Damnatio Memoriae: Problems of Faith and Forgetting

ABSTRACT: The long poem ‘Damnatio Memoriae,’ is a radical representation, in dramatic form, of the British poet, Sebastian Barker’s engagement with the Christian faith and the poet’s eventual conversion to Catholicism.

Using dialogue, soliloquy and direct address, it confronts the reader /listener with the problems that have troubled humankind through the ages: the theodicy of suffering; the conflict between history and the sacred economy; the corruption of political and religious institutions; the nature of individual and collective sin. But it also investigates how Christ, the incarnate God, overcomes ‘the inescapable terminus of death’ and gives the believer the chance to have spiritual life, ‘the true life of all’.

I will introduce the six different sections to show how the poem evolves dramatically; and give an account of its first performance, with a variety of speakers and music, in the crypt of Canterbury Cathedral in September 2013, shortly before the poet’s death.

Tim Armstrong is the prize-winning author of Walter and the Resurrection of G and Cecilia's Vision. He has translated books on philosophy and archaeology, and plays in a blues band. He holds MAs in Medieval and Modern Languages from Oxford University and in Philosophy (of Education) from London University. He worked as Head of Modern Languages at the King's School, Canterbury.