I would have forgiven a lot - but not “troops against miners” in the closing passage.
Robert > On 29 Jan 2015, at 12:29, Sandy Finlayson <[email protected]> wrote: > > PS. Apologies! What I sent was from this week's Spectator magazine. > > -------- > Sandy Finlayson > Philadelphia, PA > > >> On Jan 29, 2015, at 7:26 AM, Sandy Finlayson <[email protected]> wrote: >> >> And here's another take on Paxman's (on the whole) fair approach to >> Churchill. >> ----------------- >> In January 1958, the British government began working on the significantly >> titled Operation Hope Not: its plans for what to do when Winston Churchill >> died. The plans, it turned out, wouldn’t be needed until January 1965 — but >> the intervening seven years were obviously well spent, because, as >> Churchill: A Nation’s Farewell (BBC1, Wednesday) made resoundingly clear, >> the farewell in question was a triumph. London came to a standstill and Big >> Ben fell silent as huge crowds watched the procession of the coffin from >> Westminster to the spectacular state funeral in St Paul’s — and its boat >> journey along the Thames afterwards. >> >> For the 50th anniversary, Jeremy Paxman talked us through the day with the >> aid of some of those who took part. A member of the bearer party recalled >> how, going up the steps of St Paul’s, the coffin had begun to slide off the >> bearers’ shoulders — and how he’d said aloud, ‘Don’t worry, sir, we won’t >> let you down.’ Asked about the many tears he’d provoked, the cathedral >> trumpeter explained with some satisfaction that, ‘The “Last Post” always >> gets them.’ One of the bellringers remembered nipping out on to a gallery >> for a look at the service, and being confronted with the unexpected sight of >> a garden shed — inside which Richard Dimbleby was doing his TV commentary. >> >> The programme also featured the memories of the Churchill family, and >> several contributions from Boris Johnson, who claimed that these days >> Churchill would be ‘a terrific blogger and a self-Googler of epic >> proportions’. Paxman himself supplied the somehow melancholy news that >> Churchill and Mrs Thatcher are now the only former prime ministers in Madame >> Tussauds. >> But despite these many treats, the most surprising aspect of the programme >> was possibly inadvertent. In the approved BBC way, Paxman regularly >> emphasised how much the country has changed since Churchill’s death. And >> yet, in between times, both the tone and content of almost everything else >> wouldn’t have been out of place 50 years ago. If you just read the >> transcripts, in fact, it would often have been hard to distinguish Paxo’s >> words from those of Richard Dimbleby. >> >> Admittedly, Paxman probably wouldn’t, as Dimbleby did, refer to St Paul’s as >> ‘the great mother church of the Commonwealth’. Dimbleby probably wouldn’t >> choose, as Paxman did, to tell us what Britain was like in the 1960s (pretty >> swinging, apparently) while driving a Mini that he could barely fit into. >> Nonetheless, Paxman’s line was essentially that we shall never see >> Churchill’s like again, and that ‘when the nation needed it, he expressed >> the determination of a bulldog’. (On a particularly old-school note, he also >> used ‘England’ and ‘Britain’ interchangeably.) >> At one stage, Paxman met an ex-docker who declared that, like most >> working-class people, he didn’t like Churchill much and revealed that his >> colleagues had to be paid to lower the cranes that bowed so movingly towards >> the boat carrying Churchill’s coffin. But even when faced with such a >> spoilsport, Paxman didn’t hesitate for long. Churchill, he pointed out, may >> have been no friend to the trade unions, but ‘he did lead the fight against >> German fascism’. And with that, it was back to the eulogy. >> >> All of which made Martin Bell’s contribution seem distinctly odd. Wearing >> what he clearly (if a little tragically) still regards as his ‘trademark’ >> white suit, Bell remembered covering the day as a young reporter. The >> funeral, he concluded ringingly, ‘represented the passing of the old >> Britain’ — a verdict that rather suggests that he didn’t see the rest of the >> programme. >> >> >> >>> On Jan 29, 2015, at 5:34 AM, 'Antoine Capet' via ChurchillChat >>> <[email protected]> wrote: >>> >>> For those who watched J. Paxman's BBC programme last night : comments in >>> The Guardian : >>> >>> Winston Churchill defended as Paxman calls him ‘ruthless egotist’ >>> >>> http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jan/20/winston-churchill-anniversary-jeremy-paxman >>> >>> >>> Antoine CAPET, FRHistS >>> Professor emeritus of British Studies >>> University of Rouen >>> 76821 Mont-Saint-Aignan >>> France >>> [email protected] >>> >>> 'Britain since 1914' Section Editor >>> Royal Historical Society Bibliography >>> >>> Reviews Editor of CERCLES >>> http://www.cercles.com/review/reviews.html >>> -- >>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >>> "ChurchillChat" group. >>> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an >>> email to [email protected]. >>> To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. >>> Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/churchillchat. >>> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "ChurchillChat" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/churchillchat. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "ChurchillChat" group. 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