Communal culture

Afternoon visit to a village located in the northern "wilderness" of the county.



Above: In the centre of the settlement was an ancient hall. There has been no systematic study of domestic rural architecture in the county. Although now we are used to regarding large houses of this kind as quasi-aristocratic residences, in past centuries they would have supported a considerable community, with the manorial family a "first among equals".

The layout of the larger houses gives clues to a particular village ideology - marriage arrangements (and the hierarchy of family alliances), allocation of space for procreation, and displays of family wealth.



Above: the church is medieval but thoroughly restored in the 19th century. Instead of a bell tower there is this little turret, guarded by gargoyles. The landscape is pastures studded with clear pools, expensive-looking horses very prominent.



Above: the recumbant effigy I had come to see was in a chapel in the north east corner. Medieval priest, the features a little worn. Note on the side the heraldic escutcheons that place the priest into his religious, territorial and family context.



Above: also in the chapel were stones from local excavations. As you can see, the stones include what appears to be part of the shaft of a Saxon standing cross. In the 6th century, before the building of churches, crosses were put up in most settlements, with travelling priests using them as gathering places for preaching and open-air services.



Above: a surprise in this church was an exhibition of local history, with the historian herself giving out cupps of tea and answering questions. Her work was extremely thorough. This is a map of land-holdings in the parish (although this relates to the post-enclosure period, there were also wells and even specific trees held in common ownership).



Above: lists of surnames related to the parish. Surnames and their promulgation through the generations demonstrate the patri-lateral nature of village society. The choice of first and second names for children also reveals a family's self-identity and admiration for historic, religious or mythological figures.



Above: I admired the way in which each farm and cottage had been researched. The community would have visualised itself as a network of families and individuals rather than an arrangement of buildings. The location of the structures reveals the culturally-coded social interaction of the village.



Above: even into the 1940s a pastoral lifestyle was preserved, although perhaps not strictly necessary given the increasing mechanisation of agriculture. Pastoralist ideology was probably retained in the county (is still retained?) because it provided a framework for social organisation, values and beliefs. In this respect the knowledge systems of the pastoralists acquired a cultural and ritual significance.



Above: place names indicate Templar activity in the area (there was a preceptory in the next village). Village communities were united by oral traditions that emphasised common ancestry (even when these traditions were not really true). In an era when remote settlements had to make their own entertainment, travelling story-tellers would bring news, play music, and flatter their audiences with mythology about their ancestors.



Above: recording local stories is of great importance. I am always astonished at how much is still extant. Not just stories, but folk-songs and melodies.



Above: here you can see the folklore of the village laid out geographically. Venerable traditions, half-remembered historical events, cherished love stories - all combined into a unique culture for each of the county's villages. It was this communal culture that gave the villagers a perception of themselves, and contributed to their strong sense of identity.

I then left the building - the past week at work

Monday

As I was going through my post this morning Yvette (agency head) came up to my desk and accused me of reading a magazine. "I can't possibly be reading it, it's in German" I told her. The accusation, and the aggressive way it was delivered, made me feel very angry, and I felt like resigning immediately.

But I didn't.

Mid-morning Julie (account executive) and I were called into Yvette's office for a share-out of Andrea's clients (Andrea was formerly Account Director who resigned a couple of weeks back and is now working her notice in the PR division upstairs). I got two nice clients, new girl Lisa is to get a lot of the rubbish. Julie got the rest, and I suppose is now equal in rank to myself.

We had a talk about new business, and I was critical of the way we do things. Yvette told me I should move if I didn't like the way the agency was being run. I told her that I might do that.

Andrea's car has also been allocated to me, although I have already said I don't want it. I said I would keep it in the mews car park at the back and it can act as a pool car. Later in the day Neil (graphic designer) and I used the car to take some surplus office furniture to Neil's flat (he was buying it from the agency). Neither of us could get the back seats to go down. Eventually I drove it to a garage near Baker Street and a mechanic simply pressed a lever and the seats went down, making me look very foolish. I offered to pay him for his trouble, but he said it was free of charge.

Later in the afternoon I walked round to Covent Garden to give Lisa her new contract of employment. She seemed quite happy in her current environment. Should I have attempted to warn her?

Tuesday

Andrea's last day today. We had organised a collection for a present, Yvette refusing to contribute to it. When we gathered to go upstairs to see Andrea's send-off Yvette sprang out of her office and said we couldn't leave the floor unattended (although she was there). Later Andrea was allowed to come down to say goodbye. She hugged each of us (not Yvette obviously). I was sorry to see her go.

Wednesday

Lunchtime I went up to the Boardroom to watch the One O'Clock News. I was joined by Terry (MD and our ultimate boss) and a political friend of his. "We've lost touch with the man in the street" said Terry. They then tried to define who the "man in the street" was. Eventually they were forced to admit to themselves that they did not know any men in the street. "I suppose that proves we've lost touch with them" said Terry's friend.

In the evening we all stayed on for another of the Jess Lewis training sessions (Jess Lewis is a former Personnel Director and an old friend of Yvette's). New account exec Lisa attended the training and seemed very keen. The rest of us appeared bored. Jonathan (copywriter) continually insulted by Yvette. We had a sort of buffet meal half-way through, with various cheeses and pates. Jonathan and I sat by the wine bottles.

Thursday

I had been expecting a quiet day at the agency today, but this was not to be.

As soon as I arrived (a few minutes late) I heard Yvette complaining about the way everyone was dressed, even attacking her favourite Julie. Unknown to the rest of us she had invited a potential client to visit the agency, and was now saying that we did not look presentable. As it happened, this was one of the very few days when I was not wearing a jacket (I had a raincoat with me because of the threat of rain, and a raincoat on top of a suit jacket is too much in this weather).

We were all summoned into Yvette's office to discuss our sartorial shortcomings. She started with me, and I deflected her anger by saying I would go out and buy a jacket before the client arrived. She then turned her attention to Jonathan and Neil and raged (not too strong a word) about how scruffy they looked and how untidy the Studio was. Jonathan attempted to defend himself by saying that creatives were expected to be casual. Yvette became almost insane with fury, telling him repeatedly seven or eight times to "shut up". It was as if she was having some kind of fit.

