E.F. Benson on the Sport of Shooting

Old British novels often portray the gentry shooting birds for sport. Period TV shows and movies reinforce this image of the British aristocracy. Movies and TV series set in recent decades, such as the James Bond movie "Moonraker" in 1979, the sitcom "To The Manor Born" in 1979--1981, and the 1980's-90s mystery series "Lovejoy," feature similar scenes. Typically, such scenes  occur amid pastoral beauty, and depict shooting as a genteel, if not regal, form of sport.

In their own way, such a portrayal of shooting birds for sport suggests a high regard for wildlife. After all, it takes a lot of work to manage the grounds of a vast estate, and a lot of education and experience to successfully maintain a healthy flock of birds.

 

Houses in the Sussex Downs

 

E. F. Benson's novel Limitations, originally published in 1896, speaks to this period of British society. Tom Markham, the son of a gentleman, has caught a cold, and stayed inside his father's mansion on the Surrey Downs for a few days. But the groundskeeper's cheery face lures him outside.

“Yes, I’ll come out in half an hour,” said Tom. “Get a few beaters, and we’ll just walk through the woods. And send down to the vicarage to ask Mr. Markham if he’d care for a tramp. They don’t have pheasants in Greece, Kimberley: there’s a country for you!”

After graduating from Cambridge, Tom recently spent a few months in Greece, where he studied the sculpture of Athens. Mr. Markham is the vicar of the local church, and like his son Ted (who studied at Cambridge with Tom) prefers to spend hours of each day translating ancient Greek literature. 

King's College in Cambridge

 

Mr. Markham was devoted to shooting, but of late years had not been able to indulge his taste.  Still, as a priest, some of his parish work, and even a quiet hour spent with his beloved Aristophanes, could easily be put off, for the opportunity to shoot birds for sport.

E.F. Benson describes Tom's favorite shooting spot this way:

It stood on a knoll of rising ground, some quarter of a mile away from the house, and by dint of long experience and frequent failure Tom had found that if the pigeons were artfully disturbed by beaters entering towards the centre from opposite sides they always broke cover at two particular points at opposite ends of the knoll, and that one gun stationed at each of these points became a fiery sword, turning, as far as the pigeons were concerned, every way.

While Tom has met Ted's sister May before, he's never paid much attention to her. But after studying the way ancient sculptors portrayed the likenesses of their gods, all thoughts of shooting flee when he sees May. "Oh, all ye gods," he says, "she is a goddess!"

As for Mr. Markham:

The beaters beat, and the pigeons started from the branches, and flew out in the pre-ordained manner, threading their way between the tops of the thick trees, as they and their deceased relations had often done before. Mr. Markham had one of the most delightful five minutes that falls to the lot of sportsmen, and straight over Tom’s head as he stood in the path the steely targets tacked and swerved.

Even May, who unlike her father and brother, prefers to spend her days visiting the poor and sick, exhibits no displeasure in the idea of her father or Tom shooting. "Have you had good sport?" she asks.

The Church in Grantchester, a relaxing & scenic stroll from Cambridge

 

Much has changed in century-plus since E. F. Benson wrote Limitations. Even scenes such as in "Moonraker," in which multimillionaire industrialist Hugo Drax and James Bond partake of this sport, might well be rewritten to appeal to modern sensibilities. And while the antiques dealer Lovejoy might still sell old guns to the aristocracy for their shooting, I can't recall a single episode of recent TV series "Father Brown" or "Grantchester" which depict a Church of England priest shooting birds for sport.

If it were filmed today, I wonder if Audrey would approve of Richard Devere's desire to shoot birds on the grounds of the mansion she once owned in the 1979-1981 British sitcom "To The Manor Born." It's hard to imagine series creator Peter Spence currently penning a script which involved Audrey helping Richard organize the Hunt Ball on his estate. A later episode, in which she encourages him to ride along with her visiting friend in a hunt, likewise seems a relic of earlier times.

Times change, and we change with the times.

Dragon Dave

E. F. Benson on the Pitt Club and Inner City Missions

In the novel Limitations by British author E. F. Benson, Cambridge students Tom Carlingford and Ted Markham decide to take a break from their studies. They leave their rooms at King's College, one of the most prestigious colleges in this English university town, and walk toward the Pitt Club, where they are both members. Along the way, Tom sees a crowd outside the mission rooms, and decides to see what has attracted so much interest. 

