A parable play by Louis MacNeice with incidental music by Benjamin Britten
The music played by the BBC Midland Light Orchestra
Conducted by Alan Rawsthorne
Solo violin: James Hutcheon
Solo trumpet: John Lamb
Percussion: Norman Parker
A new production by Joe Burroughs of the programme originally produced by the author on January 21st 1946 in the Home Service
(To be repeated on December 1)
The Dark Tower
Joe Burroughs writes:
I have looked up what radio critics wrote of the first broadcast of The Dark Tower in January 1946, and I have also looked up what listeners thought of it. Both critics and listeners were sharply divided. They either liked it very much or disliked it even more. Nobody seemed indifferent then, and nobody has seemed indifferent to subsequent broadcasts. At the least it has made people think, at the best it has stimulated both emotion and imagination.
Louis MacNeice described The Dark Tower as a parable play belonging to the class of writings which includes Everyman, The Faerie Queen, and The Pilgrim's Progress. It is ageless and timeless. It has the topicality of dreams. Indeed it was suggested by Browning's poem Childe Roland To The Dark Tower Came, which Browning said came upon him 'as a kind of dream.' In MacNeice's play the manner of presentation is that of a dream-but a dream, the author said, ' which is full of meaning.' Some have found no meaning in The Dark Tower. Many more have found a meaning; although the author might no more have agreed with them than Browning did with those who tried to tell him what his poem meant.
'Belief,' said Louis MacNeice. 'remains a sine qua non of the creative writer. I have my beliefs and they permeate The Dark Tower. But do not ask me what Ism it illustrates or what Solution it offers.' The play imposes nothing on the listener, who is free to take from it what he can or will. It remains one of the finest examples of the use of radio as an extension of the language of the creative writer; and no note on it should omit reference to Benjamin Britten's incidental music which in MacNeice's opinion 'added a dimension to The Dark Tower.'
