Sandy Denny
(mostly) serious writing (mostly) about music and literature - by Philip Ward
It would be instructive to look at Mitford’s comic fictionalisation of three deeply serious episodes in the history of the 1930s to ask how much lies beneath the surface frivolity. Was she actuated primarily by a ‘talent to annoy’ or by an underlying compassion?
Wigs on the Green (1935) satirises the British Union of Fascists in a farcical plot turning on the conflict between ‘Union Jackshirts’ and pacifists in a sleepy English village. Although Mitford toned down some elements before publication, the book offended her sisters Unity and Diana, notorious for their fascist leanings, and she resisted its republication later.
Sandy Denny