Browse content similar to 29/01/2016. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
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The European Referendum campaign - what kind of fight will it be? | :00:00. | :00:09. | |
I'll have you checkmated in your next move. | :00:10. | :00:17. | |
One side has to win it when the vote comes. | :00:18. | :00:30. | |
We'll look at what kind of argument will clinch it, | :00:31. | :00:32. | |
and whether the negotiation will make any difference. | :00:33. | :00:35. | |
Rhodes holds his place in Oxford, but the argument goes on. | :00:36. | :00:45. | |
Cecil Rhodes, more than any individual in | :00:46. | :00:49. | |
Cecil Rhodes, more than any symbolises British imperial power | :00:50. | :00:52. | |
and the racial apartheid and racial violence that came with it in South | :00:53. | :00:54. | |
Africa. We'll ask if it makes sense | :00:55. | :00:54. | |
to fight over symbols. Celebrated novelist, | :00:55. | :00:57. | |
but also - you might not know this, And I've got the | :00:58. | :01:04. | |
bruises to prove it. Coming soon to a screen | :01:05. | :01:15. | |
near you, an epic battle - But before we get to the main show, | :01:16. | :01:18. | |
there's that other drama Now, scriptwriters all know that | :01:19. | :01:25. | |
to make a gripping plot, And this morning, we were treated | :01:26. | :01:30. | |
to a suggestion of the latest European offer on the vexed issue | :01:31. | :01:36. | |
of migration and benefits. It didn't sound like much | :01:37. | :01:38. | |
of an offer - an emergency benefits brake that other countries have | :01:39. | :01:41. | |
to vote on. But who knows whether that's | :01:42. | :01:43. | |
the real state of play, or just a ploy to give us all some | :01:44. | :01:46. | |
jeopardy and make the final deal What we do know is that | :01:47. | :01:49. | |
the Foreign Secretary, Philip Hammond, said last night, | :01:50. | :01:55. | |
that if there's no significant deal on migration, Britain | :01:56. | :01:57. | |
will vote to leave. So with everything hotting up, | :01:58. | :02:00. | |
let's get out of the weeds of the current negotiations, | :02:01. | :02:03. | |
and into the big questions about what kind of fight each camp | :02:04. | :02:05. | |
is going to conduct. We'll start with Chris Cook, | :02:06. | :02:09. | |
on referendum tactics and strategy. The EU referendum currently looks | :02:10. | :02:27. | |
like it could be a very tight race. And so having consulted the BBC big | :02:28. | :02:31. | |
book of heavy-handed metaphor, I have come to a racetrack. I am | :02:32. | :02:36. | |
resigned to having to work quite hard for your attention on this | :02:37. | :02:44. | |
topic. Now both campaigns actually reveal one thing. The average voter | :02:45. | :02:47. | |
is not very interested by this question. They have not got prior | :02:48. | :02:52. | |
conceptions in the way they do in normal elections, nor is it as | :02:53. | :02:56. | |
energising as the Scottish referendum. There are loads to play | :02:57. | :03:01. | |
for. Many voters have strong views on Europe, but most are just not | :03:02. | :03:11. | |
watching the minutiae of the Prime Ministers campaigning. Headline | :03:12. | :03:13. | |
polls are really less useful than usual. Campaigns are conducting | :03:14. | :03:20. | |
exercises like one that better together did in the Scottish | :03:21. | :03:24. | |
referendum. They have identified six groups. First, two sort of | :03:25. | :03:29. | |
Unionists. Two sort of pro-independence voters they could | :03:30. | :03:34. | |
write off. That left two sort of swing voters from their good fight. | :03:35. | :03:37. | |
That helped them tailor their messages. Estimates vary between | :03:38. | :03:43. | |
their being one fifth than one third of voters in play. What messages | :03:44. | :03:49. | |
might expect to hear? The number one reason we're having this referendum | :03:50. | :03:53. | |
is probably immigration. That means the strategic challenge for both | :03:54. | :03:56. | |
campaigns revolves around immigration. If they remain they | :03:57. | :04:02. | |
have to show they can understand the concerns of voters who have | :04:03. | :04:06. | |
legitimate worries around immigration. But fur leave, they | :04:07. | :04:09. | |
