The Anglican Church in Tasmania                                                             Search
	a healthy church...transformingLIFE
	Home      About      Contact us      News      Issues      Parishes      Prayer      Calendar      Youth      Resources

	February 2005				Albion - The origins of the English imagination by Peter Ackroyd. Chatto and Windus, London 2002. Hardcover 516 pp. RRP $75
		Book review Albion - The origins of the English imagination reviewed by Philip Blake
			'Albion' in an ancient word for England and in this remarkable book, Peter Ackroyd traces the origins of the English imagination. He does so in exhaustive fashion by reviewing historically the many traits and characteristics which contributed in some way towards England as it now exists; he covers just about every aspect of Englishness. Ackroyd reaches back to early patterns of art and thought, documents the changes wrought about by various invasions, and yet defines those constants which made Albion what it was and England what it is today. Poets, musical composers, scientists, novelists and theologians all form part of the progress. Influence The English have been noted for their pragmatism, their individualism, their love of drama and parody and even their peculiar sense of humour. The small garden or 'yard' appears to have been an English invention - partly brought about by the lack of land in towns and cities, and partly by the love of some kind of security and privacy. It is disappointing that in his section on the garden-loving England he fails to mention to poem 'The glory of the garden' by Rudyard Kipling, in which England is pictured as a garden, and the various people who tend it as having important parts to play in its perpetuation. This is a book which will naturally appeal to Anglophiles, but bearing in mind the influence the English imagination has had on Australian culture and language it ought to be read by all. It is made up of 53 chapters and an epilogue and some indication of the scholarship involved in its writing will be evidenced by the twenty-one pages of end notes. 'Poms' and current Australian culture In his epilogue Peter Ackroyd writes, 'The English have always been in that sense a practical and pragmatic race; the history of English philosophy, for example, has been the history of empiricism and scientific experiment. There are no works of speculative theology, but there are many manuals of religious instruction.' This is a book of some length, and given Ackroyd's command of the English language it may involve an occasional glance at the dictionary, but it is a scholarly and imaginative delve into the English subconscious. No one who reads this will forfeit anything but will rather gain in understanding both the 'Poms' and the current Australian culture.