stereo<br />
Tracklist : Radio Spot #1—Radio Spot #2.<br />
Printed label on front of clamshell box reads : “Radio Spots from Warner/Reprise No. MS-2105; artist : Ed Sanders & The Hemptones; album : Beer Cans on the Moon; no. of spots : Two; time : 60sec 7½ st”.<br />
<br />
Ed Sanders.—<b>Two Prime Cuts of Ahimsa-Rock from Beercans on the Moon</b>.—Win Magazine, US, 1972 (Flexi-disc, 33 ⅓ RPM, Single Sided, Stereo)<br />
Tracklist : Nonviolent Direct Action—Kaw River Valley Progressive Hemptune<br />
Included in Win Magazine (New York), vol. VIII, no 14 (1 September 1972).<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>1975</b></div>
<br />
<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-f7vf2KK4MBI/WqPHIc629RI/AAAAAAAAAk8/3yeoQnngWPg6rDt_Fhs7i0SUu3HusRwtwCLcBGAs/s1600/R-2362857-1402591835-8188.jpeg.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-f7vf2KK4MBI/WqPHIc629RI/AAAAAAAAAk8/3yeoQnngWPg6rDt_Fhs7i0SUu3HusRwtwCLcBGAs/s200/R-2362857-1402591835-8188.jpeg.jpg" width="199" /></a><br />
<b>The Fugs.—Fugs 4, Rounders Score</b>.—ESP Disk, US, 1975.—ESP 2018 (LP, Compilation, 33⅓ RPM, Mono)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Boobs A Lot—Romping Through the Swamp—Defeated—Crowley Waltz—Fiddler a Dram—Fishing Blues—New Amphetamine Shriek—Jackoff Blues (<i>side</i> B) I Couldn’t Get High—Slum Goddess—Caca Rocka—C.I.A. Man—Kill For Peace—Morning, Morning—Virgin Forest Excerpt<br />
Performers : John Anderson, Lee Crabtree, Pete Kearney, Betsy Klein (?), Tuli Kupferberg, Vinny Leary, Ed Sanders, Peter Stampfel, Ken Weaver, Steve Weber.<br />
Consists of recordings from the first two ESP albums plus unreleased cuts from the first album sessions. Side A is The Fugs plus Peter Stampfel & Steve Weber of The Holy Modal Rounders, previously unreleased material recorded in 1965. Side B is The Fugs. (Four tracks by The Holy Modal Rounders are included, and date from first album sessions as well.) <br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>1982</b></div>
<b></b><br />
<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Q19OBIO0rt8/WqPI_h1skcI/AAAAAAAAAlk/aTGMgVyuknsHaLOHMW0wjvAC4q6RkjYuwCLcBGAs/s1600/R-3793445-1344644094-8845.jpeg.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="199" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Q19OBIO0rt8/WqPI_h1skcI/AAAAAAAAAlk/aTGMgVyuknsHaLOHMW0wjvAC4q6RkjYuwCLcBGAs/s200/R-3793445-1344644094-8845.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a><br />
The Fugs.—<b>Greatest Hits. Volume 1: Proto Punk</b>.—PVC Records/Adelphi Records, US, 1982.—PVC 8914, AD 4116 (LP, Compilation, 33⅓ RPM, Mono)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Frenzy—Doin’ All Right—I Feel Like Homemade Shit—Dirty Old Man—Coming Down (<i>side</i> B) Slum Goddess—Supergirl—Boobs A Lot—Skin Flowers—We’re The Fugs—New Amphetamine.<br />
Performers : Tuli Kupferberg, Ed Sanders, and others.<br />
Also available as audio cassette.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>1984</b></div>
<b></b><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-EJqVmR5lziA/WqRy9auCrnI/AAAAAAAAAl4/qMXJpU6VeGMMb25Ul6Ra4QHEmmHmrQT0QCLcBGAs/s1600/love_lp.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="303" data-original-width="302" height="200" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-EJqVmR5lziA/WqRy9auCrnI/AAAAAAAAAl4/qMXJpU6VeGMMb25Ul6Ra4QHEmmHmrQT0QCLcBGAs/s200/love_lp.jpg" width="199" /></a></div>
The Fugs.—<b>Baskets of Love</b>.—Olufsen Records, Denmark, 1984.—DOC 5009 (LP, Album, 33⅓ RPM, Stereo)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Days Of Auld Lang Hippie—The Fugs Rehearsal: I Fucked a Chicken in the 60’s (But Now I’m the Dean of the Medical School), Haben Sie Herpes, I Don’t Want to Sing Any Songs Against America, Why Don’t We Do It In The Bed?—You Can’t Go Into The Same River Twice (<i>side</i> B) Frenzy—Crystal Liaison—Slum Landlord from the Lower East Side—Wet Dream—Nothing—Morning Morning.<br />
Performers : Coby Batty, Kramer, Tuli Kupferberg, Vinny Leary, Ed Sanders, Steve Taylor.<br />
Recorded live at The Bottom Line in New York City, June 9, 1984.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>1985</b></div>
<b></b><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-IS5w0LRB7Bo/WqRzXLZsIbI/AAAAAAAAAl8/ir7LVvpYJiw2yrlASjTRCK4HXrSHWPb_QCLcBGAs/s1600/R-866600-1167113559.jpeg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="505" data-original-width="500" height="200" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-IS5w0LRB7Bo/WqRzXLZsIbI/AAAAAAAAAl8/ir7LVvpYJiw2yrlASjTRCK4HXrSHWPb_QCLcBGAs/s200/R-866600-1167113559.jpeg.jpg" width="197" /></a></div>
The Fugs.—<b>Refuse To Be Burnt-Out</b>.—Olufsen Records, Denmark, 1985.—DOC 5006 (LP, Album, 33⅓ RPM, Stereo)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) The Five Feet—If You Want To Be President—Nova Slum Goddess—Nicaragua—Fingers Of The Sun—Wide, Wide River—<b>William Blake, How Sweet I Roamed From Field To Field</b> (<i>side</i> B) Refuse To Be Burnt-Out—Country Punk—CIA Man—Ban The Bomb—Keeping The Issues Alive<br />
Performers : Coby Batty, Kramer, Tuli Kupferberg, Vinny Leary, Ed Sanders, Steve Taylor. Ed Sanders performs on Pulse Lyre, Light Lyre, and Talking Tie.<br />
A new version of William Blake’s “How Sweet I Roamed” sung by Steve Taylor is included in this live reunion album.<br />
Also on New Rose Records, France<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; display: inline; float: none; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;">.—</span>ROSE 56. Reissued on CD by Big Beat Records, UK, 1995.—CDWIKD 139.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>1986</b></div>
<b></b><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-zha8gjLbZwA/WqRzxju-5kI/AAAAAAAAAmE/Qnb7fKtliwEu3YXxWySmY0U8hjhCz7hwwCLcBGAs/s1600/R-2253927-1272545467.jpeg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="285" data-original-width="288" height="197" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-zha8gjLbZwA/WqRzxju-5kI/AAAAAAAAAmE/Qnb7fKtliwEu3YXxWySmY0U8hjhCz7hwwCLcBGAs/s200/R-2253927-1272545467.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
The Fugs.—<b>No More Slavery</b>.—Olufsen Records, Denmark, 1986.—DOC 5011 (CD, Album)<br />
Tracklist : No More Slavery—Cold War—Dreams Of Sexual Perfection: I. Gratified Desire, II. Emily Dickenson, III. Party Party Party, IV. The Golden Bard Retirement Home, V. Lithe Lydia, VI. Healing River, VII. Chaos, Earth And Eros—South Africa—Matthew Arnold, Dover Beach—The Smoking Gun—Working For The Yankee Dollar—Just Like A Jail—Here Come The Levellers—What Would Tom Paine Do?<br />
Performers : Coby Batty, Tuli Kupferberg, Scott Petito, Ed Sanders, Steve Taylor.<br />
Studio album.<br />
Also issued in LP format. Also on New Rose Records, France. Reissued Big Beat Records, UK, 1995 with five additional tracks.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>1987</b></div>
<b></b><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-SQqY1_jn7tg/WqR0ykD2GVI/AAAAAAAAAmU/Wpzf4HH1mtkD8PMYUuQsToEh16VIjMqzACLcBGAs/s1600/R-8199753-1481491790-9039.mpo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="442" data-original-width="472" height="186" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-SQqY1_jn7tg/WqR0ykD2GVI/AAAAAAAAAmU/Wpzf4HH1mtkD8PMYUuQsToEh16VIjMqzACLcBGAs/s200/R-8199753-1481491790-9039.mpo.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
The Fugs.—<b>Star Peace : A Musical Drama in Three Acts</b>.—Olufsen Records, Denmark, 1987.—DOC 5027-28 (2LP, Album + Box, 33⅓ RPM, Stereo)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A : Act I, Scene I) Mr. President, This Is The Greatest Hour—Dazzle The Sky—The Wagon Trains—This Evil Empire—Go For It!—La Trahison Des Journalistes—The Prayer—Hymn To America (Act I, Scene II) Rose Petals Veiled In Smoke—The President’s In My Pocket (Act I, Scene III) Technology Is Going To Set Us Free—There’s A Dim Bulb Burning—The Pax Coeli Americana—Slapping Leather In Strange, Strange Skies (<i>side</i> B : Act I, Scene III, continued) The Greed Spasm—The Battle In The Sky—I See Isis (Act II, Scene I) Da Vinci Once Thought Of A Secret Weapon—A Nuke-Free World—I Believe In Destiny (Act II, Scene II) The Threat The Threat—How Much Do You Really Know About Those Whom You Hate?—The Metastasis—The Peer Jeer (<i>side</i> C : Act II, Scene II, Continued) He Was Such A Scientist (Act II, Scene III) Protest And Survive—World Wide Green—Till The Wormwood Fall From The Sky No More (Act III, Scene I) The Rapture Song—The Sharing Mind—Talking In Nuke-Tongues—The Light From Plymouth Rock (<i>side</i> D : Act III, Scene II) Liberty Not War—The Secret Agenda (Act III, Scene III) She Must Die—The Terrible Things (Act III, Scene IV) A Death In The Mountains—Oh, The Pain—Do Not Mourn For Me.<br />
Performers : Coby Batty, Larry Brody, Marilyn Crispell, Amy Fradon, Anne Jacobsen, Tuli Kupferberg, Ken Lovelett, Joe Martino, Scott Petito, Leslie Ritter, Ed Sanders, Steve Taylor.<br />
Super De Luxe Box Set Edition; libretto and liner notes enclosed.<br />
Also New Rose Records, France, 19887.—ROSE 115 (2LP, Album) and CD.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>1989</b></div>
