People who say Goodbye by P Y Betts, and Hilary Mantel

I was looking for Victorian memoirs and couldn't find any; Perhaps Edwardian memoirs are just more popular? I ordered this one as it said it was funny; I do love a funny book. This one does not disappoint. P. Y. Betts was an indecently intelligent child who never had her originality knocked out of her which is rather surprising, but perhaps this was because her mother was the same. Throughout the book this is the central relationship - mother and daughter sizing each other up through narrowed eyes, and the mother keeping her knives very, very sharp.

Phyllis asks "What happens to you after you die?"
Mother replies "You rot."

We see the neighbourhood of Wandsworth through Phyllis's eyes. How extraordinary; there were fields at the bottom of their garden! It sounds idyllic. But up the road there's a hospital for the war wounded, across the road there's an undertaker and regular funerals, close by there's a lunatic asylum (with joyful loonies). There are sudden attacks of possibly fatal illness, an incompetent doctor, but also some relatives who are made of very stern stuff and seem capable of living for ever. I wish Phyllis had written more.

Another review here

I have also just read Hilary Mantel's book "Giving up the Ghost" which is also a memoir but poles apart in a way. Hilary was also a clever and spirited girl, who would have liked to have been a boy, and enjoyed her grandfather's company. Her parents' troubled marriage is sensed and not explained to the child. Really, their lack of explanations is everything that's wrong with being a child. Then her school is the most backward type of provincial Catholic school which at times employed cruel and stupid teachers. I too, went to a convent school, and was so much luckier because I loved and respected my nuns, which is terribly unfashionable to say these days. Some of them were, I think, thoughtful and disciplined in a good way. Hilary concludes that being a child didn't suit her personality, and I think, yes, I understand, I was rather similar, and as I grew older I grew more able to draw the lines under and move on, which is what Hilary does. But Hilary has a medical condition which must have been such a terrible drawback to her life, as to say, my life is fine, I have a good brain and a strong spirit but I AM IN TERRIBLE PAIN IN ALL MY BODY except, she says, her ankles and feet. She even has to diagnose her own condition. She seems not to meet a single intelligent doctor, or even a concerned and caring one. The insensitivity she encounters in the medical profession is pretty appalling.

I can say that doctors have improved, even in women's medicine, and I am pretty sure that teachers have improved and are no longer allowed to do the stupid things they used to do. Although, when my neighbour was a teaching assistant, she used to tell me about young teachers who would stand up and gabble at the children without pause, not realising that the children had withdrawn their attention after the first couple of incomprehensible sentences. Young people, pah. (I don't mean this, some of you are great, but listen to yourselves!)

Hilary's book is far more ambitious, in a literary sense, she knows how to create effects that will intrigue a reader. There is a strange intuition that I get from reading Mantel's work that she thinks she knows better than we do - your "mother" is feeding you the ideas/information she thinks are suitable for you, carefully knitted into a shape which she thinks is suitable for you. PY Betts has also shaped her information into a story, but she hasn't made it to suit anyone but herself or used fancy stitches that show her knitting skills; it's just what it is, funny and sharp, and smack, there you are. They are both well worth reading. 5 stars.

The Fabian Society is a secret organisation that undermines freedom!

According to these strange protesters we had at the Fabian society conference.  Lenin was a Fabian. (Shaw said so - I don't think Lenin was, it was just Shaw trying to shake things up.) The Fabian society is completely unsecretive and  sold tickets to their conference to anyone, by the way, not just members.

These protesters are nothing if not confusing, and their arguments, that socialists are capitalists and the world is run by the Rothschilds, indicate an unwillingness or inability to separate one idea from another. But this film is quite funny.

pic.twitter.com/RZgjYEEbBx

Sorry - it has been shortened, but honestly it was funny because they start to quote Magna Carta as though it is a magic spell which will take us all back to Merrie England when everyone was happy. Yeah, right.

Other impressions of the Fabian Conference

I thought there was a good spread of ages at the Fabian conference. I think that there were Young Fabians in evidence enjoying the chance to hear from M.P.s and working economists and experts and there seemed to be about 20 percent of white-haired Fabians, some very old, who must have been going to these things for years and years. Amazing.

