Happy! - July 27 (Hilaire Belloc)

Subject: Happy! - July 27
From: Abby Sale
Date: 27 Jul 05 - 08:05 AM


Happy Birthday!

English poet,

Hilaire Belloc

born 7/27/1870 (in France)
(d1953)
He wrote:

          On Sussex Downs, where I was bred,
          In rains where autumn lanes are red,
          Where Arun tumbles in his bed
          And dusty gales go by.
  
                  "Sussex Drinking Song" (Tune set by Martyn Wyndham-Read to the
                   Irish rebel tune "The West's Awake")

Copyright © 2005, Abby Sale - all rights reserved
What are Happy's all about? See Clicky

Subject: RE: Happy! - July 27
From: Le Scaramouche
Date: 27 Jul 05 - 10:10 AM

One of the great humorists of all times as well.

Subject: RE: Happy! - July 27
From: rumgumption
Date: 27 Jul 05 - 04:32 PM

His "Bad Child's Book of Beasts" and "More Beasts for Worse Children" are highly amusing. (His politics, less so.)

Subject: RE: Happy! - July 27
From: Le Scaramouche
Date: 27 Jul 05 - 04:42 PM

At least he had integrity and drive. More than can be said for most politicians today.

Subject: RE: Happy! - July 27 (Hilaire Belloc)
From: GUEST,Joe_F
Date: 28 Jul 05 - 10:09 AM

The "Beasts" books are included, with much else, in _Cautionary Verses_. Profusely illustrated. ObSongs: Do you suppose any of his verses have been set to music?

Yes, he was a reactionary, an antisemite, etc.; but he was a man of independent mind, and it is a waste of time to try to hate him %^). So also with his friend G. K. Chesterton, and with Kipling.

--- Joe Fineman    [e-mail]

||: I'd rather be in bed. :||

Subject: RE: Happy! - July 27 (Hilaire Belloc)
From: Le Scaramouche
Date: 28 Jul 05 - 12:42 PM

Actualy those three names make an interesting 'spot the odd man out'. The answer would be Kipling.

Subject: RE: Happy! - July 27 (Hilaire Belloc)
From: rumgumption
Date: 29 Jul 05 - 10:12 AM

Joe F--Re setting to music, a number of those verses metrically fit songs from Gilbert and Sullivan musicals, which seem to me to have an appropriate degree of silliness:

I shoot the Hippopotamus with bullets made of platinum,
Because if I use leaden ones his hide is sure to flatten 'em

vs.

In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I am the very model of a modern Major-General.

(And I take your point. Belloc, Chesterton, Kipling: you don't have to endorse their various views to love their work.)

Le Scaramouche--Belloc and Chesterton would heartily agree!

Subject: RE: Happy! - July 27 (Hilaire Belloc)
From: rumanci
Date: 29 Jul 05 - 10:39 AM

Hilaire Belloc's "The Four Men", published in 1912, tells the story of Grizzlebeard, the Sailor, the Poet and Myself walking across the Sussex countryside from Robertsbridge to South Harting.
Belloc made the journey himself in 1902, foresaw that vast changes would happen, and predicted a day would come when Sussex would never more be what it was.

In the early 1990s, Bob Copper re-traced those steps with friends and later produced his own memories in

"Across Sussex with Belloc - In the Footsteps of 'The Four Men'"
(Alan Sutton Publishing Ltd., (USA) 1994)
ISBN 0-7509-0603-0

Bob's book is a wonderful read including the words and music to many of Belloc's poems/songs as well as contemporary photographs. A gem for walkers as well as Belloc students.

Copper's conclusion about Belloc's prophecy was that although much had changed in the intervening years he found that "the underlying mood of the villages and people and countryside is undiminished"

Hooray ! may this long continue and the images both of these authors conveyed be enjoyed by countless worldwide readers.


This is my countryside, my Downs, people and places too and whereever I may roam this is my home.

rumanci

Subject: RE: Happy! - July 27 (Hilaire Belloc)
From: Amos
Date: 12 Aug 05 - 11:03 AM

Most loverly phrased, Nigel!! Thanks for the lead on the Copper mine!

A

Subject: RE: Happy! - July 27 (Hilaire Belloc)
From: GUEST,Joe_F
Date: 12 Aug 05 - 10:25 PM

Scaramouche: Indeed, I should have had the wit to make it "his friend G. K. Chesterton, and his enemy Kipling". %^)

--

--- Joe Fineman    [e-mail]

||: Death before dishonor? Too late, but never mind. :||

Subject: RE: Happy! - July 27 (Hilaire Belloc)
From: Le Scaramouche
Date: 13 Aug 05 - 04:34 AM

No worries. Kipling really was more liberal-minded than we give him credit for. G. K. Chesterton might have been in the dictionary under rabid.