The approach of Bonfire Night always feels to me like the transition from autumn to winter. The dark, cold, wet nights after the clocks have gone back heralds a time to be endured rather than enjoyed. It also coincides with what was traditionally thought to be the toughest school half term. It’s a long haul to the Christmas holidays. It’s time to hunker down by the fireside with a wee dram and a ghost story. But before we say a final farewell to the glories of autumn, let’s just remind ourselves of a time that has inspired great writers down the centuries. First off, John Keats. Bit of an irritating cough, but a fine poet and social thinker.
Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For summer has o'er-brimm'd their clammy cells.
Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep,
Drows'd with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.
Where are the songs of spring? Ay, Where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,—
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.
Now compare and contrast with the majestic Jimmy Page and Robert Plant. I’m convinced that if Johnny Keats had been strutting his stuff in 1969, he would have been wearing loon pants and a Led Zep T shirt. Now that is proper cultural capital, Ofsted. Go back to the drawing board, read Bourdieu properly, and raise your eyes above a narrow band of Great Works. There are contemporary Great Works all around you, if you are prepared to make a judgment that is not just parroting received opinion. Enjoy.
The Old Grey Owl 