A Song of Patriotic Prejudice

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"A Song of Patriotic Prejudice"
Haymarket Theatre
Genre
Length2:51
LabelParlophone
Songwriter(s)Michael Flanders * Donald Swann
Producer(s)George Martin
Audio sample

"A Song of Patriotic Prejudice" (also known as "The English")

comedy song by the musical duo Flanders and Swann. It was a staple of their live tour of England in late 1963 and subsequent international tour, and later released on the album At the Drop of Another Hat.[2] The song is a satire of contemporary attitudes towards foreigners in the wake of losing the empire, with consequent uncertainty as to the position of the country on the new world. It is virulent against the other nations within the United Kingdom, referencing the common stereotype of the Welsh (as bad singers), the Scottish (as mean) and the Irish (as always trying to blow up the English). It then moves on to other nations, including the Italians and the Greeks (as garlic eaters). Scholars have debated the degree to which the song is a serious critique, but it has found continued currency into the 21st century as a symbol of English nationalism, particularly in the aftermath of Brexit
and other social phenomena.

Background

black and white photo of Flanders and Swann at the piano singing
Michael Flanders and Donald Swann performing on the American tour, 14 September 1966, prior to taking the show to Broadway

social historian David Kynaston has commented that "little was as unashamedly English as A Drop of A Hat".[9]

The song is a "spoof anthem" for England, which has no official national song[10][note 1] based on the perception of the British strength of character; that having suffered during the war, "doing without" after it were signs of strength.[17] The historian Victor Bulmer-Thomas suggests Flanders and Swann's song "brilliantly captured" the sense of superiority prevalent in the British imperial mindset.[18] The music historian Graham McCann has, however, noted that Flanders and Swann were politically left-leaning rather than right.[19]

exterior colour photo of London's Haymarket Theatre
Haymarket Theatre, London, where At the Drop of Another Hat premiered in October 1963

"A Song of Patriotic Prejudice"

The song is based on

socio-political tongue-in-cheek humour;[1][20] McCann suggested that it demonstrates a "witty and wry style of self-deprecation that set the tone for post-war and post-colonial English irony".[19]
The song's satirical nature is revealed in its early lines:

The rottenest bits of these islands of ours
We've left in the hands of three unfriendly powers
Examine the Irishman, Welshman or Scot
You'll find he’s a stinker, as likely as not.[2]

Flanders and Swann expand on the Scots in another verse:

The Scotsman he's mean as we're all well aware
And bony and blotchy and covered with hair
He eats salty porridge
He works all the day
And he hasn't got bishops to show him the way.[21]

The reference to Scotsmen as being mean was a long-standing

textual scholar David Greetham argues that the song exposes a contemporary mindset of "arrogance and self-deprecation".[17]

Construction

The Musicologist Dai Griffiths has described "Patriotic Prejudice" as sophisticated in its exhibition of the dominant-tonic juxtaposition when Swann sings the line "he sings far too loud, far too often and flat". Griffiths argues that the music and lyric stand in opposition to each other here, for, while the lyric "flat" suggests a descending note, the tune rises to B major from B♭.[27] Although the song ends on a B key, a brief A chord is heard before the melody is finally resolved.[28]

Tours and reception

In a 1998

OBE in the New Year Honours[6][35]—the duo embarked on a series of international engagements, which combined the new material ("a synthesis of the best"[36]) with some from the previous tour of At the Drop of a Hat.[6][37]

The international leg of the tour started in Australia.[38] Flanders and his family arrived on 1 August;[36] the show opened in Melbourne and passing through Brisbane, Adelaide and Sydney,[37] concluding there on 12 December.[39] The duo and spouses travelled through New Zealand, Hong Kong, Canada[6]—where in Toronto they played their largest audience of 3,400 people[37]— before returning to London "at public demand" on 29 October 1965 where it played at the Globe Theatre.[30] The duo went to the United States[40] It appeared at several cities—Cincinnati[41] and Detroit[42] in October 1966, Philadelphia in November,[43] —before moving to Broadway in New York.[44] Presented by Alexander H. Cohen,[45] it showed at the Booth Theatre revue between 27 December 1966 and 9 April the following year[44] with a total of 105 performances.[30]

colour photo of the broadway theatre in New York City
Broadway Theatre, where the revue opened in December 1967

