Norman Mailer
Norman Mailer photographed by Carl Van Vechten in 1948
Born	Norman Kingsley Mailer (1923-01-31)January 31, 1923 Long Branch, New Jersey
Died	November 10, 2007(2007-11-10) (aged 84) New York City, New York
Pen name	Andreas Wilson
Occupation	Novelist, essayist, journalist, columnist, poet, playwright
Nationality	American
Genres	Fiction, non-fiction
Influences John Dos Passos, George Eliot, Leo Tolstoy, Ernest Hemingway, Thomas Mann, William Faulkner, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Henry James, Marcel Proust, Henry Miller
Influenced Don DeLillo, Martin Amis, Truman Capote, Tom Wolfe, Lester Bangs, Jim Morrison, Matthew Barney
Literature portal

Norman Kingsley Mailer (January 31, 1923 - November 10, 2007) was an American novelist, journalist, essayist, poet, playwright, screenwriter, and film director.

Along with Truman Capote, Joan Didion, Hunter S. Thompson, John McPhee, and Tom Wolfe, Mailer is considered an innovator of creative nonfiction, a genre sometimes called New Journalism, which superimposes the style and devices of literary fiction onto fact-based journalism. He was awarded the Pulitzer Prize twice and the National Book Award once. In 1955, Mailer, together with John Wilcock, Ed Fancher and Dan Wolf, first published The Village Voice, which began as an arts and politics oriented weekly newspaper distributed in Greenwich Village. In 2005, he received the lifetime Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters from the National Book Foundation.^[1]

In 1992, Mailer received the annual Peggy V. Helmerich Distinguished Author Award presented by the Tulsa Library Trust.

Early life[link]

Norman Kingsley Mailer was born to a well-known Jewish family in Long Branch. His father, Isaac Barnett Mailer, was a South African-born accountant, and his mother, Fanny Schneider, ran a housekeeping and nursing agency. Mailer's sister, Barbara, was born in 1927.^[2] His second sister, Norma, was born in 1930.^[2] Raised in Brooklyn, New York, he graduated from Boys' High School and entered Harvard University in 1939, where he studied aeronautical engineering. At Harvard, he became interested in writing and published his first story at the age of 18, winning Story magazine's college contest in 1941. As an undergraduate, he was a member of The Signet Society. After graduating in 1943, he was drafted into the U.S. Army. In World War II, he served in the Philippines with the 112th Cavalry. He was not involved in much combat and completed his service as a cook,^[2] but the experience provided enough material for The Naked and the Dead.

Literary career[link]

Novels[link]

In 1948, while continuing his studies at the Sorbonne in Paris, Mailer published The Naked and the Dead, based on his military service in World War II. A New York Times best seller for 62 weeks, it was hailed by many as one of the best American wartime novels and named one of the "one hundred best novels in English language" by the Modern Library.

Barbary Shore (1951) was a surreal parable of Cold War left politics set in a Brooklyn rooming-house. His 1955 novel The Deer Park drew on his experiences working as a screenwriter in Hollywood in 1949–50. It was initially rejected by seven publishers due to its purportedly sexual content before being published by Putnam's.

In the tradition of Dickens and Dostoevsky, Mailer wrote his fourth novel, An American Dream, as a serial in Esquire magazine over eight months (January to August 1964), publishing the first chapter only two months after he wrote it. In March 1965, Dial Press published a revised version. His editor was E. L. Doctorow. The novel received mixed reviews, but was a best seller. Joan Didion praised it in a review in National Review (April 20, 1965) and John W. Aldridge did the same in Life (March 19, 1965), while Elizabeth Hardwick panned it in Partisan Review (spring 1965). Except for a brief period, the novel has never gone out of print.

Norman Mailer at the Miami Book Fair International of 1988

In 1980, The Executioner's Song—Mailer's novelization of the life and death of murderer Gary Gilmore—won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction.

Mailer spent a longer time writing Ancient Evenings—his novel of Egypt in the XX dynasty (about 1100 BCE.)—than any of his other books, working on it off and on from 1972 until 1983. It was also a bestseller, although reviews were generally negative.

Harlot's Ghost, Mailer's longest novel (1310 pages), appeared in 1991. It is an exploration of the unspoken dramas of the CIA from the end of WWII to 1965. He performed a huge amount of research for the novel, which is still on CIA reading lists. He ended the novel with the words "To be continued," and planned to write a sequel, titled Harlot's Grave. But other projects intervened and he never wrote it. Harlot's Ghost sold well.

His final novel, The Castle in the Forest, which focused on Hitler's childhood, reached number five on the Times best-seller list after publication in January 2007, and received stronger reviews than any of his books since The Executioner's Song. Castle was intended to be the first volume of a trilogy, but Mailer died several months after it was completed. The Castle in the Forest was awarded a Bad Sex in Fiction Award by the Literary Review magazine.^[3]

Mailer wrote over 40 books. He published 11 novels over a 59-year span.

The New Journalism[link]

From the mid-1950s, Mailer became known for his counter-cultural essays. In 1955, he co-founded The Village Voice for which he wrote a column from January to April 1956.^[4] Mailer's famous essay "The White Negro"^[5] (1957) "analyzes and partly defends the moral radicalism of the outsider and hipster."^[5][6] It is one of the most anthologized, and controversial, essays of the postwar period.

In 1960, Mailer wrote "Superman Comes to the Supermarket" for Esquire magazine, an account of the emergence of John F. Kennedy during the Democratic party convention. The essay was an important breakthrough for the New Journalism of the nineteen sixties. Mailer's contributions to the New Journalism include major books such as The Armies of the Night (1968), awarded a National Book Award^[7] and a Pulitzer Prize; Miami and the Siege of Chicago (1968); Of a Fire on the Moon (1971); and The Prisoner of Sex (1971). Hallmarks of these works are a highly subjectivized style and a greater application of techniques from fiction-writing than common in journalism.

Mailer wrote a Playboy article about Elmo Henderson, a boxer who had defeated Muhammad Ali in 1972.^[8] In the 1970s Henderson filed a $1 million libel action against Mailer and Playboy. The magazine and Mailer lost the lawsuit.^[9]

Work for film[link]

In addition to his experimental fiction and nonfiction novels, Mailer produced a play version of The Deer Park (staged at the Theatre De Lys in Greenwich Village in 1967^[10]), and in the late 1960s directed a number of improvisational avant-garde films in a Warhol style, including Maidstone (1970), which includes a spontaneous and brutal brawl between Norman T. Kingsley, played by Mailer, and Kingsley's brother, played by Rip Torn. Mailer received a head injury when Torn struck him with a hammer. In 1987, he adapted and directed a film version of his novel Tough Guys Don't Dance, starring Ryan O'Neal and Isabella Rossellini, which has become a minor camp classic.

Political activism[link]

A number of Mailer's nonfiction works, such as The Armies of the Night and The Presidential Papers, are political. He covered the Republican and Democratic National Conventions in 1960, 1964, 1968, 1972, 1992, and 1996, although his account of the 1996 Democratic convention has never been published. In the early 1960s he was fixated on the figure of President John F. Kennedy, whom he regarded as an "existential hero." In the late 1950s and throughout the 1960s and 1970s his work mingled autobiography, social commentary, history, fiction, and poetry in a formally original way that influenced the development of New Journalism.

In September of 1961 Mailer was one of the original original twenty-nine prominent American sponsors of the Fair Play for Cuba Committee organization that was the same organization that alleged John F. Kennedy assassin Lee Harvey Oswald also became a member of in 1963. In December of 1963 Mailer and several of the other sponsors left it. (some of the original twenty-nine sponsors of the group included Truman Capote, Robert Taber, James Baldwin, Robert F. Williams, Waldo Frank, Carleton Beals, Simone de Beauvoir, Robert Colodny, Donald Harrington, and Jean Paul Sartre^[11])

In October 1967, he was arrested for his involvement in an anti-Vietnam War demonstration at the Pentagon. In 1968, he signed the “Writers and Editors War Tax Protest” pledge, vowing to refuse tax payments in protest against the Vietnam War.^[12]

At the December 15, 1971, taping of The Dick Cavett Show, with Janet Flanner and Gore Vidal, Mailer, annoyed with a less-than-stellar review by Vidal of Prisoner of Sex, apparently headbutted Vidal and traded insults with him backstage.^[13] As the show began taping, a visibly belligerent Mailer, who admitted he had been drinking,^[13] goaded Vidal and Cavett into trading insults with him on air and continually referred to his "greater intellect". He openly taunted and mocked Vidal (who responded in kind), finally earning the ire of Flanner, who announced that the discussion had become "extremely boring", telling Mailer "You act as if you're the only people here." As Cavett made jokes comparing Mailer's intellect to his ego, Mailer stated "Why don't you look at your question sheet and ask your question?", to which Cavett responded "Why don't you fold it 5 ways and shove it where the moon don't shine?"^[13][14]

The headbutting and later on-air altercation was described by Mailer himself in his essay "Of a Small and Modest Malignancy, Wicked and Bristling with Dots." The Wikipedia article about landmark episodes of the show states:

A 1971 interview with Norman Mailer was not going well. Mailer moved his chair away from the other guests (Gore Vidal and Janet Flanner), and Cavett joked that "perhaps you'd like two more chairs to contain your giant intellect?"^[15] Mailer replied "I'll take the two chairs if you'll all accept finger-bowls." Mailer later said to Cavett "Why don't you look at your question sheet and ask your question?", to which Cavett replied "Why don't you fold it five ways and put it where the moon don't shine?" A long laugh ensued, after which Mailer asked Cavett if he had come up with that line and Cavett replied "I have to tell you a quote from Tolstoy?".

