In 1906 Bantock published his ‘Poem for Chorus and Orchestra’, Sea-wanderers (the words again written by Helena), and part I of Omar Khayyám had its premiere on 4 October at the Birmingham Festival. Newman's tenure at the Manchester Guardian had proven controversial, so he moved back to Birmingham to work as music critic at the Birmingham Post, a position that he held until 1919. He also published his extended study Elgar.

199 GRANVILLE BANTOCK TO ERNEST NEWMAN

Dear Will

Many thanks for your generous & sympathetic notice on Sibelius’ work & the Concert generally. It is worth while persevering in the attempt to educate pig-headed people, in Lpool & elsewhere, & I was delighted to find Wood & Kreisler also in accord with you, regarding the fine originality of “En Saga”. I am writing Sibelius today, & sending him your notice. Another copy I am keeping for myself. If you have a spare number by you, you might send it to Kling, in order that he may post it on to Leipzig.

According to present arrangements, I expect to go up to London on Sunday week by the 12.55 PM arriving Euston at 4.35 PM. If we could arrange to meet at the Station or in the Hall of Euston Hotel (East Wing) say at 5. PM, this will give us time to get dinner & catch the train for Harwich from Liverpool Street later in the evening. Let me know what train you will be going up by from Manchester & when it arrives Euston. Tomorrow, or Monday, I will see about the tickets from London to Leipzig, & return via Brussels & Paris.

I expect Helen will come to Manchester after our return; but in the meantime we are expecting Kate & Boodles to take up their quarters here at the Menagerie.

Love to you both

Gran.

200 GRANVILLE BANTOCK TO ERNEST NEWMAN

My dear Will

Thanks for your letter. If I do not see you on the platform at Euston on Sunday at 4.35 PM, I will wait for you in the Hall of the East Wing of the Euston Hotel at 5. PM.

The correspondence reproduced in this book represents the letters written by Granville Ransome Bantock (1868–1946) to his fellow composer William Francis Stuart Wallace (1860–1940) and to the music critic Ernest Newman (1868–1959) between 1893 and 1921. Although none of Wallace's replies have survived, and there is only one extant letter from Newman to Bantock, this collection of letters provides a fascinating study of the personal and professional relationships between the three men and their contemporaries at a crucial stage in their musical careers. When this correspondence begins, Bantock had completed his studies with Frederick Corder at the Royal Academy of Music (after abandoning a potential career in the Indian Civil Service) and had already experienced some modest success as a composer. In addition to several early performances of his works at the Royal Academy of Music, the Strolling Players had performed three movements from his ballet suite Ægypt (linked to his published Egyptian drama Rameses II), and his Wagnerian opera Caedmar – written to his own libretto – had been produced at the New Olympic Theatre by Signor Lago. Wallace had completed his one-year studentship at the RAM in 1889, having formerly studied medicine at Edinburgh and Glasgow universities, and opthalmology in Vienna and Paris. He too had experienced some early compositional success; the Stock Exchange Orchestral Society had performed two movements from his music for The Lady from the Sea in February 1892, and his first symphonic poem, The Passing of Beatrice (based on canto 31 of Dante's ‘Paradiso’ from La Divina Commedia), had been premiered by August Manns at the Crystal Palace on 26 November 1892. Like Bantock, Wallace's Wagnerian enthusiasms identified him as an exponent of the ‘modern’ school of composition, which inevitably drew criticism from the more conservative press such as The Standard:

The main object of this paper is to analyze how the kings of León used diplomacy in order to make possible the territorial expansion of their kingdom at the expense of Muslim lands, a subject hitherto practically ignored by historians. It is well known that León had less potential for expansion than Castile and Portugal. The ambitions of these three adjacent kingdoms converged on Muslim territory, a fact that would cause countless armed conflicts between these Christian entities throughout the period in question. An appraisal of the diplomatic relations established by the Leonese attests that the truces they concluded with the Almohads allowed the kings of León to keep their area of expansion open despite the actions of their direct rivals. In the same manner, during the last stage of León's existence as an independent kingdom, its leaders finally focused on territorial conquest. As we shall see, for those campaigns, the kings of León relied quite often on the aid or cooperation of their neighboring kingdoms, thanks to a series of agreements reached with the respective rulers of those states.

