Further Thoughts on Síomón Solomon's 'The Atonement of Lesley Ann'

Artwork for The Atonement of Lesley Ann (2020) 

reworked by Stephen Alexander (2021)

 

I say unto you, that likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, 

more than over ninety and nine just persons, which need no repentance. - Luke 15:7

 

I. 

 

Síomón Solomon's The Atonement of Lesley Ann (2020) - a theatrical ghost-cum-love story (based on actual events) - continues to haunt my imagination; particularly the use of the religious term atonment in its title ...

 

One wonders what Solomon has in mind by his use of this concept and why, for example, he didn't simply call his play the killing of Lesley Ann? 

 

For in what way is Lesley Ann atoned? And for what does she need to be atoned? Is Solomon suggesting that she is in some manner complicit in her own abduction and murder (that no one is innocent after all)? 

 

That would certainly be a provocative and unsettling suggestion. But then the whole idea of atonement via a sacrificial offering - be it Christ on the Cross or a child on the Moors - is deeply disturbing, is it not? 

 

Because we know who it is who is washed clean by the spilt blood and forgiven their sins - who it is taking a step on the path towards redemption and, ultimately, not just fellowship but reunification with God [1] - and it isn't the victim; it is, rather, the one who wields the knife ... 

 

 

II. 

 

In other words, it's Ian Brady and Myra Hindley who, via a terrible act of faith, are atoned by the sacrifice of poor Lesley Ann [2].    

 

Again, it's quite shocking to be reminded that the road to salvation can begin in an act of violence and even the practice of evil. But then, of course, the inventor of this whole mad system is a cruel and vengeful God who not only demands sacrifice be made unto him, but is prepared to see even his own son scourged and crucified. 

 

Ultimately, Solomon isn't attempting to exonerate Brady and Hindley, nor excuse their appalling crimes. By incorporating a transcript of the recording made of ten-year-old Downey begging for her young life into the play he reminds us of the facts of the case in all their horror. 

 

What he is doing, rather, is exploring the scandalous logic of Christian morality which offers the possibility of redemption to even the most depraved of individuals.

 

 

Notes

 

[1] Atonement means unity or reconciliation between man and God; a coming back into ontotheological wholness (literally at-one-ment). We might note also that the word atonement is often the English translation given for the Hebrew term kaphar [כָּפַר], which means to cover - thus atonement might also be defined as the covering over of sin, or, indeed, the covering up of crime; a form of concealment with which God himself is complicit.     

[2] Unless they have committed what is known within theological circles as the eternal or unpardonable sin and can thus never make amends or receive forgiveness. However, that isn't something - as far as I remember - indicated in Solomon's play.  

 

 

To read the first in what is now a trilogy of posts on Síomón Solomon's The Atonement of Lesley Ann (2020) - on things that go bump in the theatrical night - click here. 

 

And to read the second post in the series, in which I offer some additional thoughts on the play, click here. 

 

 

D. H. Lawrence and the Idea of Sacrifice

In a short series of related poems Lawrence explored the idea of sacrifice. 

Initially, he seems quite keen: the sacrifice of an animal in what he thinks of as the splendid pagan manner is an act of vital necessity to which he enthusiastically lends his support:

"... blood of the lower life must be shed

for the feeding and strengthening of the handsomer, fuller life."

This is an active practice of sacrifice that is about affirming mortal existence and giving thanks to the gods; it is not about atoning for sin (a concept Lawrence explicitly repudiates), or seeking to appease a God who forever sits in judgement upon us:

"There is no such thing as sin.

There is only life and anti-life.

And sacrifice is the law of life which enacts

that little lives must be eaten up into the dance and splendour

of bigger lives, with due reverence and acknowledgement."

But, unfortunately, this old, pre-Christian idea of sacrifice as life affirmation has given way to one that invariably takes place within the shadow of the Cross and is fatally tied to disastrous notions of self-sacrifice, joy in suffering, and martyrdom. Lawrence wants nothing to do with these things. Self-sacrifice, he writes, is an ethically objectionable and mistaken idea - particularly when it involves the slaying of what is best in us:

"It cannot be anything but wrong to sacrifice

good, healthy, natural feelings, instincts, passions or desires ..."

In other words, to sacrifice what Nietzsche would term our innocence is the vilest cowardice:

"But what we may sacrifice, if we call it sacrifice, from the self,

are all the obstructions to life, self-importance, self-conceit, egoistic self-will ..."

Lawrence develops this theme in a later verse:

"Oh slay, not the best bright proud life that is in you, that can be happy,

but the craven, the cowardly, the creeping you, that can only be unhappy ..."

"Oh sacrifice, not that which is noble and generous and spontaneous in humanity

but that which is mean and base and squalid and degenerate ..."

If we learn how to shed those things which poison the blood - rather than our blood itself - then we might perhaps find a way to live beyond good and evil and free from bad conscience. And that would make a pleasant (and profound) change would it not ...

Notes

See the following four poems by D. H. Lawrence: 'Self-Sacrifice', 'Shedding of blood', 'The old idea of sacrifice' and 'Self-sacrifice'. They can be found in The Poems, ed. Christopher Pollnitz, (Cambridge University Press, 2013), Vol. I, pp. 585-87. The lines quoted are taken from these verses.