Despite a very promising opening scene of 'the unspeakable in pursuit of the uneatable' as a couple of riders look at the dead body of the sitting Tory MP who has fallen from his horse on a fox hunt, this play disappoints. The death triggers a by-election. Having stood as Labour candidate a few months earlier in this solid Tory seat in the 1964 general election, the young Oxford graduate from northern mining stock Nigel Barton realises he will be expected to stand again. Not that he needs persuading. Despite his complaints about what it involves, epitomised by the cynicism of the Labour Party agent (who he later discovers is hiding his disillusion in the Labour Party because he needs to keep his job), Barton is ambitious. He dismisses his middle class wife's arguments about how the Labour leadership has been effectively co-opted by the elite.
Nevertheless, with his openly pro-business attitudes, the elimination of Clause 4 etc, Blair isn't as new as some people think, he just took co-option some steps further.With Corbyn's challenge to the elite and renewed discussion whether socialism can come through parliament, these plays, available on Youtube, are worth seeing.
The play follows on from Stand Up, Nigel Barton (1965), about a miner's son from a northern pit village going to Oxford. At first shocked by the class divide he encounters, he learns to handle it and finally discovers how he can use it to make a career. As a parliamentary candidate he hasn't forgotten the injustices his father has gone through in forty one years as a miner. But on the campaign trail, he accepts instructions from the agent to tone down his rhetoric, treating the working class people he meets, mainly women, with contempt. His wife, widely read, interested in Brecht, angry at his compromising, has no independent activity of her own that we know of. Potter leaves us with an overwhelming pessimism, no sense of an alternative, no serious left, no possibility of struggle, politics will always be dominated by the elite. The play climaxes with Barton at a dinner for the local establisment where he breaks all the rules for candidates, passionately attacking the parliamentary game only to finish with a pointless gesture flicking a V-sign at his Conservative opponent.
Nevertheless, with his openly pro-business attitudes, the elimination of Clause 4 etc, Blair isn't as new as some people think, he just took co-option some steps further.With Corbyn's challenge to the elite and renewed discussion whether socialism can come through parliament, these plays, available on Youtube, are worth seeing.