Tom says good-bye to his friend and wades through the crowd. The room is packed, banners hang from the ceiling, and the moisture from everyone's breathing coats the walls. On the platform,an impassioned greengrocer testifies how becoming saved led him away from a life of strong drink and regularly shortchanging his customers.

 

On the second day of our 2017 visit to Cambridge, England, my wife and I took a bus into town. We disembarked near St. John's College, the Round Church, and a candy shop. As none of these had yet opened for the day, we wandered along until we found a tea room in an old church, where my wife and enjoyed tea and scones, along with a Dalek and K-9.

Had we wandered the opposite way, we would have walked past the Pitt Club. Originally founded on political principles, by E. F. Benson's day the Pitt Club was a members-only social club. The club has a prestigious history, with writers, actors, politicians, and even royalty listed on its membership rolls. In addition to Prince Charles, other names most people would recognize are John Cleese of Monty Python fame, Tom Hiddleston who played Loki in Marvel Cinematic Universe movies, and Eddie Redmayne, who plays Newt Scamander in J. K. Rowling's Fantastic Beasts films (a prequel series to the popular Harry Potter franchise).

As with the church in which we took tea, the Cambridge missions were Anglican in nature. Many of the colleges also set up inner city missions in London. There they ministered alongside missions set up by Oxford colleges, as well as others like the Salvation Army. 

I'm not sure if any Cambridge colleges operate mission rooms in the university town anymore. Still, visitors are always welcome at the Pitt Club. There you can enter, sit at a table on the ground floor, and enjoy a pleasant lunch courtesy of Pizza Express, which leases the space from the Pitt Club. Maybe next time my wife and I visit Cambridge, we'll arrive a little later, and enjoy a pizza lunch on the ground floor of a building in which E. F. Benson often relaxed with his friends.

Then we'll head back to the candy shop near the Round Church, which ought to have opened by then.

Dragon Dave

Boating With E. F. Benson and C. S. Lewis

On our last visit to England in 2017, while touring Norfolk and Suffolk, our adventures often took us to the river. We punted along the River Cam in Cambridge. We cruised along the Norfolk Broads. England's canal and river system seemed a delight for holidaymakers. I could imagine, if my wife and I lived there, regularly partaking of such riparian outing.

While staying in the picturesque town of Loddon, people docked their ships in the harbor, or tied them up along the river. Signs told boaters where they could leave their boats for free, and for how how long. It seemed a pleasant and carefree way to spend one's vacation, tooling along the river, spending each night in another historic village, and never having to worry about booking hotels. 

One afternoon, while resting in our room in Loddon, we flipped channels, and came upon a couple taking a riverboat journey. The woman was Prunella Scales, who had played Basil Fawlty's ever-suffering wife in "Fawlty Towers," and socialite Miss Elizabeth Mapp in the 1980s miniseries "Mapp & Lucia," based on the novels of E. F. Benson. Prunella Scales and husband Timothy West cruised along beautiful stretches of English canals in their TV series "Great Canal Journeys." I wished I could watch the series in America, so I could see more of their riparian adventures.

A TV program showed up on Amazon Prime a few months ago. Titled "Travels By Narrowboat," and produced by Country House Gent, the host Kevin chronicled his own adventures cruising UK waterways. Unlike Prunella and her husband, Kevin had reached a nadir in his life. In order to find healing and purpose, and perhaps even redemption, he had sold everything he owned, and purchased a boat. Chronicling his adventures became not just a pasttime, but a way of life. He didn't just travel aboard a boat, he lived on it.

Kevin has been traveling aboard his narrowboat for two years or so now. As he's journeyed from place to place, he's uploaded his videos to Youtube. Since they appeared on Amazon Prime, we've sped through his last two years in two months, and now await the completion of his current journey for more. Like many of us, the COVID-19 outbreak brought his life to a standstill. We wish him well, and hope he can resume his life aboard Britain's waterways soon.

Through "Travels By Narrowboat," Kevin has made us look at our five trips to England in a different way. In traveling through areas like the English Midlands and Yorkshire, he's taken us to places we've been, and shown us new ones worth visiting. Better yet, he has done it all aboard a ship called Aslan, named after the great lion in the seven-book series The Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis. 

