When Truth is Stranger than Fiction

I've had a couple of days off work, sick.  I'm not very good at having sick days.  I know some people can enjoy them but I feel guilty, even when I'm sleeping a lot.

I've spent the last two days watching House of Cards on Netflix and keeping up with what is going on in our bizarre political world at the moment.  I started to worry that I was getting the two confused but it turns out that the real life stuff is weirder than the drama.

I fell asleep during a episode (sorry, chapter) of the first series and when I woke up Tony Blair was looking tired and emotional and talking about the Iraq war. After an hour and a half he'd pulled himself together and was looking like someone who was quite enjoying himself. Journalists had been given three hours to read a 2.6million word report before they interviewed him. I read at about 200 words a minute, so it would take me 9 days and nights, only longer because it seems like the kind of book that would help insomnia. I'm so impressed with those journos. Most have hardly slept since the whole Brexit thing as well.

I was confused. Then Michael Gove appeared and said something sinister to the camera. "You might think that but I couldn't possibly comment." No. That was a dream. I think.

     Huffington Post had the same dream

Today, I had reached the second series where Gove had been replaced by a woman. A woman who knows how to shoot a gun. There was speculation that her CV was a work of fiction. Financial journalists claimed they had never seen her at any of the meetings she had claimed to be at. 

Her supporters organised a rally. "Meet your new Vice President, Andrea Leadsom." She was supposed to give an in depth post Brexit financial analysis but said something about it not being so bad, really. It was worse after the last financial crisis that plunged us into recession for years and it hasn't even happened yet. She suggested that people just needed to be positive, so her supporters said, "Yes, too right, what-ho. Let's have a march like those jolly chaps that support Corbyn do and doesn't she have nice hair."

They tried but they weren't very good at it. They spilled out onto the street and milled around, wondering who had the jug of Pimms. Eventually, they walked, chanting, "What do we want?....Leadsom for Prime Minister.....When do we want it?.....right now (please)" One woman clutched her pearls (literally and possibly figuratively). Never have you seen a group of people less comfortable in a Tshirt. They were tucked neatly into jeans or worn over a shirt and tie. A dog barked. 

Then white powder was discovered in some mail. The White House went on lockdown, while the VP's wife told the world she'd been raped but that was the fiction. In real life the white powder had caused the Lords to be ushered out onto the balcony, where they were fed ice cream.

I'm really looking forward to getting back to work, where the children won't confuse me. 

Those Foreign Books Coming Over Here and Telling us their Stories

It's been quite a depressing few days.  What with the Farrage barrage and the Times revealing that Michael Gove intends to change the English Literature GCSE syllabus, so that children no longer study books that aren't English it seems as though everyone in the UK (except those that I actually know to talk to about these things) are terrified of anything 'foreign'.

I know I'm naive about politics but I will never understand how only about 1/3 of the eligible population vote and when they do they vote for a party whose only policy seems to be to not want to be part of the council they've just been elected to.  It seems as though they won the votes of the poor, the uneducated and the tabloid readers (according to the BBC) by instilling fear of foreigners.

I wasn't going to write about politics so I will stop now but the book thing is just something I couldn't avoid writing about and I have quite a bit to say (just warning you) and my thoughts are confused.

 I love books and I get quite upset at the thought that anyone can think a book is bad.  Especially, a book being bad because of the nationality of the author. It worries me.  I think of Nazi Germany where Hitler banned anything that wasn't German and burnt books.  It didn't really work too well for him in the end.  The Germans only had their German music but we could listen to anything, so we corrupted theirs (Lily Marlene and Beethoven's 5th spring to mind). Maybe burning books stopped people reading but it didn't stop them remembering or telling other people about what they'd read.

On the other hand I don't really mind if they change the English Literature syllabus.  Pupils study a small number of books and most never actually read those books.  They read little bits and discuss those little bits and if they run out of time to finish reading in class they watch the film.  I know this because my son's English teacher told me that it really 'wasn't necessary' for him to read the whole book.  Would my son's life be any worse for not answering questions about 'To Kill a Mockingbird'?   The truth is that I think it's a great book and I think he should have read it and reading it might change his perspective but I think he should have read lots of books.  In fact, he did decide to read the whole book (the day before the exam!) and the act of reading it in one sitting has convinced him that reading is a good thing to do. I do worry that if a boring book is chosen to replace it then children like him would not get turned onto reading.

Choosing books because they're English could be very confusing. Could books by English authors set in foreign countries be on the curriculum? What about books written by British people who are living in another country? Or books about the UK written by people from other countries? We don't really know what Mr Gove is thinking because the details are vague but we do know that he studied literature at University and has confessed to hating Of Mice and Men. He is entitled to his opinion and as a widely read person he will be able to prefer some books over others. I'm not surprised at his dislike of this book, which don't fit with his personal ideology. I didn't like Alan Hollingsworth's Line of Beauty for the same but opposite reason.  I wonder if he is banning these books because they are too left wing?

I sort of hope that the political leanings of the books is the real reason for their removal from the syllabus. The alternative is too horrific. If only British things can be taught in schools then no more chemistry (periodic table invented by a Russian, Mendeleev), we would have to teach that the earth is the centre of the solar system or that the world was flat. Driving would be a bit tricky as I'm sure Karl Benz wasn't English and we'd have to get rid of the roads that those pesky Romans brought here. 

