Politics Then and Now(ish)

 

The BBC seems to be showing a lot of 'classic' comedy to fill the August TV vacuum . Some of it very far from classic (Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em, anyone?), but the Tuesday-night pairing of Yes, Minister and The Thick of It is both entertaining and instructive. Yes, Minister takes us back to an innocent, even polite age of politics, before the wrecker Blair and his thuggish henchmen ruined everything. Jim Hacker, a minister promoted way beyond his ability (surely that never happens?) is locked in perpetual battle with his urbane, devious and endlessly obstructive Permanent Secretary, Sir Humphrey Appleby. Last night's episode, from 1980, had some surprising contemporary resonances. It revolved around the government's efforts to establish a 'National Integrated Database', containing full details of every citizen (compiled, presumably, with snail's-pace computers and no internet). This was being strongly resisted because of its 'Big Brother' surveillance overtones, and citizens' fears of their data being seen by civil servants (how quaint), and Sir Humphrey is commendably determined to kick the whole thing into the long grass. It was interesting to see to what an extent the politicians were finding themselves balked at every turn by the civil servants – even before Blair politicised the service. At one point Hacker described HM Loyal Opposition as 'the opposition in exile' and the civil service as 'the opposition in residence'. Any members of HM's current government watching this would have laughed in weary recognition.
  And then it was down, down, down into the seething amoral snakepit of post-Blair politics with The Thick of It. Once again we have a minister promoted beyond their abilities, and an eminence grise controlling everything – not the smooth-talking Sir Humphrey but the blisteringly foul-mouthed bully Malcolm Tucker (a brilliant performance by Peter Capaldi, his vocabulary enhanced by the show's 'swearing consultant' Ian Martin). Here politics is all about image, how things will look: the policies don't matter, it's all about how the media will react, and that must be ruthlessly controlled with a mixture of low cunning and foul-mouthed intimidation by the appalling Malcolm. It rings all too true, and is probably a pretty fair picture of what went on under Blair and Brown at least. The bewildered minister at the centre of this relentless onslaught of PR panics and desperate firefighting is played by Rebeca Front, who is of course superb. What I had forgotten is that for the first two series the minister in question was a man (Hugh Abbot), played by Chris Langham, one of the finest comedy actors the BBC ever had on its books – but we shan't be seeing him again: he seems to have been 'disappeared', Soviet-style, following his conviction in 2007 for child sex offences. This seems to me a terrible shame – is it not possible to separate the man (or rather one aspect of the man) from his work, much of which certainly deserves to endure? 

Three Things

 1. Until I saw one of his pictures on Facebook today, I hadn't realised that Emile Zola (not one of my favourite authors) was an accomplished photographer. Above and below are two of his Paris street scenes, both looking very like Caillebotte paintings, but of course gloomier. Zola seems to have preferred taking his photographs in the rain, which must have posed some technical challenges in those days.  

2. Something cheering. This morning on Radio 3 I heard this simple but rather lovely (and topical) folk song, beautifully performed by Jay Ungar and Molly Mason, which I pass on to brighten this cold and dismal (here in Lichfield) Bank Holiday morning. Or I would, but YouTube is reluctant to yield it, so here's the link...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MrVVEd8dw08

3. It's John Betjeman's birthday (born 1906). As I've recently become a Friend of Lichfield Cathedral, this poem seemed strangely apposite, though Betj does seem not to entirely approve of the activities of  'The Friends of the Cathedral' – 

At the end of our Cathedral
    Where people buy and sell
It says “Friends of the Cathedral”,
    And I’m sure they wish it well.

Perhaps they gave the bookstall
    Of modernistic oak,
And the chairs for the assistants
    And the ashtrays for a smoke.

Is it they who range the marigolds
    In pots of art design
About “The Children’s Corner”,
    That very sacred shrine?

And do they hang the notices
    Off old crusader’s toes?
And paint the cheeks of effigies
    That curious shade of rose?

