Tony Benn knew the rules but would not play the game

His lifelong belief in socialism inspired several generations of socialists and radicals, and infuriated the establishment

• 
• • Gary Younge
  • The Guardian, Friday 14 March 2014 18.05 GMT

Tony Benn: ‘What is the final corruption in politics? Earlier, it was to get into cabinet, before that, to be popular, but later on, the final corruption is this kindly, harmless old gentleman …' Photograph: Nick Rogers/Rex

The conductor was striding through the early train from Paddington to Penzance apologising as we shuddered to a halt just east of the Tamar. "I'm sorry for the delay," he told Tony Benn, sitting opposite me. "There was a lightning strike on the line ahead."

"Lightning strike!" said Benn, assuming industrial action. "What's it about?"

"It's about God, sir," said the guard, referring to the harsh weather of the previous night, and the two men smiled at each other.

That night I stayed in Cornwall. The prospect of spending nine hours on a train in one day was too draining. Benn came straight back, arriving in Paddington around 11pm so he could be up at 6am the next day to drive to Burford to address a Levellers rally. Around the time I was ordering my second round of sandwiches from the buffet car on my way back from Cornwall, he was heading back to London from Burford to speak to a pro-Palestinian demonstration, when his car exploded on the motorway. I was 33; he was 77.

When I next saw him I suggested, in jest, that he slow down, if only to stop me looking bad. He laughed and said he planned to work right up to the end. "The last entry in my diary will be: 'St Thomas's hospital: I'm not feeling very well today'," he said. He even had plans for his gravestone. "I'd like it to say: 'Tony Benn – he encouraged us.'"

The two things that stood out, watching him both from afar from an early age and up close over those few weeks, were his optimism and his persistence. He believed that people were inherently decent and that they could work together make the world a better place – and he was prepared to join them in that work wherever they were.

This alone made him remarkable in late 20th-century British politics. He believed in something. For some this was enough: they were desperate for some ideological authenticity, for someone for whom politics was rooted not merely in a series of calculations about what was possible in any given moment but in a set of principles guiding what was necessary and desirable. Criticisms that he was divisive ring hollow unless the critics address what the divisions in question were, and how the struggle to address them panned out.

Benn stood against Labour's growing moral vacuity and a political class that was losing touch with the people it purported to represent. The escalating economic inequalities, the increasing privatisation of the National Health Service, the Iraq war and the deregulation of the finance industry that led to the economic crisis – all of which proceeded with cross-party support – leave a question mark over the value of the unity on offer. What some refuse to forgive is not so much his divisiveness as his apostasy. He was a class traitor. He would not defend the privilege into which he was born or protect the establishment of which he was a part. It was precisely because he knew the rules that he would not play the game.

He hitched these principles to Labour's wagon from an early age. Its founding mission of representing the interests of the labour movement in parliament was one he held dear. He never left it even when, particularly as he got older, it seemed to leave him. His primary loyalty was not to a party but to the causes of internationalism, solidarity and equality, which together provided the ethical compass for his political engagement. When people told him that they had ripped up their party membership cards in disgust, he would say: "That's all well and good. But what are you doing now?"

With his trademark pipe, mug of tea and cardigans, that could have left him a fossilised figure of a distant ideological era. But, contrary to popular misconceptions, his politics did evolve. He did not grow up in a time when gay rights, defending Muslims against Islamophobia, or even gender equality were central to left discourse. But when they emerged as key issues he had no trouble understanding either their value or their potential. He stood for something more than office and he didn't pander. That was why he was one of the few people to emerge from an Ali G interview with his dignity intact.

Some would regard this as evidence of naivety, bordering on delusion, that went from dangerous to endearing the older and further away from power he got. Having fought so hard in the 60s to renounce his peerage, his struggle in later life was to be elevated to the to the role of "national treasure" – like Dame Judi Dench, only without the title or an Oscar. Those who pilloried him as an extremist became eager to patronise him as eccentric. "He may have talked some blather over the years," Keith Waterhouse once wrote of him in the Daily Mail. "But it was always blather he believed in."

"That's the thing you worry about," said Benn. "What is the final corruption in politics? Earlier, it was to get into cabinet, before that, to be popular, but, later on, the final corruption is this kindly, harmless old gentleman … I'm very aware of that. I take the praise as sceptically as I took the abuse. I asked myself some time ago: what do you do when you're old? You don't whinge, you don't talk all the time about the past, you don't try and manage anything, you try and encourage people."

The devotion that has poured out for him since his passing is not simply nostalgia. The parents of many of those who embraced him in recent times – the occupiers, student activists, anti-globalisation campaigners – were barely even conscious at the height of his left turn. They are not mourning a relic of the past but an advocate for a future they believe is not only possible but necessary.

