Damning with faint praise? Poppea is ... interesting.

The last outing of this year's country house opera season was all about experimentation. New accommodation, new opera, new pitch for the marquee. The last was probably the most successful.

After more than two months of dry, hot, still weather, a thunderous cold front driving torrents of rain came ripping through England on the night we were due to be dining al fresco on the Longborough Opera Festival's lawns. Fortunately we'd brought our marquee, though the space we've erected it on for years has been taken over by the patrons' dining tent. Not having reserved a spot within, we set up in the patron's parking area, where we discovered that the marquee fits precisely within a small grove of trees and that lashing two of its legs to their trunks kept the whole thing from going airborne in the worst of the gusts. The new location lacks the expansive views over the valley you get from the top of the meadow, but was just 20 metres from the entrance to our box. Add four gorgeous courses meandered through before, at the interval of, and after the opera, and you have the delight of the evening.

The Coronation of Poppea was more interesting than enthralling. Monteverdi's tale of the rise of Nero's second empress is still in the modern repertoire for two main reasons: it was one of the first operas as we know it, so an important ancestor of all to come, and it closes with one of the most beautiful love duets in classical music. (Second only, I believe, to Mozart's La ci darem la mano.)

Pur ti Mio, Pur ti Godo (I gaze at you, I possess you) perfectly captures the passionate ache and ecstasy of a relationship in its early glory, and is almost worth sitting through the 2.5 hours before it just to hear it live. That's not to say the preceding opera was bad, it's just very much of its time. There's a lot of ponderous harpsichord, undeveloped characters and vocal fireworks in search of a more memorable tune. I suspect that had it been performed as written ... essentially a court masque with outrageously lavish sets, costumes and special effects ... those irritations would have been less noticeable. But nobody does traditional anymore, and Longborough's small stage and tight budget couldn't finance a Baroque treatment even if they wanted it.

Instead we got a strange mix of Roman, Viking and modern "Street" costume with brutalist pillars and a few curtains as the only stage setting. The gods wore high tops, backpacks and neon-illuminated hoodies, and punctuated the action by scrawling graffiti on the central wall. When they scrawled GRIME, and then later preceded it with LA, was I supposed to read the Italian word for tears or as a fashion commentary that helped me understand the characters? The programme added little, asking us to consider not the historic Nero but a metaphorical one who lives in a "cubist, splintered hall of mirrors, that allows us to explore the perilous brevity of time and instability of place and history." Don't let years of brilliant reviews go to your head, Longborough. You're in danger of disappearing up your own backside here.

This was the young performer's production, which Longborough always uses to go experimental on staging. Often, it works. (Rinaldo set in an early 20th-century carnival was a triumph.) This one didn't. My bigger problem, however, is with the opera overall. Monteverdi is playing with morality, turning some of history's most awful people into heroes. It's hard to get excited about the main characters when you know that Nero divorced, exiled and starved to death his first wife, Ottavia ... sung here with stoic dignity by Maria Ostroukhova... then presented her head in a box to the gleeful Poppea. Or to take that final duet seriously when you know that an unhinged Nero kicked his pregnant new wife to death six months later. (And then forcibly castrated a slave boy who looked like Poppea and had him pretend to be the dead woman, returned to life. Seriously, this guy was bad news.)

 The voices and music, however, lived up to Longborough's usual standard. Anna Harvey's Nero, Sofia Troncoso's Poppea and Matthew Buswell's Seneca all gave particularly strong performances. There's a pleasing sub-plot between Ottone (Matthew Paine) and Drusilla (Lucy Knight) that's the most dramatically engaging part of the opera. Jeremy Silver's orchestra, with a full complement of period instruments and him conducting from the harpsichord, brought our ears the Baroque lusciousness that our eyes were denied.

We'd seen Harvey as Bradamante in Longborough's 2016 Alcina, and Knight as one of the spirits in The Magic Flute last year. It's great to see familiar faces progressing into bigger roles. And equally exciting to see all the Longborough debuts. Crazy staging aside, there's no question this is becoming one of the foundries for operatic talent in Europe.