The tour received mix responses from critics. In the opinion of the theatre historian Gerald Bordman, for example, "it suffered the fate of most sequels, falling far short of the vogue of the original",[8] although Flanders' biographer, Michael Meyer argues it was as successful as its predecessor.[6] The Corpus Christi Caller-Times highlighted the differences between the use of American English during the US tours, in contrast to the British English that Americans had already heard on the pair's live album, which had been recorded in London. The paper advised its readers seeing the show that they might "hear a remark or two that is rough on the United States", as a song such as "Patriotic Prejudice" was "calculated to set the jingoists aflame".[46][note 3] The New York Times' critic wrote that the duo were particularly welcome following the British Invasion, with America "having been exposed to so many of Britain's angry young men. It's very comforting to get back to Flanders and Swann again. They're not angry, they're just a bit put out."[47] Billboard called them "bright Britishers who can make their way with the Yanks, too".[48]

The song was recorded at the Haymarket and released on the At The Drop of Another Hat album. It was produced at

colour television and edited down into a one-hour CBS program for later broadcast. The producer Jacqueline Babbin told reporters that "the too special and too British will be cut" for the American audience.[49]

Analysis

Flanders stated that the song opened with "typical English understatement".

them and us", a bipolar sense that, even if Britain's physical superiority had declined, its sense of moral superiority was at full power.[17] McCann suggests that this is Flanders and Swann "teasing" their audience—i.e., the English—about their self-view compared to their views of their neighbours.[19] Neuburger argues that the lyrics are "based on a significant truth", that is, that the English often do see themselves as simply different to foreigners ("and, by 'foreigners' they primarily mean Europeans").[50]

One line—which, to Owen Dudley Edwards, "grazes nearer the bone"

William the Third".[55] This hostility was due to several factors, but mainly the famine of 1845–1852, which had already resulted in agitation and rebellion.[56] The historian Ruth Dudley Edwards considers it acceptable in light of the atrocities being carried against the English. She argues that while, in the late 20th century, lines such as this would have got the song banned "in the London Borough of Camden, now officially an Irish Joke Free Zone", this is "a pity for it is surely healthy that the English should have the safety valve of laughing at the incomprehensible Paddy".[57] She highlights how Flanders and Swann focus on a perceived Irish trait taking "history personally" by either hagiogrophising or condemning historical figures in the context of contemporary politics.[58]

However, the music is "clearly utterly comedic" and so reveals the song's humor despite the ambiguity of the lyrics.

classicist Thomas Harrison, regarding stereotypes such as "Greeks and Italians eat garlic in bed", whether "such phrases should be seen as literal or figurative".[62] The psychologist Mary Stopes-Roe, with Raymond Cochrane, has argued while such xenophobic sentiment might be "laughable", its foundations were in the popular attitudes formed over the previous few hundred years, the years of Empire.[63]

The simple stereotypes used in the song—based as they were on cultural, political and economic differences—would have been immediately recognisable to the audience, with, say Payne and Shardlow, "even viler calumnies, extending to the people of the whole world, who even argue with umpires!"

political historian Jenny Wormald has used the song as an accurate portrayal of the Early Stuart House of Commons basic political view, and the new, and different, foreign—especially Scottish—theories of kingship that James I brought with him. Wormald says between the two was a "deep, and probably unbridgeable ideological gulf".[67]

Modern relevance

colour photograph of George Martin
George Martin, producer of At the Drop of Another Hat seen in 2006

That Was the Week that Was or Beyond the Fringe).[50]
The academic Peter Grant has argued that:

