Dear Anglophiles, if you’ve not seen the new, riveting documentary about Princess Diana, Diana: In Her Own Words, here is your chance.  (The documentary, on video, is posted below.)  The documentary includes actual footage of Diana talking with her voice coach about her personal life and her marriage to Prince Charles.  Great controversy surrounded the recent release of the documentary on Channel 4 in Britain, as the 20th anniversary of Diana's death approaches.  (She died on August 31, 1997.)  Those opposed to airing the documentary—including her brother Earl Spencer and many in the palace as well—claimed that the contents were private, unintended for the public domain, and that they may distress her children.  Nevertheless, the documentary aired, drawing record viewers to Channel 4, with over 3.5 million people watching the documentary.  Now, you too, may see it.

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July 4, 1776.  A momentous moment in history for the United States; not so much for Britain.

Years ago, my older brother, who attended university in Canada and majored in history, wrote a college paper comparing the Canadian and American views of the American Revolution.  I was quite young at the time, but I remember reading his paper and was surprised that history wasn't "concrete," that there were different views about the same historical event.  In reading my grammar-school history books, I had taken their content as chiseled in stone--as truth.  But my brother's college paper introduced me to comparative history.  So naturally, years later, after my affliction with "Anglophilia,"  I developed a keen desire to understand how the British viewed our Revolutionary War. 

Over the years, I've done my own informal research about this topic--reading, probing my British friends, and perusing "history" sections of UK bookstores--and my conclusion is that the Brits hardly know about, or care about, our Declaration of Independence or Revolutionary War.  In the States, our grade-school and high-school history curriculum focuses a great deal on our fight for independence from the British.  Here, one can find whole books that cover the topic.  In Britain, the event (referred to as the "American War of Independence") garners maybe a few paragraphs in history textbooks, and one is hard pressed to find a book about the topic in a UK bookstore.  "Oh, dear!  How can that be?!" gasps the average American.  While I am not a historian, I believe these are some of the reasons why. . . .

• Here's a joke illustrating one reason why the Brits gloss over our historic rebellion: 

A British gentleman was talking to an American college student.
Brit: So, young man, what are you studying in college?
Student: American history!
Brit: Well, that must be easy.
Student:  Why is that?
Brit: There's so little of it!

Really, British history curriculum must cover so much!  Hundreds and hundreds of years!  Prehistoric Britain, Roman Britain, the Tudors, the Jacobean era, the Restoration, the Industrial Revolution, the Elizabethans, the Georgian era, the Victorian era, the Edwardian period, WWII, modern Britain, etc., etc., etc.  But in the United States, our history curriculum covers little more than 200 years--and we rarely study prehistoric America.  What little bit of American history that Brits do study seems, I believe, to focus on events in 20th century--such as the American Civil Rights movement and the Cold War.

• In the writing of textbooks, all countries focus more on the wars they win than the wars they lose.  

 

• At the time, the upstart American colonies were of little importance to Britain.  Few people were living in the colonies, little had been accomplished there, more natural resources existed in the area that became Canada than in the colonies, and trying to protect the colonies was costing Britain money (thus its attempt to impose taxes on the colonists--such as those on tea and via the Stamp Act).  From what I gather, King George III paid little attention to the colonies across the pond . . . he did, after all, have a huge, mighty empire at that time.  So the British viewed the American Revolution as one component of the "the Atlantic empire question" and as a continuation of the Seven Years War (1756 - 1763), which led to Britain's war with France and the conclusion of the Napoleonic Wars.  

 

• If British history curriculum included coverage of all the rebellions that occurred across Britain's previous far-flung empire, there would be little time left for studying anything else.

 

• Many Brits came to dislike King George III--due to his mental instability and his reluctance to relinquish certain powers to Parliament.  Consequently, many Brits sympathized with and supported the American colonists. 

