That Was Satire That Was
. I think that the Postmaster-General would be tll-advised to heed voices asking for steps to be taken about the BBC's late-Saturday-night fun and games What strikes me about the programme IS not so much the penetrating quality of its barbs as the traditional spirit which has presided Over its choice of target. Mr. Macmillan's style of speaking, the Lord Chamberlain, British catering: these are the chestnuts of little re- vues—jokes which, like wine, are all the better for being old. This evocation of stock responses is not precisely what has usually been meant by Satire If MPs object to it, what would they have to say about a modern 'Character of Lord Whar- ton'; or a treatment of cardinals in the vein of Edmund Wilson? As for those who have been kind enough to allow themselves to be bully- ragged in public. I suppose that they knew what W they were in for. That as the Week 7 hat Was seems to me to be part of a sad phenomenon: the turning into mere mass entertainment of something that once contained a genuine element of revolt.
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