Posts
Spring Reads: Arthur Salway's Cricket Poetry
2 weeks ago
Sunday, September 13, 2009
Saturday, September 12, 2009
In the Beginning and At the End
The Morrinsville College cross-country race was held early in the first term. There were several promising young athletes from the local club. That bunch broke away early accompanied by one long lanky third form Maori boy. A new teacher I was at one of the early checkpoints with an elderly teacher who said, “he won’t last long, that lot never do.” Inwardly, I wished the youth success.
We got back to the finishing post in time to see him lolloping along way in front. “He wont last long” I said to the four winds, thereby making an enemy in the hierarchy for the duration. As he and the principal were at daggers drawn, my comments labelled me as one of the other camp.
Tact was not one of young teacher McQueen’s virtues. Neither at the beginning was a sense of self-preservation. If I were being as honest as I could I’d probably add that quite a bit of present tact arises from the development of that sense, part of an on-going learning cure. Part of the process of shaping a young teacher is learning about staffroom relationships. Life as a university student is individualistic. When you join a secondary staffroom you become part of a team. Good relationships are vital.
After three years at Morrinsville I left to teach at Thames. Last period on the last day I booked the film room to show my fourth form a Disney wild-life movie. There is in time in teaching when entertainment is entitled. The film finished before the bell was due. We had been forbidden to let classes out before the end of the period. To kill time I ran the film backwards. We were falling about laughing when the bell rang - turtle eggs leaping out of the sand and back into the reptile's body. "You may go" I said. No-one left did as the film continued to wind back. Eventually I stopped it. "Hope you enjoy your next school sir?” After all the learning a little hilarity was a good curtain-call. They left happy and so did I, grateful for survival and what I had learnt and ready for the next challenge.
We got back to the finishing post in time to see him lolloping along way in front. “He wont last long” I said to the four winds, thereby making an enemy in the hierarchy for the duration. As he and the principal were at daggers drawn, my comments labelled me as one of the other camp.
Tact was not one of young teacher McQueen’s virtues. Neither at the beginning was a sense of self-preservation. If I were being as honest as I could I’d probably add that quite a bit of present tact arises from the development of that sense, part of an on-going learning cure. Part of the process of shaping a young teacher is learning about staffroom relationships. Life as a university student is individualistic. When you join a secondary staffroom you become part of a team. Good relationships are vital.
After three years at Morrinsville I left to teach at Thames. Last period on the last day I booked the film room to show my fourth form a Disney wild-life movie. There is in time in teaching when entertainment is entitled. The film finished before the bell was due. We had been forbidden to let classes out before the end of the period. To kill time I ran the film backwards. We were falling about laughing when the bell rang - turtle eggs leaping out of the sand and back into the reptile's body. "You may go" I said. No-one left did as the film continued to wind back. Eventually I stopped it. "Hope you enjoy your next school sir?” After all the learning a little hilarity was a good curtain-call. They left happy and so did I, grateful for survival and what I had learnt and ready for the next challenge.
Friday, September 11, 2009
A Courtship of Tuis
It’s raining. About time. August was well below the average Wellington rainfall for the month and we’re had almost no rain in these early days of September. The ground is very dry.
The tui pair engage in courtship flights, wheeling and dealing and flirting around the section in spectacular fashion.
We watched a DVD Some Like It Hot a couple of nights ago. I’d forgotten how chunky Marilyn Monroe was. The comedy has dated but it’s still a good movie. One could be forgiven for feeling envious of Tony Curtis for kissing Monroe. So it was with surprise I read on the net he described the experience as kissing Hitler.
Surfing the net about the movie I followed some leads about Marilyn and stumbled across a five part series about her death involving reconstruction and research. There are three possible scenarios, murder, suicide or an accidental overdose. Scientific research rules out the third. The first is very unlikely. So it does look like suicide the programme concluded.
