Friday, May 09, 2008
Christlet
Came across the allegation in last week's TLS that there were Christians in China well before the battle of Hastings. It seems that Christians had been drifting East (via Persia, the Black and Caspian seas and the river Oxus) as well as West more or less from the beginning, although most of the lot going East were Nestorians - presumably one of the various heresies frowned on by Rome. One can find out more at http://www.nestorian.org/. Perhaps they are not three-in-one people. Anyway, it appears that there were two main waves, one well before Hastings and one somewhat after. With the result that a Uighur monk was travelling West to Rome from Peking at about the same time as Marco Polo was travelling East to Peking. So maybe we should be burning the Uighurs at the stake as lapsed Christians rather than treating them as common or garden pagans, fresh for baptism.
Closer to home, the hawthorne in the front garden at its peak. Better than it has been for some years with blossom laden branches cascading down from the top of the canopy - this being maybe 12 feet up. The road to Cheam has plenty of hawthorne, also all in flower, and the air is heavy with the sweet, sticky stink (or perfume, if you prefer) of the stuff. Presumably attractive to insects.
A couple of days ago, to Lear at the Globe. Good show, with a stronger second half than first half. The company included plenty of colour, so perhaps they have a very strong director of diversity. Show somewhat marred in my case by not being able to hear all of it - the result of any or all of aeroplanes overhead (including some rather thoughtless helicopters hovering overhead, presumably to give their passengers a view of the giant bus shelter at work), poor projection by younger actors, poor acoustics when straying from the cover of the canopy, a wooden column in the firing line, fading hearing and a fading brain unable to keep up with the (complicated) word of the bard. A modest dose of song and dance - including a cast collective one after the end - a trick which brought one down to earth rather neatly after the pathos of the end. Something I had not seen before. So there is a point in such terminal routines - beyond showing off the calves of the male leads. Some bits jarred - so Edgar started off as a fop and ended as a gallant knight (dressed up in black like a medieval SAS type) and Oswald rather minced. So for me, the point that Kent was an aging Henry, a bit of a thug (in a hearty and heroic way, entirely OK by the norms for Henries of the day. Bashing each other at war and bashing natives otherwise was what they were trained to. Huxley touches on the point in EIG) for whom bullying and generally mistreating servants was entirely OK - was not made strongly enough. Nor that Lear was being a real pain, in the way that people who have been powerful can be in their dotage. And Lear of the first half did not show enough of his old power. It was all peevish, soft core dotage. He might have been a retired grocer rather than a king in an age of thugs. I remember Holm as being rather stronger than Calder in that regard. Of a peice that Holm also made more of the line near of end of the skipping falchion. Overall, the first half was too soft to balance the pathos of the second. But a good show and we shall try to go again.
Closer to home, the hawthorne in the front garden at its peak. Better than it has been for some years with blossom laden branches cascading down from the top of the canopy - this being maybe 12 feet up. The road to Cheam has plenty of hawthorne, also all in flower, and the air is heavy with the sweet, sticky stink (or perfume, if you prefer) of the stuff. Presumably attractive to insects.
A couple of days ago, to Lear at the Globe. Good show, with a stronger second half than first half. The company included plenty of colour, so perhaps they have a very strong director of diversity. Show somewhat marred in my case by not being able to hear all of it - the result of any or all of aeroplanes overhead (including some rather thoughtless helicopters hovering overhead, presumably to give their passengers a view of the giant bus shelter at work), poor projection by younger actors, poor acoustics when straying from the cover of the canopy, a wooden column in the firing line, fading hearing and a fading brain unable to keep up with the (complicated) word of the bard. A modest dose of song and dance - including a cast collective one after the end - a trick which brought one down to earth rather neatly after the pathos of the end. Something I had not seen before. So there is a point in such terminal routines - beyond showing off the calves of the male leads. Some bits jarred - so Edgar started off as a fop and ended as a gallant knight (dressed up in black like a medieval SAS type) and Oswald rather minced. So for me, the point that Kent was an aging Henry, a bit of a thug (in a hearty and heroic way, entirely OK by the norms for Henries of the day. Bashing each other at war and bashing natives otherwise was what they were trained to. Huxley touches on the point in EIG) for whom bullying and generally mistreating servants was entirely OK - was not made strongly enough. Nor that Lear was being a real pain, in the way that people who have been powerful can be in their dotage. And Lear of the first half did not show enough of his old power. It was all peevish, soft core dotage. He might have been a retired grocer rather than a king in an age of thugs. I remember Holm as being rather stronger than Calder in that regard. Of a peice that Holm also made more of the line near of end of the skipping falchion. Overall, the first half was too soft to balance the pathos of the second. But a good show and we shall try to go again.
# posted by Jim @ 2:52 AM 
