10 JULY 2004, Page 46

A stranger to myself

Jeremy Clarke

To London, to a party, carrying an umbrella of considerable sentimental value. It was a 21st birthday present to a lady who lived with us until she died last year, aged 105. In the 1920s, she carried it daily to and from her office in the City of London. The ebony handle was broken, but it was a handy size and opened and closed like anything.

I arrived in London three hours early for the party. I didn't want to start drinking too early because I can't hold my drink, especially if I haven't drunk for three weeks. After three weeks without, even one drink was going to change my physical chemistry, which in turn was going to alter my mindset so fundamentally that I would hardly know myself. Becoming a stranger to oneself now and again, whichever route one takes, is no bad thing, of course. Primitive cultures absolutely rely on it. Apart from anything else, it is a welcome break. But I was worried because the stranger to myself that I become when I drink — a consciously shallow, nihilistic personality — has lately become far more appealing to me than my real sober self.

In the past three weeks, however, I have had a rapprochement with my sober self. I have apologised for doubting him and it has been lovely. Having a second honeymoon. Having that first drink, and facing my old nihilistic self again for the first time since I had made the decision to give him up, was, however, a bit of a worry.

In order to kill time, I went to see Russian Landscapes in the Age of Tolstoy, showing in the Sainsbury Wing of the National Gallery. Between the Trafalgar Square Tube entrance and the National Gallery, I pushed my way through crowds of openly and obviously homosexual men and women. There must have been 10,000 of them standing under Nelson's column. As I passed through, I was given by various people: a sachet of sea-green lubrication; an extra-strong condom; a fascinating leaflet about the controversy surrounding the Old Testament translation from Hebrew to English of the words 'male prostitute'; and a pink balloon. London's wide and growing reputation for toleration of everything except for white workingclass men I was already aware of, but I had no idea that the fruit of that toleration was going to be as concerned about Christian values, and I was heartened by it.

But what about those Russian landscapes? After the sweaty clamour of Trafalgar Square, entering a room full of Shishkins, Kuindzhis and Levitans was like stepping through a wardrobe and finding yourself in Narnia with snow on your boots. I was more than a little astonished, and expressed my feelings accordingly. For this I received a sharp non-verbal reprimand from the official seated next to the door. I wasn't the first, I'm sure.

French and Italian art makes me feel nauseous, the Spaniards frighten me and Dutch masters make me recoil like a salted snail. But these largely unpopulated Russian landscapes, portraying in some cases hundreds and hundreds of miles of nothing at all, I found immensely congenial. No cult of the human being — let alone of the bourgeois human being. Even the picture frames were strikingly unusual. I could have gladly spent the two hours looking at these alone.

Outside the gallery I looked at my phone and saw that those magnificent views of forest and steppe had banished all thoughts of ice-cold lager for two hours. I had just under one hour to go. In front of me, on the parapet in front of the National Gallery, three community policemen were evicting a man wearing a sandwich board from the vicinity. The sandwich board had verses from the Bible printed on it. When they had seen him off, I asked the community policemen what the man had been doing wrong. 'He was protesting in a heritage area without permission,' said one. I pointed out that wearing a sandwich board with Biblical text on it was hardly protesting. 'Well, some of the people celebrating their sexuality here this afternoon might find the source of his text offensive,' he said. I asked him whether he would have ejected the man if his text had been artistically printed on a designer T-shirt. 'Quite possibly,' said the community policeman. Tut in his particular case, we also took account of what was coming out of his mouth as well as what was written on his boards. He was clearly antagonistic towards people who are not heterosexual.'

The sky went black. I felt for my umbrella and realised I had left it on the bus. I thanked the community policeman for his time, walked across the road to the nearest pub and drank a pint of Stella Artois before the barman had returned with the change.