Thursday, April 29, 2021

But where are his motorcycles?

From Trying to Please by John Julius Norwich.  Page 233. 

My new position was that of Middle East Regional Adviser to Information Policy Department, which was a good deal less distinguished than it sounds. In essence the job was to cooperate with the Central Office of Information in the circulation of pro-British propaganda to the Arab world, by means of the press (we ran an Arabic language magazine), the radio (quite apart from the BBC Arabic Service, we distributed vast quantities of recorded tapes to radio stations all over the Middle East), and by cultivating Arab journalists in London. In this last activity I possessed one huge advantage: soon after I left Oxford my father had made me a member of Buck’s Club, which was regularly patronized at lunchtime by Harold Macmillan, then Prime Minister. Every week I would telephone his private secretary Philip de Zulueta, and ask him on what days his boss would be lunching at Buck’s; I would then invite an Arab journalist on the appropriate day, taking care to place him where he had a good view of the long central table, which members arriving on their own automatically joined. Around half-past one the Prime Minister would come shuffling in and silently take “ his place at this table, his neighbors—if they were already in conversation—hardly bothering to notice him. Suddenly my own guest would stop in mid-sentence and stare across the room. “Tell me,” he would say incredulously, “is that not your Prime Minister?” I would glance around nonchalantly. “Oh yes,” I would say, “he comes here quite often.” For any Middle Eastern Head of Government to behave in such a way—and then to be effectively ignored—was obviously unthinkable. Reactions were invariably gratifying; the best response I ever received was the question “But where are his motorcycles?”

 

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