A Functional Art
Reflections of a Hymn Writer

One of the finest and most influential hymn-writers of our age, Timothy Dudley-Smith has published around 400 hymn texts. In this fascinating book, the author explores not only the writing of hymns but many other aspects including the study and singing of them. It is not a history, a text book, or an academic treatise, but the personal reflections of an experienced practitioner who has been speaking and writing on this subject, on both sides of the Atlantic, for more than fifty years. His armchair reflections draw freely on the writings of others, and in a discursive, almost conversational, style.

Educated at Cambridge University, Timothy Dudley-Smith was ordained in 1950 as assistant curate of St Paul's Church, Northumberland Heath. From 1953 he was head of the Cambridge University Mission in Bermondsey, London, and in the 1960s served as secretary of the Church Pastoral Aid Society. In 1973 he became Archdeacon of Norwich and in 1981 Bishop of Thetford; he retired in 1991. He is a Fellow of the Hymn Society of the United States and Canada, and in 2003 was appointed an honorary vice-president of the Hymn Society of Great Britain and Ireland. In the same year he was awarded an OBE for services to hymnody.