Tea at Trianon

Modern Knights

2009-11-09T02:24:00.001-05:00

Andrew Cusack has photos of the "Sovereign Military Hospitaller Order of Saint John of Jerusalem of Rhodes and of Malta,” still dedicated to serving the Church and the sick.

Grace Before Beauty

2009-11-08T07:03:00.000-05:00

There is an exhibition in Rome on the life of Princess Grace of Monaco (Via Terry Nelson.) I never knew that her confirmation name was "Bernadette." According to art historian Elizabeth Lev:

The exhibit, however, lingers on the elaborate costumes she commissioned for her sophisticated balls and parties. This section, titled "The Queen of the Ephemeral" by curator Fredric Mitterand, the French minister of culture, dazzles with the vast selection of outfits and letters from the international jet-set scene.

Here, Grace seems reduced to an actress once again, wearing costumes for less important roles. Suddenly this woman of substance appears very superficial. But scattered among the notes lie testimonies to her staunch defense and friendship of black entertainer Josephine Baker and her caring concern for the troubled recluse Greta Garbo.

I saw the first incarnation of this exhibit in Montecarlo three years ago, where there were a great many images of the princess' work as the president of the Red Cross of Monaco. She not only arranged fundraisers, but Princess Grace volunteered her time and efforts, visiting sick and assisting refugees. The Monaco show also emphasized her foundation of AMADE, formed to protect the rights of children worldwide. Amade, named so as "to sound like amour," the French word for love, seeks to "to create, promote, coordinate and support initiatives that assist the most vulnerable children."

Despite requests by Alfred Hitchcock and others to lure her back on screen, Princess Grace only returned in front of a camera shortly before her death for Family Theater, a production company founded in 1947 by an old friend, Holy Cross Father Patrick Peyton.

Princess Grace was filmed reciting the rosary in St. Peter's Basilica, a legacy greater than even her fabulous jewels exhibited in the show. Unfortunately, this work is not even mentioned by the curators, despite the fact that it was her first appearance on film in 25 years.

Photos of the Prince and Princess of Monaco with the Pope flank images of the couple visiting with the Kennedy's. But the show ignores the Catholic connection between Monaco and the Holy See, which have shared diplomatic relations since 1861.

Nor does it recount how in 1954, the 100th anniversary of the Immaculate Conception, Prince Rainier made a pilgrimage to Lourdes, to pray to Mary for a suitable wife. Several years later, Princess Grace revealed that her confirmation name was Bernadette, for the French girl to whom the Blessed Virgin appeared in Lourdes. On the 25th anniversary of the prince's pilgrimage, Princess Grace would also visit Lourdes in thanksgiving.

Princess Grace died in a car accident on Sept. 14, 1982, and was buried in the cathedral of San Nicola in Montecarlo (also dedicated to the Immaculate Conception), the same church that welcomed her for the "Wedding of the Century," 26 years earlier. The show evokes a sad nostalgia, not for the glamour queen of a modern fairy tale, but for an age when leaders remembered that noblesse oblige, and that a person's life was weighed in more than chiffon and jewels.

The Churching of Women

2009-11-08T03:28:00.002-05:00

A beautiful and ancient tradition that is slowly being revived.

Castellany

2009-11-07T05:27:00.003-05:00

With my new medieval novel being released this week, I was delighted to find an article on castles, a bit grim but interesting. (Via Richard) To quote:

A king, a duke, a count, or any mighty lord would have a household, a court, and various officials to assist him in ruling. The same men who ministered to the domestic needs of the household conducted the business of the fief and participated in warfare. The provost superintended the demesne and collected taxes and dues. In England the Anglo-Saxons kings appointed a shire-reeve or sheriff, a removable agent in each county. The chaplain heard confession and said mass in the chapel. Since the chaplain was a clerk, he did not fight, and, as he was often literate, he held the lord's written records. In time he was called chancellor and had other clerks under him who served as chaplains and secretaries. The chamberlain looked after the bed chamber, watched over the lord's valuables, jewels, and clothes as well as archives and charters, and he generally controlled access to the lord. The constable and the marshal were military officers that commanded the soldiers, were responsible for armor and weapons, and saw to the horses and, as such, had a high status in the feudal demesnes showing the importance of horses. The steward was the head of the administration; he was also responsible for the provisioning of the household. The steward was assisted by the butler, who procured the wine, and the dispenser, who supervised the issuance of wine.