My books to read shelf is filling up. I’m enjoying the Talleyrand but it’s a big book and I allow myself to be sidetracked. Knowing I was watching Charlie Chaplin movies Anne’s son Jonathan sent me a book about his development of the character of a clown. I have three books from Geoff and I know there are birthday books to come.
The tui pair engage in courtship flights, wheeling and dealing and flirting around the section in spectacular fashion.
We watched a DVD Some Like It Hot a couple of nights ago. I’d forgotten how chunky Marilyn Monroe was. The comedy has dated but it’s still a good movie. One could be forgiven for feeling envious of Tony Curtis for kissing Monroe. So it was with surprise I read on the net he described the experience as kissing Hitler.
Surfing the net about the movie I followed some leads about Marilyn and stumbled across a five part series about her death involving reconstruction and research. There are three possible scenarios, murder, suicide or an accidental overdose. Scientific research rules out the third. The first is very unlikely. So it does look like suicide the programme concluded.
My books to read shelf is filling up. I’m enjoying the Talleyrand but it’s a big book and I allow myself to be sidetracked. Knowing I was watching Charlie Chaplin movies Anne’s son Jonathan sent me a book about his development of the character of a clown. I have three books from Geoff and I know there are birthday books to come.
Thursday, September 10, 2009
Te Araroa
Te Araroa
Mildew on the slides of the mind
blurs – as lichen on the Alamein graves
at Te Ara roa – the memory of the generator
that thumped away our honeymoon evenings.
Ghosts of my callow youth
escort me now, one case only,
up the hotel stairs,
but when they mock me in the midnight surf
that bangs and bangs at the cleared beach,
I smile: I think more often now I smile
and stare them out.
I must take some new pictures to show you;
we’ll compare them with the old –
there’s much less tangle, mess and clutter now.
The present isn’t envious
of anything except the years
except the years.
I wrote this poem shortly after I became an inspector of secondary schools and revisted Te Araroa in that capacity. As I’ve been blogging about poems and cameras I decided to put it up for it is the only time I’ve written about taking photographs. I was surprised and delighted when it was selected to go into a coffee table book callled Shards of Silver containing poems and pictorial images.
A poet friend said it was a good poem except for the last three lines. He said they don’t arise from the previous material. He’s probably right but it’s what I wrote at the time. Typing it out yesterday brought back lots of memories. Indeed, when I finished that task I flipped contently through my first collection of poems Against the Maelstrom published by Caxton. The poems there are like a photograph album of my forties years.
Mildew on the slides of the mind
blurs – as lichen on the Alamein graves
at Te Ara roa – the memory of the generator
that thumped away our honeymoon evenings.
Ghosts of my callow youth
escort me now, one case only,
up the hotel stairs,
but when they mock me in the midnight surf
that bangs and bangs at the cleared beach,
I smile: I think more often now I smile
and stare them out.
I must take some new pictures to show you;
we’ll compare them with the old –
there’s much less tangle, mess and clutter now.
The present isn’t envious
of anything except the years
except the years.
I wrote this poem shortly after I became an inspector of secondary schools and revisted Te Araroa in that capacity. As I’ve been blogging about poems and cameras I decided to put it up for it is the only time I’ve written about taking photographs. I was surprised and delighted when it was selected to go into a coffee table book callled Shards of Silver containing poems and pictorial images.
A poet friend said it was a good poem except for the last three lines. He said they don’t arise from the previous material. He’s probably right but it’s what I wrote at the time. Typing it out yesterday brought back lots of memories. Indeed, when I finished that task I flipped contently through my first collection of poems Against the Maelstrom published by Caxton. The poems there are like a photograph album of my forties years.
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Two Thoughts About Education
1
In 1877, adopting the approach developed in Nelson province our Parliament established a nation-wide system of ‘free, compulsory and secular education’ for children between the ages of 7 and 13. Maori need not attend but they had the right if they wanted to.