Those things that look like wireless sets
    Suspended from each column,
Which bellow out the Litany
    Parsonically solemn—

Are these a present from the Friends?
    And if they are, how nice
That aided by their echo
    One can hear the service twice.

The hundred little bits of script
    Each framed in passe-partout
And nailed below the monuments,
    A clerical “Who’s Who”—

Are they as well the work of Friends?
    And do they also choose
The chantry chapel curtains
    In dainty tea-shop blues?

The Friends of the Cathedral—
    Are they friendly with the Dean?
And if they do things on their own
    What does their friendship mean?

'Ashtrays for a smoke'! How times change, even in the cathedral. I like 'And do they hang the notices Off old crusaders' toes? And paint the cheeks of effigies That curious shade of rose?' The answer is surely no, at least to the latter.

My Conversation with the Queen

 Last night I had a remarkably real-seeming dream about the late Queen, who I believe was a regular in many people's dream repertoire. Death, it seems, has done nothing to change this. 
  So there I was, clutching a copy of a book everyone was talking about (already you can tell it's a dream) – it was called something like Is That with Milk or Cream? and was a very cosy affair, though it seemed to involve a marital break-up. The volume was so thin it was stapled, and there were charming line drawings by way of illustration. I was heading for a particular cafe to sit and read it, when who should appear from a side road, walking purposefully in a rather fetching blue coat, but the Queen, vintage mid 1980s or thereabouts. She was on her own, attracting friendly attention but nothing more, and was exchanging remarks with those who greeted her. All very relaxed. When I was finally seated in the cafe, in she came, still on her own, no retinue. She seemed to be a regular. As she made her way to her table, she noticed what I was reading and asked me what I made of it. I spluttered something and she let me know, coolly and politely, by word and gesture, that she didn't think much of it – the word 'thin' definitely came up. I wish I could remember the conversation that passed between us, though I fancy there wasn't much of it. No doubt I felt as Johnson did in his audience with George III: 'It was not my place to bandy civilities with my sovereign.' I did warm to her, though. 

The Wrights of Derby

 Last weekend my Derbyshire cousin and I stepped into the Derby Museum and Art Gallery to admire the Joseph Wrights which are its chief glory. Had we visited a couple of days later, there would have been two more Wright paintings to enjoy, as the gallery, in something of a coup, has acquired these two, A Girl Reading a Letter with an Old Man Reading over Her Shoulder and Two Boys Fighting over a Bladder, on long loan from a private owner. This is particularly welcome, as these two have only been seen in public four times in the past 250 years. While neither is a full-on masterpiece, both look to be full of interest and both vividly demonstrate the kind of dramatic chiaroscuro effects that were at the heart of Wright's art. 'Two boys fighting over a bladder' might seem a strange subject for a painting, but inflated bladders, used as children's playthings, turn up in Dutch 17th and 18th-century art, and the possibilities of light shining through an inflated bladder were not lost on Wright, whose works also include A Boy Blowing a Bladder in Candlelight (Wolverhampton Art Gallery), Two Boys with a Bladder (J. Paul Getty Museum) and Two Boys by Candlelight, Blowing a Bladder (Huntington Art Museum). Derby also has Boy and Girl with a Bladder by William Tate in its collection.
  Anyway, with or without inflated bladders and girls reading letters, the Joseph Wright gallery is a glorious sight – even if, as it was when we visited, it also contains rows of forward-facing chairs awaiting a wedding ceremony. These days provincial museums and galleries must do whatever it takes to survive. 

Levet: 'Obscurely wise, and coarsely kind'

 On Anecdotal Evidence today, Patrick Kurp mentions W.E. Henley's anthology Lyra Heroica: A Book of Verse for Boys. This was one of my father's favourite books, and I still have his copy of the 1940 reprint, bought during his wartime service and inscribed 'E.R. Andrew. 99579, R.E.M.E.' It even carries the label of the bookshop where he bought it – the Modern Library & Stationery Store, Jaffa and Haifa. As an anthology, it's not a bad introduction to English poetry, from Shakespeare and Drayton to Kipling and, yes, Henley. While the celebration of 'the dignity of resistance, the sacred quality of patriotism' is everywhere apparent, there are many poems with nothing of patriotic sinew-stiffening about them. Opening the book at random, I found this by Samuel Johnson, under the title 'The Quiet Life'. It is more usually known as 'On the Death of Dr Robert Levet', and it touchingly celebrates the life of a good man...

