Solid Gold Toilet

The alleged theft of a solid gold toilet from Blenheim Palace suggests a very appropriate coat of arms for the royal family.

They are as useful as a solid gold toilet. 

Les Miserables

The Connaught Cinema had a live recording of "Les Miserables. The Staged Concert" starring Michael Ball as the police officer Javert, Alfie Boe as the escaped convict Jean Valjean and Matt Lucas as the comic innkeeper Thenadier

The film version is available all over the country and not confined to those who can afford to go to a theatre in London.

The story, based on a two-volume 19th Century novel by Victor Hugo is not miserable at all because it contains within it a message of hope that things can be changed.

It is worth comparing the revolutionaries in Les Miserables with those other revolutionaries in a 19th-Century novel – the bloodstained monsters depicted in Dickens’ “A Tale of Two Cities.” Although the revolution of 1830 was defeated, Victor Hugo sees the revolutionaries as human beings and evokes sympathy for the cause for which they are fighting.

To say it is a revolutionary film would be pushing it. It is a film about revolution and about the appalling injustices of society but the message is about individual salvation through love.

The central character, Jean Valjean, is imprisoned for five years for stealing a loaf of bread, then another 14 for trying to escape (not an exaggeration of the penal code of the period). On release he is condemned to carry a yellow passport – an ID card which is as effective as a brand. Even outside the prison, he is not free.

A priest  seeks to redeem him with an act of kindness and (without retelling the whole story) the narrative rests on the consequences of that act of kindness.

Perhaps the most shocking aspect of the original story is the casting of a policeman, a perfectly respectable upholder of the law with no sympathy for the poor, as a villain. We are accustomed to seeing “crooked cops” but Javert isn’t crooked; he is as straight as he can be according to his lights. He simply enforces an unjust law because it is not his place to change it.

The most powerful scenes involve the street fighting in Paris during the 1830 revolution and the idealism of students and young people who are depicted as simply and selflessly fighting for the poor of their own city.

“Do you hear the people sing?

Singing a song of angry men?

It is the music of a people

Who will not be slaves again!

When the beating of your heart

Echoes the beating of the drums

There is a life about to start

When tomorrow comes!”

Without the music the words give you some idea of the emotions stirred by the powerful song. I am aware that people talk cynically about “not a dry eye in the house” but it really is an accurate description of how people in the audience respond to this.

In the final scene the selflessness is rewarded when, with Les Miserables, they ascend to heaven. Dickens, for all his compassion, would have had them going to the other place!

The same songs are repeated with a different emphasis at different times in the film but the message of what happens when society offers no future to the poorest members of the community could not be clearer. We really will all be in it together!

“At the end of the day there's another day dawning

And the sun in the morning is waiting to rise

Like the waves crash on the sand

Like a storm that'll break any second

There's a hunger in the land

There's a reckoning still to be reckoned and

There's gonna be hell to pay

At the end of the day!” 

The Importance of Being Earnest

The National Theatre's latest production of "The Importance of Being Earnest" was shown in the Connaught Theatre.

It is very appropriate for Worthing because the main character is called "Worthing" for reasons which become apparent and indeed the play was written by Oscar Wilde in Worthing.

It is remarkable that Wilde was able to persuade Victorians to flock to a play which ridicules the predominant values in Victorian society and in particular the class system. This is still relevant today when the privileged one percent consider themselves superior to the 99 percent.

The way Wilde did this was with wicked humour and this production makes the most of it.

Sharon D Clarke's Lady Bracknell was a brilliant example of snobbery - a snobbery which was ameliorated by the chance for her nephew "to marry 130,000 pounds."

Ncuti Gatwa was possibly the most camp Algernon Moncrieff in history but the character was true to the intentions of the play to produce "A Trivial Comedy for Serious People".

Hugh Skinner's Jack Worthing was equally outrageous.

In fact, the whole cast kept the audience in stitches.

This is well worth a visit and a lot cheaper than visiting a theatre in London.

Comedians

Trump has derided Zelensky as a "comedian turned politician". Is that better than a politician turned comedian, Mr Trump?"

"Idioter and idioter" said Alice

Flash Essay on Flash Fiction

"Idioter" is a portmanteau word combining "editor" and "idiot". I can reveal that my editor is sensitive and intelligent but there are some idioters out there.

A totalising narrative used by many editors is the idea that a story should "show and not tell". This is a good description of a certain type of writing. Writers use direct speech and action sequences to tell the story. To apply this to all writing is the action of a jackass.

"It is a truth universally acknowledged that a young man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife." Editors would reject Jane Austen

"It was a bright cold day in April and the clock was just striking thirteen" They wouldn't have Orwell either.

"“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.” And as for Dickens..

Mr McMillan, Thank you for the opportunity to read your work. Our Editorial Policy is that stories should "show" and not "tell" so your story has been rejected at this time.

Dear Editor, Have you considered sticking your Editorial Policy up where the sun doesn't shine? I can "show" you. #flashfiction #fiction #editor

This has been submitted to the Dribble Drabble Review.

Safe nuclear power

The new Labour plan for green nuclear power which overrides any local objections to a Windscale on your doorstep is very interesting. I wonder how many nuclear power stations will actually be built in Keir Starmer's constituency.

Nuclear power stations produce the elements necessary for nuclear weapons. Thank heavens Chernobyl proved how safe they are. 

Trump's plan to Seize the Gaza strip

The Guardian coverage of this statement is here.

Trump justified this madcap scheme by saying, "“The only reason the Palestinians want to go back to Gaza is they have no alternative,” the president told a joint press conference with the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, at the White House on Tuesday evening. “It’s right now a demolition site. This is just a demolition site. Virtually every building is down.”

He was sitting next to Netanyahu, the person responsible for this state of affairs but he does not do irony.

It is as though Trump's advisers told him the worst thing he could possibly say and he went and said it. Most commentators draw attention to the fact that the details are vague which suggests Trump did not mean this but that it was a negotiating position.
"Tobogganing with eyes closed towards catastrophe," is the phrase Trotsky used and it seems apt.

Quis Custodet

The new Ofsted scheme of assessment raises the obvious question, who inspects the inspectors?

I would suggest that teachers would be best placed.

As a former teacher, I could contribute a few comments about the clowns who inspected my lessons!

Only one OFSTED inspector gained any respect. She had the chutzpah to teach a lesson with members of staff observing her work. None of the others had the courage.