Growth of Taste

Not half so well known as the Very Reverend William Ralph Inge, "gloomy" Dean of St. Paul's, is the equally Reverend William Foxley Norris, onetime Dean of York, now Dean of Westminster. Twice in the past month Dean Norris, whose hobby is art and who has a nice talent in painting, emerged from the shadow of the Empire's shrine into the spotlight of world news. When a petition was started to give the late great John Galsworthy an Abbey burial Dean Norris was "forced regretfully to decline." Unofficial reason given was lack of space. Last week came to light a speech by Dr. Norris before the Architectural Association in which the artist-dean advocated clearing most of the present memorials out of the Abbey and storing them somewhere to make room for the newly or truly, great. Excerpts:

"There are great masses of sculpture occupying most valuable space exactly where that space is needed. . . . There really is not room to walk in procession.

"England is the most sentimental nation on earth . . . 50 to 100 years should be sufficient commemoration by a statue for numbers of men so honored. ... It is a very striking thing that some of the most eminent men, men without whose names English history could not be written, are commemorated in the Abbey ... by a simple inscription on the wall or floor. . . .

"There are monstrosities in the Abbey, memorials to quite insignificant people and events, and some quite vulgar things, but remember that we have in the Abbey what I believe is unique--a more or less complete category showing the gradual growth of taste for the last 400 years. . . . Some of these things may be very ugly, but they were the best that could be done by the representative men of their time. . . . My main point is that they should be kept together somewhere."

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