So, on this 4th of July, as my countrymen celebrate with picnics, fireworks, and patriotic music, I ponder what could have been. . . .  Even if America had lost the Revolutionary War, we undoubtedly would have eventually gained independence as other British colonies did.  I ponder whether I would have been a Separatist or Loyalist had I lived in the colonies.  I've read that, supposedly, 40 to 45 percent of the colonists supported the rebellion, while 15 to 20 percent were Loyalists, and all others were either neutral or maintained a low profile by keeping their views to themselves.  I suppose my social and economic circumstances in the colonies would have dictated to whom I gave my allegiance.  For me, this is a great "unknown" and a question I like to ponder! 

What about you?  Wold you have been a Separatist or Loyalist? 

Happy birthday, USA!  I hope all my Anglophile friends have a pleasant 4th of July!

Dear Anglophiles: I discovered a songwriter within our midst!  George Peter Block, Jr. has written two songs that I'm thoroughly keen on, and I must share them with you.  He has roots from Kent and Glasgow, and his dedication to his ancestral homeland shines through in his music.  The first song, "Great Britain," is very witty, in a Monty Python kind of way.  The second, "Medieval Song," is a lovely ballad.  I've included the lyrics for those who are inclined to sing along.  Let's give George a big round of applause, I say!

GREAT BRITAIN
Lyrics and music by George Peter Block, Jr.
Performed by William Sherry, Jr. and Sandi Kight

“Great Britain” © George Peter Block, Jr. 2016     
   
We are Great Britain,
Our empire started splittin’,
About two hundred years ago (thanks America),
We are Great Britain,
 Civilization we’ve been pitchin’,
To a world so full of woe (how bout India?),
We live in a world of irony,
Stop during a war to have a cup of tea,
Our soccer fans go on a deadly spree,
While we sing God Save The Queen,
We are Great Britain,
With Churchill the whole world’s smitten,
Gilbert and Sullivan put on a great show (HMS Pinafore),
We are Great Britain,
Our Spitfires sure were spittin’,
Hot lead at our Nazi Luftwaffe foes (Royal Air Force Planes),
Notorious for our absurdities,
Never too many sincere apologies,
Love to say “bloody,” “awful,” “rubbish” constantly,
Robin Hood hid in Sherwood Forest trees,
We are Great Britain,
 All the plays that Shakespeare’s written,
Stonehenge’s rocks all lined up in a row (Ancient calendar),
We are Great Britain,
And it’s only fittin’,
That we tell of King Arthur’s stories of old (Tales of Camelot),
British Invasion music ruled the 60s and 70s,
Scotland, Ireland, and Wales always want to break free,
The empire sure isn’t what it used to be,
The sun sets upon it quickly,
We are Great Britain,
The prime minister’s always quittin’,
Our politics are something to behold (Still wear powdered wigs),
We are Great Britain,
Our teeth we will be grittin’,
If we get bronze and the French get the gold (so many wars we fought),
Prudish in our sensibilities,
Queen Victoria still has her constituency,
Jane Austin has a lot of devotees,
Fish and chips with vinegar, if you please,
We are Great Britain.

Medieval Song
Lyrics by George Peter Block, Jr.
Performed by William Sherry, Jr. and Sandi Kight

“Medieval Song” © George Peter Block, Jr. 2016       Capo 5
 
If I had a kingdom,
Would you be my lady?
If I had a castle,
Would you sit upon my throne?
If I had an army,
Would you lead them into Hades?
If I died in battle,
Would you make my house your own?
Make with me a fable,
That stands the test off time,
Gather at my table,
A chalice filled with wine,
Dance if you are able,
In my court of pantomime,
In long robes made of sable,
And linen oh so fine,
If I were a knight,
Would you be my lady?
If I had a court,
Would you set my sword in stone?
If my reign was long,
Can you serve until we’re eighty?
Will you go to war with me,
As the bagpipes drone?
Our fortress will have gables,
And ramparts with thick vines,
A drawbridge with strong cables,
A sanctuary divine,
Chant the ancient playbills,
Sonnets that do rhyme,
Boats for all things Naval,
Cast off the mooring lines,      
If I had a kingdom,
Would you be my lady?

