John Betjeman (above right), the Anglican poet whose work is an attractive human mixture of faith, hope, love and doubt, became Poet Laureate of the UK on this day in 1972. As Laureate, he enjoyed huge popularity, as many of his poems were written in light verse, and celebrated the familiar things of British life. His Collected Poems sold over 2 million copies.
And is it true? And is it true,
This most tremendous tale of all,
Seen in a stained-glass window’s hue,
A Baby in an ox’s stall?
The Maker of the stars and sea
Become a Child on earth for me?
John Betjeman, ‘Christmas’
Today in 1960 saw the first day of the Lady Chatterley’s Lover obscenity trial. The Crown prosecuted Penguin Books under the UK’s Obscene Publications Act for publishing DH Lawrence’s explicit classic, in which Lady Chatterley has an affair with Mellors, her gamekeeper. The defence called the Bishop of Woolwich, John Robinson, to speak about the ethical value of the book, and one of his answers in the witness box produced a headline in the London evening press: ‘A Book All Christians Should Read’. The jury found in favour of the publisher, and the permissive society was born, or at the very least conceived, in the bushes behind her ladyship’s stables.
‘What Lawrence is trying to do is to portray the sex relationship as something essentially sacred. Archbishop William Temple once said that Christians do not make jokes about sex for the same reason that they do not make jokes about Holy Communion, not because it is sordid, but because it is sacred. I think Lawrence tried to portray this relation as in a real sense something sacred, as in a real sense an act of holy communion.’ Bishop John Robinson, testimony at the Lady Chatterley trial
Burt Lancaster, the Hollywood star, died today in 1994. He played Moses in 1974, in the five-hour TV miniseries, Moses the Lawgiver, which numbered Pope Paul VI among its fans.
It is the feast day of St Acca of Hexham, a 7th/8th century Bishop of Northumbria, and a conteporary of the Venerable Bede. A celebrated singer and church builder, he was also keen on making the English Church more Roman, after making a trip to Rome himself with his mentor, St Wilfrid. Bede called him ‘the dearest and best loved of all bishops on this earth,’ and he was treated as a much-loved saint in his own lifetime.
Image: Wikimedia Commons