Research Catalog

Title

The intelligencer : an occasional commentary on late 20th century affairs.

Publication

London : B.M. Perfect.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Publication Date

Began ca. 1990?

Description

v.; 21 cm.

Alternative Title

Occasional review of late 20th century affairs

Subject

• Mandela, Nelson, 1918-2013
• African National Congress
• Counterculture > Great Britain
• Imperialism > 20th century
• Nostalgia > Great Britain
• South Africa > Politics and government > 20th century

Note

• Description based on two unnumbered and undated issues, one with subtitle "Optimism in the new 90's," the other with subtitle "South Africa: the long view."
• Publication information from colophon.
• Publication frequency unknown.
• Issue [no. 1?] devoted to "South Africa: The Long View," attacking "liberalisation" of apartheid as a step toward the "self-extinction" of the Republic of South Africa, but seeing hope in economic collapse of the new South Africa and the rest of Africa as preparing the way for the continent's "recolonisation" by the British.
• Issue [no. 2?] divided into three sections: "Optimism in the New '90s," "Toeing the Line," and "Occulted Facts." The writer finds hope in the weakening of socialism in Britain (though popular culture, especially music, remains a "vile" embodiment of the "insurmountably alien" "modern world"); attacks the press for not criticizing "the entire communist system" and for ignoring the withdrawal of Soviet support for the African National Congress as the motivating cause for the A.N.C. striking a bargain with the South African government; and, ignoring the optimism of the first section, elaborating on why "If anything, we are entering a darker age than before," which will be engendered by an absence of a strong "anti-Communist lobby" and the continued endurance of "The standard myths of liberalism and democracy which no one will challenge."
• "Perfect" publications espoused a return to Victorian and Edwardian sensibilities, which were to be expressed in all social interactions, dress, conversation, literary and cultural preferences, and mores. The female editor asserts the existence of an astral realm called Romantia, in which the ideal representations of the persons and values of these eras timelessly co-exist. Freely interspersed among these texts are snide remarks and jeremiads against cultural modernity and political liberalism.
• Sister journals included The English Magazine, Imperial Angel, New Century: The Reactionary Review, and The Romantic.
• Two 1993 articles in London's Sunday Telegraph note that the English Magazine and its sister journals were published by a society which once operated a school entitled St. Bride's Academy for Young Ladies in the same house which had been occupied by the notorious Atlantis Commune, also known as the Screamers. The reporter describes an undercover visit to the premises, where men and women brought in by advertisements in adult magazines submitted to discipline, including canings, in a schoolroom atmosphere. The society also ran the "AntiMetric Society," which sported the motto "Don’t Give An Inch," and boasted astronomer Patrick Moore as a patron.

Access (note)

• Restricted access;

Numbering (note)

• No more published?

Call Number

Berg Coll Romantia I58 1990

OCLC

826445591

Title

The intelligencer : an occasional commentary on late 20th century affairs.

Imprint

London : B.M. Perfect.

Numbering

No more published?

Access

Restricted access; request permission from holding division.

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Research Call Number

Berg Coll Romantia I58 1990