The trouble for his detractors was that Benn would not go quietly into old age. He didn't just believe in "anything": he believed in something very definite – socialism. He advocated for the weak against the strong, the poor against the rich and labour against capital. He believed that we were more effective as human beings when we worked together collectively than when we worked against each other as individuals. Such principles have long been threatened with extinction in British politics. Benn did a great deal to keep them alive. In the face of media onslaught and political marginalisation, that took courage. And, in so doing, he encouraged us.

The importance of failure

Success can dazzle, even blind. It's in failure that those like Jonathan Trott can address their weaknesses

Rob Steen in Cricinfo

March 19, 2014

 

Jonathan Trott: mired in a personal trough © AFP

What happened to me? Did I lose my talent? Am I ever going to be good again?

Find me a public performer who hasn't echoed Bill Murray's self-pitying, crestfallen lament in Wes Anderson'sThe Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou. Jonathan Trott might have served his cause better had he plumped for such candour and simplicity - it might even have spared him Michael Vaughan's intemperate outburst - but no matter. Depression, stress, burnout, anxiety, panic - variations on the theme of mental unfitness are endless.

"I remember day two or three, it was a bit of a blur, I was getting headaches and all sorts of things and I wasn't eating properly towards the end and that's when the sleep started getting disruptive and emotionally that was when I was worst and it just boiled over. I had nothing left in the tank - mentally and emotionally pretty drained." The number of appearances of the word "and" in the first of those sentences tells us a lot.

As Trott recounted his feelings during last November's Brisbane Ashes Test to Sky Sports viewers, the memories jostled for breathing space; a disorderly queue of negative emotions was being flushed out. Eye contact was strong and certain, but that doesn't mean the scars don't hurt. Amid more measured comments, yes, those references to "crazy" and "nutcase" were supremely insensitive - one of the few things Vaughan was right about in his own insensitive, somewhat hypocritical tirade (well, he did resign the captaincy of his country mid-series). But perhaps Trott felt that distancing himself from a graver clinical condition was a necessary part of his recovery. The message was plain: "I can be good again… I will be good again."

A few years back, "burnout" was a genuine and growing concern: even before the IPL was a glint in the BCCI's eye, multiplying formats and a concertina-like international programme were placing an ever-increasing strain on the leading performers. Then came the domestic T20 eruption; now all bets were off. Now "burnout" was the fear that dare not speak its name. If the players chose to spread themselves even thinner, well, that was their funeral. Frankly, my dear, who gave a damn? Trott's travails should compel us to think anew, with greater compassion. The employers who arranged 61 Tests for their charges over the past five years have far more to answer for on that score than they do over the way they handled his sudden fall from grace.

Older readers might find themselves harking back 40 years to a similar episode involving Geoff Boycott, whose intensity Trott has always seemed bent on emulating, as Mark Ramprakash did before him. The superficial cause was Boycott's repeated humiliations by bowlers of trifling gifts, primarily Eknath Solkar (such is the contempt in which the Yorkshireman holds the late Indian left-arm swinger, the latter is not even accorded the respect of a forename in Boycott's first autobiography, published in 1987).

"Batting to me is more than a mechanical use of techniques," Boycott explained. "I have to feel in a good frame of mind if I am to do well." There was a lot preying on it: difficulties over his benefit season, a rotten start to the summer by Yorkshire, and the usual internecine squabbles at Headingley, let alone the selectors' galling - as he saw it - preference for Mike Denness as England captain over his own claims.

	When nothing is working as it should, as had been the case for Trott since August 2013, convincing oneself that class truly is permanent and that form can only ever be temporary can tax the hardiest of hearts

The tipping point was another cheap dismissal in the first Test at Old Trafford. Nor did it help that it was "glaringly obvious that Denness wanted about as much to do with me as the Black Death". In taking stock, attested Boycott, "I realised, to my horror, that the desire and drive to play for England had gone. There was no satisfaction in it, very little involvement, even less pleasure… I couldn't take it any longer."

He duly informed Alec Bedser, the chairman of selectors, that he was "in no mental or emotional condition to play well for England". Yet when he put the phone down he felt no relief, and certainly no better. By the time he reached Bath, for Yorkshire's match against Somerset, he was "low, confused and physically ill… it might have been stress-related, I really don't know, but it was real and painful enough".

That September, by when his reign as Yorkshire captain was under threat, he did the unthinkable: he turned his country down. "Had anyone mentioned the mere possibility of it to the kid who played in the South Yorkshire back-streets or the young man who battled his way into the Yorkshire and England sides, he would have been invited to go forth and multiply. I would have considered him certifiable. But the culmination of events, circumstances and attitudes was too much to resist. I knew I could not go to Australia and do a good job for England." Not for another three years would he do international battle, yet recover he did, and prosper. Trott can draw hope from that.