The whole production team deserves special praise for coping with an opening night disaster: the storm that didn't take our marquee did blow out the sound board, forcing an early dinner break and putting the whole production an hour behind schedule. The show continued to that magnificent concluding duet without throwing anyone off their stride.

And there, at last, came a bit where the strange setting worked. As Poppea's and Nero's voices entwine in the majesty of love, the gods link words together on the graffiti board to say "Words mean nothing anymore". In light of the karmic justice awaiting the couple (Nero only makes it three years after murdering Poppea before he's forced to suicide), it's a profound, ironic and hugely depressing way to end the story.

I'm thankful to Monteverdi for helping to create one of my favourite entertainments, and was intrigued by this exploration of operatic roots, but I admit to breathing a sigh of relief that his cynical celebration of anit-heroes didn't become a staple of the art form.

On the Royal Route: Time works wonders for Brighton Pavilion, less so for Kensington Palace

When I first started working in Europe in the mid-'90s, I was an obsessive weekend tourist. Without local friends (they'd come later) or household responsibilities (I spent my first three years in serviced, corporate-funded rentals), I could use every weekend to indulge my passions for British history, culture and countryside.

Times have changed. And though I'm still an aggressive sightseer on holidays (as this blog attests), I've gone ever more native in the UK. My limited time gets claimed by visiting exhibitions in London rather than places I've already seen. Activities revolve around catching up with friends. A good chunk of every weekend is demanded by house and garden. Until a friend with the typical American's energy for power sightseeing comes to town, and my old touring instincts revive.

My university buddy Lee isn't just any American. He's a passionate Anglophile with a deep interest in, and knowledge of, British royal history. He was already familiar with the obvious places. We needed to dig deeper. With his particular interest in the Victorian era, I would have loved to get him to Osborne House, but we didn't have enough time for the Isle of Wight. Kensington Palace and the Royal Pavilion at Brighton got the nod.

I'd been to both, of course, but neither for at least a dozen years. In memory, both were delights, and before last weekend's touring I would have told you that Kensington was my favourite royal residence in London. No longer. Perhaps my increased familiarity with England's cultural heritage over the years has put it into a context I didn't have when it first impressed me. This time, I found its sights mostly underwhelming and its cost extraordinary. At £23.50 on the door (it's £4 less online), it's roughly the same price as Hampton Court, Buckingham Palace or the Tower, but with much less to see. Meanwhile, the years have seen the town of Brighton pour restoration funds into their community-owned Pavilion, making it even more magnificent than on my last visit. And at just £13.50 per person, a bargain. Here's a bit more on both.

KENSINGTON PALACE

I suspect just two words explain why this place can charge such a premium despite being the least impressive of the royal palaces: Princess Diana. She's strongly connected to the site, her sons still live here and the "temporary" exhibition space is occupied by a display of her dresses. No doubt they'll be here until that whole generation of women of a certain age, currently gazing at them with misty-eyed adoration, passes away. Until then, the relics of the saint of High Street Ken will keep pulling them in.

I, however, will tell you that the highlight of visiting here is the state rooms, and the woman who deserves the spotlight is Queen Caroline (nee of Ansbach), a highly-educated and hugely-competent consort of great refinement who probably would have been better at ruling the country than her husband, George II. Her tastes greatly influenced Kensington, Hampton Court and the Royal Collection, something that's explored here in a gallery devoted to her.

