Steve Schwartz writes of Vaughan Williams:

>I have no evidence for what I'm about to say, but I do get the feeling
>that he had much in common with Hardy's view of man and the universe,
>although not as unrelentingly "down" as Hardy. Hardy was a major
>artistic resource (as was Whitman) throughout his life. Neither one was
>squarely within the Anglican Christian tradition.

True indeed: and the Hardy influence became stronger at the very end of
his life, with the 9th Symphony, the oppressive "down" feeling of which is
in no small part (I guess) due to its having drawn programmatic inspiration
from "Tess of the Durbervilles".

I've always been disturbed and shaken by the fact that VW's last major
utterance was this gloom-laden, pessimistic, unquiet 9th, so very different
from the Bunyanesque visionary of the 5th, or even the Prospero-calm of the
6th (no nuclear wastes there for me, just a profound, deeply consoling
sleep!)

In many ways VW's 9th is closer in spirit to those equally unquiet last
symphonies of Nielsen and Shostakovich.  Nihilism beckons.  Certainly the
work does seem to suggest that VW's pugnacious agnosticism was cracking at
the edges, and perhaps the firebrand young atheist was gaining sway once
again!

Christopher Webber,  Blackheath, London,  UK.
http://www.nashwan.demon.co.uk/zarzuela.htm
"ZARZUELA!"