The ‘ism’ that ruined the West

In 1974, as editor of the Connoisseur magazine, I ran an ‘1874’ issue to mark the centenary of Winston Churchill’s birth, to which John Betjeman, Asa Briggs and Lady Spencer-Churchill all contributed. So I know the virtues of selecting a single year and ‘sinking a shaft into history’.

Effective use has often been made of this genre. Robert Lacey and Danny Danziger wrote the bestseller The Year 1000. James Shapiro chronicled a year in Shakespeare’s life, 1599. Thomas Pakenham wrote on 1798: The Year of Liberty (the story of the Irish rebellion). In her nineties, Rebecca West produced a volume on the year 1900, which she had the advantage of remembering as a young Victorian. Philip Metcalfe covered 1933, concentrating on Ernst ‘Putzi’ Hanfstaengl, a member of Hitler’s circle. The jolly jingoist Arthur Bryant devoted separate tomes to 1940, 1942, 1943 and 1944. And one day I feel sure there will be a book entitled 2000: The Great Millennium Cock-Up.