My
Word for It
by
Jack Solomon
Every
man has a hero, even two, three, or
more. For some persons that hero may
not be spoken of as a hero, but he
may be referred to as “somebody
I admire,” or even “if
everybody was like him the world would
be better off.”
One
of my heroes was President Franklin
Delano Roosevelt. In fact, I was a
high school junior when he died, and
the faculty member in charge of the
school memorial assembly knew that
and asked me to read Walt Whitman’s
“Oh, Captain, My Captain”
in his memory as a part of the service.
At one time, earlier, my hero was
William Boyd, the movie cowboy, and
later Jimmy Stewart in any role in
which he might be cast. But always
and forever, my constant hero has
been St. George, Patron Saint of Britain
and Knight of the Order of the Garter,
England’s highest honor.
Early
in my teaching career while directing
the productions of the Troy State
Playmakers, I discovered in a Montgomery
bookstore an acting copy of St.
George and the Dragon. It was
immediately fascinating and I produced
a performance in short order. The
production was designed to be performed
in a living room or other small area.
In old England St. George and
the Dragon was performed in castles
as a Christmas Mummer’s play.
All characters, male and female, were
played by men or boys and always in
the merry spirit of the season. I
continued this tradition until my
retirement from Alexander City Community
College in 1989, traveling to communities
and schools in the area, including
a performance in downtown Tallassee.
St.
George is a frequent subject in literature,
most prominently as the hero of the
15th century epic poem The Faeriy
Queen by Edmund Spencer. St.
George movies abound. Among the better
Hollywood adaptations is The Magic
Sword (1962), starring Gary Lockwood,
Anne Helm, Estelle Winwood, and Basil
Rathbone.
On
my desk is a plaster reproduction
of G. Ruggeri’s St. George and
the Dragon statue. In one small room
in my house there hangs a print of
St. George taken from a Medieval tapestry,
a museum copy of Raphael’s masterpiece,
“St. George and the Dragon,”
a framed jigsaw puzzle made from a
picture of another St. George statue
and reconstructed by Bobbie Pienezza,
and a color drawing of a dragon drawn
by my grandson Payne when he was four
years old and fascinated by dragons.
Elsewhere in the house there is a
triptych of copies of St. George paintings
housed in the National Gallery, Washington,
D.C., photographed by Suzannah Solomon
Wilson on a recent trip. In the entrance
hall there hangs a small bronze pressing
of St. George ready to slay the dragon,
and in my bedroom, instead of a light
switch plate there is another tiny
bronze figure of St. George with the
dragon which he has speared.
Surely,
St. George is the patron saint of
307 James Street!
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