In an interview published in the Times last Saturday, Rosabeth Moss Kanter, a Harvard professor billed by Rick Broadbent as an "expert on losing streaks", spelled out the commonalities linking sport and the world beyond. "In a losing streak everything deteriorates. There is often infighting and a lack of desire to show up for work because the situation is so unappealing. You see it in inner-city communities too, where neighbourhoods form gangs and fight against each other rather than working together." In an unusually perceptive moment, the all-too aptly named footballer Robbie Savage recalled the "soul-destroying" nature of a horrendous streak for Derby County not only robbing him of enthusiasm but reducing him to hatred for the game he once adored.

Trott, though, was mired in a personal trough. He'd gone 18 Test innings without a century before (and not that long ago). He'd also gone four ODIs without reaching 30 before, twice. This time, both happened concurrently, gnawing at his marrow.

One of the chief advantages of playing a uniquely multi-format sport is that success in one discipline can refuel another, or even persuade you to focus exclusively on a single discipline, the better to spare yourself all that angst and pain. But when nothing is working as it should, as had been the case for Trott since August 2013, convincing oneself that class truly is permanent and that form can only ever be temporary can tax the hardiest of hearts (unless, of course, your scorebook entry reads DG Bradman or SF Barnes).

****

	Has a sporting figure ever treated success and failure with such startling equanimity as Rafael Nadal? Stephen Dunn / © Getty Images  Enlarge

Repeated exposure to failure can be our undoing, but it can also reinvigorate. As that hoary old saying goes, what doesn't kill us makes us stronger. For professional sportsfolk, unlike most mortals, failure, however relative, is transparent and statistical, sometimes tweetworthy, always inescapable. For all of us, what counts is how we cope with it, and the way we heed its lessons.

The challenge to those recuperating from a setback is whether to risk the self-diminishing agonies of failure again. All the more reason, then, to salute those who take that risk for our amusement, and when there is little or no apparent need. Witness Rafa Nadal, whose improbable comeback from a career-threatening injury has been immeasurably more successful than the tennis writers and even his doctors predicted.

Had that regal racqueteer's stomach churned at the prospect of failure, he would have taken one of two courses: he would never have dared return to the court (it's not as if he needed the pesetas or kudos) or, in so doing, that renowned courtly behaviour would have lapsed. Neither happened, almost certainly because Nadal possesses the quintessential prerequisite of all champions: those competitive fires still burned. Has a sporting figure ever treated those twin imposters with quite such startling equanimity?

We make much of self-assurance as the most priceless of assets. Not only does it embolden, it also enhances the power of bluff. Confidence, achievement and reputation form a virtuous circle; how often do off-form achievers prevail purely by dint of repute? Ian Botham managed just 40 wickets in his last 23 Tests, and most of those owed more to name than skill. That confidence may or may not be innate; for those whose work exposes them to daily ordeals by competitive fire, in public view, it can certainly be mercurial. One numbing or humbling failure at an inopportune time can do more to deflate it than a hundred triumphs can buoy it. It depends on how deep it runs.

Yet strength can only be enhanced by reducing or eradicating vulnerability; by logical extension, therefore, failure can be more important than success. Failure means those glances in the mirror are likelier to be stares - broodier, more searching, less self-deluding. Weaknesses are likelier to be addressed, lessons learned. Success, conversely, can dazzle, even blind. It can also deter acknowledgement of the influence exerted by sheer blind luck, an ingredient never more potent than in the competitive arts. Perhaps only the tiny ranks of the doubt-free actively desire failure - as motivation, as a counter to complacency - but maybe that's what keeps us all going. Should we fear it? No, but a spot of constructive loathing can come in handy.

Bill Murray/Steve Zissou relocated his mojo - or at least a semblance of it - with a gun, saving his crew from a band of murderous pirates. A less violent loosening-up might do Trott a power of good.

Tony Benn was defiantly, stroppily, youthfully socialist to the very end

Mark Steel in The Independent

The older you get, apparently, the more you abandon the daft socialist ideas of your youth to become sensible and conservative. There will never be a greater retort to this miserable myth than the life of Tony Benn.

Because somehow he became more defiantly, inspiringly, stroppily, youthfully socialist every year up to 88. If he’d lasted to 90 he’d have been on the news wearing a green Mohican and getting arrested for chaining himself to a banker.

Even more remarkable is that as he became younger with age, so did his audience. In a time when socialist groups despair at how to attract the under-50s, Benn regularly packed out a tent that held 3,000 people at Glastonbury. Anyone passing by outside who heard the roars and squeals as he appeared must have assumed the Arctic Monkeys were making a surprise appearance, but it was a man in his 80s, clambering on stage with a flask of tea.

Then he’d start with: “I’m pleased to say I’ve decided to give up protesting. Instead of protesting I’m going to take up DEMANDING instead.” And teenagers would shriek and raise their arms above their heads and clap, belly button studs wobbling as he recounted the first time he met Clement Attlee.

