The Terrible Beauty of Grief
By Nick Cave
Seán O’Hagan: For me, lighting a candle for someone may be more an act of hope than faith. And I tend to think of it as one of the few residual traces of my Catholic upbringing.
Nick Cave: Perhaps, but to go into a church and light a candle is quite a consequential thing to do, when you think about it. It is an act of yearning.
Seán O’Hagan: I guess so. And yet I struggle with what it means exactly. It may be that it just makes me feel better about myself.
Nick Cave: I think at its very least it is a private gesture that signals a willingness to hand a part of oneself over to the mysterious, in the same way that prayer is, or, indeed, the making of music. Prayer to me is about making a space within oneself where we listen to the deeper, more mysterious aspects of our nature. I’m not sure that is such a bad thing to do, right?
Seán O’Hagan: No, not bad, but not rational, either. Then again, it may be that the most meaningful things are the most difficult to explain.
Nick Cave: Yes, I think so. And I do think the rational aspect of our selves is a beautiful and necessary thing, of course, but often its inflexible nature can render these small gestures of hope merely fanciful. It closes down the deeply healing aspect of divine possibility.
Seán O’Hagan: I have to say that I am slightly in awe of other people’s devotion. When I go into an empty church, it always feels meaningful somehow—and vulnerable—to just linger there for a moment or so. Do you know Larkin’s poem, ‘Church Going,’ which touches on that very thing?
Nick Cave: Yes! ‘A serious house on serious earth it is.’ And yes, there’s something about being open and vulnerable that is conversely very powerful, maybe even transformative.
For me, vulnerability is essential to spiritual and creative growth, whereas being invulnerable means being shut down, rigid, small. My experience of creating music and writing songs is finding enormous strength through vulnerability. You’re being open to whatever happens, including failure and shame. There’s certainly a vulnerability to that, and an incredible freedom.