need to understand they pretty much have all of the votes of voters who | :04:10. | :04:14. | |
are Eurosceptic and worried about immigration. That is why senior | :04:15. | :04:25. | |
people who vote leave worry that... It is very striking by the way that | :04:26. | :04:29. | |
the in campaign is focusing heavily on security. Today they campaigned | :04:30. | :04:36. | |
on Europe-wide law enforcement. The campaign is just hotting up. View | :04:37. | :04:41. | |
our being able to see some of these tried and tested techniques at the | :04:42. | :04:44. | |
ready, whether it is the cost of staying, the cost of leaving, | :04:45. | :04:49. | |
complexity, trying to paint the other side as to come to cater to | :04:50. | :04:56. | |
get to grips with, and also fear. We are seeing some tried and tested | :04:57. | :05:01. | |
techniques already emerging. Vote Leave see staying in as a 1970s | :05:02. | :05:06. | |
choice. They say exit would allow Britain to seize opportunity. But | :05:07. | :05:13. | |
sceptics on both sides have clocked that globalisation is the thing | :05:14. | :05:16. | |
people do not like, and strength in numbers is an idea that resonates. | :05:17. | :05:21. | |
Both sides expect the leave campaign will work hard to offer reassurance. | :05:22. | :05:27. | |
Both sides also expect stay to concentrate on explaining what we | :05:28. | :05:31. | |
get for our EU membership. Most people do not know. That fight will | :05:32. | :05:34. | |
decide who ends in first place and who trails behind. | :05:35. | :05:37. | |
Here with me - the MEP Dan Hannan, who is on the board of Vote Leave, | :05:38. | :05:41. | |
one of the leave campaigns, and Lucy Thomas, Deputy Director | :05:42. | :05:43. | |
Let's just start on the negotiation. Lucy, do you think it is going to | :05:44. | :06:00. | |
make any difference? We're reporting on it every day and does not sound | :06:01. | :06:06. | |
like anybody is engaging. Is that correct? Most people think the EU is | :06:07. | :06:10. | |
not perfect, so absolutely right for the Prime Minister to push for | :06:11. | :06:16. | |
reform and make it better. Like successive Prime Ministers have | :06:17. | :06:20. | |
done. But fundamentally our case is about the benefits outweighing the | :06:21. | :06:25. | |
costs right now. Whether that is on security, like the European Arrest | :06:26. | :06:27. | |
Warrant, free trade, lower prices, those things. But fur people out | :06:28. | :06:33. | |
there, they want to know what the benefits are and costs are to | :06:34. | :06:40. | |
address the question. You're not going to make a very big deal of it, | :06:41. | :06:43. | |
because you think we should be in, regardless? The benefits outweigh | :06:44. | :06:50. | |
the costs. But I do think it is important to prove that as a member | :06:51. | :06:54. | |
you can make it better. On the eurozone, that is about the | :06:55. | :06:58. | |
long-term sustainability of being a member with the best of both worlds | :06:59. | :07:01. | |
in with the benefits of free trade but not in the single currency. Dan, | :07:02. | :07:06. | |
I know you do not think very much of the renegotiation. Do you think the | :07:07. | :07:12. | |
voters will make much of it? No. I cannot imagine there are people | :07:13. | :07:16. | |
watching thinking, I am really on the fence about this, but a partial | :07:17. | :07:21. | |
moratorium on benefits claims for four years for migrants, that will | :07:22. | :07:26. | |
swing it. These are fairly small-scale negotiations. Lucy knows | :07:27. | :07:30. | |
it. There is one way in which I think it will impact the campaign. | :07:31. | :07:36. | |
It is the smell of the thing. People will see a British Prime Minister, | :07:37. | :07:39. | |
the leader of the fifth biggest economy in the world, second biggest | :07:40. | :07:43. | |
in the EU, touring Europe, begging for the right to tweak is on asylum | :07:44. | :07:48. | |
rooms -- rules and still getting the brush off. That would tell people | :07:49. | :07:53. | |
something about the extent of our subordination. To emphasise how | :07:54. | :07:58. | |
powerless we are? Yes to have raised and dashed expectations will leave | :07:59. | :08:05. | |
the yes side in a worse position. What is really interesting is, how | :08:06. | :08:08. | |