He filled theatres as well. In places like Telford, the box office manager would say: “The shows that went fastest this year were Tony Benn and a Led Zeppelin tribute act.” Maybe other politicians will try to copy him, before wondering why tickets aren’t selling well for “An evening with David Blunkett”.

He was introduced to socialism during the Second World War, when it became mainstream to suggest that if the nation could collectively pool its resources to fight, it should be able to do the same to provide health and housing. The introduction of the welfare state, along with the movements that won independence in the colonies, must have confirmed for him that mass movements, combined with parliament, can transform society in favour of the poorest people.

Parliament, he insisted, was the pinnacle of democracy, the triumph of radical thinking that went in a line from the early Christians, through the Levellers in the English Civil War and up to the Labour Party (although he’d have told Jesus, “I don’t think you should turn that water into wine as I’ve seen the damage alcohol can do.”).

These ideas can’t have seemed too controversial until the 1970s, when the response to global economic chaos was to blame the unions, taxes and state ownership of anything, and instead hand unrestrained power to big business and the free market.

But Benn stuck to his principles, so Conservatives called him the “most dangerous man in Britain”. He must have consistently disappointed opponents who portrayed him as a figure of evil, as they tried to convince people: “You can tell he’s trying to wreck the country: he’s got a gently persuasive lilting tone and he’s addicted to tea. He’s obviously worse than Stalin.”

Maybe it was the simplicity of his ideals that made him so endearing. If someone suggested immigration was causing our woes, he’d reply that it was odd how a businessman can move his business overseas, but the workforce shouldn’t be allowed to follow it to stay in work.

 

To anyone who argued that we don’t act collectively any more, he’d recount the day he was on a train that broke down for hours, and “up until then we’d all been individuals on a privatised train, but now we helped each other, lending phones and sharing sandwiches, and by the time it arrived it was a socialist train”.

But despite his reverence for Parliament, in some ways it was once he left it that he became most powerful. With an unfathomable energy he spoke at several events a day. Union meetings, anti-war benefits, campaigns against library closures – he was everywhere. If he was on Tony Blair’s asking rate for speeches he’d have been a billionaire within a month.

It wouldn’t have been surprising to find he was addressing a union conference, then speaking on the Iraq war at a children’s party, before giving a lecture about the peasants’ revolt at a sado-masochists AGM before nipping up to Leicester to appear on Question Time.

I did some filming with him once at seven in the morning, the only time he could do it. I got a taxi to his house, driven by a Pakistani man in a rage about the Iraq war. “Politicians are all crooks,” he kept saying, “The only one I trust is Tony Benn.” “Well,” I said, “strangely, we’re going to his house.” “Tony Benn? House of Tony Benn? We go to house of Tony Benn? Not Tony Benn?” he said.

Tony Benn in 1964 (PA)

So when we arrived I asked Tony Benn: “Would you mind meeting the taxi driver, he’s a huge fan of yours.” Then I went in with the driver who yelped and clasped Benn’s hand, saying “This is such a good day. Oh such a good day. My friends will not believe this.”

And Benn said: “Well I don’t know about that but I’ve got the kettle on if you’d like a cup of tea.”

This seemed to be his life. The more unassuming and down to earth he was, the more he acquired the reputation that narcissists crave.

In later years, when the establishment were unable to damage him or his reputation with their claims of his inherent evil, they labelled him a national sweetheart, and if he’d wanted to, I’m sure he could have presented Countdown and got to the final of Strictly Come Dancing.

But he ignored his new image, almost baffled by the acclaim he drew, and continued to make the case that a world in which the richest 400 have the same wealth as the poorest 2 billion is probably a bit wrong, and could do with putting right. And he did it to the end, in such a way that made anyone listening believe it was possible.

Interviewed a few weeks ago, he was asked how he’d like to be remembered. He said: “With the words ‘he inspired us’.”

Well he’s got no worries there. No worries at all.

10 of the best Tony Benn quotes

 

Tony Benn was known as an eloquent and inspirational speaker. Here are ten of his most memorable quotes, as picked by Guardian readers

• Guardian readers and James Walsh
• theguardian.com, Saturday 15 March 2014 12.39 GMT

Tony Benn attends a rally in Hyde Park, London, during a protest organised by the Trades Union Congress called The March for the Alternative on 26 March 2011. Photograph: Kevin Coombs/Reuters

1) “If we can find the money to kill people, we can find the money to help people.”

Tony Benn was interviewed in Sicko, Michael Moore’s documentary film about the health industry in the US. Explaining the post-war creation of the welfare state, he said the popular mood of the 1945 election was: “If you can have full employment by killing Germans, why can’t we have full employment by building hospitals, building schools?”

2) His “Five questions” for the powerful.

