Watch this space. At the request of some co-workers i shall shortly be putting together my essential points of British History. This is for Americans who want to know more but don't have the pedigree to back it up.
Don't use too many big words and if you can craft analogies that use tabloid celebrities and tabloid situations to help us understand – that will be good.
I sense an E.P. Thompson vs. A.J.P. Taylor style donnybrook between you and me looming over some of your impending historical statements. I just know it....
Do i smell academic feud? I challenge you, under the collective working name "Chingford Polecat" to post your own summary one week from today. Then we shall compare!
Please don't go on and on about too many Sir Whatsits and Lady Jane Blahblahblahs. All that crap is so confusing. I just don't know how you can keep so much history straight in your mind and I really should just say flat out that I will never, ever be able to remember it enough to have an actual conversation. Instead, I will rely on you to regale me with strange stories of French-speaking people of Britania or whatever and I shall sit at your feet all wide-eyed with the joy of a good tale. Or else I will yawn and walk out of the faculty room while you are still mid-sentence. I don't have much natural curiosity, you know, so I can't make too many promises.
I would love to see the attempt to summarize the whole shebang, though.
I know how it starts: "The world was perfect, with rivers of gravy, free beer for all, and accessible lard volcanoes perfect for deep frying fish, chips, and Mars Bars. Then the Lord in his benightened inanity invented the French, and he made them a jealous people."
Vishnu? Yahweh? The rain snake? Zeus? Allah? HRH the Duke of Edinburgh, proclaimed as a god by the cargo cults of the South Pacific? Which other guy would that be again? ;)
8 comments:
Don't use too many big words and if you can craft analogies that use tabloid celebrities and tabloid situations to help us understand – that will be good.
Yes, I agree we yankees ain't that sharp about you adorable Brits
I sense an E.P. Thompson vs. A.J.P. Taylor style donnybrook between you and me looming over some of your impending historical statements. I just know it....
Do i smell academic feud?
I challenge you, under the collective working name "Chingford Polecat" to post your own summary one week from today. Then we shall compare!
What? Of all history of all time?
If I wasn't in the final stages of planning a wedding I'd jump at it, truly.
Please don't go on and on about too many Sir Whatsits and Lady Jane Blahblahblahs. All that crap is so confusing. I just don't know how you can keep so much history straight in your mind and I really should just say flat out that I will never, ever be able to remember it enough to have an actual conversation. Instead, I will rely on you to regale me with strange stories of French-speaking people of Britania or whatever and I shall sit at your feet all wide-eyed with the joy of a good tale. Or else I will yawn and walk out of the faculty room while you are still mid-sentence. I don't have much natural curiosity, you know, so I can't make too many promises.
I would love to see the attempt to summarize the whole shebang, though.
I know how it starts: "The world was perfect, with rivers of gravy, free beer for all, and accessible lard volcanoes perfect for deep frying fish, chips, and Mars Bars. Then the Lord in his benightened inanity invented the French, and he made them a jealous people."
Vishnu? Yahweh? The rain snake? Zeus? Allah? HRH the Duke of Edinburgh, proclaimed as a god by the cargo cults of the South Pacific? Which other guy would that be again? ;)
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