The interiors at Kensington are very similar to Hampton Court, so if if the bigger palace is in your sightseeing plans then you may want to give this one a pass. If, however, you don't have time to get that far from central London, Kensington gives you the same William and Mary and early-Georgian style: grand staircases with frescoes of life-sized courtiers watching your progress, dark wooden panelling, Grinling Gibbons carvings, floor-to-ceiling sash windows, damask-covered walls hung densely with old masters and a hefty slice of Queen Caroline's oriental porcelain collection. George I's cupola room is the star sight, with a tromp l'oeil ceiling painted by William Kent to create a Pantheon-like dome of blue and gold coffers rising to an impressive Star of the Order of the Garter. Handel performed new works here for his patron; it is a magical setting worthy of genius. The curators of the Royal Collection have also made sure that some of the masterpieces have been diverted to Kensington, most notably Van Dyck's iconic Charles I on horseback and his Cupid and Psyche, some fine Veroneses and Tintorettos, Holbein sketches and most of the famous portraits of Queen Victoria.

Victoria looms large because she was born, lived until her accession and held her first council meeting here. There's a suite of rooms dedicated to her story which were renovated extensively in 2012. (Along with the rest of the palace, though this is the bit that seemed most different to me.) They've tried to go modern, with multi-media experiences, bold quotes and infographics screened onto the walls, interactive dress-up areas and touchable displays. It's good, but sparse. There's a lot of empty floor space here, and there's a surprising dearth of furniture or treasures in the display cases considering the motherlode of stuff the long-lived queen left behind. The main reason to plough through these rooms is to get to the jewellery exhibit at the end, opened just four months ago. There are three tiaras, all breathtaking. Most significant is the emerald and diamond, accompanied by matching necklace, earrings and brooch, all designed by Prince Albert. If Vicky hadn't realised he was "a keeper" before, I'm sure this set locked the deal.

Even if you're not a Diana worshipper, the costume exhibition is interesting. They've made a real effort to get some of the most memorable items here: the tweed set she wore in the highlands for one of her first photo shoots, the casual outfit she donned on her land mine mission, the Northwestern purple gown she wore to a university-sponsored fund raiser in Chicago (everyone remembers that one, right?). There are photos of her wearing each item, and explanations of how each was designed for the specific event it debuted at. This suite of rooms is also a rare example of a fully air-conditioned space at a London tourist attraction which, this summer, might actually have been worth the admission price.

THE ROYAL PAVILION, BRIGHTON

The Pavilion may be the seaside town of Brighton's No. 1 tourist attraction, but I'd categorise it as one of the greatest ... and certainly most unique ... buildings in all of Europe. This was George IV's seaside retreat, far enough from London's prying eyes for the notorious libertine, spendthrift and gourmande to indulge his every whim. It's gorgeous, crazy, seductive and totally bizarre; like Coleridge's opium-fuelled poem, "in Xanadu did Kubla Kahn...", brought to life through architecture and interior design. You expect to run into Lord Byron cavorting around every corner. The exterior is Indian, the interior Chinese, the execution pure English. It's a Western, Romantic-era imagining of the exotic East that's as true to its source material as the Beauty and the Beast sets are to real French chateaux. And it's all the better for it.

There are dragons everywhere. A beast in full flight holds the dining room chandelier in his claws. In the music room they hold up the curtains and wind sinuously at corners to create oversized tie-backs. Surprisingly lifelike, 1/3rd-size figures of Chinese archetypes watch you in the main gallery; they're bobble heads whose mechanisms make them nod when people pass close by. Hand-painted wall papers and panels show an imagined world of Oriental fairy tale, full of gorgeous women and handsome men in sumptuous gowns. The furniture ... all classic English Regency at its core ... is lavishly accented by palm trees, bamboo, dragons and other elements of the Orient. Although George and his decorators, the august firm of Crace, weren't purists. Egyptian sphinxes and slaves creep in here, a few Greek gods there.

Even the kitchen is a joy. George enticed the world's most famous chef, Antonin Carême, to come work for him by promising him pretty much anything he wanted, including specifying the set up of his kitchen. Not only is the space beautiful .... elegant palm trees hold up a glass-filled cupola while serried ranks of copper pots reflect the sunlight pouring in from above ... but it was state of the art. That cupola and the high ceilings below it keep air circulated and cool the kitchen down. What's possibly the world's first extractor hoods arch over the stoves. Automated turning spits could roast four or five rows of animals at a time. And, unlike almost every aristocratic pile ever built in this country, the kitchen is right next to the dining room, meaning the food at George's famous parties would have been hot and fresh as Carême intended.

