{"id":229,"date":"2019-05-05T19:16:20","date_gmt":"2019-05-05T19:16:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.critical-stages.org\/19\/?p=229"},"modified":"2022-02-06T19:43:27","modified_gmt":"2022-02-06T19:43:27","slug":"state-of-paralysis-a-cultural-history-of-brexit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.critical-stages.org\/19\/state-of-paralysis-a-cultural-history-of-brexit\/","title":{"rendered":"State of Paralysis: A Cultural History of Brexit"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

By John Elsom<\/strong>
257 pp. Cambridge: The Lutterworth Press<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reviewed by Don Rubin<\/strong>*<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

British\ncritic John Elsom served as President of the International Association of\nTheatre Critics (publisher of this august journal) from 1985 to 1992. His latest\nbook\u2014State of Paralysis: A Cultural\nHistory of Brexit\u2014<\/em>very much reflects his own long-time obsession with politics,\ngenerally, and cultural politics, more specifically. As one of the first serious\nattempts to provide understanding and insight from a specifically cultural\nperspective on Britain\u2019s decision to leave the European Union\u2014Brexit\u2014this study\nis, by definition, important. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nproblem is that trying to come to grips with Brexit at any level is rather like\ntrying to wrestle a bear. But just because a challenge is nearly impossible\ndoesn\u2019t mean that it shouldn\u2019t be undertaken, and Elsom\u2019s broad, culturally-developed\nshoulders are as good as anyone\u2019s to stand on to see what is really happening. He\nis, after all, not only a veteran of Europe\u2019s theatre wars, but also a\ncard-carrying political junkie, having once run for Parliament in the U.K. on\nthe Liberal ticket.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nbook itself actually runs a rather fine line between being a personal cultural history\nand a cultural-political study. And the personal often dominates. He tells us\nin the book\u2019s opening sentence that he was \u201cnine years old during the invasion\nof Normandy,\u201d and we soon see life through his eyes in a gutted London after\nWorld War II. The personal and political remain tightly tied together as we\nshare his youthful introductions to two of Europe\u2019s most influential existentialist\nthinkers, Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus, and to watch the U.K.\u2019s on-again,\noff-again attempts first to join the European community and, then, try to leave\nit again after its 2016 Referendum. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So,\nwill the U.K. really leave the European Union? A difficult question for everyone\nbecause, as Elsom suggests right from the beginning of his study, nobody in his\ncountry \u201cquite knew what leaving the EU might mean. . . . We may have voted to\ntake back control but control over what? Were we gaining an ounce of\nsovereignty but losing a ton of influence?\u201d (6).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Providing\nhis very personal political history to this complex issue, Elsom notes that\nthere has always been a substantial portion of the U.K. population dubious\nabout any sort of a union with Europe (as there was certainly doubt in parts of\nEurope about Britain\u2019s commitment to the continent). Even Britain\u2019s 1971 vote\nto finally join the European Economic Community (EEC) was a significantly split\none\u2014356 to 244. Elsom tells us that the split never went away. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\nwas the cultural stereotypes as much as anything that kept this distrust flourishing.\nFor the British,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