<b></b><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ferSBAJihG0/WqR1iG3OYqI/AAAAAAAAAmc/vLUlJootSMU1qFwj3FSlrk8VJL_uKRqIQCLcBGAs/s1600/31tIlql3c3L.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="252" data-original-width="252" height="200" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ferSBAJihG0/WqR1iG3OYqI/AAAAAAAAAmc/vLUlJootSMU1qFwj3FSlrk8VJL_uKRqIQCLcBGAs/s200/31tIlql3c3L.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
Tuli Kupferberg.—<b>Tuli & Friends</b>.—Shimmy Disc, US, 1989.—shimmy 020 (LP, Album, 33⅓ RPM, Mono)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Whore Of Babylon—Archetypical Poem Of The Chinese Aristocracy—John Lennon, Evolution—I’m Gonna Kill Myself Over Your Dead Body (If You Fuck Anybody But Me) —Ralph Chaplin, Mourn Not The Dead—Swami—Eugene Pottier, The New Internationale—Aye That Beckett—Vanity Fair—Festival Singers—Morning, Morning—The CIA Was Eating Beans—My Name Is Bob Dylan (<i>side</i> B) <b>William Blake, London</b>—Fruitstand—Go Fuck Yourself With Your Atom Bomb—Van Gogh’s Poem—Belushi’s Blues—Bull Poem—Bobby Edwards, Way Down South In Greenwich—The And Song—Long Poem.<br />
All songs written by Tuli Kupferberg, except those which are co-written, as indicated.<br />
Also available as an audio cassette.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>1990</b></div>
<b></b><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-em4laritp1w/WqR13xXh5KI/AAAAAAAAAmg/WdtNn4nK9jU0WbKp9GPwH1ZnHvhDPYOsACLcBGAs/s1600/R-866901-1167151453.jpeg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="286" data-original-width="290" height="197" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-em4laritp1w/WqR13xXh5KI/AAAAAAAAAmg/WdtNn4nK9jU0WbKp9GPwH1ZnHvhDPYOsACLcBGAs/s200/R-866901-1167151453.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
Ed Sanders.—<b>Songs in Ancient Greek</b>.—Olufsen Records, Denmark, 1990.—DOCD 5073 (CD Album)<br />
Tracklist : Pete Seeger, Tropei Tropei Tropei (Turn, Turn, Turn) from Ecclesiastes 3 in the Septuagint Greek Bible, 2nd Century B.C.—Sappho—High Tech Heraclitus—The Song of the Sirens (Book 12, The Odyssey) —Danae in a Box upon the Sea (Simonides) —The Wrath of Achilles (The opening lines of the Iliad, plus some thoughts about space warfare and the fate of Iphigeneia) —A Chorus from The Birds (Aristophanes) —Plato’s Cave (A version of the opening lines of Book 7, The Republic) —Archilochus Rock & Roll Wail-Out—Bonus Track: High Tech Heraclitus (Dancemix).<br />
Performers : Amy Fradon, Scott Petito, Leslie Ritter, Ed Sanders, Steve Taylor.<br />
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<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-TomkXpZIAKY/WqR2OB42V_I/AAAAAAAAAmk/27jQz-XvSi8XLKnPZiA_tQbc2LL2w2rjQCLcBGAs/s1600/R-1273540-1404186592-8128.jpeg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="569" height="200" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-TomkXpZIAKY/WqR2OB42V_I/AAAAAAAAAmk/27jQz-XvSi8XLKnPZiA_tQbc2LL2w2rjQCLcBGAs/s200/R-1273540-1404186592-8128.jpeg.jpg" width="189" /></a></div>
<b>The 20th Anniversary of the Summer of Love 1987-1967</b>.—Shimmy Disc, US, 1990.—shimmy-001 (LP, Compilation, 33⅓ RPM)<br />
Tracklist : ½ Japanese, Should I Tell Her?—Fred Frith, True Love—Shockabilly, Nobody's Place—Sharky's Machine, Collide, Collide—The Shaved Pigs, Two Car Garage—The Moon, Birth—The Workdogs, Jane Gone (Excerpt) —Missing Foundation, Backbreaker—Artless, Vegetable Rights—Krackhouse, My Revolution—Bongwater, His New Look—Tuli Kupferberg, M-O-T-H-E-R—Carney, Hild, Kramer, Telephone—Fish and Roses, The Letter—No Safety, I Sleep—Men and Volts, Healing Hands—Samm and Dave, Chunk LBJ—The Spongehead Experience, Love or Confusion—Allen Ginsberg And Steve Taylor, Dear M—George Cartwright, I Remember It All—Scott Williams, I Pledge Allegiance To You—Otto Kentrol, She's Working Days, I'm Working Nights—Laraaji, Bring Forth (Excerpt)<br />
Also issued on audio cassette (S-01 CS), by Shadowline Records, Netherlands.—SR6787 (LP), and by Shimmy Disc Europe, Netherlands.—SDE 9024 (CD).<br />
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-i_f3dJugNag/WqR2nLeApaI/AAAAAAAAAms/0UckrNgEE08968ACxbBR6pqpJ4ZbG-zXQCLcBGAs/s1600/R-865924-1167010503.jpeg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="600" height="200" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-i_f3dJugNag/WqR2nLeApaI/AAAAAAAAAms/0UckrNgEE08968ACxbBR6pqpJ4ZbG-zXQCLcBGAs/s200/R-865924-1167010503.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
The Fugs.—<b>Songs from a Portable Forest</b>.—Gazell, US, 1990.—GPCD 2003 (CD, Album)<br />
Tracklist : No More Slavery—Cold War—Dreams Of Sexual Perfection—Matthew Arnold, Dover Beach—Liberty Not War (Hands Reach Out)—Technology (Is Going To Set Us Free)—What Would Tom Paine Do?—World Wide Green—If You Want To Be President—Nova Slum Goddess—Refuse To Be Burnt Out—Keeping The Issues Alive.<br />
Performers : Coby Batty, Robbie Dupree, Amy Fradon, Mark Kramer, Tuli Kupferberg, Vinny Leary, Scott Petito, Leslie Ritter, Ed Sanders, Steven Taylor.<br />
The best tracks from the 1980s reunion albums. Reissued 2003.<br />
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<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-D-pPlSq8_dI/WqHQxn2OkSI/AAAAAAAAAjY/-sFwI3D7YdYCjxC8ralDZwSNQtnSs5gYQCLcBGAs/s1600/51zxSoqoLjL.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="198" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-D-pPlSq8_dI/WqHQxn2OkSI/AAAAAAAAAjY/-sFwI3D7YdYCjxC8ralDZwSNQtnSs5gYQCLcBGAs/s200/51zxSoqoLjL.jpg" width="200" /></a><br />
<b>What Else Would You Do? A Compilation of Quiet Music</b>.—Shimmy Disc, US, 1990 (LP, Album, 33⅓ RPM, Stereo)<br />
Artists : Pale Face, Dean Wareham, Bongwater, Dogbowl, Suzie Unger, Daniel Johnston, David Keener, <b>Tuli Kupferberg</b>, Christian Marclay & Catherine Jauniaux, Mr. Elk & Mr. Seal, Men & Volts, The Tinklers, Fred Lane, The Hat Brothers, Rebby Sharp, False Prophets, Tamela Glenn, Daved Hild.<br />
Artist list from sleeve. No further information.<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>1991</b></div>
<b></b><br />
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<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-H6608GpaDIQ/WqUDgGjWOdI/AAAAAAAAAnA/-_PUHmxs6ecFwrOb2NR71MrtDUYM-rELACLcBGAs/s1600/R-4019561-1352562911-9885.jpeg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="219" data-original-width="136" height="200" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-H6608GpaDIQ/WqUDgGjWOdI/AAAAAAAAAnA/-_PUHmxs6ecFwrOb2NR71MrtDUYM-rELACLcBGAs/s200/R-4019561-1352562911-9885.jpeg.jpg" width="124" /></a></div>
Ed Sanders.—<b>Yiddish-Speaking Socialists of the Lower East Side</b>.—HyperAction P.C.C., US, 1991.—ISBN 0-938331-12 (Audio Cassette)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>side</i> A) Yiddish-Speaking Socialists Of The Lower East Side—(<i>side</i> B) Yiddish-Speaking Socialists of the Lower East Side<br />
Ed Sanders discusses socialism interspersed with snippets of music. One 17:26 track repeated on each side of the tape.<br />
Unofficial reissue Latter-Day Quixote, US, 2014.—LDQ-1007 (Audio Cassette). Reissued in collaboration with Sanders himself, in a slightly remastered version on ten inch vinyl : Okraïna, Belgium, 2015.—okraïna #5 (10” LP, 33⅓ RPM, Mono).<br />
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<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ajADBqJDrzc/WqUJfAZJhcI/AAAAAAAAAnY/xzdbT5XSYA8Re-ZN0p-sZYUR8E4e_CU2gCLcBGAs/s1600/R-865810-1167001220.jpeg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="593" data-original-width="600" height="197" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ajADBqJDrzc/WqUJfAZJhcI/AAAAAAAAAnY/xzdbT5XSYA8Re-ZN0p-sZYUR8E4e_CU2gCLcBGAs/s200/R-865810-1167001220.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
Tuli Kupferberg.—<b>No Deposit, No Return ; Tuli & Friends</b>.—Shimmy Disc Europe, Netherlands, 1991.—SDE 9133 CD (CD, Compilation, Mono)<br />
<APKD><br />
Tracklist : (No Deposit, No Return) Pubol—Social Studies—The Hidden Dissuadors—Lifetime Guarantee—The Art Scene—Want Ads 1—Purina—Lanoflo—The Hyperemiator—The Sap Glove—The Bunny Mother—Auto-Da-Fe—Fields Matrimonial Service—Want Ads 2—Howard Johnson’s Army—No Deposit, No Return (Tuli & Friends) Whore Of Babylon—Archetypical Poem Of The Chinese Aristocracy—John Lennon, Evolution—I’m Gonna Kill Myself Over Your Dead Body (If You Fuck Anybody But Me)—Ralph Chaplin, Mourn Not The Dead—Swami—Eugene Pottier, The New Internationale—Vanity Fair—Morning, Morning—The CIA Was Eating Beans<br />
Compilation of two recordings by Tuli Kupferberg : the entirety of the LP, “No Deposit, No Return” with side A of “Tuli & Friends”.<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>1993</b></div>
<b><br /></b>
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<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-d9UFI5D629k/WqUcm3NN0dI/AAAAAAAAAok/TjFWlUnoAxUyHMEwChlWfnV1ktqzYrSjACEwYBhgL/s1600/R-1836190-1306191668.jpeg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="593" data-original-width="600" height="197" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-d9UFI5D629k/WqUcm3NN0dI/AAAAAAAAAok/TjFWlUnoAxUyHMEwChlWfnV1ktqzYrSjACEwYBhgL/s200/R-1836190-1306191668.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
The Fugs.—<b>The Fugs First Album with Sizzling Additional Tracks from the Early Fugs</b>.—Fugs Records/Ace Records, UK, 1993.—CDWIKD 119 (CD Album, Stereo).<br />
