Feast of Henry Fothergill Chorley (December 15)

Above:  Tower of London, 1890

Image Source = Library of Congress

Reproduction Number = LC-DIG-ppmsc-08569

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HENRY FOTHERGILL CHORLEY (DECEMBER 15, 1808-FEBRUARY 16, 1872)

English Novelist, Playwright, and Literary and Music Critic

Henry Fothergill Chorley found his vocation and succeeded in it.

Chorley came from a Quaker family of Lancashire, England.  His father was a lock manufacturer who died four years after going  bankrupt.  An uncle, one Dr. Retter of Liverpool, gave young Chorley an office job.  That paid pills, but our saint had musical and literary interests, so some cousins encouraged him to become a writer.

He did so.  In 1830 Chorley started writing for The Athenaeum, a literary magazine which existed from 1828 to 1921.  Three years later he joined the editorial staff.  Eventually our saint wrote music criticism and literary reviews.  He left The Athenaeum in 1868 and became a music critic for The Times of London.  Chorley favored the music of Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847) and Louis Spohr (1784-1859) yet not that of Frederic Chopin (1810-1849), Robert Schumann (1810-1856), and Richard Wagner (1813-1883).  On the literary side, our saint, a friend of Charles Dickens (1812-1870), wrote novels, dramas, opera librettos, and other works.  His books included the following:

1. Music and Manners in France and Germany (1841);
2. Pomfret (1845);
3. Modern German Music (1854);
4. Roccabella (1859);
5. The Prodigy (1866); and
6. The National Music of the World (published posthumously, 1880).

Chorley also wrote hymns.  Among them was “God the All-Terrible!” (1842), which has become part of “God the Omnipotent,” a composite text.

Chorley died at London on February 16, 1872.

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

JULY 22, 2015 COMMON ERA

THE FEAST OF SAINT MARY MAGDALENE, EQUAL TO THE APOSTLES

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O God, you have endowed us with memory, reason, and skill.

We thank you for the faithful legacy of [Henry Fothergill Chorley and all others]

who have dedicated their lives to you and to the intellectual pursuits.

May we, like them, respect your gift of intelligence fully and to your glory.

In the Name of God:  Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  Amen.

Deuteronomy 6:4-9

Psalm 103

Philippians 4:8-9

Mark 12:28-34

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

MARCH 6, 2013 COMMON ERA

THE FEAST OF SAINT CHRODEGANG OF METZ, ROMAN CATHOLIC BISHOP

THE FEAST OF EDMUND KING, ANGLICAN BISHOP OF LINCOLN

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