Canterbury Cathedral

In 1162, Henry II, King of England, nominated his closest friend, Thomas Becket, to be Archbishop of Canterbury.  The Pope duly approved the appointment. 

From that point on, everything went downhill for Henry -- I'm reminded of Trump's appointment of Jeff Sessions as attorney general.  Becket's newly-acquired loyalty to his God proved superior to his long-standing friendship with his King.  Becket argued repeatedly for the rights of the Church as opposed to those of the Monarchy.  In a fit of rage, Henry uttered the fateful words -- "Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?"  Four knights did just that, on December 29, 1170, attacking Becket and dashing his brains out in his own cathedral. 

The story is familiar to most of us from the Jean Anouilh play, made into the 1964 movie starring Richard Burton and Peter O'Toole.  It has special meaning to me, because in 1961, I wrote my junior year history thesis -- some thirty pages with voluminous footnotes -- on a topic relating to the dispute between the King and the Archbishop.

I visited Canterbury Cathedral for the first time when I was 21, just three months after completing my thesis.  The Cathedral was sacred ground to me, like walking through an incarnation of my own research and writing.  There, I told myself, was the spot where Becket was stricken down by four swords.  And over there was the place where King Henry voluntarily submitted to a lashing by four monks, doing penance for his part in the death.

I visited the second time when I was 31, while hitchhiking in England with my friend Jim.  I guess I was less awed that time, especially because I was with another person, and we had similar senses of humor.  We hadn't yet had breakfast.  We sat down on the grass in the middle of a cloister, poured dry cereal and milk into our aluminum mess kits, and dined.  We were unaware that The King's School (founded 597 A.D.) was located on the cathedral premises until a line of smartly-uniformed students came pouring out one of the doors onto the cloister, did a double-take, and stared at us with delight and amazement.  A priest came rushing up and told us that this simply wouldn't do, dear boys, and hustled us and our unfinished breakfasts off the premises.

I hope to visit the cathedral for the third time next week, the day before I climb aboard a train headed for St. Ives, Cornwall, where I'll join my fellow hikers.  I suspect my visit will be neither so filled with awe as in my first visit, nor so oblivious to proper standards of behavior as in my second.

In writing my junior thesis, and in both my earlier visits to the cathedral, I approached Canterbury with the attitude that I was doing homage to the site of a martyrdom.  Thomas Becket was canonized just two years after his death, and it was while they were making a pilgrimage to honor St. Thomas Becket that Chaucer had his fictional pilgrims tell their "Canterbury Tales" a couple of centuries later.  Aside perhaps from those with strong anti-clerical leanings, most people view Becket as the hero of the tragedy -- not only as a religious hero but as a symbol of resistance to the absolute rule of kings.

An exception might be the writer André Aciman.  As a 14-year-old boy, he first viewed the Oscar-winning movie in 1965, the year his family was to be driven from Alexandria. He recalls the movie's being the sensation of the European community in Alexandria.  He himself was obsessed by it, saw it every night for a week, and has continued seeing it whenever possible ever since.  He claims to know by heart much of the film's dialogue.

And to him as a boy, the hero -- or at least the man with whom he could identify -- was not Becket, but Henry II.

The King, one senses, has lost everything he cared for and is now condemned to wander the icy, wintry palace rooms, learning, as he says, "to be alone again."
…
I, too, like King Henry II … was learning how to be alone.  In this, I had found a sister soul.  My sympathies were always with the lonely King, never with Becket, or the honor of God.

--A. Aciman, False Papers, "Becket's Winter"

Aciman certainly gives me insights to consider, and perhaps new empathy for the powerful -- if lonely and bereft -- King Henry.
But I suspect that, as I view Canterbury Cathedral next week, my hero will still be Burton's St. Thomas Becket, not O'Toole's King Henry II.