Not surprisingly, he has found healing and purpose, and a new outlook on life, thanks to his journey aboard a ship named after a figure of love and redemption.

With everything that's going on right now, I don't know when, or even if, we'll visit Britain again. If we do, Kevin's journey has suggested an entirely different way to find joy and renewal in his country. That, I think you'll agree, is a great gift indeed.

Dragon Dave

Related Links
Travels By Narrowboat on Facebook

John Wyndham and Triffids in Brighton

Brighton, England

In Wyndham's novel The Day of the Triffids, some communities prove less open to strangers than others. Those living in the picturesque community of Brighton, for example, block all roads leading into the city. Anyone who attempts entry is shot on sight.

The principle reason for this is the disease, or plague, that sweeps through the population. The blind suffer worse than the sighted because they cannot see what they are eating. It's also likely that they pick up infection with their hands, since the blind must be more tactile than the sighted.

The disease is made worse because all essential services have broken down. With so many blind, there is no one to operate the water system, work at power plants, deliver goods and services. There are definitely no disposable wipes. The only way to protect against the plague is to isolate and quarantine. Even one infected person can wipe out an entire community.

A church mentioned in E. F. Benson's novel The Blotting Book

I'm glad I got to visit Brighton back in 2013. E. F. Benson set his 1908 novel The Blotting Book there. I enjoyed walking the streets, and visiting locations E. F. Benson used in his novel. One was a church that has since been turned into a homeless center. I gather the homeless situation has worsened since my visit, and Brighton hosts one of the highest homeless populations in the U.K. outside London.

I have no idea what the homeless situation in Brighton might have been like in the early 1950s, when John Wyndham wrote his novel. San Diego county certainly attracts the homeless, and seaside communities struggle to deal with and care for these poor people. I wonder if, while on a seaside holiday, John Wyndham noticed the homeless in Brighton, and that prompted him to include the city in his novel.

In The Day of the Triffids, Brighton is taken over by a militaristic regime. The leaders declare that each sighted person is responsible for ten blind people. It seems a hard life, and an untenable one to Bill Mason. He also worries about the leaders' talk of building an army to unify the country. But then, when John Wyndham wrote the novel, World War II would have been recent history.

 

The West Pier, Brighton, England

During our stay, one monument to the past my wife and I noticed was the West Pier, which had been closed for decades. The West Pier would have been standing in 1951, when The Day of the Triffids was published. It would be interesting to see Brighton with two active piers back then, along with the life, energy, and fun they would have brought. So if the Doctor's reading this, I'd gladly accompany you on a ride through time and space to Brighton 1951. Is that wheezing and groaning I hear coming from the TARDIS? I'd better sign off now, so I can look outside.

Dragon Dave

Rick Steeves on Social Distancing

Sacramento Airport, St. Patrick's Day 2020

Recently, world traveler and TV presenter Rick Steeves has observed that travel has become extremely touristy. Instead of venturing into the unknown to make interesting discoveries, tourists swamp the most popular sites for Instagram moments. 

"Look where I am!" they say. "That's one off the bucket list!

Meanwhile, places off the beaten track, that could prove fun and inspiring destinations, and where tourism could really benefit the locals, go relatively unvisited. This sort of herd mentality, of having to go where everyone else goes, makes no sense to me. Don't people want to experience adventure and discovery anymore?

Besides, where's the fun of sitting in traffic, waiting in line, or being limited to a designated amount of time in a given location because it's such a popular destination? I suppose it's easier to impress your friends with photos and tales of the places you've been, if they are places they'll instantly recognize. But is that was travel is supposed to be about?

On my return flight, I was struck by how empty Sacramento Airport felt. Few restaurants had patrons. Most stood empty. I saw one person walking away from the counter at Starbucks, while Peet's Coffee & Tea was staffed, but seemingly closed. Hardly anyone waited for flights. Most of the chairs at the gates were empty. 

By now, admonitions to wash your hands, wipe down any surfaces you touch, and keep your distance from others were in the news. So we found an unoccupied area at the gate, disinfected the seats and sidetables w/ wetwipes, and pulled out our ebook readers. Within a few minutes, a woman plunked down next to us. Seemingly oblivious to us, she talked on her phone loudly and continuously enough to make reading impossible.

