‘Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red’, © Derek Clarke
Clays have pleasantly surprised me by discovering that they have over-printed by not 20 copies, which is the number under/over contractually allowed, but 59 — which they offer me at an extraordinarily good price including free delivery. I have snapped them up. This will enable us to send out more review copies than we had planned. The gnomes of Sam&Sam’s distribution department will therefore work overtime to get these off, with covering letters, before 7 July, the two-month mark before publication…
Meanwhile, Richard Morrison has delivered a Big Bertha salvo about WW1 commemoration in The Times of 22 June 2018 (2 Arts, p. 6) which I feel I simply cannot ignore. It is entitled ‘This national war tribute has descended into overpriced poppycock’. Given that I am supposed to be taking part in presentations about the commemoration around Armistice Day this year, I would be intensely interested to hear what followers of Calderonia think of Morrison’s claims. Unfortunately, the piece is currently available online only behind a pay wall, so I shall have to summarise it.
‘Now that we are approaching the end of 14-18 NOW, the government’s £50 million centenary commemoration of that catastrophic event’, Morrison begins, ‘the same question that was asked in 1918 must be asked again, albeit in a less tragic context. What was the point of it all?’
I won’t mince words. So far, 14-18 NOW has been a colossal waste of money, a bandwagon to which have been hitched some inconsequential arts projects with, at best, a tangential connection to the First World War. And apart from ‘Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red’, the installation of 888,246 ceramic poppies that attracted millions of people (and wasn’t originally part of 14-18 NOW anyway), it has had minimal impact on the public.
I was instantly reminded of a similar piece by Morrison in The Times of 22 January 2016 in which he fulminated about the fact that the creators of Blood Swept Lands, Paul Cummins and Tom Piper, were ‘even refused an Arts Council grant and [Cummins] had to sell his house in Derby to develop the project’. As I shall elaborate in a moment, the fact that this powerful and inspired installation had no official funding does not surprise me one jot. But ought not Morrison at least to recognise the creative opportunism of the Arts Council in taking it up and bringing it to a far bigger audience? Was this not a good thing? Similarly, I personally found it hilarious that the 14-18 NOW website co-opted the unveiling of Millicent Fawcett’s superb statue in Parliament Square as though they, 14-18 NOW, had been somehow involved in campaigning for and funding it, but even so I applaud their opportunism in recognising the significance of the moment. Surely one should be grateful to them for contextualising women’s suffrage in the War?
According to Morrison there are two reasons for the ‘minimal impact’ that 14-18 NOW has supposedly had on people:
First, with no veterans left, the personal connection to the First World War has been lost. Of course there’s nobody alive who can remember women getting the vote either, but that centenary has resonated much more widely because the issues that galvanised the suffragettes are still hot topics.
Even if First World War veterans were still around, though, I doubt whether 14-18 NOW would have made much impression. Not with our politicians so fixated on Brexit. The mood is all wrong. How can we lament the conflict that tore apart Europe a century ago when we are obsessed with how to tear apart Europe now? [There follow ten lines of similar impassioned questions comparing aspects of WW1 with Brexit.]
It seems to me that this overlooks two fundamental things. First, ‘personal connection’ does not depend on people still being alive who lived through a catastrophic event. Personal connection is experienced by those left behind who emotionally connect with the dead and grieve for them. Feeling and thinking like this is what ordinary people do. You only have to have followed Twitter or read local newspapers in the last four years to know that it’s what millions of families in Britain have been doing. Almost every week I hear about projects in villages up and down the country that ‘personally connect’ with those who did not come back to their villages or town streets. The epitome of such personal connection is Andrew Tatham’s history and art project A Group Photograph: Before, Now & In-between, which was also awarded no Arts Council funding and has received precious little official recognition, e.g. from 14-18 NOW, either.
Second, the shenanigans of Brexit negotiations cannot, in my opinion, influence people’s emotions and thinking about the commemoration, rather the reverse: the electorate’s mood about the First World War may have influenced Brexit. Why people grieve and shed tears for soldiers they never knew is that they feel these soldiers’ lives were nihilistically wasted in a war that should not have happened and that we should not have had to fight. They feel that men and women of their families had to go and die because we had to help save Europe from itself. We had to fight and win the war because of our tragic geopolitical position, namely that we are with Europe but not of it. Whether we realise it or not, commemorating the national holocaust of 1914-18 has reminded us every day of our tenuous historical relation to Europe. It has held constantly before us our apartness and the dangers of involvement. The issues of the First World War are therefore white-hot topics. Subliminally, could that have made the difference of 4%?
