Albion’s Alchemist

Today I shot over to the CEP News Blog - I haven’t visited in a little while, largely because it makes me angry when I do, and you wouldn’t like me when I’m angry. Well, I don’t like me when I’m angry and I know what a splendid man I am, so it stands to reason you wouldn’t like me either.

If you have been there recently (and I highly recommend it, for those of you with high-capacity spleens) you will have seen the polls on the right hand side. One asks about the concept of an English National Anthem. No-doubt you recall we sang ‘Land of Hope and Glory’ at the last Commonwealth Games, and that served to highlight our lack of an official Anthem.

I added my two penneth worth just to see the results of those who had voted before. I voted for ‘Jerusalem’.

One hundred and twenty-nine other people have also voted for that particular song – fifty-nine percent of those who have expressed an opinion. ‘Land of Hope and Glory’ is a rather asthmatic second place with fourteen percent.

Leaving for the moment the question of why we need an official National Anthem for England (and I leave it because it is not worth the pixels) I took to wandering what it is about Jerusalem that holds me, and so many others so.

Famously, the words started as a poem by William Blake at the start of the nineteenth century, and remained so for a long time, languishing in semi-obscurity.
The poem is based upon the rather risible legend that Jesus Christ came to Britain at some point, unremarked by scholars or theologians ever since. Nevertheless Blake apparently believed the legend to be true and wrote a poetic précis of his thoughts on the matter.

There probably would the tale have ended if it ere not for a minor composer called Hubert Parry. It seems odd to us today that men could have looked at this poem, obviously a masterpiece, and then flicked over the page without a second thought – but the Alchemist has noticed that art in general only becomes a masterpiece when someone declares it so. Artists who we today think of as old masters were all but forgotten a century ago, and those we pass by in the galleries today will be called geniuses by the children of our children.

Where was I? Ah yes, Parry was so taken with the poem that he set it to music. The First World War was in full swing at the time and our man knew his audience. The new song Jerusalem was an instant hit, as such things are reckoned and this was certainly helped by Blake’s masterful wordsmanship. Anyone can learn the poem, and thus the song in twenty minutes or less, yet there is a real depth of feeling therein. More than would be thought commensurate with the plain text.

The version which we are all familiar with today appeared in nineteen twenty-two. Sir Edward Elgar arranged the popular song for a full orchestra and gave it the real presence and majesty which had been lacking since it was first penned, Now there was a melody the equal in power of the words.

And the words – oh yes. Y’see, generally a patriotic song has a very plain subtext, something along the lines of ‘My country is pretty damn good and if you don’t think so, well your only a foreigner’.
Don’t miss-understand, the Alchemist can get behind this sort of song, and indeed has done on many occasions. However, Jerusalem is different.

Take out that bit about Christ and Jerusalem boils down to ‘My country is pretty damn good and if you don’t think so, well, I’ll make it better’.

That’s it, really. Yes, there are the Dark Satanic Mills, yes, but underneath there is good earth, a green and pleasant land. No, Jesus never walked here, but that does not matter. We walk here – and we don’t need a messiah, because we will make our world a better place!

We are English and we will not cease from the good fight! Our swords shall not sleep, and neither shall our spades or our pens or our computers or our hearts. We will go on because it is the personal, sacred duty of every English man and every English woman to make England greener and more pleasant.

This is why Jerusalem holds me – in this case the truth really is beautiful, and beauty really is the truth. This is why I am proud to sing this song and why it is the only choice four our Anthem.

And did those feet in ancient time
Walk upon England’s mountains green?
And was the holy Lamb of God
On England’s pleasant pastures seen?
And did the Countenance Divine
Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
And was Jerusalem builded here
Among those dark Satanic mills?

Bring me my bow of burning gold!
Bring me my arrows of desire!
Bring me my spear! O clouds, unfold!
Bring me my chariot of fire!
I will not cease from mental fight
Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand
Till we have built Jerusalem
In England’s green and pleasant land