Tony Benn’s final speech to the House of Commons as MP was an appropriately eloquent farewell, in which he talked widely on his view of the role of parliament and the wider question of democracy. As Hansard records, he said: 

In the course of my life I have developed five little democratic questions. If one meets a powerful person--Adolf Hitler, Joe Stalin or Bill Gates--ask them five questions: “What power have you got? Where did you get it from? In whose interests do you exercise it? To whom are you accountable? And how can we get rid of you?” If you cannot get rid of the people who govern you, you do not live in a democratic system.

3) “Making mistakes is how you learn.”

 I made every mistake in the book, but making mistakes is how you learn. I would be ashamed if I ever said anything I didn’t believe in, to get on personally.

4) “I now want more time to devote to politics and more freedom to do so”

With a typically memorable turn of phrase, Tony Benn signalled the end of his parliamentary career in 1999, when he announced he would not be standing for re-election at the next general election. Asked whether he would be taking his place in the House of Lords, the former Viscount Stansgate - Benn renounced his peerage back in 1963 - replied: “Don’t be silly.”

5) “The House of Lords is the British Outer Mongolia for retired politicians.”

Given the above, this quote is not especially surprising, but worth repeating. Tony Benn was a lifelong campaigner for constitutional reform, and introduced a bill that would have allowed him to renounce his peerage as early as 1955.

6) “I think there are two ways in which people are controlled. First of all frighten people and secondly, demoralise them.”

Another quote from Tony Benn’s interview with Michael Moore in Sicko, in which he highlighted poverty and healthcare inequality as a democratic issue. “The people in debt become hopeless, and the hopeless people don’t vote... an educated, healthy and confident nation is harder to govern,” he said.

7) “Hope is the fuel of progress and fear is the prison in which you put yourself”

Tony Benn thought any meaningful change could only come from below, and felt apathy was openly encouraged by those in positions of power. “The Prime Minister said in 1911, 14 years before I was born, that if women get the vote it will undermine parliamentary democracy. How did apartheid end? How did anything happen?”

8) “We are not just here to manage capitalism but to change society and to define its finer values.”

Blamed by many for contributing to Labour’s lack of electoral success during the 1980s, Tony Benn was a totem for those who rejected the shift to the right widely seen as necessary if the party was to regain power. This shift was eventually completed under Tony Blair, who pushed through the abandonment of clause IV and redefined Labour as a party comfortable with privatisation and free market economics. The quote above indicates why Benn resisted such a move.

9) “There is no moral difference between a stealth bomber and a suicide bomber. Both kill innocent people for political reasons.”

10) “A faith is something you die for, a doctrine is something you kill for. There is all the difference in the world.”

Tony Benn’s calcified view of the US as an imperialist force left him on the margins of mainstream opinion during the cold war, but a voice of reason to many after the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Tony Benn puffs on his pipe as he listens to speeches during the second day of the 66th annual Labour Party Conference, in Scarborough, England. Photograph: Laurence Harris/AP

F**k It Meditation - The Magic Mantra for all sorts of situations

Nick Duerden in The Independent


Context, invariably, is everything. And so while it will doubtless prompt much hilarity to convey that, on a bright Saturday afternoon in east London, I find myself indulging in free-form dance to the accompaniment of something called F**k It Music, let me assure that, at the time, it all seemed perfectly sensible.

I'm not the only one at it on this so-called Let Go seminar – there are 40 of us here, in an ugly office block one floor up from the Centre for Islamic Guidance, and we are each in the deeply private process of disrobing our inhibitions and doing something that general consensus tells us we don't do anywhere near enough of these days: really tuning into ourselves. When we do, what do we feel? And when we do follow our core instincts (and our core instincts speak to us for a reason), what happens then? The answer we are encouraged to come to is that we feel freer; better; liberated. Liberation is all too fleeting a sensation, says John C Parkin, the man behind the whole F**k It movement, but it doesn't have to be. "When I first came up with the idea," he tells me, "it felt like magic, really. Just say fuck it, to all sorts of situations and see what happens. The fact that it works as a therapeutic tool is, to me, mind-blowing."

And so what began as a whim has, nine years on, become something of a phenomenon. Parkin has written three books on the subject – F**k It: The Ultimate Spiritual Way, F**k It Therapy and The Way of F**k It – which between them have sold 400,000 copies, and been translated into 22 languages. The week-long F**k It retreats that he runs with his wife Gaia in her native Italy sell out months in advance. People come from all over to attend. Many return home, Parkin suggests, transformed.

The young lady I'm currently shaking my limbs alongside right now (her name is Lucy, she works in marketing) tells me that a colleague of hers attended one recently. "She was a very angry person, all the time, but came back completely chilled. Amazing, no?"

John C Parkin conducts a Let Go day course in east London (Teri Pengilley)Today's seminar is a kind of pick 'n' mix self-help selection and touches upon yoga, xigong and meditation. Parkin namechecks Jung, Freud and RD Laing, he talks to us about high-functioning, multi-levelled consciousness and demonstrates through muscle testing, or kinesiology, how we can all tap into our subconscious to find out what we really believe, how we restrict ourselves and how we can learn to let go. "The truth makes us stronger," he says. "This has a huge impact on our well-being."

