The Balm of Coolth, and Factor Ignotus

With Southeast England still in the grip of the Great Heatwave, the dear old C of E seems to have woken up to the fact that it has a Unique Selling Point in all those stone-cool church interiors that never warm up, whatever the weather, and often feel colder than the outside even in winter. Canterbury Cathedral's Twitter account has posted an image of the crypt, and the message 'With temperatures set to reach 30C in Canterbury this week, come and escape the heat in the tranquil environment of the crypt.' And why not? More churches should follow their lead and open their doors to sunstruck visitors seeking the balm of coolth. Indeed more churches should open their doors full stop, but that's another subject.
  Needless to say, my cousin and I were in many a cool church interior on our travels last weekend, including all the medieval churches of Stamford, surely one of England's most beautiful towns. Two monuments stand out from this latest jaunt – both of outstanding quality, and both of unknown authorship. At Exton in Rutland, amid one of the finest arrays of monumental sculpture in the land, stands the hauntingly beautiful monument to Anne, wife of Lord Bruce of Kinlosse, who died in childbirth in 1627.

On a tall tomb chest in black and white marble, Lady Anne lies in her shroud (like Lady Berkeley at Cranford), her head resting on a pillow decorated with two cherubs' heads. Her pose is not as languid and Berniniesque as Lady Berkeley's, nor is her face as delicately pretty; Lady Anne's feature are more like those of Mrs Coke (who also died in childbirth) in Nicholas Stone's great monument at Bramfield in Suffolk. It's hard to believe Lady Anne's monument is not also by Nicholas Stone, but if it was, it would, like all Stone's major works, be documented in his meticulous business records. Clearly some unknown genius was at work here.
  And one must reach the same conclusion about the second outstanding monument of this trip. It stands in the Farnham chapel of St Bartholomew's church in Quorn (or Quorndon), Leicestershire (a family chapel that is normally closed to visitors, but we struck lucky). This monument, to one of many John Farnhams and his wife, is quite extraordinary, for several reasons, but chief among them is the carving of the two figures that lie atop the ornamental tomb chest.

There's something almost Mannerist about the elongation of their necks in those extraordinarily high-collared ruffs, and the curious, unanatomical curvature of their praying hands. The figures too seem elongated, and the whole monument has a tendency to a kind of abstraction and simplifying of forms that also suggests something of medieval statuary. I've never seen anything quite like this in any English church, and the two figures make a startling impact. The monument is clearly work of the highest quality – an impression enhanced by the relief panel that stands against an adjacent wall, but has always been part of the monumental composition. It was probably this panel, portraying scenes of military triumph, that led Mrs Esdaile to tentatively suggest Epiphanius Evesham as the maker of the monument. That attribution has since fallen out of favour – but if not Evesham, who? Another unknown genius? Once again a mystery. Factor ignotus.

Today, Tomorrow

I spent today walking among the butterflies of Oxfordshire – I'll spare you the details, but a good many glorious Silver-Washed Fritillaries were involved – and tomorrow I'm off on another Mercian expedition with my Derbyshire cousin. There will be churches, and monuments...

That's Nigeness – your one-stop shop for butterflies, church monuments and obscure books. No wonder my numbers are going through the roof, hem hem.

Good News for Retroprogressives

A good day for retroprogressives, with two news items to gladden our reactionary hearts...
  One: Sales of what are now quaintly called 'physical books' have risen again, bringing in five per cent more income. Sales of hardback fiction were up by an eye-popping 31 per cent, while sales of digital books were down by two per cent. All this was supposed to happen the other way round, with e-book sales soaring at the expense of 'physical books'. It's the old story – over-hyping the new and expecting that it will consign the old to oblivion. Things seldom work out that way, as technologies have a habit of co-existing rather than devouring one another.
  Two: After 35 years of huge sales (totalling some 120 million) and competition from all manner of trendier and higher-tech vehicles, that enduring fixture of the album charts, Now That's What I Call Music, has reached its century. Now That's What I Call Music 100 is about to be released. Now that's what I call retroprogressive.

How Not to Leave the EU

Call me a simpleton, but there's something I don't understand about this whole Brexit farrago. Didn't Parliament vote (by a very large majority) to hand over the decision on whether or not to stay in the EU to the people, the electorate, with no comeback and no further process (as per EU law)? In those circumstances, how can it be right that Parliament – which has always been overwhelmingly pro-EU and anti-Brexit (along with the rest of the political, administrative and cultural establishment) – now has a stranglehold on the entire process? This can only lead to a failure to actually leave the EU in any meaningful sense at all. Not that that's a great surprise (at least to the more cynical among us), but surely there was some effective way of getting from A (voting to leave) to B (actually leaving)? Shouldn't it have been an administrative, rather than a party-political, project?
  Never mind – this morning brings news (from arch-Remainer Anna Soubry) that Jacob Rees Mogg is running the country. I do hope she's right.