<APKD><br />
Tracklist : (<i>The Fugs First Album</i>) Slum Goddess—<b>William Blake, Ah, Sunflower Weary of Time</b>—Supergirl—A. C. Swinburne, Swinburne Stomp—I Couldn’t Get High—<b>William Blake, How Sweet I Roamed from Field to Field</b>—Carpe Diem—My Baby Done Left Me—Boobs a Lot—Nothing (<i>Additional Studio Material</i>) We’re The Fugs—Defeated—The Ten Commandments—CIA Man—In the Middle of their First Recording Session the Fugs Sign the Worst Contract Since Leadbelly’s—I Saw the Best Minds of My Generation Rock—Spontaneous Salute to Andy Warhol (Songs from the “Night of Napalm”: Live at the Bridge Theatre, St Mark’s Place, 1965) War Kills Babies—The Fugs National Anthem—The Fugs Spaghetti Death (No Redemption No Redemption) A Glop of Spaghetti for Andy Warhol.<br />
Performers : John Anderson, Tuli Kupferberg, Vinny Leary, Ed Sanders, Pete Stampfel, Ken Weaver, Steve Weber.<br />
“The Fugs First Album”, 1966, originally released as “The Village Fugs”, 1965. Also Fugs Records/Fantasy, US, 1994.—FCD-9668-2.<br />
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The Fugs.—<b>Live In Woodstock</b>.—MUSIK/MUSIK, Sweden, 1993.—M M 4 (CD, Album)<br />
Tracklist : <b>William Blake, Ah, Sunflower Weary Of Time</b>—The Freak-Out Tent—Horses In The Stream—Nothing—Workers Of The World Relax—Crystal Liaison—<b>William Blake, Auguries Of Innocence</b>—New Age Safe Sex—The Golden Songs Of Tuli—Ballade Of The League Of Militant Agnostics—Cave 64—Nectar In The Wind—Matthew Arnold, Dover Beach—But I Was Much Mistaken—Morning Morning.<br />
Recorded 1989.<br />
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<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-mDiJaNrEOfg/WqUKJZekQ8I/AAAAAAAAAng/g5gd21_FYOEgUVsc99xo2mVzVAJEAXhsgCLcBGAs/s1600/R-866391-1167078400.jpeg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="558" data-original-width="599" height="186" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-mDiJaNrEOfg/WqUKJZekQ8I/AAAAAAAAAng/g5gd21_FYOEgUVsc99xo2mVzVAJEAXhsgCLcBGAs/s200/R-866391-1167078400.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
The Fugs.—<b>The Fugs Second Album</b>.—Fugs Records/Ace Records, UK, 1993.—CDWIKD 121 (CD, Album).<br />
Tracklist : Frenzy—I Want To Know—Skin Flowers—Group Grope—Coming Down—Dirty Old Man—Kill For Peace—Morning Morning—Doin' All Right—Virgin Forest—I Want To Know—Mutant Stomp—Carpe Diem—Wide, Wide River—Nameless Voices Crying For Kindness<br />
Performers : John Anderson, Lee Crabtree, Pete Kearney, Tuli Kupferberg, Vinny Leary, Ed Sanders, Ken Weaver.<br />
Reissue of 1967 album with 5 bonus tracks.<br />
Also issued Fantasy Records, US, 1994.—FCD-9669-2<br />
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<b>1994</b></div>
<b></b><br />
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<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-LofDaZTLWWs/WqUWhgAZSuI/AAAAAAAAAn8/syQL4rPwE6kCturfjm-AZa2SaxZqVff9QCLcBGAs/s1600/R-866490-1387196528-3117.jpeg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="320" data-original-width="320" height="200" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-LofDaZTLWWs/WqUWhgAZSuI/AAAAAAAAAn8/syQL4rPwE6kCturfjm-AZa2SaxZqVff9QCLcBGAs/s200/R-866490-1387196528-3117.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
The Fugs.—<b>Live From the 60s</b>.—Big Beat Records, UK, 1994.—CDWIKD 125 (CD Album)<br />
<APKD><br />
Tracklist : Doin’ All Right—The Swedish Nada—<b>Homage to Catherine and William Blake</b>—I Couldn’t Get High—Johnny Pissoff Meets The Red Angel—J.O.B.—My Baby Done Left Me—The Garden Is Open—The Exorcism Of The Grave Of Senator Joseph McCarthy—Yodeling Yippie—A Medley From The Fugs, First Concert : The Ten Commandments/Swinburne Stomp.<br />
Performers : John Anderson, Lee Crabtree, Pete Kearney, Dan Kootch, Tuli Kupferberg, Charley Larkey, Bob Mason, Ken Pine, Ed Sanders, Peter Stampfel, Ken Weaver, Steve Weber, Bill Wolf.<br />
This album is made up of recordings from assorted (unprofessionally recorded) tapes of various shows, and home demos.<br />
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<b>1995</b></div>
<b></b><br />
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<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-2D89R2_v6uI/WqUW7CwOpmI/AAAAAAAAAoA/BHY7ZI0AQdAG9OHhLLfbR0bb5NvcMrj7ACLcBGAs/s1600/R-866602-1167115065.jpeg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="285" data-original-width="290" height="196" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-2D89R2_v6uI/WqUW7CwOpmI/AAAAAAAAAoA/BHY7ZI0AQdAG9OHhLLfbR0bb5NvcMrj7ACLcBGAs/s200/R-866602-1167115065.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
The Fugs.—<b>Refuse to be Burnt-Out</b>.—Big Beat Records, UK, 1995.—CDWIKD 139 (CD, Album).<br />
<APKD><br />
Tracklist : The Five Feet—If You Want To Be President—Nova Slum Goddess—Nicaragua—Fingers Of The Sun—Wide, Wide River—<b>William Blake, How Sweet I Roamed</b>—Refuse To Be Burnt-Out—Country Punk—CIA Man—Ban The Bomb—Keeping The Issues Alive—Chaos, Earth And Eros—Summer Of Love<br />
Performers : Coby Batty, Kramer, Tuli Kupferberg, Vinny Leary, Scott Petito, Jeff Ruzich, Ed Sanders, Steve Taylor.<br />
Originally issued Olufsen, Denmark, 1985. Reissued now with two extra tracks.<br />
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<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-H1fnWXOMMw4/WqUXelGSUyI/AAAAAAAAAoM/vke0sLrjhKgqkpR-tDadZ7pZTqZj3p2aQCLcBGAs/s1600/R-866598-1167112106.jpeg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="360" data-original-width="361" height="199" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-H1fnWXOMMw4/WqUXelGSUyI/AAAAAAAAAoM/vke0sLrjhKgqkpR-tDadZ7pZTqZj3p2aQCLcBGAs/s200/R-866598-1167112106.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
The Fugs.—<b>No More Slavery</b>.—Big Beat Records, UK, 1995.—CDWIKD 145 (CD, Album).—Tracklist : (<i>No More Slavery</i>) No More Slavery—Cold War—Dreams Of Sexual Perfection, I. Gratified Desire, II. Emily Dickenson, III. Party Party Party, IV. The Golden Bard Retirement Home, V. Lithe Lydia, VI. Healing River, VII. Chaos, Earth and Eros—South Africa—Matthew Arnold, Dover Beach—The Smoking Gun—Working For The Yankee Dollar—Just Like A Jail—Here Come The Levellers—What Would Tom Paine Do? (<i>Two Demos for Star Peace</i>) Technology Is Going To Set Us Free—Hymn to America (<i>Additional Unreleased Material</i>) Days of Auld Lang Hippie—The Ballade of the League of Militant Agnostics—You Can't Go Into the Same River Twice<br />
Performers : Coby Batty, Tuli Kupferberg, Scott Petito, Ed Sanders, Steve Taylor.<br />
This was a reunion album LP put together in 1986. The CD includes the original LP material, a couple of demos, and some live tracks from “Refuse to be Burnt-Out”. Also Fugs Records/Ace Records, UK, 1996.<br />
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<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-opYac0RuJzI/WqUX6A35-aI/AAAAAAAAAoU/2dhMjpT4q1kn5p5TVDWwJgCwe1p0cbvgQCLcBGAs/s1600/R-866618-1167118934.jpeg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="500" height="200" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-opYac0RuJzI/WqUX6A35-aI/AAAAAAAAAoU/2dhMjpT4q1kn5p5TVDWwJgCwe1p0cbvgQCLcBGAs/s200/R-866618-1167118934.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
The Fugs.—<b>The Real Woodstock Festival</b>.—Big Beat Records, UK, 1995.—CDWIKD2 160 (2CD)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>CD</i>1) Nova Slum Goddess—Poe Job—CIA Man—Crystal Liaison—The Golden Age—Tuli Kupferberg: Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame—Frenzy—Sonnet 29: Fortune And Men’s Eyes—The Postmodern Nothing—Ramses The ll Is Dead, My Love—When The Mode Of The Music Changes—The Ten Commandments (Together With The Ten Amendments)—Woodstock Nation (<i>CD</i>2) <b>William Blake, Auguries of Innocence</b>—They’re Closing Up The Loopholes Of Life—Einstein Never Wore Socks—Shadows Of Paradise—I Want To Know—A Song For Janis Joplin—Cave 64—Down By The Salley Gardens—Coming Down—Wide, Wide River—<b>William Blake, How Sweet I Roamed From Field To Field</b>—Morning Morning—<b>William Blake, Nurse’s Song (And All The Hills Echoed)</b>.<br />
A third version of “How Sweet I Roamed” appears on this album, which also contains two new William Blake pieces: 1. Auguries of Innocence, and 2. Nurse’s Song. <br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>1996</b></div>
<b></b><br />
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-DBHsYdbFx3k/WqUdWqbTTVI/AAAAAAAAAos/w6ZL5WVMd2cUjtT-qq6Xzkd0grACZD9qACLcBGAs/s1600/R-866902-1167155281.jpeg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="285" data-original-width="290" height="196" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-DBHsYdbFx3k/WqUdWqbTTVI/AAAAAAAAAos/w6ZL5WVMd2cUjtT-qq6Xzkd0grACZD9qACLcBGAs/s200/R-866902-1167155281.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
Ed Sanders.—<b>American Bard</b>.—Olufsen Records, Denmark, 1996.—DOCD 5324 (CD, Album)<br />
Tracklist : Lost, Lost, Lost, Lost, Lost—Matisse—Cabin Fever—Brecht— T. S. Eliot, Coffee Spoons—Shakespeare’s 57th Sonnet—Everybody Has a Right to a Home—John Keats’s Negative Capability Letter—Hymn To the Rebel Café—Shakespeare’s 18th Sonnet—Evening Star—Chanting Chipmunks—Morning Morning—When It’s Time to Say Goodbye<br />
