I’ve been shamefully absent from this blog recently, but, in partial recompense, here’s the chance to read a piece I wrote for the first number of the resurrected Cambridge Literary Review about my memories of the concrete poet and Benedictine monk, Dom Sylvester Houedard, otherwise known as dsh and seen here in priestly garb. This excellent new magazine is putting some of its contents online here, but you’d be much happier if you actually bought a copy and held it in your hands. It’s beautifully produced and, of course, contains things that will never see the light of a computer screen.
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That's just such a lovely piece, Charles. Congratulations!
Thanks, Wendell. And thanks for putting up with this long silence on my part! Mind you, your last post on SB and his decretini vari left me feeling pretty much redundant…
Wow. Beautifully told, psychologically astute. dsh was always something of an enigma to me, but I was in awe of him, not least on account of his vocation. And the Courier: that always seemed a sign of integrity. I can't remember when I first came across his work – some time in the 70s I think. It feels clearer now. Monks are rather like aeroplanes these days, aren't they? We can't see them up there journeying off into the blue without imputing to them the possibility of ulteriority.
The Courier? Aeroplanes. I must admit I tend to think of more terrestrial metaphors for monks than your rather lovely one, Anne, though you're absolutely right about suspecting ulteriority.