Michael Portillo

I watched Michael Portillo's Hidden History of Britain back in 2018, including the episode which included the former Odeon in Bradford, and wanted to revisit the series after reading Mark Nicholson's book about the cinema but apparently Channel 5 don't archive old programmes. Grr. Then I discovered the book of the documentary, which is equally interesting and informative, so I'm happy! Michael Portillo is an enthusiastic historian, even though he warns that he is 'no David Starkey or Simon Schama', and this book adds to the TV series 'a wealth of material – personal testimonies, documents, letters, photographs – which was crying out for more detailed examination and exposure'.

Aside from the chapter on the Bradford Odeon, which is currently being restored - 'I, for one, will be back when the 'New Vic' reopens, Portillo promises - Hidden History also covers a few other abandoned or repurposed places which fire my geeky heart. I have long been fascinated by Imber, the ancient village on Salisbury Plain which was claimed by the military during the Second World War and is now part of a firing range. All traces of life bar the Norman church have long since been obliterated but the descendants of old villagers still hold a grudge. My question would be why the army continue to shoot and bomb the stuffing out of Salisbury Plain in this day and age. Like Imber, the West Pier in Brighton is another ghost from England's history, now reduced to a skeleton in the sea, which has recently caught my interest and is featured here. Portillo also investigates the sewers under Brighton, which are apparently better built than the Regency houses above! 'This, in Graham Greene’s phrase, is ‘the shabby secret behind the bright corsage’ for many of Brighton’s Regency houses were built using a cheap and inferior material known as ‘bungaroush’, a mix of lime and flint and anything else that came to hand.' I was also amazed to learn that Harold Gillies, the pioneering plastic surgeon based at Cambridge Military Hospital, also carried out the first gender reassignment surgery in 1946. My imagination wasn't stirred by military sites like Orford Ness and the Russian submarine currently moored in the River Medway, but I was amused by the thought that 1960s civil servants were planning to face possible nuclear war 'with dry biscuits and sombre music'!

Michael Portillo is a brilliant layman's historian because his own love of the recent past draws readers (and viewers) in with his enthusiasm and humour ('I have visited jails a few times to see friends - I was an MP, after all', he wryly observes in the chapter on Shepton Mallet Prison). I wish the photographs were included with the text in the Kindle version, instead of lumped together at the end, but that's what TV is for!… (mehr)