Performers : Sergei Azizian, Amy Fradon, Scott Petito, Leslie Ritter, Ed Sanders.<br />
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-pe_Eez-rnJk/WqUd1n4yArI/AAAAAAAAAo0/QzU73vrviT4ehIvJHqeFHtTOz5ZQ_U0cACLcBGAs/s1600/R-9306423-1478314468-3641.jpeg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="600" height="200" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-pe_Eez-rnJk/WqUd1n4yArI/AAAAAAAAAo0/QzU73vrviT4ehIvJHqeFHtTOz5ZQ_U0cACLcBGAs/s200/R-9306423-1478314468-3641.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
Neil B. Rolnick.—<b>Requiem Songs [</b><i>and</i><b>] Screen Scenes</b>.—Albany Records, US, 1996.—TROY 188 (CD Album, Stereo)<br />
Tracklist : (Requiem Songs, for The Victims Of Nationalism, 1993) Invocation—Bosnia's Mountains—The Wedding Party—Deep Is the Sea/The Bee—So Still—Ethnic Cleansing—Home Is A Ghost—The Cellist—Final Prayer (Screen Scenes, 1995) PlayList 1—PlayList 2—PlayList 3—PlayList 4<br />
Composed by Neil B. Rolnick; lyrics by Ed Sanders (Requiem Songs).<br />
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<b>2000</b></div>
<b></b><b></b><b></b><br />
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<b>Uptight Before Christmas Again: Tales & Tunes of True Holiday Spirit: Artists United for Amos House</b>.—Amos House, US, 2000.—AHCD 0001 (CD Compilation)<br />
Tracklist : Folks Together, What Is In A Name? —Ed Sanders & The Hemptones, Universal Rent Strike Rag—Mary King, Polysaturated Woman—Atwater & Donnelly, Pity Undue—The Young Adults, New Deal—Compass Rose, Breton Tunes—Tim McCarthy, Goddamn Ye Greedy Capitalists—Pedro Pietro, Telephone Booth #905-1/2—The Fugs, Working For The Yankee Dollar—John Lennon, John Lennon Interview—David Peel & The Lower East Side, All The Homeless People—Pendragon, Imagine Peace—Bellaire & Dunn, Cup Of Kindness—Vernon Frazer & Thomas Chapin, Extinction/The Sane—The 4th Street String Band, 'Twas In The Moon Of Wintertime—Ed Sanders & Steven Taylor, <b>William Blake, Auguries of Innocence</b>—New England Christmas-Tide Musicians : Jon Campbell, Everett Brown, Sandol Austauski, Dave Peloquin, Shetland Tunes—Tuli Kupferberg, Social Studies—David Peel & The Apple Band, Imagine—Jon Campbell & Mark Roberts, The Leading Star/Christmas Eve<br />
From back cover: “Profits from the sale of this recording benefit the people and programs at Amos House, 41 Friendship Street, Providence, RI 02907.”<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>2001</b></div>
<b></b><br />
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The Fugs.—<b>Electromagnetic Steamboat: The Reprise Recordings</b>.—Rhino Handmade, US, 2001.—RHM2 7759 (3CD, Compilation, Limited Edition)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>CD</i>1) Turn On/Tune In/Drop Out—Knock Knock—The Garden Is Open—Wet Dream—Hare Krishna—Exorcising The Evil Spirits From The Pentagon October 21, 1967—War Song—Matthew Arnold, Dover Beach—Fingers Of The Sun—Aphrodite Mass (In 5 Sections), Litany Of The Street Grope, Genuflection At The Temple Of Squack, Petals In The Sea – Sappho’s Hymn To Aphrodite, Homage To Throb Thrills—Crystal Liaison—Ramses II Is Dead, My Love—Burial Waltz—Wide Wide River—Life Is Strange—Johnny Pissoff Meets The Red Angel—Marijuana—Leprechaun—When The Mode Of Music Changes—Whimpers From The Jello—The Divine Toe (Part I)—We’re Both Dead Now, Alice—Life Is Funny—Grope Need (Part I)—Tuli, Visited By The Ghost Of Plotinus, More Grope Need (Grope Need Part II)—Robinson Crusoe—Claude Pelieu and J. J. Lebel Discuss The Early Verlaine Bread Crust Fragments—The National Haiku Contest—The Divine Toe (Part II)—Irene (<i>CD</i>2) Whimpers From The Jello, The Divine Toe (Part I), Grope Need (Part I), Tuli, Visited By The Ghost Of Plotinus, More Grope Need (Grope Need Part II), Robinson Crusoe, The National Haiku Contest, The Divine Toe (Part II)—Bum’s Song—Dust Devil—Chicago—Four Minutes To Twelve—Mr. Mack—The Belle Of Avenue A—Queen Of The Nile—Flower Children—Yodeling Yippie—Children Of The Dream—Slum Goddess—CCD—<b>William Blake, How Sweet I Roamed</b>—I Couldn’t Get High—Saran Wrap—I Want To Know—Homemade—Nothing—Supergirl (<i>CD</i>3) Knock Knock—Wet Dream—Carpe Diem—Nameless Voices Crying For Kindness—Aphrodite Mass (In 5 Sections), Litany Of The Street Grope, Genuflection At The Temple Of Squack, Petals In The Sea, Sappho’s Hymn To Aphrodite, Homage To Throb Thrills—Turn On/Tune In/Drop Out (Mono Album Version)—Knock Knock (Mono Album Version)—The Garden Is Open (Mono Album Version)—Wet Dream (Mono Album Version)—Hare Krishna (Mono Album Version)—Exorcising The Evil Spirits From The Pentagon October 21, 1967—War Song (Mono Album Version)—Matthew Arnold, Dover Beach (Mono Album Version)—Fingers Of The Sun (Mono Album Version)—Crystal Liaison (Promo Album Version)<br />
Limited to 5000 numbered copies.<br />
Includes the four Reprise albums in their entirety plus special promo edits, mono mix of Tenderness Junction (except for Aphrodite Mass) and tracks from the unreleased Atlantic LP (in censored, mono form.)<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>2002</b></div>
<b></b><br />
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The Fugs.—<b>Greatest Hits : The Olufsen Years</b>.—Olufsen Records, Germany, 2002.—DOCD 5526 (CD, Compilation)<br />
Tracklist : Matthew Arnold, Dover Beach—Frenzy—Fingers Of The Sun—CIA Man—No More Slavery—Nova Slum Goddess—Wet Dream—Crystal Liaison—The Terrible Things—Liberty Not War—Nothing—<b>William Blake, How Sweet I Roamed</b>—Wide Wide River—The Smoking Gun—Refuse To Be Burn-out—The Fugs Rehearsal—You Can’t Go Into The Same River Twice—Here Comes The Levellers—Dreams Of Sexual Perfection—Dreams Of Sexual Perfection—Dreams Of Sexual Perfection—Dreams Of Sexual Perfection—Dreams Of Sexual Perfection—Dreams Of Sexual Perfection—Morning Morning.<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>2003</b></div>
<b></b><br />
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The Fugs.—<b>The Fugs Final CD (Part 1)</b>.—Artemis Records, US, 2003.—ATM-CD-51170 (CD, Album)<br />
Tracklist : Burn, Bridges, Burn—Try To Be Joyful—Government Surveillance Yodel—Septuagenarian In Love—Where Is My Wandering Jew?—Miriam—I Will Be A Shadow—A Western Ballad—Ultimate Things—Advice From The Fugs—I’ve Been Working For The Landlord—Go Down, Congress—Perpitude—A Short History Of The Human Race—Is—Chameleon—A Poem By Charles Bukowski—Luke Was A Physician And A Saint.<br />
Also issued Rykodisc International, UK.—RCD 17004.<br />
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The Fugs.—<b>The Fugs/Firesign Theatre Sampler</b>.—Artemis Records, US, 2003.—ARTCD-197 (CD, Sampler, Promo)<br />
Tracklist : (<i>The Fugs</i>) Burn, Bridges, Burn—Try To Be Joyful—Government Surveillance Yodel—Is—Perpitude—Where Is My Wandering Jew?—Go Down, Congress (<i>Firesign Theatre</i>) An Undermutter Moment—The Grass Roots Gourmet—Beat St. Jack’s Famous Accountants School—TIPS Hotline—The Arts Of Defense—Pinata! Pinata!—Everything You Know Is Wrong (About Shoes)—Hal Stark is Off the Road—No Jokes about America!—Nick Danger in Lucky Liability—It’s Saddam Shame!—Beat St. Jack’s Baghdad Bush Suit—S**t Happens!—Bob Heeblehauser’s Tacomasaur—Mutt ‘n’ Smutt’s Scary Sale!—Mask Your Movies!—Thanksgiving, or Pass the Indian Please!<br />
Promotional disc from The Fugs and Firesign Theatre. Features 7 songs from “The Fugs Final CD (Part 1)”, and 16 cuts from Firesign’s “All Things Firesign” disc. Issued without a booklet. “For Promotional Use Only, Not For Sale.”<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>2004</b></div>
<b></b><br />
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Ed Sanders.—<b>Thirsting For Peace</b>.—Olufsen Records, Denmark, 2004.—DOCD 5585 (CD, Album, Stereo)<br />
Tracklist : The Question Of Fame—Wild Women Of East Tenth Street—Satie—The Final Section Of Gregory Corso’s Bomb—Song For Allan—America At Peace March—Thirsting For Peace In A Raging Century : A Microtonal Cantata, Scroll Me Some Answers O Universe, No Greater Belief In Words Has There Been, Soap Clay Cliff, The Feather Of Justice, Spiritual Topography, Why Is Why Whying, It Chars My Lips, But Still I Drink, I Think Of Sappho Often, Rock & Roll & Roll Away The Rock, Water Is The Greatest Thing, Crack Of Grace, See My Shadow On The Other Side<br />
All songs written, recorded and produced by Ed Sanders performing on his microtonal instrument, the Microlyre (31 notes to the octave).<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>2006</b></div>
<b></b><br />
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The Fugs.—<b>The Fugs Greatest Hits 1984-2004!</b> —Fugs Records, US, 2006.—8 3710125871 1 (CD, Compilation)<br />
<APKD><br />
Tracklist : Nova Slum Goddess—CIA Man—Liberty Not War—Dreams of Sexual Perfection—Government Surveillance Yodel—Einstein Never Wore Socks—The Terrible Things—<b>William Blake, Auguries of Innocence</b>—Cave 64—I Want to Know—Here Come the Levelers—Refuse to Be Burnt-Out—Nothing—Kill for Peace—Crystal Liaison—Try to Be Joyful<br />
Performers : Coby Batty, Tuli Kupferberg, Scott Petito, Ed Sanders, Steve Taylor.<br />
Featuring studio and live performances.<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>2007</b></div>
<br />