Censorious judgments regarding the treaties, pacts, and alliances concluded between the Christian kingdoms and the Muslims are not common in the historiography of recent decades. Nonetheless, such remarks have not completely disappeared from the copious writing on the topic. For instance, for Manuel González Jiménez, the agreements between the kings of León and the Almohads were “alianzas contra natura” – unnatural alliances. Maria Alegria Marques and João Soalheiro describe as an “aliança espúria” – an illegitimate alliance – the pact arranged between Sancho VII of Navarre (1194–1234) and the caliph ‘Abd Allah al-Nasir (1199–1213). Pascal Buresi's view is slightly more nuanced, recognizing a difference between the Christian–Muslim treaties signed in the early years of the thirteenth century and those concluded previously, the last of which was between Sancho VII of Navarre and the Almohads, from 1198 to 1201. In positing such a distinction, he notes that in the earlier arrangements made among the Christian kings it was established that they should respect the truces which some of them might already have made, and that consequently they would not be able to aid other monarchs in their fights against the Almohads.

In 1912 Bantock published his ‘orchestral drama with a prologue’ Fifine at the Fair (premiered at the Birmingham Festival on 2 October, with Bantock conducting), the Overture to a Greek Tragedy, the Serenade: In the Far West for string orchestra (movements 2, 3, and 4 of which were premiered at the Hereford Festival on 11 September) and the ‘12 morceaux’ for solo piano, Silhouettes. He also began a sketch of Scenes from the Scottish Highlands. Part I of Omar was performed in Vienna under Schalk on 14 February, and in Glasgow on 17 December. There are diary references to correspondence with Wallace on 16 and 21 January and 29 February, but the letters have not survived; however he also met Wallace for ‘a chat about the Philharmonic Society & Copyright questions & attitude of Soc of British Composers’ on 22 March, and put Wallace up on 21 May in preparation for Wallace conducting his The Passing of Beatrice at the Students Annual Orchestral Concert at Birmingham Town Hall on 22 May. Bantock also met Sibelius at the rehearsal of the composer's Fourth Symphony on 26 September and took him back to Broad Meadow on 27 September, where he stayed until 2 October. The diaries confirm that Bantock and Helena met Newman and his wife at Liberty's in Birmingham on Christmas Eve.

262 GRANVILLE BANTOCK TO ERNEST NEWMAN

My dear Will

It was a great pleasure to me to see you at Manchester, and to receive such words of encouragement from you in the ‘Post’. I think the performance was wonderful considering all the circumstances, and your generous recognition of the work of the Choir will be a great delight & reward to them for all their labours. I believe that future performances will lead to more confidence, especially on the part of the male singers, & a different complexion will be given to the first Ode, which I am not disposed to regard as the worst of the four. However, I shall be well content, if we get on a bit further in the development of purely Choral music, as I have not much faith left in the possibilities of the Orchestra.

1902 saw the premiere of Bantock's The Witch of Atlas at the Worcester Festival on 10 September and the publication of his Russian Scenes for orchestra. Bantock was also introduced to Richard Strauss at the London Strauss Festival. The letters highlight his early attempts to get Newman appointed on the staff of the Birmingham and Midland Institute; Joseph Holbrooke was appointed in September. Newman completed his series of articles on British Music in The Speaker, and published an essay on Herbert Spencer in the Monthly Musical Record. Wallace's song cycle Lords of the Sea was premiered in Bournemouth, and he published a song setting of a text adapted from Gawain Douglas, ‘O Hie Honour’.

133 GRANVILLE BANTOCK TO ERNEST NEWMAN

My dear Will

Many thanks for your prompt kindness in allowing Halford to use your Elgar notes. I have sent them on to him, & it will relieve his mind, as Elgar is in Germany, & Booseys say they have not a copy of the scores.

One more favour. Will you let Kate bring with her next Monday the engraved proofs of the “Russian Scenes” Suite. Godfrey wants it for Bournemouth,2 & I cannot get a word from the wretched printers as to when the score will be published. This is only a hurried scrawl. More news later.

Yours always

Gran

I am trying to write a Romantic Poem for Cello & Orchestra, & to score Fifine at the same time.

134 GRANVILLE BANTOCK TO ERNEST NEWMAN

Dear good soul

I am at a loss to know how to thank you for your generous article in today's “Speaker”. You are the first man who has openly championed any of my work, and I value your criticism the more for pointing out my failings. For this I do heartily thank you, but am beggared at the idea of attempting to thank you for your favourable judgements. Frankly, it's beyond me. You have done more for me than I can ever do for you, hence my helplessness.

