The historian unravels all the lies about life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Top marks!
Two years ago, Lucy Worsley delivered unto us the three-part series British History’s Biggest Fibs. She took us through the spin Henry VIII put on the Wars of the Roses and how Shakespeare took it and ran with it, helping to preserve big H’s not entirely unbiased account of it as one of the most attractive pieces in the national reliquary. She pointed out that the bloodless Glorious Revolution wasn’t so bloodless or glorious if you happened to be walking as a Scotsman or Irishman through the tumultuous year of 1688. She also showed us how the new, modern, caring ‘n’ sharing form of imperialism that created the Raj with loving Empress Vicky as the gentle polisher of the jewel in her crown … umm … wasn’t.
It was an opportune look, presented with customary brio by the historian, at the process of wish fulfilment, misdirection, confabulation and copper-bottomed lying that makes up an unknowable proportion of all the “facts” we think we have about the past and how it unfolded. Now – because, let’s face it, the time for programmes problematising national narratives and interrogating how they are wrought ain’t got any less ripe over the last 24 months – it is the turn of the United States.
Continue reading...from The Guardian http://bit.ly/2QYyCBb
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