The remaining three-fifths of Morrison’s article are devoted to taking apart the latest 14-18 NOW event Fly by Night, as well as Rachel Whiteread’s ‘inside-out Nissen hut’ in Dalby Forest, the forthcoming Shrouds of the Somme installation (‘just a remake of Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red, only with ghoulishness replacing tragic beauty’), and Danny Boyle’s event advertised for 11 November ‘inviting communities across the UK to come together in marking 100 years since the Armistice’. Morrison has been
surprised by how spurious many arts projects promoted by 14-18 NOW are. It’s possible that, in the 150-odd days remaining until November 11 we will be struck speechless by some extraordinary statement, but I’m not hopeful.
This too is wrong-headed. Like it or not, 14-18 NOW is a species of official art. Official art is enacted to recognise, and not much more, what a nation is feeling or in the opinion of the establishment should feel. It is very rarely great art, can be good art, but is usually kitsch and tat. Are Nelson’s Column, the Gold State Coach, or William Orpen’s vast canvas The Treaty of Versailles, 1919, great art? Although we know that Edwin Lutyens’ aesthetic decisions for the design of the Cenotaph were extremely fine, you could still not call the Cenotaph great art. It is disingenuous of Morrison, therefore, to expect ‘extraordinary artistic statements’ from those artists commissioned by 14-18 NOW.
Partly that is because they are doing it for money. It may sound laughably romantic, but I do not think extraordinary artistic statements can be conjured up for money; rather, they are produced by individuals who viscerally HAVE to create them, whether they are paid for it or not. But if they would not create official art for normal inspirational reasons, they have to be more or less, er…well…bribed to do it! That’s one reason why official art has never come cheap. Given the scale of some of 14-18 NOW’s events, the length of time it covers, and the number of administrators it has to employ, I actually don’t think £50 million is off the scale for official art of this national importance.
Moreover, it is taxpayers’ money spent on taxpayers. As far as I know, there have not been howls of protest at what the taxpayer is getting for £50 million. True, there have not been tidal waves of approval and gratitude, either. But that is exactly how it is with official art: if it is fine, if it more or less works for people, then it is accepted and no-one says anything. The original Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red at the Tower of London had five million visitors in four months and even a full-page image and commentary in the German newspaper Die Zeit. I am reliably informed that it was 14-18 NOW’s idea to turn off one’s house lights on the evening of 4 August 2014 and place a lighted candle in one’s window. This was observed by millions, too. It utterly caught the national mood: despair clinging to hope. Similarly, Dr Kenneth Bogle, writing in The Times on 25 June, was affected ‘among many evocative [14-18 NOW] artworks’ by Jeremy Deller’s We Are Here:
On July 1, 2016, the centenary of the first day of the Somme offensive, volunteers dressed as First World War soldiers appeared in public spaces across the UK, such as high streets and railway stations. Each carried a card with the name of the soldier they represented, his age and when he died.
Commuters and passers-by were mesmerised by these ghost soldiers. This imaginative project, which lasted only a day, was a reminder that the Great War casualties were living, breathing human beings, often pitifully young. Their war did not take place in black and white.
Clips of this ‘modern memorial’ are available online and never fail to move me to tears.
There we have it. Two things strike me: the actors were volunteers and the writer’s personal connection with the 14-18 NOW event moved him to tears. From the general lack of grumbling and from the conversations I have had about the subject, I think people feel that the 14-18 NOW commemoration is fitting and proper. In a strange way, I think families are touched that their government has put its money where the people’s heart is. For official art, 14-18 NOW’s success rate has been well above average. It has enabled us to share, in Wilfred Owen’s words, ‘The eternal reciprocity of tears’.