French culture in London was associated less with history than with soft porn, more Folies Berg\u00e8re than the Louvre. French publishers produced sexually explicit works, such as Henry Miller\u2019s Tropic of Cancer <\/em>and James Joyce\u2019s Ulysses, <\/em>which were banned in the U.K. and the U.S. In Anglo-American movies, the Italians were passionate lovers or priests, Germans were shaggy-haired geniuses or goose-stepping Prussians, and the Swedes went skinny-dipping at midsummer and committed suicide during the rest of the year. Multiculturalism was not the answer to such misconceptions. It was a description of them. (31)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Would\nthat Elsom went further in this particular area. Unfortunately, he drops it in\nfavour of more readings of the political zeitgeist. He quotes, for example, the\nlittle-known Russian Alexandre Koj\u00e8ve, who believed that Europe was divided into\nthree essential cultures\u2014an Anglo-Saxon one, a Slav one and a Latinate one.\nThese groups, said Koj\u00e8ve, spoke different languages and worshipped different\nforms of Christianity\u2014Protestant, Orthodox and Catholic\u2014\u201con which were based\ntheir various laws, customs and sense of natural justice.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nFrench, suggests Elsom, were at the core of the Latinate culture which\ncultivated the art of leisure, \u201cthe source of art in general.\u201d So, it was France\nwhich tried to take charge of European culture by offering to host in Paris the\nUnited Nations\u2019 educational, scientific and cultural programs in 1946 through UNESCO.\n\u201cFrance thus became the landlord of a large, global, cultural headquarters\u201d\n(36-37).  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But\n\u201chistory is a hall of mirrors. At every step, the angles change and another\nperspective comes into view\u201d (39). And as Elsom\u2019s UNESCO view becomes clear,\nhis perspective changes once more to the very personal. We learn that during\nthe 1960s, he \u201cliked being self-employed\u201d and served not only as a talent scout\nfor a major film company, but also as a free-lance theatre critic for both London Magazine<\/em> and \u201cThe Listener\u201d on\nBBC, where he was able to see a whole new generation of playwrights emerge with\nnew ideas about post-war society\u2014 John Osborne, Harold Pinter, Tom Stoppard, Alan\nAyckbourne and Edward Bond among them. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\nwas through the decades of the 1960s and 1970s that Elsom watched the theatre in\nthe U.K. change with the appearances in London of such landmark productions as\nGrotowski\u2019s The Constant Prince <\/em>from\nPoland, <\/em>with the opening of the American\nlove-rock musical Hair<\/em> in the West\nEnd and with the Peter Brook-Ted Hughes Orghast<\/em>\nmaking dents in the country\u2019s well-made play tradition. Then, there was Peter\nDaubeny\u2019s many World Theatre Seasons at London\u2019s Aldwych Theatre. A rich time\nindeed for a politically-inflected young theatre critic (or, perhaps more\naccurately, a culturally-inflected would-be politician).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But\nthe U.K. and Europe were still vastly different cultures, \u201cone of which was\nfrightened of too much state control and the other of too much individualism. Their\nworld perspectives were at odds\u201d (114): <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At a time when British entertainment industries were basking in the glow of winning the war, continental theatres were undergoing a painful self-examination. They were striving to examine the causes of war, all wars, and why the revolution of the people was so hard to achieve and so close to tyranny, once it had taken place . . . the stories might be dressed up in the metaphors of the Absurd or in the cool detachment of Bertolt Brecht\u2019s Epic theatre . . . But there was little room for evasion. Dramatists from both sides of the Iron Curtain in Europe understood all too well how their continent had become civilisation\u2019s charnel house for much of the twentieth century. (71)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

There\nwere certainly many in the U.K. who, like Brook, were trying to make their own\nchanges. Elsom notes the satirical revues of the 1950s like Beyond the Fringe <\/em>and the 1960s\nexperimental seasons Brook piloted at the RSC. And popular British culture\nshowed a wide range of cultural muscle leading the world, for a time, \u201cin\n\u2018soft\u2019 diplomacy. In 1965, the visit of Laurence Olivier in the new National\nTheatre\u2019s Othello <\/em>was triumphantly\nreceived in Moscow. . . . The British boy bands\u2014the Beatles, the Rolling Stones\u2014were\nheading the international charts\u201d (73).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As\na result, European attitudes toward the U.K. did begin to change. \u201cWhen in 1968,\na new Conservative Prime Minister, Edward Heath, approached the EEC for the\nthird time to apply for EEC membership, he was met with a cordial welcome, not\na rebuff\u201d (73). But was the U.K. electorate really ready? As Churchill once\nsaid, if ever it were \u201cfaced with a choice between the Continent and the Open\nSea, the U.K. would always follow the Open Sea\u201d (87).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\nwere certainly those after the war who <\/p>\n\n\n\n

favoured the idea of sacrificing some sovereignty for participation in a wider European community. The Common Market was an economic success. It would soon become the largest trading bloc in the world. But those who hankered after lost imperial glory and saw signs of betrayal [of the] past was strong. To abandon the Commonwealth in favour of an economic arrangement with those countries on the Continent which had recently been our enemies was hard to accept. (58) <\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Yet,\nthe French themselves continued to feel that \u201cBritain was not European enough.\nIt was too tied to its transatlantic Big Brother, whose secrets it shared,\nwithout sharing them with France\u201d (62). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\nsaid, [Jacques] Delors\u2014a major supporter of the idea of a united Europe\u2014\n\u201cpretended that all national cultures were good and should be respected, except\nwhen they were bad, in which case they should not be called culture\u201d (128). The\nreal question for the Brits at this time, according to Elsom, was whether the\nEU could \u201cbecome the civilisation that matched the vision of its founders or\nwould it become merely the sum of its trade deals?\u201d (180).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Britain,\nof course, did become part of the European Union despite the fact that there\nwere many in the country who never did agree with the idea. In the U.K. today,\nElsom says, they are mostly members of the nationalist UKIP party which during\nthe Leave Referendum, and with the Conservatives, intentionally \u201cmangled\nhistory, turned a blind eye to the EU\u2019s achievements and promoted the white\ncommonwealth, the Anglosphere, as if it were an alternative\u201d (150). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Elsom\nalso blames the Leave decision on the ubiquity of the Internet, which, he says,\nwas manipulated to tilt the balance toward Leave in the debates. The key\nquestions at the time became simply economic in nature: how much of the\nnational income \u201cshould we spend looking after the vulnerable as opposed to\nstrengthening our defence system and building more houses? How much should be\nspent on improving our own standards of living, as opposed to responding to\nfamines elsewhere?\u201d (159).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He\nargues that the Internet also shrouded the nation <\/p>\n\n\n\n

