Sebastian Faulks’s diary: Inside the official first world war commemorations

A year or so ago I was asked to sit on a committee that advises the government on how to commemorate the first world war. It consists of about 30 dauntingly well-qualified people (former heads of the army and of Nato, historians, ex-defence secretaries), so there seems little for me to contribute at meetings. But it is interesting to be on the government side of something and see how it deals with public expectation and the press. In the summer there was a report in a British paper that the Germans had sent over their commemoration team and asked if, instead of dwelling on the conflict, the British could make 2014-18 a chance to talk up the European Union. I emailed the Department of Culture to ask if this could be right. Not a word of it was; but they sent me a link to a truthful account of the visit in a German paper.