On Being English

No one watching Easter from King's, courtesy of BBC iPlayer, can be in any doubt about what it is to be English, even the young Chinese boy in the choir.

How the fates do favour one: Having just retrieved my belongings, in perfect condition after more than four years in store in an unventilated steel container, I am delighted to hear a piece that I possess, though after so long cannot now name, and can play shortly. These days, of course, the BBC rarely delights without immediately disappointing and I was not surprised when, perhaps in defiance of Dr Johnson's observation, a young woman with an all too obviously, and for some unpronounceably, foreign name (Halliki Voolma) and an accent that could have been Scotch, could have been American or could have been international, but was not English, stood at the end of the piece I possess and cannot name and read the lesson.

How times have changed.

We English learned long ago that the British believe they can fool us into thinking we alone amongst the peoples of the world are not entitled to a homeland, a history and a culture and so we know that when the BBC attempts to prove canines, and foreign dogs at that, can be bipeds it does so in defence of its British Marxist raison d’être and not in celebration of our 'celebrated' tolerance of diversity and change.

How times must be changed.