With people canceling or changing their travel plans, most airlines canceled flights. Despite only having thirty passengers, Southwest Airlines demonstrated their mission of customer service by not canceling our flight, or rescheduling all their flights to fly full. Instead, they kept to their schedule, operating at a loss to not inconvenience their passengers. 

The flight crew advised everyone to spread out, and leave plenty of space between themselves and others, in order to inhibit the potential spread of Coronavirus COVID-19. Being among the first to board, my wife and I took a row around a third of the way back. We disinfected out seats and tray tables, and strapped in. 

Despite warnings from government health authorities and the Southwest staff, passengers filled up seats and rows in front, beside, and behind us. Again: the herd mentality. When a family filled up the row directly in front of us, we abandoned our seats, and left our carry-ons where we had stowed them.

The view ahead on our Southwest flight

A little behind the wings, we found a row with no one else close around. We disinfected the seats and tray tables, and got comfortable. By the time boarding had finished, only six others had joined us from the wings back. This left 145 empty seats on the plane, with 22 people clustered up front.

The view behind

On our trips to England, we've visited many popular places, such as Westminster Abbey and Stonehenge. But most of the places we traveled to were places few international travelers go, such as the town of Bideford, where Charles Kingsley set his novel Westward Ho!, and Chagford, a historic stannery town featured in The Tinner's Corpse, a novel in the Crowner John mystery series by Bernard Knight. Some places, such as Cromer, have grown more interesting since our visit. Through my reading, I've accompanied characters on their visits to the seaside town in Tono-Bungay by H. G. Wells, Limitations by E. F. Benson, and So Disdained by Nevil Shute.

No one knows how Coronavirus COVID-19 may alter our world. Times like these make us reflect on our lives, and what really matters. Perhaps we should contemplate how Rick Steeves' observation relates to us. At the very least, it makes sense to adopt easy habits such as cleaning your hands, disinfecting surfaces, and keeping more distance from others than usual. 

Dragon Dave

Related Links
Rick Steeves' Blog

E. F. Benson on Limitations

King's College, Cambridge UK

In E. F. Benson's novel Limitations, we meet Tom Carlingford, the son of a rich, retired English gentleman. He's attending King's College, but can't concentrate on his classes. University life in England is different from that in the United States. As best I understand it, students attend Sixth Form for two years, which equates to our 12th and 13th grades (or last year of High School and first year of college). Then they attend university for three years, where they have no general education requirements, but study only classes for their major. 

I'm not sure how easy it is to change your major once you've been accepted at a UK university. Unlike his friend Ted Markham, Tom finds he has little love for classical literature. So he loafs around, playing sports, and hanging out in the museums. Eventually, he decides he wishes to become a modern art sculptor. So instead of changing his major to Art (assuming that was possible back in 1890s, when the novel was published), Tom does the minimum he needs to graduate while reading up on sculpture. 

After graduation, he travels to Athens. There, he finds himself drawn to classical art. It affects him so powerfully that he vows to give up on modern art, and spend his life chipping classical Greek figures out of marble instead.

The Elgin Marbles room in the British Museum, London UK

While in Greece, he meets Maud, a young English woman. Her family is wealthy like his, and her father is an influential member of the government. While Tom is interested in her, she falls head over heels in love with him. But when they return to England, and he returns home, Tom is drawn to the sister of his old school chum Ted. Somehow, she embodies the grace and perfection Tom found in classical Greek sculpture. So Tom courts Ted's sister, and after they marry, takes an apartment in London. There he begins working on a life-size sculpture of the Greek goddess Demeter.

A frieze of Demeter, from the Parthenon in Athens, Greece

Unfortunately, his father dies shortly after learning that the company for which he worked has gone bankrupt. All the family finances were tied up in the failed company, which leaves Tom with no money. He attacks his statue with vigor, but it's a long, ambitious project. Worse, he can find no one interested in buying it. 

Once, when the financial strain has him in his grips, he seeks inspiration in the Elgin Marbles, or the portions of the Greek Parthenon on display in the British Museum. To clear his head, Tom walks past the Serpentine in Hyde Park. There he sees people swimming and enjoying themselves on a hot day in London.