do you think that we have more influence and more control by | :08:09. | :08:14. | |
leaving? Because we take back control of our borders, money, | :08:15. | :08:18. | |
taxes, our democracy. We have been outvoted more than any other member | :08:19. | :08:23. | |
country of the EU. Let me come in here. I want to focus, one of the | :08:24. | :08:28. | |
things I wanted to focus on was the question of how immigration is going | :08:29. | :08:32. | |
to play. I would imagine you both think migration will be a big issue | :08:33. | :08:36. | |
through the campaign? Think is one of the issues. But I will go back to | :08:37. | :08:40. | |
what Dan was saying. This idea that we do not have control now. How is | :08:41. | :08:46. | |
it that France and Germany are going to give us a better deal when we | :08:47. | :08:51. | |
just walked out and left? I simply do not understand how we get more | :08:52. | :08:55. | |
control. We will be an independent country, Lucy, like New Zealand and | :08:56. | :09:01. | |
Japan. There are 198 territories in the UN of which 170 are not in the | :09:02. | :09:07. | |
European Union. To me the most interesting question of the whole | :09:08. | :09:11. | |
thing, and I don't know the answer, is, if we leave, do we get our | :09:12. | :09:17. | |
border back? Carl Bildt said on this problem the other day if you want | :09:18. | :09:21. | |
access to the single market you will have two have free movement, like | :09:22. | :09:26. | |
Norway and Switzerland. This is about control more than migration. I | :09:27. | :09:31. | |
am quite a fan of controlled legal immigration. I think people in the | :09:32. | :09:34. | |
country will also want to have a component of refugees coming into | :09:35. | :09:38. | |
the country. But if you are going to make that argument, people in return | :09:39. | :09:41. | |
want to know that they are ultimately in charge of who we admit | :09:42. | :09:49. | |
and about numbers. You have totally avoided the question. Do you expect | :09:50. | :09:56. | |
Britain will have access to the single market, but will not have | :09:57. | :10:03. | |
free movement under current rules? Nobody is suggesting we are going to | :10:04. | :10:10. | |
join Schengen. Every time you mention Switzerland they say, | :10:11. | :10:14. | |
Schengen. Nobody is suggesting that. I think it would be sensible for us | :10:15. | :10:19. | |
to have an element of free movement of labour, but I don't think that | :10:20. | :10:25. | |
should be a pre-judgement of benefits. People coming in as | :10:26. | :10:29. | |
seasonal workers, that will carry on. It will carry on with people | :10:30. | :10:34. | |
from outside the EU. There is an issue of fairness. There will be a | :10:35. | :10:40. | |
lot of Brits of Commonwealth origin who know what a hassle is to bring | :10:41. | :10:43. | |
somebody over for a wedding because we have had to crack down on visas | :10:44. | :10:51. | |
to make space for EU nationals. Your weakness probably is immigration. | :10:52. | :10:55. | |
Daniel Hannan has given a long answer to the question but that has | :10:56. | :10:59. | |
got to be basically the weak point of your campaign? I am not sure it | :11:00. | :11:04. | |
is. We have just heard there will be an element of free movement. Leave | :11:05. | :11:08. | |
does not mean closing the border. If people are try to argue that that is | :11:09. | :11:12. | |
all leaving means, there is evidence it is not that if we still want | :11:13. | :11:17. | |
those benefits. Nobody is suggesting that. The personality factor, at the | :11:18. | :11:23. | |
moment you would like Boris to join your campaign. I would like | :11:24. | :11:29. | |
everyone. Do you need a big name? The public are probably going to get | :11:30. | :11:33. | |
lost in the detailed conversation. Do you need a big-name? In the AV | :11:34. | :11:38. | |
referendum there was not a big-name. In the north-east there was not a | :11:39. | :11:44. | |
big-name. It is a strength to have people making different argument is | :11:45. | :11:47. | |
to different constituencies. I do not think you need a single figure. | :11:48. | :11:52. | |
Because, although we all come together wanting a democracy back, | :11:53. | :11:58. | |
we disagree about what we would do as Labour, Conservative, green or | :11:59. | :12:01. | |