Entertainment included solid meals and drinking and possibly more refined shows with minstrels displaying varied talents, storytellers with magnificent tales, tumblers, and dancing bears. Hunting and hawking were the feudal ruler caste's main pleasure, and the hunting grounds were guarded with jealousy against the depredations of poachers. Penalties for catching reserved animals- such as a deer - were severe and included flaying, mutilation, and even hanging. Hunting was regarded as a sign of great courage and an opportunity to exercise healthiness, knightly qualities, and a display of skill besides providing a valuable addition to the medieval diet. The chasse-a-courre consisted of pursuing on horseback stags, wild boars, deer, and wild cats with the help of a pack of hounddogs. Animals were put to death with spears or swords. Troublesome animals were also hunted - as much for pleasure as for the necessary extermination - including wolves, bears, lynx, elk, aurochs, and bison, which terrorized peasants, ruined their crops, and decimated their cattle. Wild animals could be hunted with bows and arrows. Game birds were hunted by hawking with a trained falcon. It developed into a great art, falconry. Hawks and falcons were valuable and sometimes given as prestigious gifts.

Karl Marx as Religious Eschatologist

2009-11-07T03:07:00.000-05:00

Marxism is a religion . According to Murray N. Rothbard:

Marxism is a religious creed. This statement has been common among critics of Marx, and since Marxism is an explicit enemy of religion, such a seeming paradox would offend many Marxists, since it clearly challenged the allegedly hard-headed scientific materialism on which Marxism rested. In the present day, oddly enough, an age of liberation theology and other flirtations between Marxism and the Church, Marxists themselves are often quick to make this same proclamation.

Certainly, one obvious way in which Marxism functions as a religion is the lengths to which Marxists will go to preserve their system against obvious errors or fallacies. Thus, when Marxian predictions fail even though they are allegedly derived from scientific laws of history, Marxists go to great lengths to change the terms of the original prediction.

The Sisters Who Would be Queen

2009-11-06T05:23:00.007-05:00

Author Stephanie Mann shares her thoughts on Leanda de Lisle's new book about the Grey sisters. According to Mrs. Mann:

Along with her first book: After Elizabeth (and its very long subtitle), Leanda de Lisle has written this book, focused on the Grey sisters to explore the complex issues of succession in the Tudor Dynasty. After all, so many of Henry VIII's decisions and actions were all directed at ensuring orderly succession after his death. When the only surviving child of his marriage to Catherine of Aragon was a daughter, he feared rebellion and civil war if Mary succeeded him. Therefore, he turned heaven and earth upside down to marry Anne Boleyn, young and promising a son, separating England from the universal Catholic Church and the authority of the Pope, risking war with the Holy Roman Empire, and incurring excommunication.

Once he had his son (having to get rid of another disappointing wife), he then violated the principle of primogeniture and settled the succession, with Parliament's consent on the heirs of, not his eldest sister, Margaret, but his favorite sister Mary: the Greys, who would follow his son and daughters if they died without issue. Ironically, this left only women to succeed Edward VI if he died without issue: his sisters Mary and Elizabeth and their relatives Frances, Jane, Katherine and Mary. Then both Edward VI and Elizabeth I contravened Henry's will: Edward by naming Jane Grey his heir and Elizabeth by naming Mary, Queen of Scots as hers. (Mary I regretted the inevitability of Elizabeth's succession but did not try to thwart it.) Edward made his decision based on religious principle, since Jane was an Evangelical like him. Elizabeth made her decision based on primogeniture and Mary's royal person, since Mary, Queen of Scots, after all, was a Catholic--and many in her court dreaded another queen and a Catholic on the throne.

Leanda de Lisle traces this sometimes confusing web of succession, with the plots of attempted coups and subterfuges of secret marriages as clearly as possible (with name changes and so many Mary's and Catherine's). She corrects many erroneous interpretations (of Lady Jane Grey as victim or of her mother Frances as an evil woman, etc) effectively, and demonstrates Elizabeth I's cruelty to Katherine and Mary, imprisoning and separating them from their well-beloved husbands and Katherine from one of her sons. The book is very well illustrated too, with excellent family trees for the Tudors and the Greys, et al. One irony of the family trees in my copy was that Jane's name was nearly always in the gutter of the spread!

Theology in the 12th Century

2009-11-06T03:03:00.002-05:00

Here is a brief lesson from Our Holy Father Pope Benedict (Via Blog by-the-Sea):

Today I pause to reflect on an interesting page of history, regarding the flowering of Latin theology in the 12th century, which came about by a providential series of coincidences. In the countries of Western Europe there reigned then a relative peace, which assured society of economic development and the consolidation of political structures, and fostered a lively cultural activity thanks also to contacts with the East. Perceived within the Church were the benefits of the vast action known as the "Gregorian reform," which, vigorously promoted in the preceding century, brought greater evangelical purity to the life of the ecclesial community, above all of the clergy, and restored to the Church and the papacy genuine liberty of action. Moreover, a vast spiritual renewal was spreading, sustained by the exuberant development of consecrated life: New religious orders were being born and spreading, while those already existing experienced a promising renewal.