Condemned to Hope’s delusive mine,

    As on we toil from day to day,

By sudden blasts, or slow decline,

    Our social comforts drop away.

Well tried through many a varying year,

    See Levet to the grave descend;

Officious, innocent, sincere,

    Of every friendless name the friend.

Yet still he fills Affection’s eye,

    Obscurely wise, and coarsely kind;

Nor, lettered Arrogance, deny

    Thy praise to merit unrefined.

When fainting Nature called for aid,

    And hovering Death prepared the blow,

His vigorous remedy displayed

    The power of art without the show.

In Misery’s darkest cavern known,

    His useful care was ever nigh,

Where hopeless Anguish poured his groan,

    And lonely Want retired to die.

No summons mocked by chill delay,

    No petty gain disdained by pride,

The modest wants of every day

    The toil of every day supplied.

His virtues walked their narrow round,

    Nor made a pause, nor left a void;

And sure the Eternal Master found

    The single talent well employed.

The busy day, the peaceful night,

    Unfelt, uncounted, glided by;

His frame was firm, his powers were bright,

    Though now his eightieth year was nigh.

Then with no throbbing fiery pain,

    No cold gradations of decay,

Death broke at once the vital chain,

    And freed his soul the nearest way.

Robert Levet was one of the little community of misfits and unfortunates that Johnson gathered around him. 'Levet is a brutal fellow,' Johnson remarked to Boswell, 'but I have a good regard for him, for his brutality is in his manners and not in his mind.' Johnson admired Levet for his piety and his devotion to ministering to the medical needs of the poor (though he was barely qualified). This admiration of course baffled Boswell, who described Levet as 'of strange grotesque appearance, stiff and formal in his manner, and seldom said a word while any company was present'. Levet's patients often had nothing to pay him with but gin, so he often came home quite drunk – 'perhaps the only man,' said Johnson, 'who ever became intoxicated through motives of prudence.' 
Levet makes a memorable, if mute, appearance in Beckett's fragmentary drama Human Wishes, set in the household of Dr Johnson: 

Enter LEVETT, slightly, respectably, even reluctantly drunk, in great coat and hat, which he does not remove, carrying a small black bag. He advances unsteadily into the room & stands peering at the company. Ignored ostentatiously by Mrs D (knitting), Miss Carmichael (reading), Mrs W (meditating), he remains a little standing as though lost in thought, then suddenly emits a hiccup of such force that he is almost thrown off his feet. Startled from her knitting Mrs D, from her book Miss C, from her stage meditation Mrs W, survey him with indignation. L remains standing a little longer, absorbed & motionless, then on a wide tack returns cautiously to the door, which he does not close behind him. His unsteady footsteps are heard on the stairs. Between the three women exchange of looks. Gestures of disgust. Mouths opened and shut. Finally they resume their occupations.

Mrs W:  Words fail us.

Bach, Offenbach and Debussy?

 Another day, another birthday – and another man-and-dog photo. This is Claude Debussy, with his dogs Boy and Xanto. Debussy, often described as the first 'impressionist' composer – a label which, like Manet, he vehemently rejected – was born on this day in 1844. Here is one of my Debussy favourites, 'Jardins sous la Pluie' – as many jardins have been this soggy summer...

Caillebotte

 This remarkable photograph shows the French painter Gustave Caillebotte (born on this day in 1844) in the Place du Caroussel in 1892 with his dog Bergère. Though smartly dressed, Caillebotte looks pretty rough, as if he's had a heavy night. The photograph was taken by Gustave's brother Martial, who was not only a photographer but a very eminent philatelist. Indeed, the important collection he and Gustave formed is now part of the British Library's philatelic collection.