I'm sure people who set the exams will be widely  read and will be able to find books by British authors that will annoy Gove just as much. If not I have a few suggestions.

1. The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists Robert Tresssel

2. Hard Times - Charles Dickens

3. Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy

4. How Green was my Valley - Robert Llewellyn

5. PD James - the Children of Men

6. Living - Henry Green

7. Fahrenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury

8. Wuthering Heights - Bronte

9. The Time Machine - HG Wells

10. The Hired Man - Melvyn Bragg

11. Peaches for M Le Curee - Joanne Harris.

12. Brave New World - Aldous Huxley

13. 1984 - George Orwell

14. A Room of One's Own - Virginia Woolf

15. The Golden Notebook - Dorris Lessing.

Actually, after 15 books off the top of my head he probably should just ban all books. Books are dangerous - they could give people ideas!

And just to prove how confused my thoughts are on the subject I start to wonder if Gove has done us all a huge favour. He's got us talking about books. People are reading Of Mice and Men to find out why he hates it so much (all most of us can remember is a big, not very clever man who accidentally squishes a mouse). To Kill a Mockingbird has shot up to number 9 on Amazon's best seller lists and it has given bookstores a marketing hook.

Also, I don't think it matters what people read. Gove is a bit of an intellectual snob when it comes to books. He is quoted as saying, "You come home to find your 17 year old daughter engrossed in a book. Which would delight you more - Twilight or Middlemarch?" I've read both and would probably say that Twilight was more gripping (annoying but gripping) and while Middlemarch is certainly a very well written book it is a bit old fashioned. Both stories have women who give up their own self for a man, so I probably wouldn't be too thrilled about either but I would just be happy that she was engrossed in a book, making up her own mind and forming her own opinions.


Note:  Since writing this blog I have read Michael Gove's piece in the Telegraph and it seems as though the whole thing was made up.  http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/10857079/Michael-Gove-attacks-fictitious-claims-he-has-banned-US-books-from-schools.html

Do we still need it?

Last week there was a big fuss in the press about longer school hours and shorter holidays.  It was the result of a few 'churnalists' (I can't claim the word - it's my daughter's), who had read a blog by a former government adviser, who really couldn't see the point in short school days and long school holidays. Instead of going and interviewing people and getting a real story they then recycled the story into a piece designed to worry and scare ordinary middle and working class parents.  Some people would argue that with the invention of social media and blogging, journalists don't need to get out and report any more.   But what about the people without this kind of public voice? Think of all the stories they are missing.

Whenever I read this type of blog by rich men I wonder why they had children in the first place.  They don't like children and see them as an obstacle to their favourite thing; making money. Reading Paul Kirby's blog http://paulkirby.net/2014/01/26/is-this-the-perfect-2015-election-promise/ I suddenly realised what is going on.  Rich men have children to pass their money onto.  They want them fully grown, and full of 'grit', so that they can take care of their money and make more of it.  He thinks that everyone wants to work 70 hour weeks and have their children make as little impact on their lives, until they are ready to inherit,  as possible.  He thinks that spending time with children is no longer needed.  Unfortunately, most people don't have children for the same reasons.  Most people don't want to work all the time and the truth of it is, even if they did, they wouldn't be making the kind of money that would make procreation about transfer of wealth. So, short school days and long school holidays are still needed by most people because it's all we have.  We had our children to spend time with interesting and funny growing humans - we have no wealth to transfer.

We so often hear people say that feminism isn't needed anymore.  They argue that women have equal rights in this country and so it's time to stop fighting and occasionally I agree until I read an article like this http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2014/01/29/the-de-piero-fantasy-cabinet/ or see a picture like this and think it's a joke.

Harriet Harman on the Andrew Marr show this morning, dared to make the suggestion that the sacking of Baroness Sally Morgan might have been more to do with the fact that she's a woman than her allegiance to the Labour party.  Michael Gove, said that it's good business practice to 'refresh' jobs and that it is a sensible thing to replace someone who is doing a good job.  Luckily for him, after a year longer in his job than Sally Morgan had in hers, he isn't doing quite such a good job, so there's no fear of him refreshing himself.  Twitter exploded and despite the fact that Harriet had properly mocked Michael with her, "Conservative Cabinet is raining men," comment, she came off the worse for it.  Her name was changed by several people to 'Harperson' and comments were made on her appearance.  They pointed out that the only female prime minister this country has had was a conservative (as if one woman thirty years ago is enough)  I thought that of the two politicians sat on the BBC sofa, Ms Harman was the more attractive to look at of the two but Twitter was full of remarks about her personal appearance.

Although people do make comments about Mr Gove's appearance I have never seen it suggested that because he looks like a Pob, all men should be excluded from public office.

This afternoon I went to the cinema and watched American Hustle. It was a good film, with some amazing acting by Jennifer Lawrence, in particular, that thankfully, didn't dumb down or leave out the importance of the women in this piece of history, or did it?  I grew up in the Seventies and I can confirm that men dressed like that, with ridiculous hair, and that wallpaper was just as hideous but I never saw quite so much female flesh, which the male costume designer justifies by saying that it represents the women's naked vulnerablity. 

 So, I would argue that we still need long school holidays, proper reporter journalists and feminism.