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The death of John Bird at age 86 is very sad news for lovers of satire in the United Kingdom and the world and perhaps particularly for satirists, ‘resting’ like myself, or those still functioning day-to-day.
Obituaries will do a better job than I can of explaining what and how Bird did what he did, notably in partnership with his long time partner John Fortune and latterly alongside impressionist Rory Bremer.
Deeply saddened to hear that the great John Bird has left us. One of the most modest of men and most brilliant of satirists. And one of the last surviving pillars of the anti-establishment. 1/4
Suffice to sign off by citing this particularly accurate two-handed piece about Euroscepticism in the UK. Many of us habe been living the consequences of this in my years.
The Long Johns – John Bird and John Fortune talk about Europe.
It is a fate of accurate satire that the jokes, ridicule, joy and recogntion so often go on to come to pass. The warnings can tend to be overlooked.
So sad to see the news about John Bird. His work with John Fortune and @rorybremner perhaps marked the last golden age of British satire, before mocking the government became wrapped up in culture wars, spiteful Prime Ministers, and threats to our freedom.
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Prime minister Theresa May’s sudden decision to call a ‘snap’ General Election has produced a result that demonstrated just how profoundly split the UNited Kingdom is after the 2016 EU referendum.
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Cartoon – Very Well, Alone by David Low
One image that merits the overused and abused term, iconic, is in the news again because of Brexit.
Extracted from Gideon Rachman column in the FT – 2nd May 2017
The acute analysis about ‘Very well, alone‘ offered by Mr Rachman in his column should be supplemented by knowledge of the next cartoon – All alone in the world – displayed by Fougasse aka Kenneth Bird.
Cartoon – Fougasse (Kenneth Bird) on World War Two at Matthew Buck Hack Cartoons
Aside from being funny, Bird’s drawing was a more accurate depiction of the reality of late Imperial Britain’s efforts in the last world war – which ended almost seventy years ago.
I argue that in the murky realm of national mythologies these two cartoons occupy positions akin to yin and yang. the epitomy of complementary or conflicting opposites – emotion and reason – pride and pragmatism.
We have long seemed as a nation to have chosen World War Two as our national lodestar and these two pieces of imagery sum up the nation’s conversation with itself as well as anything else I know of.
My own modest efforts at reinterpretation of Low’s classic are below and are firmly #Brexit related – watching the Conservative Party become UKIP has been a most unedifying watch.
Flirting with Fascism – Matthew Buck at Hack Cartoons
And its consequences following the EU Referendum of June 2016 are becoming ever clearer.
