This article is from the source 'guardian' and was first published or seen on . It last changed over 40 days ago and won't be checked again for changes.
You can find the current article at its original source at http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/apr/17/thatcher-funeral-downton-abbey-politics-bluff
The article has changed 2 times. There is an RSS feed of changes available.
Previous version
1
Next version
| Version 0 | Version 1 |
|---|---|
| Thatcher's funeral: an exercise in Downton Abbey politics | Thatcher's funeral: an exercise in Downton Abbey politics |
| (5 months later) | |
| According to the story, when Christopher Wren was laying out his new cathedral after the Great Fire of London of 1666, he asked for a flat stone which would fix, at ground level, the centre point of the planned great dome for the new St Paul's. As Wren placed the stone on the ground he noticed that it was piece of old gravestone, upon which was carved a single word: Resurgam – I shall rise again. | According to the story, when Christopher Wren was laying out his new cathedral after the Great Fire of London of 1666, he asked for a flat stone which would fix, at ground level, the centre point of the planned great dome for the new St Paul's. As Wren placed the stone on the ground he noticed that it was piece of old gravestone, upon which was carved a single word: Resurgam – I shall rise again. |
| Apocryphal or not – and it is surely too good a story to be true – Resurgam instantly became integral to the mythology of the new St Paul's. Resurgam embodied not just the Christian doctrine of the resurrection, but the determination for the cathedral itself to rise again on the ashes of its destroyed predecessor. Wren duly had the word carved into the portico of the south door of the new St Paul's, with a phoenix rising from the ashes. It is there to this day. | Apocryphal or not – and it is surely too good a story to be true – Resurgam instantly became integral to the mythology of the new St Paul's. Resurgam embodied not just the Christian doctrine of the resurrection, but the determination for the cathedral itself to rise again on the ashes of its destroyed predecessor. Wren duly had the word carved into the portico of the south door of the new St Paul's, with a phoenix rising from the ashes. It is there to this day. |
| Yet for the high Tory Wren, according to his biographer Lisa Jardine, Resurgam implied something more political too. It meant not just doctrinal piety and his magnificent cathedral. It was also a statement of faith in the possibility that the old political order of the Stuart monarchy and high church Anglicanism could now rise again, unchallenged and unchallengeable after the upheavals of the English civil war and the fire. | Yet for the high Tory Wren, according to his biographer Lisa Jardine, Resurgam implied something more political too. It meant not just doctrinal piety and his magnificent cathedral. It was also a statement of faith in the possibility that the old political order of the Stuart monarchy and high church Anglicanism could now rise again, unchallenged and unchallengeable after the upheavals of the English civil war and the fire. |
| I do not know if Margaret Thatcher chose to have her funeral in Wren's cathedral because she had the Resurgam story in her mind. Certainly, if she herself were to rise from the ashes in the next few days, all of us would be forced to rethink rather a lot of things. But at some level it nevertheless seems appropriate that she and her followers insisted on St Paul's. That's because Wednesday's procession and funeral were a political Resurgam, a statement of faith in the continuing ascendancy of the Thatcherite legacy and in the lasting nature of the Conservative political order. It was an attempt to freeze-frame history. | I do not know if Margaret Thatcher chose to have her funeral in Wren's cathedral because she had the Resurgam story in her mind. Certainly, if she herself were to rise from the ashes in the next few days, all of us would be forced to rethink rather a lot of things. But at some level it nevertheless seems appropriate that she and her followers insisted on St Paul's. That's because Wednesday's procession and funeral were a political Resurgam, a statement of faith in the continuing ascendancy of the Thatcherite legacy and in the lasting nature of the Conservative political order. It was an attempt to freeze-frame history. |
| Attending the funeral, as I did, it was not hard to sense that this was as bold a bluff in death as Thatcher ever attempted in life. The heat has now gone out of the argument about whether the procession to St Paul's was right or wrong, but this was an imperial state funeral in every essential respect – and it should not have been. Three things gave me a frisson in St Paul's yesterday. One, as usual, was Elgar's Nimrod. The second was the harsh tramp of the polished military boots on the cathedral's marble floor as Lady Thatcher's coffin was borne in and out. And the third was the unmissable symbolism of the Queen taking a subordinate place to a dead prime minister for the first time since the funeral of Churchill, which yesterday's events so deliberately aped. | Attending the funeral, as I did, it was not hard to sense that this was as bold a bluff in death as Thatcher ever attempted in life. The heat has now gone out of the argument about whether the procession to St Paul's was right or wrong, but this was an imperial state funeral in every essential respect – and it should not have been. Three things gave me a frisson in St Paul's yesterday. One, as usual, was Elgar's Nimrod. The second was the harsh tramp of the polished military boots on the cathedral's marble floor as Lady Thatcher's coffin was borne in and out. And the third was the unmissable symbolism of the Queen taking a subordinate place to a dead prime minister for the first time since the funeral of Churchill, which yesterday's events so deliberately aped. |
| This was a bad precedent. Thatcher was neither a second Churchill nor a monarch, though she sometimes behaved like both. We should have a better way of closing the book on our political leaders. It would be wrong to overstate the harm or the wrong that has been done to civil society in this country by the Thatcher funeral, but a smart prime minister would now get some modest and appropriate ground rules agreed and in place for such events in the future – and publish them. That way, some useful civic good might yet emerge from this week's excesses. | This was a bad precedent. Thatcher was neither a second Churchill nor a monarch, though she sometimes behaved like both. We should have a better way of closing the book on our political leaders. It would be wrong to overstate the harm or the wrong that has been done to civil society in this country by the Thatcher funeral, but a smart prime minister would now get some modest and appropriate ground rules agreed and in place for such events in the future – and publish them. That way, some useful civic good might yet emerge from this week's excesses. |
