I’d strongly recommend that you read my new book, unreviewed, largely on both sides of the Atlantic called The Phony Victory which is about the origins of the Second World War and actually the rather awkward relationship between the United States and Britain, which existed at the beginning of the war, which is now largely forgotten. I thought you were unfair and possibly had a trouble to look too much into what I thought about either the Anglo-American relationship or the Second World War before writing the piece. For me the relationship would be a lot better if it was stripped of the false sentimentality of a special relationship which doesn’t exist. If we have different interests from the United States, we should pursue them and likewise. They have to have different interests I don’t resent or object to that. And it’s foolish, as far many British people do, to imagine that somehow there’s some sort of shoulder to shoulder fraternity between the two countries. It’s a separate country, with its own culture and its own needs. But one of the things I learned was this: The United States is not a big England. I spent much of the time traveling through most of the 50 states, and always with fascination and pleasure. I had wonderful American neighbors who were immensely hospitable. You also criticized my attitude towards the United States, seeming to suggest that I was in some way hostile to the United States, and this is just simply not true I lived with great delight in Bethesda, Maryland for two years. I’m not against war films I’m not against the idea that the young, particularly, should be reminded of the sacrifice of their elders, but I think this should be done intelligently. And he always found that film to be convincing and persuasive, as is the book on which it was based. And also, brilliant films, probably one of the best 10 best war films ever made, such as The Cruel Sea, particularly interesting to me because my father was in the Royal Navy during the Second World War and experienced some of the things which it shows. Two in fact, one a 1958 version of Dunkirk which was far, far more interesting, about the political and historical context and about the struggle for morale which was going on in Britain at the time, when Britain was by no means convinced in 1940 that it had joined the right war. And there are many films, some good, some superb which have been made about the Second World War in Britain. There was no understanding of how the British army came to be standing up to its armpits in saltwater, or what had happened beforehand or anything to do with it. My point was these films-the film Dunkirk was so bad, that as I sat through it, I increasingly wished that the Germans would hurry up and come because at least they might bring a plot. And you took me up and I have to turn to quote from the thing which you particularly said here, which was that you thought that I might prefer a dribble and shlock to this sort of thing, which is absolutely not my point. Which I thought were bad films historically, either empty or illiterate, and generally false in their tone. The thing that I first wanted to raise with you was an article you wrote about the reviews-well not exactly reviews-but commentaries I’d given on two movies-one the Dunkirk movie, the other the one supposedly about Churchill, The Finest Hour. But sometimes there are things about which it’s necessary to be grouchy and gloomy. And grouchy and gloomy I may well be, people can judge that themselves when they get to know me. I think sometimes it’s useful, if you find something you disagree with, to take it up, because you can then sort these things out. Hitchens thank you so much for joining us. Hitchens a chance to respond and to explain to us his wider perspective. I believe specifically in my column I had referred to him as grouchy and gloomy. And specifically, we’re going to start out by talking about a couple of columns in Providence that reference Mr. TOOLEY: Hello this is Mark Tooley editor of Providence, a journal of Christianity and American foreign policy as well as president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy here in Washington DC, and I have the pleasure of talking to Peter Hitchens, British columnist, journalist, thinker, author of many books.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |