[This is the first of a series of articles giving a brief
description of each of the 26 ancient Anglican cathedrals coupled with a sketch
of a person, activity or institution connected to the area]
Lichfield is an agreeable
if not much visited market city in Staffordshire, about 25 miles North of
Birmingham. The Gothic cathedral we now see is the third on the site and dates
from 1195 to 1330. It is the only ancient Anglican cathedral with 3 spires
which makes for a distinctive skyline.
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| Lichfield Cathedral |
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| The Evangelist from the Lichfield Gospels |
The cathedral possessed the relics of the 7th
century Saxon missionary St Chad
and an extensive cult venerating him grew up on his death, bringing much vital income
to the diocese. The partly-illuminated 8th century Lichfield
Gospels, similar to those of Lindisfarne, are
on treasured display.
It was a major blow when Henry VIII dissolved the
monasteries and suppressed the cult of St Chad in the 1530s.
Worse was to follow as the cathedral was twice besieged and
extensively damaged in 1643 during the Civil War. Charles II provided funds for
repair but the cathedral deteriorated in the 18th century thanks to
absentee bishops and the prevailing lethargy of the Anglican clergy. The
energetic Victorians, notably George Gilbert Scott, drastically restored the
cathedral to its notional Gothic splendour, even if they left their
characteristic imprint.
There is still much to enjoy – a fine nave, an impressive
octagonal chapter house, rare 16th century Flemish glass donated by
a later benefactor, a pretty, unspoilt Close and a West front packed with
figures of saints and kings (even if unkind critics have likened the curled
machine-perfect images to an advertisement for a Victorian hairdresser!). It is
most assuredly worth a visit.
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The heyday of the city of Lichfield was the 18th century as
it was a coaching terminus, a place of inns, livery stables and associated
trades.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) was the son of Michael Johnson,
an amiable but improvident bookseller in Lichfield.
Samuel Johnson was a very odd personality. His birth was difficult and he grew
to be a large, rambling, short-sighted
character afflicted by scrofula (a tuberculous swelling of the lymph nodes in
the neck) and uncontrollable tics, making him twitch at every opportunity.
Modern medical science diagnoses Tourette
Syndrome. He was also prey to regular bouts of severe depression.
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| Johnson's Statue at Market Square, Lichfield |
Despite these difficulties, Johnson read feverishly and
became a prodigy. He went to Pembroke College, Oxford
for a year but could not afford to continue. At the age of 25 he married a lady
21 years older, Tetty Porter, whom he loved dearly. Attempts to work as a
schoolmaster and start a school near Lichfield failed and with his pupil David
Garrick he walked to London
in 1737. Garrick went on to become London’s
favourite actor while Johnson was a penniless hack writer in Grub Street,
taking what work he could.
His first major works were the poem London,
published anonymously, his Life of Savage and his play Irene, which only ran for 9 nights when Garrick eventually produced
it. He built up a reputation as a writer of ephemeral pieces and was
commissioned in 1746 to compile a dictionary. After 9 years of immense solo
labour, A Dictionary of the English Language appeared in 1755, bringing
Johnson recognition, a pension a few years later and literary immortality. He
was not above having a few digs at the Scots; “Oats: a grain which is generally
given to horses but in Scotland
it supports the people”. He soon embarked on the writing of moral essays under
the name of The Rambler and The Idler, some
of his finest work. Later he produced an edition of Shakespeare and his Lives of the Poets confirming his status
as a great critic.
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| Short-sighted Samuel Johnson |
Johnson was a convivial person and dined with the leading
intellectuals of the day, including Goldsmith, Reynolds, Gibbon, Garrick and Burke
at “The Club”. As ever, he dominated the conversation “Sir, when a man is tired
of London, he is tired of Life; for there is in London all that life can
afford”.
His wife Tetty had died in 1752 and he never married again;
“A second marriage: the triumph of hope over experience”. He was not impervious
to the attractions of women but avoided temptation, remarking to Garrick:
"I'll come no more behind your scenes, David; for the silk stockings and
white bosoms of your actresses excite my amorous propensities".
Johnson never forgot Lichfield
– he kept up a long friendship with his step-daughter Lucy Porter – nor did he
entirely lose his Staffordshire accent. Garrick sometimes used to mimic him,
squeezing a lemon into a punch-bowl, with uncouth gesticulations, looking round
the company, and calling out, 'Who's for Poonsh?'
In 1763 Johnson befriended the 22 year-old Scotsman James
Boswell, “a bigot and a sot” thought Macaulay, though a literary hero to me. The
introduction famously did not go well;
[Boswell:] "Mr. Johnson, I do indeed come from Scotland, but I cannot help
it."[Johnson:] "That, Sir, I find, is what a very great many of your countrymen cannot help."
They were to meet regularly over the ensuing years and in 1773 Johnson accompanied Boswell on his Journey to the Western Isles of Scotland, helping to soften his bantering prejudices against Scotsmen.
Johnson also became a close friend of brewer and MP Henry Thrale and his wife Hester and regularly stayed with them in Southwark until Thrale died in 1781. Johnson’s London household was odd containing various outsiders including blind poetess Anna Williams, a doctor for the poor, Robert Levet, and his negro servant Francis Barber, all of whom he treated with notable charity.
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| Boswell's Statue in Market Square, Lichfield |
SMD
16.10.12
Text copyright © Sidney Donald 2012
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