An echo from history
THE Bishop of Willesden has caused a furore by describing Prince William and his fiancée, Kate Middleton, as "shallow celebrities" and the media fuss surrounding their engagement as "nauseating tosh". He predicts their marriage will last seven years.
British satirical magazine Private Eye takes up the theme:
"One of England's leading bishops has launched an astonishing rant about the forthcoming marriage between King Henry VIII and his beautiful bride-to-be Anne Boleyn. Thomas Cramner, a senior bishop, has written an article in his Commonplace-book denouncing the Royal Family as a bunch of tyrants, and criticising the media for producing reams of 'fawning deferential nonsense'. Even more insanely, he criticizes the King's FAMILY, saying it's full of 'broken marriages and philanderers'.
"We would like to make perfectly clear where our allegiances lie. We can only hope that our glorious king executes the bishop as soon as possible.
"On other pages
· 'You've never had it so good,' minister tells starving peasants.
· Ruinously expensive wars overseas continue.
· King executes wife."
Agony aunts
PRIVATE Eye has a lot of fun with the Fleet Street gossip columnists who have gone into orbit over the royal engagement.
One – Katie Nicholl, of the Daily Mail – has predicted their imminent engagement and marriage 12 times since 2004. She has also told readers six times in that same period that the whole thing is off. Other columnists and "royal experts" have predicted imminent engagement/marriage 11 times over the same period.
Then there are the bored insouciants who are tired of the whole thing – except they don't get backed up by their own newspapers.
"We are all happy for William and Kate, of course," wrote Carol Midgely in The Times. "But does it count as treason to say that it's been only two days and I'm already sick of hearing about it?"
As Private Eye points out, her column was immediately followed by six articles, over two double-page spreads of the paper's features section, devoted to the royal engagement. So too were five pages of the paper's main section, most of the front page, the Young Times page and the lead editorial.
The contradiction is captured by Glenda Slagg, Private Eye's resident columnist:
"Where were you when you heard the news? I tell you where I was – Seventh Heaven! In a few magic words all the doom and gloom of Cameron's cuts disappeared and it was spring again!!! And I tell you for why Mister in case you've been on Mars for the last week! Our handsome Prince is marrying his childhood sweetheart! Wills 'n Kate – Doesn't it sound great? That's Glenda's little poem. Pass me the Kleenex someone. Glenda needs another little weep!!?
"For crying out loud can't everyone put a sock in it!! I'm talking about the flood of sentimental drivel that's going to drown us all! So Prince Wills is getting hitched to some girl he met at a party years ago! Who cares??? I DON'T WANT TO READ ABOUT IT!!? Geddit!!?. Will and Kate. They're the ones I hate. Glenda's little poem. Pass me the sickbag someone, Glenda needs to throw up again!"
More bargains
THIS week's bit on the beachfront lunch for R3.50 (with free glass of wine) prompts Pat Doveton, of Durban North, to phone in with details of the bill from the Thousand Hills Hotel, at Drummond, where she and her husband Jock spent the first night of their honeymoon almost 60 years ago.
The bill was 17s 6d (R1.75), dinner bed and breakfast. Pat also phoned her mother to tell her they'd arrived safely, and that cost all of ninepence (7 1/2 cents).
Some years later Pat and Jock dropped in at the Thousand Hills for tea and asked if they could see their old room – No 13. But the numbering had been changed because 13 was considered unlucky. The numbers ran 11, 12, 14.
The numbering doesn't seem to have affected Pat and Jock though. She's a sprightly 80 and still works in sales for the company that has employed her for 41 years. Jock, now 82, still goes deep sea fishing a couple of times a week.
Tailpiece
WHAT do you do if you see a spaceman? You park in it, man!
Last word
Everyone is a genius at least once a year. The real geniuses simply have their bright ideas closer together.
GRAHAM LINSCOTT
No comments:
Post a Comment