SONGWRITER'S BIO

George Peter Block, Jr. is a (self-described) neurotic American songwriter who has wallowed away in anonymity and obscurity his entire life.

An enthusiastic Anglophile, his maternal grandfather, Bertrand Goodwin, was from Kent, England, and served in the English army in World War War I. His maternal grandmother, Lillian Russell, hailed from Glasgow, Scotland. Both of his maternal grandparents immigrated to Canada and then to Detroit.

Block says he is not as passionate about his paternal German ancestry.

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Dear Zella,

My last novel MRS QUEEN TAKES THE TRAIN was a surprise (to me) bestseller. The Weinstein Company optioned it for a movie.  As my background has been in academic history and biography, I never really imagined I could write a novel.  I'm used to spending years in the archives and writing a footnote to back up every fact.  How could I possibly make things up and publish a fiction?  Historians have had their heads cut off for less.

I suppose the lesson is: Just give it a try.

To be honest, too, there was a lot of background research in MRS QUEEN that I acquired without even trying to.  When I'd written books on Queen Victoria's courtiers, I'd spent time at Windsor Castle in the archives.  I'd caught distant glimpses of how the current Queen lives.  I knew someone who lived on a far corner of the Balmoral estate.  I'd met people who worked for her.  It wasn't so hard to imagine what the lives of those courtiers would be like beyond their 9 to 5 routines.

My new book has similar origins.  I've never met Prince Harry, but I do know some people who were at school with him.  I've never been to Afghanistan, but I had students who were deployed to Iraq and I've known others who served near Kabul.  I once went to a Buckingham Palace Christmas party, courtesy of one of the archivists at Windsor.  Harry's mother was there.  She had on a long red dress and red satin shoes with block heels.  She wasn't only beautiful.  She shimmered.  I was a Diana skeptic up to that point.  That night, however, I began to see how her charm consisted of a naturalness and an accessibility that many others of the royal family didn't have.  Part of the beginning of PRINCE HARRY BOY TO MAN was wondering what it would be like to have someone like that in your life and then to lose her.

I was also interested in Harry's first real deployment to Afghanistan in 2007.  He was sent home after a few weeks when some of the media blew his cover.  That much is true.  But then for this novel, I threw in his former nanny secretly stowing herself away on his plane to Kabul and a brother officer named Mustafa sitting beside him on the plane.  I imagined a reporter prowling around his camp looking for a scoop.  I wrote in a commanding officer who's no fan of the monarchy.  That's how the fiction began this time around.

The story is a lighthearted account of a young man's coming of age, but there are darker things underneath, including the Taliban's destruction of treasured Afghan art, and Harry's having to cope with buried trauma from his childhood.  Our hero does manage to survive all this, and the promise of the book is to suggest ways in which we all open new horizons for ourselves by engaging with things in our past that we'd rather not remember.

The book will be published, both as ebook and paperback, on June 22nd.  I very much hope that your Anglophile readers will take a look.

With all best wishes,

Bill

AUTHOR BIO

,William Kuhn is a novelist, biographer, historian, scribbler, and dabbler.  Before Mrs Queen Takes the Train he wrote a biography of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis called Reading Jackie.  It tells the story of her life through the pages of the hundred books she edited at Viking and Doubleday.  He has also written on the British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli in The Politics of Pleasure.  His book on a funny couple who lived in Windsor Castle, Henry & Mary Ponsonby:  Life at the Court of Queen Victoria, was a BBC Radio Four Book of the Week.  He wears antique military jackets around the house when no one is watching.  He lives in Boston, Massachusetts, and whenever he can, in London too.  For more, including audio files, stories, and pictures, please go to http://www.williamkuhn.com or follow him on Twitter @kuhnwilliam.