Theology was also flourishing, acquiring greater awareness of its own nature: It refined its method, addressed new problems, advanced in the contemplation of the mysteries of God, produced fundamental works, inspired important initiatives of culture -- from art to literature -- and prepared the masterpieces of the next century, the century of Thomas Aquinas and Bonaventure of Bagnoregio.

There were two realms in which this fervid theological activity developed: the monasteries and the town schools, the scholae, some of which very soon gave life to the universities, which constituted one of the typical "inventions" of the Christian Middle Ages. In fact from these two realms, the monasteries and the scholae, one can speak of two different models of theology: "monastic theology" and "scholastic theology." The representatives of monastic theology were monks, in general, abbots, gifted with wisdom and evangelical fervor, dedicated essentially to arousing and nourishing a loving desire for God. The representatives of scholastic theology were cultured men, passionate about research; magistri wishing to show the reasonableness and soundness of the mysteries of God and of man, believed in with faith, of course, but understood also by reason. The contrasting objectives explain the differences in their method and their way of doing theology.

In the monasteries of the 12th century the theological method was linked primarily to the explanation of sacred Scripture, of the sacra pagina, to express ourselves as the authors of that period did. Biblical theololy was particularly widespread. The monks, in fact, were all devoted listeners and readers of sacred Scripture, and one of their main occupations consisted in lectio divina, namely, prayerful reading of the Bible. For them the simple reading of the sacred text was not enough to perceive the profound meaning, the interior unity and the transcendent message. Therefore, they had to practice a "spiritual reading," leading in docility to the Holy Spirit. Thus, in the school of the Fathers, the Bible was interpreted allegorically, to discover in every page, of the Old as well as the New Testament, what is said about Christ and his work of salvation.

Count Roland

2009-11-05T05:08:00.003-05:00

In the medieval times Roland, the kinsman of Charlemagne, was seen as the epitome of the Christian knight.

Catholicism and Anglicanism

2009-11-05T03:43:00.000-05:00

What are the main differences? Scott Richert explores the topic.

La Rochejaquelein

2009-11-04T05:24:00.000-05:00

One of the greatest heroes of the Vendée.

His handsome youth and great courage made him a natural leader that his troops would follow anywhere. He once gave an order which has become one of the most famous phrases of the counterrevolutionary forces, "Mes amis, si j'avance, suivez-moi! Si je recule, tuez-moi! Si je meurs, vengez-moi!" - "Friends, if I advance, follow me! If I retreat, kill me! If I die, avenge me!"

The Rules of Engagement

2009-11-04T04:13:00.000-05:00

How to be polite on the internet. (Via Esther)

Chapbooks

2009-11-03T05:31:00.005-05:00

Chapbooks were the popular reading for the common people from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries. (Via Hermes) Many popular fairy tales were spread by such a means, as well as news and sermons. According to the National Library of Scotland:

Chapbooks are small paper-covered booklets, usually printed on a single sheet or portion of a sheet, folded into books of eight, 12, 16 and 24 pages, often illustrated with crude woodcuts. They were in circulation from the 17th to the 19th centuries, sold by travelling hawkers, pedlars, street-criers or 'chapmen' for a penny or less on the streets and at markets and fairs. The word 'chapman' is related to the word 'cheap', but it is probably also related to the Anglo-Saxon 'ceapian', meaning to barter, buy and sell. The quality of paper used was invariably coarse; chapbook printers frequently employed worn and broken type and it was not uncommon for the illustrations to bear no relation to the text.
Chapbooks, along with broadsides, comprised the staple reading matter of the 'common people' in an age well before the arrival of harbingers of modernity such as the telegraph, the train, the telephone and the mechanised printing press. The subject matter of chapbooks was quite broad - sermons of covenanting ministers, prophecies, last words of murderers, songs and poems by Robert Burns and Allan Ramsay, biographies of famous people such as Wallace, Napoleon and Nelson, romances, legends, not to mention manuals of instruction and almanacs. One of the features of this type of publication is the proliferation of provincial imprints - chapbooks were printed in places such as Fintray, Newton Stewart and Inveraray, as well as Edinburgh, Falkirk and Glasgow. Chapbooks were read, or perhaps more accurately, read out to people of all ages, though few publishers catered specifically for children. James Lumsden of Glasgow was an exception - he produced good quality chapbooks for children in the early 19th century. Chapbooks gradually disappeared from the 1860s onwards, not only because of the explosion in the amount of cheap printed matter available but also due to strong competition from religious tract societies such as the Stirling Tract Enterprise which regarded many chapbook publications as 'ungodly'.

