Think of England, and anger hardly springs to mind as its primary
national characteristic. Yet in "The Angry Island, " A. A. Gill
argues that, in fact, it is plain old fury that is the wellspring
for England's accomplishments.
The default setting of England is anger. The English are
naturally, congenitally, collectively and singularly livid much of
the time. They're incensed, incandescent, splenetic, prickly,
touchy, and fractious. They can be mildly annoyed, really annoyed
and, most scarily, not remotely annoyed. They sit apart on their
half of a damply disappointing little island, nursing and picking
at their irritations. The English itch inside their own skins. They
feel foreign in their own country and run naked through their own
heads.
Perhaps aware that they're living on top of a keg of fulminating
fury, the English have, throughout their history, come up with
hundreds of ingenious and bizarre ways to diffuse anger or
transform it into something benign. Good manners and queues,
cul-de-sacs and garden sheds, and almost every game ever invented
from tennis to bridge. They've built things, discovered stuff, made
puddings, written hymns and novels, and for people who don't like
to talk much, they have come up with the most minutely nuanced and
replete language ever spoken -- just so there'll be no
misunderstandings.
"The Angry Island" by turns attacks and praises the English,
bringing up numerous points of debate for Anglophiles and anyone
who wonders about the origins of national identity. This book hunts
down the causes and the results of being the Angry Island.
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