Alan Bennett’s ‘The History Boys’: This Summer’s Analogy

It is not very often that I read plays, especially modern plays. Being a Classics student, I have often revelled in the great works of Sophocles or Euripides, and I have also ‘revelled’ in Shakespeare’s The Tempest. However, theatre has almost become a thing of the past, becoming replaced by film and major Broadway productions. Even The History Boys was made into a film, starring the original cast from the stage production. Now we are reliant on playwrights, such as Alan Bennett or Tom Stoppard (Rosencrantz and Guildenstern) to redefine the theatre as an art form.

Of course, the success of The History Boys was in no way hindered by the film created post-stage. Yet its poignancy and message have been designed for the theatre and, having both read the play and seen the film, I can in some way confirm this.

That is not to say that the film is bad by any means. With the cast (including James Cordon and Dominic Cooper) achieving their successes from the stage, the film almost feels like a play. I’ve noticed that on the stage, an emotion can only be conveyed in an exaggerated fashion, so as to be conveyed to a far-off viewer. For a film it is the contrary, where techniques such as camera angles or complex body language can do this successfully. Whilst this way is just as, if not more, powerful, it almost seems lazier. However, the exaggerations are not compromised in the film, with suitable annunciation in most cases and the overly-witty responses, which only represent the theatrical nature of the film.

The quality of the actors is one huge selling point of the film, but of course, it ain’t the only thing. It was also Bennett’s job to create a production which conveys the message which he intends to convey, but also make the production simultaneously inquisitive, hilarious and heart-breaking.

And on his part, it is a huge success.

The History Boys revolves around eight working class students who, intending to study History at Oxbridge, have returned for a term to prepare for the examinations and interviews. This is done with the aid of three teachers with radically different teaching viewpoints and techniques: Hector is a veteran who believes that words and culture are most important in defining a young man. Mrs Lintott believes in teaching a curriculum to the best understanding. Irwin is a young supply teacher who wants to make History an exciting discipline again. And the Headmaster is obsessed with league tables.

This play, through these three teachers, addresses a long standing issue of viewpoints on education. What is it really there to offer? How important is it really? Of course, there are many answers to these questions, all possessed by these teachers, and also the students of our day. It has taken me almost three years to not complete my Bronze Duke of Edinburgh Award due to sheer boredom and riotous behaviour against the bureaucratic nature of everything. However, some people have lapped it up. In this case, when university entry is the overall prize, these things are done solely for the purpose of university entry. D of E was created in order to allow less privileged students to have the opportunity to help the community, learn a new skill and have some general fun. Now, it is used to get into university.

It is claimed that programmes, such as D of E, are necessary as they allow you to obtain UCAS points. These are supposed to get you into university, however its nature still eludes me to this day. This has given me a lot of comic relief in quizzing the sorts of people doing D of E concerning the nature of a UCAS point.

Does reading give you UCAS points?

What is the books are really small?

What is they contain lots of pictures?

What if you are blind in one eye?

This has allowed me to come to the conclusion that, in fact, nobody knows what they are talking about. Apparently I have UCAS points. And that is lovely. But I’m not sure why…

This idea is not much expressed in The History Boys, given that these sorts of ideas only came into play recently. However, teachers such as Irwin are fixated by teaching the boys how to ‘stand out’ amongst the other prospective History students from more privileged backgrounds. He does this by branding their essays as ‘dull’, and telling them to stand out by arguing on the contrary to their actual stance which, if you ever try it, is extremely fun.

However, the viewpoint taken by the more naive of our community is that you can partake in activities in order to broaden your character INSTEAD of in order to get into university. This stance is stressed by Hector, who encourages the students to study French, recite poetry and watch films that no one else has heard of. This has set up some of the most hilarious scenes of literature I have ever read (though sometimes a decent knowledge of French is helpful).

Being potential Oxbridge candidates ourselves, many of my friends will be using this Summer to cram their heads with enough co-syllabic knowledge to get them an interview at a good university. This action, and its consequences, are perfectly displayed in Bennett’s The History Boys. Is it the correct thing to do? I guess it depends on who you are and your own reasons for going to university in the first place. But The History Boys is a witty, subtle, moving and immensely funny ode to what our lives seem to have become, and is undoubtedly worth a read.

The Anti-War Novel

Considering my, frankly, disastrous form in terms of posting here, due to the fact that I have spent a month in Israel,  I’d like to apologize and say that I shall be writing here much more frequently as of today and, luckily, I have plenty to write about. But what I write about today will be about something a little different to my holidays. Enjoy!