I enjoyed the plenary on "Does the Left now have the ideological momentum?" I was particularly taken with the straight -talking Wes Streeting M.P. for Ilford North - a spokesman for keeping the UK within the single market and the customs union. His point of view was very popular with the audience. He said a clearer Labour standpoint on Europe would influence policy (I agree) although the current very ambiguous stand on Europe is popular on "the doorstep" (whatever the voter says, the Labour politician agrees with them). Richard Burgon M.P. said that the country has been suffering from the failure to share the country's wealth equally. Of course, this is particularly evident in the North/South East divide. No country is so geographically economically divided as ours and this is simply not being addressed. Polly Toynbee pointed out some of the pernicious effects of austerity. Katy Balls said that young people are pro-Labour on the whole, but didn't like the Mayor's call on Uber - because Uber is part of the young person's lifestyle. It caused outrage! She made many more points but she didn't try to speak very clearly so the effort of understanding her mannered way of talking became too much for me. Polly Toynbee said that if 16-18 year olds got the vote politicians would have to campaign in 6th forms and young people would get a fairer share of the cake, and more of the things they need, and therefore this age group should get the vote. (A good point).

After this plenary I was tired and went to have lunch in the café, where there is also a bookshop. It was a bright café and bookshop but not very warm.

I then attended a session, organised by the Young Fabians on Global-ready Britain: Taking stock as we go it alone.

There was much discussion about the education in this country - a poor skills base, poor lifelong learning, training in work confined to health and safety and the induction. Nothing else, most of the time. Bad management skills. Our economic vulnerabilities are social vulnerabilities and vice versa. If your education system produces people who are badly skilled and can do little, this is socially a time bomb (dissatisfaction leading to identity politics - British and proud of it - nothing else to be proud of but this accident of birth) and it is also economically rock-bottom.

Vicky Pryce talked at this conference and I heard her twice, without rating her highly as a speaker - her thoughts seemed to be all jumbled together - and her points very unclear.

There was a good woman Shadow Treasury Minister - Anneliese Dodds - very good intelligent speaker. Michael Jacobs was very good, very well-informed.

Later there was a talk by Keir Starmer M.P. He was a revelation to me because I had no idea he was such a good speaker, so confident, so clear. When I got home I looked him up and discovered that he has had a very successful career as a barrister and used to be the Director of Public Prosecutions. In fact, he was responsible for deciding to prosecute Vicky Pryce and her then husband, Chris Hahn, and they were sent to prison. Have they met since, I wondered? Anyway, he has also been knighted and is Sir Keir Starmer. He is the Labour shadow minister for Brexit and I have to say he must be a lot more intelligent than the Tory team. Sadly I didn't take any notes, and I can't remember what was said, except the level of the Tory incompetence is very high, e.g. the story of the excruciatingly detailed economic impact assessments that don't exist. Bad, very bad, as D. Trump would say.

Labour would be far better for the country than the Tories. They are move positive thinkers and care about the people; those people who don't have money in shares, trusts and funds. That's most of us. When people vote, they think the Tories know more about the economy because they are rich, so they vote for them. This is ridiculous. The Tories want to screw down wages so that only share owners will benefit.

Fabian Society conference

At the last minute, I decided to try the Fabian Society conference for interest. I took the train to Waterloo and then the Northern line to Euston, came past the bus station and across the Euston Road. There, with a patch of garden to one side, was the Friends' Meeting House, an excellent venue for the purpose. The first meeting was in the "Light" - a square lecture theatre with a square roof light, with an interesting aperture leading to it, diminishing in size as it went up.

Although I was five or ten minutes late, the Keynote speaker wasn't speaking as I went in. There was a great hubbub and some booing and shouting. The Fabians' meeting had been interrupted by Right wing extremists, an old bald chap, and about 6 younger men, all white, in their twenties. The old bald chap was in a right old lather and kept shouting and showing us the American flag. He was offended, I think, that we are not to be visited by Donald Trump, the President of the United States, and thought quite rightly that Sadiq Khan (the Mayor of London) is in some way to blame for this. Sadiq Khan did not respond to him, and the chair of the meeting (a dignified Scotswoman) stayed quite calm (even witty) and waited for the police to come and take him and the supporters away, because they were causing a breach of the peace or whatever. I thought that the Fabians have something in common with the Quakers in that although the Fabians were about a thousand strong they didn't resort to rounding them up and putting them outside themselves, but waited for the police to come. We just booed and shouted "Get out". We all wished that the press had not been there giving the demonstrators publicity - there were far more press men and women than activists. There were about 25 press personnel and two camera crews - they were acting on the hope and expectation that there would be a demonstration. So after about half an hour the demonstrators were ejected, but it was a great nuisance and made us feel very unsettled.
Film of this interruption is supplied by the Telegraph