Introducing the Act, Sir Charles Bowen said, ‘the higher branches of education may be taught upon payment of a fee. … and there is provision for scholarships which enable children of unusual attainments and ability to carry on their education. It is not intended to encourage children whose vocation is honest trade to waste in higher schools time which might be devoted to the learning of a trade.’ This two-way division fastening different expectations has bedeviled our system ever since.
2
I learnt a hard lesson in my first term teaching. I had a third form English class, bright young country adolescents like alert young puppies, enthusiastic and full of verve. But as the first term progressed they got noisier. Just before Easter they got very raucous, calling out answers across each other. I realised I had to put my foot down, hard. Foolishly I said, "I'll cane the next boy who calls out." Realising I meant it they quietened down.
Near the end of the period a quiet scholarly boy who had never previously opened his mouth unless I asked him a question, called out an answer. "You gotta cane him, sir. You said you would". I knew I had left myself no option. "Outside" Head down he went out before me into the corridor. The phrase ‘this hurts me more than it hurts you’ was never more true. I also knew I could not cane him gently - the class inside waited expectantly. I hit him once. He waited for the second stroke. "That's all. And don't call out again." Back in the classroom someone quietly said, "you only caned him once." "He only called out, once," I replied. The humour eased our mutual unease at the injustice of the situation. They knew he did not deserve the punishment. They also knew I could not lose face. Moral - never utter a general threat, it can collide with justice.
In 1877, adopting the approach developed in Nelson province our Parliament established a nation-wide system of ‘free, compulsory and secular education’ for children between the ages of 7 and 13. Maori need not attend but they had the right if they wanted to.
Introducing the Act, Sir Charles Bowen said, ‘the higher branches of education may be taught upon payment of a fee. … and there is provision for scholarships which enable children of unusual attainments and ability to carry on their education. It is not intended to encourage children whose vocation is honest trade to waste in higher schools time which might be devoted to the learning of a trade.’ This two-way division fastening different expectations has bedeviled our system ever since.
2
I learnt a hard lesson in my first term teaching. I had a third form English class, bright young country adolescents like alert young puppies, enthusiastic and full of verve. But as the first term progressed they got noisier. Just before Easter they got very raucous, calling out answers across each other. I realised I had to put my foot down, hard. Foolishly I said, "I'll cane the next boy who calls out." Realising I meant it they quietened down.
Near the end of the period a quiet scholarly boy who had never previously opened his mouth unless I asked him a question, called out an answer. "You gotta cane him, sir. You said you would". I knew I had left myself no option. "Outside" Head down he went out before me into the corridor. The phrase ‘this hurts me more than it hurts you’ was never more true. I also knew I could not cane him gently - the class inside waited expectantly. I hit him once. He waited for the second stroke. "That's all. And don't call out again." Back in the classroom someone quietly said, "you only caned him once." "He only called out, once," I replied. The humour eased our mutual unease at the injustice of the situation. They knew he did not deserve the punishment. They also knew I could not lose face. Moral - never utter a general threat, it can collide with justice.
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
NZ Review of Books
Yesterday’s mail included our copy of New Zealand Review of Books. Enthusiastic reviews of Jenny Bornholt’s The Rocky Shore and Vince O’Sullivan’s Further Convictions Pending, two poetry collections I really enjoyed. Sue Macauley’s review of Fiona Kidman’s second volume of autobiography made me even more keen to read it. I have asked for it for my birthday which is coming up soon.
Regrettably, my review of Denis Welch’s book on Helen Clark has been held over for the next edition. My last review to be published there was last year on Bassett’s book on David Lange. Here it is:
Working With David
Michael Bassett
Hachette Livra, $59.99, ISBN 978-1-86971-094-1
Working With David is a dogmatic and humourless book about a man who, even in adversity, revelled in laughter. Beginning with clear praise - ‘at the peak of his career in 1984-5, Lange had a magic about him that no other parliamentarian rivalled’ - Michael Bassett goes on to make scathing comments about his later performance: ‘a jumping jack’, ‘a political cot-case’, and ‘only Lange’s removal could really have let cabinet government operate properly’. My hunch is that he never forgave the PM for taking the Health portfolio away from him in 1987.
