Back-post from
15 June 2013
London
“The communication / of the dead is tongued with fire beyond / the
language of the living.”
T.S. Eliot, “Little Gidding”
The words that mark
his memorial in Westminster Abbey.
It’s almost impossible to let go of my obsessive need to
accomplish – to not waste a minute of time, to record every instance. This
morning, I tried to shut it off. I let myself sleep until 930, mosey down to
the common room for coffee and toast and relax a little.
My primary goal of the morning is a visit to Westminster
Abbey, another site I disregarded on my original London excursion. Another day,
another cathedral – this is London after all.
Rick Steves correctly advised me to chose the cash line
(over the credit line) to get in the doors of this imposing building, but both
lines moved surprisingly quick for a Saturday morning, just a couple years
after the most recent Royal Wedding was held in this very space. (The first
was in 1100!)
Entering the cathedral overwhelms visitors, as I myself do
what each person has before me – touch my chest and let my jaw fall open. It is stunning, and its place in British
history cannot be overstated. For almost 800 years, this has been the site of
nation-changing weddings, funerals and mention coronations.
I’m not in the building for three minutes, barely getting my
orientation, when I notice a wall plaque for Alfred Russel Wallace, a 19th
century British explorer, geographer, anthropologist and biologist. Although a
somewhat overlooked scientist, Wallace not only explored and described the
flora and fauna of unknown regions of the world in the 1880’s, he also
developed a theory of evolution independent of his contemporary Charles Darwin.
Some suggest that Darwin was pushed to publish his On the Origin of Species
primarily to beat Wallace to the punch. Although Wallace is buried in Dorset,
as he wished, the plaque was placed in Westminster two years after his death,
in 1915.
I’m still thinking about poor Wallace and the short-end he
got in British history when I find myself standing on the stone marked for
Darwin himself. I immediately wonder if Wallace’s scientist bros purposefully
had his plaque added just a few feet in
front of Darwin’s grave so he could be first at something. My hands shake and clench at the desire to break
the rules and take a picture, but I can control myself. I’m honored and awed to
be standing here and wish desperately that I could talk to the grumpy old Darwin
and tell him what he means to me. I’m secretly glad that I skipped this stop
when I was 19, because there’s no way it would have felt this special.
Nearby the rests stone of Charles Lyell, another scientist and
contemporary of Darwin (a friend and mentor, really). Among kings and queens, I also find a Isaac Newton, a brilliant dedication to William Shakespeare (who is buried in
Stratford-Upon-Avon) and a memorial to T.S. Eliot, among other influential
poets and writers. The list of rockstars who are buried or memorialized here
would take up a whole post, but go ahead and check Wikipedia.
Westminster Abbey is a place that can make you feel both
tiny and inspired at the same time. To mingle with history in this
close proximity really is to communicate with the dead.
