MANCHESTER’S SOUL.

Waikato Times, Volume 106, Issue 17837, 9 October 1929, Page 15

MANCHESTER’S SOUL.

“There is a story told about a certain high dignitary of Manchester who was showing some distinguished visitor round the Art Gallery. Things were not going too well, until they came to tho room with the big Lord/ Leighton canvas. The C.H.D. strode up to it with refreshed conviction, saying: ‘Now, 'ere, my lord, we ’ave something that will appeal to you. The captive Andromaitch and (turning to the official in attendance), ‘correct me if I’m wrong, Mr , all ’and-painted, all ’and-painted!’” The Senstltlve City. This delightful anecdote from “The Soul of Manchester,” edited by W. H. Brindley, might seem to fortify a libellous argument that the northern city has no soul, but is the apotheosis of commercialism and materialism. But, we need not be assured, this is not so; Manchester is sensitive about her inartistic reputation, and has' long striven to give art, music, and literature a place in the vast complexities of her everyday life. True, her statue*, displease and her Cenotaph “emerges as a vulgarised adaptation of London’s unique and single-minded monument,” but her City Art Gallery and her Whitworth Art Gallery, with its Clough collection of engravings, do much to compensate for them. The Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society sprang into being in 1781, and the birth in her midst four years later of Thomas De Quincey is accounted her most illustrious contribution to English literature. It was while waiting in a Manchester tavern for a train

Its Services to Literature, Music and the Drama .

that De Quincey wrote his “Vision of Sudden Death.” Mrs Gaskell, the wife of a leading Mancunian minister, wrote nearly all her books in the city, painting pictures of its iife and character, and the combination of Mr C. P. Scott and the late Mr C. E. Montague which made the Manchester “Guardian” what it is, was one of the greatest in newspaper history. Halle raid Harty. It is, however, i[\ music and drama that Manchester has dc ' her greate-6 sorvice. Sjr Edward Elgar reierred to her as “the centre of musical England.” In 1858 the Halle concerts were inaugurated by Charles Halle, a French refugee, who also founded the Manchester College of Music. Under the rule of Hans Richter, these concerts became stamped with the classical symphonic mark; on the outbreak of War, deprived of their German support, their *ate hung in the balance, but they were saved by Sir Thomas Beecham. At the present time, under the direction of Sir Hamilton Harty, they make a wide public appeal. Manchester’s theatrical history goes back one hundred and fifty years. Kemble appeared there in 1777; Macready started there; Irving and Forbes-Robertson played there before facing London audi- , ences. In 1908 Miss Horniman founded her famous repertory company, which in eight years staged two hundred and three plays, of which one hundred and eleven were new to the stage, discovered 6iich authors as Stanley Houghton, Harold Brighouse, and Allan Monkhouse, and trained among others Basil Dean and Lewis Casson.