How bureaucracy used to cheat us all in the 1950s, and how even a gifted artist could not save the situation

 A most interesting book about the clash between the state and the artist in Britain in the 1950s:

https://thinkscotland.org/2026/06/jiggery-pokery-in-the-london-art-world-in-the-1950s/  

Fascinating book - five thousand years of Indian history

 You really ought to read this article reviewing the latest comprehensive history of India: 

 TS 057 - India - Truschke

Enjoy!

Anyone who wants to know about Nicola Sturgeon should read this

 

And remember, in these unusual times, Nicola Sturgeon is in the news again. There is an excellent book about her early life in politics which was published a few years back. She resigned shortly afterwards (for allegedly unrelated reasons). The book goes some way to explaining how she has got into the pickle she now finds herself in. I think I wrote, it but, like Sturgeon herself, “I honestly cannot recall”.

 

Hating Tories: How Nicola Sturgeon Got into Government (1970-2007): Amazon.co.uk: Mitchell, Ian: 9798375508573: Books

 

All ideas of the usefulness of bureaucracy will be killed once you read this real-life example of a back-to-back comparison in the 1930s

 A brilliant book by a well-known man who was part of the competition for airship design in the 1920s-30s. 

See here: 056 - Shute and R 101 

Nevil Shute says of the (intelligent can consciencius) civil servants of his day. “A politician or a civil servant is an arrogant fool to me unless proved otherwise…. The men in question put their jobs before their duty… In this case a number of high civil servants shirked their duty in order to preserve their jobs.” (p. 147)

Enjoy!