Sunday 29 August 2010

A Churchyard in Surrey


Paradoxically perhaps, as a non-believer, I love churches.  Especially parish churches.

It's the history I think (you don't have to look far to find centuries of evolving social relations), and the quiet atmosphere, together with the astonishing achievements of art and architecture all around, not to mention feats of engineering - often entirely by hand.

And the complex web of human and spiritual longings that they embody is always moving.




Anyway, I rarely miss an opportunity to visit one.

This little town, Farnham, had all its religious bases covered by the early-mid 12th century. The Bishop's Castle was on the hill, from which the whole valley could be controlled, and St. Andrew's was there on its knoll by the river, close to (and no doubt protecting) the muddy track between the two power centres of London and Winchester. The hamlet of a few hundred people was safely tucked between church and castle.


SU8346 : Farnham view by Richard Croft
View of St. Andrew's Church from the Bishop's Castle
© Copyright Richard Croft and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence


View of Bishops Castle from the St. Andrews Church Tower.


The church overlooked the ford in the river and another track, this time across the water-meadows to  Waverley Abbey, just down stream, where a small band of Cistercian monks were living their work-filled lives.


Downloaded from Flickr under Creative Commons License


That knoll above the ford, safe from the regular flooding of the water meadows, was noted long before as a strategic point.  There had been a wooden church on the site in Saxon times, and the earliest use of the town's name, deriving from the swampy, reedy character of the landscape (fen and fearn have the same root), was in a deed from Caedwalla, King of the West Saxons, "to Cedd, Cissa and the Christians" for a "monisterium" to be established on the site, way back in 688.

So it's pretty old.

Whatever its origins, there have been many re-constructions and additions over the years, and the church has become an imposing building, the largest parish church in Surrey.  It is not particularly distinguished as churches go, pleasant more than beautiful, and  "violently restored" (Pevsner) by the Victorians.  Nevertheless, it is built of the local chalk-stone, which is a gorgeous soft creamy colour, and a recent renovation has been highly successful, giving it a particularly lovely internal space.  




And like all parish churches, it has many charming details

For example, it is approached from the north along Church Passage, which features the lovely ironstone cobbling typical of the area, with cart tracks.




And several other delights, such as this brass plaque among the cobbles.  Not bad for a drain cover.


Reflected sunlight on the aged wall



Memories of an ancient pub



And a traditional half-round wall heading




The graveyard is expansive




And somewhat parklike



With plenty of graves (of course), great and small



Some are quite grand, for a country town



Not all are well-cared for, or perhaps they were the targets of grave-robbers in days gone by.....



Some are in damp corners, shiny when wet, and mossy



Most are subsiding, worn and covered in lichen so you can't read the inscriptions.



And some have simply gone to the wall



But one of the town's greatest sons, William Cobbet, that vigorous iconoclast, rural reformer and corn law repealer is there.  He died in 1835.

And it looks as though they popped in a couple of other family members as well.  I like that.  Cottage Economy.







I particularly like the well-used paths, with their combination of old flag stones and ironstone cobble.  There are several of these - the churchyard is, naturally enough, at the junction of some of the many footways that criss-cross the town.  Quite a few people use it as a short-cut: I do myself, almost every day.  In this simple way the church is a real part of the everyday secular life of the town.



This is the Old Rectory


It looks like a gingerbread house. It has been here since before the Reformation.



You enter the church through this exceptionally attractive porch.  The stone wall has been replaced with glass to let more light in.



Inside, the Church is cool and quiet, with the usual churchy stillness that I love so much



In accordance with modern practice, the fixed old wooden pews have been removed, allowing for more flexible seating arrangements. Although more modern, it is likely that this is closer to the use of space in the earliest years of the church, when people stood to worship, and also used to space to store equipment for market day, to shelter their cattle, and in emergencies even lived there.

Simple and attractive georgian-style pavillions have been built at the back of the nave for various community uses.  It has full wheelchair access, and altogether is a very pleasant space.



There is the usual collection of elaborate and complacent memorials to several centuries of local dignitaries: baronets, merchants, colonial administrators and generals who died in foreign wars. Many of these plaques remain in their usual spots around the walls of the church, but some have been attractively gathered together in the tower.  Unfortunately most are too high to read, thwarting one of the greatest pleasures of church-visiting.  



But some of these plaques are simple and dignified, like this one to William Cobbett



And this one, to George Sturt, disciple of William Morris (and perhaps like him an atheist and socialist) and a member of the Arts and Crafts Movement.  The plaque was carved by the iconic and controversial Eric Gill.




And this one




All in all, I like this church and its environs very much.  Its simple, its peaceful and its unpretentious.  And I like how the steeple can be glimpsed from all over the town, up many streets and courts and alleyways.






From across the water-meadows



And even from across what used to be the Hyde Field, and is now the Waitrose car park.




And this, on a notice-board, shows that the Parish Council is not immune from worldly limitations, and is  blessed with the gift of irony.


Dave Walker.  www.cartoonchurch.com


Nice!


A terrific study of the role of a church and its priest in the life of a pre-reformation village is: The Voices of Morebath: Reformation and rebellion in an English Village by Eamonn Duffy.  Totally readable and wonderful.

There is also The Rev Robo's 1935 study of mediaeval Farnham, drawn from the Bishop's pipe-rolls.  Interesting, but not quite so readable.

St. Andrew's, Farnham




Tuesday 24 August 2010

How Jay Smooth Solved My Bloggers Block (and other political matters)


I've been getting a lot done recently, but I've had trouble with my blogging.

If I were a guy, this would be me over the past couple of weeks, as I deal with a certain amount of Blogger's Block.



Downloaded from Flickr under Collective Commons License

The point is that I have been enraged, ENRAGED, in recent days.  Almost everything in the news has been enough to send a girl totally frothing mad.  This has caused me problems on the writing front.

