'I glory in the name of Briton'*
August 13 2012
Video: BBC
I guess you know you're getting carried away with Olympic fever when you think Damien Hirst's Union Jack spin painting, seen on the floor of the closing ceremony, was actually quite good. But then these last few weeks have been extraordinary for us Brits, so forgive me the odd lapse of taste. Not only have we staged the Best Olympics Ever, we've also come third in the medal table, behind the USA and China. We thrashed Australia. And, better yet, we proved Mitt Romney wrong. It's the first time Britain has done something supremely well on an international scale, and to global applause, since winning the War. Even the Argentines had a good time.
The pre-Games pessimism (would our transport system work? could we afford it? would we win anything?) was a mark of how low our national self-esteem had fallen. I'm not just talking about our present double-dipping economic woes, but our longer-term national decline into gloomy, Daily Mail-inspired Little Englanders. But thanks to the Games (and their peerless transmission into our living rooms by the BBC, above) we seem to want to see ourselves afresh. I was lucky enough to go to the men's 100m final (TV doesn't do justice to how fast those guys run), and in the Olympic Park everyone was cheerful, strangers talked to each other, and, most unusually of all, people were proud to be British. Brilliantly, our new national hero was an immigrant from Africa, Mo Farah. We were unified, at ease with ourselves and the diverse nation we have become. It was a bit like living in America. We're gripped by the Olympic spirit. Not even Alex Salmond can stop us now. Long may it last.
* as George III once said.
Update - a reader writes:
Much enjoyed your post on the Olympics - and we Brits have achieved great things. But don't think that we have not been through a similar period of achievement but subsequent disappointment in relatively recent history. I so well remember the atmosphere of achievement and optimism at the time of the Coronation in 1953...
On Coronation Day the newspapers were bought by us excited teenagers camping overnight on the Mall. The Daily Mirror was printed in gold, with a huge headline: “The Crowning Glory – Everest is Climbed”… the first we knew of Hilary and Tensing’s momentous achievement. There were other expressions of triumph lauding the ‘New Elizabethan Age’, the popular sentiment of the day. Advertisements for Air France proudly proclaimed “The only airline flying the de Havilland Comet and jet-prop Vickers Viscount” – British-built and the first and only jet-powered aircraft in airline service... the envy of the Americans. Britain ‘Led the World’ in so many ways: Jaguar and Aston Martin were winning the Le Mans 24-hour races; the ‘Glorious Glosters’ had won fame and a VC in Korea; our motorcar, aircraft and shipbuilding industries were supreme… The Jodrell Bank radio-telescope and Calder Hall, Europe’s first nuclear power station, were further proof of our scientific achievement. A year before, the Festival of Britain had launched a new era in domestic and industrial art, architecture and design. The Royal Ballet was the envy of the western theatre; Britten, Walton and Vaughan-Williams were our greatest living composers. Cunard’s ‘Queen’ liners were unloading thousands of Americans at Southampton to attend the coronation of our beautiful young Queen. Churchill was our Prime Minister, the most famous of all living international leaders, presiding over a Commonwealth of Nations that spanned the globe, as did the Royal Navy's Fleets and dockyards. The whole world looked on in admiration, envying our outstanding achievements in trade, technology, industry, the arts and engineering - and our huge contribution to winning the second world war.
Tragic. What happened? He concludes:
Yet, what is the ‘legacy’ of all that heady optimism today? Whatever the undoubted success of London 2012, we should beware of complacency bred from success in sport alone. There is far more urgent work to be done if we are to regain, in other fields, the international respect accorded to our athletes in the past two weeks.
Meanwhile, a reader from Canada gives another perspective:
You are right; the London games were a triumph for Britain. Hopefully the resulting positive triumphalism will sustain people in the face of quotidian reality. However, your comments reminded me of Canadian’s collective joy during the Vancouver Winter Olympics in 2010, when heavy investment in a multi-year support program for athletes, rather embarrassingly called “Own the Podium,” translated into a pleasing medal haul (the most gold won by a country at a single winter games).
It was a great party and probably most of us got fan fever to some degree for sixteen days. Indeed, there was absolute delirium when the Canadian team beat the Americans for gold in hockey (our self-proclaimed national sport). Lasting impact? The hockey final is mentioned occasionally. Also, periodically there is a news item about the difficulties encountered selling units in the Olympic Village (designed as a condominium complex). Otherwise, not much.
Perhaps such successes – the efforts of a few enjoyed by many – are not sufficient to remain with us as a touch point of lasting national pride. Nonetheless, you Brits have much to celebrate, everything that happened between the Queen’s dramatic arrival at the opening to the Spice Girls dancing on top of black cabs during the closing ceremony. We enjoyed it all!