In 1980, Mailer spearheaded convicted killer Jack Abbott's successful bid for parole. In 1977, Abbott had read about Mailer's work on The Executioner's Song and wrote to Mailer, offering to enlighten the author about Abbott's time behind bars and the conditions he was experiencing. Mailer, impressed, helped to publish In the Belly of the Beast, a book on life in the prison system consisting of Abbott's letters to Mailer. Once paroled, Abbott committed a murder in New York City six weeks after his release, stabbing to death 22-year-old Richard Adan. Consequently, Mailer was subject to criticism for his role. In a 1992 interview with the Buffalo News, he conceded that his involvement was "another episode in my life in which I can find nothing to cheer about or nothing to take pride in."^[16]

In 1989, Mailer joined with a number of other prominent authors in publicly expressing support for colleague Salman Rushdie in the wake of the fatwa calling for Rushdie's assassination issued by Iran's Islamic government for his having authored The Satanic Verses.^[17]

In 2003, in a speech to the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco, just before the invasion of Iraq, Mailer said: "Fascism is more of a natural state than democracy. To assume blithely that we can export democracy into any country we choose can serve paradoxically to encourage more fascism at home and abroad. Democracy is a state of grace that is attained only by those countries who have a host of individuals not only ready to enjoy freedom but to undergo the heavy labor of maintaining it."^[18]

From 1980 until his death in 2007, he contributed to Democratic Party candidacies for political office.^[19]

Mayoral campaign[link]

In 1969, at the suggestion of Gloria Steinem,^[20] his friend the political essayist Noel Parmentel and others, he ran unsuccessfully in the Democratic Party primary for Mayor of New York City, allied with columnist Jimmy Breslin (who ran for City Council President), proposing the creation a 51st state through New York City secession.^[21] Although Mailer took stands on a wide range of issues, from opposing "compulsory fluoridation of the water supply" to advocating the release of Black Panther Party leader Huey Newton, decentralization was the overriding issue of the campaign.^[21] Mailer "foresaw the city, its independence secured, splintering into townships and neighborhoods, with their own school systems, police departments, housing programs, and governing philosophies."^[22] Their slogan was "throw the rascals in". Mailer was endorsed by libertarian economist Murray Rothbard, who "believed that 'smashing the urban government apparatus and fragmenting it into a myriad of constituent fragments' offered the only answer to the ills plaguing American cities," and called Mailer's campaign “the most refreshing libertarian political campaign in decades.”^[21][22] He came in fourth in a field of five.^[23] Looking back on the campaign, journalist and historian Theodore White called it "one of the most serious campaigns run in the United States in the last five years. . . . [H]is campaign was considered and thoughtful, the beginning of an attempt to apply ideas to a political situation."^[22]

Biographical subjects[link]

His biographical subjects included Pablo Picasso, Muhammad Ali, Gary Gilmore, Lee Harvey Oswald, and Marilyn Monroe.

Marilyn Monroe[link]

Mailer's 1973 biography of Monroe (usually designated Marilyn: A Biography)^[a] was particularly controversial. The book's final chapter states that Monroe was murdered by agents of the FBI and CIA who resented her supposed affair with Robert F. Kennedy. In his own 1987 autobiography Timebends, the playwright Arthur Miller, a former husband to Monroe, wrote scathingly of Mailer: "[Mailer] was himself in drag, acting out his own Hollywood fantasies of fame and sex unlimited and power."

The book was also enormously successful, selling more copies than any of his works except The Naked and the Dead. It remained in print for decades, but was out of print in the United States as of 2009^[update].^{[citation needed]}

Two later works co-written by Mailer presented imagined words and thoughts in Monroe's voice: the 1980 book Of Women and Their Elegance and the 1986 play Strawhead, which was produced off Broadway starring his daughter Kate Mailer.

Personal life[link]

Marriages and children[link]

Norman Mailer was married six times and had nine children. He fathered eight children by his various wives and also raised and informally adopted Norris' son from another marriage, Matthew.

Norman's first marriage was in 1944, to Beatrice Silverman, whom he divorced in 1952. They had one child, Susan.

Mailer married his second wife, Adele Morales, in 1954. They had two daughters, Danielle and Elizabeth. Mailer was violent to his wife.^[24] He was at one time involuntarily committed to Bellevue Hospital for 17 days; his wife would not press charges, and he later pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of assault, and was given a suspended sentence.^[25][26] While in the short term, Morales made a physical recovery, in 1997 she published a memoir of their marriage entitled The Last Party, which recounted her husband stabbing her at a party and the aftermath. This incident has been a focal point for feminist critics of Mailer, who point to themes of sexual violence in his work.^[27]

His third wife, whom he married in 1962, and divorced in 1963, was the British heiress and journalist Lady Jeanne Campbell (1929–2007), the only daughter of Ian Campbell, 11th Duke of Argyll and a granddaughter of the press baron Lord Beaverbrook. The couple had a daughter, Kate Mailer, who is an actress.

His fourth marriage, in 1963, was to Beverly Bentley, a former model turned actress. She was the mother of his producer son Michael Mailer and his actor son Stephen Mailer. They divorced in 1980.

His fifth wife was Carol Stevens, a jazz singer whom he married on November 7, 1980, and divorced in Haiti on November 8, 1980, thereby legitimating their daughter Maggie, born in 1971.

His sixth and last wife, whom he married in 1980, was Norris Church Mailer (née Barbara Davis, 1949–2010), an art teacher. They had one son together, John Buffalo Mailer, a writer and actor, and Mailer informally adopted Matthew Norris, her son by her first husband, Larry Norris. Living in Brooklyn, New York and Provincetown, Massachusetts with Mailer, Church worked as a model, wrote and painted.

Works with his children[link]

In 2005, Mailer co-wrote a book with his youngest child, John Buffalo Mailer, titled The Big Empty.

Mailer appeared in an episode of Gilmore Girls entitled "Norman Mailer, I'm Pregnant!" with his son Stephen Mailer.

Death and legacy[link]

Mailer died of acute renal failure on November 10, 2007, a month after undergoing lung surgery at Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan, New York.^[28]

The papers of the two-time Pulitzer Prize author may be found at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at the University of Texas, Austin.^[29][30]

In 2008, Carole Mallory, a former mistress, sold seven boxes of documents and photographs to Harvard University, Norman Mailer's Alma Mater. They contain extracts of her letters, books and journals.^[31][32]

In 2008, The Norman Mailer Center and The Norman Mailer Writers Colony, a non-profit organization for educational purposes, was established to honor Norman Mailer.^[33] Among its programs is the Norman Mailer Prize established in 2009.

Cultural references[link]

• In the comedy Sleeper, Woody Allen remarks that Mailer "donated his ego to the Harvard Medical School."
• He's referenced in the Red Hot Chili Peppers song "Animal Bar" in the lyrics "Ever loving mug of Mr. Norman Mailer".
• Singer Lloyd Cole referenced Mailer in the song, "Are You Ready To Be Heartbroken" with the line, "If you really want to get straight, read Norman Mailer, or get a new tailor."
• Rapper Talib Kweli, in single Get By, proclaims to "paint a picture with the pen like Norman Mailer".
• He is Also referenced in the 1993 PC game Sam and Max Hit the Road in a conversation with the fisherman in the world of Fish (this itself is a Woody Allen parody)
• Mentioned in the GWAR song "Vlad the Impaler", the subject of which is someone who "could've been a whaler, could've been a sailor, he turned out to be Norman Mailer."

Selected bibliography[link]

Fiction[link]

Novels

• The Naked and the Dead. New York: Rinehart, 1948.
• Barbary Shore. New York: Rinehart, 1951.
• The Deer Park. New York: Putnam's, 1955.
• An American Dream. New York: Dial, 1965.
• Why Are We in Vietnam? New York: Putnam's, 1967.
• The Executioner's Song Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1979.
• Of Women and Their Elegance. New York, Simon and Schuster, 1980
• Ancient Evenings. Boston: Little, Brown, 1983.
• Tough Guys Don't Dance. New York: Random House, 1984.
• Harlot's Ghost. New York: Random House, 1991.
• The Gospel According to the Son. New York: Random House, 1997.
• The Castle in the Forest. New York: Random House, 2007.

Plays

• The Deer Park: A Play. New York: Dial, 1967.

Short Stories

• The Short Fiction of Norman Mailer. New York: Dell, 1967.

Non-fiction[link]

General non-fiction

• The Armies of the Night. New York: New American Library, 1968.
• Miami and the Siege of Chicago: An Informal History of the Republican and Democratic Conventions of 1968. New York: New American Library, 1968.
• Of a Fire on the Moon. Boston: Little, Brown, 1970.
• The Prisoner of Sex. Boston: Little, Brown, 1971.^[34]
• St. George and The Godfather. New York: Signet Classics, 1972.
• The Faith of Graffiti. New York: Praeger, 1974.
• The Fight. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1975.
• Of a Small and Modest Malignancy, Wicked and Bristling with Dots. Northridge, CA: Lord John Press, 1980.
• Why Are We At War?. New York: Random House, 2003 ISBN 978-0-8129-7111-8
• The Spooky Art: Some Thoughts on Writing. New York: Random House, 2003.
• The Big Empty: Dialogues on Politics, Sex, God, Boxing, Morality, Myth, Poker and Bad Conscience in America. New York: Nation Books, 2006
• On God: An Uncommon Conversation. New York: Random House, 2007 ISBN 978-1-4000-6732-9

Essay collections

• Advertisements for Myself. New York: Putnam's, 1959.
• The Presidential Papers.New York: Putnam, 1963.
• Cannibals and Christians. New York: Dial, 1966.
• Pieces and Pontifications. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1982.

Biographies

• Marilyn: A Biography.^[a] New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1973.
• Portrait of Picasso as a Young Man: An Interpretive Biography. Atlantic Monthly Press, 1995.
• Oswald's Tale: An American Mystery. New York: Random House, 1996 ISBN 978-0-679-42535-9

Famous essays and articles

• "The White Negro". San Francisco: City Lights, 1957.