The Serpentine, Hyde Park, London UK

Meanwhile, Maud's love for Tom has her tied up in knots. Unable to get past him and move on, she takes a holiday in the seaside Norfolk town of Cromer. She stays with a relation of Tom's for a month, enjoying the beach with huge sand dunes, and the quaint red-roofed buildings surrounding the church tower. There, she gains perspective. Although she refuses to marry another of Tom's friend, a promising modern art sculptor they met in Greece, perhaps one day she can open her heart to love another.
 

Cromer UK

In his novel Limitations, E. F. Benson ponders the limitations that define us. Each of us have strengths and weaknesses, and the paths we choose shape us just as Tom's chisel shapes his statue of Demeter. Tom's brother-in-law Ted, a bookish fellow student at Cambridge, becomes an instructor, and then a priest. His passion for for study and learning limits and isolates him from an ordinary social life. Maud's unrequited love for Tom limits her ability to love another who would make any sacrifice for her. And then there's Tom. No one in England is buying classical Greek art right now. It simply isn't the flavor of the month.

In order to make a living for his family, Tom is forced to make modern art sculptures instead. No matter what he does, he cannot awaken his original love for contemporary art. His passion for Classical Greek art has seemingly ruined him on every other form of art, or at least those that people will buy.

The first time I read Limitations, I could not empathize with the characters as much as on my recent reread. Having visited so many of Benson's settings in the interval, I better understand Tom, Ted, and Maud. I suppose, ultimately, that's why we travel: to better understand our world, and the people who inhabit it. 

Perhaps one day I'll visit Greece. I'd love to see the remains of the original Parthenon. I can only imagine how much more I might enjoy rereading E. F. Benson's novel again, after visiting the country that so transformed young Tom.

Oh, and while I'm dreaming, perhaps one day I'll return to England on a hot day. A visit to London when I'm not constantly wearing a jacket? Now that would really be something!

Dragon Dave

Kevin J. Anderson and E. F. Benson in Rye England

In his forthcoming novel, The Spine of the Dragon, Kevin J. Anderson introduces us to young Adan Starfall. He's the king of Suderra, one of three countries that make up the Commonwealth. He lives in Bannriya Castle, which sits atop the hill overlooking the capital city of Bannriya. Adan's mind is troubled, for a sandstorm is approaching. He watches as shopkeepers close their shops, and residents prepare their homes for what could prove a particularly violent storm.

Kevin J. Anderson's description of the Bannriya Castle initially reminded me of one described in the novel Eragon by Christopher Paolini. Not only are both High Fantasy novels, but both reference a dragon in the title. In fact, Kevin's novel is the first in a series called Wake The Dragon, so dragon-lovers have a lot to look forward to. 

As for Bannriya Castle, and how it is situated in the town, I realized it reminded me of another town I had visited. Although the remains of a castle lie on the marshland along the coast, the English town of Rye sits of a hill, and another castle sits atop the hill. Just like Bannira, Rye is rich in history. In its time, it was a center for fishing in England. Even people in faraway London depended on Rye for the Cod and other seafood the ships regularly brought into harbor. 

Unlike Bannriya, Rye doesn't sit on the edge of a vast desert, so thankfully, it's unlikely to suffer from sandstorms any time soon.

As a cowriter of the popular Dune novels with Brian Herbert, sandstorms are something Kevin J. Anderson is familiar with. We follow Adan as he hunkers down inside his castle to wait through the storm. Adan's father-in-law is a former desert nomad, so he knows how to fortify the windows and doors against the windblown sand. Nonetheless, one little diamond-shaped pane in a window breaks, and the storm rushes in. Everyone rushes to help, as that broken window could allow the storm's violence to sweep through the entire castle.

It's always interesting to me to think of England's rich history. It's a country that measures time in thousands of years, as opposed to hundreds. Like England, Suderra's history goes back millennia. Once, a race called the Wreth devastated Commonwealth lands with their wars. They created Humans to be their slaves, then disappeared over two thousand years ago. 

After the sandstorm, a party of travelers arrives outside the city gates. King Adan rides down to meet them. To his astonishment, he discovers that they are Wreth.

I felt for Adan as he met these god-like beings. With their vast powers, Adan suspects he could not stop them if they stormed his city. Although they've ridden across the desert, they are not covered in sand. In fact, it appears they summoned the storm. When they ask to enter his city, as they wish to converse with him, how can he refuse them?

