The World Will Sing Again

Like all self-respecting social distancers I’ve been passing some of this time in semi-isolation by binging on episodes of Classic Coronation Street.

ITV3 is currently charging through 1995 and on YouTube I’m flitting between the 1960s and the 1970s. The 90s episodes I’m finding a real treat. It was in the early 90s that I first became aware of Corrie and as I mentioned in my first ever Blog I lived with my Aunty Jean back then. Aunty Jean would always shout to her mother in the other room that Corrie was about the start; “Mother, the Street’s on!” she’d yell and little Florrie would shuffle in, face like thunder and sit down ready for a visit to the cobbles. Jean looked and dressed a bit like Hattie Jacques and her mother could have been the inspiration for Corrie’s Maude. Grumpy, often catty and full of personality. She scared me a bit though.

90s Coronation Street

Anyway the early to mid nineties is when Corrie came into my life and it’s so nice to look back at that period while I’ve got some time on my hands. As a fan and blogger, I’m always watching old episodes and clips but it’s great to be able to dive back into it properly and watch episode after episode as if watching it for the first time.

I found a couple of episodes broadcast last week quite poignant. It’s the fiftieth anniversary of VE Day on the Street and Percy is going about lecturing the other residents about the lessons they ought to have learned from World War Two, rather dictatorially I might add. There’s a great little scene between him and Mavis where he berates her for not stocking the Union Jack flag in the newsagent shop. She barks back that the whole point of going up against a fascist dictator is that back street corner shops would have the freedom to stock whatever they want, and that seems to shut him up for a bit.

Manchester Library and Information Service: Manchester Archives and Local Studies (VE DAY Manchester)

Later in the Rovers, as customers gather to mark the occasion and toast to freedom, a couple of gents who lived through the Second World War share stories of VE Day and their return home from battle. They talk about some of the girls they met and the mischief they got up to. This leads Betty to do some reminiscing of her own. In a later episode she sits down with one of the old soldiers and they realise they were lovers briefly. In a revealing conversation with Billy, Betty admits some women behaved differently during and after the war saying:

“It was a strange time for us girls you know. Very confusing. I mean we behaved in ways we never would have done normally and ooh, the heartaches. Nobody to talk to you know Billy”.

And that’s what Corrie is all about. It’s actually why it exists and I think I remember Tony Warren acknowledging this in an interview. Whilst the men were away fighting for our freedom, the women were fighting a battle of their own. Helping the war effort on home soil but also overcoming a highly emotional and stressful time. Life was far from normal and it must have been so tough to find your own path through it all. It broke some people. It toughened others up. And the residual affects of the war can still be found today. While many people who lived through it have died, one of the most significant events in our parents and grandparents’ lives is far from forgotten and in a way it continues to shape working class communities, their sense of patriotism, their sense of fairness and their sense of community. Although I do worry sometimes that the real lessons of war are slowly fading away with the people who lived through that time.

"They were strange times"

During his chat with Betty, Billy acknowledged her admission that she did things she wasn't necessarily proud of by saying they lived through “strange times”. It’s a term used a lot at the moment. With the Coronavirus pandemic keeping us all in a sort of lockdown, our lives are changing beyond our control and although this is nothing like a war, I’ve found it has helped me understand how people might have felt back then. The things that were happening were completely out of the hands of the average person and whilst they did everything they can to do their bit, the big decisions were made by a very small number of people far away. And having watched the VE day episodes of Corrie, I started to understand it a bit more, particularly with that telling line from Betty about behaving differently in uncertain and confusing times. This isn’t to say I’m now compelled to find the nearest Marine and get up to all sorts on top of a bus shelter whilst noone’s looking. Actually who am I kidding that sounds great.

Betty Driver was to some a significant part of the war effort, having travelled through Europe lifting the spirits of the troops. It's likely the actress was reminiscing for real when filming those VE day episodes of Coronation Street. One song she became well known for was this one, The World Will Sing Again:

Who knows how these weeks and months will change our lives in the long term. I kind of hope they do change us though. I worry about how angry society has become and how we don’t seem to appreciate how lucky we are to have such freedom. Freedom shouldn’t have to be fought for but it was, and we mustn’t forget what was sacrificed in order to have what we have now. I’m not much of a flag waver and I’d rarely describe myself as a patriot, but when we come out of this “strange time” I hope we appreciate our diverse and interesting communities a bit more, stop blaming foreigners for all our problems and realise that if we stick together, whatever cobbled street, town, city or country we are from, we can probably solve the big problems much quicker. One day, like Betty, Billy, Percy and the others, we’ll talk about this time and ponder how we dealt with it and how it changed us, hopefully for the better.

"Look for the silver lining

Whenever skies are grey

No matter what befalls you now

There will come a brighter day"

@StevieDawson

Stay Home. Save Lives.

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