The 40 of us in attendance – Parkin calls us "fuckateers" – have all brought so much baggage with us, it's a wonder there's any space to sit down. Collectively, we are dealing with relationship issues, work crises, ill health. One man has anger issues; a woman worries that her critical parents are affecting her personal relationships. Some have experience in alternative therapies and self-help courses, others have been tempted through the door simply by the rude word. We range in age from early twenties to late fifties and there are several ruminative beards among us and a lot of tattoos, but fewer sandals than one might expect.

The whiff of anything even remotely new age is conspicuous by its absence. This permits many of us to unclench.

The F**k It dancing has obvious clubby comparisons, the organic equivalent of being chemically enhanced and thus uninhibited in a way that one could never be in the real world. Parkin insists that it is emboldening stuff; it peels away at our inner onions. He says that, on his retreats, people have been known to really let go: to cry, to woof and shout out with the kind of carefree abandon one normally associates with foreigners. Here, in east London, where most of us are diligently British, we employ a greater sense of reserve. No woofing, then – just a lot of wobbly legs, plenty of rocking back and forth, some yoga poses. Parkin himself indulges in a slow-motion robotic dance and he is not the only one with a beatific smile on his face. Like suddenly taking your clothes off in public, this really is surprisingly liberating.

John C Parkin used to work in the advertising game, which probably explains his chunky, zebra-striped glasses that scream: "I'm non-conformist, me!" He worked on campaigns for First Direct and Egg, and a particularly mischievous ad for Pot Noodle in which he claimed that all that monosodium glutamate was good for you.

"I always liked the idea of mucking around with people's heads," he explains when we meet three days before his Let Go seminar. We are in his publisher's office in Notting Hill, a boardroom whose corner water feature strives to create an atmosphere of serenity, but which merely sounds like a small child continually peeing. Parkin is 46 years old and bearded, his uncombed hair all too clearly unused to being told what to do. He boasts a belly that he says his brother-in-law calls "fat", and despite living in Italy, where adherence to fashion is law, he is endearingly scruffy. He was born in Nottingham to lay preacher parents, but grew up mistrustful of rigid religiosity and sought out his own spiritual path instead, immersing himself in yoga, tai chi and hypnotherapy.

A Parkin seminar in Italy, where he now calls homeHe spent time in Glastonbury, training to become a shamanic healer, and was so encouraged by how it helped fuel his creativity that he became the ad industry's go-to shaman.

"I started running these lunchtime sessions I called Parkin Labs, where I would play club music loud enough to put everyone into a trance, which would help them contact their animal power within."

He laughs uproariously, as if mocking himself before anybody else can. "Sounds freakish, I know, but it worked."

By 2001, he and his wife (also an alternative therapist) were parents to twin boys, and had relocated to Italy, where they started running idiosyncratic retreats in Umbria.

"Holistic holidays, Italian nosh", reads their first online campaign, accompanied by a picture of a woman in yoga pose, burping loudly. The burping offended many. "Oh, we got loads of letters saying how disgusting it was, ha ha!" Parkin roars. But it also attracted people who were turned off by other, more regimented retreats, the kind that demand pre-dawn sessions, vows of silence and subsisting purely on vegetables.

"I couldn't see what the problem was with starting at 10 o'clock after a hearty Italian breakfast," he says with a shrug. "And I didn't see why I couldn't both do yoga and drink wine in the evening. Ice cream, too. I like ice cream. Does that make me any less spiritual?" It was at one of these early retreats that Parkin, attempting to help a Parisian businesswoman de-stress, suggested that she might simply say "Fuck it" to her problems and see what happened.

She wrote later to say how incredibly effective the advice had been. Parkin immediately realised that he was on to something and wrote his first F**k It book, The Ultimate Spiritual Way, in a frenzy. By 2008, it was an international bestseller.

He has now updated that book, adding a further 10,000 words in which he extrapolates the idea into every area of our lives, from diet, to illness, to self-control, to fear.

This concept isn't an original one, of course, and he borrows liberally from Taoism and Buddhism and, as he admits himself, "all the colours of new-age spirituality". But what he does do – and rather niftily – is re-tune it for modern thinking. Most people have a yoga mat these days and meditation is fast becoming a daily practice in many workplaces.

Any lingering resistance people feel, he suggests, is likely due to the dogma of those Eastern origins, but then a former ad man does know how to speak to an audience. By simply employing that sonorous expletive, he is breaking down barriers and tempting the curious. Many who attend his retreats are complete newcomers.

His books are, in many ways, silly and over-irreverent; awkward jokes worthy of David Brent lurk beyond every other comma. He talks about women with "ample breasts", goat shagging and how 99 per cent of all Americans are obese because they "bin eatin' donuts again".

