Roger, 1945-2023. A
note from his friend Graham
Welcome from the ‘Essex Riviera’ at night. Thank you for reading.
Job, a minor contributing author to Bible canon, suggests
that ‘wisdom comes with age’. Although I’m fairly sure that accumulating years merely
confers experience and wrinkles. It’s rather retrospection that informs better
choices.
Roger always promoted the idea of agreeing to differ. Even
where diametrically opposing opinions clash. It’s the difference between a
feisty debate or a blazing row. It is the discipline of healthy discourse, rather
than viewing an opposing opinion through the distortion of ad hominem. In a
wider sphere, it’s the difference between coexistence and war.
It is an uncomfortable truth that, as with most friendships,
Roger and I had our occasional arguments. Even to the extent of hitching up
petticoat tails and flouncing away in high dudgeon! Looking back, especially
now that he’s passed away, I regret those occasions. They evoke a sense of self-recrimination,
and rightfully become somehow absurd under the shadow of mortality. Most of our
arguments occurred in the early days of our friendship. Predominantly over my awful
timekeeping. I was in my early 30s and so blasé about punctuality. It annoyed
him intensely - and rightly so. Mea culpa.
In so many ways, Roger made me a better person. He
encouraged me to read great works of literature. He offered constructive
criticism with my early attempts at poetry. A mentor really - as well as a best
friend. We agreed on most things. But there were contentious issues at times.
The toppling of Edward Colston’s
statue by student activists on 7 June 2020 in Bristol, being an example.* Yes,
it’s true that destruction of public property is, on the face of it,
criminality. And true, reinterpreting history for a political agenda is also problematic.
(In this instance relating to Black Lives Matter.) However Roger’s disapproval
of ‘vandalism’ by students seemed to me at odds with his core ethos on decrying
hypocrisy. It looked like a sop to a politically conservative viewpoint (or
perhaps it simply highlighted our generational divide). He regarded the removal
of the bronze cast (by John Cassidy, 1895) as a version
of mob-rule (ochlocracy). The destruction of ‘art’, Roger suggested, was a prelude
to another Kristallnacht** and the horrors that followed in its wake. It remains
a valid viewpoint.
But was it really ‘criminal damage’ or mindless destruction in this case? There’s something inescapably symbolic, and subjective, about placing a figure on a pedestal in a public space. It implies moral virtue. Specifically, Colston (1636–1721), a pious, ‘Christian’ man and MP, made various grandiose gestures to charities like Almshouses - to great public acclaim (virtue-signaling in modern terms). A self-publicising philanthropist. Although, his effigy emanates that unholy stench of hypocrisy. As an investor in the slave-trade, he weighed the lives of enslaved Africans as little more than chattel. Does this eugenicist worldview inspire civic pride among Bristol’s multi-ethnic community…?
It seems befitting that Colston’s effigy was cast into the
depths of Bristol Harbour.
A watery grave shared by so many of those rebellious West Africans aboard trans-Atlantic
slave vessels. Karma perhaps. Nowadays, let’s face it, Colston would be
languishing in prison for people smuggling and modern-day slavery - rather than
occupying the elevated position to which his blood-money afforded him. In my
opinion, ridding the public space of him was an act of cleansing. And a collective
gesture of moral aestheticism. It is surely valid to question the legitimacy of
those figures who are held aloft as pillars of society? (As are the motives of
those local civic leaders who strive to keep them there.)
With hindsight though, I realise both our opinions were valid.
Both grounded in history and both informed
by moral conviction. Opposing interpretations…
I think the point I’m trying to make is that obstinacy (or
hubris) has a price to pay. It can be an obstacle to making amends with someone dear
to our heart. And to some extent the conceit that accompanies a fervently held
opinion deafens a person to other perspectives and blinds them to another’s legitimate
counter-argument. It mutes expressions of regret and stifles the words ‘I’m
sorry’. It is the genesis of regret. In my experience, a degree of humility is
easier to live with than regret.
‘A man is not old until his regrets take the place of his
dreams.’ Yiddish proverb
Notes:
* It was quite a heated disagreement. I think my indignance
stems from visiting Cape Coast and Elmina slave castles in Ghana, 2006. Both housing
churches to administer blessings and hear the prayers of men like Colston. And
their depravities regarding enslaved female Africans resulted a fair-skinned, biracial
local population that continues to this day.
** Nazi thugs destroying Jewish homes, hospitals schools and businesses in
Germany, 1938.
* * *
REGRET
I move with favour or prejudice
among men, women, children;
To whomsoever calls me out, I will
always answer, no one denied
the music I bring, Blues I sing;
Rich, poor, famous, infamous, saints
and sinners… welcome to tap into
a wisdom some say down to Fate,
lessons learned too late
I touch without favour or prejudice
the loose thread missing a button
that old sock, empty vase in rooms
yawning with boredom for what’s
on TV and must have heard that CD
a thousand times (surely?) though
any sound better than none and
(finally) settling for a plaintive purr
by a lap tray set for one
I bury without favour or prejudice
forgotten dreams, misspent ideals,
wishful thinking on falling stars…
meant to light a kinder, better world;
alas, not meant to be though we
mull over old letters, photos, poems,
home videos… as dead as the cat
whose meows we miss and listen for
at every mealtime
I move without favour or prejudices
among life’s pleasures and losses
Copyright R. N. Taber 2015. From the collection ‘Accomplices to Illusion’.
