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A Question of Attribution
Single
Spies by Alan Bennett – one of the favorite writers of the undersigned, author
of The Madness of King George III http://realini.blogspot.com/2016/08/the-madness-of-king-george-iii-by-alan.html and other remarkable Magnum opera
10 out of
10
A Question
of Attribution
This reader
has been exhilarated by all the works of Alan Bennett that he has had the
fortune to read – actually, mostly to listen to – and clearly, A Question of
Attribution is no exception, for albeit it is only thirty seven pages long -
and thus it is generally performed as Single spies, together with An Englishman
Abroad, which has some dedicated lines
at the end of this note and it is about Guy Burgess as the central figure,
while A Question of Attribution concentrates on Sir Anthony Blunt, another spy,
whose identity is not revealed and indeed, for one who lives outside Britain
and that specific timeframe, it is more than puzzling and this may add to the
mystery and make the main point even more relevant, for we are invited to think
about real and ‘fake’…forgery is not a word that Blunt likes, he insists that
these would be enigmas, ‘paintings do not have a goal and art evolved, it is a
‘Question of Attribution’…
The main
character is the expert attached to the Royal Collection, which he calls
however the ‘acquisition’, in part surely because he had embraced leftist,
communist ideas, he is one of the infamous spies employed by the Soviet Union
and therefore an abhorrent figure for the under signed, who has been benefiting
and will alas to his final day from the largesse with which the villains have
spread their doctrine (and are bent on doing it again, with the Ukraine, which
has 150,000 ‘friendly troops’ massed at its border)
Sir Anthony
Blunt is talking in the play with a detective who is trying to find more about
other men or women (we can assume there were no ‘they”, no gender, trans and
other categories to be identified in those days, even if today the fact that
they looked only into men and women might cause cancelation and uproar, which
these words here would, if only they had any traction) that may be on the
payroll of the Soviets, but the interaction becomes amusing, if sardonic at
times, when the detective asks about ‘what is her majesty like’, the sometimes
aloof, superior spy retorts with ‘this is like asking a woman at a department
store about Frank or John (not these names, but it is a trifling matter)
It is
incredible how much is packed into so few lines, for we get a short lesson in
art, as well as the character of the queen – as for that, Alan Bennett has
another chef d’oeuvre in The Uncommon Reader http://realini.blogspot.com/2020/11/the-uncommon-reader-by-alan-bennett-11.html wherein her majesty takes
up…reading, thus she is the uncommon reader and that generates all sorts of
conundrums and trouble, for she is in fact supposed to keep to (very) small
talk and not be intellectual…incidentally, they have a dark period ahead, with
the ex-prince Andrew facing statutory rape accusations, stripped as he is of
official duties and titles, The Economist brilliantly explains, as always, that
they cannot take him out, hereditary succession is the key word for monarchy,
once you question the ‘genetic lottery’, then you end up asking what is the
point of having a monarch and not a republic
The queen –
portrayed in the play produced for BBC Radio by wonderful Prunella Scales aka
the legendary Mrs. Fawlty in one of the best comedy series ever made, if not
the Very Best, Fawlty Towers http://realini.blogspot.com/2015/12/fawlty-towers-and-evaluations.html - happens to have one event
cancelled and therefore she is talking to Sir Anthony about art, King Charles
I, who was a connoisseur, but not a good monarch, what Gertrude Stein has said
‘after a time, even the best pictures turn into wallpaper’, the portraits of
the queen – painters of portraits are not representative of the avant-garde,
and that is for the better says her majesty, for ‘one does not want to have two
noses’.
She goes on
to say that most of her portraits are nor recognizable nonetheless, and she
seems to not mind that, but she is upset the horses do not look like the
painted ones – she is a buyer of horses, but she knows about them – and mentions
Francis Bacon and his Screaming Pope, for there might have been a chance to
have him offer the public ‘The Screaming Queen’…the Prince of Wales (the
monarchy will suffer a loss of popularity when he becomes king, albeit I am
impressed by the fact that he is an intellectual, has read a lot and had been a
‘green’ long before most of the others even knew what was all that about, even
if he has some very peculiar views on some subjects) and the late Prince Philip
paint or painted respectively…
In terms of
portraits, ‘God does not a secret self, since he is always on duty and he must
always be the same’…we also learn about the hidden significance, symbols in
painting, the dog (common sense maybe) represents loyalty, the wolf greed, the
owl wisdom, but it is not always what we should take for granted, for the owl,
‘being a bird of night, can be associated with ignorance and other representations
could be misinterpreted as in (again) A Question of Attribution’…the paintings
that are interpreted offer a good metaphor for the infamous spies, since in one
work, there seem to three men, then using technology there is another and
changing the perspective, even a fifth, just like with the traitors
The
interaction with the detective includes some lectures on art, which the
audience can benefit from, the notion that ‘art evolves’ – Chubb takes a
chronological approach, like all of us do I guess, except if you (are still
here first of all) have much higher education on this subject and then you are
evidently in apposition to look down at
all of us, characters and under signed – learning the perspective, how to
‘paint what is actually there’…Blunt explains that ‘art does not necessarily
progress towards photographic realism, different periods have different styles…what
about the Impressionists, or Picasso…’
To which
the detective replies that ‘they could do it properly, they just got bored’ and
then he comments on Michelangelo, women are not natural, just like men with
tits’…Alan Bennett has offered audiences another mesmerizing, amusing,
inspirational, erudite, simple and yet so sophisticated Magnum opus… on a minor
note, the rising star Dan Stevens has the role of Philips, an assistant.