Notes[link]

References[link]

Further reading[link]

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Norman Mailer

• The Norman Mailer Center
• The Norman Mailer Society
• Norman Mailer at the Internet Movie Database
• Transcript of interview with Ramona Koval, Edinburgh International Book Festival, August 2000 broadcast on The Book Show, ABC Radio National, November 12, 2007
• "Superman Comes to the Supermarket," article by Norman Mailer on John F. Kennedy, Esquire magazine, November 1960
• Andrew O'Hagan (Summer 2007). "Norman Mailer, The Art of Fiction No. 193". The Paris Review. http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/5775/the-art-of-fiction-no-193-norman-mailer. 
• Sunday New York Times review by Lee Siegel of The Castle in the Forest
• Norman Mailer on American Masters (PBS Broadcast)
• Norman Mailer: The American (Documentary)
• Norman Mailer's writing on The Huffington Post
• A conversation with Norman Mailer (Minnesota Public Radio)
• Norman Mailer and Günter Grass interviewed by Andrew O'Hagan at The New York Public Library, June 2007
• Norman Mailer speech at UC Berkeley Vietnam Teach-In, 1965 (RealAudio) (via UC Berkeley Media Resources Center)
• Joyce Carol Oates on Norman Mailer
• Booknotes interview with Mailer on Oswald's Tale, June 25, 1995.
• The short film We Are in Love with the Word, Part I (1986) is available for free download at the Internet Archive [more]
• The short film We Are in Love with the Word, Part II (1986) is available for free download at the Internet Archive [more]

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (February 2010)

Iain Matthews
Background information
Birth name	Iain Matthew McDonald
Also known as	Ian McDonald, Ian Matthews, Iain Matthews
Born	(1946-06-16) 16 June 1946 (age 66) Scunthorpe, Lincolnshire, England
Genres	Folk rock, rockabilly, Country music, Alternative rock, surf music, jazz, folk
Occupations	Musician, Songwriter
Instruments	Vocals, Guitar
Years active	1967–present
Labels	Decca/Deram, Polydor, Vertigo, Elektra, Columbia, Mushroom, Windham Hill, Mooncrest, Brilliant
Associated acts	Fairport Convention, Plainsong, Matthews Southern Comfort
Website	iainmatthews.com
Notable instruments
guitar

Iain Matthews (born 16 June 1946) is an English musician and songwriter. He was born Iain Matthew McDonald, in Scunthorpe, Lincolnshire, England. He was known in the 1960s first as Ian McDonald, then as the 1960s progressed, as Ian Matthews. In 1989 he reverted to the original spelling of his first name.

Influenced by both rock and roll and folk music, he has performed mainly as a solo act, although he was a member of Fairport Convention during the early period when they were heavily influenced by American West Coast folk rock. He later had a solo career and fronted the bands Plainsong, Hi-Fi, No Grey Faith, More Than A Song and Matthews' own Southern Comfort.^[1]

Origins[link]

Matthews grew up in Scunthorpe, Lincolnshire, England. He sang with several minor bands during the British pop music explosion of the mid-1960s and moved to London in 1966, taking a job in a Carnaby Street shoe shop. That year he formed a trio, The Pyramid, an English short-lived surf music band, which recorded one single, "Summer Of Last Year" in January 1967, on Deram Records. A remaining song, "Me About You," surfaced on Matthews' Orphans & Outcasts Volume 3 in 1999.

Fairport Convention[link]

In the Spring of 1967, Matthews was recruited by Ashley Hutchings as a male vocalist for Fairport Convention, where he duetted first with Judy Dyble, and then with Sandy Denny. In 1969, as Fairport drew increasingly from a British traditional folk repertoire, Matthews found out he had not been invited to a recording session and, after a short discussion with Ashley Hutchings, departed toward a musical direction of his own.^[1]

Matthews Southern Comfort[link]

With Thompson, Simon Nicol, and Hutchings from Fairport Convention, guitarist Mark Griffiths, drummer Gerry Conway (of Fotheringay; later to join first the Cat Stevens, backing band, Jethro Tull and then Fairport Convention from the 1990s on) and pedal steel player Gordon Huntley, and drummer Ray Duffy, Matthews recorded his debut solo album, Matthews' Southern Comfort, whose sound was rooted in American country music and rockabilly. This was his first significant experience as a songwriter, although the band also covered the likes of Neil Young and Ian and Sylvia. He followed it up by forming a working band using the name of his first album and Second Spring (UK #52)^[2] and Later That Same Year followed. The band went through several different lineups and toured extensively for the next two years, to general critical acclaim. They had one commercial success: a 1970 cover version of "Woodstock" (written by Joni Mitchell) was a number one hit single in the UK Singles Chart.^[2] It experienced heavy airplay in Canada reaching #5, as well as peaking at #23 on the Billboard singles charts in the United States in 1971. Afterwards, Matthews split with Southern Comfort, who went on to release three albums of their own on Harvest Records.

Plainsong[link]

After recording two acclaimed solo albums on Vertigo Records, under the sponsorship of former Yardbird Paul Samwell-Smith and surrounded by a who's who of likeminded British semi-folkies (notably another ex-Fairporter, Richard Thompson), he formed Plainsong, who signed to Elektra Records and in 1972 produced In Search of Amelia Earhart, which solidified Matthews' songwriting reputation with the critics, if not with the general public. The album included a cover of Dave McEnery's "Amelia Earhart's Last Flight", plus a song of Matthews' own, "True Story of Amelia Earhart's Last Night" based on the research that suggests that Earhart on her round-the-world flight may have been spying on Japanese bases in the Pacific islands. It also included "Even the Guiding Light", a spiritually positive answer to Thompson’s powerful but bleak "Meet on the Ledge".

"Bouncing around"[link]

After Plainsong collapsed due to a bandmate's alcohol problem, and with his career now based in Los Angeles, Matthews released several more albums with ad hoc bands, including one produced by Michael Nesmith, formerly of the Monkees; Valley Hi, but none met with commercial success. He bounced from Elektra to Columbia Records, to the small Rockburgh label, where he finally scored a hit single in 1978 with a cover of Terence Boylan's "Shake It", which reached #13 in the U.S.A charts, and a moderately successful follow-up covering Robert Palmer's "Gimme an Inch". However, the North American rights for his album were held by the small Canadian label Mushroom. Label-owner Shelly Siegel, died suddenly in 1979, leaving the label rudderless. The song "Shake It" is heard at the beginning of the 1980 movie Little Darlings. It can also be heard on the radio in the game The Warriors from Rockstar games.

Matthews' official web site states that at this point he "had been struggling for nearly 15 years now and was still living hand to mouth, with nothing to show for his efforts but a string of out-of-print albums, and the loyalty of those musicians and fans who shared his vision." ^[3] He moved from Los Angeles to then-inexpensive Seattle, where he teamed up with David Surkamp, formerly of the St. Louis band Pavlov's Dog, to form the power pop band Hi-Fi, whose repertoire included Matthews originals, but also covers of Neil Young's "Mr. Soul" and Prince's "When You Were Mine". Neither this nor a return to solo recording in England turned his luck. He worked for a while in an A&R capacity at Island Records and then New Age Windham Hill Records.

Later career[link]

Since 1974, Fairport Convention had been staging the annual Cropredy Festival; since 1979, this annual reunion had primarily the height of their activity at that period in time as a band, but in the mid-1980s several members became interested in reviving the band, stimulating creativity as a group and in recording new material. Matthews was invited to perform with them as a part of the band, and in their other side-projects, at the 1986 Cropredy Festival. This led to Walking a Changing Line (1988) on Windham Hill Records, an unlikely album-length tribute to Jules Shear of Jules and the Polar Bears. Matthews found himself moving to Austin, Texas, and recording several albums for a series of German independent labels. It also led to his first truly solo performances: his previous "solo" outings had always been as a frontman for a one-shot band. He appeared with Andy Roberts at the 1992 Cambridge Folk Festival, which led to the first of what became several changed versions of Plainsong.

Since that time, Matthews has had a moderately successful career, releasing records on a number of small labels in Germany, the UK, and the US, before moving to Amsterdam in 2000, where he continues to be involved in various indy projects and collaborations, including the Sandy Denny tribute band "No Grey Faith" and another revival of Plainsong. Moving to Horst in the south of Holland, in 2008 he produced a new album, Joy Mining, in collaboration with the Dutch jazz combo Searing Quartet. In this album he could work with his lifelong love for jazz. September 2010 saw the first Matthews Southern Comfort album in 40 years, and Matthews' return to a major label. Matthews is a season ticket holder at Scunthorpe United.

In December 2011 he performed as Matthews Southern Comfort with his Dutch band at the 2nd Great British Folk Fesival at Butlins Skegness and performed an excellent set of both old and new songs.

Discography[link]

The following is a partial discography; a comprehensive discography is available on Matthews' personal website.