Bassett’s account of Cabinet discussions is something rare in New Zealand politics, an insider’s view. To read it is to re-enter those six turbulent years when the Fourth Labour Government radically changed the shape and direction of New Zealand society. Bassett’s account of the 1951 waterfront strike and his lives of Ward and Coates were good books, but he spoilt the account of Fraser’s life with cheap ideological jibes. This book is much worse - 550 pages obsessively pursing the theme of a great leader led astray by a siren woman. As a personal memoir or diary it’s acceptable, but it’s not an impartial history. It would be tragic if it is accepted as the only accurate account of those six years.
Margaret Pope is not the only woman at the receiving end of Bassett’s scorn. His misogyny is clearly evident. At a Cabinet meeting, Margaret Shields ‘warbled about rumours and leaks not only being sourced to the Prime Minister’s Department’. After the 1987 election as the Cabinet discussed likely new appointments, ‘Lange was losing concentration. He had [Margaret] Wilson waiting to see him, possibly to pour more poison into the king’s ear.’ On 29 June 1989, the day Lange narrowly won a non-confidence vote, “Douglas, Butcher, Goff, Prebble and I had a lunch of fish and chips for old times’ sake, this time without Moore or Lange. And we kept the door firmly shut. Hunt got together with Clark, and they set up a dinner date for the Friday evening. Her plans were coming along nicely.’ Ruth Dyson ‘kept hectoring Labour MPs on Lange’s behalf.' ‘We laughed about the cabal egging Lange on. I likened it to the last days of the Tsar, with Pope as the Empress and Wilde as a female version of Rasputin.’ Those who live by conspiracy find it everywhere.
His chronicle is not only a belittlement of Lange and Pope; it’s too simplistic. There were so many other factors. Above all, it does not do justice to the titanic clash between Lange and Roger Douglas - the stuff of Greek drama, hubris, the future direction of a nation, the nature of power, an ideological struggle.
It must be remembered that Lange supported the early economic reforms, as the inertia of the status quo was challenged in new and exciting ways. His implementation of the Picot proposals for educational administrative reform is further proof of his sense of a need for restructuring. Further, he trusted people in whom he had confidence. He delegated well, I can vouch for that. But he began to diverge from Douglas in April 1987, when the Finance Minister signalled his desire for a flat tax and the privatisation of social services. In a written response dated 22 April, Lange strongly stated his reservations: ‘Your radical strategy would negate our assets. We would no longer be united. Our determination would falter. Mine would. Our purpose would appal our own suppporters.’.
After the sharemarket crash in mid-October that year, Douglas resurrected the flat tax idea on the grounds that the markets needed something heroic to restore faith in them. The spin-doctoring from Douglas’s office on the Beehive’s sixth floor saw the media dutifully carrying stories of the need for dramatic action. Despite Treasury reservations, Douglas persisted with the concept, persuading his Cabinet colleagues to go along with it. Lange reluctantly agreed, a major mistake, and it was announced with great fanfare. But the more Lange studied the proposals, the more uneasy he became.
He tried to persuade his colleagues to accept that the announcement was in principle only and to take the issue to Labour’s caucus. He made little headway. Knowing he was breaking Cabinet collectivity, at a press conference on 28 January 1988 he announced delays in its implementation. The gap of the previous April had become a chasm. Dennis Welch wrote in the Listener, ‘the towering edifice of the Labour Government shifted on its foundations’.
Hijacking the debate over social policy, the passions, frustrations, anger and conflict generated by that shift dominated the remainder of the government’s term in office. Bassett was a major participant in all these events: I was a mere bit player, in that it was my good fortune to be an education aide for Lange in 1998-9. In the subsequent Cabinet reshuffle after the 1987 election, despite Pope’s advice to take Health, Lange chose Education. It was decided he would stump the country consulting teachers and parents about the education reforms. So for 15 months I was in close proximity to him as he toured New Zealand. I saw him on good days and on bad days. Three times officially and quite often off-the-cuff during that time I advised him to drop the portfolio to concentrate upon the power struggle with Douglas about the direction of the government and country. He remained adamant he would continue. I had shaken hands on an education job. Instead I found myself in a war-zone.