I imagined the Wreth walking up the narrow streets of Bannriya, heading toward Adan's castle. I felt his wonder and fear as the Wreth summoned controlled bursts of wind that blew the streets free of sand as they walked. For I too walked those streets, up and down the hill, many times during the weekend I stayed in Rye. Only for me, the town was imbued with magic even more powerful than that of the Wreth. 

One of my all-time favorite authors lived in Rye. His name is E. F. Benson, and he set four novels in his Mapp And Lucia series there. Through those novels, I came to love Rye as much as E. F. Benson did. I guess that's why Rye came to mind when I started reading Kevin J. Anderson's new novel Spine of the Dragon. Rye is a great little town on the south coast of England, and fills up with visitors every weekend. Even if few people today have heard of E. F. Benson, the author's power, like that of the Wreth in Bannriya, remains in Rye.

I can't wait to delve further into Kevin J. Anderson's new novel, and see what other associations it brings to mind. 

Dragon Dave

Spine of the Dragon, by Kevin J. Anderson, will be available for purchase on June 4, 2019.

Mapp And Lucia And Lifeboats

At the end of Cromer Pier, in the county of Norfolk, England, you'll see a ramp descending into the sea from a large brown building. Inside this branch of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, you'll find the Tamar, the ship that slides down that ramp and sets out to aid those in peril on the sea.

With its dual, 1000 horse power engines, the Tamar can race off to a vessel in distress. The rescuers inside, clad in their waterproof gear, sit in seats designed to absorb the impact of hitting storm waves at anything up to 25 knots per hour. Once the crew arrive, they can pull a vessel out of dangerous waters, or tow it back to port, even if it weighs up to seven tons. 

Should they need to transfer people to their ship, or pull them out of the sea, they have any number of rescue items easily within reach. Metal arms swing out. Ropes and winches deploy. The threatened are hauled aboard to safety, and either transferred to a helicopter, or transported back to shore. Despite its compact size, the Tamar can hold as many as one hundred people, although passengers might find conditions a little cramped. 

In E. F. Benson's novel Mapp And Lucia, society matrons Elizabeth Mapp and Emmeline Lucas are swept out to sea when a storm hits the English seaside town of Tilling. Friends spy the two clinging to Lucia's dining room table amid roiling waves. They send out a plea for rescue to local fishing vessels, the coastguard, and the Lifeboat station. But none of the ships can reach the women fast enough. After awhile, with no further sightings, the ships give up their search for the women, supposing them lost to the sea.

Had powerful and capable ships like the Tamar existed in the 1930s, E. F. Benson would have needed to work harder to convince his readers that the local Lifeboat station had failed to rescue the leading lights of Tilling society. As for Lucia's dining table serving as a short term raft...well, that's timeless.

Dragon Dave

E. F. Benson on the Value of a Cambridge Education: Part 2

During our boat trip on the River Cam, our tour guide praised the architecture of King's College, and spoke glowingly about the beauty of its famed chapel. Strangely, he then asserted that the interiors, and particularly the dormitories, had not kept up with the times, and were little better than prison cells. 

If this is the case now, I can only assume they were nicer a hundred years ago, when author E. F. Benson studied there. 

In his novel The Babe, B.A., E. F. Benson introduces us to a group of fun-loving young students at Cambridge. Most are studying at King's College, and the foremost of them is the Babe. He may be the son of an aristocrat serving in the House of Lords, but he's the silliest, and yet most learned of them all. 

The Babe, as everyone calls him, is the picture of fun, and his hijinks, and lack of scholastic excellence, constantly land him in trouble with the authorities. Everyone loves him for his athletic feats on the Rugby grounds, and the parties he holds or attends. Yet in the midst of revelry, or lighthearted talk, he will suddenly astound everyone by throwing out a completely unexpected reference to a famous poet like Wordsworth, an erudite writer like Charles Kingsley, or controversial literary magazine like The Yellow Book. 

Toward the end of his second year at King's College, his extracurricular activities land him in real trouble. Instead of studying for exams, the Babe goes out with his friends on the Cam for a picnic and a swim at Byron's Pool near Grantchester. When he returns after hours to his dormitory, he tries to sneak into his room. But he is caught, and the college authorities dismiss him for the rest of the term. So he goes to live with his father in London. 