whatever. It should be for the British people to decide. Wildie | :12:02. | :12:06. | |
Prime Minister ultimately lead the in campaign? Let's see what happens | :12:07. | :12:11. | |
with his reforms and what he decides to do. They will be lots of | :12:12. | :12:15. | |
different people on our side of the argument, as there already are. We | :12:16. | :12:18. | |
have huge diversity from the president of the NUS to the former | :12:19. | :12:22. | |
head of the army, to respected business leaders, a cross-party of | :12:23. | :12:28. | |
people. Dan's party are fighting each other over who is gone to lead | :12:29. | :12:33. | |
the campaign. Let's pic on your campaign. Agley both campaigns have | :12:34. | :12:39. | |
a degree of disarray. Stewart rose seems to beat Wheeldon, not properly | :12:40. | :12:43. | |
briefed. He was given statistics he does not have to defend because they | :12:44. | :12:47. | |
are largely thought of as indefensible. And unable to remember | :12:48. | :12:50. | |
the name of your campaign on sky television interview. I think that | :12:51. | :12:56. | |
can happen to the best of us. Forget to remember the name of the campaign | :12:57. | :13:01. | |
they lead? That clip was before he properly started recording the | :13:02. | :13:06. | |
interview. You got in a tangle over somebody's name earlier in the week. | :13:07. | :13:12. | |
I can at least remember the name of the programme I am presenting, what | :13:13. | :13:21. | |
is it to Newsnight. Stewart has led one of this country's best loved and | :13:22. | :13:25. | |
best named brand. We have diversity on our board who are all hugely | :13:26. | :13:29. | |
respected and incredible in their own field of who are making the same | :13:30. | :13:33. | |
argument, unlike Dan's side were fighting each other. Do you agree | :13:34. | :13:38. | |
that nothing will change the first ten years after we leave? It is on | :13:39. | :13:44. | |
the record. Talking about disarray, there seems to be on your side of | :13:45. | :13:48. | |
the argument a tendency for your site to fight each other. You have | :13:49. | :13:54. | |
got a vote leave. You are on the board. Arguments about whether | :13:55. | :14:00. | |
Dominic Cummings is running it. What is going on? We have so much | :14:01. | :14:04. | |
exuberance. We have so many people wanting to do it. In every campaign | :14:05. | :14:08. | |
there are strong feelings. You have covered in general elections to know | :14:09. | :14:12. | |
that people, because they want to win, have different ideas. The idea | :14:13. | :14:15. | |
that we are not pulling together around the general vision of | :14:16. | :14:18. | |
fighting an upbeat, optimistic, positive campaign about a global | :14:19. | :14:24. | |
Britain, we are going to come together. Will Dominic Cummings be | :14:25. | :14:28. | |
an office on Monday? Yes. 20 both. | :14:29. | :14:31. | |
Cecil Rhodes has triumphed for the time being - | :14:32. | :14:33. | |
Oriel College says his statue will stay, against the wishes | :14:34. | :14:36. | |
of the campaign to have him taken down, given his brutal | :14:37. | :14:38. | |
The argument though has been remarkable. | :14:39. | :14:41. | |
In a way, it's a bit like the other Cecil - | :14:42. | :14:44. | |
Cecil the Lion - one of those individual cases that somehow | :14:45. | :14:47. | |
ignites a consciousness of a far bigger issue. | :14:48. | :14:50. | |
In this case, it's been the British variant | :14:51. | :14:53. | |
John Sweeney went to Oxford today to see how contentious | :14:54. | :14:57. | |
The Latin says roughly thanks to the great generosity of Cecil Rhodes but | :14:58. | :15:28. | |
others disagree. Cecil Rhodes said... He was a 19th-century | :15:29. | :15:40. | |
imperialist who made a mint in South Africa. Some students want this | :15:41. | :15:45. | |
symbol of racial supremacy to be cast down. I do not think that a | :15:46. | :15:50. | |
statue that symbolises racial violence and apartheid should be | :15:51. | :15:56. | |
adorning any acronym done Mike academic institution of any | :15:57. | :15:58. | |
institution that considers itself to be progressive. What it has done | :15:59. | :16:03. | |
with it I do not really care but I do not think it should be part of an | :16:04. | :16:08. | |