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Dear Anglophiles: If you’re like me, you adore British television not just because a particular program’s story line is “good” or “interesting” or “funny” but because the show provides you insights into Britain and its people.  We Anglophiles crave such knowledge!  Downton Abbey intrigued us with riveting plots and well-developed characters, but the show also taught us about the British class system and the habits, customs, and mores of people living in post-Edwardian Britain.  It was those historically accurate details that we Anglophiles lapped up like a kitten drinking from a bowl of milk.  Well, I’ve come across another British TV show that provides insights of a different kind.  Escape to the Country.  The show has been around for years (it first aired in Britain in 2002), but, as is always the case with British programming, gaining access to the program on this side of the pond has been problematic.  Now, two sources are available in the US, and I wanted to let you know!  If you subscribe to Netflix, you’re in luck: In March, it started streaming Escape to the Country.  But you can also watch Escape for free on Youtube!  (See the link below.)  Note: While neither outlet offers all episodes ever produced, many episodes are available.

Escape to the Country is a familiar format, similar to the popular US hit show House Hunters, but Escape focuses on city dwellers hankering a move to the countryside.  The home-buyers describe their ideal property to the show’s host and state how much money they can spend on the real estate, then the host totes the home-buyers around, showing them various houses.  Trade-offs and tensions ensue: Will the buyers get exactly what they want for the price they want or must they compromise? 

So, why does this British show featuring such a common format charm me?  The reason, my Anglophile friends, is because Escape to the Country teaches us about British geography and local customs.  Each episode showcases a different region of Britain, taking us along to see what the countryside looks like while the hosts delivers juicy nuggets of information about the locale’s history, customs, and culture.  

Nearly every Anglophile who crosses the pond visits London, and from there, perhaps on later trips, they tend to visit the more popular tourist towns and regions, such as Oxford, Bath, or Yorkshire.  But what about all the other regions?  Sure, we’ve heard many of those geographical names.  Cumbria, Cornwall, Dorset, Somerset, etc.  We’re quite sure they offer quaint villages and abound with natural beauty . . . but still, they’re off the beaten track.  Well, Escape to the Country takes you to these regions.  For armchair travelers, watching the show is like being given a free passport and airplane ticket, and for Anglophiles who actually cross the pond, well, maybe this insider knowledge will inspire you to travel new paths on your next trip to the UK. 

(PS: I should mention another plus of watching Escape to the Country: We get to listen to those divine British accents!  Any student of British culture knows that much is made about the various regional accents heard across the UK, and Escape allows us the opportunity to compare accents, pegging them to a particular region—you know, just like the Brits can do.  Such insight bumps us from the realm of “regular Anglophile” to “consummate Anglophile,” I say!) 

Note: A special thanks to Elan Durham, Twitter friend and fellow Anglophile, for informing me about Escape to the Country.  You can find her on Twitter at Elan Durham @europabridge1.

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Dear Anglophiles: So, summer will be here before you know it, and many of you will be heading across the pond to the UK.  I'm always on the lookout for new, interesting, fun activities in London, and when I ran across this nugget, I knew I had to share it with you.  "Gin Lovers Afternoon Tea" bus tour.   The tour, aboard a vintage bus, departing from Victoria Station, is sponsored by Brigit's Bakery and Hayman's, the award-winning, English gin-maker.  I mean, relaxing with a G&T, eating tasty morsels, while seeing London's iconic sites--what could be more pleasant?  

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Dear London:  Please know that your friends across the pond--Anglophiles United and all our Anglophile readers--are thinking of you on this tragic day.  With heavy hearts we acknowledge your pain and stand with you in solidarity.   

Dear Anglophiles:
       So, is anyone here a Harry Potter fan?  (Ha!  Just kidding!  I know perfectly well what a silly question that is!)  The real question is this: Are any of you heading to London any time soon?  If so, I have learned of a free, Harry Potter walking tour that may interest you.  Hear about Harry, Ron, Hermione, and the gang while visiting the London locations that inspired J.K. Rowling's stories about the boy wizard.  Sounds like fun to me!  As if London weren't already magical enough, right?
 
(Note: The tour, offered by Strawberry Tours, is free, but they do, of course, appreciate tips!)

