Ghent in Wartime

Frank Key of Hooting Yard and our own Key's Cupboard is taking advantage of the wonders of web publishing to post his mother's wartime memoirs in weekly instalments at a blog, Ghent in Wartime:

During the 1980s, my mother [Lydia Brusseel] wrote a memoir of her teenage years in Belgium during World War Two. The first version was written in longhand, and then she bought a typewriter, typed it up, and made copies for her children. As far as I know, she never submitted it for publication. The other day, my brother had a bright idea. Why don’t we publish it on the internet?, he suggested. Although it is not written in diary format, I added my tuppenceworth to the effect that it would lend itself to appearing as a blog...

It contains some memorable anecdotes and observations, which convey very effectively the daily distress of war. They are recounted plainly and without fuss and are quite affecting. This is probably because the events we read about are occurring just a remove or two from ordinary life: it's uncomfortably easy to put ourselves in Lydia's shoes. From last week's, which deals with the family's attempt to flee Ghent for the coast and England:

My young brother was in charge of the dog on a leash. We, the older children carried bags with all the food and drink we could muster together. On the handle of the pram hung wet nappies to dry, washed at the last minute. We must have looked a most bizarre group of travellers. I guess we had walked about half way to the main highway when the baby started to cry. The mother was distressed and insisted we all stop, so she could feed the baby. 

Our little dog had never run very far from home, after going a little further the poor wretch was probably tired, hot and thirsty and had a fit, foaming at the mouth and rolling his eyes. My little brother had hysterics, upset at seeing his pet like this.

But that's not to say one can't learn about the bigger events too. One is given an ongoing account of the response of Ghentish society to military defeat: the suspicions of Germany fed by memories of the previous war (from the week before last); the 'dejected gloom' of the families fleeing for the coast, rapidly turning to 'frozen fear' and then panic when they appear to be strafed; the brave patriotism of Lydia's father and a friend who set off on bikes for the coast to join the Allied armies in England, leaving behind fearful wives and families (how last week's ended). However, it's always grounded in the personal: 'During the following two weeks I saw my mother age about ten years.'

This is the sort of testimony that makes David Kynaston's books on post-war England so compelling. Those familiar with Austerity Britain and Family Britain will recognise this as a strong recommendation.

The would-be Caesars' wives

[We try to offend only when we mean to here at The Dabbler so I should warn you that this post contains some bad language. It's at the end. There'll be something else along soon enough if you don't fancy it.]

I like reading American political history and I love reading about it through a decent political biography. What appeals is seeing how the individual personality, with its quirks and ticks, is exposed and transformed in such a vast and pressured arena. I'm currently enjoying Race of a Lifetime, an account by a couple of journalists of the 2010 presidential race. Whilst not a biography, it comprises roughly two-year sections from the lives of the rather motley group of contenders told in parallel.

American politics is played out on an imperial stage - and I'm not referring to the US's foreign involvements. The US itself has characteristics of empire: a diversity of cities, states and regions spread across a continent-sized landmass; it's a federation of different ethnicities, cultures, geographies, and economies. Any politician who seeks the American presidency has to come to terms with the lot of them, at least to some degree. He or she must play up to half-a-world's worth of particularities: Hollywood stars and Silicon Valley techies, Iowan farmers and Chicagoan retailers, Wall Street financiers and New Hampshire fishermen, Texan oilmen and Nevadan hoteliers, Boston brahmins and New Mexican ex-Mexicans. And these sprawling, multi-million dollar efforts are all relayed to the American public via the American media, by turns unwieldy, faddish, ignorant, lavish, punctilious, obsessive, dogged, lazy, sycophantic, malicious and frenzied.

It's epic and complicated. And an awful lot of political calculation - and luck and timing - is required to master such a vast theatre of action and ideas.

The fun comes when this outsize challenge is attempted by politicians whose continental-scale egos tell them the prize is within reach, but whose fate it is to see it move beyond their grasp - or, at least, it is for all but one of them. The book conveys very well the excitement of this situation, even if the language can be a bit exuberantly journalistic: it's billed as the story of 'the meat-grinder, flash-incinerator race to be the 44th President of the United States'. But don't let that put you off (perhaps it wouldn't anyway - you may enjoy your races recounted racily).

However, for me, the most striking thing about the book is the number of crazily dysfunctional marriages on display. Put it this way - Hilary and Bill's is the second-most harmonious (the Obamas' marriage comes out top, probably not coincidentally).

What's peculiar about these screwed-up partnerships is how profound mutual dependence is so often combined with a reckless level of abuse. In Rudy Giuliani's case, his wife 'called him constantly when he was travelling without her, no matter where he was or what he was doing...'

"Hello, dear," he said when she interrupted him while he was onstage addressing the annual meeting of the National Rifle Association. "I'm talking to the members of the NRA right now. Would you like to say hello?"

His staff concluded that he had no choice but to answer Judith's calls, because ignoring her risked dire consequences - more dire than wrecking some speech. To the NRA members, Rudy apologised, but added, "It's a lot better that way."

Even at long-distance the American political wife is more than a match for a hall full of gun-toting voters.

Another daunting spouse is Elizabeth Edwards, who, admittedly, had reason to feel aggrieved when the story of her husband's affair with a staffer appeared in the National Enquirer. In the course of his denial, John Edwards praised her as 'an extraordinary human being, warm, loving, beautiful, sexy and as good a person as I've ever known'. His staff went into 'damage-control mode, going into overdrive to dissuade the mainstream media from picking up the story.' And, 'Their efforts at constraining the fallout were remarkably successful.'

Edwards felt he owed 'the small coterie of aides who had corralled the story':

"It's John," he began in a voicemail to one of them. "I just wanted to call and thank you for everything you've done in the last few days. It hasn't been easy. I know that, and I want you to know how grateful I am for everything you've done. We'll get through this together. Don't worry, man"

The next voice mail in the staffer's queue was from Elizabeth, who vented her fury that the story had appeared in any form, suspicious that the very aides who had kept the matter from mushrooming had somehow enabled the affair.

"You're to have nothing more to do with this!" Elizabeth hissed. "Nothing more! You stay away from our family! You're poison! You're dead to us!"

Ok-aay.

I wonder, do American politicians tend to attract crazy wives or do they send them that way after a while? I'll leave you with John McCain (his wife, Cindy, is pictured below):

"FUCK YOU! FUCK, FUCK, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!!!"

McCain let out a stream of sharp epithets, both middle fingers raised and extended barking in his wife's face. He was angry; she had interrupted him.