It was at this point that I decided to go. I walked out of Yvette's office and went upstairs to see Terry. He saw me almost immediately and accepted my resignation (he asked me to think about it, but I said no).

I then left the building and went home.

Friday

I wanted to sleep late, but I was woken at 9 by a phone call from Jonathan asking how I was. He told me he was going to complain to Terry later today about Yvette. He said that in the end the potential client had not turned up, so the storm had been for nothing.

Mid-morning came a call from Katharine (Terry's PA) asking how I was. She described the aftermath of my resignation ("Yvette came up to see Terry shaking like a jelly"). I asked her to clear my desk for me.

Twenty minutes later came a call from Rachel (PR exec in the upstairs offices) asking me to dinner in her flat in Maida Vale this evening.

During the day I calculated my finances, and I am better off than I realised, so no immediate need to panic about getting a new job.

Late afternoon I caught a train up to London.

Maida Vale and the familiar flat. Probably the last time I shall see it as Rachel moves out in two weeks. The meal was savoury crepes followed by profiteroles, with white wine to drink.

We talked long into the night about everything.



Above: I thought I would put a picture of Yvette up, at least for a short while. So here she is. This is Jonathan's photo, not mine. I took a photo of his laser-printed photo, so not good quality. She's not a bad person. But she has done many bad things.

Wonderful Life by Hurts

This has been going through my head all day. Wonderful Life by Hurts. They even manage to reference Temple Meads station in Bristol (a Tudor-gothic manorial edifice).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?annotation_id=annotation_889449&feature=iv&v=PIJXqOvXb1A

Is this a pastiche of 1980s culture? Or is this 2010 culture in a 1980s style? Or is this genuinely 1980s culture that just happens to be produced in 2010?

Shell

Above: entrance to the Shell Centre in London which is one of the two headquarters of the Anglo-Dutch Shell company. Shell started in the 1830s selling seashells to Londoners. It was when one of the owners of the company was collecting rare shells on the coast of the Caspian Sea that he realised the potential of oil deposits in the area.

Supposedly Shell is now the eighth largest company in the world.

In 1953 Shell was involved in Operation Ajax which took control of Iranian oil after British and American forces imposed regime change on the Iranians.



Above: the main tower of the Shell Centre seems to be undergoing refurbishment. While I was taking this picture an unbelivably officious little security guard came out and told me to stop taking photographs. He was incredibly obnoxious. I told him he was an idiot. I called him a ridiculous little buffoon. I asked him (rhetorically) if we were living in a police state when any little person in a uniform can order people about.

Then I turned my back on him and walked away (although secretly I wanted to smack his face).

Going back to the architecture, I think we need a by-law in London that requires all buildings more than seven stories to be clad in Portland stone.



Above: Shell uses as its logo a scallop shell. This shell is an emblem of considerable antiquity and in heraldry symbolises the act of holy pilgrimage. It is also a symbol of Christian baptism.

Artistic

I'm afraid I can't get very enthusiastic about the "empty plinth" in Trafalgar Square.   It has been an open-air venue for various artistic endeavours, although to me they seem to be alternating stunts, gimmicks and self-indulgent trash.   Yinka Shonibare' ship in a bottle seems a particularly asinine piece of work.  Has public money been spent on this?  If so, how much?

Not easy to find

Driving from the south to the north of the county, I stopped en route to look round a village in the central hills.



Above: by the side of the road is the old Butter Cross. Farmers would bring their butter and other dairy products in from the surrounding countryside. From a marketing perspective I am surprised that villages do not do more to encourage specialist productions from their particular area - the more of a story you have to tell, the more people will buy.



Above: the path to the church was not easy to find. It was on a prominence above the village, screened from the road by dense trees. Note the picturesque mixture of stone and brick in construction of the tower.



Above: the dedication is to the Archangel Michael, "Great Prince" of the high places. Churches dedicated to St Michael are often on hilltops or geographic eminences. I am not sure I believe the theory that they are all connected by ley lines.



Above: the angelic theme is continued under the tower where three wooden angels look down from below the bell chamber. Note the crude representation of feathers on the bodies of the angels (clicking on the image will enlarge it). They looked like angel-shaped balloons filled with helium that had floated up there and got stuck.



Above: old Bibles laid out on the altar.



Above: I have long been interested in the farms in this area. The tradition (at least until the beginning of the last century) was that only the strongest of a farmer's sons would succeed his father, although he would hold the land as a common family resouce for the other members. This produced over time a farming community that was exceptionally hardy and with notably impressive physiques, able to withstand all climatic conditions and produce above average crop yields.

The past week at work

Monday

So late was I in getting ready for work that I had to put my tie on while waiting for the train, a cup of coffee balanced on the bench beside me.

I felt tired all day, so that I had to find easy things to do.

I nearly fell asleep in the weekly planning meeting.

Tuesday

Again very tired. Now that I have made the decision to leave the agency I cannot seem to motivate myself to go there. Today I arrived at 10, and made no attempt to explain why I was late.

Most of the afternoon I spent talking to Eleanor (trainee account executive, had been due to leave but now persuaded to stay on). Neither of us had much to do. She described her divorce (some years ago, but the memory obviously still rankles).

Wednesday

In the morning Yvette (agency head) and Julie (account executive) went off to see our car hire client. I was left alone in the agency as everybody else was either out or off. I looked at medical sites on the internet to see why I might be so tired - the time rushed by while I was doing this.

In the afternoon Julie's brother Martin came in to the office and sat in the account execs room talking to her. England football shirt, jeans, clean white trainers. Until a couple of weeks ago he was going out with Andrea, who is now working in the PR division upstairs - no-one knows why they broke up.

He talked about his army cross-country running ("eight mile runs, some five-minute miles..."). He talked about his planned holiday in Grand Canaria. He mentioned he was born in Cyprus (his father had also been in the army).

