Cocktails and Records

I’m sorry to be getting all angsty this past week, but what is wrong with this country at the moment?

It was only earlier this week that I was bemoaning the fact that nearly half of the British population allegedly believe that the BBC isn’t good value for money. Now I discover that the nation’s favourite author is Enid Blyton.

Now, I’ve nothing against Enid Blyton. I devoured her books when I was a child and there will always be a very firm place in my heart for the faraway tree, the wishing chair, Mr Meddle, Mr Pink Whistle, the naughtiest girl in the school, Julian, Dick and Anne, George and Timmy the dog et. al.

Enid taught me all about the mysterious ‘English’ world of ginger beer, school monitors, lacrosse, conkers, bluebell woods, secret passwords and hidden passageways, wobbling blancmanges, sugar mice, moors, mists and marshes and outsmarting smugglers  - but I would never say that she was my favourite author.

Although I loved her imagination and her alternate world where fairies bake ‘pop biscuits’ and children are always right, even as a child I knew that Enid’s stories were simplistic, repetitive and churned out at a rate of knots.

Citing Enid Blyton (or indeed Roald Dahl and JK Rowling, second and third on the list respectively) as your favourite author when you’re over the age of 12 is more than just longing wistfully for some nostalgic past that never existed, it’s a refusal to engage with adult issues full stop. Surely the people who voted for her don’t still read about the adventures of the Secret Seven with a torch under the blankets? Haven’t they moved on?

On the positive side, it’s nice that people don’t have to pretend that they love Chaucer or Shakespeare; they can unashamedly state that their favourite author is the woman behind the ghastly Noddy…

Rant over. Normal service (i.e. boring anecdotes about public transport etc.) will resume next week.

I had a strange night last night. There I was, sitting at home, feet up in front of the TV, when I started to find myself feeling sorry for Margaret Thatcher.

The cause of this was BBC4 drama Margaret Thatcher: The Long Walk to Finchley which fictionalises the life of the young Margaret Thatcher and her quest to be elected to parliament. The programme suggests that Thatcher was constantly held back by Conservative constituency party members because she was from the ‘wrong background’ and because ‘a mother’s place is in the home’.

Oh, she was still annoying, power obsessed and downright bossy, but by God, the sexist old men who tried to keep her down would test anyone. So for the first time in my life, I found myself egging Margaret Thatcher on as she experienced 8 years of being patronised because of her gender.

I feel kind of dirty now.  

I met my heavily pregnant friend for afternoon tea the other day. Inevitably, the conversation turned to baby names.

Perhaps you should call the baby Chardonnay or Cosmopolitan I quipped, referring to some of our favourite tipples. ‘Don’t joke’ she replied ‘Someone in my pre-natal classes already has twin girls called Moët and Chandon.’

Shouldn’t there be a law to stop this kind of thing?

Stuff New Year. It is my birthday this week and I’m celebrating 33 years of not being run over, having my house burnt down or contracting a random disease. Always an acheivement in my book.

Obviously age has been on my mind lately, as it always is this time of year. The concept has been made even more salient for me by the strange combination of the American elections and a book I’m reading, The Social History of London by Roy Porter.

Listening to the analysis of the caucuses taking place in Iowa this week, I’ve heard more than a few people say that Barack Obama is too young and inexperienced. He is 46.

In The Social History of London, Roy Porter points out that William Pitt the Younger (British Prime Minister, 1783 - 1801, 1804 - 1806) was actually a reasonably good Prime Minister. He was 24 when he was first elected.

The book doesn’t mention whether the nation was aghast at Pitt’s youthful inexperience. I know Pitt the Younger is an extreme example, but maybe people were used to shorter life spans and young monarchs “running” the country back then (even though good old Queen Elizabeth II was 26 at her coronation I think).

In any case, I wonder how much our perceptions of age have changed over time?

And what exactly does old age have to offer other than conservatism and wisdom (allegedly) anyway?

Most great works of genius were done by younger people - Newton had discovered the laws of gravity by 25, Martin Luther had nailed his 95 Theses to the church door and kickstarted the reformation in his early 30s, Einstein had come up with the basics behind the theory of relativity by 26, Mozart had composed most of his repertoire by 30 and Marx had written The Communist Manifesto by around the same age. And by the time he was 26/27 George Harrison was an ex-Beatle.

This tradition of youthful over-achievement is made even more strange by the way our society continuously demonises young people - they’re all ASBO collecting, saddo 80s clothes wearing, knife wielding, binge-drinking, shallow consumerist, obese, lazy, Facebook addicted, media ’sleb/porn star wannabees. 30-somethings like me live protracted youths, desparately pretending that we are still young and cool and down with the kids. Younger people, particularly in their teens and 20s are definitely not perceived to be writing the political manifestos of tomorrow or turning science on its head.

I have no answers and I’m quite happy to be getting older, but the question of age does interest me - particularly how we so often seem to see youth as bad and as a problem to be solved, middle age as good, and older people, again, as an unwanted problem we wish would go away.

On a positive slant, I’ve bought myself seasons 1 & 2 of The Mighty Boosh as a birthday present. I think Noel Fielding was 31 or so when he wrote it so it should be ok, but Julian Barratt was an ancient 35…

Whilst sitting outside eating my sandwiches this lunchtime, I started thinking that I should make a personal commitment to never eating crappy supermarket cheese ever again. This inevitably led to me thinking about other ethical decisions I could also make if I had any moral fibre/will power whatsoever.

What I would really like to do is to swear that I will never step foot in another Odeon, Vue or similar chain cinema in my life. We saw the new Harry Potter movie a few weeks back and whilst the movie was good, it certainly had its work cut out to lift the misery of seeing it at Islington Vue. What a completely soul destroying dump that place is – hidden, almost embarrassed like in a shopping centre, a machine selling you tickets rather than a person, harsh strip lighting illuminating heavy duty flooring, all roads leading to the overpriced crappy junk food.

It’s hard to believe that once upon a time movie theatres were built as fantastic temples to escapism where the whole experience of going out was special and exciting. Somewhile ago we went to see Sunset Boulevard at Finsbury Park Astoria (ironically once an Odeon, now an evangelical church run by the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God) and even the hideous rows of bibles and religious scaremongering paraphernalia in the foyer couldn’t detract from the excitement and thrill engendered by the building. Now most cinemas don’t even try to pretend that screening films is anything more than a way of fleecing as much cash out of you as possible.

Sadly, I’ve got to hand it to religion on this one - they understand the importance of good design and how architecture can raise your spirits and change your perceptions – in a way that the real palaces of our dreams do not.