HERMANN KANT PROBABLY NEVER IMAGINED that he, a man of fifty and vice president of the Writers Union, would ever stand in front of one hundred twenty fellow writers and cry. Yet that was exactly what he did on November 26, 1976, at the SED base organization meeting within the union's Berlin district branch. They were meeting for the second time in four days, a frequency that underscored the urgency of the situation. The purpose was to deal with criticism of the SED's actions against Wolf Biermann, the popular songwriter who had had his East German citizenship revoked ten days earlier. The ensuing “Biermann Affair” quickly became the most controversial cultural-political event in Honecker's tenure, especially in the literary community. Within days, dozens of intellectuals, including six members of the Berlin branch steering committee, had signed a petition demanding the SED reverse its decision. Penned by Stephan Hermlin, it was first presented to Neues Deutschland but within hours was also distributed to the Western media. Scarcely a week after the petition's publication and after much consultation with local and national Party leaders, the SED's Berlin base organization in the union demanded that the signatories appear at a two-part meeting (November 23 and 26) of all local Party members.

Kant had been away for the first meeting but returned in time for the second. Afraid he had been too lenient in an earlier public statement, he now spoke more sharply, lecturing, “We all have experienced our injustices. I know what I'm talking about!;” He then reached the rub: “I thought we manage certain adversities among ourselves!;” he exclaimed, reminding his listeners that what writers had achieved “[they had]n't accomplished by calling anyone in, but [through] [their] own intelligence, [their] own reason, [their] own courage, and [their] comrades in different areas who [could] help [them].” This was the only way to do things: he stated: “Through this we have achieved something and through nothing else!;” He then addressed the petition's author, his dear friend Hermlin. When Kant learned of his actions, he had felt ashamed, and when he returned home he quickly telephoned Henniger to find out if Hermlin had recanted. He related his reaction to the news: “And I'll tell you what—you can brush it aside, can forget it—but I was excessively happy that….”

The topic of medieval strategy has aroused lively debate among military historians in recent years, especially whether medieval military history was characterized by a particular type of strategy, be it Grand, Vegetian or Battle-seeking. This volume, based on a conference organized by Manuel Rojas Gabriel at Cáceres in 2009 and rounded out by specially commissioned papers, brings together many of the pre-eminent military historians active today in order to examine a number of case studies that display the complexity and diversity of strategic realities, as well as exploring new models and methodological avenues in evaluating medieval strategies. The cases span the late Roman Empire through the High Middle Ages, from the Baltic and the British Isles to Iberia and the Crusader States.

Bachrach examines the strategy behind the building of a defensive network of fortifications in Gaul, from the perspective of a late Roman government that was not hard pressed by barbarian invasions across the Rhine, as often argued, but did have to take extensive measures against sea-borne raiders whose bases were beyond Roman reach. Petersen follows the long-term survival and effectiveness of late Roman and early Byzantine methods of client management on the northern frontiers that persisted well into the middle Byzantine period. Abels demonstrates how the lack of coherent, long-term strategic planning led to failure under Aethelred II, despite immense military, organizational and economic efforts, whereas Alfred the Great had succeeded over a century earlier under similar circumstances by ensuring that each of his efforts reinforced the other. Bennett argues that Normans were masterful in their consistent application of the ideological component, alongside effective use of diplomacy, family connections, and technology such as ships and fortifications in what amounted to a strategic vision that characterized western Christian expansion in the High Middle Ages. Similarly, García-Guijarro demonstrates that the ideological support provided by the reform papacy was essential to the political coherence of the Catalan counties, while at the same time strengthening the papacy. Rojas and García examine the wildly fluctuating strategic needs of the Christian Iberian kingdoms in the 12th century, which shifted from truce with Muslim powers and conflict with Christian neighbors and back again to expansion at the expense of al-Andalus several times over, depending on power politics rather than ideology; however, behind the shifting alliances, the Iberian kingdoms always worked to ensure further opportunities of expansion.

Given the difficulties of having Christus performed owing to its length, in 1907 Bantock published a shorter episode from it in vocal score, ‘Christ in the Wilderness’, and Part II of Omar Khayyám was premiered at the Cardiff Festival on 25 November. With Delius, he began plans for a Musical League. Wallace published his English translation of a song by Rudolf Baumbach, ‘Das begrabene Lied’. Newman gave the Peyton lecture for Elgar at the University of Birmingham, ‘New Forms in Music’, and published his book Hugo Wolf.