The Pavilion is in magnificent condition thanks to Brighton's consistent investment. Victoria sold the place to the town ... it was too outrageous, too small and too much in the public eye for her tastes ... after which it went through a variety of incarnations and crises. Aware that this is the anchor pulling international tourism to their town, Brighton lavishes time and money into regular improvements. Fixtures and fittings are in top condition, while pieces of furniture and decorative elements that were once dispersed are regularly found and returned. Since my last visit the vast swathes of curtains have been renewed to sumptuous effect, they've restored the gardens, opened a suite of rooms once used by Victoria and Albert and created a cafe on the roof, complete with a balcony where you can sit in the open air, take tea under the domes and look out at the gardens.

Staff here were noticeably more cheerful and spontaneously offered more information than the people at Kensington. Maybe it's the civic ownership. You definitely feel their pride in their palace. One of the guides told me about opera nights in the winter, where you actually get to eat in George's magnificent dining room and adjourn to the equally dramatic music room for a recital. That's enough to tempt me to a return visit, even without the excuse of a visiting American.

If you fancy binging on Roman history, Imperium is for you

Despite the more than 1,500 years that have passed since the fall of their empire, Western civilisation has yet to shake off an obsession with the ancient Romans. We base our legal codes, government structures and grammatical constructs upon theirs. We borrow their architecture to express authority and their decorative patterns to convey elegance. We study them as role models. (Though who we lionise has a lot to do with how we see ourselves. Napoleon liked conquering emperors; America's founding fathers were fond of Cincinnatus, a statesman called out of retirement to meet a crisis who, once he'd put things right, laid aside the reigns of government and returned to his farm rather than holding on to supreme power.) I’m even drafting this article at a spa in the English countryside based, and decorated, on a Roman model.

Whether they really were like us or not is irrelevant. The ancient Romans have become the eternal mirror in which we seek a baseline for ourselves.

Thus it’s little surprise that the Royal Shakespeare Company’s Cicero plays, now in a limited run at London’s Gielgud theatre, feel as relevant as watching the nightly news. Together, they're called Imperium: the first is Conspirator, the second Dictator. Though they’re a good deal more entertaining and, despite our hero’s end by political assassination, send us home with an uplifting validation of trying to be the good guy.

The relevance comes from the populist uprisings at the heart of this chunk of history. After years of civil strife and economic hardship ... mostly caused by squabbling factions within the aristocratic families that comprised the Republic's Senate ... the people lost patience. They began to look for salvation in a line of strongmen: Clodius, Julius Caesar, Mark Antony, Augustus. Each was an aristocrat, yet each managed to make the people forget that, getting the mobs on side by convincing them that they were men of the people. Paternalistic good guys who would, you might say, "drain the swamp". Whether the shift from Republic to Empire actually did help the common man is something historians still argue about. But there's no doubt that their support of these strongmen helped to bring on the change, and that in that evolution they got more "bread and circuses" but less rule of law. You can see why it's a hot topic for a modern London stage, and there were plenty of thinly-veiled references to politics on  both sides of the Atlantic that set off wry laughter throughout the theatre.

This production team has form. The Royal Shakespeare Company and writer Mike Poulton had already teamed up to convert Hillary Mantel's books about Cromwell into plays that later became a much-acclaimed BBC drama. Now we get seven hours of political intrigue, historical epic and witty repartee split into two plays, all drawn from Robert Harris' three-part fictionalised biography of the great Roman statesman, lawyer and orator Cicero. It's a brilliant fit. Cicero's life ... dancing back and forth between sides, bouncing in and out of power, trapped in impossible situations that give him no good choices ... is properly Shakespearean. The experience of seeing both of these plays is a close cousin to watching Henry IV parts I and II and Henry V in close succession. (We went on a Monday and a Friday. If you want to "binge watch" you can do it all on a Saturday. Whichever way you do it, book tickets all at once for a discount.)