He stayed for about two hours, handed round a packet of soft mints, then left.

When he had gone Eleanor asked Julie: "Is he stalking Andrea?"

This led to an outburst of invective from Julie about how badly Andrea had treated him and how she didn't want them to get back together. There is certainly a disparity between them - Andrea is nine years older than Martin, has probably double his salary, they have almost no interests in common. "She was just using him" said Julie, "and now she's bored she won't even talk to him."

Thursday

Extremely quiet in the agency today. I think everyone was bored in various different ways. Yvette very blase about the collapse in business.

The only person to be occupied was Eleanor. She worked on an ad for our IT client, and it was obviously too much for her. Rather than ask for help she struggled with it, becoming red-faced and starting to swear.

I openly read newspapers. Jonathan (copywriter) openly read a book of short stories. Julie played games on her computer.

Lunchtime I went to look at the books in Waterstones, which always cheers me up.

Returning to the agency I was in time to see Yvette make an exhibition of herself. She rang Julie complaining that she was unable to park her car in the tiny space in the mews at the back of the building (it is closed by an automatic gate and is only for people in our building). She wanted Julie to go upstairs and find out who owned two cars and tell them to move them. She was shouting so loudly that everyone could here what she was saying. While Julie went upstairs the rest of us crammed ourselves into the toilet lobby where from the window you can look down into the mews. We saw Yvette in her car, the top down, vainly trying to manouvre her sportscar into a space that was over-parked by the cars either side. We saw Julie go down to her and explain she couldn't find out who owned the cars.

Eventually Yvette left her car in the middle of the mews, blocking in almost everyone. We heard her coming up the stairs telling Julie what she was going to do to the two car owners when she met them. Her arrival in the quiet agency was like an explosion.

Later I briefed Jonathan on some copywriting. He is an odd character. He told me very seriously "I really envy people who have incurable diseases as they have such a desire for life whereas I couldn't care less."

Friday

Fridays always seem to bring a sense of relief. I went straight to see my Financial Services client before going into the office. The River Thames looked lovely as I crossed Hungerford Bridge.

What a boring day. Mid-morning I went out to a florist to arrange for flowers to be sent to one of our more important clients (it's her birthday). The flower shop seemed a quaint comfortable world (it is a business that seems to be recession-proof: "People always want flowers" the owner told me).

Later I wrote some copy, and did some research for our toy client. Time seemed to be passing excrutiatingly slowly. I stopped drinking coffee for the rest of the day as it was making me feel ill.

The final stage of the afternoon was completely dead. I talked to an Irish girl who is temping upstairs. And I read more of Hemingway's Fiesta.

The Normans on BBC2

Above: writing about the programme in The Guardian, television critic Lucy Mangan says she "swallowed it whole", which is an unsettling image.

I watched the second in the series The Normans on BBC2 last night. Last week's programme I thought was a fairly workmanlike production but oddly old-fashioned. It seemed to be a rehash of the Victorian view that the Norman Conquest was an absolute dividing line in English history, with the ubermensch short-back-and-sides Normans utterly dominating and subduing the backward long-haired Anglo-Saxons (this view was popular with the Victorians as it provided a justification for 19th century colonialism).

The "Conquest" theory of history has been comprehensively debunked by many distinguished historians, so it was strange to see the presenter Professor Robert Bartlett putting this forward as a credible thesis. It was as if Professor Henry Loyn (that gentle intellectual giant) had never lived. It was as if Professor Robert Bartlett had never been put in an invigilated room and asked to write for three hours on the topic The Norman Conquest - continuity or change? Discuss.

Anyway, I watched the second programme last night and realised that for all its heavyweight endorsements this is not a serious production. Professor Bartlett was telling us Anglo-Saxon culture was eradicated (when in fact both the Domesday Book and the Bayeux Tapestry were almost certainly produced by Anglo-Saxons); that Scotland was a multi-ethnic state (Scotland in the 11th century was many things, but it was not a cosmopolitan society); that the Normans in Ireland were developing a blueprint for "colonialism" (when in fact they intermarried and went native within a couple of generations).

This is not a serious production. This is a stealthy attempt at diversity-awareness propaganda. My suspicians were reinforced when I saw that the producer was Fatima Salera (whose body of work includes Black Women the experience of Muslims around the world; and Southall Stories).

And on Domesday (also last night) I almost laughed out loud when historian Michael Wood told us the Anglo-Saxons were "economic migrants".

To paraphrase Margaret Thatcher, the subtext seems to be: there was no such thing as Anglo-Saxon society, there were only immigrants.



Above: not all historians are media whores re-editing and politicising the narrative of history with an abandon that would shame Orwell's Ministry of Truth. In the latest Transactions of the Ancient Monument Society there is a fabulous article on Medieval Muniment Rooms by John Steane. This is history at its best.

Coleridge and the Anglican Church by Luke Savin and Herrick Wright

Above: Coleridge and the Anglican Church by Luke Savin and Herrick Wright, published 2010.

Have just finished Coleridge and the Anglican Church by Luke Savin and Herrick Wright. Not an easy book, but rewarding if you stick with it. If you think Coleridge is all Kubla Khan and The Rime of the Ancient Mariner then this book will surprise you.

This book made me realise how profoundly Anglicanism influenced the Tory Party in the 18th century, and (this is my interpretation) how Coleridge's philosophy can be seen in the Big Society policy we have today.

Quotes:

"...the standpoint in any debate: do the participants and their actions live up to the expectations of a Christian nation and a Christian society?"

"...the two entities of Church and State actually constitute one organically unified society given that each person in the nation is a member of both." Note in theory this is still true - the Established Church of England in law encompasses the whole population, although complete religious freedom and toleration is also practised.

"A people is the association of a multitude of rational beings united by common agreement on the objects of their love."

"...shift the burden from the macro scale of the state acting for society to the micro scale of individual Christian persons acting charitably."

"The Poor Laws exerted a demoralising effect both on the poor and on the classes paying for them."