| The immediate question arising from the death of Lady Thatcher is whether the past 10 days have made any lasting difference to Britain. My strong instinct is that they have not. It was Lady Thatcher's life that left the mark, which is slowly disappearing, not her death. | The immediate question arising from the death of Lady Thatcher is whether the past 10 days have made any lasting difference to Britain. My strong instinct is that they have not. It was Lady Thatcher's life that left the mark, which is slowly disappearing, not her death. |
| The Thatcher funeral has been an event that has loomed over British politics, and the Tory party in particular, for many years. It was bound to do so because of the legacy of her fall from power in 1990. It was always going to provide her with a last shake of the dice, trigger a last hurrah for the media personality cult, and be her last chance to cause trouble for her successors. All those things have happened since she died. Now they are over. The net short-term effect is somewhere between negligible and, because it has reminded the public of the mischievous sway she still holds, very slightly damaging to the Tory party. In the long run, however, the death of Lady Thatcher could be a release for the Tory party. | The Thatcher funeral has been an event that has loomed over British politics, and the Tory party in particular, for many years. It was bound to do so because of the legacy of her fall from power in 1990. It was always going to provide her with a last shake of the dice, trigger a last hurrah for the media personality cult, and be her last chance to cause trouble for her successors. All those things have happened since she died. Now they are over. The net short-term effect is somewhere between negligible and, because it has reminded the public of the mischievous sway she still holds, very slightly damaging to the Tory party. In the long run, however, the death of Lady Thatcher could be a release for the Tory party. |
| The big question is whether the Tory party can accept this. Thatcher and Thatcherism were umbilically linked. They are both now in their box. Certainly there has been an attempt to glorify Thatcherism in some quarters as if it is her living bequest to those who remain. But this is the vainglory of the overmighty. Take the Falklands war out of Thatcher's record and yesterday's imperial funeral would have been inconceivable. There is no second Falklands waiting to happen. To be sure, some on the right want Britain to go to war with the European Union, but in the end neither the public nor the Tory party really seems to want this. Nigel Farage is no more a second Thatcher than Thatcher was a second Churchill. | The big question is whether the Tory party can accept this. Thatcher and Thatcherism were umbilically linked. They are both now in their box. Certainly there has been an attempt to glorify Thatcherism in some quarters as if it is her living bequest to those who remain. But this is the vainglory of the overmighty. Take the Falklands war out of Thatcher's record and yesterday's imperial funeral would have been inconceivable. There is no second Falklands waiting to happen. To be sure, some on the right want Britain to go to war with the European Union, but in the end neither the public nor the Tory party really seems to want this. Nigel Farage is no more a second Thatcher than Thatcher was a second Churchill. |
| Thatcherism poses far more problems than opportunities for the modern Tory party. That is why it is a category error to cast David Cameron's coalition government as more Thatcherite than Thatcher's own administrations, even to the extent of praising Thatcher for her pragmatism and restraint and contrasting it with Cameron's supposedly more ideological and more ruthless approach. | Thatcherism poses far more problems than opportunities for the modern Tory party. That is why it is a category error to cast David Cameron's coalition government as more Thatcherite than Thatcher's own administrations, even to the extent of praising Thatcher for her pragmatism and restraint and contrasting it with Cameron's supposedly more ideological and more ruthless approach. |
| But this is simply not the case. It is to equate Thatcherism with trying to reform the public sector and trying to create a more virtuous balance between the private and the public, the central and the local. That is not a definition of Thatcherism. It is a way of stating the unsolved problem of all modern politics, the holy grail to which Thatcherism offered one set of answers at one particular time. Thatcherism's distinctive drivers – imperial fantasy, privatisation of public goods, possessive individualism, and hostility to the overmighty unions – are not dead, but each is more muted now. | But this is simply not the case. It is to equate Thatcherism with trying to reform the public sector and trying to create a more virtuous balance between the private and the public, the central and the local. That is not a definition of Thatcherism. It is a way of stating the unsolved problem of all modern politics, the holy grail to which Thatcherism offered one set of answers at one particular time. Thatcherism's distinctive drivers – imperial fantasy, privatisation of public goods, possessive individualism, and hostility to the overmighty unions – are not dead, but each is more muted now. |
| Buildings can last for centuries. So can reputations. St Paul's Cathedral was reborn and survives. But Wren's vision of a reborn and enduring old order barely survived his own lifetime. Likewise with Thatcher. She will be talked about for generations. But her attempt to bequeath a political settlement for the ages is as doomed as Wren's. It is a folly, just like her funeral. It is Downton Abbey politics. Her funeral marks an end not a beginning. Thatcherism will not rise again, any more than she will. | Buildings can last for centuries. So can reputations. St Paul's Cathedral was reborn and survives. But Wren's vision of a reborn and enduring old order barely survived his own lifetime. Likewise with Thatcher. She will be talked about for generations. But her attempt to bequeath a political settlement for the ages is as doomed as Wren's. It is a folly, just like her funeral. It is Downton Abbey politics. Her funeral marks an end not a beginning. Thatcherism will not rise again, any more than she will. |
| Our editors' picks for the day's top news and commentary delivered to your inbox each morning. |
Previous version
1
Next version