What's New OR: 'Yo, ladies ... What's happenin ?
Whatever Next ? [ Downs Lord Triptych / The Two Confessions / Amy-Faith & the Stronghold]
Dispatch dated 21st October 2003
Here, as promised ( see dispatch dated 14th October 2003 ), quarantined into its own separate page ( see across ), is the full text of:
[
IMPORTANT - PRIOR TO PERUSAL.
This script contains salty, even saucy, 18th century style plain speaking, wherein a spade is unlikely to be termed a manually operated excavation implement. Or in other words and in 21st century speak, BEWARE: ADULT CONTENT. ]
And
just in case you wondered, the title comes from the description of Mr W by his
exasperated monarch, George III
What more is there to say ? In Mr Wilkes own favourite and immortal words:
'I wish you joy !
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Inspired by the Wilkesian theme I also append a slight journalistic
piece, commissioned back in 2002 for some or other government department.
It never saw light of day for reasons that may become apparent ...
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WILKES
& LIBERTY - FOR ENGLAND !
That
loveable rogue, John Wilkes ( 1727 - 1797 ) would have absolutely loved
modern English politics. In playful
opposition to our present government, as stuffed with self-importance and
duplicity as it is with Scots, he'd have felt quite at home !
Tony
Blair would also find himself up against someone who'd fight fire with fire.
After all, it was Wilkes who said:
'Give
me a grain of truth and I will mix it up with a great mass of falsehood, so that
no chemist shall ever be able to separate them !'
New Labour's spinners would find Wilkes winging deliveries their way which would get even Mandy out. Shameless and thus immune to blackmail, brave as a lion, witty, charming and radical, Jack Wilkes, the man the London mob hailed with 'Wilkes and Liberty !' would cut a swathe through our modern day hollow men who are suits and spin and not much else.
So 'oos this bloke', you may ask, that should be around today ? And how come not much is made of him ? One pugnacious statue in Fetter Lane, one blue plaque on the site of his 'villakin' in Sandown, Isle of Wight ( now a ladies' dress shop - and how his ghost must relish lurking round the changing room there ) and, oh yes, Tony Banks MP, tribune of the people, is apparently rich enough to afford a collection of Wilkes-related antiques. That's about it.
That's it for the man who risked his neck to secure our right to elect candidates of our own, not the government's, choice; squint-eyed Jack who ensured the wise words of our MPs should be recorded for our perusal in Hansard ( against their bitter opposition, just like they fought tooth and nail to stop TV showing the empty chamber ). He who wore down an autocratic and Scots-dominated anti-English regime by his sturdy opposition and survived their hireling assassins; he who kick-stated the National Gallery project ... and all the rich rest of his crowded life: that's his nation's entire thanks and remembrance. A disgrace.
A disgrace but not entirely an accident I think. Because high in the modern obscurity-earning stakes, John Wilkes was the last English nationalist politician ...
Since at least George III ( Wilkes' inveterate enemy and coiner of the immortal phrase: 'that Devil Wilkes !' ) we have been ruled by British nationalists. German George said he 'gloried in the name of Briton'. Whether you date it from him or Scottish James I, from the misty past to the bright shiny present, the one thing guaranteed to get you a curled lip and ruling class condescension is a specifically English perspective.
Similar noises from the Scots and Welsh, being minor crew-components in HMS Britain, could be tolerated and bought off with English tax largesse and, recently, toy assemblies, but surly sounds from the English engine room are just too too ghastly, darling, - and highly dangerous for existing cosy arrangements.
Wilkes faced all that in the 18th century - and lost. He won other victories, he stayed alive until a ripe and roguish old age ( a result in itself ), but merely one man against a whole ruling class he lost the patriotic struggle. England as England went to sleep during the century and a half of Empire. 'For England - see Britain'.
Profiting from that era themselves, Scottish and Welsh gripes were kept to a grumble ignorable by London, articulated only by Jacobite nostalgics and neo-Druids.
But nothing lasts for ever. Not even Empires on which the sun never sets. A couple of World Wars later Britain found itself Empireless and alone. The EU came along and suddenly Scotland might do as well, if not better, outside Britain. They needed placating and got a Parliament - of sorts.
Yet paying the Danegeld carries hidden costs. Scottish and Welsh devolution has revived old issues thought safely buried centuries back. Veteran Labour gadfly, Tam Dalyell, formulated the so-called 'West Lothian Question' in response to devolution proposals in the 1970's, but it's become a burning question today. On the street that question is manifesting itself as a sea of Crosses of St George on houses and vehicles and clothing. And mostly, mark you, in the non Guardian/Independent reading, non big house owning, non au-pair and dinner party part of society. In other words, Wilkes' old mob constituency. Even the Guardian can't pretend they'll all in the BNP.
Of course, for some it's just World Cup fever and nothing more. Their flags will be folded away until Euro 2004 and gather dust in the interval. But not all or even most. They are the visible sign of something bigger going on ...
Still drowsy after centuries of zzzzz, the English are beginning to awake. It is a remarkable sight and an interesting time to be alive - if you're English.
And some are organising.
'Why
should they have a say in our affairs' asks Tony Linsell, Vice-Chairman of
the 4 year old 'Campaign for an English Parliament', speaking of Scottish and
Welsh MPs, 'when we're denied any input to theirs ?
We aren't extremists: we're simply asking for basic fairness !'
He's
right - and basic fairness is a tricky thing for politicians to deny.
They can't be against it - any more than politicians can be
against motherhood or fluffy animals. So
they try to ignore it. Thus says
Lord Chancellor Derry Irvine, the answer to the West Lothian question is to
simply 'stop asking it'.
But in case that's insufficient, maybe you can tug the rug from under these Saxon peasants asking impertinent questions. You could try and abolish England so that they'd have only memories to campaign about. You could claim to be enhancing democracy by splitting England into a set of competing 'regional assemblies' - toothless talking shops, home to unelected fifth rate politicians and dodgy business men flinging themselves at the gravy train. The EU will collaborate by ( alone of the historic nations of Europe ) erasing the name 'England' from the map of regions. A clever stratagem - if you can get away with it. Clever but high risk ...
So, what a shame that Wilkes isn't alive today, because he could have taken on their shabby tricks. Imagine his lightning wit pitted against 'verbally-challenged' John Prescott, supposedly architect of the project to Balkanise England. You could video the results and sell them as slapstick comedy. Or visualise Wilkes pitted against Blairite self-righteousness during Prime Minister's Question Time. As one of his former Scottish adversaries testified, smooth as he may have looked, a Wilkesian verbal mauling was 'as rough as a bear's arse'.
Alas, Wilkes died in 1797, cheerful and composed after a life replete with mobs and mistresses - but we can learn from him today. Strangely enough, as history turns full circle, his time has come again.
Look out for ambitious Young ( English ) Turks reading his biography.
June
2002
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