Thinking of special relationships, personal and political between the U.K and the U.S. Just read a review in The Wall Street Journal of a new book called The Churchill Complex about the “special relationship” between the two countries since Winston Churchill, son of an American mother and British father, forged an alliance with the U.S. that helped defeat the Nazis. The book traces the bilateral relationship since before WWII through the intervening decades, including the partnership of President George W. Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair in the second Iraq war and the current so-called bromance between President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
One of my first published essays was a piece I wrote for my college’s student newspaper my senior year. This was in the fall of 1992 following the signing earlier in the year of the Maastricht Treaty that founded the European Union. The opinion piece was based on skepticism about the EU that I experienced during my junior year abroad in London, 1991-92. One of my history tutors there worried that EU standardization would change British higher education for the worse, possibly doing away with the tradition there of small tutorial meetings to supplement lectures. I sensed other reluctance in the country about European unification.
My best friend in London was a British German-language specialist and has since become a high school German teacher in the U.K. who often travels to Germany with students. He seemed welcoming of unification but also liked U.S. culture and was open to me as an American. I think culturally and ethnically, the U.K. on some levels has stronger ties with the U.S. than it does with continental Europe. Both the U.K. and U.S. have large Germanic ethnicities and have similar economic traditions. Our literature, plays, and films seem to cross-fertilize.
On a personal level, I related easily to British classmates during my junior year abroad. My English “mate” turned out to be my best friend from my college years, one with whom I have stayed in touch to this day. The opinion piece I wrote during my senior year raised questions about whether the U.K. would assimilate easily into the E.U. A Swedish neighbor in my dormitory hall in the U.S. took issue with the piece, and I felt like I may have overstepped my bounds, being perhaps presumptuous about my expertise. But it seems now that the essay had some merit.
I have similar reservations about the book this site is currently promoting. I am an outsider analyzing Irish literature and culture in-depth. While I am confident in the research, I wonder how Irish people will react to what the book proposes. It could be taken as derogatory on the one hand or as chauvinistic on the other. I hope academic objectivity and rigor place it on more neutral territory.