"Take the maintenance of the indigent and destitute out of the realm of the state and place it within the realm of the church." Note via Establishment the Anglican Church in England still has a responsibility to minister to the whole population, whether they identify themselves as Anglicans or not.

"A disbelief in the efficacy of private charity and a total reliance on a system of state measures was the essence of a new blasphemy."

"The only proper way to administer relief to the poor is through love." Note it is axiomatic that there is no love displayed by the administration of state benefits and services.



Above: article by Polly Toynbee very critical of the Big Society (Polly Toynbee is an agnostic).

The Big Society policy has come under sustained attack since it was announced. Is this criticism based on reason? Or is it because the critics do not understand the philosophical tradition that underpins it?



Above: article on a new report by the Prince's Trust.

This has nothing to do with Coleridge, but I was interested in newspaper reports about a new study by the Prince's Trust about the way in which young people from jobless households have low expectations.

As someone who spends a lot of time looking at society (albeit from a marketing point of view) it is clear to me that a good twenty per cent of the population needs looking after. These are people who for a variety of reasons cannot establish themselves as productive "consumers" able to pay their own way in society and support themselves (they may have no confidence, or low intelligence, or have no attention span etc etc). At the moment these people are being shunted onto state benefits, and increasingly under pressure to "get a job".

This pressure is pointless.

Bullying this sector is not going to turn them into self-supporting "consumers" - it will just push them deeper into poverty, misery, petty crime, drug and drink dependence, anti-social behaviour and social unrest.

We ought to accept (cross party) as a nation that twenty per cent of the population needs to have housing provided for them, and a social structure that includes subsidised employment opportunities (transport perhaps, or manufacturing enterprises protected by import tariffs, or public utilities). The cost of doing this will not be as great as the present welfare structure, nor will it be as dehumanising and demoralising as the current system. The import of cheap labour also needs to be drastically curtailed to protect this vulnerable sector.

You might say: why should I pay taxes to support these "idle" people. You should support them because your children and grand-children and great-grand-children WILL include individuals who will be classified as "inadequate" and unless they are looked after will fall into destitution (unless you are very rich and can project your wealth down through several generations). If you look carefully enough at any family you can identify people who would "go under" were they to be left on their own.

This is not a political point, and certainly not an attack on the Tories. Nothing disgusted me more than people in the last government (Caroline Flint springs to mind) bullying inadequate members of society through an ever harsher regime of prescriptions. The JobCentre Plus pogrom against the unemployed (delivered by organisations such as A4e) was a disgrace.

Note added 17th August:

What I am really saying though is that the ten million inadequate people will always be with us. Let's just budget for it and accept it is not going to change.

And the political opportunity is: Labour have bribed this sector for decades. But since 1997 they have turned against the "working class". The Conservatives, if they work out a distinctive "nanny state" solution of their own, now have an opportunity to bribe them and get their votes for decades (for decades because these people are not going to go anywhere).

House of Dorchester chocolates

I read about House of Dorchester chocolates in the Guardian (in an article about town planning by Tom Smedley).

You can buy them in Waitrose (but unfortunately there isn't a branch of Waitrose within 30 miles, not that I want another supermarket plonked down in the countryside).

Interesting flavours, smooth texture, satisfying size of chocolates. I can testify that you can eat twelve of them at one go without feeling sick. Unfortunately they don't seem to do bars of chocolate.

With the right marketing this is a brand that could take on Cadburys and win.

More:
http://www.hodchoc.com/chocolates/
http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2010/aug/07/victorian-style-model-towns

Simon Hoggart made an attack on single people

Above: Simon Hoggart is a senior journalist with The Guardian (and used to write for Punch from the evidence of this paperback which has been lying around the house for at least twenty years). His words, despite their surface humour, carry weight. Unlike for instance Euan Ferguson where you just say "Self-indulgent garbage" and turn the page.

In The Guardian yesterday Simon Hoggart made an attack on single people. As if they do not already suffer enough discrimination (single "supplements" on hotel rooms, paying tax to educate other people's kids, last in the queue for any state handouts etc). Based on a reading of the Ziegler biography of Ted Heath, Simon Hoggart told the Guardian's readers that single people brood on things too much, have no sense of perspective, and because they live alone are likely to make poor decisions.

A look at the last two premiers demonstates how faulty the Hoggart theory is:

Gordon Brown was "living with someone" but was notorious for his brooding, his sulking, his bullying, his pushing-secretaries-off-chairs, his stabbing of car seats, his gratuitous insults of elderly grannies who disagree with him etc.

Tony Blair was "living with someone" (Lady Macbeth no less) and yet managed to be one of the most evil and dishonest holders of the office of Prime Minister.

Neither of these two can be called well-balenced individuals with a good sense of perspective and able to make good decisions.

So Simon Hoggart's theory is in tatters.

An air of finality - the past week at work

Monday

For some reason I woke at 3.30 and couldn't get back to sleep again, knowing I would be tired the rest of the day.

At the agency it was the birthday of Yvette (agency head). She made lots of references to it during the morning. The rest of us made a collection, and Chris (Accounts, working her notice) went out and bought a bottle of Marks & Spencer champagne which we presented to Yvette. The big woman sat at her desk with a towel wrapped round her head (she had just washed her hair, water dripping onto her blotter).

Most of the day was spent working on a presentation we are due to give to a potential construction client (Crane). I had to do a lot of media research for this. My other clients were all quiet, which gave me the time to get it finished.

Lunchtime and I met PMF (an old sort-of friend) at a City restaurant. We had one of the balcony window seats, the windows open to give a view of the sparkling Thames. The restaurant was nearly empty so no-one overheard PMF's scandalous comments about the son of someone in the government (impossible to know if she was making it all up).

Late back to the office at 3pm, but it was okay as I had pre-arranged this.

Yvette, Julie (Account Executive) and Eleanor (trainee Account Executive) left at 5 with a group of clients they were taking on a theatre trip - Phantom of the Opera.