academic institution. Oxford has decided that Cecil Rhodes is | :16:09. | :16:15. | |
staying. If you start with smashing the statue, where do you stop? What | :16:16. | :16:22. | |
about the kings and bishops hanging out with Cecil Rhodes? The | :16:23. | :16:28. | |
21st-century is not big on statues but it does do legacy. This business | :16:29. | :16:35. | |
School is evidence some say of the amazing generosity of a billionaire | :16:36. | :16:41. | |
benefactor, proof according to others that the facilitator is | :16:42. | :16:49. | |
worried about his immortal soul. It is not just rich men who have have | :16:50. | :16:55. | |
been buying up chunks of our universities. An imperial power is | :16:56. | :17:02. | |
at it as well, but that is not Britain. China is being to get its | :17:03. | :17:08. | |
Confucius Institutes into our academia. LSE has received ?860,000 | :17:09. | :17:14. | |
from the detainees state and that is not all. It turns out they find 29 | :17:15. | :17:20. | |
Confucius centres across the country in universities like Cardiff, eight | :17:21. | :17:27. | |
Edinburgh and Manchester. Totalling up to roughly ?4 million a year. | :17:28. | :17:37. | |
Smashing up statues of people you do not bike has always been good fun. | :17:38. | :17:43. | |
It is how the present gets its revenge on the past. The danger is | :17:44. | :17:47. | |
if you clean up history too much you may end up forgetting it. | :17:48. | :17:51. | |
With me now, the historians David Olusoga and Tom Holland. | :17:52. | :17:59. | |
I would like to generalise this beyond Cecil Rhodes. Is it a concern | :18:00. | :18:08. | |
you have that there is a tendency in Britain and maybe other parts of the | :18:09. | :18:12. | |
west to whitewash some of the full things that we did in the past and | :18:13. | :18:16. | |
that is what this debate is about? The debate has got to the heart of | :18:17. | :18:20. | |
the fact that the statues are not very good at telling of history. | :18:21. | :18:25. | |
Telling of the very simple one-sided celebratory history. The image of | :18:26. | :18:31. | |
Cecil Rhodes that is presented as of his great works. He undoubtedly gave | :18:32. | :18:36. | |
a lot of money that has done a lot of good but there is another side of | :18:37. | :18:40. | |
a legend died statues do not give us that. They are not very good tools | :18:41. | :18:47. | |
for history. It is just a statue. Do you think there is a problem with | :18:48. | :18:51. | |
whitewashing of colonial past or not? I think we have struggled in | :18:52. | :18:58. | |
this country to look all the sickly at the colonial past. Some people | :18:59. | :19:02. | |
want to claim that everything Britain did abroad was terrible. | :19:03. | :19:11. | |
Then there are people who convince themselves that the empire was some | :19:12. | :19:18. | |
enormous act, some great global charity that Britain abandoned the | :19:19. | :19:21. | |
poor of Britain and spent its wealth and treasure going around the world | :19:22. | :19:28. | |
and was -- worrying about whether India would have a railway. It was | :19:29. | :19:36. | |
done for profit. Where are we on Empire? A lot of this debate is | :19:37. | :19:45. | |
really about attitudes to the imperial past. Yes. The debate | :19:46. | :19:50. | |
demonstrates that attitudes to Empire are divided and essentially | :19:51. | :19:53. | |
there is a huge conflict-of-interest. I do not think | :19:54. | :19:59. | |
that the people who are supporting the retention of the statue Kirk | :20:00. | :20:05. | |
very much about Rhodes himself. I think it reflects a sense that | :20:06. | :20:11. | |
people have of how we in this country have traditionally done | :20:12. | :20:15. | |
history. We are not like the French or the Russians. We do not go around | :20:16. | :20:22. | |
toppling statues because we have the slightly strange attitude to our | :20:23. | :20:26. | |
history that we have evolved gradually over time. I did not hear | :20:27. | :20:37. | |
a whimper of discontent at Jimmy Savile in Glasgow. Maybe that is the | :20:38. | :20:41. | |
exception that proves the rule. In Oxford there was a memorial to fill | :20:42. | :20:48. | |
Marshal Haig that was put up and got discreetly removed so it does happen | :20:49. | :20:52. | |
