In the late 1800s, the boxing and wrestling scene of east and south-east London was going through a transformation, and if you are genuinely interested in that, I cannot recommend enough the work of the historian Sarah Elizabeth Cox. If, on the other hand, you are more interested in the fashioning of political analogy, it is this: boxing starts out a legit contest between boys and men trying to render one another unconscious; then it morphs into strongman pantomiming, with one amazing boxer in the ring and have-a-go heroes trying their luck; then it starts to lean in to its showbiz elements; and after that it’s chaos. The strongman is suddenly wrestling a donkey called Steve (this really happened). People are slicing lemons with swords in the interval. It’s all a terrible stain on the noble sport, and yet it looks revivified, because suddenly every idiot in town thinks he can have a go.
Which is more or less what’s happened to the office of prime minister, and I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that this, unlike everything else to befall this stricken nation, is not Keir Starmer’s fault. Amazed as I am to even type this, it’s not Boris Johnson’s fault. It started with David Cameron.
