Wednesday, April the 5th, 2006
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As I wend my slightly crumpled way through the world, there is one question I am asked more often than any other. Readers of this website and those who listen to Hooting Yard On The Air, the weekly radio show on ResonanceFM, will buttonhole me at bus stops or as I trudge around Nameless Pond, and say, usually in importunate tones, “Frank, why is it that you are so obsessed with the fact that a few years ago Peter Maxwell Davies found an electrocuted whooper swan, took it home, cooked it and ate it?”
Regular readers will know that I have referred more than once to the swan-eating habits of the contemporary British composer, who is also the Master of the Queen's Music (whatever that might mean). And here I am beetling away at the topic again. Why does it exert such a fascination upon me?
Oh, I could tell some long and involved story about my invented ornithological past, but I am not going to. I will simply say this. Max, as he is known to his chums, was interviewed by the police when they saw a dead swan hanging outside his Orcadian retreat. They were concerned because all swans are the property of the Queen. (I assume this means all British swans, as opposed to every single swan throughout the world, but I am prepared to be corrected on this detail. Commonwealth swans, too, possibly belong to Mrs Saxe-Coburg-Gotha-Windsor. Maybe.) Anyway, I was wondering if a meeting had to be called where the Master of the Queen's Music, still digesting that whooper swan, was hauled before the Keeper of the Queen's Swans to explain just what he thought he was doing, stealing food from the monarch.
It was then I learned that the post of Keeper of the Queen's Swans—the only job I ever really wanted—had been abolished in 1993. Reactionaries complain that the “New” Labour government is destroying traditions and institutions that have defined this country for centuries, but here was a case of flagrant and senseless cultural vandalism from the Conservative administration of John Major. I began to understand the true reasons for that Labour landslide in 1997. It all came down to the Cones Hotline and the abolition of the Keeper of the Queen's Swans!
I admit that I carried myself with an air of smugness, having identified one of the hidden threads of late twentieth century history. But I was in for a shock. In fact, what I learned next meant that my theory crumbled to dust, to ashes and dust. Yes, it was certainly true that there was no longer a Keeper of the Queen's Swans. And no, the position had not been replaced by zonk-eyed bean-counting management consultants under a public-private partnership initiative, whose first decision would have been to give it a trendy new name like Swansignia. What actually happened was that the post was replaced by two brand new offices, the Warden of the Queen's Swans and the Marker of the Queen's Swans. This made me so happy that I burst into tears. Now all I need to do is wait for one of the post-holders to resign or die. Wish me luck.
The above may not have answered that frequently asked question, but I am sure it is a topic we shall return to again. And again.