From the Ridiculous to the Sublime

I don't want to pre-empt next week's big feature here which will be a review of Johnson at 10 but, by way of a preview, I thought we could revive the Top 6 feature with Top 6 Things Boris Johnson said. That feature has lain dormant for quite some time but is always open to guest appearances and this edition shows how wide its remit can be so please give some thought to a contribution. Either a Top 6 or My Favourite Poem.

Still not having recovered from the magnificence of Portsmouth Baroque Choir's Messiah last week and reading Laura Cumming's Thunderclap, a large helping of Johnson was a salutory reminder of 'low, dishonest' human nature between some absolute glories. We spoil ourselves, I hope, by choosing to indulge in the best things available which is why next up and newly arrived is Laura's first book, the only remaining one I haven't read, A Face to the World, on Self Portraits. It was a sumptuous acquisition for a tenner because you won't get one for less than £25 now I've snapped that up. It's a good feeling to know that is waiting for me. I do hope I don't get tempted into writing any more about art than I do already. I'm far enough out of my depth with music but there is Gwen John in Chichester to fit in during the summer.

Top 6 Things Boris Johnson said

 

- Let the bodies pile high in their thousands.

- Vanity projects, regarding his rivals in the 2019 leadership election.

- He was furious when he found out there had been parties in 10 Downing Street, where he both lived and worked, during lockdown but then it turned out he'd been at them.

- Letter boxes, regarding Muslim women; Mugwump, regarding the Leader of the Opposition, but there's a catalogue of such childish insults directed everywhere, from Liverpudlians to Tank-topped bumboys, picaninnies, etc. 

- Oh s**t, we've got no plan. We haven't thought about it. I didn't think it would happen. Holy crap, what will we do?, regarding the result of the referendum on EU membership that he is credited with winning.

- Suicide vest, regarding Theresa May's Chequers deal on Brexit, now generally thought to be more advantageous than what he achieved in its place but indicating a fixation on Islam when considered alongside item three here and his only published novel.

It's not historians that are needed to study him but psychiatrists. As in Fawlty Towers, there's enough material for a whole conference. Perhaps it's infectious. Maybe I'm fixated on him for equal and opposite reasons. I will try to make next week's words about the book my last on the subject. It gets you nowhere.

Addictions only serve themselves, like his to himself only ever did.