We attended a most interesting lecture at the Royal Philosophical Society of Glasgow tonight: Liberty and Common Values by Shami Chakrabarti. She is the Director of Liberty and talked about civil liberties and promotion of human rights.
After the lecture, over a glass of wine, I chatted to a wonderful lady who was/is a member of the Communist Party. She was telling me of happy days singing in the Young Communist Choir in Glasgow (for many years). She said that in 1959 the choir sang in the St Andrews Halls for the Burns Bicentenary (of his birth in 1759). The concert was rapturously received and was apparently the only time a recording was made despite years of performances. She said the BBC refused to record the choir presumably because they did not approve of their philosophy.
She was a lady who also performed in Burns's play, The Jolly Beggars. As we raised a glass to the memory of Burns she quoted a few apt lines from the play:
A fig for those by law protected!
Liberty's a glorious feast!
Courts for cowards were erected,
Churches built to please the priest.
Later: Here is one of my favourite people, Bruce Davies, giving the Address to the Haggis.
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Photograph source: Wikipedia: Adrien Brouwer, The Bitter Tonic, Frankfurt am Main
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