All Hallows and All Hallows' Eve: The Origins

2009-11-03T03:17:00.011-05:00

As has been pointed out elsewhere, the Christian feast of All Saints was not invented by the Roman Church to replace the pagan Celtic New Year celebration called Samhain, although eventually the two coincided. The feast of All Saints was originally celebrated on May 13 and later transferred to November 1. The Roman Pantheon, once the temple dedicated to all the gods, was dedicated on May 13, 609 to Our Lady Queen of All the Martyrs. It was then that the bones of many martyrs were taken from the catacombs and placed with honor in the Pantheon. As Abbot Gueranger describes in his masterpiece The Liturgical Year, Vol XV:

When Rome had completed the conquest of the world, she dedicated to all the gods, in token of her gratitude, the Pantheon, the most durable monument of her power. But when she herself had been conquered by Christ, and invested by him with the empire over souls, she withdrew her homage from vain idols and offered it to the Martyrs; for they, praying for her as she slew them, had rendered her truly eternal. To the martyrs then, and to Mary their Queen, she consecrated for ever, on the morrow of her merciful chastisement, the now purified Pantheon.

"Come forth from your dwellings, ye Saints of God, hasten to the place prepared for you." For three centuries the catacombs were the resting-place of our Lord's athletes, when they were borne from the arena. These valiant warriors deserved the honours of a triumph far better than did the great victors of old. In 312, however, Rome disarmed but not yet changed in heart, was not at all disposed to applaud the men who had conquered the gods of Olympus and of the Capitol. While the Cross surmounted her ramparts, the white-robed army still lay entrenched in the subterranean crypts that surrounded the city like so many outworks. Three centuries more were granted to Rome, that she might make satisfaction to God's justice, and take full cognizance of the salvation reserved for her by his mercy. In 609 the patient work of grace was completed; the Sovereign Pontiff Boniface IV uttered the word for the sacred crypts to yield up their treasures. It was a solemn moment, a forerunner of that wherein the Angel's trumpet-call shall sound over the sepulchres of the world. The successor of St. Peter, in all his apostolic majesty, and surrounded by an immense crowd, presented himself at the entrance of the catacombs. He was attended by eighteen chariots magnificently adorned for the conveyance of the martyrs. The ancient triumphal way opened before the Saints; the sons of the Quirites sang in their honour: "You shall come with joy and proceed with gladness; for behold, the mountains and the hills exult, awaiting you with joy. Arise, ye Saints of God, come forth from your hiding-places; enter into Rome, which is now the holy city; bless the Roman people following you to the temple of the false gods, which is now dedicated as your own church, there to adore together with you the majesty of the Lord."
Thus, after six centuries of persecution and destruction, the martyrs had the last word; and it was a word of blessing, a signal of grace for the great city hitherto drunk with the blood of Christians. More than rehabilitated by the reception she was giving to the witnesses of Christ, she was now not merely Rome, but the new Sion, the privileged city of the Lord. She now burned before the Saints the incense they had refused to offer to her idols; their blood had flowed before the very altar, on which she now invited them to rest, since the usurpers had been hurled back into the abyss. It was a happy inspiration that induced her, when she dedicated to the holy martyrs the temple built by Marcus Agrippa and restored by Severus Augustus, to leave upon its pediment the names of its primitive constructers and the title they had given it; for then only did the famous monument truly merit its name, when Christian Rome could apply to the new inhabitants of the Pantheon those words of the Psalm: I have said, you are gods. The thirteenth of May was the day of their triumphant installation.

Every dedication on earth reminds the Church, as she herself tells us, of the assembly of the Saints, the living stones of the eternal dwelling which God is building for himself in heaven. It is not astonishing, then, that the dedication of Agrippa's Pantheon, under the above-mentioned circumstances, should have originated the feast of today. Its anniversary, recalling the memory of the martyrs collectively, satisfied the Church's desire of honouring year by year all her blessed sons who had died for the Lord; for at an early date it became impossible to celebrate each of them on the day of his glorious death. In the age of peace there was added to the cultus of the martyrs that of the other just, who daily sanctified themselves in all the paths of heroism opened out to Christian courage. The thought of uniting these with the former in one common solemnity, which would supply for the unavoidable omission of many of them, followed naturally upon the initiative given by Boniface IV.
In 732, in the first half of that eighth century which was such a grand age for the Church, Gregory III dedicated, at St. Peter's on the Vatican, an oratory in honour of the Saviour, of his blessed Mother, of the holy Apostles, of all the holy Martyrs, Confessors, and perfect Just, who repose throughout the world. A dedication under so extensive a title did not, it is true, imply the establishment of our feast of All Saints by the illustrious Pontiff; yet from this period it began to be celebrated by divers churches, and that too on the first of November; as is attested, with regard to England, by Venerable Bede's Martyrology and the Pontifical of Egbert of York. It was far, however, from being universal, when in the year 835 Louis le Debonnaire, at the request of Gregory IV and with the consent of all the bishops of his realm, made its celebration obligatory by law. This decree was welcomed by the whole Church and adopted as her own, says Ado, with reverence and love.