During the summer break, his friends from Cambridge visit him in London. They join with his father's aristocratic friends in suggesting that the Babe isn't cut out for scholarly pursuits, and he should devote his life to something else. The realization that he's virtually wasted the tremendous opportunity of higher education galvanizes him. When the Babe returns to King's College for his final year, he allows himself the occasional game of Rugby. But for the most part, he throws himself into his studies, gives up parties and frivolity, and surprises everyone when he graduates with distinction. 

The British people have recently demanded that their government do more to rein in the costs of a university education. Strangely, the government in the United States seems to be moving in the opposite direction. A move to reform and "simplify" taxes would include provisions to tax certain private universities, end tax credits for university workers and their families, restrict higher education tax credits, and eliminate deductions for graduates repaying their student loans. 

No one likes being taxed on the money they earn. Still, life isn't about money: it's about doing what you find meaningful and fulfilling. If government reforms make it harder for people to afford an already-expensive college education, and prepare the young for their desired career, then perhaps the elected officials should reexamine their plans, and question whether they are in the country's best interests.

That's what British citizens want their government to do. Certainly our tour guide would agree with that sentiment. After all, he studied at a university in Brighton, and graduated with a Pre-Med degree. But instead of continuing his studies, he had to spend a few years guiding a boat along the River Cam, regaling tourists from around the world with anecdotes from Cambridge's past, while he repaid his student loans. While being a tour guide a worthy profession, I think we'd all agree that the world needs the qualified doctors and nurses more. 

But then, he was a great tour guide, and gave us a fun, relaxing boat trip on the River Cam. Perhaps that's what the Babe or his friends might have done, if they needed money too.

Dragon Dave

E. F. Benson on the Value of a Cambridge Education: Part 1

A highlight of our Cambridge experience was drifting along the River Cam past King's College. Not only do we see the Doctor and Romana punting past the college in "Shada" and "The Five Doctors," but one of my favorite English authors, E. F. Benson, attended King's College. He set Limitations, one of his early novels, at his old alma mater. 

In Limitations, two students at King's College ponder their future. Ted Markham is the son of a priest, only there because of a rich man's generosity. His friend Tom Carlingford is the son of the rich man, the lord of the manor, who has sent both his son and the son of his family priest to such a costly and prestigious school. But while Ted values the tremendous gift he's been given, and spends all his time studying, Tom whiles away his time at college, and dreams of becoming a sculptor. 

Like Tom and Ted, people today still argue over the value of a university education. Those who identify with Tom Carlingford, the idle rich man's son, argue that all that matters is that you leave with a degree, which will provide you with the qualifications for higher paying jobs. And if you're young, and not interested in your studies, then the time and money spent there seems like a waste. 

Tom saves his harshest criticism for students like his friend Ted, who plan on becoming university teachers and scholars. He warns Ted that many educators actually turn themselves into vegetables. Instead of using their greater knowledge to become dynamic, creative people, they become authorities on subjects that no one else cares about, such as gerunds, obscure Greek writers, binomial theorems, or acid radicals. 

Despite his friend's arguments, Ted, the poor man's son, stays at King's College, graduates with distinction, and goes on to become an educator there. He enjoys his life filled with books and learning, and sharing all he discovers with colleagues and students. His life, for him, is idyllic, and one he could not have achieved without the generosity of his patron, Tom's father.

Tom Carlingford, the rich man's son, leaves King's College before graduation. He uses his father's generous allowance to travel, and study the creations of great artists. In Greece, he is inspired by the Greek's classical style. He works hard to develop his talents, and hone his craft, in order to create statues as beautiful as those that fire his imagination. In this way, he educates himself, and singlehandedly forges his own future.

All is well until his father dies. Then Tom learns that his father's investments had been failing for years, and he is now penniless. So while Ted enjoys his new life as an educator in Cambridge, surrounded by people who respect him and appreciate his talents, Tom struggles to make ends meet in London, and picks up any scraps of work he can to put food on the table. Eventually he achieves success in his chosen vocation, but not before he undergoes a great deal of suffering.

While we toured this historic center of higher education, England was contemplating a change in leadership. Shortly after we left Cambridge, the country held an election. Prime Minister Theresa May had hoped to gain more Conservative Party seats in the House of Commons. Instead, people in the UK voted for the Labour Party. While I'm sure there were many reasons the Conservative Party lost, most of the young people interviewed on TV News programs said that they voted Labour because they wanted a university education, but under the current leadership they couldn't afford it. 

