Tell us one thing you hope people say about you.
One thing I have learnt over the years is that other people’s opinions of you are likely to be restricted by the context in which they meet you. If they meet you professionally they will see the professional side of you. If they meet you socially they will see the social side of you, assuming you have one! If they read something you have written they will see a curated version of you. So, in many ways you are controlling what they might say about you, and therefore their comments are actually a reflection of what you have chosen to share with them.
Why do I say it’s a strange question? Well, what would you do with that opinion? Agree with it, disagree with it or ignore it are your three options. In any of those cases the impact of what they think is simply going to be short term. It doesn’t matter at any deep level what people say about you. Years ago I had a number of friends, as nearly all of us do in our younger days. Now, very few of them probably give me a single thought. Their opinions were very important to me at the time, but the fact that they have no interest in me now shows that those opinions were irrelevant in the greater scheme of things. I have had students who really enjoyed my teaching and students who hated it, more the latter than the former in my last couple of years of full time teaching. They saw me in lessons and made their judgement on me based on two hours a week. They may have made some valid points, but that would have been more by accident than insight. Even my colleagues only saw a curated part of my personality, however long they worked with me. Their opinions would carry more weight, but I would be either unwilling or unable to change anything based on that.
People’s views of you are simply that, their views, and I feel that only my wife sees the full me, so hers is the only view that really counts. I don’t have to ask what she thinks, because she will tell me, and I know that she will do so out of love. If you listen to anyone else’s view other than those closest to you, you are barking up the wrong tree.
Tell us about your first day at something — school, work, as a parent, etc.
One thing that your memory does is play tricks on you. It takes odd scenes from particular days and builds a narrative around them. I can remember odd things about first times in a variety of situations but I can’t guarantee that those things actually happened in that way or whether they were remotely important at the time. The memories almost certainly reflect what I ended up thinking about the situation. So, I think I remember standing in the playground on my first day at Secondary school and being incredibly nervous. Was I? Who knows? I am almost certainly fixing my memory based on the fact that I ended up hating the place. If I had ended up enjoying it I would no doubt have remembered a much more positive moment from that morning.
We develop a narrative around situations that make sense to us, but if we talk to people who were with us we may find out that either events did not happen in those ways or that no one else even vaguely remembers them. The film Inside Out perfectly reflects this view of memories and was based on what is known about the way that the brain stores memories and how those memories are analysed. I am not saying that the events other bloggers are recounting didn’t happen, but I can guarantee that if there were 10 other people there they would remember 10 other ways that it played out. The way that someone reacts to the event is almost certainly after the fact rather than contemporaneous. So, be careful what you think you remember as it almost certainly very personal and very selective.
What was 2025 like?
Actually, as Fred says in the first stave of A Christmas Carol, ‘I will keep my Christmas spirit to the last’! So, let’s just agree that globally it’s been perhaps the worst year in living memory and leave it at that!!
Woman & Home 2025
The Front Cover
The first thing you notice is the difference in the front cover. In the middle you have the marvellous Joanna Lumley. None of the old magazines I looked at had celebrities on the cover, although some that I didn’t look at may well have done, but then we didn’t have a real celebrity culture until quite recently. Christmas was the main selling point so various Christmas themed covers were the order of the day. Now, most of the magazines on the supermarket shelves feature a famous person to try to entice the casual reader to part with their money. Now, looking at the bottom of the front cover you see a list of twelve further celebrities in a section called ‘Celebrate with the stars’. When you see the names, it is quite clear that the magazine’s demographic is skewed towards the older female reader as the average 25 year old is unlikely to see the names Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen, Annabel Croft, Katie Piper and Hugh Bonneville and think that they have to read on. As well as the list at the bottom, there are seven ‘cover stories’ and a quote from Joanna Lumley. Why is there so much going on here? Well, as I will mention more than once, magazines are fighting a desperate rear guard action against the Internet, and on there we are used to a blizzard of information before deciding what to click on. Woman & Home, like pretty much all other magazines nowadays, has a digital version and this magazine cover is clearly designed to be seen digitally.
