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From: dyons@houxa.UUCP (N.MITRA)
Newsgroups: net.nlang.india
Subject: Mountbatten series (Sinister Implications?)
Message-ID: <929@houxa.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 5-Feb-86 10:11:40 EST
Article-I.D.: houxa.929
Posted: Wed Feb  5 10:11:40 1986
Date-Received: Thu, 6-Feb-86 20:49:47 EST
Organization: AT&T Bell Labs, Holmdel NJ
Lines: 24

Arising from this recent TV series on Mountbatten (of which I watched
only the first episode), do you think that the recent trend of Masterpiece
theatre and films like "Out of Africa" in showing reminisences of colonial India/Africa and the overwhelming
viewer enthusiasm is symptomatic of the increasing conservatism in
the USA these days? It seems to me that India(or Africa) is merely a backdrop for
indulging in vicarious nostalgia for a time (of which ofcourse Americans have
no experience except through books or TV) when class distinctions were alive,
everybody knew their place and rulers were firm yet benign. Ofcourse, most of
these productions are set at a time when these values were changing but there is something very subliminally 
suggestive I think in evoking Pax Brittanica (and everything that goes with
it) in images of sitting down to afternoon tea while mobs rampage in the native
quarters.
I also found that series like "Brideshead Revisited", "Upstairs, Downstairs"
and that Trollope thing (Barchester Towers, was it?) appeared to cater
to the vicarious desire-impossible to achieve in this country and age-of a
time when the world was at peace, the dividend checks were coming in regularly,
nobody raised their voices and servants (what ARE they?) knew their place.
Granted that these productions are superior to anything available commercially,
so one argument goes, but I must say I suspect something more sinister than the desire
to see superior TV in the overwhelming audience(principally the liberal intelligentsia)
response on Sunday nights.

					Nilotpal Mitra
					ihnp4!houxa!dyons