I stayed until nearly 9, working on the Crane presentation with Neil (graphic designer) and Jonathan (copywriter). We had a bottle of wine sent over from the Italian restaurant, putting it on the agency's account. Jonathan went through Yvette's desk and discovered a reference Yvette had written for Duncan (trainee, dismissed for incompetence) - we were all shocked at how spiteful and bad the reference was.

Tuesday

A rush to get to the agency on time this morning as I knew the morning would not be easy.

What chaos! What hysteria! The hours up to 11 o'clock were almost insane, with everyone's efforts aimed at producing and collating materials for the Crane presentation.

Yvette was the biggest problem, constantly preventing people from getting on with their work due to hysterical outbursts, accusations and torrents of bad language. The main target was Eleanor, and a massive clash was only narrowly avoided (you could see each of them choking back their angry words). Katharine (PA to Terry, our ultimate boss) came down to help us, and she typed up the main presentation report while I read out Yvette's appalling handwriting to her.

At last Yvette and Julie rushed off to the Crane offices.

The rest of us were left with feelings of exhaustion and mild shock.

Andrea (former Account Director working out her notice as a lowly admin assistant in the PR division upstairs) came down to see what was going on.

Eleanor complained bitterly about Yvette's false accusations, saying "She's just trying to cover her arse".

"There's a lot of it to cover" said Andrea.

I felt so tired I could do very little for the rest of the day. Everyone else also seemed exhausted and subdued. We all left early.

Wednesday

During the morning I had to rewrite various invoices that clients had challenged. This was a very tedious task and involved trying to remember work I did three or four weeks ago. This is not always straightforward, as campaigns change so suddenly and frequently that you have to constantly keep notes.

Crane (the potential construction client) rang up Yvette and told her she had not got the account. Yvette transferred the call into her office and closed the door. We could see the red light on the 'phone - the call lasted half an hour, and Yvette was obviously trying to talk them round.

Later we heard the reasons the presentation had failed - Yvette had been too dominant, Julie had been too quiet.

Yvette stayed in her office with the door shut for most of the day. Eleanor described Yvette's likely mood: "She's suffering from shock at the moment. This will turn to maudlin self-pity and then irrational anger".

For lunch I had some pastries, too many pastries, knowing that I was comfort-eating.

Jess Lewis (trainer who is leading a course on teamwork) arrived but Yvette cancelled the training. Jess Lewis went out and bought us all some cream cakes. After so much food I felt bloated.

The afternoon was slow. I worked on three routine ads. Then I went home early - no-one seemed to notice or care.

Thursday

Katherine is now working in the agency, and brings a calm sanity to the offices. She is still doing some of Terry's PA work, and disappears upstairs for hours at a time. Yvette cannot complain about this as Katherine is popular with Terry.

A planning meeting this morning. It is very noticeable how quiet Andrea's former clients have been. Yvette played this down, telling us the market was quiet at the moment.

Most of the day I spent on a series of ads, not difficult but time-consuming.

Yvette went home early.

After she had gone Terry came down and wandered through the offices looking anxious.

At 4.30 Julie's brother Martin arrived. He only comes to the offices when Julie is not there, so presumably she has told him to keep away. As usual he was asking for Andrea, who he used to go out with (he knows she works upstairs now, but he won't go up there).

I rang Andrea's extension, and when she answered I told her Martin had arrived. There was a long pause. Then she put the 'phone down without speaking.

Expecting Andrea to come down I asked Martin to sit down. He was wearing grey trackkie bottoms and a T-shirt that said British Army Training Unit. He talked about his army career ("...want to be a sergeant at least before I come out..."). From where he sat he could look out into the stairwell. I heard the staff upstairs begin to leave for the evening, and Martin watched them carefully, suddenly leaping from his seat and rushing out onto the stairs. I heard him arguing with Andrea ("Leave me alone" she shouted at him).

Friday

For me the agency has an air of finality about it. I have decided not to work beyond the end of August. Also I do not intend to work any notice, but just leave (I have enough holiday owed to me to cover this).

I have a number of campaigns running at the moment, which kept me busy for most of the day. Kennedy, one of the PR execs upstairs (aged about forty, thin, good-natured), wanted to place an ad for one of his clients. He made so many amends to this ad that all records were broken (we keep a score on the studio wall).

Yvette flirted with Kennedy, telling him she had lost nearly a stone in weight.

"Did you drop one of your rings?" Kennedy joked.

Again I left early.

Superman

Above: there are lots of positive reviews circulating for the new Sherlock Holmes series with Benedict Cumberbatch. Like Mozart's Marriage of Figaro in Armani, the drama has been updated to modern times. I haven't seen it yet (no time) but everyone says it is good.



Above: Sherlock Holmes is more than just a Conan-Doyle fictional character - he is a phenomenon. This is the Sherlock Holmes statue in Baker Street. The previous television series starring Jeremy Brett had huge audiences.



Above: there is also a West End play on until September.



Above: not to mention numerous and spontaneous expressions of affection from ordinary people.



Above: which makes me ask why this character is so popular. A comment I read in a national newspaper (I forget which) summed it up best - Sherlock Holmes is a superhero you can believe in. Which in turn raises the question: what does a desire for the existence of superheros say about society in 2010?

Naomi Campbell giving evidence in The Hague

Hearing Naomi Campbell giving evidence in The Hague (reported on PM on BBC Radio 4 this afternoon) I was appalled by her selfish, self-obsessed attitude.

Completely indifferent to the gravity of the trial.

And obviously lying her head off.

Has anyone checked whether she paid tax on the "gift" she was given?

Advance warning - from now on it is unlikely I will book any ads with publications that put Naomi Campbell on the cover.

Cloned food

On the Today programme this morning there was a discussion about products from cloned animals entering the food chain (milk, beef etc). Two "experts", including one from the recently abolished Food Standards Agency, were blithely assuring us that there was nothing wrong with cloned food. As usual Evan Davis was pathetically ineffectual as an interviewer.

