why europe is important and will always remain so

7/25/2019 Why Europe is Important and Will Always Remain So

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Why Europeis important and will

always remain so 1

WILDair, world-mothering air,Nestling me everywhere,

That each eyelash or hair

Girdles; goes home betwixt

The fleeciest, frailest-flixed 5

nowfla!e; that "s fairly mixed

With, riddles, and is rife

In every least thing"s life;This needf#l, never s$ent,

%nd n#rsing element; 10

&y more than meat and drin!,&y meal at every win!'''

Gerard Manley Hopkins wrote the abovebeautiful poem comparing Mary to the airwe breathe. It has all his characteristicsoaring vision beautiful word musicastonishing coinages and archaisms !
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6aqkVf-mn2nb3FIRm9XX0lPQ1E/view?usp=sharinghttps://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6aqkVf-mn2nb3FIRm9XX0lPQ1E/view?usp=sharing


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together with an informed andpassionately e#pressed theology.

$urope is also like this% it is all around us.&omething we sup in with our mothersmilk and breathe out all our life. 'or thosewho know her $urope e#erts afascination which lasts a lifetime.

I am a (ritish citi)en born in the &outh of$ngland in 1*++ in the twilight followingthe war. I have the e#perience of living inhalf a do)en countries and cultures. ,nd Iam also partly of -orman e#traction.

hen you live abroad ! and especiallywhen you live in $urope / each small actof communication is an act of $uropeansolidarity and friendship% a reaching outto a well/liked but unknown partner andcompanion on the way.

0here is really nothing else like it e#ceptthat this same spirit of cooperationcordiality and hospitality is widely


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encountered among young people andmany not so young ones with the samevibrancy the world over.

3ou notice it in small gestures of courtesyin airport lounges when speaking to Help4esks operating from e#otic locationsand in the many fervent and sincerepeople one may encounter 5uite bychance ! or at the most by a sharedinterest in or concern about something !on the internet.

e are all $uropeans now for it is from$urope 6and I suppose also ,merica but$urope was an ob7ect of fascination for,mericans which helped to foster thisvision8 that the idea of $uropean andhumanitarian solidarity comes.

0oday friendship cooperation and aconcern for the ne#t country along isindeed a global brand. 0here is not muchdi9erence between :osta :o9ee in(udapest and :osta :o9ee in (asingstoke


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! e#cept that in $ngland the pastries arein


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&o yes we are brothers. ,nd yeshumanity is for real. ,nd shining verystrongly in this constellation of humanityis $urope% like Aenus a beautiful andparado#ical symbol to guide us throughthe many dark nights of the esternsoul...

B

0oday I went to a Hungarian

haberdashery shop for nothing more

profound than an improved draw/string

for a pair of new swimming trunks. I

noticed the &ingle Market% they weremade in Ireland and proudly bore the

logo C-eill. (ut the e#isting string was

a little too long and made me think that I

was a tennis shoe.

0he proprietor and I were already fast

friends% I had previously bought some

black fabric for the school computer room


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windows as part of my world mission to

encourage language learning via the

pro7ected computer screen...

&he welcomed me with aplomb and

allowed me to park my bicycle in the shop

itself. I told her that this would not be

allowed in $ngland and thought vaguely

of :arlo :urley who was apocryphallyreputed to have driven his car into a -ew

3ork church and left it there while he

practised comple# (ach 0rio &onatas...

&oon a panoply of possible solutions in awide variety of colours and styles was laid

out on the sacred cutting table. I made a

shrewd choice about length and a modest

one about colour and she charged me a

derisory sum.

,s she packed away her wares she

mentioned that she knew me from church


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6in Hungarian the word for church is

temple ! which speaks volumes about

the Hungarians sensitivity to culturalnuance8 she en5uired about my plans

and she asked me 6using my phone and

Google 0ranslate8 how much the

swimming trunks had cost. -ever before

it seemed had she used this system for

communication and she seemed 5uite

buoyed up by the e#perience missing out

the spaces between the words however...

I told her how uni5uely for a small

church we are to have a new pipe organ

in the coming months and that I will be

allowed to play it when I am in the area.

&he knew that already of course...

ith the seamstresses again a ball.

Fokes miming mantic utterances eagerlyawaited in appalling Hungarian from me%

these are the order of the day. I salve my

conscience at their low or non/e#istent


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prices for a remarkable variety of subtle

and accomplished mending 7obs

sometimes with ice creams or once?krainian chocolate from Georgia. 0he

type Ivanishvili made his fortune from. It

is never all bad...

