History of England 1-6

The Nineties have been called the decade of ‘spin’, but the novelty lay in the prominence of the spin doctors, who had taken the place of trade union leaders as the most important national figures outside government. The collapse in voter turnout reflected a government adept at soothing the populace; as a result, parliamentary discourse acquired the attributes of a patois: ‘tackle’, ‘raft’, ‘package’, ‘deliver’ and the suggestive ‘meaningful’. Is it uncharitable to suggest that when John Major left Downing Street, he took the English language with him? It may be that he took pragmatism with him, too. He could not match the wild-eyed millenarianism of his predecessor, while Blair was nothing if not a believer. ‘The eyes of the world’, ‘the hand of history’, ‘the right thing to do’: resonant banalities of this sort were his demesne, and for five years they worked.

And so, with many bangs and flashes of fireworks, the twentieth century ended. No bug had bitten, no rapture had occurred, and the frost added glitter to the great white marquee. In accordance with the spirit of the time, the Dome enshrined the future. Yet the past seems to gain in allure as modernity cloys. It may be that as the millennium progresses, the English will recover what was once their glory in that most precious and fugitive of instincts: a capacity for awe.

The End

Footnote

1. The sun never rises

* This is a history of England, rather than of Britain. However, British institutions, such as the British army, navy, government, monarchy and empire, are constantly referred to in this book, as they are inextricably bound up with England’s history. For the same reason, certain events which took place in the wider United Kingdom are also covered.

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