What was missing from the discussion was any acknowledgement that no mandate exists from the people to introduce cloned products into the food chain. All the available evidence tells us that the ordinary people of this country do not want cloned food. There are strict regulations currently in force that prohibit cloning.

And yet this cosy little radio chat end with a general agreement that the regulations against cloned food would be dropped. As if it was a done deal. As if Mad Cow Disease and all the other horrors had never happened.

What is to be done with the arrogant elite in this country that thinks they can do what they like irrespective of public opinion?

The animal rights movement will tell you that the only way to curb these people is through violence.

I do not share this view, but I can see how they have come to that conclusion.

When are the people involved in selling cloned food going to be arrested and put on trial?

PS and I am not happy about the plans to build a "super dairy" on Nocton Heath in Lincolnshire.

Alexandria Quartet 2

I am still working my way through The Alexandria Quartet by Lawrence Durrell. I should finish it by the weekend. As you might expect from such a long novel, the quality is uneven (exceptional in parts, plodding in other parts).

"...his character was as thin as a single skin of gold leaf - the veneer of culture which diplomats acquire..."

"God's real and subtle nature must be clear of distinctions: a glass of spring-water, tasteless, odourless, merely refreshing - and surely its appeal would be to the few, the very few, real contemplatives?"

"...his carefully graduated cocktail parties into which he occasionally introduced guests from the humbler spheres of life like prostitution or the arts."



Above: I was at an outdoor cafe recently, and a character at a nearby table seemed familiar, although I did not know him. There was something about the way he was simultaneously doing deals over his phone, ordering coffee, greeting people walking by. Then I realised this was how I imagined Nessim Hosnani from The Alexandria Quartet.



Above: one of the themes of the book is Jemais de la vie (Not in this life). The name of Justine's perfume, the title of a persistent popular song, the theme of the recurring love affairs etc. I wondered whether there might actually have been a popular song in Egypt in the 1930s and I found this on Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIk-Y8zOHN8 (2789).

Annihilated

Normally this time of year the garden is filled with swaying scented madonna lillies, four or five feet high and growing in big clumps.

This year they have been completely annihilated.

I thought at first the recent hot weather was responsible. But looking closely at the plants over the weekend I saw red beetles crawling all over them. I collected a few of them in a glass, with a bit of withered lily leaf, and brought them into the house to examine them properly.

They were a complete mystery to me. I had never seen them before. I couldn't find them in the Guardian guide to creepy-crawlies (not as you might think a survey of the New Labour project but a useful list of common insects).

It was only when I looked on the internet that I discovered there was such a creature as the red lily beetle, which has been steadily moving through the country since arriving in England in 1939.

I didn't know what to do with the beetles in the glass so I took them back into the garden and let them go.

More: http://www.rhs.org.uk/RHSWebsite/files/40/40ae74b2-f5cd-4ac5-9520-139cb2b7cf1b.pdf

Silver

It's always good to see the silver on show. Many churches don't make the effort. Or perhaps they are afraid that people will think the Anglican church is rich (which in fact it is).

"It's a small token" - the past week at work

Monday

During the morning I went into the quiet room and did some amendments to the German campaign for our toy client. This is the biggest piece of work we have on at the moment, and so is very good for my position in the agency. I get on well with the client because I always write a full justification for every single aspect of the advertising (choice of media, creative rationale, collateral back-up etc).

I was so busy on this work that I forgot to go to lunch on time.

So it was a shock to wander into the account executives' room and hear that Andrea (Account Director) had resigned. She came out of a meeting with Yvette (agency head, a monster) looking very tight-lipped and announced she was leaving. She began clearing her desk and because I didn't know what else to do I gave her a small cardboard box I use to keep magazines in.

Then Yvette asked me into her office and officially told me the news.

"I suppose you're wondering if you'll get her car" she said.

This had been the last thing on my mind. I told her I already had a car and didn't want another one. Yvette said we would talk again about Andrea's clients.

I went back into the account exec's room. Terry (head of the PR division upstairs and our ultimate boss) appeared looking dazed. He went into Yvette's office and shortly afterwards Andrea was called in to join them.

Later it was announced that Andrea would work a month's notice in the PR office upstairs.

Tuesday

Terry's wife Diane is to move into one of the unused small offices on our floor (she runs a small business and works three days a week). It is obvious that she is doing this to keep an eye on the agency as normally she uses one of the "hot desks" upstairs. Perhaps Terry and Yvette are falling out.

Often today I wondered whether I should leave on the same day as Andrea. I know I do not want to go on working at the agency. And I am not enthusiastic about having to pick up Andrea's client list (we almost certainly will not recruit anyone new).

Wednesday

One of the (many) downsides of Andrea's resignation is that with the air of crisis it is impossible to arrive late in the mornings. When I arrived this morning Yvette was looming over Andrea who was sat at her desk. Andrea was sent home to collect agency property she has supposedly stolen - when she returned all she had were a few innocuous papers.

Then Andrea was sent upstairs to help Val's admin team.

At lunchtime Jonathan (copywriter) suggested we went for a drink. We went to the Two Brewers. He announced it was his birthday, but this was an incidental comment. He mainly wanted to talk about conditions in the agency. He thought that with Andrea gone he would become the main target of Yvette's bullying. We reached a loose agreement that if either of us was attacked we would act together to protest.

Later that afternoon we all gathered in the general office where Yvette gave Jonathan a present Eleanor (trainee account executive, working out her notice) had bought earlier.

Handing Jonathan the gift-wrapped package Yvette said: "It's a small token of our appreciation - actually it's quite a big token when you consider our appreciation..."

We all laughed politely.

Late afternoon Martin, Julie's brother and Andrea's former boyfriend, arrived asking for Andrea. He was wearing a suit, a red T-shirt, black shoes. Julie was out. Eleanor told him Andrea no longer worked in the office (technically true, although she was only upstairs). He asked if he could wait and sat down in a chair, reading a martial arts paperback. After about half an hour he left, telling Eleanor and myself that the army was transferring him soon (presumably he wanted us to pass this information on).