I totally agree that the events organised (and co-opted) by 14-18 NOW have, generally, been both excellent in themselves, and excellent value for money. But perhaps it’s in Richard Morrison’s job description to criticise any effort by any government body to organise anything at all for the benefit or enjoyment of the nation. I am reminded of the media negativity that surrounded the Millennium Dome, back in 2000. The feedback from most ‘ordinary’ people who weren’t put off from buying tickets was that it was brilliant. We thought it was so good we took our children twice. Besides which, the Dome itself, now reincarnated as the O2, has been a huge economic and cultural success – as, presumably, can be said of 14-18 NOW.
But anyhow, the real purpose of this comment is to ask, do any Calderonians listen to The Archers on Radio 4? I have been following with interest the efforts of bell-ringing supremo and pig man extraordinaire Neil Carter to recruit Ambridge villagers to take part in a special peal on Armistice Day. This really is a Thing – see https://www.gov.uk/government/news/nations-bells-to-ring-out-together-to-mark-armistice-centenary. Could there be any more appropriate way to mark the anniversary of the guns falling silent? (I don’t like to say, of the war ending. As a nation we seem to have forgotten that the terms signed on November 11 were but the agreement to a ceasefire that allowed the peace negotiations to begin.) The Ringing Remembers campaign will involve volunteers and entire communities across Britain – everyone will have to listen, whether they want to or not – in a way that chimes (!) perfectly with how ordinary people reacted to the news in 1918. But that’s where the similarity ends of course: Neil Carter and his non-fictional counterparts will also be enjoying themselves… War may not be fun; but commemoration most certainly is. (Discuss.)
The Morrison comment, I hope, is just another example of the affected detachment and cynicism of the chattering classes down the ages. It may beggar belief, but the Magdalen SCR betting book contains a number of wagers from 1940 and 1941 about the chances of a German invasion and the speed with which Britain would be conquered. And the wagers were laid by people close to government! And when the Second World War was over the college didn’t bother to put up a memorial to its dead or even bring back its First World War memorial cross from safe-keeping in Wheatley. It is no wonder Carol Reed made a film in early 1942, The Young Mr Pitt, on Pitt’s struggles against defeatism in the long war against France in the 1790s and early 1800s.
It is highly unlikely that there will be any significant opposition to the public money spent on 14-18 Now because at the local level there has been tremendous interest in commemorating the Great War and many local communities intend to mark the centenary of the Armistice with a special event. In my own village, Wootton, near Abingdon, we are holding a commemorative party for all ages on the afternoon of 11 November. It will begin with a play about the village’s war dead in the 1914-18 war, based in present and past time, which will set the scene for a brief account of Wootton, Britain and the world’s history over the last hundred years told in song, dance and drama. It will end with Brexit to emphasise as Patrick has said that Britain’s relationship with the continent of Europe has been difficult and unresolved since 1914. For the century before we largely stayed aloof. For the last century we have hovered on the edge undecided whether to commit or withdraw. As early as 1960, it should be remembered, AJP Taylor was daring to argue that we should never have gone to war in 1939 over Poland.
The 11 November remains one of the pivotal dates in the national calendar and has become more rather than less so as the number of veterans, even from the Second World War, is dwindling fast. It is to the nation or all four nations what Trafalgar Days is to the navy. If there is a threat to its importance, it comes not from articles by the intelligentsia but from the decision of the present and recent governments to mark the anniversary of any civilian tragedy with a national two-minutes silence. This is an understandable development given our new-found readiness to express our emotions. And there is always room for family and friends to mark these anniversaries with some act of remembrance. But too many national days of mourning rapidly devalues the currency. And where does it end? Why is there no annual commemoration of the Abervan disaster, for instance? We need to keep 11 November special.
As always a thought-provoking post, Patrick. Here are some of mine. Am I alone in never having heard of 14-18 NOW, or is this further proof of that organisation’s expensive failure to connect with the public mood? In November 1916 the local choir in which my wife and I sing gave a performance of the Mozart Requiem in Blandford to commemorate the centenary of the ending of the Battle of the Somme. Together with readings of names of the fallen from Blandford and its twin towns in France and Germany, it was a moving occasion, well attended, with proceeds going to a military charity. Checking with the programme, I see that it was sponsored entirely by local organisations and individuals. I suspect this is typical of the many grassroots events which have had nothing to do with 14-18 NOW.
