One for Sorrow ...

One for Sorrow (Or The Murder of Murgatroyd) 

Stephen Alexander (2023)

 

 

I. 

 

It's striking how the death of an individual creature can have far greater emotional resonance than news of an entire species dying out. 

 

Thus it is that when I came across the body of a dead magpie this morning it filled me with genuine sorrow, whilst discovering that the Chinese paddlefish was declared extinct in 2022 left me almost entirely indifferent. 

 

That's not because I value our feathered friends more than our aquatic ones, it's just due to the fact that death only becomes real (conceivable) when reduced in scale and given a face, as it were. 

 

This applies to people as well as animals; reports of atrocities involving multiple fatalities don't move as much as the image of a single dead child (a fact often exploited by those looking to influence or emotionally manipulate public opinion).   

 

 

II.

 

Magpies, of course, belong to the crow family - widely considered to be the most intelligent of birds - and are famous for their beautiful black-and-white colouration and (in the European imagination) the fact that they love to steal shiny objects, such as wedding rings and other valuables.      

 

They are also thought to have an ominous aspect; to be a portent of good or bad fortune. According to English folklore, one is for sorrow, two for mirth; three for a death and four for a birth. The popular nursery rhyme builds upon this ornithomantic idea, albeit with different lyrics:

 

One for sorrow, 

Two for joy, 

Three for a girl, 

Four for a boy, 

Five for silver, 

Six for gold, 

Seven for a secret never to be told. [1]

 

There are many variants of this, but the key fact remains - as any fisherman will tell you - that a solitary magpie is never a good sign ...

 

In Piero della Francesca's painting of the Nativity scene, for example, a lonely magpie can be spotted on the roof of a ruined stone stable presaging the pain and sorrow that lies ahead (aguably for all mankind, not just Mary and her son).     

  

 

Piero della Francesca The Nativity (1470-75)

Oil on wood (124 x 123 cm)
National Gallery (NG908) [2]

 

 

Notes

 

[1] Like many of my generation, I know this version of the rhyme thanks to the children's TV show Magpie, (1968-80). Sadly, the popularity of this version - performed by The Spencer Davis Group as the programme's theme song [click here] - displaced many regional variations that had previously existed.

 

[2] Click here for more information on the work and its recent restoration. Keen-eyed birdspotters will doubtless also note the goldfinch - a symbol of redemption in devotional art - sitting in a bush on the left of the picture.

 

 

On Dead Sparrows and the Great Leap Forward

Poor Dead Sparrow 

Stephen Alexander (2017)

I pretty much like all birds (with obvious exceptions, such as the vulture, ostrich and flamingo). But, mostly, I like the little birds that live in my garden; robins, blue tits and sparrows. The latter in particular hold a special place in my affection and the fact their numbers have fallen in England so dramatically over the last forty years is a cause of great sadness. I miss their company.  

Not only do I not trust people who fail to find sparrows anything other than delightful, but I despise those who would wish them harm; be it Queen Elizabeth I or Chairman Mao. The former, for example, passed a law in 1556 that branded sparrows as vermin and placed a small bounty on their tiny heads. Whilst for the latter, sparrows were one of the four main pests in the People's Republic of China (the other three being rats, flies, and mosquitoes) and, in 1958, Mao launched a public campaign of extermination as part of the so-called Great Leap Forward.

All citizens, including solders and schoolchildren, were instructed to loudly bang pots and pans and to shout and scream at the birds, thus preventing them from resting in the trees or on rooftops. As a result, the exhausted and terrified sparrows literally fell dead from the sky. Nest were also destroyed, eggs smashed and chicks killed.

Starting in the countryside, the campaign eventually moved to the towns and cities, including Peking, where staff at foreign embassies watched on in horrified amazement. The personnel of the Polish Embassy - to their great credit - refused to allow any bird abuse on their premises, but Chinese citizens surrounded the building and began two days of constant drumming. As a result, even the sparrows that had sought refuge in the embassy were eventually killed.

By 1960, however, this mad avian genocide had resulted in a plague of crop-destroying insects of biblical proportions. With rice yields falling and faced with an ecological catastrophe, Mao was obliged to redirect the campaign away from bourgeois sparrows - all birds were regarded as animals of capitalism by the communist regime - and towards bedbugs.

Unfortunately, it was too late and a famine followed that was so severe in nature, that tens of millions of Chinese starved to death. And whilst that's not usually something I'd be flippant about, in this case one can't help feeling that it serves 'em fucking right.  

On the Art of Necro-Ornithology

Poor Dead Sparrow 

(on plastic orange background) 
Stephen Alexander (2017) 

As regular readers will know, I have had a persistent love for birds from early childhood; from cheeky house sparrows to menacing black crows. I love to watch them and I love to listen to them. 

I agree entirely with Luce Irigaray: Birds are our friends. They accompany us throughout our life, making happy and bringing comfort in times of crisis. Angels, one might suggest, not only have mighty wings, they also have sharp beaks.   

People who don't like birds, or would do them harm, obviously have something wrong with them. But, I have no objections to those individuals who find the dead bodies of birds an opportunity for art and lovingly transform feathered corpses into aesthetic objects of morbid curiosity.

Because whilst for birds, as for flowers, beasts and man, the supreme triumph is to be most vividly, most perfectly alive, the second best thing is to leave behind a beautiful corpse, or a fascinating image. 

Knowing nothing about taxidermy, however, and unable to draw for toffee, the best I can do is try to take an interesting snap with my iphone when encountering a poor dead sparrow lying on the front garden path (before gently wrapping the little body in kitchen paper and placing it in the bin). 

Note: readers interested in birds might like to see the earlier posts related to this one: Feathered Friends, On the Whistling of Birds at Midnight, and Necro-Ornithology (Study of a Dead Baby Bird).

Necro-Ornithology (Study of a Dead Baby Bird)

Dead Baby Bird 
(on chrome yellow background with daisy) 
Stephen Alexander 2017

You know what it is to die alone,
Baby bird!

To have fallen from the nest, unfledged,
Dragon-faced and flipper-winged.

Once your tiny beak-mouth chirruped
With bold reptile defiance, indomitable.

Now maggots rend your unfeathered flesh.