I admit to being partisan myself - but Bassett’s mean-spirited portrayal of Lange is not the person I worked with. He was ebullient, courteous, humane, witty, quirky and highly intelligent. He was both formidable and vulnerable. He could be infuriating, but his capacity to suddenly focus constantly astonished me. He was more stoical than is commonly recognised. His dislike of confrontation was legendary but it also aroused protective instincts amongst his aides.
Not only were the Rogernomes arrogant, they were impatient. Bassett’s fundamentalist fervour allows no recognition that Rogernomics was maybe not working, indeed might be flawed. His continuing criticism of Lange’s insistence on more social service spending is evidence of its importance to the PM. I believe Lange’s lapsed Methodism was a key to his approach to politics. He spoke often of the influence of the English preacher Donald Soper upon him. He had a strong sense of helping the underdog and the needy.
He told me how he felt Douglas’s policies were not helping these people, indeed they were disadvantaging them further. The 1987 election results concerned him, in that suburbs such as Remuera swung sharply to Labour, while its vote went down in its heartland electorates. He sensed something was wrong. Both his instincts and the polls showed the same story. Restructuring had damaged too many people – there was a need for a breather. This had nothing to do with pillow-talk. He was speaking from his own heart. Of that I am convinced.
Lange’s government should be seen in context. Post-Muldoon, it was a struggle, amongst other things, about the future shape of the Labour party. There were fisticuffs at conferences and constituency contests. Bassett gives some clues, but does not explore the background to the two breakaway parties of the early1990s - to the right Roger Douglas and ACT, to the left Jim Anderton and the Alliance. Clark and Cullen’s experience of a disunited ministry and caucus goes a long way to explain the leadership style of the Fifth Labour Government.
Had the flat tax gone ahead it would have destroyed the Labour party. David Lange can be criticised not for shelving it, but how he did so. When I started work I was surprised, indeed amazed, at how isolated he was. He was an outsider; his path to power had not been through the ranks, the rough and tumble of meetings and conferences, remits and compromises, the camaraderie of a common cause. With all his brilliance he never really understood politics. He took a lonely path. It was a brave one and it was a sacrificial one.
I recall Lange’s visit to a secondary school where he visited a class with learning difficulties. The students had been making up crosswords. They challenged him to do them and he finished very quickly, telling them he did one every morning. He invited them to help him create a new one. They crowded round him. The teacher and I both moved forward, but he jovially waved us away. As I stood watching, two thoughts jostled in my mind. He should be in Wellington dealing with affairs of State; and savour this moment, you’re in the presence of a man who has an immense capacity to enjoy his humanity. David Lange deserves a better and more balanced account of his time in office than this.
Regrettably, my review of Denis Welch’s book on Helen Clark has been held over for the next edition. My last review to be published there was last year on Bassett’s book on David Lange. Here it is:
Working With David
Michael Bassett
Hachette Livra, $59.99, ISBN 978-1-86971-094-1
Working With David is a dogmatic and humourless book about a man who, even in adversity, revelled in laughter. Beginning with clear praise - ‘at the peak of his career in 1984-5, Lange had a magic about him that no other parliamentarian rivalled’ - Michael Bassett goes on to make scathing comments about his later performance: ‘a jumping jack’, ‘a political cot-case’, and ‘only Lange’s removal could really have let cabinet government operate properly’. My hunch is that he never forgave the PM for taking the Health portfolio away from him in 1987.