212 GRANVILLE BANTOCK TO ERNEST NEWMAN

Dear old Will

Your leader is splendid. Grateful thanks. It will do our scheme all the good in the world. Can you possibly join us at 5. PM in Fiedler's room at the University today to discuss further operations. Ronald & Mossel are coming over here from 3–4 PM to-day to smoke a cigar.4 I know your views about meeting people you are called upon to criticise, so I will not press you, but Ronald is very anxious to meet you, & as you are partly responsible for my conversion, it would afford me much pleasure, if you could spare time to join us in a smoke at 3. PM. We could return to B'ham in company, & Mossel, you & I can go straight to see Fiedler & Russell for the 5. PM appointment.

I am sending copies of your leader to Elgar & Wood. I have had a delightful letter from Wood. He asks to be put down as a guarantor for £30, but I hope we may be able to do without it. We ought to make it local & self-supporting.

Ever yours

Haroun al Rashid.

Bismillah.

213 GRANVILLE BANTOCK TO ERNEST NEWMAN

Dear Abu Bakr!

Just received enclosed wire from Dr. Russell. You had better attend meeting also. Have asked Russell to appoint time & let me know by p-c. first thing in morning. He will summon Fiedler & Wallis. I will wire you if he fixes morning. In any case could you run over here after breakfast (9. AM). I forgot the subject of the Lectures on Sunday. We must settle on this before the next School Committee, & can talk it over tomorrow if you can come.

There are no surviving letters from Bantock to Newman between 1914 and 1916 (none may have been written), and the only reference to Newman in Bantock's diaries in this period is of a discussion on 18 December 1916 with ‘Mr Forty’ over ‘Newman's article in today's Post attacking my Memorandum’. In the meantime Bantock had published the vocal scores of his ‘Choral Ballet with Orchestra’ The Great God Pan (1914) and the Choral Symphony A Pageant of Human Life (1914), along with the Scenes from Scottish Highlands for strings (1914) and the Celtic Poem for cello and piano (1916). Newman had published his book Wagner as Man and Artist (1914), and Wallace had also been busy, publishing The Musical Faculty (1914). In 1917 Bantock completed his Hebridean Symphony (premiered on 1 February in Manchester) and spent much time rescoring Lalla Rookh as ballet music. He also had visits from Marjorie Kennedy-Fraser (over his opera The Seal Woman) at Birmingham and (with her daughter Patuffa) in Harlech. Newman's writings included articles on Mussorgsky and Glinka in the New Witness. The significance of this first letter to Newman of 20 February is confirmed in Bantock's diary: ‘Wrote letter to Newman in morning, offering to bury the hatchet’.

269 GRANVILLE BANTOCK TO ERNEST NEWMAN

Dear Newman

It would be a relief to the present situation, a source of gratification to our friends, and again to the musical interests of the town if we could agree to sink all our personal differences, and allow bygones to be bygones. With this aim in view I appeal to the generous side of your nature, and express my willingness to bury the past, in order that we may work together and in a better understanding for the present and future of music in Birmingham. Time is the best healer of grievances, and we have both surely much to gain and little to lose by a voluntary sacrifice. The prospects are favorable, [sic] and much can be achieved by our mutual co-operation for the public service. I am convinced that our differences arose originally in a series of unfortunate misunderstandings.

IN THE WAKE OF THE HEYM EXPULSIONS, SV leaders were well aware of turmoil in their union. As they prepared for district elections in 1979 and 1980, their plans explicitly addressed the controversy. “The intensified ideological conflicts in recent years within the Writers Union with several members,” an August 1979 report observed, “show clearly that they are part of the great political conflict between socialism and imperialism, and there is no middle ground.” Accordingly, the report instructed that the goal of the elections was a familiar one: to strengthen “the societal function of the association, its impact and responsibility,” including via “the consistent awareness of all interests of association members in accordance with the associational statute and socialist legality.” Post-election evaluations confirmed that such themes had indeed been evident. Yet in addition to such statements, a 1980 report recorded another prominent discussion topic that was not mentioned in any plans: “The securing and defending of peace, the struggle against the realization of the NATO armaments plans, solidarity with the Soviet Union (in connection with the events in Afghanistan).” Given the tense climate, it is unsurprising that these meetings stressed writers’ responsibilities. But the unscripted focus on peace was a new development.

The catalyst was the announcement of NATO's “Double-Track” decision. Reacting to the USSR's installation of intermediate-range nuclear missiles in the mid-1970s, in December 1979 NATO pledged to deploy similar missiles in Western Europe if the Soviet ones were not removed within four years. In response, a heterogeneous global peace movement emerged in the early 1980s, dovetailing with anti-nuclear and disarmament protests from the 1970s. While some activists blamed both sides, many politicians, intellectuals, and ordinary citizens focused on the double-track decision as a reckless act that threatened, by intention or accident, to make Europe a nuclear battleground. As such, much scorn was directed at NATO and the United States for recklessly endangering the lives of millions. Soviet leaders were only too happy to encourage this outlook, and Eastern bloc governments began propaganda campaigns in the early 1980s to do just that, all while suppressing domestic peace activists who criticized the USSR.