Singles[link]

• Pyramid, "The Summer of Last Year"/"Summer Evening" (1967) UK Deram Records; his first recording

Albums[link]

• Fairport Convention, Fairport Convention (1968) UK Polydor/ US Cotillion
• Fairport Convention, What We Did On Our Holidays (1968) UK Island/ US A&M
• Fairport Convention, Heyday(1986) BBC - a release of recordings from 1968/1969 UK Island/ US Hannibal
• Ian Matthews, Matthews' Southern Comfort (1969) UK Uni/ US Decca (actually his first solo album)
• Matthews Southern Comfort, Second Spring (1969) UK Uni/ US Decca
• Matthews Southern Comfort, Later That Same Year (1970) UK Uni / US Decca
• Matthews' Southern Comfort, The Essential Collection (1997) Half Moon (a retrospective of 1970s recordings)
• Ian Matthews, If You Saw Thro' My Eyes (1971) UK and US Vertigo (2nd solo album)
• Ian Matthews, Tigers Will Survive (1971) UK and US Vertigo (3rd solo album)
• Plainsong, In Search of Amelia Earhart (1972) UK and US Elektra
• Ian Matthews, Journeys from Gospel Oak (1972) UK Mooncrest
• Ian Matthews, Valley Hi (1973) UK and US Elektra Records
• Ian Matthews, Some Days You Eat the Bear...Some Days the Bear Eats You (1974) UK and US Elektra
• Ian Matthews, Go For Broke (1975) UK CBS/ US Columbia
• Ian Matthews, Hit and Run (1976) UK CBS/ US Columbia
• Ian Matthews, Stealin' Home (1978) UK Rockburgh/ US Mushroom
• Ian Matthews, Siamese Friends (1979) Rockburgh
• Ian Matthews, Discreet Repeat (1979) Rockburgh
• Ian Matthews, Spot Of Interference (1980) UK Rockburgh/US RSO
• Hi-Fi, Demonstration Record (1982) First American Records; live mini-album
• Hi-Fi, Moods for Mallards (1982) First American Records
• Ian Matthews, Shook (1984) Polydor
• Ian Matthews, Walking a Changing Line (1988) Windham Hill Records
• Iain Matthews, Pure and Crooked (1990) Gold Castle Records
• Iain Matthews, Skeleton Keys (1992) Line
• Iain Matthews, The Dark Ride (1994) Watermelon
• Iain Matthews, God Looked Down (1996) Watermelon
• Iain Matthews, The Seattle Years 1978-1984 (1996) Varese Sarabande
• Iain Matthews, Excerpts from Swine Lake (1998) Blue Rose
• Iain Matthews, Orphans & Outcasts Volume 3
• Iain Matthews, A Tiniest Wham
• No Grey Faith, Secrets All Told — The Songs of Sandy Denny (2000) Perfect Pitch / Unique Gravity
• Iain Matthews & Elliott Murphy, The Official Blue Rose Bootleg (2001) Blue Rose
• Iain Matthews & Elliott Murphy, La Terre Commune (2001) Blue Rose / Perfect Pitch / Eminent
• Plainsong, Pangolins (2003) Blue Rose
• Iain Matthews, Zumbach's coat (2005) Blue Rose / Perfect Pitch / Eminent
• Iain Matthews, Contact in live (2008)
• Iain Matthews & Searing Quartet, Joy Mining (2008) Perfect Pitch (an easy listening/jazz oriented album)
• Iain Matthews & Nick Vernier Band, Woodstock (2009) Brinker Media
• Iain Matthews & Egbert Derix, Afterwords (2010) Matrix
• Iain Matthews & Nick Vernier Band with Emitt Rhodes, Time Will Show The Wiser (2010) Brinker Media
• Iain Matthews & Ad van der Veen, Ride the times (2010) Turtle Records
• Matthews Southern Comfort, Kind of New (album) Brilliant/Genepool BMCD1010 (2010)

1996 Songs From The Red Couch - Live ( Iain Matthews & Julian Dawson)

Billboard Hot 100 Singles[link]

• "Woodstock" (#23, 1971)
• "Mare, Take Me Home" (#96, 1971)
• "Tell Me Why" (#98, 1971)
• "Da Doo Ron Ron" (#96, 1972)
• "Shake It" (#13, 1979)
• "Give Me an Inch" (#67, 1979)

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official site. Much of the biographical and discographical information in this article comes from the biography and discography on that site, accessed December 16, 2004.
• Iain Matthews discography from Music City
• Biography on music.com
• Iain Matthews discography at Discogs

Rip Torn
at the 47th Emmy Awards (1994)
Born	Elmore Rual Torn, Jr. (1931-02-06) February 6, 1931 (age 81) Temple, Texas, U.S.
Occupation	Actor
Years active	1956–present
Spouse	Ann Wedgeworth (1955–1961; divorced) Geraldine Page (1963–1987; her death) Amy Wright (1989–present)
Children	Danae Torn Tony Torn Jon Torn Angelica Torn Katie Claire

Elmore Rual "Rip" Torn, Jr. (born February 6, 1931), is an American actor of stage, screen and television.

Torn received an Academy Award nomination as Best Supporting Actor for his role in the 1983 film Cross Creek. His work includes the role of Artie, the producer, on The Larry Sanders Show, for which he was nominated for six Emmy Awards, winning in 1996. Torn also won an American Comedy Award for Funniest Supporting Male in a Series, and two CableACE Awards for his work on the show, and was nominated for a Satellite Award in 1997 as well.

Early life[link]

Torn was born Elmore Rual Torn, Jr. in Temple, Texas, the son of Thelma Mary (née Spacek) and Elmore Rual Torn, an agriculturalist and economist.^[1][2] Being given the name "Rip" is a family tradition of men in the Torn family for several generations.^[3] It was given to him by his father, who was also called Rip; although as a young child and teenager he was referred to as "Skippy". He was a member of the Texas A&M Corps of Cadets and is a member of the Sigma Chi fraternity.

Film career[link]

Following graduation from the University of Texas at Austin, where he studied drama with B. Iden Payne, Torn relocated from his native Texas to Hollywood, making his debut in the 1956 film Baby Doll. Torn then headed to New York where he studied at the Actors Studio under Lee Strasberg, becoming a prolific stage actor, appearing in the original cast of Tennessee Williams' play Sweet Bird of Youth, and reprising the role in the film and television adaptations. While in New York, Torn introduced his cousin, the Oscar-winning actress Sissy Spacek, to the entertainment business, and helped her enroll in Strasberg's Actors Studio.

One of his earliest roles was in the film Pork Chop Hill, playing the brother-in-law of Gregory Peck's character. He also played an uncredited role in A Face in the Crowd as Barry Mills, touted as the down-home successor to Andy Griffith's megalomaniacal TV star Lonesome Rhodes. In 1957 Torn played "Jody", a young man trying to avenge the death of his father in an early episode so titled of John Payne's NBC western television series, The Restless Gun. He also played an arrogant young thief on Alfred Hitchcock Presents in the episode "Number Twenty-Two".^[4] Rip also played Judas Iscariot in MGM's King of Kings released in 1961.

In 1963 he appeared as a graduate student with multiple degrees at fictitious Channing College in the ABC drama Channing starring Jason Evers and Henry Jones. That same year, he appeared as Roy Kendall in the episode "Millions of Faces" in the ABC medical drama about psychiatry, Breaking Point with Paul Richards. In 1964 Torn appeared as Eddie Sanderson in the episode "The Secret in the Stone" of the NBC psychiatric drama, The Eleventh Hour with Ralph Bellamy and Jack Ging. That same year, he appeared in the premiere of the short-lived CBS drama The Reporter, starring Harry Guardino as a New York City journalist. In 1965 he portrayed Colonel Royce in the "The Lorelei" episode of 12 O-Clock High (TV series).

He has been a character actor in numerous films since then, including roles such as those of New Orleans blackmailer Slade opposite Steve McQueen and Karl Malden in 1965's The Cincinnati Kid or the gruff boss Agent Zed in Men in Black.

The part of lawyer George Hanson in the Peter Fonda–Dennis Hopper road movie Easy Rider was written for Torn by Terry Southern (who was a close friend), but according to Southern's biographer Lee Hill, Torn withdrew from the project after he and co-director Dennis Hopper got into a bitter argument in a New York restaurant. On The Tonight Show in 1994, Hopper said that the argument ended with Torn pulling a knife—a statement that was later rescinded.^[5] As a result, Torn was replaced by Jack Nicholson, whose appearance in the film catapulted him to stardom.^[6]

Torn portrayed a psychiatrist who installed a hidden camera in his New York office to record his own mental breakdown in Coming Apart (1969). In 1972 he won rave reviews for his portrayal of a country & western singer in the cult film Payday. In 1976 he starred in the cult classic science fiction movie The Man Who Fell to Earth. In 1979 Torn along with Conchata Ferrell starred in the Richard Pearce directed film "Heartland" about early homestead life in western America. He received an Academy Award nomination as Best Supporting Actor for his role in the 1983 film Cross Creek.

Rip Torn in 1993

In 1988 he ventured into directing with the offbeat comedy The Telephone, starring Whoopi Goldberg. The screenplay was written by Terry Southern and Harry Nilsson, and the film was produced by their company Hawkeye. The story, which focused on an unhinged, out-of-work actor, had been written with Robin Williams in mind. After he turned it down, Goldberg expressed a strong interest, but when production began Torn reportedly had to contend with Goldberg constantly digressing and improvising, and he had to plead with her to perform takes that stuck to the script. Goldberg was backed by the studio, who also allowed her to replace Torn's chosen DP, veteran cinematographer John Alonzo, with her then-husband. As a result of the power struggle, Torn, Southern and Nilsson cut their own version of the film, using the takes that adhered to the script, and this was screened at the Sundance Film Festival, but the studio put together a rival version using other takes and it was poorly reviewed when it premiered in January 1988.^[6] In 1990 he played the ultra-hawkish Colonel Fargo in the cold war drama By Dawn's Early Light. In 1991 he portrayed Albert Brooks' defense attorney in the comedy Defending Your Life. In 1993 Torn played the OCP CEO in the science fiction film, Robocop 3, and was Gord's dad, James "Jim" Brody, in the 2001 film Freddy Got Fingered.