I totally agree with your comments on ‘official art’. They are by no means ‘laughably romantic’, but a statement of what should be the obvious. The only arrangement which really works is for a sponsor or patron to provide the cash, with the creative artist enjoying complete artistic freedom. This used to be the case at the BBC, for instance, whereas my impression is that nowadays too often the dead hand of managerial expectations and demands holds sway.
It was no doubt disingenuous of Morrison to drag Brexit into the argument. Second-guessing what motivated people to vote one way or the other in the referendum seems to have become something of a national sport, and it was quite reasonable of you to oppose his speculations with an alternative interpretation. One could of course equally suggest that many remainers were swayed by the argument that the EU has ensured peace in Europe since WW2, which various historians have justifiably seen as an almost inevitable continuation and completion of unfinished business from WW1. But who really knows?
One final point: it’s striking that there were apparently no comparable ceremonies in 1915 to commemorate the centenary of the ending of the Napoleonic Wars, despite the defeat of Napoleon and the Congress of Vienna having ushered in a century of, if not universal peace, at least relatively limited warfare in Europe (the big exception being the Crimean War). There were of course obvious reasons for ignoring this momentous anniversary at the time. Former allies and enemies from those days now found their roles reversed. It would also presumably have been considered unacceptable to celebrate a hundred years of (relative) peace in the midst of the bloodiest war the world had ever seen. But above and beyond this I wonder if the celebration of such anniversaries on such a scale is perhaps after all a phenomenon more typical of our own age. And if so, why?
This is as brilliant a clutch of Comments as any I can remember on Calderonia… Thank you all. Moreover, I found myself nodding approvingly as I read them, even when there might seem some variance from my own post. For example, I think John Dewey probably is typical in not having heard of 14-19 NOW by name before, and I do accept his point that many people voted Remain precisely to prevent further wars in Europe — both old and young have told me so.
And Clare’s point about the Archers is spot on. There is something mysterious and moving about sound that you can hear from a distance but can’t see the source of. A correspondent tells me that up and down the country campanologists have been commemorating their fallen by ringing ‘quarters’, sometimes muffled, and there is a campaign https://www.big-ideas.org/project/ringing-remembers/ to recruit 1400 new bell ringers in commemoration of those who never returned in 1918. Even Richard Morrison acknowledges this as ‘evocative and useful’. But I think the ringing of every bell in the land at 11.00 a.m. on 11 November will reach parts of the nation that even the visual image can’t reach on TV.
On John’s last point, I know there was a widespread desire to celebrate the centenary of Waterloo in 1915, because George refers to it in a letter to Kittie on his way to Gallipoli. He and other officers on the R.M.S. Orsova agreed that they would meet on the ship to celebrate Waterloo properly in precisely a year’s time — by which time their own War would be over… Personally I agree with Laurence Brockliss that 11 November must be kept special.
I had intended to respond to Clare’s comment but was rather slow off the mark, and so the following may in some way overlap with the responses of others (including yours, Patrick). I gave up listening to The Archers years ago when it started to irritate me rather than entertain, so I wasn’t aware that the programme had mentioned the Ringing Remembers campaign; but it’s worth mentioning that bell ringers have been hard at work commemorating the loss of their colleagues throughout the First World War centenary period. As an example, our small village (Wylam, in Northumberland) lost two of its ringers (out of 54 men in all) and a quarter-peal was rung for both of them on the 100th anniversary of their deaths. Our local history group managed to identify, contact and bring together a number of members of their families to hear the peals. Other villages with slightly larger or more experienced bands have rung quarter-peals to commemorate every single villager (not just those who rang). How extraordinary, and how touching, that we as communities should remember 1,400 individuals who happened to be bell ringers in such a fitting manner. And top marks to the Central Council of Church Bell Ringers for co-ordinating the scheme. More details at https://cccbr.org.uk. The Ringing World (https://www.ringingworld.co.uk) has published short biographies of every ringer who was known to have died in the Great War.
And while on the subject of grassroots events – no, John, you are not alone: I had never heard of 14-18 NOW either. I’m sure I would have remembered those capital letters. But I have been aware of and enjoyed some of the events, and that is what is important.