Sir John Betjeman - St Pancras Station, London, UK
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N 51° 31.911 W 000° 07.630
30U E 699253 N 5712883
Sir John Betjeman was responsible for saving both the St Pancras chambers and the station from demolition in the 1960s.
Waymark Code: WM639K
Location: London, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 03/25/2009
Views: 19
In tribute to the famous poet and railway lover an 8 1/2ft sculpture by Martin Jennings has been designed to stand at platform level at St Pancrass International Station to celebrate the man and his poetry.
The sculpture features the poet looking up in awe at the splendour of the Barlow shed whilst catching hold of his hat.
Hand clutched to his hat, coat-tails caught by a gust of wind, John Betjeman gazes up at the magnificent arch of St Pancras station's freshly restored train shed.
Betjeman was one of the most energetic figures who, in the 1960s, fought the destruction of St Pancras - mercifully unthinkable today, now that public taste has softened towards George Gilbert Scott's marvellously elaborate neo-Gothic station buildings and old Midland Grand Hotel. "He didn't save it singlehandedly, but it certainly wouldn't have happened without him," said Andrew Motion, one of Betjeman's successors as poet laureate.
"Louis MacNeice once called Betjeman a triumphant misfit. But the things he was regarded as eccentric for admiring during his lifetime are the things that we have learned to hold dear," he added. "What he did as a saviour of 19th-century architecture is extraordinary."
Jennings said of his sculpture: "All my choices were led by the station. What Betjeman is doing in the statue is what we all do - we look up, with an intake of breath. I have shown him as if he has walked in for the first time since the station was saved." Jennings worked from photographs and film footage of Betjeman, and was "nudged" in the right direction by Betjeman's family, in particular Lycett Green. She said: "He has captured his sense of wonder on first walking into a great man-made space such as a cathedral ... He always looked up at the roof - and in St Pancras more than anywhere. It is, after all, the greatest station roof on earth, isn't it?"
Around the base of the statue are carved lines from Betjeman poems, chosen by Jennings, including: "Here where the cliffs alone prevail. I stand exultant, neutral, free,/ And from the cushion of the gale. Behold a huge consoling sea."
Website for John Betjemin:-
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Betjeman
Website for Martin Jennins, Sculptor:
www.martinjennings.com/
Relevant Web Site: Not listed
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