Fred Dibnah TV - Thomas Gray - John Keats - William Shakespeare - Benjamin Jowett - Thomas Hardy - Matthew Smith -
I like working on churches. It’s so nice and peaceful. And then I like doing a bit of grave-stone reading. Fred Dibnah, Life With Fred 1/4, BBC 1994
The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,
The lowing herd wind slowly o’er the lea,
The plowman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.
Now fades the glimm’ring landscape on the sight,
And all the air a solemn stillness holds,
Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight,
And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds;
Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tow’r
The moping owl does to the moon complain
Of such, as wand’ring near her secret bow’r,
Molest her ancient solitary reign.
Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree’s shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a mould’ring heap,
Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,
The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep. Thomas Gray, Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard
The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power,
And all that beauty, all that wealth e’er gave,
Await alike th’ inevitable hour,
The paths of glory lead but to the grave. ibid.
Some village Hampden, that, with dauntless breast,
The little tyrant of his fields withstood,
Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest,
Some Cromwell guiltless of his country’s blood. ibid.
A poor, weak, palsy-stricken, churchyard thing. John Keats, The Eve of St Agnes, 1820
Night’s swift dragons cut the clouds full fast,
And yonder shines Aurora’s harbinger;
At whose approach, ghosts, wandering here and there,
Troop home to churchyards. William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night’s Dream I i 149, Puck
’Tis now the very witching time of night,
When churchyards yawn and hell itself breathes out
Contagion to this world. William Shakespeare, Hamlet III ii
Nowhere probably is there more true feeling, and nowhere worst taste, than in a churchyard. Benjamin Jowett
O passenger, pray list and catch
Our sighs and piteous groans,
Half stifled in this jumbled patch
Of wretched memorial stones!
We late-lamented, resting here,
Are mixed to human jam,
And each to each exclaims in fear,
I know not which I am! ... Thomas Hardy, The Levelled Churchyard
I would rather sleep in the southern corner of a little country churchyard, than in the tombs of the Capulets. Edmund Burke, letter to Matthew Smith