but what you have in Oxford in the examination rooms is a picture of | :20:53. | :20:56. | |
the Kaiser. With these memorials it is as though you are looking at | :20:57. | :21:00. | |
fossils in a great wall of sedimentary rock and you can use | :21:01. | :21:04. | |
them to trace the evolution of our history and that is part of the | :21:05. | :21:08. | |
fascination. We have Rhodes in Oxford but we have the young Mandela | :21:09. | :21:14. | |
and the elder statesman Mandela in Parliament Square. That is one | :21:15. | :21:20. | |
tradition. Britain has two traditions. The domestic and the | :21:21. | :21:26. | |
colonial and Britain has gone around the world than destroyed thousands | :21:27. | :21:31. | |
of statues. Missionaries destroyed temples in Africa of the indigenous | :21:32. | :21:35. | |
people and we went to China and we destroyed one of the great jaws of | :21:36. | :21:43. | |
China. We went and destroyed another palace and all of the bronzes of the | :21:44. | :21:50. | |
kingdom. We have another great sideline which is in pinching | :21:51. | :21:53. | |
statues. The British Museum is full of statues... This idea that statues | :21:54. | :22:00. | |
are somehow uniquely sacrosanct and unviable for the British might be | :22:01. | :22:05. | |
true in the domestic sense... Within Britain. His career was not in | :22:06. | :22:14. | |
Britain, it was in Africa. In a way this gets to the heart of the debate | :22:15. | :22:18. | |
about other things like the way the language is sexist or other symbols. | :22:19. | :22:24. | |
Should we focus as much as we do for modern causes on symbols? On | :22:25. | :22:30. | |
changing symbols? Like statues or words. I think they can be extremely | :22:31. | :22:40. | |
important. There is a risk happening in some university campuses this | :22:41. | :22:45. | |
idea that no disagreement or idea that you do not like should be | :22:46. | :22:49. | |
presented to you. You should love in a safe space. You are not in favour | :22:50. | :22:55. | |
of that? I am opposed to that but I do not think that is what this | :22:56. | :23:03. | |
debate is about. Do we go too far? That is quite common to pull down a | :23:04. | :23:08. | |
statue. These are complex and difficult issues. We live in an age | :23:09. | :23:13. | |
where an effective hash tag can generate an it I campaign. The | :23:14. | :23:20. | |
ability of people to harness campaigns is having an impact on the | :23:21. | :23:23. | |
way in which certain symbols and acting as lightning rods. No one in | :23:24. | :23:29. | |
this campaign is talking about toppling or destroying statues. This | :23:30. | :23:35. | |
is not destroying the statue. India has had a great solution. All the | :23:36. | :23:43. | |
old statues are used to be littered around colonial belly are jumbled | :23:44. | :23:48. | |
old statues are used to be littered together in a park. None | :23:49. | :23:48. | |
old statues are used to be littered have been destroyed. Last time I was | :23:49. | :23:51. | |
that there was a queen or storks have been destroyed. Last time I was | :23:52. | :23:57. | |
nesting on Queen Victoria. There is a way of diffusing statues. | :23:58. | :24:02. | |
nesting on Queen Victoria. There is is to accept they | :24:03. | :24:04. | |
nesting on Queen Victoria. There is history and should stay there. At | :24:05. | :24:09. | |
Whitehall you have a statue of Charles | :24:10. | :24:12. | |
Whitehall you have a statue of Cromwell. That seems a wonderful way | :24:13. | :24:12. | |
of sorting out the problems. Cromwell. That seems a wonderful way | :24:13. | :24:22. | |
have space for both. Maybe a bigger plaque explaining the context. I | :24:23. | :24:27. | |
wanted to be contextualised. I want the other side of Rhodes' career. | :24:28. | :24:33. | |
That is what they seem to be saying they will do. I do not think we will | :24:34. | :24:37. | |
be arguing about this in a year. But if you want a writer | :24:38. | :24:40. | |
who really walks the walk, look no further than | :24:41. | :24:45. | |
best-selling author Before he made it big with novels, | :24:46. | :24:46. | |
including The World According to Garp, The Cider House Rules | :24:47. | :24:50. | |
and A Prayer for Owen Meany, Irving kept his young family | :24:51. | :24:53. | |
by training fighters. He sold well over 12 million books | :24:54. | :24:56. | |