Stage career[link]

Broadway[link]

Torn has appeared in ten Broadway plays, and directed one. He made his feature Broadway debut in 1959, when he played Tom Junior in Sweet Bird of Youth, for which he won a Theater World Award, also receiving a Tony Award nomination. He returned next in 1962 in the play Daughter of Silence as Carlo, following that with a role in the 1963 production of Strange Interlude. In 1964, he played Lyle Britten in Blues for Mister Charlie, and four years later he was Roberto in The Cuban Thing for its only performance on September 24, 1968. In 1971 he played Edgar in Dance of Death, and directed his first Broadway play in 1973: Look Away. He played The Son in the Broadway revival of The Glass Menagerie in 1975, and five years later played Don in Mixed Couples. Torn was absent from Broadway for thirteen years, but returned in 1993 to play Chris Christopherson in Anna Christie. In his last Broadway appearance he played Will Kidder in The Young Man from Atlanta in 1997.

Off Broadway[link]

Torn made his feature Off Broadway acting debut as Eben Cabot in the play Desire Under the Elms, followed by Peter in The Kitchen at the 81st Street Theatre. His third Off Broadway role was Marion-Faye-A-Pimp in The Deer Park, for which he won the 1967 Obie Award for Distinguished Performance. He performed at the Lucille Lortel Theatre in the play Dream of a Blacklisted Actor, and later in the Joseph Papp Public Theater's Anspacher Theater as William McLeod in Barbary Shore. He last acted Off Broadway at the American Place Theatre as Henry Hackamore in the play Seduced.

Torn's Off Broadway debut as director was for the Evergreen Theater with the play The Beard; he won the 1968 Obie for Distinguished Direction for that work. He next directed The Honest-to-God Schnozzia at the Gramercy Arts Theater, followed by Strindberg's Creditors and The Stronger – in which he acted beside his wife at the time, Geraldine Page and his future wife, Amy Wright – in the Anspacher Theater of the Joseph Papp Public Theater. Torn and Page also co-produced that production, and had previously presented the two plays along with Miss Julie at the off-off-Broadway Hudson Guild Theatre the year before.

[edit] The Larry Sanders Show

From 1992 to 1998 Torn played veteran television producer "Artie" on the HBO series The Larry Sanders Show, a satire about celebrity-driven Hollywood talk shows. For his work, Torn received six consecutive Emmy award nominations as Best Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series and won the award once (1996). Torn is the only actor on the show who won an Emmy Award for his work. Other than the Emmys, Torn received two American Comedy Awards nominations for Funniest Male Performance in a Series, winning once, and two CableACE Awards for his work on the show.

Later career[link]

Following The Larry Sanders Show, Torn has appeared in many comedic roles in films such as Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story, Freddy Got Fingered, Canadian Bacon and Rolling Kansas, as well as dramatic roles in films such as The Insider and Marie Antoinette. Torn is also known for his voice work, and has done voice-overs for many animated films. He lent his voice to the Jerry Seinfeld film Bee Movie.

In 2007 and 2008 Torn made five guest appearances on the Emmy-award winning NBC comedy 30 Rock as the fictional Chief Executive Officer of General Electric, Don Geiss. He was nominated for an Emmy Award in the category for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series, but lost to Tim Conway, who also guest starred in the same sitcom. Torn's character was reportedly killed off as a direct result of his 2010 arrest,^[7] though Tina Fey denied this in a DVD commentary. Torn voiced the character of Hephaestus in the 2010 video game, God of War III.

Torn also appears in the music video for the They Might Be Giants song Can't Keep Johnny Down, from their 2011 album Join Us.

Personal life[link]

Family[link]

Torn has been married three times and has six children:

Torn was married to actress Ann Wedgeworth from 1956 to 1961 with whom he had a daughter, Danae Torn.

After his divorce from Wedgeworth, he married the Oscar-winning actress Geraldine Page in 1963. Page and Torn remained married until her death in 1987. They had three children: Tony Torn, Jon Torn (an Electronic Media and Film teacher at Northern Arizona University^[8]) and actress Angelica Torn. Torn apparently delighted in the fact that their country estate was called Torn Page.^[9]

His first cousin, Sissy Spacek, lived with Torn and Page when she first moved to New York (circa 1966) to pursue a show business career. Torn helped her enroll in the Actors Studio.^[10]

He currently is married to actress Amy Wright with whom he has two children, Katie and Claire.

Legal troubles[link]

In January 2004 Torn was arrested in New York City after his car collided with a taxi. A video of his arrest in which he curses at officers and angrily refuses a breathalyzer test was aired on television news outlets. In October 2004 a jury acquitted Torn of any wrongdoing.^[11]

In December 2006 Torn was again arrested for drunk driving in North Salem, New York, after colliding with a tractor trailer. In April 2007 Torn pleaded guilty and had his driver's license suspended for 90 days and was required to pay a $380 fine.^[12]

On December 14, 2008, Torn was again arrested on suspicion of drunk driving. A bartender at the White Hart Inn in Salisbury, Connecticut reportedly served Torn, but apparently noticed he appeared intoxicated as he was leaving the establishment, according to a police report. Torn reportedly refused a ride home and got into his vehicle with a Christmas tree tied on top and drove away. He was convicted and sentenced to probation in May 2009.^[13]

On January 29, 2010, Torn was arrested after breaking into a closed Litchfield Bancorp branch office in Lakeville, Connecticut, where Torn maintains a residence. He was charged with carrying a firearm without a permit, carrying a firearm while intoxicated, first-degree burglary, second-degree criminal trespassing and third-degree criminal mischief. The Connecticut State Police said that Torn broke into the bank thinking it was his home.^[14] On February 1, 2010, Torn appeared in court where his attorney, A. Thomas Waterfall, told the judge that his client needed help with his alcohol abuse and that he could start treatment immediately in New York state. Torn was released on $100,000 bail. As a condition of his release, the judge said Torn must be evaluated for substance abuse. On August 11, 2010, Torn was denied special probation which would have allowed his name to be cleared of charges. The judge in the case cited Torn's history of alcohol abuse, and the possession of a loaded weapon while intoxicated, which carries a minimum one-year sentence.^[15] On December 14, 2010, Torn pled guilty to a litany of charges: reckless endangerment, criminal trespass, criminal mischief and the illegal carrying of a firearm and was given a two-and-a-half-year suspended jail sentence and three years probation.^[16][17]

On-set conflicts[link]

Appearing as an interview subject in Studs Terkel's 1974 oral-history book Working, Torn confessed, "I have certain flaws in my make-up. Something called irascibility. I get angry easily. I get saddened by things easily."^[18]

While filming Maidstone (1970) Torn, apparently unhappy with the film, struck director and star of the film Norman Mailer in the head with a hammer.^[19][20] With the camera rolling, Mailer bit Torn's ear and they wrestled to the ground. The fight continued until it was broken up by cast and crew members as Mailer's children screamed in the background.^[19] The fight is featured in the film. Although the scene may have been planned by Torn, the blood shed by both actors is real,^[19] and Torn was reportedly truly outraged by Mailer's direction.^[20]

In 1999 Torn filed a defamation lawsuit against Dennis Hopper over a story Hopper told on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.^[6] Hopper claimed that Torn pulled a knife on him during pre-production of the film Easy Rider (1969). According to Hopper, Torn was originally cast in the film but was replaced with Jack Nicholson after the incident. According to Torn's suit, it was actually Hopper who pulled the knife on him. A judge ruled in Torn's favor and Hopper was ordered to pay $475,000 in punitive damages. Hopper then appealed but the judge again ruled in Torn's favor and Hopper was required to pay another $475,000 in damages.^[5]

Filmography[link]

Notes[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Rip Torn

• Rip Torn at the Internet Movie Database
• Rip Torn | PlaybillVault.com
• Rip Torn at the Internet Broadway Database
• Rip Torn at the Internet Off-Broadway Database
• Rip Torn at The TV IV
• Production: Anna Christie—Working in the Theater Seminar video at American Theatre Wing.org, January 1993

All Saints
Painting by Fra Angelico
Also called	All Hallows, Hallowmas
Observed by	Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodoxy, Anglican Communion, Lutheranism[1] and Methodism,[2] among other Christian denominations
Liturgical Color	White
Type	Christian
Date	November 1 (Western Christianity) Sunday after Pentecost (Eastern Christianity)
Observances	Church services
Related to	All Hallow's Eve, All Souls' Day

All Saints' Day (in the Roman Catholic Church officially the Solemnity of All Saints and also called All Hallows or Hallowmas^[3]), often shortened to All Saints, is a solemnity celebrated on 1 November by parts of Western Christianity, and on the first Sunday after Pentecost in Eastern Christianity, in honour of all the saints, known and unknown. In the Western calendar it is the day after Halloween and the day before All Souls' Day.

In Western Christian theology, the day commemorates all those who have attained the beatific vision in Heaven. It is a national holiday in many historically Catholic countries. In the Catholic Church and many Anglican churches, the next day specifically commemorates the departed faithful who have not yet been purified and reached heaven. Christians who celebrate All Saints' Day and All Souls' Day do so in the fundamental belief that there is a prayerful spiritual bond between those in purgatory (the 'Church Suffering'), those in heaven (the 'church triumphant'), and the living (the 'church militant'). Other Christian traditions define, remember and respond to the saints in different ways; for example, in the Methodist Church, the word "saints" refers to all Christians and therefore, on All Saint's Day, the Church Universal, as well as the deceased members of a local congregation, are honoured and remembered.^[2][4]

In the East[link]

Eastern Orthodox icon of All Saints. Christ is enthroned in heaven surrounded by the ranks of angels and saints. At the bottom is Paradise with the bosom of Abraham (left), and the Good Thief (right).

Eastern Christians of the Byzantine Tradition commemorate all saints collectively on the first Sunday after Pentecost, All Saints' Sunday (Greek: Αγίων Πάντων, Agiōn Pantōn).

