If that wasn't naff I don't know what is! After an hour the family had switched the box off and friends were phoning me up or texting saying how awful the whole thing was (maybe we were just spoiled by the Chinese). Would have been better off doing slum dog east end or how "we" bombed Jerry.
But here's the thing: England's always thought it was the centre of the world; a strange kind of inwardness that pushed to the extreme becomes xenophobic-as well one might expect from an island nation. As the kids today might say: anal.
You've always thought that England is best when it does small-things like afternoon tea and religion; whenever it goes big it looks rather ridiculous (colonialism, for instance). And of course, "only connect" is something that one struggles with..no, just leave me alone with my tea and newspapers...
The papers have played it up as eccentric and irreverent, as being a reflection of the quintessential "English character". Not sure if that's true..I mean, like any other self-perceptions that people have of themselves-like the 'stiff upper lip' (which, incidentally, was apparently an Americanism!)-there's a grain of truth to them. But the ideals we hold up to ourselves and other people say more about us whether they're true reflections or not. Mr. Bean, for example, is not eccentric. Spike, on the other hand...
Someone once wrote that the scene of English fiction is always the home whereas America, with its wide open spaces, allows for and encourages an engagement with bigger issues. So, the insular, parochial, fake inwardness character...is that really just shyness? In any case, there's something quite claustrophobic about all this domesticity.
The man of action is never the hero of English letters...
But there is a tendency with the English to dislike writes who fail to sustain their stay-at-home virtues, who fail , indeed, to devote themselves to the occasionally poetic business of nothing very much happening all the time.
Nicholson:
You've always thought that England is best when it does small-things like afternoon tea and religion; whenever it goes big it looks rather ridiculous (colonialism, for instance). And of course, "only connect" is something that one struggles with..no, just leave me alone with my tea and newspapers...
The papers have played it up as eccentric and irreverent, as being a reflection of the quintessential "English character". Not sure if that's true..I mean, like any other self-perceptions that people have of themselves-like the 'stiff upper lip' (which, incidentally, was apparently an Americanism!)-there's a grain of truth to them. But the ideals we hold up to ourselves and other people say more about us whether they're true reflections or not. Mr. Bean, for example, is not eccentric. Spike, on the other hand...
Someone once wrote that the scene of English fiction is always the home whereas America, with its wide open spaces, allows for and encourages an engagement with bigger issues. So, the insular, parochial, fake inwardness character...is that really just shyness? In any case, there's something quite claustrophobic about all this domesticity.
The man of action is never the hero of English letters...
But there is a tendency with the English to dislike writes who fail to sustain their stay-at-home virtues, who fail , indeed, to devote themselves to the occasionally poetic business of nothing very much happening all the time.
Nicholson:
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