During the Saturday seminar, however, he comes over as far more considered and thoughtful. And though he himself has utilised the F**k It life to great effect – bestseller status has made him wealthy and given him a nice tan – there is nothing aggressively motivational about him as there is with so many of his peers. He is less Tony Robbins than he is Bagpuss. Listen quietly and it is genuine wisdom he imparts.

He asks us, at one point in the day, to fill in the ellipses in the following sentence: "In order to feel full of… I need to let go of…" The list can be as long as we want, he says. Write as much as you like. For the next five minutes, the only sound in the room is that of pen on paper, everybody scribbling furiously.

After we dance, we lie down for a final meditation, Parkin encouraging us to ponder on what we've learned and how we might use this for quieter, less driven, more contented lives. Then it's time to go.

One woman, Caroline, departs quickly, a train to catch, and elderly parents to get home to. Others stay to mingle. When I get to my bus stop a quarter of an hour later, Caroline is still there, now anxious. I commiserate, but then wonder whether I shouldn't encourage her to employ those two words we have spent all afternoon immersing ourselves in. After all, there will be more trains, and her parents aren't going anywhere.

But then the universe suddenly realigns itself to our rhythm, as can sometimes happen, and coughs up a pleasant surprise. The bus arrives.

"Oh, thank fuck for that," she says.

Well, we're all a work in progress.

It's all down to the feet - The cornerstone of batting technique is foot position and movement

Martin Crowe in Cricinfo

March 12, 2014

Sachin Tendulkar had the ideal natural stance: poised and ready to move © PA Photos

Every year, as I watch and marvel at the finest batsmen on view, new insights emerge. The art of batting provides subjects for a mighty debate. Allow me to share my latest observations.

The first advice I recall getting when I started as a lad was to line up "side-on" to the bowler, feet shoulder-width apart, shoulder tucked into the head, bat placed behind back foot. I was taught to get the front elbow up, and to play in the V. Everything was about hitting the ball, but I could only do it through mid-off, as that's where my body aimed. Today, batting successfully is, from a technical viewpoint, with the odd rare exception, really about one vital thing - footwork.

-----Also by Martin Crowe
To bat right get your mind right
----

Batting, in a nutshell, is about moving the body in reaction to a moving ball. Once in the right position, it is only then that relevance to hitting the ball applies, to stroke the ball into a gap in the field. The emphasis is to focus on what is required to execute proper movement to a moving ball. Therefore, the essential role of the stance is to be poised and ready to move athletically.

To move athletically, you must use your feet. To get the best out of your feet, the weight must be on the ball of each foot, for that is where the energy, the springy muscle, is, not the arch or the heel. Often the toes are referred to, yet it is in fact the ball of the foot, the round, sinewy area at the base of the big toe, that is the most vital part of the body when it comes to batting.

As you stand awaiting the bowler's delivery, the balls of the feet are priority, poised, ready to move quickly and efficiently. The best way to get on to the balls of the feet is to flex the knees. Straight legs send the weight to the wider part of the foot, including the heel, a sure way to slow movement. By flexing the knees and feeling the pressure on the balls of the feet, the body has its engine room fired up and ready to pounce. When I think of quick footwork I think of Don Bradman. He, better than anyone, showed that fast, efficient foot movements that facilitated getting into the correct body position was the key to batting.

What is the correct head position? In the modern day, with so much analysis, greater fitness levels, reverse swing and the 15-degree chucking toleration, it is critical for batsmen to play straight for long periods. Bowlers and coaches spend their time focusing on hitting the top of off stump. Therefore, more than at any time in history, I believe the position of the head has a key role in knowing where your off stump is at the moment the ball is released, aiding the ability to play pitch-straight.

It is my strong view that the outside eye (right eye for a right-hand batsman, left for the lefties) should be level with the other one and in a position to see the ball leave the bowler's hand, and not aiming at mid-off or looking over or past the nose to see the ball. The outside eye ensures the batsman is getting the best view of the ball release, knows where his off stump is, and provides an overall feeling of total balance and poise, allowing for the potential to play straight. This analysis of the outside eye is a lot different to the old days, when playing back was more the norm, mainly due to uncovered pitches and no protective equipment.

With the outside eye looking at the ball release, the shoulders will be slightly open towards the non-striker. As we work down the body, if the eyes are level as the ball is released, the hips will be slightly open also. From the hips to the flexed knees, to the weight on the balls of the feet, you have the ideal natural stance, poised, ready to move. Think Sachin Tendulkar.

At this point, with the body in the correct poised position, the bat can be placed into the mix. Imitating top batsmen who hold their bats aloft can be a dangerous exercise if not understood correctly. When the bat is positioned up high behind the body as the bowler runs in, there is potential for the hips, shoulders and head to all close off and for the outside eye to aim at mid-off. Also, if standing too tall, the weight can easily shift on to the heels. With respect, recall Nick Compton last year, when he was struggling. It is the balls of the feet that the weight must be on, not the heels; flexed knees, not straight-legged.