The councils of Spain and Gaul, as early as the sixth century, mention a custom then existing, of sanctifying the commencement of November by three days of penance and litanies, like the Rogation days which precede the feast of our Lord's Ascension.

The main reason the Pope changed the feast of All Saints from May to November was that in the fall after the harvest there was more food to feed the pilgrims who came to Rome to venerate the relics of the martyrs. May 13 is still regarded as the feast of Our Lady Queen of Martyrs, and it was on that day that the Blessed Mother first appeared at Fatima in 1917, at the beginning of the century when more Catholics would be killed for their beliefs than ever before.

Chrysanthemums

2009-11-02T06:07:00.000-05:00

Catherine Delors shares a beautiful and cherished custom.

More on All Saints and All Souls, HERE. (Via The Western Confucian)

The Lisbon Earthquake of 1755

2009-11-02T05:32:00.005-05:00

It occurred on November 2, 1755, All Souls Day and the day Marie-Antoinette was born. Catherine Delors reports.

L'Autrichienne (1990)

2009-11-01T06:05:00.010-05:00

Although I have not yet seen L'Autrichienne in its entirety, I have it on good authority that it is perhaps the best film about Marie-Antoinette. German actress Ute Lemper gives a magnificent performance as the Queen in her last days at the Conciergerie, during her grueling trial and preparations for death. Marie-Antoinette's agony, her serenity in the face of many indignities, and her ability to move hearts, are captured with authenticity and stark realism. The screenplay, written by André Castelot, was taken directly from the court transcripts and the accounts of eye-witnesses. Although it is almost impossible to find L'Autrichienne in America on DVD, it can be watched on YouTube . (Thanks to "lemraq" for this find.) Sadly, there are no subtitles but the poignancy of Ute Lemper's performance supersedes language.

Solemnity of All Saints

2009-11-01T06:03:00.000-05:00

On November 1 the Church commemorates the "cloud of witnesses" (Hebrews 12:1), both hidden and renowned, who have ascended the mountain of perfection to their heavenly home. As the nineteenth century French liturgist Dom Gueranger expressed it:

Blessed are they who are called to the marriage-supper of the Lamb! Blessed are we all, who have received in baptism the nuptial robe of holy charity, which entitles us to a seat at the heavenly banquet! Let us prepare ourselves for the unspeakable destiny reserved for us by love. To this end are directed all the labors of this life; toils, sufferings, struggles for God's sake, all adorn with priceless jewels the garment of grace, the clothing of the elect....Let us sing, then, with the psalmist: "I rejoiced at the things that were said to me: We shall go into the house of the Lord...." (Dom Gueranger's The Liturgical Year, Vol XV, p.58)

The Little Flower greatly relied upon the intercession of the saints. In her autobiography, St Thérèse wrote:

Remembering the prayer of Eliseus to his Father Elias when he dared to ask him for his double spirit, I presented myself before the angels and saints and I said to them: 'I am the smallest of creatures; I know my misery and feebleness, but I know also how much noble and generous hearts love to do good. I beg you then, O Blessed Inhabitants of Heaven, I beg you to adopt me as your child. To you alone will be the glory which you will make me merit, but deign to answer my prayer. It is bold, I know; however, I dare to ask you to obtain for me your twofold spirit.' (The Story of a Soul, pp.195-196)

Shortly before her death, St. Thérèse had a dream in which the Venerable Mother Anne of Jesus, one of the foundresses of the Carmelite reform in the sixteenth century, assured her that she would soon possess eternal beatitude. The saint of Lisieux was surprised because, as she penned:

I was, up until then, absolutely indifferent to Venerable Mother Anne of Jesus. I never invoked her in prayer and the thought of her never came to mind....And when I understood to what a degree she loved me, how indifferent I had been towards her, my heart was filled with love and gratitude, not only for the saint who visited me, but for all the blessed inhabitants of heaven. (The Story of a Soul, pp.191-192)

We will never know in this life how individual saints, perhaps ones we have never heard of, have interceded for us. Through prayer and the Eucharist, we can draw upon the merits of our brothers and sisters in Paradise. Such richness is ours in the Communion of Saints, for all belong to Christ.