The feast of All Saints achieved great prominence in the ninth century, in the reign of the Byzantine Emperor, Leo VI "the Wise" (886–911). His wife, Empress Theophano—commemorated on December 16—lived a devout life. After her death in 893,^[5] her husband built a church, intending to dedicate it to her. When he was forbidden to do so, he decided to dedicate it to "All Saints," so that if his wife were in fact one of the righteous, she would also be honored whenever the feast was celebrated.^[6] According to tradition, it was Leo who expanded the feast from a commemoration of All Martyrs to a general commemoration of All Saints, whether martyrs or not.

This Sunday marks the close of the Paschal season. To the normal Sunday services are added special scriptural readings and hymns to all the saints (known and unknown) from the Pentecostarion.

In the late spring, the Sunday following Pentecost Sunday (50 days after Easter) is set aside as a commemoration of all locally venerated saints, such as "All Saints of America", "All Saints of Mount Athos", etc. The third Sunday after Pentecost may be observed for even more localized saints, such as "All Saints of St. Petersburg", or for saints of a particular type, such as "New Martyrs of the Turkish Yoke."

In addition to the Sundays mentioned above, Saturdays throughout the year are days for general commemoration of all saints, and special hymns to all saints are chanted from the Octoechos.

In the West[link]

The Western Christian holiday of All Saints' Day falls on November 1, followed by All Souls' Day on November 2, and is a Holy Day of Obligation in the Latin Rite of the Catholic Church.

The origin of the festival of All Saints celebrated in the West dates to May 13, 609 or 610, when Pope Boniface IV consecrated the Pantheon at Rome to the Blessed Virgin and all the martyrs; the feast of the dedicatio Sanctae Mariae ad Martyres has been celebrated at Rome ever since. There is evidence that from the fifth through the seventh centuries there existed in certain places and at sporadic intervals a feast date on 13 May to celebrate the holy martyrs.^[7] The origin of All Saints' Day cannot be traced with certainty, and it has been observed on various days in different places. However, there are some who maintain the belief that it has origins in the pagan observation of 13 May, the Feast of the Lemures, in which the malevolent and restless spirits of the dead were propitiated. Liturgiologists base the idea that this Lemuria festival was the origin of that of All Saints on their identical dates and on the similar theme of "all the dead".^[8]

The feast of All Saints, on its current date, is traced to the foundation by Pope Gregory III (731–741) of an oratory in St. Peter's for the relics "of the holy apostles and of all saints, martyrs and confessors, of all the just made perfect who are at rest throughout the world", with the day moved to 1 November and the 13 May feast suppressed.^[9]

This usually fell within a few weeks of the Celtic holiday of Samhain, which had a theme similar to the Roman festival of Lemuria, but which was also a harvest festival. The Irish, having celebrated Samhain in the past, did not celebrate All Hallows Day on this November 1 date, as extant historical documents attest that the celebration in Ireland took place in the spring: "...the Felire of Oengus and the Martyrology of Tallaght prove that the early medieval churches [in Ireland] celebrated the feast of All Saints on April 20."^[10]

A November festival of all the saints was already widely celebrated on November 1 in the days of Charlemagne. It was made a day of obligation throughout the Frankish empire in 835, by a decree of Louis the Pious, issued "at the instance of Pope Gregory IV and with the assent of all the bishops", which confirmed its celebration on November 1. The octave was added by Pope Sixtus IV (1471–1484).^[11]

The festival was retained after the Reformation in the calendar of the Anglican Church and in many Lutheran churches. In the Lutheran churches, such as the Church of Sweden, it assumes a role of general commemoration of the dead. In the Swedish calendar, the observance takes place on the Saturday between October 31 and November 6. In many Lutheran Churches, it is moved to the first Sunday of November. In the Church of England it may be celebrated either on 1 November or on the Sunday between 30 October and 5 November. It is also celebrated by other Protestants of the English tradition, such as the United Church of Canada, the Methodist churches, and the Wesleyan Church.^[12]

Protestants generally regard all true Christian believers as saints and if they observe All Saints Day at all they use it to remember all Christians both past and present. In the United Methodist Church, All Saints' Day is celebrated on the first Sunday in November. It is held, not only to remember Saints, but also to remember all those who have died who were members of the local church congregation.^[13] In some congregations, a candle is lit by the Acolyte as each person's name is called out by the clergy. Prayers and responsive readings may accompany the event. Often, the names of those who have died in the past year are affixed to a memorial plaque.

In many Lutheran churches, All Saints' Day and Reformation Day are observed concurrently on the Sunday before or after those dates, given Reformation Day is observed in Protestant Churches on October 31. Typically, Martin Luther's "A Mighty Fortress is Our God" is sung during the service. Besides discussing Luther's role in the Protestant Reformation, some recognition of the prominent early leaders of the Reformed tradition, such as John Calvin and John Knox, occurs. The observance of Reformation Day may be immediately followed by a reading of those members of the local congregation who have died in the past year in observance of All Saints' Day. Otherwise, the recognition of deceased church members occurs at another designated portion of the service.

Roman Catholic Obligation[link]

In Catholicism, All Saints' Day is a Holy Day of Obligation in many (but not all) countries, meaning going to Mass on the date is required unless one has a good reason to be excused, such as illness. However, in a number of countries that do list All Saints' Day as a Holy Day of Obligation, including England and Wales, the solemnity of All Saints' Day is transferred to the adjacent Sunday, if 1 November falls on a Monday or a Saturday, while in the same circumstances in the United States the Solemnity is still celebrated on November 1 but the obligation to attend Mass is abrogated.

Customs[link]

All Saints' Day at a cemetery in Sanok - flowers and light candles to honor the memory of deceased relatives. Poland, 1 November 2011

In Mexico, Portugal and Spain, offerings (Portuguese: oferendas, Spanish: ofrendas) are made on this day. In Spain the play Don Juan Tenorio is traditionally performed.

All Saints' Day in Mexico, coincides with the first day of the Day of the Dead (Dia de los Muertos) celebration. Known as "Día de los Inocentes" (Day of the Innocents), it honours deceased children and infants.

Portuguese children celebrate the Pão-por-Deus tradition, going door-to-door where they receive cakes, nuts and pomegranates. This only occurs in some areas around Lisbon.

Hallowmas in the Philippines is variously called "Undas" (based on the word for "[the] first"), "Todós los Santos" (literally "All Saints"), and sometimes "Áraw ng mga Patáy" (lit. "Day of the Dead"), which refers to the following day of All Souls' Day but includes it. While traditionally, Filipinos observed this day solemnly by visiting the graves of deceased relatives, offering prayers and flowers, lighting candles, cleaning and repairing the graves, this tradition is slowly dying. Instead it has been replaced by Filipinos spending the day, and often the entire night, picnicking and holding reunions at the cemetery near their loved ones. Many sing, bring Karaoke TV sets and musical instruments, and even burst fire crackers. In fact, for the past few years, the government has banned bringing of liquor, sharp instruments and guns due to incidents of drunkenness and resulting violence during the festival. [14]

In Argentina, Austria, Belgium, Chile, France, Hungary, Italy, Lebanon, Luxembourg, Malta, Portugal, Spain, and American cities such as New Orleans, people take flowers to the graves of dead relatives.

In Austria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Finland, Catholic parts of Germany, Hungary, Lithuania, Moldova, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia and Sweden, the tradition is to light candles and visit the graves of deceased relatives.

In English-speaking countries, the festival is traditionally celebrated with the hymn "For All the Saints" by William Walsham How. The most familiar tune for this hymn is Sine Nomine by Ralph Vaughan Williams. Catholics generally celebrate with a day of rest consisting of avoiding physical exertion.

Notes[link]

See also[link]

• Veneration of the dead
• Halloween
• Dziady
• Day of the Dead
• Irish calendar
• Litany of the Saints

External links[link]

• All Saints Day
• All Saints and All Souls Day American Catholic
•  "All Saints' Day". Catholic Encyclopedia. 1913. 
• All Saints Sunday Orthodox England
• A Vigil service for All Saints All Hallows' E'en - "Halloween"
• First Sunday after Pentecost, or All Saints Sunday by Sergei Bulgakov, Handbook for Church Servers
• Synaxis of All Saints Icon and Synaxarion of the feast
•  Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "All Saints, Festival of". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. 

This article includes a list of references, but its sources remain unclear because it has insufficient inline citations. Please help to improve this article by introducing more precise citations. (December 2010)

Saint Olaf of Norway
A medieval representation of Saint Olaf.
King and Martyr
Born	995
Died	29 July 1030(1030-07-29) (aged c. 35)
Honored in	Roman Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodox Church, Lutheran Church
Canonized	1164 by Alexander III
Major shrine	Trondheim
Feast	29 July; also 3 August (translation) and 16 October (conversion)[1][2]
Attributes	crown, axe, dragon
Patronage	carvers[disambiguation needed ]; difficult marriage; kings; Norway, Faroe Islands, Åland

Olaf II Haraldsson (995 – 29 July 1030) was King of Norway from 1015 to 1028. He was posthumously given the title Rex Perpetuus Norvegiae (English: Norway's Eternal King) and canonised in Nidaros (Trondheim) by Bishop Grimkell, one year after his death in the Battle of Stiklestad on 29 July 1030. Enshrined in Nidaros Cathedral. Olaf's local canonisation was in 1164 confirmed by Pope Alexander III, making him a universally recognized saint of the Catholic Church. The exact position of Saint Olaf's grave in Nidaros has been unknown since 1568, due to the Lutheran iconoclasm in 1536–37. Saint Olaf has today a prominent legal as well as cultural position in the country. He is symbolised by the axe in Norway's coat of arms, and the Olsok (29 July) is still his day of celebration. The Order of St. Olav is named after him.

