Nine Lessons and Carols... with a twist
The London Review of Books is taking a Victorian Christmas tradition and running away with it, laughing
1880 was peak Victorian. Britain was meddling in the Middle East (plus ça change) with the second Anglo-Afghan War, Greenwich Mean Time was being adopted as the standard across the country, and, because the Victorians LOVED Christmas and were constantly making up new traditions to inflict on future generations, the first ever festival of Nine Lessons and Carols took place.
It was created by Edward Wright Benson, then Bishop of Truro (who earlier that year had seen the foundation stone laid for that city’s cathedral - the first to be built on a new site in Britain in about 400 years). Like so many Christmas ‘traditions’ popularised by the Victorians (like decorating trees and sending seasonal cards), it took off, and remains a rather lovely pillar of the season, luring back irregular visitors to churches and affording vicars across the country the chance to exert a little light passive aggression at the sight of rarely seen parishioners.
I’m not at all religious, but I love a good church (Truro’s is magnificent, one of only four in the UK with three spires; very French) and I love church music, particularly of the choral variety. However, this post is not really about any of that; instead, for the strong religio-refuseniks among us, it’s about a rather nice alternative festive event with a faint hint of Benson’s spiritual intentions but a stronger whiff of cheerful dissent.
Instead of bible readings and hymns, the London Review of Books’ Alternative Lessons and Carols, taking place on Thursday and Friday this week at the strangely little-known but quite cool venue Stone Nest, on Shaftesbury Avenue, will see nine ‘lessons’ selected and read by contributors to the magazine and other writers and artists (with a different line-up for each night).
‘Carols’ on both nights will be arranged by composer Kieran Brunt and performed by the experimental vocal ensemble, Shards, with guest appearances from Tom Rasmussen and others.
The events will loosely track the traditional arc of the service, from the Fall of Man to the Mystery of the Incarnation, while offering “more radical, transgressive, inclusive kinds of wisdom, by drawing on alternative literatures and traditions”.
All of which risks sounding unbearably smug, but among the readers (who also include the ‘shamanic cult hero of contemporary queer poetry,’ CA Conrad; Andrew O’Hagan, author of Caledonian Road; writer, activist and researcher Lola Olufemi; poet and philosopher Denise Riley; and historian, author and mythographer Marina Warner, alongside many others) is the artist and musician Jem Finer, a founding member of the Pogues, whom I have met on a number of occasions and who is an utter delight of a man - thoughtful, funny and not at all smug.
So I hope that is an indication that it will be irreverent and fun and joyous instead of smirky and annoying. And the music should be outstanding. Tickets can be booked here.
The new episode of my podcast The London Theatre Review is now live, with reviews of A Christmas Carol at the Old Vic, and All’s Well That Ends Well at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse - plus a lovely interview with Simon Russell Beale, about to appear in Tom Stoppard’s The Invention of Love at the Hampstead Theatre. Find it on Spotify, Acast or wherever else you get your podcasts.