Sinclair McKay

The Silver age

What bliss it was to be a child in 1977

I was ten years old during the Silver Jubilee in 1977. That perfect, daft summer formed and cemented my view of the country I live in, and still makes me feel a wave of unconditional affection every time I think back to it.

Social historians seem almost contractually obliged to present England during that time as a tatty, shambolic, declining realm, a dreary windswept concrete shopping precinct where everything was brown and orange. But that is not what we ten-year-olds saw. We saw the vivid bright green of Slime (a fashionable novelty toy then) and the mellow purple of our Chopper bikes and the thrilling scarlet from our LED digital watches. And in the summer of 1977, there was a ubiquity of red, white and blue. Streets, shops, schools, the Blue Peter studio — even Smiths crisp packets. It coloured everything.

Certainly there were elements of the Silver Jubilee that were frayed around the edges. Gauche, even. But it was sincere. In 1977, we were pre-postmodern. The national celebrations — the Queen wearing floral hats like those favoured by her adoring old-lady subjects as she performed walk­abouts in small towns — very often had the extemporised atmosphere of a local tombola event. That’s what made it so very special. It wasn’t sleek but we meant it.

And it was amazing to be ten years old at that time. In my west London primary school playground in 1977, here is what we knew about the Queen, fragments of knowledge gleaned from listening to parents and grandparents. We absolutely knew that every Saturday afternoon, she would watch the wrestling on ITV’s World Of Sport. We knew that Buckingham Palace was so big that sometimes when the Queen was walking around it, she forgot where her bedroom was. We knew that It Must Be Awful To Be The Queen, All Those People Looking At You, She Deserves Every Penny (this we had learned from our grandmothers).

Already a subscriber? Log in

Keep reading with a free trial

Subscribe and get your first month of online and app access for free. After that it’s just £1 a week.

There’s no commitment, you can cancel any time.

Or

Unlock more articles

REGISTER

Comments

Don't miss out

Join the conversation with other Spectator readers. Subscribe to leave a comment.

Already a subscriber? Log in