Matzos
26-01-07, 09:16
John Gillespie Magee, author of the famous poem 'High Flight', has been honoured with a major painting by aviation artist Edward Ash. The painting marks the 65th anniversary of the death of Magee, a Spitfire pilot and veteran of World War Two.
http://www.militaryimages.net/imagehost/images/Matzos/20070125uhighflight.jpg
John Magee was an American teenager, educated at Rugby in England, who set aside his scholarship at Yale to go to Canada in 1940 where he joined the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF). By September 1941 he was based at RAF Digby in the UK, flying the Spitfire.
It was during one of these flights that he got the idea for his poem which he finished soon after and sent home to his parents. Three months later, on 11 December 1941, Pilot Officer Magee was dead, killed in a mid-air collision with a student pilot near RAF Cranwell. He is buried in the military cemetery at Scopwick.
The poem:
Oh! I have slipped these surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds – and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of – wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there,
I've chased the shouting wind along and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air …
Up, up the long delirious burning blue
I've topped the wind swept heights with easy grace,
Where never lark, or even eagle flew –
And, while with silent lifting mind I've trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.
His poem has lived on, the original manuscript being held in the Library of Congress in the USA. Later in the war, the poem was used in posters which were sent to every airfield in Britain and throughout the Commonwealth.
In 1971, James Irwin, pilot of the Apollo 15 Lunar Module, carried a copy of the poem with him to the moon. President Regan quoted from the poem following the Challenger disaster in 1986 and in 1998 it was included in the eulogy to America's first man in space, Alan Shephard.
An American officer stationed at RAF Digby suggested to Edward Ash that he make a painting to mark the 65th anniversary, the result is 'A tribute to High Flight'.
Ash described painting one of the world's most famous aviation poem's as a "huge challenge". He wanted it to be more than an aviation painting and had to capture the ethos of the poem, the vastness of the space. His solution was a contemporary painting but with a 1940s feel. It took six months to complete.
And why is the poem so enduring? Ash commented: "It captures space and air and the sanctity of God."
The final painting recalls Magee's time on 412 (RCAF) Squadron when he was first inspired to write 'High Flight'. It depicts Supermarine Spitfire Mark IIa 'VZ-E', the aircraft shared between John Magee and Flight Sergeant MacDonnell in which MacDonnell had the honour of becoming the first 412 Squadron pilot to shoot down an enemy aircraft.
A digital print of the painting has been presented to RAF Cranwell and further prints will soon be on their way to a US audience. The US Air Force Academy in Colarado Springs is fascinated by the history of 'High Flight'. The artist hopes to sell more prints in the future but the original painting is still to find its final home.
Source - MoD
http://www.militaryimages.net/imagehost/images/Matzos/20070125uhighflight.jpg
John Magee was an American teenager, educated at Rugby in England, who set aside his scholarship at Yale to go to Canada in 1940 where he joined the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF). By September 1941 he was based at RAF Digby in the UK, flying the Spitfire.
It was during one of these flights that he got the idea for his poem which he finished soon after and sent home to his parents. Three months later, on 11 December 1941, Pilot Officer Magee was dead, killed in a mid-air collision with a student pilot near RAF Cranwell. He is buried in the military cemetery at Scopwick.
The poem:
Oh! I have slipped these surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds – and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of – wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there,
I've chased the shouting wind along and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air …
Up, up the long delirious burning blue
I've topped the wind swept heights with easy grace,
Where never lark, or even eagle flew –
And, while with silent lifting mind I've trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.
His poem has lived on, the original manuscript being held in the Library of Congress in the USA. Later in the war, the poem was used in posters which were sent to every airfield in Britain and throughout the Commonwealth.
In 1971, James Irwin, pilot of the Apollo 15 Lunar Module, carried a copy of the poem with him to the moon. President Regan quoted from the poem following the Challenger disaster in 1986 and in 1998 it was included in the eulogy to America's first man in space, Alan Shephard.
An American officer stationed at RAF Digby suggested to Edward Ash that he make a painting to mark the 65th anniversary, the result is 'A tribute to High Flight'.
Ash described painting one of the world's most famous aviation poem's as a "huge challenge". He wanted it to be more than an aviation painting and had to capture the ethos of the poem, the vastness of the space. His solution was a contemporary painting but with a 1940s feel. It took six months to complete.
And why is the poem so enduring? Ash commented: "It captures space and air and the sanctity of God."
The final painting recalls Magee's time on 412 (RCAF) Squadron when he was first inspired to write 'High Flight'. It depicts Supermarine Spitfire Mark IIa 'VZ-E', the aircraft shared between John Magee and Flight Sergeant MacDonnell in which MacDonnell had the honour of becoming the first 412 Squadron pilot to shoot down an enemy aircraft.
A digital print of the painting has been presented to RAF Cranwell and further prints will soon be on their way to a US audience. The US Air Force Academy in Colarado Springs is fascinated by the history of 'High Flight'. The artist hopes to sell more prints in the future but the original painting is still to find its final home.
Source - MoD