Stone Carving and Letter Cutting

With all the stone available at Portland, Dorset, and in Zagori, Epirus (first picture above), it seems a pity not to try one's hand at stone carving, sculpture or letter cutting. It's something I've always wanted to do. Some years ago I even went so far as to buy a set of specialist stone-sculptor's chisels and hammers. They remain in their box. I soon realised that I needed a course and some expert tuition.

I have visited Portland twice in recent weeks, most recently to see the Portland Sculpture and Quarry Trust, at Tout Quarry. I was taken round the quarry by Hannah Sofaer. It was fascinating, and my interest and artistic ambitions are growing.

Having long admired the stone sculptures or environmental installations/assemblages of Andy Goldsworthy (his sheepfolds in particular), Richard Long, Tony Cragg and Ian Hamilton Finlay (Little Sparta), not to mention Henry Moore, I have often dreamt of creating a small sculpture park in the Zagori, near the Vikos Gorge. I am drawn to works in stone, whether carved, assembled, built, installed or arranged. There's a work by Anthony Gormley in Tout Quarry ("Still Falling"). I am equally drawn to megalithic menhir, dolmens and runic stones.

Since I am unlikely to achieve any of these dreams, I might settle on learning how to cut a few words (a memento mori or some runes?) into a slab of Portland stone. A haiku might be too long.

Perhaps a quote from Jack Kerouac?

"When rock becomes air
I will be there".

Or from Charles Simic's "The Stone":

"I am happy to be a stone".

Or a line from Shelley's Ozymandias:

"Nothing beside remains".

I'd like to engrave two pantheistic thoughts from Wordsworth:

"To every natural form
I gave a moral life".
(The Prelude, Book III)

and

"The still, sad music of humanity"
(Tintern Abbey).


It would be appropriate to link a block of Portland stone with St. Paul's Cathedral (Sir Christopher Wren made much use of Portland stone).

Perhaps the Latin word, "RESURGAM" (I Shall Arise, which was carved on the pediment above the door of the rebuilt cathedral's south transept?

Or a line by John Donne, Dean of St. Paul's?

"Death be not proud" or "I fear no more".

There are plenty of other well-known short Latin sayings, appropriate for the Portland environment:

LECTOR, SI MONUMENTUM REQUIRIS, CIRCUMSPICE

or "Respice post te! Hominem te memento!"

("Look behind you! Remember that you are but a man!" Tertullian, Apologeticus).

or

"Ubi sunt qui ante nos fuerunt?"

(Where are those who were before us?)

or

"Et in Arcadia ego"


I might also try some lines from Anglo-Saxon poems like The Ruin, or The Wanderer:

Wrætlic is þes wealstan - wyrde gebræcon,
burgstede burston; brosnað enta geweorc.

(Wondrously wrought its wall of stone,
Shattered by Fate! The city buildings fell apart,
The work of giants crumbles! -The Ruin).

or some other "Ubi Sunt" lines like

Hwær cwom mearg? Hwær cwom mago?

(Where is the horse gone? Where the rider?)

or, again from The Wanderer,

Winde biwaune weallas stondaþ,
hrime bihrorene, hryðge þa ederas.


Then I remembered the Gotland poet Gustav Larsson:

"Varje sten i ditt hus är ensam
så som du själv är ensam
bland dina vänner..."
(Gustav Larsson)

(Every stone in your house stands alone,
just as you yourself are alone
amongst your friends)

But suddenly my mind turned to Albert Camus's "Myth of Sisyphus" and the image of Sisyphus and his eternal punishment, endlessly pushing his rock up the mountainside. In spite of that (he did get a bit of a breather on the way down, before he started again), Camus wrote, reassuringly,

"Il faut imaginer Sisyphe heureux".

Difficult to keep smiling and happy, when you think of all those memento mori poems like To His Coy Mistress by Andrew Marvell:

"Had we but world enough and time..."

D. M. Thomas (author of books like "Logan Stone" and "Birthstone") wrote, in his poem on the Ninemaidens stone-circle in West Cornwall,

"In your arms
Stone is beautiful".

One should not forget all the convicts who had to labour in Portland's quarries:

"Black towers above the Portland light
The felon-quarrier stone."

(A.E. Housman)

I soon realised I had enough inscriptions to cut graffiti on nearly all the blocks of stone or exposed stone surfaces on Portland...but that's not allowed. Sculptors, like architects (in Wren's words) "aim at eternity".

Before I create my timeless anthology in stone, maybe I should start learning how to handle a hammer and chisel.

I could begin by cutting just two words:

S T O N E.
R. I. P.

I need to consult the local experts in Abbotsbury.