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Strong Women Detectives on British Television
by
Sarah Cords

Can we all just agree that it’s not easy being a woman?

Perhaps that is why it’s thrilling to see so many British police and crime dramas featuring strong, complex female leads. Shows in this genre are popular for many reasons, among them are intense storylines and lightning-quick plotting, but I confess that I watch these programs for the characters. There’s nothing I love more than a woman in law enforcement who is masterful at enforcing the law—society’s, her own, or both.

One of the most important female leads in British TV police-drama is the über-female detective Jane Tennison, as portrayed by Helen Mirren, in Prime Suspect. This ITV classic ran for seven seasons and saw its protagonist square off (quite effectively) against criminal types, as well as against the old boys’ club of the Metropolitan Police and her often condescending male co-workers. Series creator and writer, Lynda La Plante, has said that she based Tennison’s character on a DCI (Detective Chief Inspector) who “gained extraordinary respect from her male colleagues because she ate, slept, and breathed the job.”  Tennison engages in several romantic liaisons throughout the series, typically with colleagues, but in the end, her ambition and dedication to solving her cases proves more important to her than carving out a work/life balance.

Now is the time to binge-watch all fifteen episodes of Prime Suspect, as ITV has produced a prequel for the show, entitled Prime Suspect: Tennison, set in the 1970s, airing on Masterpiece Theatre in the U.S. in 2017. Although the new series will likely be watchable on its own, knowing the relentless detective that Tennison becomes should make watching the development of the young Tennison even more satisfying.

Prime Suspect is one of the most well-known British police dramas around, but another outing by Lynda La Plante, entitled Above Suspicion, based on her book of the same name, also features a notable female character, rookie DC (Detective Constable) Anna Travis (Kelly Reilly). Thrown into the deep end on her first case, searching for a serial killer, Travis is determined to show everyone around her, especially the men and particularly her supervising officer, that she has the detective chops necessary to survive. Above Suspicion ran for four seasons, a total of eleven episodes; though not as trailblazing as Prime Suspect, it does offer a strong cast and a female protagonist who wants to succeed but also obviously wants a personal life and love. 

The most direct descendant to Mirren’s Tennison in recent British television has been Gillian Anderson’s riveting Metropolitan Police superintendent Stella Gibson in the crime/serial-killer drama The Fall. Gibson’s power is displayed by aggression in her personal and sexual relationships.  When grilled by the Northern Irish Internal Affairs-type investigator about a one-night stand she had with a fellow police officer, her reply is simple but perfect: “Man fucks woman. Subject, man; verb, fucks; object, woman. That’s okay. Woman fucks man. Woman, subject; man, object . . . that’s not so comfortable for you, is it?”

Although The Fall focuses on the crimes and increasing confidence of the killer, much of the drama and the undeniable pleasure of watching this program is derived from watching Gibson be completely badass. She stares down a threatening gang of men in an unstable Belfast neighborhood . . . then turns her back on them as she walks to her car. When a colleague with whom she previously shared a physical relationship tries to rekindle that relationship against her will, she employs a self-defense move that stops him in his tracks. And she does all this while simultaneously employing every tool in her arsenal to unmask and provoke her serial-killing quarry. 

The detective who Brenda Blethyn plays in the criminally underrated drama Vera seems, at first glance, to be Stella Gibson’s polar opposite. Unfussy in appearance and seemingly random in her methods, DCI Vera Stanhope nonetheless possesses a mind that is always thinking through the crimes she is investigating. She, too, has her own demons, particularly those surrounding her relationship with her recently deceased father, but however unwilling she may be to investigate her own feelings and motives, her most valuable skill is her understanding of others’ all-too-human natures. Of note in this series is her working relationship with her DS; she attempts to keep a distance and primarily use him as her physical enforcer, but over the course of the first four seasons—the DC leaves the final two seasons—he serves to keep Vera grounded and provides an emotional connection that she clearly hadn’t realized she needed.