The Writers Union played a crucial role in these efforts as authors brought a message of peace to domestic and foreign audiences.

Having completed his studies at the Royal Academy of Music in 1892 (the same year that his opera Caedmar was produced at the New Olympic Theatre in London and his drama Rameses II published by D. Stott), Bantock launched the New Quarterly Musical Review in 1893 under his editorship, to which he, Wallace and Newman contributed in later issues; he also toured the provinces between August and September as musical director of a travelling opera company and met Tchaikovsky after the composer had conducted his Fourth Symphony at a Philharmonic concert. Wallace, who had studied at the RAM in 1889 (the same year that Newman began his work as a clerk in the Bank of Liverpool), had already had several works performed, including his vocal scena Lord of Darkness in 1890 and his ‘Shelley Trio’ (a song setting from Prometheus Unbound, ‘My Soul is an Enchanted Boat’ for voice, piano and violin), the orchestral suite The Lady from the Sea, and his first symphonic poem, The Passing of Beatrice, in 1892. Wallace's Spanish Songs were premiered on 17 May 1893 and his orchestral prelude The Eumenides on 21 October at the Crystal Palace. Newman had already published a number of essays under his pseudonym in the secular journal National Reformer from 1889, and in 1893 contributed several articles to the Free Review, established by the freethinker John M. Robertson.

1 GRANVILLE BANTOCK TO ERNEST NEWMAN

Dear Sir

In answer to your communication of the 24th inst, just received, I write to inform you that your article will appear in No 2, which will come out on August 1st. Proofs will be sent to you early in July, which I will ask you to return to me as soon as corrected. I notice that your article is signed “Ernest Newman.” Do you wish to keep it, or write under your own name?

Yours very truly

Granville Bantock.

To.

Wm. Roberts Esq

Liverpool.

2 GRANVILLE BANTOCK TO WILLIAM WALLACE

1921 marked Sibelius's final visit to Britain. Having attended a reception on 10 February at Claridge's hotel and heard Sibelius rehearse and perform his Fifth Symphony on 12 and 13 February, plus Sibelius's performance of his Karelia Suite, Valse triste and Valse lyrique in the afternoon of 19 February, Bantock that evening took Sibelius back to Birmingham to oversee the composer's engagements there, with Sibelius subsequently travelling to Oxford on 23 February. Bantock's tribute to the composer, ‘Sibelius. The Man and Artist’, was published in The Times on 26 February, and on 6 March Bantock travelled to London to hear Sibelius conduct The Swan of Tuonela, along with the Andante festivo for string quartet. Bantock continued to promote Sibelius's music after Sibelius's return to Finland, conducting the Third Symphony, The Swan of Tuonela and En Saga at the Midland Institute on 21 March. Bantock's publications in 1921 included Songs of Arcady, ‘Summum Bonum’, ‘A Pearl, a Girl’ and ‘The Moon Maiden's Song’; he also completed The Golden Journey to Samarkand, Pagan Chants and Kubla Khan for brass band, plus song settings of Fiona Mcleod (‘The Shadowy Woodlands’, ‘Nocturne’, ‘At the Rising of the Moon’, ‘The Reed Player’), Shelley (‘As the Moon's Soft Splendour’, ‘Hymn of Pan’, ‘Ozymandias’, ‘A Widow Bird’) and Browning (‘By the Fireside’, ‘In a Year’, ‘Wanting is – What?’, ‘Life in a Love’) and rearranged The Pierrot of the Minute overture for strings, harp and harmonium for a ballet production. He conducted his Hebridean Symphony at the Queen's Hall on 30 April and Sappho and Browning orchestral songs in Bournemouth in November; Tovey (appointed by Bantock as an External Examiner at Birmingham University) conducted the Sappho Prelude and songs with orchestra on 5 March, and The Vanity of Vanities was performed by the Wolverhampton Music Society on 10 October. As well as adjudicating at musical festivals in Cleethorpes and Ilkley, Bantock met the illustrator Eduard Dulac on 3 December.

294 GRANVILLE BANTOCK TO ERNEST NEWMAN

Dear Will

I am very sorry to hear from your letter of yesterday that your health is causing you such anxiety, & quite understand your desire to get away for a change of air & scene.