The Mayor - this is quicker than writing his name - said that in this, the centenary of women finally getting the vote in this country, absolute gender equality is far from our grasp. Change has happened too slowly. Only from 1994 has there been such a thing as rape of a wife by a husband.  He said that there has been zero progress in the last decade and there are even signs of progress eroding. An anti-feminist movement is on the rise. "Feminist" is being made to sound pejorative. "Social justice warriors" is being used as an insult. (How can it be an insult?) S. Khan says we must fight back. He, personally, is trying to make City Hall a model workplace for women. He says men must challenge the culture in pubs, and workplaces. He says the policies in the election manifesto must be studied carefully for their impact on women. This is something that the Labour Party didn't do well at the last election. (The Fabian Society analysed their manifesto promises and judged that they would not improve life for the people they aimed to help.)

Throughout the conference the chair of the meeting asked for questions and took the first question from a woman, because it has been found scientifically that if the first question is asked by a woman, other women will ask questions, but if the first question is asked by a man, more men than women ask the questions. However, in the case of the Fabian conference woman were given the floor many more times than the men. I think this unfair. They were also careful to chose people of ethnic minorities.  This is fair enough.

There were ideas about misogyny being included as a category of "hate crime" and what to do about online hate crime.

The Mayor wanted much more funding for child services, parenting classes and youth services. I agree. I think cutting all of these is a false economy.

The Mayor himself goes and visits schools in order to raise the aspirations of the children, and especially primary schools. He is interested in what schools are doing about equality and self-esteem in all the children, girls and boys and different races. Tells children his father was an immigrant bus driver but he became a lawyer - mainly because one of his teachers told him he enjoyed arguing so much, he should be a lawyer.

He also thinks schools have gone too far promoting Science, Technology and Maths, and should be encouraging students into the arts. The arts are strong in the UK and make a huge impact worldwide - we should do more to encourage them.

My impression of Sadiq Khan is that he is intelligent enough to do his job well, and that he even has a sense of humour at times, but he has a lot to put up with. In short, I liked him.

Sadiq Khan wore an expensive-looking black suit with some sort of white trainers and a collared shirt buttoned up to the top. This may be a fashionable look but I absolutely didn't like it and spent some time trying to decide what would suit him! In particular, I didn't like the buttoned-up neck but no tie look. On the other hand, ties signal a very conformist attitude these days. I think maybe a thin jumper in a subtle colour under the suit, but the suit was too black for my taste - it looked like funeral wear. I looked up his Google images and found he usually wears a blue suit and often wears a tie. I hope he has some brogues.

He didn't mention terrorism. Trump said Khan was complacent for saying that all big cities are prone to terrorist attacks and the risk of them is a part of living in one these days. I think Londoners would agree with him. They know that there are loads of people working in security to prevent and deal with terrorist attacks, because we all know someone who does. We have all seen the huge barriers in place to protect areas that would be vulnerable. Nobody thinks the Mayor isn't providing what is needed in the way of security or prevention.


Happy New Year

Happy New Year to all who read this.

I hope you are happy in your surroundings.

I hope you have interesting books to read, and people who love you.

We went away at Christmas to a cottage in the Cotswolds, and spent a relaxing week - four people who love each other, hanging out, walking, playing games and doing a jigsaw. Very restful. No wonder people (mainly men) stop trying to be friends with other people when they have a family. It's a siege mentality, I suppose. My husband has it - never invites people round.

As for me, I am ashamed of our house and I can't get to like it. No matter what we do, you can't turn a sixties semi into anything very much - they were built cheap and stay looking cheap. Can't even fix a fan into the bathroom wall, according to the latest workman I have consulted.

We still have no carpets after the moth problem - good, we got rid of the old ones. Bad, we can live with underlay for months.

Yes, I am feeling rather sad today. I will go to the gym and exercise like a sad old carthorse.