<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-PCk_smtPodU/WqPIjiVN5UI/AAAAAAAAAlc/a9TqeMb6fPg4IQGGq32WfCo5TSaAm1zZACLcBGAs/s1600/61L2-ce5xvL._SS500.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-PCk_smtPodU/WqPIjiVN5UI/AAAAAAAAAlc/a9TqeMb6fPg4IQGGq32WfCo5TSaAm1zZACLcBGAs/s200/61L2-ce5xvL._SS500.jpg" width="200" /></a><br />
Ed Sanders.—<b>Poems for New Orleans</b>.—Paris Records, US, 2007.—7 33792 77102 4 (CD, Album).<br />
<APKD><br />
Tracklist : The Battle of New Orleans—Teeming Docks: New Orleans 1820-1860—<b>What if William Blake Had Gone to New Orleans?</b>—Did Mark Twain Meet Marie Laveau?—Marie Lebage and Huey Long—Unearned Suffering—Calling on Charles and Wallace—Some Fema Trailers in Hope—Quiet Joy—The Experience—My Ironing Board—Rape—Ash Wednesday and Lent—Grace Lebage—Then Came the Storm: a Prayer for the Victims of Katrina.<br />
Lyrics by Ed Sanders; original music composed by Mark Bingham.<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>2008</b></div>
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-nouYQ39EPik/WqPH_xwFLsI/AAAAAAAAAlQ/e6ZxKr_O9883lNsdv_VMkx71A77DEmMdgCLcBGAs/s1600/R-1454182-1220930090.jpeg.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-nouYQ39EPik/WqPH_xwFLsI/AAAAAAAAAlQ/e6ZxKr_O9883lNsdv_VMkx71A77DEmMdgCLcBGAs/s200/R-1454182-1220930090.jpeg.jpg" width="112" /></a><br />
The Fugs.—<b>Don’t Stop! Don’t Stop!</b>—Big Beat Records, UK, 2008.—Fugsbox 9 (4CD, Compilation)<br />
Tracklist: (<i>CD</i>1 : The Fugs First Album) Slum Goddess—<b>William Blake, Ah, Sunflower Weary Of Time</b>—Supergirl—A. C. Swinburne, Swinburne Stomp—I Couldn’t Get High—<b>William Blake, How Sweet I Roamed From Field To Field</b>—Carpe Diem—My Baby Done Left Me—Boobs A Lot—Nothing (Additional Tracks From 1965) We’re The Fugs—Defeated—The Ten Commandments—CIA Man—In The Middle Of Their First Recording Session The Fugs Sign The Worst Contract Since Leadbelly’s—I Saw The Best Minds Of My Generation Rock—Spontaneous Salute To Andy Warhol—War Kills Babies—The Fugs National Anthem—The Fugs Spaghetti Death ; No Redemption No Redemption (A Glop Of Spaghetti For Andy Warhol)—The Rhapsody Of Tuli (<i>CD</i>2 : The Fugs Second Album) Frenzy—I Want To Know—Skin Flowers—Group Grope—Coming Down—Dirty Old Man—Kill For Peace—Morning Morning—Doin’ All Right—Virgin Forest (Additional Tracks From 1966-1969) I Want To Know—Mutant Stomp—Carpe Diem—Wide, Wide River—Nameless Voices Crying For Kindness (<i>CD</i>3) Rapture Of The Deep, The Fugs Live Performances And Recordings 1966-69 Previously Unissued) We Don’t Allow No Robots In Sunday School—Crystal Liaison—The Peace Eye Sequence—Six Pack Of Sunshine—Four Minutes To Twelve—Carpe Diem—J Edgar Hoover Is Paranoid—The Final Moments Of J Humpington Billsworth—Jimmy Joe, The Hippybilly Boy—The Garden Is Open—Johnny Pissoff #2—I Couldn’t Get High—Breadtray Mountain—”Hello Fleshlovers!” A Sample Of Tuning In The 1960s—War Song ‘68—Tuli Sings ‘When The Mode Of The Music Changes’—Elegy For Robert Kennedy (<i>CD</i>4 : The Wonderful Torrent, Previously Unissued) The Beauty Of Nada: A Suite Of Five Nothings From The 60s Nothing, The Full Fugs Version Recorded For Folkways 1965—Community Breast Nada—Players Theater Nada-Dada—Garnicht, At The Fillmore East, 21 May 1968—Nothing, From The Psychedelic Supermarket, Boston, 1968 (Alternate Takes From The Fugs First Folkways Session, April 1965)—Supergirl, The Write Underwater Version—<b>William Blake, Ah, Sunflower Weary Of Time</b>—I’m Going To Kill Myself Over—Demos For Eternity Johnny Pissoff & The Red Angel—Two Drunkards On The Spaceship—As My Moog Weeps—Street Punk—Fragmentation Bomb (The Enormous Truth Of Tuli : Some Platinum Moments From Tuli Kupferberg’s 1960s Songwriting Tapes) The Enormous Truth Of Tuli<br />
Repackaging of the first two albums with various outtakes, demos and live recordings. The 4-CD set contains over 34 previously unreleased Fugs songs and performances covering the years 1965-1969.<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>2010</b></div>
<br />
<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-u3BMQieNLmE/WqPHlrfLY-I/AAAAAAAAAlI/xHDfS9oMtZYsCMutIvy4z5FGh3JrrlaOgCLcBGAs/s1600/R-7046617-1446845653-4375.jpeg.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="199" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-u3BMQieNLmE/WqPHlrfLY-I/AAAAAAAAAlI/xHDfS9oMtZYsCMutIvy4z5FGh3JrrlaOgCLcBGAs/s200/R-7046617-1446845653-4375.jpeg.jpg" width="200" /></a><br />
The Fugs.—<b>Be Free (The Fugs Final CD Part 2)</b>.—Fugs Records, US, 2010.—KRM 1160 (CD, Album)<br />
Tracklist : Be Free—Backward Jewish Soldiers—My Darling Magnolia Tree—Goofitude—This Is A Hit Song—<b>William Blake, Laughing Song</b>—Hungry Blues—Loose Peach Gown—Bartleby the Scrivener—Imgrat—The CIA Made Me Sing Off-Key—The British Journalist—I Am an Artist for Art´s Sake—Greenwich Village of My Dreams.<br />
Performers : Coby Batty, Tuli Kupferberg, Scott Petito, Ed Sanders, Steve Taylor.<br />
Featuring 14 new songs, including five by Tuli Kupferberg.<br />
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The Fugs.—<b>Tenderness Junction ; It Crawled Into My Hand Honest</b>.—Retroworld/Floating World Records, US, 2010.—FLOATM6083 (CD, Compilation)<br />
Tracklist : Turn On/Tune In/Drop Out—Knock Knock—The Garden Is Open—Wet Dream—Hare Krishna—Exorcising The Evil Spirits From The Pentagon October 21, 1967—War Song—Matthew Arnold, Dover Beach—Fingers Of The Sun—Aphrodite Mass (In 5 Sections), Litany Of The Street Grope, Genuflection At The Temple Of Squack, Petals In The Sea – Sappho’s Hymn To Aphrodite, Homage To Throb Thrills—Crystal Liaison—Ramses II Is Dead, My Love—Burial Waltz—Wide Wide River—Life Is Strange—Johnny Pissoff Meets The Red Angel—Marijuana—Leprechaun—When The Mode Of Music Changes—Whimpers From The Jello—The Divine Toe (Part I)—We’re Both Dead Now, Alice—Life Is Funny—Grope Need (Part I)—Tuli, Visited By The Ghost Of Plotinus, More Grope Need (Grope Need Part II)—Robinson Crusoe—Claude Pelieu and J. J. Lebel Discuss The Early Verlaine Bread Crust Fragments—The National Haiku Contest—The Divine Toe (Part II)—Irene.<br />
Combining the first two Reprise albums, but unlike the Rhino Handmade set (“Electromagnetic Steamboat”) which used tapes, this release is sourced from vinyl.<br />
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<br />
<b>Acknowledgments</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
Most of the illustrations above and much of the description derive from the invaluable website <a href="http://www.discogs.com/">www.discogs.com</a> .<br />
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Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-20863386971001935332018-02-18T13:38:00.000-08:002019-11-28T07:07:56.419-08:00Blake set to music—Ed Sanders and The Fugs<span style="font-family: inherit;">The chronological sequence of musical settings of a poet provides an interesting measure of the reputation of that poet and the reception history of their oeuvre. Musicians, too, are influenced by literary fashion. The first known setting of Blake’s poetry (a setting of “The Chimney Sweeper”, in <i>The Illustrated Book of Songs for Children</i>) appeared in 1863 which, hardly coincidentally, was the year of publication of Gilchrist’s <i>Life of Blake</i>. There were a few more Blake songs in the 1870s, mostly single settings from the <i>Songs of Innocence and of Experience</i>, perhaps 80 or so for the rest of the nineteenth century, and then a flood of compositions from 1900 onwards that still shows no sign of stopping. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The nineteenth century established the various forms Blakean music would take: children’s songs, drawing-room ballads, art songs (the equivalent of the German Lied), and choral works. These classical forms persisted into the twentieth century, and to a lesser extent persist today. When it came to Blake, even a popular songwriter like Alec Wilder, who had worked with Frank Sinatra, Peggy Lee, and Tony Bennett, felt able only to compose songs for children. Not until William Bolcom completed his wildly eclectic setting of the complete <i>Songs of Innocence and of Experience</i> (in 1984 though not recorded until 2004) do we get, for example, “The Little Vagabond” as Broadway show-tune, or a bluegrass “Shepherd”.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">So for The Fugs to set Blake in a folk-rock style in 1964 was something entirely new. Who then inspired The Fugs? It was, of course, Allen Ginsberg. As he wanders in and out of this story, The Fugs respond to Ginsberg and Ginsberg responds to the Fugs. Ginsberg had famously had a vision of Blake in a New York tenement flat in 1948. In some kind of trance, he “heard the voice of Blake” intoning several poems, including “Ah! Sunflower!” From this experience comes Ginsberg’s “Sunflower Sutra”, a kind of Blakean-Buddhist piece that is one of Ginsberg’s best poems. But also a continuing sense of Blake as spiritual guide or bodhisattva. Like it or not, it was Allen Ginsberg who made Blake a significant hero of the emerging sixties counter-culture.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br /></div>