Let’s look at the subjects of the front cover, going from top left. The big gold highlight is Absolutely Fabulous, an obvious nod to Lumley’s most famous role, and covers make up and no less than 143 style buys. Just below that there is a gift guide of 175 ideas for all the family. 12 ways to spread goodwill brings the magazine back to the ‘meaning of Christmas’ but the bottom left is the much more superficial ‘A Flatter Tum for Christmas’! On the right, we start with a quote from the interview with Lumley about trying not to drink champagne before midday. This is a clear nod, once again, to Patsy, her constantly drinking alter ego in Absolutely Fabulous and you can imagine her eyes twinkling as she delivers that line. It’s a very clever quote placed in the part of the cover that your eye is drawn to first, namely right next to her smiling face. Just below are money saving deals that are, once again, aimed at the demographic which is, broadly speaking, ‘middle class’ and in their 40s or older, because the magazine buyer definitely seems to be incredibly rare in the younger generation. Keeping the idea of class you have ‘Classy v Tacky. What your Christmas lights say about you’. This preoccupation with not appearing tacky is not a new one, but it definitely has extra force now that someone could take pictures of your display, put it on social media and judge it. Finally, there is advice on sex around Christmas! I can guarantee that any mention of that before the 2000s would have had the readers of this magazine up in arms. It is part of a greater openness about subjects that used to be taboo that is either refreshing or intrusive depending upon your viewpoint.
The Contents
With over 230 pages to fill, there are obviously a number of articles, but what becomes clear immediately is how short those articles are compared to the magazines of the past. In the magazines up to the turn of the 21st Century, you tended to have longer interviews dotted throughout and specially written Christmas stories, often about the trials of the season. In the ‘Great Reads’ section, Joanna Lumley gets 6 pages, the 12 celebrities on Celebrate with the stars get 12 pages between them. Everything else is dispensed with in a few pages. These articles are designed to be read quickly before moving on to something else that is perhaps more interesting. It reflects our cultural reduction in attention span. We then have five articles on fashion and four on beauty that are aimed at the person with Christmas occasions to attend and to host. The Health section starts with the article about sex and finishes its list of seven vaguely health related subjects with the promised flatter tum for Christmas. Just as an aside, the magazines of the 50s, 60s & 70s would not have dreamed of using a slang phrase like tum, as that would just have been too common. The Food section is perhaps the one that a 1950s reader would recognise most from their own reading, although the recipes, as we will see, have definitely become more complex and are now as much about appearance as taste. Home and Travel are dealt with very quickly with two articles in each section. Time for you is a mixed bag of articles, mainly focused on books but also encompassing entertainment and puzzles. Finally, there are the offers for a range of products. This contents page is set up like the main page of a website, and you can imagine the online reader clicking on an article, skimming it and then hitting the back arrow. Even reading it in print you find your brain defaulting to a skimming approach, because you just want to see if it is worth saving or highlighting. As a society we tend not to read magazines or individual articles deeply anymore, and the dreaded acronym ‘TLDR’ is increasingly common. This contents page is the visual representation of that.
The Headline Articles
The Joanna Lumley interview is the first main article and covers six pages of observations, clearly in response to questions, that cover a range of subjects. Given Joanna Lumley’s age you would expect, and indeed get, a very traditional approach to Christmas, talking, for example, about how cards keep you connected as the tradition in society as a whole is almost vanishing due to digital communication and incredibly high postage costs. She also talks about mortality and health in a marvellously matter of fact way. An interesting box at the top of the final page of the interview is entitled ‘Give us hope, Joanna’ which reflects, once again the expected age group of the reader. It references a song by Eddy Grant released in 1988, so that pretty much rules out anyone under 50 without an encyclopaedic knowledge of pop music, from understanding the reference to what was a relatively minor hit! Actually, her three tips to end the year on a high are very good.
The Christmas with the stars is the ultimate in fluffy articles, with no content beyond ‘this is what I like to do at Christmas’. It is largely superficial but occasionally there are some interesting insights. The trouble is that you have to search very hard for those few nuggets as you flick past celebrities you don’t know or aren’t interested in and only skim the ones you are interested in. There, in a nutshell, is the problem with this magazine and so many others. You drown in information and end up not really being able to sift through it effectively, however much you intend to. The old magazines were clearly designed to be read cover to cover and to hold your attention whilst having a sit down and a cup of tea, whereas this magazine is designed to be clicked on in the digital version or mentally scrolled through in the physical version as you look for articles to hold your attention. Other than the Joanna Lumley article, I would recommend ’12 ways to spread goodwill’ looking at how you can be charitable at Christmas time, ‘My worst ever Christmas’ which is great fun and the food section, another skimming exercise, but one that has a huge number of recipes, at least of few of which will pique your interest. Finally, there is a nod to Christmas Past with an article about Christmas styles through the decades that I wish could have been longer and more in depth as there was a very interesting premise that was dashed through too quickly.