Thursday

The agency has become very silent following Andrea's resignation. The atmosphere one of boredom mixed with tension. Julie (trainee account executive) has become very withdrawn.

During the morning I met with a German media buyer. She told me that the best-selling magazines in Germany are television listings. "There is tremendous personal wealth in Germany" she said.

Towards the end of the working day I was asked into Yvette's office to discuss Andrea's client list. I expressed disquiet at the way Andrea was being treated. We talked for quite a while, although not acrimoniously. Yvette told me that she was hoping Eleanor would stay on at the agency. She also wanted Katharine (Terry's PA upstairs) to join us as a trainee account exec. For the time being she intends to handle Andrea's client list herself (which was a relief as I was afraid of having them dumped on me).

Friday

The mystery solved today about why Yvette's car alarm keeps going off. She parks it in the mews at the back of our building. The assistants in the photographic studio on the ground floor have been sneaking out into the mews, rocking the car until the alarm goes off, then rushing back inside again. Yvette caught them this morning red-handed. She apparently told their boss that she wants them sacked. She came back up to our floor seething with anger.

I helped Jonathan with some copywriting and Julie with some media research.

Yvette out all of the afternoon at an awards ceremony (nothing very special).

Krispy Kreme

Above: Krispy Kreme.

I don't know what made me buy this Krispy Kreme doughnut. I wasn't hungry. The experience wasn't particularly noteworthy (certainly not the catharsis others have claimed to experience when consuming these items).

Was this a waste of money? Was this an indefensible indulgence in the decadant foodstuffs of a dying materialist culture? Or was it consumer choice taken to its logical conclusion?

Foreign policy initiative

Above: The Lion and the Tiger by Denis Judd.

David Cameron is in India, leading a big delegation to create a new alliance.

The foreign policy initiative is extremely interesting and made me think of The Lion and the Tiger by Denis Judd, which I read last year (Denis Judd is Professor of Imperial, Commonwealth and Indian History at London Metropolitan University).

The book is an entirely unsentimental review of the historical relationship between Britain and India and had a number of points that made me think:

The association between Britain and India created the world’s first superpower, and Britain ceased to be a world power immediately after Indian independence in 1947.

Putting to one side the colonial aspects, the association was essentially one of collaboration.

The behaviour of the local (and self-serving) British community in India (especially the women) poisoned the atmosphere and masked the mutual dependency.

Indian and British people were well suited in temperament.

Under British rule Indian industry developed rapidly from the 1880s, so that by 1914 India was among the top fourteen most industrialized nations.

India was granted its own delegation in the Versailles Conference that followed the First World War.

Roosevelt’s policy objective was to weaken the link between Britain and India, and the Atlantic Charter in 1942 was part of this process – this stealthy manouvre became on-going American policy.

What does all this tell us about David Cameron’s mission today? The Guardian dismisses the visit as a cynical attempt to sell arms to the sub-continent, and they may be right. But it is also possible that David Cameron has a much more far-sighted aspiration.

Both India and the United Kingdom are regional powers. India is one of the strongest powers in Asia. Britain is one of the strongest powers in Europe. Neither country can achieve regional military-economic hegemony alone (assuming hegemony is a policy objective). If they pooled their commercial and military power in a strong alliance they would, almost immediately, become an irresistible world power. With hardly any effort, and almost unnoticed, David Cameron would have taken the United Kingdom to the edge of greatness.

The two countries are well-matched. They have economies that are roughly equal in size but complementary so that there is little rivalry. They have surplus assets that would be of use to the other (for instance, the United Kingdom has considerable reserves of diplomatic influence throughout the world). The linguistic link is obvious. The geographical separation adds rather than detracts from the alliance (neither country is particularly enamoured with its neighbours). A huge number of semi-dormant cultural links already exist between to the two nations.

To create such an alliance would mean an unaccustomed exercise of realpolitik. Britain would have to abandon any pretence of friendship with Pakistan. India would have to get over its post-colonial hang-ups. Sections of British society would have to get over their Jewel In The Crown hang-ups (although there cannot be many of the Raj generation left alive). The pro-Labour Indian claque in Britain will need to be faced down. There will be many critics around the world.

But this looks like the most interesting and ambitious foreign policy initiative since 1st January 1973.

More:

http://www.number10.gov.uk/news/latest-news/2010/07/uk-india-relationship-should-be-stronger-and-deeper-pm-53956

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/opinion/edit-page/Old-Ties-Made-New/articleshow/6233548.cms

Masterpieces from the Uffizi Gallery, Italian Renaissance Drawings

I went to see the Masterpieces from the Uffizi Gallery, Italian Renaissance Drawings at the British Museum last week. The tickets were free, a gift from a client who was unable to go. ­­I went with Alan Nixon, who wanted to see if he could spot any collector's marks that he knew. Drawings I especially liked: Luca Signorelli's Shepherds and an Angel – fabulous expressions. Fra Angelico's beautiful King David. Fra Filippo Lippi's Virgin and Child with Two Angels – everything about this drawing is wonderful. I used to like drawing - it teaches you to observe the world closely. The Fra Filippo Lippi: http://www.lib-art.com/imgpaintingthumb/5/4/t13045-madonna-with-the-child-and-two-ange-fra-filippo-lippi.jpg

Delighted

It was good to see that Sainsburys has started selling cottage loaves. The drab experience of going round the store on a Friday evening was suddenly transformed. It was a textbook example of delighting the customer (well, it delighted me).

I suppose it's possible that they have always sold cottage loaves but they run out before I get to the shop.

But this is the first time I have seen a cottage loaf on sale in a supermarket.

Now I want to see a "cottage brick" (a London delicacy) on sale.

Concentration

Recently I have been thinking a lot about concentration.

Some examples:



Above: rolling a cigarette.



Above: texting.



Above: listening to music.

Concentration is a cognitive process. It has received a huge amount of attention from psychologists and cognitive neuro-scientists. The subject is of great interest to advertising agencies as getting the target audience to concentrate on "the message" is a good eighty per cent of what we do.