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Bm_-sr2njOs/Wol7JACCCEI/AAAAAAAAAhA/ycE2ElyNExUj-EBe-K1HdgYdSojJ3wSqACLcBGAs/s1600/Image_2_Ed_%2526_Tuli.jpg"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Bm_-sr2njOs/Wol7JACCCEI/AAAAAAAAAhA/ycE2ElyNExUj-EBe-K1HdgYdSojJ3wSqACLcBGAs/s320/Image_2_Ed_%2526_Tuli.jpg" width="320" /></span></a></div>
<br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">The Fugs were the creation of two men, Ed Sanders (left) and Tuli Kupferberg.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Edward James Sanders was born in Kansas City, Missouri in 1939. He hitchhiked to New York in 1958, where he got involved in the Beat scene. Testifying at the Chicago Seven trial in 1970, Ed Sanders identified himself to Judge Julius Hoffman as a ‘‘poet, songwriter, leader of a rock-and-roll band, publisher, editor, recording artist, peace-creep”.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Naphtali (or ”Tuli”) Kupferberg was born in New York in 1923 into a Yiddish-speaking family. Tuli found fame or notoriety as the inspiration for an episode in Allen Ginsberg’s poem “Howl”. You will recall its opening lines</span><br />
<br />
I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked,<br />
dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix,<br />
angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo<br />
in the machinery of night,<br />
who poverty and tatters and hollow-eyed and high sat up smoking in the supernatural<br />
darkness of cold-water flats floating across the tops of cities contemplating jazz,<br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">and then fifty-four lines later</span><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">who jumped off the Brooklyn Bridge this actually happened and walked away unknown and forgotten into the ghostly daze of Chinatown soup alleyways & firetrucks, not even one free beer,</span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">As Ginsberg and Kupferberg acknowledged, this is a reference to Tuli’s 1945 suicide attempt (off the Manhattan Bridge, not Brooklyn). The fame that episode earned him caused Kupferberg a lifetime of chagrin and embarrassment. “Throughout the years,” he later said, “I have been annoyed many times by, ‘Oh, did you really jump off the Brooklyn Bridge?’ as if it was a great accomplishment”. With his bushy beard and wild hair, Tuli embodied the hippie aesthetic. But the term he preferred was bohemian, which to him signified a commitment to art as well as a rejection of restrictive bourgeois values, and which he as a scholar of the counterculture traced back to rebellious students at the medieval Sorbonne.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">I shall draw heavily on Ed Sanders’ 2011 memoir : Fug You : An Informal History of the Peace Eye Bookstore, the Fuck You Press, the Fugs, and Counterculture in the Lower East Side. There’s a well-known saying: “If you can remember the 60s, then you weren’t really there”. Sanders has the answer. He kept the documentation (much of which is reproduced in his book) and his unflinching tales of arrests, government harassment, and trying to make it in the music business are refreshingly free of nostalgia, sentimentality, or false memory.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Sanders writes</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">In February of 1962 I was sitting in Stanley’s Bar at 12th and B with some friends from the Catholic Worker … and I announced I was going to publish a poetry journal called Fuck You, A Magazine of the Arts. There was a certain tone of skepticism among my rather inebriated friends, but the next day I began typing stencils, and had an issue out within a week. I bought a small mimeograph machine, and installed it in my pad on East 11th, hand-cranking and collating 500 copies, which I gave away free wherever I wandered.</span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Sanders’ Magazine of the Arts was a mimeographed journal, printed on a stencil duplicator in an edition size of roughly 500 copies. Printing on a mimeograph was hard work : all the gathered texts needed to be retyped on stencils, the illustrations cut by hand-held styluses into the page of text, the sticky, awkwardly shaped stencil attached to the drum of the mimeograph which squeezed ink through the stencil onto a paper page. Counting the paper sheets needed for an issue of the magazine : 36 x 500 = 18,000 sheets, to be collated and stapled to complete just one issue, it’s amazing that this was a one-man operation. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">And Sanders continues</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">I published Fuck You, A Magazine of the Arts from 1962 through 1965, for a total of thirteen issues. In addition, I formed a mimeograph press which issued a flood of broadsides and manifestoes during those years, including Burroughs’s <i>Roosevelt after Inauguration</i>, Carol Bergé’s <i>Vancouver Report</i> [a response to the 1963 Vancouver Conference on poetry and a seminal text in 1960s poetics], Auden’s <i>Platonic Blow</i>, <i>The Marijuana Review</i>, and a bootleg collection of the final <i>Cantos</i> of Ezra Pound.</span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Writing in the <i>New York Review of Books</i>, Elizabeth Hardwick commented, “There is a schizophrenic sweetness and dirtiness about [<i>The Fugs</i>] and the leader of the group, Ed Sanders, is a dismayingly archetypal American … wildly funny because he and his songs have trapped the infantilism of smutty little boys”. Hardwick was wrong. It’s not just schoolboy joshing. There’s a political edge to Sanders’ exuberantly foulmouthed confrontation of J. Edgar Hoover’s police state. In 1964, Lenny Bruce was sentenced to four months imprisonment for using forbidden expletives in his cabaret performances. He died before serving his sentence. Sanders’ “magazine of the arts” was a serious poetry magazine. For example, the 11th issue, for some reason termed Vol.5 No.7, includes work by Norman Mailer (a poem, “The Executioner’s Song”), Paul Blackburn, Al Fowler, Antonin Artaud, Philip Lamantia, Arnault Daniel, Alden Van Buskirk and the editor. And it’s not just a boys’ club. Other issues include poems by Carol Bergé, Diane Di Prima, Diane Wakoski, and other women poets.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Sanders writes</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">In the fall of 1963 Allen Ginsberg mailed me a poem called "The Change," which he'd just created while riding on the Kyoto-Tokyo express train in Japan. ... When Allen mailed me his visionary poem, I was in the midst of my final two semesters at New York University, studying Greek and Latin. ... On the benches of Washington Square Park, near the NYU main building, during the warm months I began to set two Blake poems, "The Sick Rose" and "Ah, Sun-Flower," to melodies. I was inspired by Allen's having heard Blake himself chanting those very poems in an apartment in Spanish Harlem, some fifteen years before. I also came up with a melody for "How Sweet I Roamed from Field to Field," one of Blake's earliest works of genius, written as early as age eleven. These songs provided the kernel of identity for the founding a year later, of The Fugs.</span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Ginsberg’s poem “The Change” appeared in Vol. 5 no. 5 of Sander’s Magazine of the Arts.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Sanders again</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">One night after a poetry reading at Cafe Le Metro, Tuli Kupferberg and I visited the Dom, where we watched poets such as Robert Creeley and Amiri Baraka (then still known as LeRoi Jones) dancing to the jukebox. Then Tuli and I retired to another bar of St. Mark's, where I suggested we form a musical group. "We'll set poetry to music," I proclaimed. Tuli was all in favor of it. ... At first we didn't have a name. An early one I came up with was "The Yodeling Socialists." Tuli was too anarcho for that, and though I am the only Beatnik who can yodel, he wasn't into the Great Yod. … [<i>O</i>]ur first duty was to create some songs. I already had four Blake poems, inspired by Allen Ginsberg, set to music. Two, "How Sweet I Roamed from Field to Field" and "Ah, Sun-Flower, Weary of Time," would appear on our first album.</span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The other two, I believe, were “The Sick Rose” and “The Lilly” both too short to make conventional album tracks.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">So delicate were American sensibilities in mid-century that when Norman Mailer wanted to convey the conversation of men in wartime in <i>The Naked and the Dead</i> (1948), he or his publisher came up with the three-letter expletive “fug”. So Kupferberg (perhaps in response to Sanders being editor of <i>Fuck You : A Magazine of the Arts</i> and publisher of Fuck You Press) suggested Mailer’s euphemism should name The Fugs.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Three performers: Sanders and Kupferberg, with Ken Weaver on drums, formed the core of The Fugs. Late in 1964 they were joined by Peter Stampfel (fiddle) and Steve Weber (guitar), rather more accomplished musicians. The poet Al Fowler occasionally added flute to the ensemble.