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Author and Novelist Glynn Young

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coronation

Dancing King Stories: The Coronation at Westminster Abbey

May 7, 2018 By Glynn Young Leave a Comment

Westminster Abbey

In the 1040s, King Edward of England (later St. Edward the Confessor) began to enlarge the church of a small Benedictine monastery near his palace. It was referred to as the “west minster,” to distinguish it from the “east minister,” aka St. Paul’s Cathedral. The large stone church was dedicated to St. Peter.

In 1066, William I invaded and conquered England. On Christmas Day, he was crowned in Edward’s church. Every English and British monarch since 1066 has been crowned in Edward’s church. The complex has grown over the tears, especially during the 13thto 16thcenturies. Today, Westminster Abbey is one of the most popular sites in Britain, visited by millions of tourists annually and a center of major worship activities.

It’s also a rather large cemetery. Some 3,300 people are buried here, including Queen Elizabeth I and her sister Queen Mary, King Edward (he was moved a century or so after his death), Henry V, Sir Isaac Newton, Geoffrey Chaucer, and Charles Dickens (he didn’t want to be buried in the Abbey, but no one paid attention to his wishes). Poet’s Corner is a veritable who’s who of British literary history, containing both graves and plaques (including a fairly recent one for C.S. Lewis).

The complex is soaked in British history, literature, science, government, and philosophy. The soaring Gothic architecture is overwhelming. The beauty of the Henry VII Lady Chapel is simply astounding. And the complex keeps growing, with a new Abbey museum, the Queen’s Jubilee Galleries, opening on June 11 this year.

Westminster Abbey interior
The interior of Westminster Abbey

A coronation of a monarch is a massive undertaking. The interior of the Abbey has to be remodeled to accommodate viewing stands, seating, platforms, and a number of other structures. Planning can go on for a year or more. The ceremony is plotted out to the smallest detail.

The last coronation in the Abbey was Queen Elizabeth II’s in 1953; consider that there had been three in the 36 years after Queen Victoria’s death in 1901.

In addition to quite a few YouTube videos (like this one), the primary resource for the coronation scene in Dancing King was Crown, Orb & Sceptre: The True Story of English Coronations by David Hilliam. It’s actually a fun read, full of odd things that have happened over the years and unusual events, like Richard III being crowned in his bare feet. Hilliam describes the processions to the Abbey and the ceremonies themselves.

Dancing KingThe coronation scene in Dancing King follows Hilliam’s description of Queen Elizabeth’s ceremony very closely, with a few major exceptions. The Archbishop of Canterbury, as the lead official in the Church of England, usually crowns the monarch. A different official does it in the novel, largely because of the ongoing conflict between Michael Kent-Hughes and the Archbishop of Canterbury, a major narrative line in the novel that is not resolved by the end of the book. Michael also makes changes in how monarchs-to-be-crowned are usually dressed and adds a segment to the ceremony at the end.

It is a moving ceremony. The coronation follows the near destruction of the royal family in A Light Shining, the second novel in the Dancing Priest series. There almost wasn’t a coronation, or anyone left to crown. Like the real coronation event, that of Michael Kent-Hughes is meant to signify the continuance of family, faith, and tradition, even in the face of constant societal and cultural change, and, in the Dancing King story, near-annihilation.

One element of the coronation that Michael does not change is the singing of “Zadok the Priest” by George Frederic Handel, which has become the traditional coronation anthem.

Dancing King Stories: The Tower of London

April 30, 2018 By Glynn Young Leave a Comment

Tower of London

For almost a millennium, the Tower of London has stood watch over the city, a symbol of William the Conqueror who built it. Few buildings evoke such a mixture of emotions, The Tower has served as royal residence, prison, armory, mint, torture chamber, and even a menagerie of exotic animals presented to British monarchs.

In 2014, to mark the 100thanniversary of the start of World War I, the Tower was host to one of the most remarkable art installations ever – the planting of ceramic poppies in the moat, one for each casualty of the warm until almost 900,000 had been placed by that November.

Tower of London poppies
The ceramic poppies int he Tower of London moat in 2014.

From the time of William I to Charles II in 1660, the Tower served another purpose – the start of the coronation procession for each British monarch. Charles II was the last; his brother James II, something of a closet Catholic, was supposedly crowned privately in a Catholic ceremony and then proceeded from Whitehall Palace to Westminster Abbey for the “protestant coronation.” No monarch after that did the Tower to Westminster procession.

In my novel Dancing King, Michael and Sarah Kent-Hughes return to the earlier tradition, with a procession starting from the Tower and ending at Westminster Abbey. It’s a considerably longer route than what the real British monarchs do today, riding from Buckingham Palace to the Abbey.

Right as the procession begins, Sarah asks about how the street names will change. And they do – Tower Hill, Great Tower Street, Eastcheap, Cannon Street, St. Paul’s Churchyard, Ludgate Hill, Fleet Street, and the Strand are essentially the same thoroughfare. The change in names is a kind of record of a lot of London history.

Michael reminds Sarah of what they’re returning to the earlier tradition of leaving from the Tower, and he cites two reasons.

First, the longer route affords many more people to see the king and queen in the procession. The route stretches from the Tower, through the City of London (the business district), past St. Paul’s Cathedral and then Fleet Street, past the Royal Courts of Justice, then the Strand, just skirting London’s theatre district. It continues on the Strand past Charing Cross Station to Trafalgar Square, down Whitehall to the Parliament building, and then a short turn to Westminster Abbey.

Dancing KingMany a time have my wife and I ridden the iconic double-decker bus along that route.

Second, Michael explains that proceeding through the business district, the theatre district, and the center of legal practice shows that the Crown recognizes the importance of these industries and professions – business, banking, law, and the theatre – to British national life. The coronation of a new king isn’t only about a new monarch; it’s a celebration of what matters and what’s important to the British nation. It’s about history and tradition, yes, but it’s also about the future.

It’s never explicitly stated, but Michael Kent-Hughes is beginning the process of becoming the “People’s King.”

Top photograph: The Tower of London as seen from the Thames River, with the White Tower in the center. Photo courtesy of Wikimedia.

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Meet the Man

An award-winning speechwriter and communications professional, Glynn Young is the author of three novels and the non-fiction book Poetry at Work.

 

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