Another recent program highlights the difficulties many female officers still have: trying to reconcile their personal lives with their jobs. Perhaps the most blatantly conflicted of these is Catherine Cawood, the Yorkshire policewoman at the heart of the series Happy Valley. Focusing on a rural setting beset by drugs and violence, Happy Valley is anything but happy (or idyllic). And Cawood, the world-weary but vulnerable cop played by the perfectly expressive Sarah Lancashire, understands better than most the problems of those whom she is policing. Or, in her own words: “I’m forty-seven, I’m divorced, I live with my sister who’s a recovering heroin addict, I’ve two grown-up children, one dead, one who doesn’t speak to me, and a grandson.” Cawood may have issues, but she’s nobody’s fool.  The violence in this series is gut-wrenching to watch, but viewers are compelled to follow how she manages to do her job, help save a kidnapping victim, and keep tabs on the drug dealer recently released from prison who she believes raped and impregnated her daughter. She is less a Yorkshire police officer than she is a force of nature.

Many of the programs discussed thus far represent women detectives as decidedly “lone wolf” types, but two other police procedurals showcase partnerships between policewomen. The drama in these programs is driven nearly as much by their collaborative work and sharing of personal details as by the crimes being committed and solved.  When creating her “feminist” cop-buddy show  Scott & Bailey, writer Sally Wainwright, like La Plante, was inspired by a real detective: Greater Manchester Police Detective Inspector Diane Taylor. Wainwright’s consultations with Taylor (who, tragically, died in 2016 at the age of 55) helped make the show more realistic and enabled Wainwright to let her stars—Suranne Jones as Rachel Bailey and Lesley Sharp as Janet Scott—be tough and talented investigators, as well as friends and characters with vulnerabilities, often stemming from their complicated personal lives. Viewers may get frustrated with Bailey for leaking details of her current investigation to her boyfriend, who breaches professional ethics, but they can still relate to the impulse: Even police officers want to talk about their work. Her counterpart, Janet Scott, also gets into ethical scrapes; most notably one in a later season when she wants to protect her daughter from a criminal charge.  Anyone with a family can understand that conflict of interest.

A slight digression here to note that both Happy Valley and Scott & Bailey were created and are written by Sally Wainwright, which is, quite frankly, amazing. Not only are the characters she creates strong, driven women, clearly Wainwright herself knows her way around a demanding work schedule.

Although its run was much shorter than Scott & Bailey’s, the crime series Murder in Suburbia also focuses on the interplay between main characters and the crimes being solved. The show is lighter in tone than any other program on this list, perhaps owing to its suburban London setting, and it also features more lighthearted banter, such as between the more cerebral Kate Ashurst (Caroline Katz) and her partner in detection, Emma Scribbins (Lisa Faulkner), who operates more on her hunches. Their work together means they always get their suspect, but meanwhile, what viewers get is witty repartee that says as much about the modern pool of dating prospects as it does about crime-solving methods.

Strong women can also shine when paired with the right male partner, as is the case in the police series Line of Duty. Featuring the anti-corruption unit (AC-12) of the Metropolitan Police (analogous to internal affairs police officers in the U.S.), this series demands and rewards close attention, particularly when it is paid to the working relationship between DS Kate Fleming (Vicky McClure) and her DS.  The questions facing these detectives are legion: Which cops are crooked? How are the anti-corruption officers going to get them to admit to their wrongdoings? How do the anti-corruption officers themselves sometimes act unethically? The program features a female cop who is not only skilled at routine police work but also undercover work, and who can stand up under the pressure of being everyone’s least favorite co-worker.  Even when a male colleague spits on her after her cover is blown, she manages to out-dignify him with a simple pause and head-up exit.

So, yeah: Being a woman can be hard. Finding women detectives on British television who help you get in touch with your inner law-enforcement officer? That’s easy!

WRITER'S BIO:

Sarah Cords is a reference book author, former librarian, and full-time Anglophile. She blogs about British television at The Great British TV Site.

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