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The Fugs’ first album, “The Village Fugs Sing Ballads of Contemporary Protest, Point of Views and General Dissatisfaction,” was released in 1965 on Broadside Records, a subdivision of Folkways. The album was “produced” in part by the film-maker Harry Smith, who had compiled the influential “Anthology of American Folk Music” (6 LPs worth) a few years earlier. “Harry was a friend of mine, long before the Fugs were founded, and he came to many of our shows,” Sanders says. “He got us a deal at Folkways Records, claiming we were a ‘jug band.’ When it came time to record, he was smart to have the engineer just roll tape and record the whole thing. We didn’t know anything about doing ‘takes’ or recording, but we had songs. He yelled out at us, ‘Just get going.’ … It was a three-hour recording session, but the best parts of it have been in release since 1965.”</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">That first album included two Blake tracks: “Ah! Sunflower”, from Songs of Innocence and of Experience, and “How Sweet I Roamed from Field to Field”, from Blake’s juvenile <i>Poetical Sketches</i>. These were, almost certainly, the first pop, rock, or folk setting of Blake’s verse. If, in 1965, The Fugs could barely sing or play their instruments, I still find The Fugs’ amateurishness rather endearing. On subsequent albums the band changed its lineup many times and acquired a more professional sound, though its scatological themes got it kicked off at least one major record label.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">The Fugs were perhaps the most puerile and yet the most literary rock group of the 1960s, performing with a ramshackle glee that anticipated punk rock. The band played at the October 1967 march on the Pentagon, the subject of Norman Mailer’s <i>The Armies of the Night : History as a Novel, The Novel as History</i>. Mailer himself was one of 650 people arrested for civil disobedience at this, the most famous anti-Vietnam War rally in Washington DC. I quote</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Well, let’s move on to hear the music. It was being played by the Fugs, or rather—to be scrupulously phenomenological—Mailer heard the music first, then noticed the musicians and their costumes, then recognized two of them as Ed Sanders and Tuli Kupferberg and knew it was the Fugs. Great joy!</span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">It is, I think, no coincidence that the book’s title derives from another literary work brought to musical life by The Fugs : Matthew Arnold’s poem, “Dover Beach”, with the famous line “Where ignorant armies clash by night”, though this time the tune was by Kupferberg rather than Sanders.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Sanders ended the band in 1969 to focus on his writing. <i>The Family</i>, his book about the Charles Manson murders appeared in 1972 and is still in print. And has probably made him a great deal more money than The Fugs ever did. Sanders also found time for a solo album, <i>Beer Cans on the Moon </i>(1972). This includes a track “Albion Crags” in which Blake’s “The Sick Rose” is embedded in a longer song. Similarly, “The Lilly” (from Songs of Experience) was coupled with Sappho’s “Hymn to Aphrodite” (in Greek) but remains unrecorded. Other unrecorded and unpublished settings of Blake poems which Sanders performed at poetry readings include “Laughing song”, “Long John Brown and Little Mary Bell”, and “I dreamt a dream, what can it mean?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The Fugs’ genial folk-rock settings of Blake’s lyric verse would eventually lead to a world-wide enthusiasm for Blake in folk, rock and jazz settings—much of this enthusiasm fostered by Allen Ginsberg who followed and was influenced by The Fugs. It may be thought that since Blake’s poems were, one presumes, originally sung unaccompanied that the various folk-style settings would be the nearest to his intention. But almost all the “folk-singers” who follow The Fugs lack the intensity, conviction, and expression that Blake surely brought to his singing.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Ginsberg’s own recording of Blake songs was first issued in 1970. Despite the presence of some able musicians backing Ginsberg (including Bob Dorough who also worked with The Fugs), these are not recordings one listens to with pleasure. The composer Ned Rorem commented on Ginsberg’s performances</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">One’s … heart sinks on witnessing Allen Ginsberg, presumably oblivious to the TV cameras yet mugging like Dean Martin in slow motion, embedded among acolytes intoning with mindless de-energized redundant unison the stanzas of William Blake.</span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Rorem adds</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Formal study would not make Ginsberg a better composer, only a discerning one. He needs more of an ear: his music may be fun to join in, as any college songs are for the tone-deaf, but it sounds colorless, uncommunicative, and wrong for Blake, who needs a rainbow blaze. </span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Only after hearing The Fugs’ Blake settings did Ginsberg emulate them with his own “tunings” of Blake. Innumerable folk and rock settings of varying quality followed. I estimate there have been something like 400 or 500 recordings issued of pop, rock, folk and jazz versions of Blake since the Fugs in 1965.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">The Fugs reunited in 1984 with new Blake tunes or old tunes rediscovered : “Homage To Catherine and William Blake” (Blake walking naked with his wife Catherine, while reading Milton's <i>Paradise Lost</i> in their garden in 1793), “Auguries of Innocence”, and “Nurse’s Song” (And All the Hills Echoed). Tuli Kupferberg died in 2010, but Sanders, at 75, is still performing with the band.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">As Blake has become a presence in popular music so too has arisen a curious phenomenon (perhaps it’s something well-recognised in the study of reception history), where the work is remembered and its author forgotten. Thus Kate and Anna McGarrigle on their second French album <i>La vache qui pleure</i> (2003) include one English song, a setting of "Ah! Sunflower". The same song is performed in French ("Ah tournesol"), with Philippe Tatartcheff, actually the translator, given as its author. Blake's authorship is not acknowledged in the credits for either version.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">For many people, a favourite Fugs number remains “How Sweet I Roamed from Field to Field”, Blake’s "strange and sardonic pastoral hymn" (Jason <span style="font-size: 11pt; line-height: 107%; margin: 0px;">Whittaker's description)</span> set to a melody with more than a hint of country-music. When Acetone issued an EP of country-music covers, they include “How Sweet I Roamed” as a tribute to Ed Sanders and The Fugs, but, to judge by their published comments, had absolutely no idea who William Blake was. Perhaps they thought him some relative of the blues singer Blind Blake or the ragtime composer Eubie Blake.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">And here's a Fugs' version</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Of course, separation of author and work, conveniently forgetting who wrote what, can tip over into plagiarism. I find it hard to believe that a naïveté like Acetone’s had any part in another rock Blake. Gordon Sumner CBE (“Sting”) is a former English teacher. He has recorded Blake’s “Cradle Song” in an adaptation of the Vaughan Williams setting. It is not a recording I would recommend. And his 2003 song, “Send Your Love”, opens with some curiously familiar lines</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"> Finding the world in the smallness of a grain of sand</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"> And holding infinities in the palm of your hand</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"> And Heaven’s realms in the seedlings of this tiny flower</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"> And eternities in the space of a single hour.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">And he claims copyright in them. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">I’ll conclude with a recording that respects Blake’s words. The Fugs provide a touching performance of “Auguries of Innocence” on their album<i> The Real Woodstock Festival</i> (1995). Yes, I think it has that rainbow blaze.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sources and Further Reading</span></b><br />
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Ed Sanders.—Fug you : an informal history of the Peace Eye Bookstore, the Fuck You Press, the Fugs, and counterculture in the Lower East Side.—Cambridge MA : Da Capo Press, 2011.<br />
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Ed Sanders.—“The Fugs still riotous after all these years” [interview]<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; display: inline; float: none; font-family: inherit; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;">.—</span>Chicago Tribune (27 November 2012).