(Published in the November-December 2008 issue of Canticle Magazine.)

Halloween Etiquette

2009-10-31T05:11:00.003-04:00

Some tips (from Miss Janice, of course.)

Also, a brief history of Halloween in America from Edwardian Promenade. Recta Ratio explains the origins as well.

Helen Keller the Socialist

2009-10-31T03:24:00.001-04:00

Yes, I was a bit surprised myself.

Teachers of the Past

2009-10-30T05:29:00.003-04:00

Under the Gables explores what it was like to be a teacher long ago. (More HERE.) Many teenagers, including some of my grandparents, earned money for college by teaching elementary school. To quote:

According to the National Gallery of Art, where this watercolor resides, scholars were long perplexed about the shapes on the blackboard, whose corner holds Homer's signature in "chalk." Art historians have since discovered that the shapes signify that the young woman is teaching "drawing," which was considered a necessity for children, since it enabled industrial design and construction of buildings and presumably also furniture.

The composition echoes the shapes on the blackboard in the angularity of the teacher's apron and the checks of the gingham, the stacked rectangles of the background, the symmetrical placement of the blackboard and teacher, and the slate monochrome of the entire painting. The one contrast is the teacher's fresh and very young face. In fact, so young does her expression seem that if she were not holding the pointer, we would think she was a student.

Witchcraft in Africa

2009-10-30T03:27:00.002-04:00

It is a matter for some concern, and seems to be aimed at children.

Hans Christian Andersen

2009-10-29T05:12:00.004-04:00

The author of some of the most beloved fairy tales and yet, according to The Sword and the Sea, he had a troubled life.To quote Petri Liukkonen:

Hans Christian Andersen was born in the slums of Odense. His father, Hans Andersen, was a poor shoemaker and literate, who believed he was of aristocratic origin. Andersen's mother, Anne Marie Andersdatter, worked as washerwoman. Although she was uneducated and superstitious, she opened for his son the world of folklore. Later Andersen depicted her in his novels and in the story 'Hun duede ikke'. Anne Marie declined into alcoholism and died in 1833 in a charitable old people's home. Andersen's half-sister Karen Marie may have worked as a prostitute for a time; she contacted her famous brother only a few times before dying in 1846.

Andersen received little education. As a child he was highly emotional, suffering all kinds of fears and humiliations because of his tallness and effeminate interests. Andersen's hysterical attacks of cramps were falsely diagnosed as epileptic fits. Encouraged by his parents he composed his own fairy tales and arrange puppet theatre shows. His father loved literatuire and took Andersen often to the playhouse. "My father gratified me in all my wishes," wrote Andersen in The True Story of My Life (1846). "I possessed his whole heart; he lived for me. On Sundays, he made me perspective glasses, theatres, and pictures which could be changed; he read to me from Holberg's plays and the Arabian Tales; it was only in such moments as these that I can remember to have seen him really cheerful, for he never felt himself happy in his life and as a handicrafts-man."

In 1816 his father died and Andersen was forced to go to work. He was for a short time apprenticed to a weaver and tailor, and he also worked at a tobacco factory. Once his trousers were pulled down when other workers suspected that he was a girl. At the age of 14 Andersen moved to Copenhagen to start a career as a singer, dancer or an actor - he had a beautiful soprano voice. The following three years were full of hardships although he found supporters who paved his way to the theatre. Andersen succeeded in becoming associated with the Royal Theater, but he had to leave it when his voice began to change. When he was casually referred as a poet it changed his plans: "It went through me, body and soul, and tears filled my eyes. I knew that, from this very moment, my mind was awake to writing and poetry." He then began to write plays, all of which were rejected.

In 1822 Jonas Collin, one of the directors of the Royal Theatre and an influential government official, gave Andersen a grant to enter the grammar school at Slagelse. He lived in the home of the school headmaster Meisling, who was annoyed at the oversensitive student and tried to harden his character. Other pupils were much younger, 11-year-olds, among whom six years older Andersen was definitely overgrown. His appearance drew also unvanted attention - he had a long nose and close-set eyes.