Hopefully, the British government will listen to this mandate, and do something to make university educations more affordable for its citizens. Whether you identify more with Ted Markham or Tom Carlingford, not all of us have rich parents or benefactors, and it's always nice to have a choice as to which path you follow in life.

Dragon Dave

Scarlet And Hyssop Vs Downton Abbey

The formal splendor of an earlier era
in the Victoria And Albert Museum in London, England

While I don't know as much about his life as I would like, Scarlet And Hyssop seems like a rather brave novel for E. F. Benson to write, given how well connected he was with anyone-who-was-anyone in English society back then. His father's high standing in the Church of England granted him entry to the rich and powerful, but if he incurred someone's wrath, that could have made his writing career more difficult. The fact that it is a challenging novel to read, with largely unlikable characters, makes it all the more surprising he would write it. Stories that require understanding a key, or the contemplation of an underlying symbol to really enjoy a story, do not always sell well. Stories that require a second reading to gain a fuller understanding of the author's intent do not always age well. While writers such as G. K. Chesterton, George McDonald, and Charles Williams have not been forgotten, they can hardly claim a place in our hearts like Agatha Christie, Charles Dickens, or J. R. R. Tolkien. 

Perhaps it was a mistake for E. F. Benson to write this novel. His long bibliography, and the sheer range of his writing, suggest that he really loved every type of literary genre. When a writer does not concentrate on one or two genres, but spreads his net wide, it is inevitable that he will not always succeed at everything he attempts. While some reviewers loved it, critical assessment of Scarlet And Hyssop largely tends to be negative. As I mentioned, I found it a challenging novel to read. Still, as my post-reading realization demonstrates, there was more going on in the story than could be initially grasped on the surface level. This left me with a desire to read the novel again. With my better knowledge of the characters, and the goal Benson was striving toward, I'm sure it would be a richer experience. 

It goes without saying that, if I felt the novel was an utter failure, I would not even contemplate a second attempt.

When the TV series Downton Abbey premiered on TV, I took an immediate dislike to it. Although the characters inhabited a world similar to those described by writers such as E. F. Benson, I found little to interest me in their petty schemes and jealousies. Similarly, when I first watched the movie Gosford Park, I had just as much difficulty in appreciating it. Here was a story about a murder among the rich in a country house of the nobility. But instead of allowing me to follow a police investigation that led to the capture of the murderer, screenwriter Julian Fellows forced me to wade through portraits of largely unlikable characters. The murderer even gets away with the crime at the end of the movie!

Recently I watched the movie again, and found it intriguing enough to view a second time with commentary with screenwriter Julian Fellows. This actor, writer and producer, the creator of Downton Abbey, is a modern English Baron, and a peer in the House of Lords. As such, he divides his time between telling stories to the populace and contributing to the government of Britain. He has made his name by writing about the types of people he grew up with, both among the rich and titled, as well as the lowly servants. What might seem to us an incomprehensible social structure is something he understands. On the commentary for Gosford Park he said something that stuck with me. He said that the sense he got, from the relatives and people he knew, was that the high and mighty eventually decided to abolish their complicated systems of etiquette, and relax their highly formalized way of life, simply because they found it too tiresome to perpetuate it. In other words, the system grew over time, until it became to unwieldy that those at the top, the ones who theoretically benefitted most from it, finally gave up on it and opted for a simpler way of life.

Don't get me wrong. I still dislike Downton Abbey. Even after watching it again, I'm still not wild about Gosford Park. But the similarities between those stories and Scarlet And Hyssop suggest that E. F. Benson was writing a story along similar lines to those historical stories being told today by writers such as Julian Fellows. The major difference is Benson was pointing out the dangers of perpetuating certain aspects of English society while they were occurring, while Fellows is looking backward to teach us lessons from the past. Given the interest in--and apparent hunger for--TV series such as Downton Abbey, Scarlet And Hyssop represents an opportunity to immerse oneself in the glamorous and stratified society of an earlier era. If the ritualistic nature of that bygone era intrigues you, and the type of characters who lived and worked within it fascinate you, then perhaps you might find Scarlet And Hyssop an interesting and entertaining novel.

Dragon Dave