Bassett’s account of Cabinet discussions is something rare in New Zealand politics, an insider’s view. To read it is to re-enter those six turbulent years when the Fourth Labour Government radically changed the shape and direction of New Zealand society. Bassett’s account of the 1951 waterfront strike and his lives of Ward and Coates were good books, but he spoilt the account of Fraser’s life with cheap ideological jibes. This book is much worse - 550 pages obsessively pursing the theme of a great leader led astray by a siren woman. As a personal memoir or diary it’s acceptable, but it’s not an impartial history. It would be tragic if it is accepted as the only accurate account of those six years.
Margaret Pope is not the only woman at the receiving end of Bassett’s scorn. His misogyny is clearly evident. At a Cabinet meeting, Margaret Shields ‘warbled about rumours and leaks not only being sourced to the Prime Minister’s Department’. After the 1987 election as the Cabinet discussed likely new appointments, ‘Lange was losing concentration. He had [Margaret] Wilson waiting to see him, possibly to pour more poison into the king’s ear.’ On 29 June 1989, the day Lange narrowly won a non-confidence vote, “Douglas, Butcher, Goff, Prebble and I had a lunch of fish and chips for old times’ sake, this time without Moore or Lange. And we kept the door firmly shut. Hunt got together with Clark, and they set up a dinner date for the Friday evening. Her plans were coming along nicely.’ Ruth Dyson ‘kept hectoring Labour MPs on Lange’s behalf.' ‘We laughed about the cabal egging Lange on. I likened it to the last days of the Tsar, with Pope as the Empress and Wilde as a female version of Rasputin.’ Those who live by conspiracy find it everywhere.
His chronicle is not only a belittlement of Lange and Pope; it’s too simplistic. There were so many other factors. Above all, it does not do justice to the titanic clash between Lange and Roger Douglas - the stuff of Greek drama, hubris, the future direction of a nation, the nature of power, an ideological struggle.
It must be remembered that Lange supported the early economic reforms, as the inertia of the status quo was challenged in new and exciting ways. His implementation of the Picot proposals for educational administrative reform is further proof of his sense of a need for restructuring. Further, he trusted people in whom he had confidence. He delegated well, I can vouch for that. But he began to diverge from Douglas in April 1987, when the Finance Minister signalled his desire for a flat tax and the privatisation of social services. In a written response dated 22 April, Lange strongly stated his reservations: ‘Your radical strategy would negate our assets. We would no longer be united. Our determination would falter. Mine would. Our purpose would appal our own suppporters.’.
After the sharemarket crash in mid-October that year, Douglas resurrected the flat tax idea on the grounds that the markets needed something heroic to restore faith in them. The spin-doctoring from Douglas’s office on the Beehive’s sixth floor saw the media dutifully carrying stories of the need for dramatic action. Despite Treasury reservations, Douglas persisted with the concept, persuading his Cabinet colleagues to go along with it. Lange reluctantly agreed, a major mistake, and it was announced with great fanfare. But the more Lange studied the proposals, the more uneasy he became.
He tried to persuade his colleagues to accept that the announcement was in principle only and to take the issue to Labour’s caucus. He made little headway. Knowing he was breaking Cabinet collectivity, at a press conference on 28 January 1988 he announced delays in its implementation. The gap of the previous April had become a chasm. Dennis Welch wrote in the Listener, ‘the towering edifice of the Labour Government shifted on its foundations’.
Hijacking the debate over social policy, the passions, frustrations, anger and conflict generated by that shift dominated the remainder of the government’s term in office. Bassett was a major participant in all these events: I was a mere bit player, in that it was my good fortune to be an education aide for Lange in 1998-9. In the subsequent Cabinet reshuffle after the 1987 election, despite Pope’s advice to take Health, Lange chose Education. It was decided he would stump the country consulting teachers and parents about the education reforms. So for 15 months I was in close proximity to him as he toured New Zealand. I saw him on good days and on bad days. Three times officially and quite often off-the-cuff during that time I advised him to drop the portfolio to concentrate upon the power struggle with Douglas about the direction of the government and country. He remained adamant he would continue. I had shaken hands on an education job. Instead I found myself in a war-zone.