in a fog of nostalgic self-delusion. . . . Facts mattered less than gut instincts. The Vote Leave campaign sent carefully targeted messages through social media, borrowing the skills of commercial marketing. The Brexiteers were conviction politicians, but their sense of purpose led many to believe that their patriotic ends justified their dishonourable means. In cricketing terms, they were proved guilty of ball-tampering on a massive scale. (196) <\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Ultimately,\nthe study concludes, \u201cThe grand simplicities of Leaving grew more complicated\nday by day\u201d (208). For Elsom, always an advocate of open and fair critical\ndebate, \u201cthe emergence of a critical culture\u201d never really happened, that \u201cthe\nbetter way ahead never became apparent through the process of discussion\u201d (225).\nThe debates became badly blurred by national and generational fears. For some,\nthe arguments being put forth<\/p>\n\n\n\n

were pieties, to others, necessities. To some, they meant only interference from the state, to others, the protection of the state. . . . Those who grew up before the 1990s and the arrival of the Internet had a certain understanding of what was meant by national borders. Those who corresponded daily across the world through the social media were less likely to see them as barriers to be controlled. (231)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

And,\nas we know now, the conclusion to those debates, these hopes and fears, the\nconclusion to Brexit itself is still to be written. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the arrival of a new year, 2019, we in Britain do not know what will happen. Will we leave or will we stay? . . . The saddest feature of the Brexit paralysis is the way in which a national self-absorption has stopped us from facing up to global challenges. The great betrayal of our heritage is that we no longer have time to play our full part in world affairs. (237)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

So,\nhas John Elsom provided any deeper understanding of Brexit by looking at it\nfrom his own cultural standpoint? Hard to say. Personally, I think he spreads both\nhis personal and political canvas a bit too widely and too often drifts across the\nsurfaces of such subjects as the economic and military influence of the U.S. on\nEurope, the Iran-Iraq war, the present position of the Gulf states and even Africa\n(the latter given a whole chapter in this book on Brexit). The focus really\ndoes fade from direct view at too many points. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Certainly,\nthe Brits and Europeans already know all the political and social background\ncontained here. That being so, one must ask if the cultural aspect is honed\nenough to provide new insight. Perhaps not. But, certainly, for interested\nnon-Europeans like me, who look in amazement at Britain\u2019s current political and\ncultural \u201cstate of paralysis\u201d and wonder how long such navel gazing can last having\nthis historical background, is certainly useful. And such a cultural focus does\nprovide an unusual intellectual arc through this impossibly large subject. And Elsom\nhimself, in the end, is a continuingly amusing guide, one who consistently\nprovides verbal food for thought on such Brexit-related subjects as Equality\nand Democracy. As he says of these subjects near the end of the book:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Equality began as a cry against privilege but it became a denial of difference. . . . Democracy is the expression of equality at a national Level. . . . It adds layer after layer of excuses for, when everyone is responsible, nobody is to blame. Democracy is the lemmings alibi. (234)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Yes,\nwhen everyone is responsible, nobody can be blamed. Truly a lemmings\u2019 alibi for\nsomething as profoundly disturbing as Britain\u2019s \u201cstate of paralysis.\u201d <\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n\"\"\n\n\n\n

*<\/a>Don Rubin<\/strong> is Managing Editor and Books Editor of Critical Stages<\/em>. Professor Emeritus of Theatre at Toronto\u2019s York University, he was the General Editor of Routledge\u2019s six-volume World Encyclopedia of Contemporary Theatre<\/em> and was the founding Editor of Canada\u2019s national theatre quarterly Canadian Theatre Review<\/em>. He has served as President of both the Canadian Centre of the International Theatre Institute and the Canadian Theatre Critics Association and has represented Canada on the International Executive Committees of both these organizations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Copyright \u00a9<\/strong> 2019 Don Rubin
Critical Stages\/Sc\u00e8nes critiques<\/em> e-ISSN: 2409-7411<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Creative<\/a><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

This work is licensed under the
Creative Commons Attribution International License CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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