If Michael Flanders and Donald Swann are remembered in Britain at all, it is as very old-fashioned humorists who went out of style as soon as the 1960s wave of modern satirists appeared in the wake of Beyond the Fringe.[5]

He suggests, however, that this view does the duo a disservice and fails to recognise the degree to which their songs were "incisive and radical", particularly in the context of the time.

gnus".[69][note 6]

The song has been identified as relevant to 21st-century

jingoist exposed in the lyrics; it satirises national pride, highlighting how close to prejudice this could be. The authors, drawing their discussion of the song onto the present, argue that it "makes for difficult listening" since the UK voted to leave the European Union[2]—and alongside, McCann argues, resurgent Scottish nationalism[19]—because this, in turn, has made the breakup of the UK more, rather than less, likely.[2] Neuburger also argues that the English "somewhat singular" attitude to others the song iterates is reflected in contemporary political debate, particularly with regard to the European Union.[50]

In 1994 the

2012 Olympics. The line—"It's knowing they're foreign that makes them so mad!"[77]–lead Eaaston to consider that "nationalism is social identity theory at work, exaggerating a sense of the in-groups distinct qualities while often casting the out-group in a poor light".[77]

The late 20th-century comedy duo Armstrong and Miller parodied Flanders and Swann songs under the names Donald Brabbins and Teddy Fyffe in which the former, played by Alexander Armstrong is "rolling about in his wheelchair", and the latter, played by Ben Miller sits "giggling at his piano".[78] McCann describes them, in their interpretation of Flanders and Swann, as "two rather posh comedians play[ing] two rather posh comedians ... singing right-wing-sounding songs whilst being laughed at by rather posh-sounding studio audiences".[19]

Notes

  1. parliamentary debates took place regarding codifying its position, and "while there was no guarantee that 'Jerusalem' would have been the winner with the public, had the bill been enacted, it was clearly a front runner exactly ... The government ultimately talked out the bill".[13] For political and historical reasons Northern Ireland has tended to use God Save the King, although in the latter half of the 20th century 'Danny Boy' has become a popular substitute.[14] The other UK countries have unofficial anthems. In Wales, Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau (Land of My Fathers) has been recognised, at least for sporting purposes, as its de facto anthem since the 1970s.[15] Scotland has "no fewer than four possible" anthems.[16]
  2. ^ This quotation comes from the monologue that Flanders would introduce the song with live; he suggests that the reason no-one cared about nationalism was that when he young, in the 1920s, "nationalism was on its way out" and that "we'd got pretty much everything we wanted", without it.[26]
  3. De Gaulle song that should take care of Anglo-French relations for the next few years".[46] Marsh's article seems to have been syndicated from the Chicago Sun-Times.[46]
  4. anti-fascist,[60] Mitchell used his role as Alf Garnett—a "ranting, right-wing Wapping dock worker"[61]—to lampoon the prejudices of the Little Englander by exposing them as "misogynistic, racist, commie-hating, reactionar[ies]".[59]
  5. World War One—"the greatest human slaughterhouse in human history"[68]—as an "ideal war".[5][68]
  6. ^ Referring to, respectively, 1963's 'Slow Train'[70] and 'The Gnu.[71]
  7. ^ Containing lyrics such as

    I wish you woke motherfuckers would go back to sleep. It's retarded how you fags be so PC. I wish you woke motherfuckers would go back to bed. And take a plastic bag and tie it over your head.[2]