Over the past week or so, I have been engaged in a book that was recommended to me by my friend Ed (who recommends most of the stuff I read to be honest, making me look a bit odd). It was called Slaughterhouse-Five, by an American writer called Kurt Vonnegut. The blurb described it as ‘the most original anti-war novel since Catch-22’ and Joseph Heller, the author of Catch-22 himself, described this novel as ‘a work of keen literary artistry’. So undoubtedly, I was expecting a  book that would live up to its expectations.

However, when I finally put the book down yesterday afternoon, I was left with mixed feelings about it. Whilst being a highly interesting novel with lots of literary technique and entertaining scenes, it was clear to me that this was a very ‘arty’ book, in terms of saying that it goes out of its way, thus making it look particularly confusing, for the purpose of developing meaning. And this is exactly what is done here. The blurb (I know I keep referring to it. I did read the book) begins by saying, ‘Prisoner-of-war, optometrist, time-traveller – these are the life roles of Billy Pilgrim…’ And this doesn’t even mention the fact that he is abducted by aliens by a planet millions of miles away, with the name Tralfamadore. This is truly not your typical novel.

Yet when I put the book down and ran through all the random plots and sub-plots (it is random due to Pilgrim’s spontaneous and involuntary time-travelling throughout his life) in my head, it all made sense. And although this does not characterise an anti-war novel, it is a common characteristic.

Let us use Catch-22 as an example. Firstly, what is a Catch-22? A Catch-22 is a situation where no favourable outcome is possible due to contradictory rules. Here is an example:

A university graduate goes into a job interview as he wants to gain some experience. However, the interviewer will not hire him as he does not have any experience. In this situation, the only way in which the graduate can be hired is if he had the job already, as he would need the experience.

The situation in Catch-22 is a little more complex. It is a fact in the army (Catch-22 happens amongst American soldiers in the US Air Force after they invaded Italy in 1943) that if you are crazy, you cannot fly the planes. If you know that you are crazy, all you need to do is tell the commander that you are crazy, and you will be demobilised and sent home. However, here is where the twist comes in. By telling someone you are crazy, with the full knowledge that you will be sent home, you are showing that you have concerns for your safety; evidence of a rational mind. Therefore you are not crazy and have to stay. Here, it is impossible to leave the army without proving that you have to stay in the army. This example of a logical paradox is now commonly known as a ‘Catch-22’.

One idea relayed in Catch-22 seems to be echoed in all anti-war novel, and that is the idea of insanity. In Catch-22, it seems to become clear quite early on that only someone insane would fly a plane, thus indicating that anyone who says they are not insane is actually insane. In Slaughterhouse-Five, this idea is mentioned too. In his old age, Pilgrim becomes increasingly unable to live life by himself, and he needs the assistance of his daughter, Barbara, who treats him like a childish invalid. When she makes her first appearance in the book, she says, ‘Father, father, father…what are we going to do with you?’ This seems to be a perfect example of insanity, as specified in both novels.

And  this is what really makes an anti-war novel. From the first chapter, it is made clear that one thing that caused Pilgrim’s insanity was the night when Dresden, a German city, was bombed and destroyed (as a matter of interest, according to the book, 71,739 people were killed at Hiroshima, but around 135,000 people were killed in Dresden). Pilgrim spends this night in the slaughterhouse with the other prisoners-of-war, which provides an excellent bomb shelter for him.

What these anti-war novels do is ignore the glory of war and replace it with the true effects that war has, not only concerning the people who have been killed, but also those who weren’t killed. We are endlessly told about all of the soldiers who suffered shell shock after World War One, and we learn to sympathise. This is what a good anti-war novel does and, gladly, this is what Slaughterhouse-Five does.

So it goes…

Today’s Russia

Throughout my school (at least my school in particular), there is a common joke theme that has found itself travelling around the school; a selection of jokes beginning with ‘In Soviet Russia…’. The idea is that when something happens in ‘The West’ (here), the opposite happens in Soviet Russia. For example, one of my favourites is ‘In Soviet Russia, fleas get dog’.

Presumably, this is a direct result of iGCSE History, where we cover both Communist Russia 1917-24 and Communist China 1934-1989, where leaders were so unbelievably anti-capitalist that they would take whatever measures to separate their country from the free markets of the West. It is interesting to see when Vladimir Lenin took control of Russia, following the October Revolution of 1917, that before his death in 1924, the only thing that benefited the lives and quality of life of the Russian populace was something known as the NEP (New Economic Policy), where he introduced a temporary free market in order to get the Russian economy running after the devastating Civil War. The issue is that the whole time, Lenin was attempting to distance himself from Western capitalism, but the only beneficial thing he did for these people followed a capitalist idea; the free market.

Interestingly enough, one thing that makes these comments amusing for us is the utter knowledge that none of it is actually true in today’s society. At school, we were lucky enough to be given the opportunity to study Russian from the age of 11; an opportunity which I, and seven others, decided to grasp. This has given us a particularly good knowledge of Russian society and culture, and while we are all aware of the famously beautiful, yet depressing Russian cultural aspects, such as music (Tchaikovsky and Shostakovitch) and literature (Dostoevsky and Tolstoy), among others, we have always been under the impression that Russia is still a bit stuck in the past, concerning a lack of development opportunities.