Blues

Having been, for several days, itching to get out and stroll among the butterflies on the Surrey hills, I finally made it today. Unfortunately I arrived at my destination just as banks of sullen cloud moved into place, completely obscuring the sun. It was decidedly cool too (after days, indeed weeks, of searing heat). However, much to my delight, I soon found a few Adonis Blues flying among the all-weather Meadow Browns and Gatekeepers. When, an hour or two later, the sun finally broke through, the effect was instant: suddenly Chalkhill Blues (milky blue to the Adonis's brilliant near-turquoise) were everywhere, flying along with Adonis and Common Blues galore – a glorious downland spectacle.
 There were more blues – many, many more – as I made my way down the dip slope of Box Hill. Marbled Whites too – and, as I neared the Burford Bridge hotel (where, in 1817,  Keats worked on Endymion), a lordly Dark Green Fritillary was flying along the margin of a copse. A thing of beauty indeed.

Ginger

Born on this day in 1911 was the great danseuse and more than useful actress Ginger Rogers. She was the perfect partner for Astaire, as he was for her, and together they created a particular kind of dance magic that has never been bettered. And, of course, like all the true greats in every field, they made it all look as easy as breathing. Here's a little reminder of her loveliness...

Auberon Waugh, Novelist. 1.

Auberon Waugh, whose diaries I was enjoying recently, was also, for some years, a novelist, publishing five titles before abandoning the form in 1972, ostensibly in disgust at the fact that authors at that time received no money at all from public library loans of their titles (which in those days could run into huge numbers). Perhaps he was also tacitly recognising that he could never escape the shadow of his father's achievements as a novelist and that comparisons were always (and rightly) going to be to Evelyn's advantage. But what were Bron's novels like? I know I read them at the time, but have only the blurriest memories, so I thought I'd have another look, beginning with the first, The Foxglove Saga (1960 – long out of print but easily available from online bookshops).
  The title is misleading, as it's no saga. What it is is an accomplished, often very funny comic novel that at times is well worthy of comparison with Waugh pere's works. Beginning with a wry account of backbiting and petty rivalries among the monastic brothers at a Catholic monastery-cum-public school, it gradually introduces a group of pupils who are to be the central characters in the story that unfolds. Among them is Martin Foxglove, beautiful and charming son of the widely adored and apparently saintly Lady Foxglove. Oddly he does not remain at the centre of the unfolding action, most of which revolves around his school friends and their various misadventures. There is also, early on, a brilliantly managed comedy of confusion involving the elderly and ailing Brother Thomas's stay in an NHS hospital – which he is thoroughly enjoying until the do-gooding Lady Foxglove gets busy...
  The most prominent among Martin Foxglove's old school friends are the hapless Stoat and the reckless O'Connor, whose paths – and sometimes Martin's – repeatedly overlap as life takes them from school to an Army training camp, and into the murky world of trading in stolen goods from a Petticoat Lane stall (with a deeply dodgy character who styles himself Joseba da Farratoga). Again and again, Waugh sets up and executes brilliant comic set pieces involving these three and various authority figures and walk-on characters. Misunderstandings, confusion and crossed signals abound, and there are many laugh-aloud scenes and moments (which is a great deal more than you can say about many supposedly comic novels).
  Up to somewhere near the end, The Foxglove Saga is a joy to read. Then, I think, something goes wrong with the tone, and the latent cruelty in Waugh's (both Waughs') comedy comes too near the surface, in the shape of a monstrous baby, born to Dooley, a hospital doctor turned blackmailing biographer, and his ex-nurse wife, Herring. The farcical climax of the novel reads more like Tom Sharpe than either Waugh, and really doesn't work (at least for me). And then Waugh (A.) rounds things off with a thumbnail sketch of what happens next, over a good many years, to each of the major characters. This is seldom a good idea, especially in a comic novel.
  So, a novel full of promise, which for much of its length is brilliantly achieved and very funny, fails to carry through to the end. Never mind – the best bits are truly comparable to Waugh pere at his funniest, and suggest a great comic novelist in the making.  Bron, incredibly, was only twenty when he wrote this one. What happened next? Well, three years later, he published a second novel, Path of Dalliance. I have a copy, and am going to read it. I'll be reporting back...