in 35 languages since. Now 73, Irving's new book, | :24:57. | :25:01. | |
Avenue of Mysteries, presciently anticipates our current | :25:02. | :25:03. | |
preoccupations with migration He went 12 rounds with our | :25:04. | :25:05. | |
punch-drunk palooka, If this is going to work, | :25:06. | :25:08. | |
we have to keep it quite Not any more because I am | :25:09. | :25:19. | |
standing on your foot. Hemingway played the macho card | :25:20. | :25:30. | |
but you have kind of lived it, I competed as a wrestler for 20 | :25:31. | :25:51. | |
years and I coached the sport until I was 47 but I | :25:52. | :25:58. | |
was disappointed. I was a good wrestler | :25:59. | :25:59. | |
among better wrestlers. Just as well he was more | :26:00. | :26:05. | |
of a contender on the page. Irving's new novel follows | :26:06. | :26:14. | |
the Mexican slum kid Juan Diego who becomes | :26:15. | :26:19. | |
a successful writer. The book deals with the consolations | :26:20. | :26:25. | |
and failings of religion. The word got around that he had | :26:26. | :26:30. | |
taught himself to read. That was how the Jesuits, | :26:31. | :26:35. | |
who put such a high priority While Juan Diego has always been | :26:36. | :26:41. | |
suspicious of the man-made institution of the Catholic Church, | :26:42. | :26:54. | |
of the man-made rules, dictates, policies, politics | :26:55. | :26:57. | |
of the Catholic Church, he has always been | :26:58. | :27:02. | |
seeking to believe. For an alpha male of | :27:03. | :27:11. | |
a writer Irving is much praised by some critics | :27:12. | :27:13. | |
for his liberal approach to issues 40 years ago I was writing | :27:14. | :27:15. | |
The World According to Garp where the most sympathetic | :27:16. | :27:20. | |
and arguably the least sexually volatile or intemperate | :27:21. | :27:30. | |
person in the novel is the transgender | :27:31. | :27:34. | |
character in that novel. The treatment, the acceptance, | :27:35. | :27:37. | |
the tolerance, of sexual minorities, gays, lesbians and transgender | :27:38. | :27:42. | |
people, is certainly better. The fact you say it | :27:43. | :27:55. | |
as an issue and a debate still today keeps | :27:56. | :27:58. | |
the issue alive in my work. Jermaine Greer, who I am sure | :27:59. | :28:01. | |
you know, said that a transgender I do not take and have never taken | :28:02. | :28:05. | |
Jermaine Greer seriously. She does not know what | :28:06. | :28:13. | |
she is talking about. Irving has written more than a dozen | :28:14. | :28:26. | |
novels and won an Oscar after adapting one | :28:27. | :28:35. | |
of them, The Cider Irving's new novel concerns | :28:36. | :28:36. | |
the plight of people in poor countries like Mexico | :28:37. | :29:01. | |
and the appeal of more I feel very badly for | :29:02. | :29:03. | |
Mrs Merkel who I believe has tried to do the right thing, | :29:04. | :29:10. | |
the progressive thing, the responsible thing, | :29:11. | :29:14. | |
the humane thing, by It is tragic that | :29:15. | :29:19. | |
among the people who perpetrated that violence | :29:20. | :29:28. | |
against those women in Cologne has caused this backlash | :29:29. | :29:33. | |
against Mrs Merkel and against the genuine heartfelt | :29:34. | :29:39. | |
instinct that you have to help these people who have nowhere to go, | :29:40. | :29:45. | |
who are in peril, who need to come. Donald Trump, I do not know | :29:46. | :29:52. | |
if he has resiled from this but he talked about | :29:53. | :29:57. | |
building a wall to keep I do not take what Mr | :29:58. | :29:59. | |
Trump says seriously. But I am seriously worried | :30:00. | :30:08. | |
about the number of people who are angry, as angry, | :30:09. | :30:13. | |
as ignorant, as misinformed or uninformed or shallowly | :30:14. | :30:20. | |
informed as he is. The old grappler even pulls off | :30:21. | :30:32. | |
a somersault leg drop on the American | :30:33. | :30:39. | |
writer's biggest foe. I never wanted to write | :30:40. | :30:42. | |
the great American novel. It always struck me as another act | :30:43. | :30:56. | |
of patriotic extermism that anyone would care to write | :30:57. | :30:59. | |
a great American novel. We still have some hazards to come | :31:00. | :31:18. | |
through the night and into | :31:19. | :31:20. |