Fortunately for all of us, especially those studying Russia, this idea is changing rapidly. Russia is one of the four BRIC nations (Brazil, Russia, India and China), a set of countries who have experienced increasingly rapid economic growth over recent years, leading to their emergence as global economic superpowers. Also, today, I was lucky enough to attend a conference at my dad’s work, UK Trade and Investment North West, concerning business aspirations for British companies in Russia. With the oncoming 2014 Winter Olympic Games in Sochi and the 2018 World Cup, Russia is eager for global investment, creating infinite possibilities and opportunities for British companies.

And these aspirations come from the most unlikely of places. I spoke to Alan Richardson, the CEO of Hart Door Systems Ltd., a company which specializes in the formation and selling of fire doors, which are doors specially designed to conceal fires and prevent them from spreading. This company have been commissioned for many large-scale projects, such as the new Olympic Stadium in London and London’s famous St Pancreas Station. He is hoping to expand into Russia in the near future, with particular focus on the 2018 World Cup, where the Russians plan to supply 12 high-quality stadia in 11 cities throughout Western Russia.

But there wasn’t only a focus on sporting events. I also spoke to a woman who has developed a Rubik’s-Cube-type toy which she hopes to take over to Russia, having already sold it to Aeroflot, the Russian national airline. Another woman present was part of PVC Recycling, and interested in bringing her ideas to Russia.

The point here is that most ideas of Russia are simple misconceptions, surrounding mostly the KGB, the Pogroms and copious amounts of Smirnoff vodka. But the truth of the matter is that Russia is a gold mine (allegorically, but probably physically as well). If Russia continues to receive increasing amounts of interest and investment, thus resulting in developments in their economy, soon they will be the next global economic powerhouse. According to the International Monetary Fund, Russia has the eighth largest economy in the world, with a GDP of over $2,000,000,000,000. And whilst Russia continues to expand, the UK has only just managed to avoid a ‘triple-dip’ recession. So we better watch out, as whilst these countries develop, we are getting left behind.

My Factless Autobiography

Morning all!

Welcome to my new blog; The Factless Autobiography! I’m Dan Jacobson, and I’m a 16-year-old Briton from Manchester, UK.

Considering that you, the reader, are currently reading this monumental introductory page, you may be under the consideration of, hopefully, returning to this page in the near future. But what will you be reading then? Here’s the answer.

I have not the foggiest clue.

Having administered two failed blogs previous to this, I am fully aware that it is unwise to embark on this kind of voyage without as much as a theme. However, I’m treating this blog as much of a benefit to me as it may be to you. Whilst I will be posting various thoughts on new films or albums, which the reader may take an interest in, from the point of view of the reader, this will also be an opportunity with me to converse, with myself thus, concerning my own personal interests and studies. Next academic year, I will be beginning sixth form college, where I hope to be studying Mathematics, Further Mathematics, Chemistry, Biology and Classical Greek, and I profoundly believe that writing about these subjects will enable a certain understanding of the subject, which I hope will be beneficial to me and, possibly, to you.

You may also be wondering about this blog’s title. ‘What is the name for? It’s awfully depressing, isn’t it?’ I hear you cry. Well, even if you are not, this will be a fine opportunity to express some of my hard-earned wisdom. ‘The Factless Autobiography’ is the first of two volumes from ‘The Book of Disquiet’, by the Portuguese author Fernando Pessoa. This book is interesting in that it is considered, by Pessoa, to be an ‘autobiography’ about a Portuguese bookkeeper called Bernardo Soares. This provides an immediate paradox, in that Pessoa can only write an autobiography about himself, otherwise it would simply be a ‘biography’. However, Pessoa considers Soares to be a ‘mutation’ of himself, and Pessoa has used this book as an opportunity to write about his own life, where he essentially writes his own diary. It is referred to as ‘factless’ due to the lack of plot and meaning throughout this volume. Although this does not follow the path towards an international bestseller, it seems to have parallels with this blog itself. Whilst Pessoa’s/Soares’ life is devoid of a meaning, it agrees with this ‘themeless’ blog, in that anything could appear here. One may call this, simply, as my own e-version of Pessoa’s masterpiece.

Although I have had a history on WordPress, I have never quite got the hand of various points, such as aesthetic pleasure, but I hope that these concerns will be resolved soon. I have a long Summer ahead, and I will certainly find something to do!

Anyway, I’d like to thank you again for reaching this blog, and I hope that the next posts promise something entertaining and stimulating for you all.

Au revoir!