SHARED OPINION
This anniversary has at last ended our mourning
FRANK JOHNSON
It does not seem possible that it was only a year ago. It was an unforgettable life, but it was also an unforgettable death. Was the outpouring of grief excessive? Of course it was. Those of us brought up to be English Orthodox are not supposed to approve .of such alien displays of mass emotion. I felt a stranger in my own country.
But, as last week's anniversary showed, we are beginning to see that unique life with a sense of proportion. The British realise after all that it is time to move on. It is time to allow peace to that troubled soul, Jeffrey Bernard.
As Mr Blair would have put it had he been asked, he was the People's Drinker. It was just Diana's bad luck that she died on the same weekend as Jeffrey. His death rather distracted the attention of Spectator readers from hers. Realistically, hers just could not compete with his. He was unique. He touched all our lives. He touched some of our wallets. He had a heart of gold; pity about his liver.
Would he have married again? I doubt it. If Mr Al Fayed had had an available daugh- ter, he would doubtless now claim that Jef- frey was on the brink of commitment. One more free run of the Ritz minibars would have done the trick. But Jeffrey felt bruised by marriage. Surely, in that department of his life, he was not about to make an unsuitable match. He had his pick of Soho. At 65, his life was ahead of him.
We shall never know. But one of the more depressing, or amusing, aspects of this anniversary is the number of people who say they know. These are the people, from assorted walks of life, claiming to have been his confidantes. Just because he touched you for a fiver, or even lent you a fiver, or even stuffed a fiver down your throat, or indeed followed it by pouring his glass of vodka over your head, it does not mean that you knew him, or that he was especially fond of you. Even I do not claim to have known him well. As editor, I inher- ited his incomparable column. On my appointment, I hurried to see him, to ask him to continue his indispensable work. I shall never forget the touching words about me which he then confided to a friend whom we had in common: 'Another bleed- in' gay, I suppose.'
Jeffrey, towards the end of his life, sus- pected most people of being gay, including women, especially women. How else to explain the rise of feminism? On being Ptch000! That's vegetarian bats wing!' asked for his evidence in my case, he replied: 'Likes opera.' On it being pointed out to him that he too liked opera, he replied: 'Only Mozart.'
At our last meeting, a few days before his death, he expanded on this latter theme. Mozart was obviously a greater composer than Beethoven. He was beginning to think that Beethoven could occasionally be a bit of a wanker. He would not go so far as to say for certain that the deaf old bastard from Bonn was gay, but where was his mis- sus? Never had one, did he? Anyway, all he was saying was, Beethoven wasn't very sociable.
`But Jeffrey, for years he couldn't hear anyone.'
`The disabled are always using their dis- abilities as an excuse if they're boring.'
Mozart, however, was a man Jeffrey could have drunk with. Mozart played bil- liards. That meant he must have liked pubs. Provided they didn't have canned music.
We parted. Then he died. I put a leader in the magazine announcing that his 'Low life' column would now stop. A replace- ment would be sacrilegious. He was irre- placeable.
That does not stop people constantly try- ing to replace him. Not a month goes by without someone, females as well as males, assuring me that he or she would write a terrific 'Low life'. My routine question to all of them is: 'Are you an alcoholic, cor- roded by bitterness and a sense of failure, with a pen touched by genius?' To which they chirrup: 'Oh, yes!' Where did you go to school?' I ask, to which the reply is often something like: `Roedean.'
In any case, a new Jeffrey Bernard could not happen today. That is because the old one could not. The focus groups would see to that. Could we imagine a favourable reaction from a focus group asked whether they would like to read a weekly column by an impecunious drunk, explaining inter alia the best places in which to throw up, and how Soho was being ruined by gays? Adver- tisers, and advertising managers, would not like it either. Such a column would not be the best setting around which to sell luxury goods. Also, not too good for attracting possessors of the Pink Pound. Jeffrey's col- umn was an act of defiance against the spir- it of our age. Our age needs people like him. On reflection, let him not rest in peace.
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