Name[link]

Olaf II's Old Norse name is Ólafr Haraldsson. He was during his lifetime known as Olaf digre (modern orthography). Today, he is commonly referred to as Olav den hellige (Bokmål; Olaf the Holy) or Heilag-Olav (Nynorsk; the Holy Olaf) in honour of his sainthood.^[3]

Olaf Haraldsson had the given name Óláfr in Old Norse. (Etymology: Anu – "forefather", Leifr – "heir".) Olav is the modern equivalent in Norwegian, formerly often spelt Olaf. His name in Icelandic is Ólafur, in Faroese Ólavur, in Danish Oluf, in Swedish Olof. Olave was the traditional spelling in England, preserved in the name of medieval churches dedicated to him. Other names, such as Oláfr hinn helgi, Olavus rex, and Olaf are used interchangeably (see the Heimskringla of Snorri Sturluson). He is sometimes referred to as Rex Perpetuus Norvegiae (English: Norway's Eternal King), a designation which goes back to the thirteenth century. The term Ola Nordmann as epithet of the archetypal Norwegian may originate in this tradition, as the name Olav for centuries was the most common male name in Norway.

Background[link]

Statue of S. Olav (Austevold Church)

Olaf was born in Ringerike. His mother was Åsta Gudbrandsdatter, and his father was Harald Grenske, great-great-grandchild of Harald Fairhair, the first king of Norway. Harald Grenske died when Åsta Gudbrandsdatter was pregnant with Olaf. She later married Sigurd Syr, with whom she had other children including Harald Hardrada who would reign as a future king of Norway.

Saga Sources for Olaf Haraldsson[link]

There are many sources surrounding Olaf Haraldsson. The oldest source that we have is the Glaelognskvida or “Sea-Calm Poem,” was written by Porarinn Loftunga, an Icelander. It praises Olaf and mentions some of the famous miracles attributed to him. Olaf is also mentioned in the Norwegian synoptic histories. This includes the [Agrip af Noregskonungasogum] (c. 1190) and the Historia Norwegiae (c. 1160-1175) A Latin text, Historia de Antiquitate Regum Norwagiensium by the monk Theodoric the Monk (c.1177-1188).^[4]

Icelanders also wrote extensively about Olaf and we also have several Icelandic texts. These include: Fagrskinna (c. 1220) and Morkinskinna (c. 1225-1235). The famous Heimskringla (c. 1225), written by Snorri Sturluson largely bases its account of Olaf on the earlier Fagrskinna. We also have the important Oldest Saga of St. Olaf (c. 1200) which is important to scholars for its constant use of Skaldic verse, many of which are attributed to Olaf himself.^[4]

Finally, there are many hagiographic sources that describe St. Olaf, but many of these focus on the miracles of St. Olaf and cannot be used to accurately recreate Olaf’s life. A notable one is The Passion and the Miracles of the Blessed Oafr.^[5]

Olaf's death as depicted in later Heimskringla Manuscript

Reign[link]

A widely used description of Olaf's life is found in Snori Sturluson's Heimskringla, from c. 1225. That saga cannot be taken as an accurate source for Olaf's life, but most of the following description is based on the narrative there.

Norway in 1020

About 1008, Olaf landed on Estonian island Saaremaa (Osilia). The Osilians, taken by surprise, had at first agreed to pay the demands made by Olaf, but then gathered an army during the negotiations and attacked the Norwegians. Olaf nevertheless won the battle.^[6]

As a teenager he went to the Baltic, then to Denmark and later to England. Olaf saw it as his call to unite Norway into one kingdom, as his ancestor Harald I of Norway largely succeeded. On the way home he wintered with Duke Richard II of Normandy. This region had been conquered by the Norseman in the year 881. Duke Richard was himself an ardent Christian, and the Normans had also previously converted to Christianity. Before leaving, Olaf was baptized in Rouen.

Olaf returned to Norway in 1015 and declared himself king, obtaining the support of the five petty kings of the Uplands. Norway during the reign of St. Olaf (1015–1028) showing areas under the control of hereditary chieftains (petty kingdoms). In 1016 he defeated Earl Sweyn, hitherto the virtual ruler of Norway, at the Battle of Nesjar. He founded the town Borg by the waterfall Sarpsfossen, later to be known as Sarpsborg in Østfold county, Norway. Within a few years he had won more power than had been enjoyed by any of his predecessors on the throne.

He had annihilated the petty kings of the South, subdued the aristocracy, enforced the acceptance of Christianity throughout the kingdom,^{[citation needed]} asserted his suzerainty in the Orkney Islands, and conducted a successful raid on Denmark. He made peace with King Olof Skötkonung of Sweden through Þorgnýr the Lawspeaker, and was for some time engaged to his daughter, Princess Ingegerd Olofsdotter, though without Olof's approval.

In 1019 Olaf married Astrid Olofsdotter, Olof's illegitimate daughter and half-sister of his former fiancée. Their daughter Wulfhild married Ordulf, Duke of Saxony in 1042. Numerous royal, grand ducal and ducal lines are descended from Ordulf and Wulfrid, including the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. Maud of Wales, daughter of King Edward VII of the United Kingdom, was the mother of King Olav V of Norway, so Olav and his son Harald V, the present king of Norway, are thus descended from Olaf.

But Olaf's success was short-lived. In 1026 he lost the Battle of the Helgeå, and in 1029 the Norwegian nobles, seething with discontent, supported the invasion of King Canute the Great of Denmark. Olaf was driven into exile in Kievan Rus. During the exile he stayed some time in Sweden in the province of Nerike where, according to local legend, he baptized many locals. In 1030, Canute's Norwegian vassal king, Jarl Håkon Eiriksson, was lost at sea. Olaf seized the opportunity to win back the kingdom, but he fell at the Battle of Stiklestad, where some of his own subjects from central Norway were arrayed against him.

Canute, though distracted by the task of administrating England, managed to rule Norway for five years after Stiklestad, with his son Svein as viceroy. However, when Olaf's illegitimate son Magnus (dubbed 'the Good') laid claim to the Norwegian throne, Canute had to yield.

St Olaf with his axe on a bishop's crozier, walrus ivory, Norway c1375–1400 (Victoria and Albert Museum)

Problems of Olaf as Christianizing King[link]

Traditionally, Olaf has been seen as being significant to the Christianization of Norway. However, most Norse scholars now recognize that Olaf himself had little to do with the Christianization process. Olaf brought with him Grimkell, who is usually attributed with helping Olaf create episcopal sees and further organizing the Norwegian church. Grimkell, however, was only a member of Olaf’s household and no permanent see were created until c. 1100. Also, Olaf and Grimkell most likely did not introduce new ecclesiastical laws to Norway, but they were ascribed to Olaf at a later date. Olaf most likely did try to bring Christianity to the interior regions of Norway, where it was less prevalent.^[7]

Also, questions have been raised about the nature of Olaf’s Christianity itself. It seems that Olaf used his Christianity, like many Scandanavian Kings, in order to gain more power for the monarchy and centralize Norway. The Skaldic verses attributed to Olaf do not speak of Christianity at all, but in fact use Pagan references to describe romantic relationships and in some cases, his longing for an already married woman.^[4]

Anders Winroth, in his book The Conversion of Scandinavia tries to make sense of this problem by arguing that there was a “long process of assimilation, in which the Scandinavians adopted, one by one and over time, individual Christian practices.”^[8] Winroth certainly does not say that Olaf was not Christian, but he argues that we cannot think of any Scandinavians as quickly converting in a quick way as portrayed in the later hagiographies or sagas. Olaf himself is portrayed in later sources as a Saintly-miracle working figure to help support this quick view of conversion for Norway, although the historical Olaf did not act this way, as seen especially in the Skaldic verses attributed to him

Sainthood[link]

Olaf, a rather harsh ruler and prone to rough treatment of his enemies, ironically became Norway's patron saint. His canonization was performed only a year after his death by bishop Grimkell. The cult of Olaf not only unified the country, it also fulfilled the conversion of the nation, something for which the king had fought so hard. While divisive in life, in death Olaf wielded a unifying power no foreign monarch could hope to undo.^[9]

Owing to Olaf's later status as the patron saint of Norway, and to his importance in later medieval historiography and in Norwegian folklore, it is difficult to assess the character of the historical Olaf. Judging from the bare outlines of known historical facts, he appears, more than anything else, as a fairly unsuccessful ruler, who had his power based on some sort of alliance with the much more powerful King Canute the Great; who was driven into exile when he claimed a power of his own; and whose attempt at a reconquest was swiftly crushed.

This calls for an explanation of the status he gained after his death. Three factors are important: the later myth surround his role in the Christianization of Norway, the various dynastic relationships among the ruling families, and the needs for legitimization in a later period.^[10]

Conversion of Norway[link]

Modern wrought-iron vignettes of Olav's life on the door of a Stave church in Hardemo, Nerike, where Olav baptized locals during his escape

Silver pfennig coin of St. Olav from the period 1023–1028. Inscription OLAF R NORMANNORW ("Olaf King of the Norse")

Olaf and Olaf Tryggvasson together are traditionally associated as the driving forces behind Norway's final conversion to Christianity.^[11] However, large stone crosses and other Christian symbols suggest that at least the coastal areas of Norway were deeply influenced by Christianity long before Olav's time; with one exception, all the rulers of Norway back to Håkon the Good (c. 920–961) had been Christians; and Olav's main opponent, Canute the Great, was a Christian ruler. What seems clear is that Olav made efforts to establish a church organization on a broader scale than before, among other things by importing bishops from England, Normandy and Germany, and that he tried to enforce Christianity also in the inland areas, which had the least communication with the rest of Europe, and which economically were more strongly based on agriculture, so that the inclination to hold on to the former fertility cult would have been stronger than in the more diversified and expansive western parts of the country.