Final Reflections
Everyone will get different things from this magazine, depending upon their age, income and individual situation. Gone are the days of Woman’s Realm or Woman’s Own where one size fitted all and, in most practical ways, people other than the very rich and the very poor led broadly similar lives. Now, rather than a main meal to be partaken of together, it is a buffet spread out in front of you inviting you to load up on certain small treats and ignore others completely. I must confess that I miss the days of shared experiences in our increasingly atomised existences. In the 1970s, Morecambe and Wise and Mike Yarwood would attract over 20 million viewers with ease. Even in the 1980s, Only Fools and Horses and Eastenders would regularly top the 20 million mark. Now, the most watched Christmas programmes struggle to reach 10 million. Children used to get annuals like Shoot, Blue Peter, The Beano, Victor Book for Boys and Jackie which would keep them quiet for ages. Now, annuals are ignored in favour of the endless scroll of Tik Tok or WhatsApp messages. We can’t go back, and in many ways I wouldn’t want to, but I feel that Christmas is the last remaining shred of a shared tradition and I genuinely hope that the magazines of the future, in whatever format they may exist, will always reflect this special time of the year.
I first got into amateur dramatics in Junior School when our fourth year play took place and I decided to audition for one of the parts in a play called Lady Precious Stream. I got the part of the Prime Minister, one of the main roles, but almost lost it before I got on stage! At the first read through, I hadn’t done more than glance through my part, so not only was I hazy on the speeches, I didn’t know where my cues were! The headmaster Commander Starkie was very angry and said that there would be another read through the following day and anyone who was similarly clueless then would be removed from their role. I was not about to become Spear Carrier Number 1 so I spent the evening poring over the script and practicing for hours until I was happy that I had got it memorised. The following day I was word perfect, and I never put myself into that situation again whenever there was a script to learn. When I got to the two performances I was flying as this review, which I never saw until I revisited the school 35 years later, attests.
It was to be over a decade before I ventured onto stage again as my hated secondary school, Maths School Rochester, made it clear that if I did step out in front of an audience I would be ridiculed and bullied by pupils and staff alike. The local church, which I was involved in around my teens and twenties, had a drama group called ASCAF and my best friend Gavin was one of the regular performers. He persuaded me that I should go along and for the first production, a pantomime called Hickory Dickory Dock, and I was the prompt for the production. On the second night I appeared on stage, or at least my arm did! The characters were supposed to find a note on the stage but the crew hadn’t put it there to find. Thinking quickly I decided that as it was a pantomime I could give them the note and have some fun at the same time. So, I stretched my arm out from the wings with the note in my hand causing laughter on and off stage and in the audience. It made me think that perhaps the next production I could take a chance and audition.
The next play was Grease. I hadn’t become as obsessed with the musical as most back in 1978 and when we started in late 1986 I wouldn’t have listened to the songs in 7 or 8 years. I was not sure what part I wanted, if any, but as I had promised myself I would give it a go I auditioned. I got given the part of Johnny Casino, the lead singer of the band, Johnny Casino and the Gamblers, at the high school dance. The prospect terrified me, especially when I found out that I would be backed by a live band. How could someone like me live up to singing in front of musicians who were well trained and highly talented? I had such a case of Imposter Syndrome that I tried to pull out. Luckily, the director who had seen everything before talked me round and gave me the opportunity to give my best. I decided to get into character so I went to the barber’s in town and asked for a fifties style DA cut. The teasing I got from the other cast members was incredible, but it really made me feel like I belonged. I had a huge wobble on the morning of the opening performance, but I had come too far to back out now, and the first night was such a great experience – well at least once I got on stage it was! Having a band behind me was a massive help and I just went into a zone that allowed me to relax and heightened my senses at the same time. It was an experience that money couldn’t buy and I wanted more!
I am on the far right with the white shirt and red cummerbund!
My final role on stage came a year later where I was the compere for ASCAF’s Greatest Hits. I linked the pieces, gave a few details and anecdotes, having quizzed the actors who were in the productions at the time, and I wrote the whole thing out as a script. By the second night I was so confident I started ad libbing in the middle, but never at the end, because a prompt is a prompt and, in my opinion, should never be messed with. It was definitely in my comfort zone and, unbeknown to me at the time, was perfect practice for getting up in front of a class. My decision to be a teacher was three years away, but all teachers are actors so it makes sense! Some of my colleagues when I was teaching EFL were genuinely actors or performers during the evening and used teaching as a regular if small income.
That was the end of my stage acting career, but it left many lovely memories of time spent with friends who have all vanished from my life over the last few decades but whose presence in my formative years was so important.
What was 2019 like?