Collin arranged in 1827 a private tuition for Andersen. He gained admission to Copenhagen University, where he completed his education. In 1828 Andersen wrote a travel sketch, Fodreise fra Holmens Kanal Til Østpynten af Amager, a fantastic tale in the style of the German Romantic writer E.T.A. Hoffmann. Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm's Children's and Household Tales had appeared between 1812 and 1815, but they were based on original folktales. Andersen's poem 'The Dying Child', was published in a Copenhagen journal and the Royal Theatre produced in 1829 his musical drama. PHANTASIER OG SKISSER, a collection of poems, was born when Andersen fell in love with Riborg Voigt, who was secretly engaged to the local chemist's son. "She has a lovely, pious face, quite child-like, but her eyes looker clever and thoughtful, they were brown and very vivid," Andersen remembered in The Book of My Life. Riborg married the chemists's son, Poul Bøving, in 1831. A leather pouch containing a letter from Riborg was found round Andersen's neck when he died. Also Edvard, Jonas Collin's son, and Henrik Stempe in the 1840s were for Andersen other objects of unfulfilled dreams.

"I do wish that I were dead," Andersen said to one of his friends in 1831, expressing not his feelings about his failed love for Riborg but also echoing the melancholy of Goethe's Werther from The Sorrows of Young Werther (1774). Andersen never met Goethe, who was still alive when Andersen made his first journey to Germany. The visit inspired the first of his many travel sketches. From 1831 onwards he travelled widely in Europe, and remained a passionate traveller all his life. Andersen wrote sketches about Sweden, Spain, Italy, Portugal, and the Middle East. During his journeys Andersen met in Paris among others Victor Hugo, Heinrich Heine, Balzac, and Alexandre Dumas. A Poet's Day Dreams (1853) Andersen dedicated to Charles Dickens, whom he met in London in 1847. And in Rome he met the young Norwegian writer Björnson.

As a novelist Andersen made his breakthrough with The Improvisatore (1835), using Italy as the setting. The story was autobiographical and depicted a poor boy's integration into society, an Ugly Duckling theme of self-discovery in which Andersen returned in several of his works. The book gained international success and during his life it remained the most widely read of all his works. E.B. Browning wrote warmly to her future husband of the novel and her last poem was written for Andersen in 1861, shortly before her death. Only a Fiddler (1837), Andersen's novel, was attacked by the philosopher Søren Kierkegaard in his book Af En endnu Levendes Papirer (1838, From the Papers of a Person Still Alive, Published Against his Will). "The joyless struggle that is Andersen's in real life now repeats itself in his writing," he wrote. Kierkegaard, the 'Ugly Duckling' of Danish philosophy, used a number of pseudonyms, none of whom 'agreed' with one another. A little later, Andersen took his revenge with the play En Comedie i det Grønne (1840), which included an unpractical philosopher.

Andersen's fame rests on his Fairy Tales and Stories, written between 1835 and 1872. Tales, Told for Children, appeared in a small, cheap booklet in 1835. In this and following early collections, which were published in every Christmas, Andersen returned to the stories which he had heard as a child, but gradually he started to create his own tales. The third volume, published in 1837, contained 'The Little Mermaid' and 'The Emperor's New Clothes.' Among Andersen's other best known tales are 'Little Ugly Duckling,' 'The Tinderbox,' 'Little Claus and Big Claus,' 'Princess and the Pea,' 'The Snow Queen,' The Nightingale,' and 'The Steadfast Tin Soldier.' With these collections, inspired by the great tradition of the Arabian Nights on the other hand, and Household Tales, collected by the brothers Grimm, Andersen became known as the father of the modern fairytale. Moreover, Andersen's works were original. Only 12 of his 156 know fairy stories drew on folktales.

Andersen broke new ground in both style and content, and employed the idioms and constructions of spoken language in a way that was new in Danish writing. When fairy tales at his time were didactic, he brought into them ambiguity. Children and misfits often speak truth; they serve as Andersen's mouthpiece in moral questions: ""But he has nothing on at all," said a little child at last. "Good heavens! listen to the voice of an innocent child," said the father, and one whispered to the other what the child had said. "But he has nothing on at all," cried at last the whole people. That made a deep impression upon the emperor, for it seemed to him that they were right; but he thought to himself, "Now I must bear up to the end." And the chamberlains walked with still greater dignity, as if they carried train which did not exist." (from 'The Emperor's New Suit,' 1837) Ugliness of the hero or heroine often conceals great beauty, which is revealed after misfortunes. In psychoanalysis this kind of figure is sometimes interpreted as a symbol of the inner self of soul, which has to be released from its prison.