I admit to being partisan myself - but Bassett’s mean-spirited portrayal of Lange is not the person I worked with. He was ebullient, courteous, humane, witty, quirky and highly intelligent. He was both formidable and vulnerable. He could be infuriating, but his capacity to suddenly focus constantly astonished me. He was more stoical than is commonly recognised. His dislike of confrontation was legendary but it also aroused protective instincts amongst his aides.
Not only were the Rogernomes arrogant, they were impatient. Bassett’s fundamentalist fervour allows no recognition that Rogernomics was maybe not working, indeed might be flawed. His continuing criticism of Lange’s insistence on more social service spending is evidence of its importance to the PM. I believe Lange’s lapsed Methodism was a key to his approach to politics. He spoke often of the influence of the English preacher Donald Soper upon him. He had a strong sense of helping the underdog and the needy.
He told me how he felt Douglas’s policies were not helping these people, indeed they were disadvantaging them further. The 1987 election results concerned him, in that suburbs such as Remuera swung sharply to Labour, while its vote went down in its heartland electorates. He sensed something was wrong. Both his instincts and the polls showed the same story. Restructuring had damaged too many people – there was a need for a breather. This had nothing to do with pillow-talk. He was speaking from his own heart. Of that I am convinced.
Lange’s government should be seen in context. Post-Muldoon, it was a struggle, amongst other things, about the future shape of the Labour party. There were fisticuffs at conferences and constituency contests. Bassett gives some clues, but does not explore the background to the two breakaway parties of the early1990s - to the right Roger Douglas and ACT, to the left Jim Anderton and the Alliance. Clark and Cullen’s experience of a disunited ministry and caucus goes a long way to explain the leadership style of the Fifth Labour Government.
Had the flat tax gone ahead it would have destroyed the Labour party. David Lange can be criticised not for shelving it, but how he did so. When I started work I was surprised, indeed amazed, at how isolated he was. He was an outsider; his path to power had not been through the ranks, the rough and tumble of meetings and conferences, remits and compromises, the camaraderie of a common cause. With all his brilliance he never really understood politics. He took a lonely path. It was a brave one and it was a sacrificial one.
I recall Lange’s visit to a secondary school where he visited a class with learning difficulties. The students had been making up crosswords. They challenged him to do them and he finished very quickly, telling them he did one every morning. He invited them to help him create a new one. They crowded round him. The teacher and I both moved forward, but he jovially waved us away. As I stood watching, two thoughts jostled in my mind. He should be in Wellington dealing with affairs of State; and savour this moment, you’re in the presence of a man who has an immense capacity to enjoy his humanity. David Lange deserves a better and more balanced account of his time in office than this.
Monday, September 7, 2009
The Iceberg That Sank The Titanic
Last night I watched a good TV documentary, The Iceberg That Sank The Titanic. It gave pictorial images to the concepts in Thomas Hardy’s great poem about the event.
The Convergence Of The Twain
1
In a solitude of the sea
Deep from human vanity,
And the Pride of Life that planned her, stilly couches she.
II
Steel chambers, late the pyres
Of her salamandrine fires,
Cold currents thrid, and turn to rhythmic tidal lyres.
III
Over the mirrors meant
To glass the opulent
The sea-worm crawls-grotesque, slimed, dumb, indifferent.
IV
Jewels in joy designed
To ravish the sensuous mind
Lie lightless, all their sparkles bleared and black and blind.
V
Dim moon-eyed fishes near
Gaze at the gilded gear
And query: "What does this vaingloriousness down here?" . . .
VI
Well: while was fashioning
This creature of cleaving wing,
The Immanent Will that stirs and urges everything
VII
Prepared a sinister mate
For her - so gaily great -
A Shape of Ice, for the time far and dissociate.
VIII
And as the smart ship grew
In stature, grace, and hue,
In shadowy silent distance grew the Iceberg too.
