By James Woodward
Principal of Sarum College
March 2024
The Good Soldier is an extraordinary novel published just before the Great War began. Written by Ford Madox Ford, it captures the dying of an era and the end of innocence. Rereading it recently left me with an overwhelming sense of the abiding tragedy and disaster of war. The world today is as precarious as it ever has been despite the fact that we know what the consequences of conflict are. In this digital age we access the immediate devastation that violence wreaks on people and civilizations. The victims of war, like the poor, are always with us.
Perhaps what we must do is to put a human face on war. This is about individuals. Stories of men women and children whose faces we can see and voices we can hear. Flesh and blood shape the way we engage with reality. We all know what human nature is like and we know that this human nature does not change very easily. As we look towards Ukraine and Gaza, we might wonder why it is that human nature does not change very easily? We feel powerless, imperfect and anxious. I have a feeling that these insecurities and horrors dig deep into our psyche and make us all feel just a little bit more vulnerable.
Perhaps we have a choice. Expressing sympathy but aware that these things are a long way away from our lives so we put them to one side and get on with whatever the day may bring. This is of course an understandable evasion but what lessons do we need to learn and what do we need to do to improve our own behaviour?
A rabbi was once asked whether a garment that had been symbolically torn in grief could be sewn up and used again. Yes, he replied, but you mustn’t disguise the tear. The imperfection, the grief, the tear must always be shown.
Anna Simmons, a friend of Sarum College, is an artist of great skill and creativity. In this painting she shows us the human cost of war. Look carefully at both the light and the darkness. You will glimpse the destruction but also a human spirit that reaches a hand out to help and support. You will find in it some truth about our fragile world but also yourself.
Here is what Anna writes about making this artwork:
I have often found inspiration for my paintings from the Guardian newspaper. Their photographs of people around the world suffering disasters in earthquakes, tsunamis, and in the war zones of Ukraine and now Gaza are so harrowing, so desperate. Creating a painting from these images is my way of being part of the drama, almost sharing the suffering.
When I saw this most recent image of people searching through the rubble after a bomb attack in Gaza, I recognised immediately that this image was not only factual, but was full of messages, of stories, of interpretations, and that I MUST paint it. Almost that it was my duty to paint it.
This painting is on display in Sarum College’s Chapel – please do come and look at it.
We can join in this prayer as we hope and long for peace.
I found this post moving, deeply insightful yet also very painful. Thank you from someone who had close relatives wounded in both world wars – and deeply scarred by them. I pray for a balanced peace to return to Ukraine and to Gaza – but not at the cost of justice.