By holding the bat down low, with relaxed arms and soft hands, the bat has no influence on the ideal body position that has been set up. In fact, when the bat is held low, it encourages a slight crouch, enabling flex in the knees, weight on the balls of the feet. Often I see youngsters going into their stance with too much emphasis on holding the bat up high, not on getting ready to move. This is self-defeating because without the body moving into the correct position via the feet, the actual hitting will be flawed anyway.

Graham Gooch had a very effective upright stance, bat held high. Yet he had slightly open hips, eyes perfect, knees flexed, weight on the balls of his feet. He worked on this exhaustively. Those who copied him didn't work on the subtle yet important aspects of eye position, balls-of-feet pressure, and on retaining the ability to move quickly and freely, as Gooch did. For a big man who had obvious balance issues at times in his career, he carved out an amazing legacy.

There are many unique examples of how to bat well with different stances. AB de Villiers and Jacques Kallis provide examples of setting the stance nicely, with slightly open hips and front foot, bat held off the ground but not high, poised, ready to move. Virat Kohli stands with a great head position - quite tall, yet at the moment the bowler gathers, he flexes his knees enough to tap his bat and activate his ability to move. He is a wonderful example to all. Allan Border dipped his body at the last second to create flex in the knees.

The bat tap can be an important trigger for batsmen. It was for me. As I tapped the bat near my right foot, I felt the whole body spark into action. I once tried holding my bat up and couldn't get the same ready-to-move feeling. I preferred to flex and crouch a little. I liked the position of a boxer, of a tennis player. I marvelled at the stances of Don Bradman, Greg Chappell, Viv Richards, David Gower and Sunil Gavaskar, and the sublime movements they made. I liked, too, the way Javed Miandad stood at the crease, alert and ready. The best stance to spinners I have seen was his open one, suited to every possible line from well outside leg to well outside off. To see and then move accordingly.

	It is the ball of the foot, the round, sinewy area at the base of the big toe, that is the most vital part of the body when it comes to batting

And now for the most important part, the actual footwork needed to scoring runs, to staying long periods at the crease. Remember, the stance is set to know where the off stump is and to be poised to move. Then the ball is released and the eyesight picks up the movement of the ball. As it does, the brain sends a signal to the feet and body, to move. The key here is the plural: both feet. With all the best players, both feet are moving in some way, even subtly, to every ball they face. Even when they leave the ball, the best players will use both feet to ensure that they know fully where the ball is in relation to the stumps.

When a ball is full, the back foot loads up and activates the front-foot step. For Chappell, he expected the full ball, loading up the back foot in preparation. As the front foot steps forward, the back foot joins in on the fluent movement, coming up on to the toes, even off the ground, to assist in completing the whole body movement, and shot. Think a Chappell on-drive, with back foot flicked up to balance and complete the fluent front-foot shot.

The back-foot release, as I call it, is critical to every front-foot shot. For some strange reason, throughout New Zealand, coaching demands the back foot stays still, heel on the ground, for supposed stability. This only encourages a half body movement, forcing the hands and bat to take over prematurely, leading to all sorts of problems. This, in my view, is completely wrong and a real concern as I go around schools and clubs. A more important view is from Bradman himself, as shown page after page in his book The Art of Cricket. Every frame of footage of him shows both feet activated and fluent.

To play straight off the front foot, past the bowler, the back foot must play a part in aligning the whole body, aiming everything down the pitch and to complete the movement and straight stroke. As the feet and body work in unison in completing the positioning, the bat comes through straight and late - the best shot in the game. When the feet and body stop short of proper positioning, there are problems. For instance, when the back foot is rooted to the spot, the front-foot step falls short and often to the off side, encouraging the bat to come through early and mistime, often lifting, or with the batsman playing across his front pad.

When a ball is bowled short, the front foot quickly presses down, sending the back foot into position. As the back foot lands square to the wicket, the front foot releases onto the toe, or even off the ground out of the way, hips open, to ensure the entire body movement is complete and the striking of the ball is easy below the eyes.

The front foot plays a huge part in all back-foot play - often it is just about getting it out of the way of hitting the ball - and also in providing balance to the body as a shot is played. When you imagine a pull or cut shot, think Gordon Greenidge or Brian Lara; their front leg lifts up into a fully flexed position off the ground, as they swivel on the back foot, striking the ball with balance and full force.

To spin, the best players, like Michael Clarke or Miandad, use their feet at all times, either coming down to the pitch of the ball or quickly pressing off the front foot to score off the back foot. To defend a good spinner off the front foot, think of Ross Taylor, who uses the back foot to always align his body and his bat, to play pitch-straight, making the bowler field the ball.

Footwork, the use of both feet for every ball, is the absolute cornerstone of batting.