Concentration involves making a choice (either voluntary or involuntary) between several simultaneous demands on our attention. On the whole I am persuaded by the feature-identification theory. Also I am interested in the neural correlation when we focus our concentration (the "firing" in the superior colliculus of the brain) - but I am entirely opposed to the experiments carried out on monkeys.

How different is visual attention from mental concentration? Visual attention has three stages - focus, margin and fringe. Advertising uses repetition to get a message onto the fringe of a subject's visual attention, then relies on creative impact to persuade the subject to focus.

This is England, 25th July 2010

St James's Day. I was invited to two patronal festivals. Instead I decided to go to a village fete in the heart of the county.



Above: the village street (there is only one) is very picturesque, lined with thatched cottages. The walls of the houses are made of baked mud, and have lasted over two hundred years. Normally you hardly see a single car in the place, but today there was a row of parked cars for about half a mile.



Above: there was some evidence of gentrification, but not much. Tinker's Cottage was obviously once the abode of socio-economic class "E". Now it looked very prosperous and bourgeois.



Above: at the end of the village, by the sharp bend, is the church. Fourth church to stand on this site. The raised churchyard indicates a burial ground of some considerable antiquity.



Above: one of the memorial windows in the church, dated 1917, showed two pre-Raphaelite knights. This is how "modern" society viewed itself. The faces are so distinctive that it seems they are portraits.



Above: the fete itself was held in the garden of The Old Rectory. Pevsner says the building is 1839, the architect SC Lomas. The severity of the large three-story brick box was softened by the beautiful woodland garden that surrounded it (terraces, herbacious borders, rambling roses).



Above: as I looked at the main lawn I thought: this is England, 25th July 2010. It was so English it could have been a caricature by Eugène Ionesco. The heat of the day began to ease.



Above: the most interesting stall (for me) was the honey stall. It was run by a local farmer's wife who keeps bees. There were informative notes about bee-keeping pinned to a board.



Above: there was also a sample hive (without live bees!).



Above: samples of the honey were being sold for a few pence. I bought this little jar. The honey seemed to add to the Rupert Brooke ambience of the day.



Above: bee just outside my back door. The falling bee populations thoughout the world are causing scientists some concern, but so far no government has commissioned research on why this is happening. We still get bees in our garden, but for how much longer?



Above: the latest magazine from the Soil Association has an interesting article on bees.

More:

http://www.soilassociation.org/

http://www.thewi.org.uk/standard.aspx?id=18528

"What's jangling?" - the past week at work

Monday

Yvette (agency head) is becoming more and more anxious as the end of the month approaches and it is clear we are not going to hit our billings target. She was extremely rude to Andrea (Account Director) interrupting a 'phone call to ask her questions (it had been a personal call, but Yvette wasn't to know that). She switched off a fax transmission left by Rachel from the PR division upstairs (we have the last fax machine in the building).

Lunchtime Yvette's friend from the Sunday Express came in and they both disappeared into Yvette's office with two bottles of wine, their laughter heard all over the floor.

Terry (MD and our ultimate boss) came down and asked me to do some PR for a French bathrooms client, although I have only the sketchiest idea what he wants me to do.

Tuesday

We had back the results of the psychometric tests we did with Jess Lewis last week. Yvette went through them, making all sorts of snap judgements. "You obviously want my job" she said to Andrea.

We were quite busy this morning, with two quite big campaigns coming in, but they will not be billed until August, so no use for this month's figures. One of these campaigns was the German advertising for our toy client. As I had done most of the work on the proposals, it put me in a good light.

Wednesday

The working day ended, but we had to stay on for another of the Jess Lewis training sessions. Aged in her late fifties, Jess Lewis wears a dark suit (looks very Marks & Spencer) and has short blonde-grey hair. Her training style is very pedestrian, and she will make a bland statement and then pause, as if expecting us to gasp in admiration.

Thursday

Very tired this morning because of the late night yesterday. I was twenty minutes late getting to the agency. Eleanor was half an hour late and Andrea rang in sick.

No more money came in today. July looks as if it is going to be a major failure for Yvette. Jonathan (copywriter) is openly pleased about this, even though it may have serious repurcussions for staffing levels (Jonathan and Yvette have completely fallen out, and they are no longer even polite to each other).

Neil (graphic designer) seems to have wiped lots of artwork from the system when loading some new software. I suggested that it would all be on the back-up, but he became very mysterious and said "Backing-up is not as easy as it sounds". He is supposed to do a back-up every evening.

Eleanor wearing lots of bracelets.

"What's jangling?" said Yvette.

"My nerves" said Eleanor.

Friday

Yvette not in until midday, which made everyone feel relaxed.

Nothing to do, so most of the time we just sat around talking and drinking coffee.

At 5 Martin, Andrea's boyfriend, turned up although Andrea had told him not to. She stayed in the general office and wouldn't come into Reception. Eventually Eleanor told him Andrea wasn;t feeling well.

Ed Miliband

Above: Ed Miliband seems to be emerging as the front runner for leader of the Labour Party.

On This Week yesterday Ed Miliband talked to Andrew Neil about his campaign to become leader of the Labour Party. His voice has a unique sound I can't identify - it's as if he is continually gobbling his words ("like the Soup Dragon on the Clangers"). During the interview he revealed that he had only been an MP since 2005.

Attitudes towards Ed Miliband are mixed. About half of media commentators regard him as an intellectual man of integrity. The other half talk of him as if he were Ass-Eared Folly in Mantegna's Allegory on the Fall of Ignorant Humanity.

This Week is now "on holiday" until September, mirroring the excessive summer holiday of the House of Commons. In the past MPs took the summer off because they had to bring in the harvest on their landed estates. Now they just loaf around.



Above: Andrew Rawnsley writing in The Observer.

Lawrence Durrell wrote in the 1950s: it is the unthinking instinct of the Left to promote civil war. As well as class war within wider society, this also applies to factional war within the Labour Party. None of the five candidates (except perhaps Burnham) can be called a unity figure.