Fake History by Otto English
The subtitle of this book is “Ten Great Lies and How They Shaped the World”. It presents a series of case studies supporting the author’s belief that what we think is ‘history’ – what we think we know about the past – is inevitably partial, incomplete, and coloured by our own perceptions of ourselves and others. As English puts it, it’s “how we deliberately misremember the past”.
Whether it’s the family stories of what Grandad did in the War (which war doesn’t matter), or the popular belief that what we call ‘curry’ came to the British Isles in the waves of migration in the mid-20th century, or that Winston Churchill really did say many of the witty aphorisms attributed to him, the story or myth takes on a life of its own and becomes ‘true’ simply because enough people believe it to be true.
This is a timely analysis, as claims about Britain, its place in the world and the heroes it honours have polarised the country. Right wing politicians deplore the toppling of a statue to a slave trader, saying such actions attempt to “rewrite history” and “cancel” Colston, or Cecil Rhodes, or whoever, while at the same time they vilify the National Trust for acknowledging that many of the properties in its care exist because of money made through slavery. Lies told to win the Brexit referendum and the subsequent departure of the UK from the EU have become unassailable truths in many people’s minds.
There are no easy or obvious solutions to these problems but awareness of them, understanding how they came about and how they permeate popular debate should at least be a starting point.
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