Sussex poems and songs

[Pogue Mahone]

This isn't quite poetry either, but they were brilliant live...

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=y5fPntjfVr8

 

[Buzzer]

There's a Kipling poem, can't remember the title, but I LOVE the last verse:

God gives all men all earth to love,
But, since man’s heart is small,
Ordains for each one spot shall prove
Beloved over all.
Each to his choice, and I rejoice
The lot has fallen to me
In a fair ground-in a fair ground,
Yea, Sussex by the sea!

EDIT: Just googled it and I think it's called, er, 'Sussex'

I once had a fantastic drunken conversation with someone who wrote a PhD on Dylan Thomas and he had a theory that the poem Sussex and especially that verse was an influence for the Rev Eli Jenkins monologue in Under Milk Wood where he says about never, never leaving. I'd like to think it's true.

 

[CorgiRegisteredFriend]

Any excuse...

 

[Green Cross Code Man]

Aside from GOSBTS, has anyone got any favourites? I love 'The South Country' by Hilaire Belloc. There's some lovely quotes in it..

When I am living in the Midlands that are sodden and unkind,
I light my lamp in the evening my work is left behind;
And the great hills of the South Country come back into my mind.
...
I never get between the pines but I smell the Sussex air;
Nor I never come on a belt of sand but my home is there.
And along the sky the line of the Downs so noble and so bare.

A lost thing could I never find, nor a broken thing mend:
And I fear I shall be all alone when I get towards the end.
Who will there be to comfort me or who will be my friend?

I will gather and carefully make my friends of the men of the Sussex Weald;
They watch the stars from silent folds, they stiffly plough the field.
By them and the God of the South Country my poor soul shall be healed.

If I ever become a rich man, or if ever I grow to be old,
I will build a house with deep thatch to shelter me from the cold,
And there shall the Sussex songs be sung and the story of Sussex told.
...

I so love that poem. I was going to post that when I saw the thread title. Wonderful!

 

[Green Cross Code Man]

Anther Ravilious. One of my favourite artists and especially great that he's from Eastbourne.

 

[Buzzer]

I don't know if he's still around but a great Sussex man who knew countless folk songs is/was Noel Dumbrell, a proper old Sussex surname too. This is my favourite version of GOSBTS. A lovely old pub, everyone slightly sozzled and there's him leading the singing with gusto.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQtVbA4hXAk

 

[AmexRuislip]

I don't know if he's still around but a great Sussex man who knew countless folk songs is/was Noel Dumbrell, a proper old Sussex surname too. This is my favourite version of GOSBTS. A lovely old pub, everyone slightly sozzled and there's him leading the singing with gusto.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQtVbA4hXAk

That's brilliant, but I still think this version takes some beating.
Apologies, as posted before on a previous thread.

 

[Norman Potting]

This thread is an unexpected NSC cultural delight. Had heard of Eric Ravilious but didn't appreciate the Sussex connection - this link should take you to some of his work.

https://images.search.yahoo.com/sea...2M-?p=Ravilious+Paintings&fr=yset_chr_cnewtab

Will give the British Sea Power track a listen as well. Anti Nowwhere League are/were from Tunbridge Wells in Kent, although its most famous bit, the Pantiles, were in Sussex until the border got tinkered with many moons ago.

 

[catfish]

In pop and rock, Brighton gets hundreds of mentions, of course. Suede reference my hometown of Worthing, Leo Sayer name-drops Montague Street, there's a Phil Manzanera (no, I've never heard of him either) song which Robert Wyatt played on called Cissbury Ring (my favourite place in the whole world). Trouble is I think the song is a bit pants.

Al Stewart mentions Worthing in the song Manuscript. Apparently his grandparents lived here and he used to stay with them when he was a lad.

 

[The Spanish]

I so love that poem. I was going to post that when I saw the thread title. Wonderful!

Whale-backed downs. I love that. Genius.

 

[Bulldog]

You cut off the best verse Buzzer, my favourite one, sends a tingle up the spine.

If I ever become a rich man,
Or if ever I grow to be old,
I will build a house with deep thatch
To shelter me from the cold,
And there shall the Sussex songs be sung
And the story of Sussex told.

I will hold my house in the high wood
Within a walk of the sea,
And the men that were boys when I was a boy
Shall sit and drink with me.
Hilaire Belloc

 

[Worried Man Blues]

“When you have lost your inns, drown your empty selves, for you will have lost the last of England” – Hilaire Belloc just read his Farrago Four men etc

 

[Peter Grummit]

Paul Nash was Ravillious's mentor. Wood on the Downs.



PG

 

[goldstone]

Wow! The cultural side of NSC. I have a couple or Ravilious prints at home. Was introduced to his work a few years back.

 

[MattBackHome]

Horace at Brighton


Now fruitful Autumn lifts his sunburnt head,
The slighted Park few cambric-muslins whiten
The dry machines revisit ocean's bed,
And Horace quits the town awhile for Brighton.


The cit forgoes his box at Turnham Green,
To pick up health and shells with Amphitrite
Pleasure's frail daughters trip along the Steyne;
Led by the dame the Greeks called Aphrodite.


Phoebus, the tanner, plies his fiery trade,
The graceful nymphs ascend Judaea's ponies,
Scale the west cliff, or visit the parade,
While poor papa in town a patient drone is.


Loose trousers snatch the wreath from pantaloons;
Nankeens of late were worn the sultry weather in;
But now (so will the Prince's light dragoons)
White jeans have triumph'd o'er their Indian brethren.


Here with choice food earth smiles and ocean yawns,
Intent alike to please the London glutton;
This for our breakfast, proffers shrimps and prawns,
That for our dinner, Southdown lamb and mutton.


Yet here, as elsewhere, Death impartial reigns;
Visit alike the cot and the pavilion-
And for a bribe, with equal scorn disdains,
My half-a-crown, and Baring's half a million.


Alas! how short the span of human pride,
Time flies, and hope's romantic schemes are undone,
Crosweller's coach, that carries four inside,
Waits to take back the unwilling bard to London.


Ye circulating novelists, adieu!
Long envious cords my black portmanteau tighten;
Billiards, begone! Avaunt, illegal loo!
Farewell, old ocean's bauble, glittering Brighton!


Long shalt thou laugh thine enemies to scorn,
Proud as Phoenicia, queen of watering places!
Boys yet unbreach'd, and virgins yet unborn,
On thy bleak downs shall tan their blooming faces.

 

[knocky1]

Paul Nash was Ravillious's mentor. Wood on the Downs.

View attachment 73411

PG

An amazing artist and teacher indeed. Wood on the Downs depicts Ivinghoe Beacon on the Ridgeway in N Bucks.