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span>Elizabeth Hardwick<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; display: inline; float: none; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;">.—<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; display: inline; float: none; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"></span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; display: inline; float: none; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;">“</span></span>The Theater of Sentimentality".—New York Review of Books (15 December 1966).<br />
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<b><span style="font-family: inherit;">Acknowledgement</span></b><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">This blogpost began as a brief presentation at an informal student workshop, “William Blake: The Man from the Future?” at the Whitworth Art Gallery Study Centre, Manchester, the afternoon of 5 May 2017. My thanks to Colin Trodd for inviting me to contribute, enabling me to put my thoughts on Blake and the Fugs into some sort of order.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"> </span>Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-32831543648225004282018-02-17T04:38:00.003-08:002018-03-13T08:50:54.463-07:00More about cricket and Blake<blockquote class="tr_bq">
And what should they know of England who only England know?—K<span style="font-size: x-small;">IPLING</span><br />
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What do they know of cricket who only cricket know?—J<span style="font-size: x-small;">AMES</span></blockquote>
By the 1770s the game of cricket had reached a high level of development. It had recognized, accepted rules or—this being the eighteenth century—laws. It was played by teams sufficiently well known to attract large and enthusiastic crowds, and to arouse passionate local loyalties. In 1765 a crowd of 12,000 was reported to have attended a match of Dartford against Surrey at the Artillery Ground in Chiswell Street. The number of players was usually the same—eleven a side—though matches were sometimes played that involved fewer or more than that number. Bowling was underarm, and before the 1760s the ball came skimming at the batsman with only minimal bounce. Batting was no easy matter on the primitive, rough pitches that were the norm.<br />
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The bat was curved like a hockey stick, and it was only during the great days of the Hambledon club, in Hampshire, in the 1770s and 1780s that bowlers developed the knack of making the ball kick up at the batsman. This, as well as the addition of the third stump to the two widely spaced ones previously used, made it necessary to switch to the “straight” bat, more easily used with precision. The expression was later to become something like a metaphor for cricketing virtue.<br />
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William Blake included in his <i>Songs of Innocence</i> the lovely poem “The Ecchoing Green”, a nostalgic recollection of childhood pastimes, and surrounded the two pages of the verses with emblematic illustrations in which boys with cricket bats are a prominent feature. The most interesting of these figures appears in the illustration on the second page. This figure belongs to a group of three children, accompanied by a mother holding an infant and leading a small boy, who are being shown the way home by the “old John, with white hair” of the poem. The day is drawing to an end and it is time for repose:<br />
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Such such were the joys.<br />
When we all girls & boys,<br />
In our youth-time were seen,<br />
On the Ecchoing Green.<br />
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Till the little ones weary<br />
No more can be merry<br />
The sun does descend,<br />
And our sports have an end:<br />
Round the laps of their mothers,<br />
Many sisters and brothers,<br />
Like birds in their nest,<br />
Are ready for rest;<br />
And sport no more seen,<br />
On the darkening Green.</blockquote>
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<i>Songs of Innocence </i>(copy I), plate 29: <span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; display: inline; float: none; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;">“</span>The Ecchoing Green<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; display: inline; float: none; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;">”</span>.<br />
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<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Z-Z4vlN2YDY/WogJvMiUP7I/AAAAAAAAAgk/4X2I2iJmLNAMuiVQs6AqjgUN1GRT5Hp-wCLcBGAs/s1600/s-inn.i.p29-7.300%2B%25282%2529.jpg"><img border="0" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Z-Z4vlN2YDY/WogJvMiUP7I/AAAAAAAAAgk/4X2I2iJmLNAMuiVQs6AqjgUN1GRT5Hp-wCLcBGAs/s640/s-inn.i.p29-7.300%2B%25282%2529.jpg" /></a><br />
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<i>Songs of Innocence</i> (copy I), detail showing curved cricket bat.<br />
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<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-pwKjQJukUKg/WogJxTS0eMI/AAAAAAAAAgo/Eoorb7C8WvALdWVsLXJyLI6GsHOxe4RjgCLcBGAs/s1600/songsie.z.p7.300.jpg"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-pwKjQJukUKg/WogJxTS0eMI/AAAAAAAAAgo/Eoorb7C8WvALdWVsLXJyLI6GsHOxe4RjgCLcBGAs/s640/songsie.z.p7.300.jpg" width="408" /></a><br />
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<i>Songs of Innocence and of Experience</i> (copy Z), plate 7: <span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; display: inline; float: none; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;">“</span>The Ecchoing Green<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; display: inline; float: none; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;">”</span>.<br />
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<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-6eoiG_lLCKU/WogJzWuAp_I/AAAAAAAAAgs/NJRN9LEU7dUsyh703_U8WCWwKYzK-SsGACLcBGAs/s1600/songsie.z.p7.300%2B%25282%2529.jpg"><img border="0" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-6eoiG_lLCKU/WogJzWuAp_I/AAAAAAAAAgs/NJRN9LEU7dUsyh703_U8WCWwKYzK-SsGACLcBGAs/s640/songsie.z.p7.300%2B%25282%2529.jpg" /></a><br />
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<i>Songs of Innocence and of Experience</i> (copy Z), detail showing straight bat.</div>
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<i>Songs of Innocence</i> first appeared in 1789, and the relief-etched illustration to “The Ecchoing Green” shows the boy cricketer has a curved bat, such as would have been in use in Blake’s own childhood. In 1794, however, Blake reissued <i>Songs of Innocence</i> with the addition of his <i>Songs of Experience</i>. The curved bat was now completely out of use, and in a later copy of the combined <i>Songs of Innocence and of Experience</i> Blake now represented the boy with a straight bat, thus reflecting one of the major developments in cricket in the late eighteenth century.<br />
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How was this done? It may be that he just painted over the curved bat and inked in a straight bat. (I think this is what he did—after all that is clearly how he created a larger bunch of grapes in the same image.) Alternatively, Blake could have wiped clean the area surrounding the curved bat on the inked plate before printing and leaving a gap in the printed image. And then drew in the straight bat on the resulting print. Without examining the original, this seems too complicated. <br />
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Blake’s alteration of the hooked bat into a straight bat was first spotted by Simon and Smart, writing on the art of cricket. As far as I am aware it has not been noticed by Blake scholars.<br />
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What do they know of William Blake who only Blake know?<br />
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<b>Sources and further reading</b><br />
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Stanley Gardner.—Blake’s ‘Innocence’ and ‘Experience’ retraced.—London; New York : Athlone Press; St. Martin’s Press, 1986.<br />
Reprinted London : Bloomsbury Academic, 2013.<br />
Gardner locates “The Ecchoing Green” and its cricketers at Wimbledon.<br />
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C.L.R. James.—Beyond a boundary.—London : Stanley Paul & Co., 1963.<br />
50th anniversary edition.—Durham NC : Duke University Press, 2013. <br />
James was the first writer to place the game of cricket in a broader arena of political, economic and social influences. The quotation at the start comes from his “Preface” (unnumbered page).<br />
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Rudyard Kipling.—“The English Flag”.<br />
First published in the St. James’s Gazette (3 April 1891), with the title “The Flag of England”. Much reprinted.<br />
The flag of the poem is the Union Jack. (There’s a silly affectation which insists on it being referred to as the Union Flag—see the Daily Telegraph, <i>passim</i>. If Union Jack was good enough for Kipling it’s good enough for me.) Kipling, from his time as a young journalist in India, was keenly aware of the fact that Indian and Irish nationalists drew analogies between each other's colonial situation to make the case for self-government and to oppose British misrule. The occasion for the poem was an incident in which an Irish crowd applauded the burning of the flag. Kipling’s repeated emphasis on Irish participation in the Raj (the Irish in India in Kipling's fiction include Terence Mulvaney in <i>Soldiers Three</i> and, of course, Kim) can be seen as a powerful “imperialist” counter-representation to these subversive analogies. <br />
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Robin Simon & Alastair Smart.—The art of cricket.—London : Secker & Warburg, 1983.<br />
Published to coincide with an exhibition at the Fine Art Society Galleries in London, the York Art Gallery, and the University Art Gallery at Nottingham.<br />
My thanks to Ted Ryan for supplying this reference.<br />
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David Underdown.—Start of play : cricket and culture in eighteenth-century England.—London : Allen Lane, 2000.<br />
Underdown traces the origins and development of cricket in Kent, Sussex and Hampshire from the early eighteenth-century until the mid-nineteenth. He shows how a peasant game was gradually appropriated by the upper classes and eventually developed into a commercial sport based in London.<br />
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Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4070234699724886478.post-70160215753385100022017-12-20T14:11:00.001-08:002018-03-09T14:07:43.854-08:00William Blake and fake news<span style="font-family: inherit;">William Blake has declared Jerusalem to be the capital of England and dismissed all other suggestions as fake news.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /><b> Source</b><br /><br />Wanda Cloud & Daffyd Dyll.—“Jerusalem ‘is capital of England’ claim”.—<i>Private Eye</i>.—No 1459 (14-22 December 2017), 26.</span><br />
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Kerihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10906697197001353206noreply@blogger.com0