IX
Alien they seemed to be:
No mortal eye could see
The intimate welding of their later history,
X
Or sign that they were bent
By paths coincident
On being anon twin halves of one august event,
XI
Till the Spinner of the Years
Said "Now!" And each one hears,
And consummation comes, and jars two hemispheres.
Thomas Hardy
From snowflakes that settled while humanity was still in its stone age a great ice-sheet was formed in Greenland. As it reached the sea great chunks calved to form ice-bergs. There was stunning footage of these happenings. Photographs of the sea-floor revealed huge gouges where the ice had stuck, scraped and scarred. Historic film showed the ship’s construction and launch in Belfast and its maiden voyage sailing from Southhampton.
Most icebergs melt before they enter the shipping lanes. Some get stuck along the Newfoundland coast because most of the volume is under water. I did not realise they tumbled because the underwater melt of the ice makes the ‘berg top-heavy. In 1912, however, this large one was in the path of the Titanic.
Apparently the decision on sighting the ‘berg to go to starboard was a mistake. Head-on would have crumpled the bow and caused considerable chaos and damage on board. But with its waterproof compartments the ship would have survived. As it was the ice ripped along the keel and water poured into the compartments. It sank with a huge loss of life. Modern underwater images of the sunken ship reveal what Hardy had imagined – marine life.
By coincidence, Anne and I earlier had watched The Antiques Roadshow. A man brought in some mementoes of his grandfather. He had been a sailor and sailed on the Titanic’s fateful voyage. In charge of a lifeboat he survived.
The Convergence Of The Twain
1
In a solitude of the sea
Deep from human vanity,
And the Pride of Life that planned her, stilly couches she.
II
Steel chambers, late the pyres
Of her salamandrine fires,
Cold currents thrid, and turn to rhythmic tidal lyres.
III
Over the mirrors meant
To glass the opulent
The sea-worm crawls-grotesque, slimed, dumb, indifferent.
IV
Jewels in joy designed
To ravish the sensuous mind
Lie lightless, all their sparkles bleared and black and blind.
V
Dim moon-eyed fishes near
Gaze at the gilded gear
And query: "What does this vaingloriousness down here?" . . .
VI
Well: while was fashioning
This creature of cleaving wing,
The Immanent Will that stirs and urges everything
VII
Prepared a sinister mate
For her - so gaily great -
A Shape of Ice, for the time far and dissociate.
VIII
And as the smart ship grew
In stature, grace, and hue,
In shadowy silent distance grew the Iceberg too.
IX
Alien they seemed to be:
No mortal eye could see
The intimate welding of their later history,
X
Or sign that they were bent
By paths coincident
On being anon twin halves of one august event,
XI
Till the Spinner of the Years
Said "Now!" And each one hears,
And consummation comes, and jars two hemispheres.
Thomas Hardy
From snowflakes that settled while humanity was still in its stone age a great ice-sheet was formed in Greenland. As it reached the sea great chunks calved to form ice-bergs. There was stunning footage of these happenings. Photographs of the sea-floor revealed huge gouges where the ice had stuck, scraped and scarred. Historic film showed the ship’s construction and launch in Belfast and its maiden voyage sailing from Southhampton.
Most icebergs melt before they enter the shipping lanes. Some get stuck along the Newfoundland coast because most of the volume is under water. I did not realise they tumbled because the underwater melt of the ice makes the ‘berg top-heavy. In 1912, however, this large one was in the path of the Titanic.
Apparently the decision on sighting the ‘berg to go to starboard was a mistake. Head-on would have crumpled the bow and caused considerable chaos and damage on board. But with its waterproof compartments the ship would have survived. As it was the ice ripped along the keel and water poured into the compartments. It sank with a huge loss of life. Modern underwater images of the sunken ship reveal what Hardy had imagined – marine life.
By coincidence, Anne and I earlier had watched The Antiques Roadshow. A man brought in some mementoes of his grandfather. He had been a sailor and sailed on the Titanic’s fateful voyage. In charge of a lifeboat he survived.
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