References

  1. ^ a b c d Berberich 2009, p. 389.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h Smith & Overy 2023, p. 59.
  3. ^ a b c Alfonso et al. 2003, p. 421.
  4. ^ Warrack 2004.
  5. ^ a b c d e f Grant 2017, p. 95.
  6. ^ a b c d e Meyer 2004.
  7. ^ Obituary 1994, p. 9.
  8. ^ a b Bordman 2001, p. 709.
  9. ^ Kynaston 2013, p. 8.
  10. ^ McLean & McMillan 2006, p. 24.
  11. ^ Noble 2014, p. 24.
  12. ^ Costambeys-Kempczynski 2009, p. 79.
  13. ^ Whittaker 2022, pp. 185–186.
  14. ^ Mulvenna 2017, pp. 164–165.
  15. ^ Johnes 2012, 'Under an acid rain': Debating the Nations, 1970–1985.
  16. ^ Harvie 1994, p. 11.
  17. ^ a b c Greetham 1998, p. 5.
  18. ^ Bulmer-Thomas 2023, The English Backlash.
  19. ^ a b c d e McCann 2021.
  20. ^ Corrin 1975, p. 5.
  21. ^ Swarbrick 2006, p. 4.
  22. ^ Coleman 2023, Introduction.
  23. ^ a b c d e f g Payne & Shardlow 2002, p. 15.
  24. ^ a b Bulmer-Thomas 2023, The English Backlash n.41.
  25. ^ a b Cockburn 2021, p. 30.
  26. ^ a b c d Dudley Edwards 2022, Nationalism is Everybody Except Me.
  27. ^ Griffiths 2015, p. 35.
  28. ^ Griffiths 2015, p. 35 n.21.
  29. ^ Ottumwa 1998, p. 22.
  30. ^ a b c d Hummel 1984, p. 33.
  31. ^ Coe 1963, p. 3.
  32. ^ J. E. M. 1963, p. 3.
  33. ^ White 1963, p. 6.
  34. ^ Dietz 2014, p. 403.
  35. ^ London Letter 1964, p. 6.
  36. ^ a b O'Neil 1964, p. 128.
  37. ^ a b c Howard 1964, p. 17.
  38. ^ Mr Manchester 1964, p. 6.
  39. ^ SMH 1964, p. 26.
  40. ^ Billboard 1966a, p. 56.
  41. ^ Report 1966, p. 13.
  42. ^ The MovieScope 1966, p. 39.
  43. ^ Davis 2010, p. 277.
  44. ^ a b Benjamin & Rosenblatt 2006, p. 727.
  45. ^ Report 1967, p. 64.
  46. ^ a b c Marsh 1966, p. 2D.
  47. ^ Kerr 1966, p. 4.
  48. ^ Billboard 1966b, p. 46.
  49. ^ Horn 1967, p. 24.
  50. ^ a b c d Neuberger 2014.
  51. ^ Bradley 2016, p. 246.
  52. ^ a b c Richards 2001, p. 34.
  53. ^ a b Richards 2014, p. 113.
  54. ^ Kenny 1994, pp. 6–7.
  55. ^ McLean & McMillan 2005, p. 97.
  56. ^ Kinealy 2002, pp. 186–187.
  57. ^ Dudley Edwards 1988, p. 63.
  58. ^ Dudley Edwards 1988, pp. 63–64.
  59. ^ a b Smith & Overy 2023, p. 60.
  60. ^ Copsey 2017, p. 126.
  61. ^ Crewe 2019, p. 16.
  62. ^ Harrison 2020, p. 144.
  63. ^ Stopes-Roe & Cochrane 1990, p. 9.
  64. ^ Priestley 1930, p. 16.
  65. ^ Smith 1988, p. 231.
  66. ^ Ellingworth 2000, pp. 32–33.
  67. ^ Wormald 1991, pp. 37–38.
  68. ^ a b Block 2016, p. 108 n.1.
  69. ^ Grant 2017, p. 96.
  70. ^ Williams 2011, p. 1.
  71. ^ McCormick 1999, p. 74.
  72. ^ a b Flint 2017, p. 85.
  73. ^ Politics 2005.
  74. ^ Higginson 2020.
  75. ^ a b Hoppit 2021, 1970–1999: Changing Worlds.
  76. ^ FBA 2023.
  77. ^ a b Easton 2022, Destiny: A Matter of Life or Death.
  78. ^ Roberts 2018, Armstrong and Miller.

Bibliography

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