So I've been spending a bit of time (a bit too much time actually) with Mr. John Randolph, or Jay Smooth, founder of WBAI's great hip hop show Underground Railroad.  Get the podcasts (when you're done reading this post).  You probably know him pretty well already.

If you don't - make up for lost time.  He's lovely!

Man, he's got it down, my whole blogging/writing/political situation right there.

First of all there is that little Inner Hater to deal with



But its more than just self-criticism, although goodness knows, I have enough of that. 

The outrages in the news have been on my mind, so that's what I want to write about, naturally.

But being so angry,  can I write about it without going way over the top, or being just totaly naive?

Right or wrong, that is what has blocked me up.

Take Tony Blair for example.  Every time that smirking bastard gets into the media is a further insult to democracy and the rule of law.  Not only has he never been called to judgement for his crime(s?) he has been richly rewarded for it or them.

I mean, really, how sick is this culture? 

Then there are the cuts, another round of thievery by that band of tax exiles, press barons and prefects ruling UK right now, on behalf of their school friends and brothers-in-law in the financial sector.  Who created the problem in the first place, and now want us to pay for it. Us?  Pay for their  corruption? Robbing us coming and going:  heads they win, tails we lose. It's the usual story of course, but more blatant than usual, and this time has got me totally climbing the wall.

However, I'm hoping that the sad death of Jimmy Reid will provide inspiration for many widely-supported sit-ins and work-ins this coming winter.  The dignity of Jimmy Reid's funeral, with reminders of the importance of his political and intellectual achievements, provided a moment of regeneration during the week.

On top of that, the gross accusations against the heroic Julian Assange, using the oldest trick in the book, practically sent me into orbit.  Which leads me to my favourite tweet of the week: "So that's how they are planning to take him down.  How retro!
(Gareth Allen @TCInterval,  The Confidence Interval)

Fourthly there have been crocodile tears spilled over the truly dreadful situation of Afghani women, fuelled by cynical CIA spin doctors (revealed by Wikileaks), and articles from the lackey press, e.g. Time Magazine, and these too have had me fuming.

Laurie Penny showed, in a well-researched New Statesman piece called The West must Not Use Women's Rights to Justify War, that any "support" of NATO governments for women's rights is entirely contingent on how far doing so will advance their own goals: even when women are really suffering, neither these governments nor their armies lift a finger unless it suits them.  

Honestly, are we really expected to believe that war is a feminist enterprise, or that armies have feminist goals?

Marwan Bishawa of Al Jazeera is also very clear: if invading armies benefitted women, he writes, the women of the middle east and central Asia would be among the most liberated in the world.  He quotes Martin Van Creveld, the Israeli war historian, who believes that men go to war to escape their wives and families in search of ecstacy.  This is a striking thought, but hardly fertile ground for feminism, even if only half-true.

And we can't relax, even in the metropoles. Cath Eliot commented sharply and correctly on continuing lenience to rapists, which shows how the state will still ignore women's rights if it can get away with it, regardless of what the law says.   I mean, really, after all our struggles, they still have impunity).

And finally, there are the astonishing, I mean astonishing fulminations over an islamic community centre in Lower Manhattan.  Timothy McVeigh and his cronies (remember them?) were militant christian terrorists and white supremacists who bombed 168 people, including 19 pre-school kids, but I never heard anyone call for an end to church-building in Oklahoma City, or denial of license to the Y.  No-one tried to punish and humiliate their co-religionists.

Astonishing that such medieval bigotry has gained so much traction in a modern society: including, we now hear, book-burning (Some red-neck fanatic Reverend is planning to burn the Koran on September 11! Astonishing!)

It may be astonishing, but its also terrifying: this is not just hysteria (although that's part of it), it's the outcome of a systematic effort to eliminate Islam from the US and Europe, a rabid but coordinated movement that started in Denmark and UK after that whole Mohammed Cartoon thing, and increasingly espouses violence.  It includes such elements as the English Defense League and Stop Islamisation of Europe/UK.  Salon.Com had a pretty good timeline on how it was whipped up initially, including information on the horrific Pam Geller. Even a couple of  quick Wikipedia searches will give you loads of info on these dangerous bozos.

So, as you can see, my rage is pretty understandable.

But can I write about all this shit, in the way that I really feel, without going way over the top or just sounding like a total dumbass maniac ... ?

Jay Smooth has the answer, at least part of it.


I really like that whole clenched fist thing going on here, signifying our shared essential humanity!

And I pretty much agree with what he's saying, with one small proviso:

Are all different views of equal value? Views I can respect, but what about those with different interests?  Such as ConDems, bankers, imperialist spin doctors and right-wing fanatics?  Those who are trying to screw us?  I don't think so.  I draw the line there.

But, all in all, Jay Smooth, bless him, seems to have sorted out my blogging block.  

Saturday 14 August 2010

My Garden is Extremely Green (Literally)

I am a vagabond at present, part of the hidden homeless, kind of. So far this year I have had four separate homes: in sequence, of course.  

Fortunately, these places have had beautiful gardens, of various styles, which has been a comfort........

My current garden is a bit run-down, shabby even, but is very green and peaceful, and in its way, also beautiful.

Completely walled, it is (sadly) innocent of cats, but correspondingly full of birds and birdsong, including, especially delightful, a tame robin.

And for one so small, it has a vista.



And an embowered compost box



Sporting today a single spray of white flowers, the only one in the entire garden.





It has several interesting nooks and crannies
























Sadly there is no veggie patch, and no tomatoes, but there are some peaches ripening by the kitchen window, which add a very subtle touch of colour.





All in all, I really am very lucky to be here.  



Other gardens I have known this year