Many believe Olaf introduced Christian codification into the country in 1024, based upon the writing of the [Kuli stone]. This stone, however, is hard to interpret and we cannot be entirely sure what the stone is referring to.^[8] This codification was attributed to him in either case and so high did Olaf's legal arrangements for the Church of Norway come to stand in the eyes of the Norwegian people and clergy, that when Pope Gregory VII attempted to make clerical celibacy binding on the priests of Western Europe in 1074–5, the Norwegians largely ignored this, since there was no mention of clerical celibacy in Olaf's legal code for their Church. Only after Norway was made a metropolitan province with its own archbishop in 1153 —which made the Norwegian church, on the one hand, more independent of its king, but, on the other hand, more directly responsible to the Pope — did canon law gain a greater predominance in the life and jurisdiction of the Norwegian church.

Sigrid Undset noted that Olaf was baptized in Rouen, the capital of Normandy, and suggested that Olaf used priests of Norman descent for his missionaries. These priests would be of Norwegian descent, could speak the language^{[citation needed]}, and shared the culture of the people they were to convert^{[citation needed]}. Since the Normans themselves had only been in Normandy for about two generations, these priests might, at least in some cases, be distant cousins of their new parishioners and thus less likely to be killed when Olaf and his army departed. The few surviving manuscripts and the printed missal used in Archdiocese of Nidaros show a clear dependence on the missals used in Normandy^{[citation needed]}.

Olav den Helliges død
Peter Nicolai Arbo (1859)

It should be mentioned that King Olaf II's attempts to convert Norway involved coercion and violence,^{[citation needed]} as described in the Heimskringla and other sources.

Olaf's dynasty[link]

For various reasons, most importantly the death of King Canute the Great in 1035, but perhaps even a certain discontent among Norwegian nobles with the Danish rule in the years after Olaf's death in 1030, his illegitimate son with the concubine Alvhild, Magnus the Good, assumed power in Norway, and eventually also in Denmark. Numerous churches in Denmark were dedicated to Olaf during his reign, and the sagas give glimpses of similar efforts to promote the cult of his deceased father on the part of the young king. This would become typical in the Scandinavian monarchies. It should be remembered that in pagan times the Scandinavian kings derived their right to rule from their claims of descent from the Norse god Odin, or in the case of the kings of the Swedes at Old Uppsala, from Freyr. In Christian times this legitimation of a dynasty's right to rule and its national prestige would be based on its descent from a saintly king. Thus the kings of Norway promoted the cult of St. Olaf, the kings of Sweden the cult of St. Erik and the kings of Denmark the cult of St. Canute, just as in England the Norman and Plantagenet kings similarly promoted the cult of St. Edward the Confessor at Westminster Abbey, their coronation church.

Saint Olaf[link]

St. Olaf illustration for Olav den helliges saga, Heimskringla Gerhard Munthe. 1899

Among the bishops that Olaf brought with him from England, was Grimkell (Grimkillus). He was probably the only one of the missionary bishops who was left in the country at the time of Olaf's death, and he stood behind the translation and beatification of Olaf on 3 August 1031. Grimkell later became the first bishop of Sigtuna in Sweden.

At this time, local bishops and their people recognized and proclaimed a person a saint, and a formal canonization procedure through the papal curia was not customary; in Olaf's case, this did not happen until 1888.

Grimkell was later appointed bishop in the diocese of Selsey in the south-east of England. This is probably the reason why the earliest traces of a liturgical cult of St Olaf are found in England. An office, or prayer service, for St Olaf is found in the so-called Leofric collectar (c. 1050), which was bequeathed in his last will and testament by Bishop Leofric of Exeter to Exeter Cathedral. This English cult seems to have been short-lived.

Adam of Bremen, writing around 1070, mentions pilgrimage to Saint Olav's shrine in Nidaros, but this is the only firm trace we have of a cult of St. Olaf in Norway before the middle of the twelfth century. By this time he was also being referred to as Norway's Eternal King. In 1152/3, Nidaros was separated from Lund as the archbishopric of Nidaros. It is likely that whatever formal or informal — which, we do not know — veneration of Olav as a saint there may have been in Nidaros prior to this, was emphasised and formalized on this occasion.

During the visit of the papal legate, Nicholas Brekespear (later Pope Adrian IV), the poem Glaelognskvida, or “Sea-Calm Poem". In this poem, we hear for the first time of miracles performed by St. Olaf. One is the killing and throwing onto the mountain of a still visible sea serpent. One of these took place on the day of his death, when a blind man got his eyesight back again after having rubbed his eyes with hands that were stained with the blood from the saint.

The texts which were used for the liturgical celebration of St. Olaf during most of the Middle Ages were probably compiled or written by Eystein Erlendsson, the second Archbishop of Nidaros (1161–1189). The nine miracles reported in Glaelognskvida form the core of the catalogue of miracles in this office.

St. Olaf was widely popular in Scandanavian regions, including those outside of Norway. Numerous churches in Norway, Sweden, and Iceland were dedicated to him. His presence was even felt in Finland and many traveled from all over the Norse world in order to visit his shrine.^[12] Apart from the early traces of a cult in England, there are only scattered references to him outside of the Nordic area. Several churches in England were dedicated to him (often as St Olave). St Olave's Church, York is referred to in the Anglo Saxon Chronicle for 1055^[13] as the place of burial of its founder Earl Siward. This is generally accepted to be the earliest datable church foundation to Olaf and is further evidence of a cult of St Olaf in the early 1050s in England.

St. Olaf was also, together with the Mother of God, the patron saint of the chapel of the Varangians, the Scandinavian warriors who served as the bodyguard of the Byzantine emperor. This church is believed to have been located near the church of Hagia Irene in Constantinople. The icon of the Madonna Nicopeia,^[14] presently in St. Mark's Basilica in Venice, which is believed to have been one traditionally carried into combat by the Byzantine military forces, is believed to have been kept in this chapel in times of peace. Thus St. Olaf was also the last saint to be venerated by both the Western and Eastern churches before the Great Schism.

There is also an altar dedicated to St. Olaf in the church of Sant'Ambrogio e Carlo al Corso in Rome with a painting of the saint given to Pope Leo XIII in 1893 on the occasion of the golden jubilee of his ordination as a bishop by Wilhelm Wedel-Jarlsberg as its altarpiece.

Recently the pilgrimage route to Nidaros Cathedral, the site of St. Olav's tomb, has been reinstated. The route is known as Saint Olav's Way. The main route, which is approximately 640 km long, starts in the ancient part of Oslo and heads North, along Lake Mjosa, up the Gudbrandsdal Valley, over Dovrefjell and down the Orkdal Valley to end at Nidaros Cathedral in Trondheim. There is a Pilgrim's Office in Oslo which gives advice to Pilgrims, and a Pilgrim Centre in Trondheim, under the aegis of the Cathedral, which awards certificates to successful Pilgrims upon the completion of their journey. But, the relics of St. Olaf is no longer in the Nidaros Cathedral. They rest in St. Olaf's Cathedral in Oslo.

On 29 July the Faroe Islands celebrates Ólavsøka (Saint Olaf celebration), the National Day also, when they remember Saint Olaf, the king who Christianized the islands.^[15]

Propers of the Mass for the Feast of St. Olaf[link]

Entrance Verse:

Let us all rejoice in the Lord on the feast of blessed Olav, Norway's eternal king. The angels exult over his martyrdom and praise the Son of God.

Opening Prayer (Collect):

Almighty, eternal God, you are the crown of kings and the triumph of martyrs. We know that your blessed martyr, Olav, intercedes for us before your face. We praise your greatness in his death and we pray you, give us the crown of life that you have promised those who love you, through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever.

Old Testament Reading: Wisdom of Solomon 10: 10–14.

Responsory Psalm: Psalm 31 (30): 1–7 with the response: "Into your hands, Lord, I commend my spirit."

Epistle: James 1: 2–4, 12.

Allelua Verse:

Alleluia. Holy Olav, you who rejoice with the angels of heaven, pray for us that we may be worthy to present our sacrifice of praise before the Lord. Alleluia.

Gospel: Matthew 16:24–28

Prayer over the Offerings (Secret):

Almighty God, in awe we call upon your inscrutable might. Make holy these created things which you have chosen so that they may become the body and blood of Christ, your Son. Through the intercession of the holy Olav, king and martyr, let them for the salvation of body and soul. Through Christ our Lord.

Communion Verse:

Great is his glory through your saving help. With glory and honor will you clothe him, Lord.

Closing Prayer (Postcommunion):

We who have been fed at the table of the Lamb implore you, almighty God, through the intercession of your blessed martyr Olav let us always stand under the protection of your Son who redeemed us by his death on the cross, he who lives and reigns from eternity to eternity.

Other instances of St Olaf[link]

Faroe stamp featuring St. Olav

• St. Olaf College was founded by Norwegian immigrant Bernt Julius Muus in Northfield, Minnesota, in 1874.
• St Olav's Church is the tallest church in Tallinn, Estonia, and between 1549 and 1625 was the tallest building in the world.
• The coat of arms of the Church of Norway contains two axes, the instruments of Saint Olav's martyrdom.
• The oldest picture of St. Olav is painted on a column in the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem.
• The only country which keeps 29 July as a holiday is the Faroe Islands; see Ólavsøka.
• The Royal Norwegian Order of St. Olav was founded in 1847 by Oscar I, king of Norway and Sweden, in memory of this king.
• Saint Olaf Catholic Church [1] in downtown Minneapolis and the statue of the saint from the sanctuary.^[16]
• The Tower of St. Olav is the only remaining tower of the Vyborg Castle
• T.S.C Sint Olof is a Dutch student organisation with St. Olav as its patron.

Ancestry[link]

It is unlikely that Olaf II was a (partrilineal) descendant of Harald I.^[17] The ancestors in the following ahnentafel must be treated as legendary.