Remembering National History

26 Historically Speaking · November 200 1 WDlSPATCH FROM THE UNITED KINGDOM Il Remembering National History by Jeremy Black ? ¦ ? "?end of one millenI ¥~\ £Zi nium and the -JL. JL JL ^.z beginning of its successor led to less discussion, let alone celebration, of the national past than might have been anticipated. In part this was a deliberate matter of public policy. It was decided at a very senior ministerial level to include no section on history in the Millennium Dome at Greenwich. Similarly, the Project for a Museum of National History in London was unsuccessful in its requests for governmental support under the National Heritage Lottery grant program. Yet two public corporations did use the millennium to considerthe nation's history. For the first time ever, the Royal Mail devoted all its stamps for one year (1999), with the exception of a royal marriage, to an individual topic, British history in the last millennium, while the BBC spent a large sum of money to produce A History of Britain presented by Simon Schama. Future historians interested in the creation and sustaining of national images, and in anniversaries and heritage, might well consider the Royal Mail commemorations and the BBC series. As the historical advisor to the Royal Mail on the 1999 stamps (I also wrote or revised the explanatory texts sent to the individual artists who This dumbing down is linked to a persistent and mistaken tendency in the "media" to underrate the intelligence and interest of viewers, listeners and readers. produced the images, and drafted the text on the presentation packs), and as one of the three trustees responsible for the historical rationale and prospectus for the History of Britain Museum proposal (as well as for the proposal from the same group for space in the Dome), I am uneasily conscious how little documentary material survives to reveal and explain the decisions taken about approach and content. In the case of the Royal Mail, there was no committee to leave minutes; there was only the correspondence between myself and the relevant official at the Royal Mail. I am uncertain as to whether the Royal Mail kept minutes or other papers; my efforts to find out have been unsuccessful. It is noteworthy that I faced no opposition to my determination to adopt a thematic approach that gave due weight to non-political histories , such as those of culture andscience, although there was some newspaper criticism of particular stamps, most particularly the agriculture set. In contrast, the Schama series received serious criticism; although he found favor with the government, receiving a CBE in the 2001 New Years Honors List. In the Times of September 28, 2000, Magnus Linklater pointed out that Schama's approach to Britishness "blithely ignore[d] the entire canon of recent historical work." Two days later, the anonymous reviewer in The Economist warned that Schama "runs the risk ofreducing the history ofBritain to little more than a soap opera of bloodthirsty warring kings, jealous siblings and revolting barons . . . [and] risks the charge of banality." In the Times Higher Education Supplement of December 8, 2000, Christopher Haigh found "no vision, no theme, no coherence . . . too much drama ... a Hollywood version ... a messy soap opera in costume," rich in error. Equally disturbing is the failure to make due allowance for contrasting responses and different approaches, which is not only part of the fascination of history , but also central to its civic importance, not least as a reminder of the limitations of authoritarian accounts. This dumbing down is linked to a persistent and mistaken tendency in the "media" to underrate the intelligence and interest of viewers, listeners and readers. They encounter competing analyses in political debate, so why not for history; or is the audience supposed to be dimmer? Writers and presenters have to be clear, but clarity is not the same as simplicity. Look at and read Schama, not to smile or squirm at the errors, omissions and slant, but in order to consider how best to make public history; and also to think how best to present the wealth of American scholarship in an accessible fashion. Jeremy Black isprofessor ofhistory at the University ofExeterand author o/Europe and the World...