Andersen's identification with the unfortunate and outcast made his tales very compelling. Some of Andersen's tales revealed an optimistic belief in the triumph of the good, among them 'The Snow Queen' and 'Little Ugly Duckling', and some ended unhappily, like 'The Little Match Girl.' In 'The Little Mermaid' the author expressed a longing for ordinary life - he never had such. In the story the youngest of six mermaid precesses longs after the land above the sea, but the fulfillment of the dream causes her much pain. "She knew this was the last evening she would ever see him for whom she had forsaken her kindred and her home, given up her lovely voice, and daily suffered unending torment - and he had no idea of it. This was the last night she would breathe the same air as he, or look upon the deep sea and the starry blue sky; an everlasting night without thoughts or dreams waited her, for she had no soul and could not gain one." (trans. L.W. Kingsland) Andersen's tales were translated throughout Europe, with four editions appearing in the UK in 1846 alone. His works influenced among others Charles Dickens ('A Christmas Carol in Prose,' 'The Chimes,' 'The Cricket on the Hearth.' 'The Haunted Man and the Ghost's Bargain'), Willam Thackeray and Oscar Wilde ('The Happy Prince,' 'The Nightingale and the Rose,' 'The Fisherman and His Soul'), C.S. Lewis, Isak Dinesen, P.O. Enquist, whose play, Rainsnakes, was about Andersen, Cees Noteboom, and a number of other writers. Elias Bredsdorff has complained in his book Hans Christian Andersen: The Story of His Life and Work (1975), that Andersen's tales have been bowdlerized and sweetened by Victorian British translators.

Andersen's last unfilled love was the Swedish opera singer Jenny Lind, whom he met first time in 1840. Jenny was the illegitimate daughter of a schoolmistress. According to her own words, she was at the age of nine "a small, ugly, broad-nosed, shy, gauche, altogether undergrown girl". At eighteen, she had made her breakthrough as a singer with her powerful soprano. 'The Ugly Duckling' become Jenny's favorite among Andersen's stories. However, 'Andersen's 'The Nightingale' is considered a tribute to Jenny, or "the Swedish Nightingale" as she was called. "Farewell," she wrote him in 1844, "God bless and protect my brother is the sincere wish of his affectionate sister, Jenny." Andersen never married.

Between the years 1840 and 1857 Andersen made journeys throughout Europa, Asia Minor, and Africa, recording his impressions and adventures in a number of travel books. He wrote and rewrote his memoirs, The Fairy Tale of My Life, but the standard edition is generally considered the 1855 edition. During his travels abroad, Andersen was able to be more relaxed and take more liberties than in Copenhagen, where everybody knew him. At the age of sixty-two Andersen went to Paris, where he visited a brothel - it was not his first visit or last. "Then went suddenly up into a meat market - one of them was covered with powder; a second, common; a third, quite the lady. I talked with her, paid twelve francs and left, without having sinned in deed, though I dare say I did in my thoughts. She asked me to come back, said I was indeed very innocent for a man." (from Hans Christian Andersen: The Life of a Storyteller by Jackie Wullschlager, 2001) Andersen died in his home in Rolighed on August 4, 1875. Edvard Collin and his wife were later buried with Andersen. However, their family members moved the Collins' bodies after some years to the family plot in another cemetery.

Was Oswald a CIA Agent?

2009-10-29T03:55:00.000-04:00

More facts are brought to light.

The Pre-Raphaelites

2009-10-28T05:25:00.000-04:00

Since the art of the pre-Raphaelites is featured so often on this blog, I was glad to find an article about them. (Via Pre-Raphaelite Art) According to The Guardian:

Few dead white male artists are as popular as Rossetti and co, despite a near total condemnation by modern critics. Even a senior curator at Tate Britain recently expressed to me his dislike of these artists - but what can Tate Britain do? As he said, if they don't show the pre-Raphaelites they get complaints from "teenage girls".
Well, I've decided to take my name off the petition calling for the pre-Raphaelites to be erased from history. After all, what was their crime? Not to be Manet. And yet just because their version of the avant-garde turned out to have little to do with the future of art doesn't mean these idealistic painters were without merit.
They were very literary artists, in a literary nation. They told stories that moved and seduced their public - and still do. In the end, liking a picture because it reminds you of the imaginative worlds of Tennyson, Dante, Keats and Shakespeare - to take some authors the pre-Raphaelites illustrated - is commendable. There are far worse reasons to like art than because it feeds a passion for literature. It is not even true that modern art owes nothing to the pre-Raphaelites. Their fascination with poetry, romance and dream came into its own in the late 19th century when the Symbolists emulated, and deepened, their sensuality. There is a line from Burne-Jones to Gustave Moreau and Odilon Redon.
This is why the pre-Raphaelites are famous all over the world, not just in Britain. We can't escape them, and we shouldn't deny them. They epitomise the worst of British art - and the best.

(Artwork: Rossetti's Helen of Troy)

Beyond the Mantilla: Other Veils

2009-10-28T03:33:00.003-04:00

Sancta Sanctis has more thoughts to share on veiling. In the Middle Ages, during the nuptial blessing, both bride and groom would be covered with a veil, a ritual which endures in many traditional cultures.