B

I suppose $urope


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day I remember inscribing my name in

the Aictoria and ,lbert Museums -ational

,rt Kibrary readers book on "* 4ecember1*D*. &omehow precociously and deep

down inside I knew then that the old

order was on its way out% I would grow up

and something pristine and important

would die with my aging and maybe in

the outside world as well.

I was allowed to take the train from

:ascais to Kisbon and view the -uno

GonLalves pictures of the Jortuguese

court at the height of the Jortuguesemaritime empire under Henry the

-avigator all on my own. I was 7ust


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Jortugal was still in the grip of &ala)ar

who was to die later that year. 0hemuseum sta9 and circumambulating

Jortuguese were cordial and helpful% and

so at a very green age I obtained alone

an encounter with a eading &chool near the

0hames river in mellow and

unadventurous (erkshiremy ineptitude

in languages shaded as I grew older into

a small and gradual con


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and caring 'rench teacher -eville Hart.

Hart was the brother of a well/known

(ritish 0A personality of the time 4erekHart who presented a hands/on

childrens art which was immensely

successful. -eville was as modest as his

brother was famous and he is etched in

my memory for the trip he made with

certain invited pupils to the Maison

'ranLaise in C#ford.

Here we heard the widow of (oris

Jasternak recite many of her brothers

poems in her own translation in both>ussian and $nglish ! although I reali)ed

later that her $nglishings contained a

measure of willful recreativity that can

obscure the thrust of the original >ussian.

(ut the impact of this on a sensitive boy

in during an =lite and heightened evening


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visit to a fabled location can be well

imagined%

Winter Night

It swept, it swept on all the earth,

At every turning,

A candle on the table flared,

A candle, burning.

Like swarms of midges to a flame

In summer weather,

Snowflakes flew up towards the pane

In flocks together.

Snow moulded arrows, rings and stars

The pane adorning.

A candle on the table shone

A candle, burning.

Entangled shadows spread across

The flickering ceiling,

Entangled arms, entangled legs,

And doom, and feeling.

And with a thud against the floor

Two shoes came falling,

And drops of molten candle waLike tears were rolling.

And all was lost in snowy mist,

!rey"white and blurring.

A candle on the table stood,

A candle, burning.

The flame was trembling in the draught#

$eat of temptation,

It lifted up two crossing wings

As of an angel.

All %ebruary the snow"storm swept,

Each time returning.

A candle on the table wept,

A candle, burning.

1946

Translated by Lydia Pasternak Slater


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I saw in a ash that >ussia too was part

of $urope and that it e#erted a fateful

charge of the most obscure and e#citingkind. It would be many many years until I

e#plored the original in 0bilisi in lessons

I arranged according to my own desired

programme so that I could see and taste

the great >ussian words in the original...B

In the present confusion about (re#it it isgood to reali)e that nothing is moreimportant than $urope.It has been therein all the states of soul which we havee#perienced or are likely to e#perienceand we have thus no choice but to hangin with it.

0o pretend ! arguing upon a spuriousallegiance to an ill/understood neo/liberalpolitics and economics 6or alternativelyupon the temporary e#haustion of the$uropean mind...8 that globali)ation haschanged all this and that $urope counts


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no more well thisis some namelessGreek crime ironically% either ritualcastration or some in7ury to theomphalos and pretty nasty andpsychologically unpleasant whicheverway you look at it.

Fust because the psyche 6or the 'reudianid 8 is rampant in these de


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I was very near to tears. I still do notknow what it is about% :entral $urope.

,t the time the youthful professor was ina Hungarian prison as the result of aminor scrape and had been listening to(achs Saint Matthew Passion.

He has ! of course ! devoted his entirecareer to


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enduring contribution to that same$uropean world...

Cur renewed contribution can still bemade and $urope re5uires that all hercountries make the same e9ort. It is notan argument about getting back% it is anargument about recreating with all theskill of our time and an argument about

putting back...

&o long as >ussia is under the grip of adelusional nationalism of course theavailable alternatives are really too awfulto contemplate...


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-eville Hart 6d. 1**28 :ode# ,miatinus D*"


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10he te#t of the &amuel (arber setting of Gerard Manley HopkinsHeaven/Haven 6, -un takes the Aeil8 / presented to accompanythis paper is given at the 3ou0ube site where this performance ishosted as follows %

I H,A$ 4$&I>$4 to gohere springs not fail0o


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Mat=s)alka -orth/$ast Hungary

why europe is important and will always remain so

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