As I write, I am going back six years, but so much has happened in that time, especially politically, that it feels like sixty! It was the last year of daily life having a feel of normality before the Covid lockdowns, so let’s see what the main events and interesting asides were.
Queen Elizabeth was in the 67th year of her reign, but any thoughts of a peaceful winding down in her role were dashed by one of the most fractious political years on record. During the year she had two Prime Ministers, Theresa May and ‘Boris’ Johnson. Brexit negotiations and infighting had removed the former from power and his role in railroading (or perhaps bus driving) the country to the vote to leave saw him given the keys to No 10. Within months he had illegally prorogued parliament and, when he didn’t get his way over a no deal Brexit called a General Election in December and won an 80 seat majority over Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour Party. At the time, Covid was only just starting with the first recorded case in China on December 1, but until January the following year there was no real indication as to how much impact it would have. Looking back on the politics of that year, and those since, it is clear that the more measured approaches I observed in the 20th Century have gone, never to return.
With such an awful year, politically speaking, around the world it is surprising to find out that the New York Times called it the ‘Best year in human history’! They cited decreased child mortality, literacy rates reaching 90% worldwide, a decline in diseases like polio and increased digital connectivity. They may have had a point at the time, but the 2020s are going the right way to reversing all of the above apart from the last, which now means more people than ever have their world view controlled by a small number of powerful people. So, what did Country Life make of Christmas 2019?
Country Life Christmas Special 2019
After the somewhat sour and decidedly unfestive fare served up 12 years early, I had a feeling of trepidation when starting this particular issue. The jolly looking Father Christmas on the front once again doubles up as an Advent Calendar, and although this one remains unopened, the contents page informs the reader that the windows hide a cast of Christmas characters drawn by Alan Baker of Look and Learn. Maybe I will open it during Advent 2026! The editorial for 2019 is firmly back in the world of Christmas with a reflection on songs that have messages relevant to modern life. The connection between hope for the future and the hope engendered by a new born baby, the sorrow at the state of the world and the everlasting light promised in a Bethlehem that was in 2019, and still is in 2025, riven by conflict. It is thought provoking and hopeful. The following page is an article about my favourite carol, ‘Hark the Herald Angels Sing’ tracing its sometimes confusing history. Finally, in the early pages of the magazine is a lovely article about a camel farm whose residents are in great demand for Nativity Plays. It’s a marvellous peek behind the curtain of some very British eccentricity.
The best mince pies are put to the test because, as Country Life states and I agree wholeheartedly, ‘Mince pies maketh Christmas …’! Of course, homemade is the best but if you aren’t going to make them from scratch then this was a guide to the best options. Interestingly, Sainsbury’s beat Konditor and Cook and Fortnum and Mason whose mince pies were four and six times the price respectively! In many magazines, you would be told how best to cook a turkey. In this magazine there are some interesting ideas for red cabbage instead. There is also a recipe for venison burgers but they’re too deer for me!
There are present ideas for The Host, The Hostess, Tricky Teen, Little Ones, Bachelor Uncle (!) and Made Personal. If you wanted to buy the most expensive items, the suggestions for each category were, a travel bag for £1295, fire opal and diamond earrings for £3500, a leather belt bag for £395, an alphabet chest of drawers for £1350, a Green stag head decanter for £3950 and finally a personalised backgammon set for £12000 totalling nearly £25000! They may be expensive, but some of the ideas are simply marvellous and I will look into them if I win the lottery!
There is an article called Doorways to Heaven where Ysenda Maxtone Graham, with tongue firmly in cheek for some of it, counts down the 25 musical moments she is looking forward to most as a kind of advent calendar. My favourite is Day 21 which reflects the joy of hitting the top note of Hark the Herald without squawking! The final page of the magazine is an interesting call for more superstition, or perhaps a willingness to believe, in a world that is becoming more materialist.
At the bottom of the final page the cartoon cannot resist political commentary. The three wise men following the star are told there is a change of plan and they need to sort out the UK instead!
Final Reflections
This set of articles have been something of a labour of love, and in many ways a real eye opener. The past definitely has been a different country, so it has been a lovely finish to read a magazine so full of Christmas spirit. Yes, the audience is quite specific, but in many ways their likes, dislikes and preoccupations are not so different from ours. They have more money to indulge in their tastes, but they look forward to certain aspects of Christmas and suffer others like we all do. It left me with a feeling that at Christmas there is still more that unites us than divides us, and it is a message I needed to hear.
My final magazine tomorrow brings us right up to date with a Christmas issue from 2025, but which one? You’ll have to visit this site to find out!
David Pearce - Popular Culture and Personal Passions 