Richard McCabe's Cicero (above) is a wonder. McCabe is one of those familiar faces you can't quite place; then you go to his IMDB profile and see that he's been a supporting actor in a long string of notable British TV dramas and films. Here, he is the centre of the action for much of the seven hours. Given that Cicero was one of the most famous word-spinners in history, that means he's spouting beautifully constructed, fairly complex prose most of the time. The sheer feat of memorising the lines of a role this enormous is mind boggling. Add acting that gives us a totally believable, emotionally complex character who rockets from heights of joy to the depths of despair. McCabe gives us a complex and totally believable self-made man who's never quite able to get past his humble beginnings. The self doubt in that situation also gives Cicero a towering ego and dangerous susceptibility. We love the man McCabe gives us, but we also often want to scream at him in frustration.

That role is played, instead, by his slave ... eventually freed and clearly his best friend ... Tiro, presented here by an energetic and amiable Joseph Kloska. He's an essential narrator to the action, and as a foil to Cicero's character weaknesses he gives us some of the plays' best humour. One of the joys of this adaptation, in fact, is just how much humour Poulton pulls out of the books. It was all there (and, indeed, in Cicero's writing in the first place), but didn't stand out as much in the vast sprawl of the plot. The clever wordplay here is front and centre.

Inevitably, of course, you lose a lot when transferring three huge novels to the stage. The first, which gave us Cicero's early battles to establish himself in the capital, is covered in a few summary lines. About half of the plot of the third book also hits the cutting room floor. The stage play narrows the action down to the rise of the Caesars ... Julius, then Augustus ... and Cicero's role in their story. It works. I missed the private lives, however. To wedge this into even seven hours, Imperium becomes a political drama. Cicero's wife Terentia and daughter Julia are important to the first play and have only bit roles in the second. Their stories are much more interesting in the book. The good news? Book and play are very separate things, both totally enjoyable. Do both and double your satisfaction.

I understand, however, that seven hours of Roman political drama and admirable wordplay isn't exactly popular entertainment (despite the populist themes). Despite the staggering quality of the production, there were good tickets available on both nights. I suspect that will be the case through the close of the run in early September. So ... if you've ever binge-watched the TV series Rome, or love Shakespeare's history plays ... catch this while you have a chance. If Love Island is as much intellectual stimulation as you can stand over this long, hot summer, best to give this one a pass.

Traviata outshines the English sun, while Hampton's gardens seem confused beneath it

It's been a remarkable summer in England. Consistently clement since early May, memories of our miserably wet winter and spring's surprise snows have been banished by an atmosphere that feels positively Mediterranean. The smell of barbecue lingers constantly in the air. Gardeners report bumper crops of berries. Pub gardens are packed. The national team is still playing in football's World Cup. Commuters into The City have shifted down to Bermuda shorts, polo shirts and deck shoes.

It is, of course, not all good news. The global warming that's brought this weather is wreaking havoc in more extreme climes. Arguably, as we down another Pimms in our sultry gardens we're fiddling while Rome burns. Water companies are having difficulty processing enough supply to meet demand. A large chunk of Saddleworth Moor is burning and brush fires closer to home are disrupting the train network. An unexpected carbon dioxide shortage is endangering the supply of fizzy drinks, meat and packaged salad. Worst of all, in a country where the average summer high is just 18C (66F), air conditioning is rare. Our buildings are designed to retain heat. Public transport rarely offers more than a weak fan. Any temperature beyond 27C (80F) turns London into a miserable heat trap. The underground system is like the sixth circle of Dante's hell.

One inevitable effect: the weather has eclipsed all else in our consciousness. Longborough Festival Opera's La Traviata was both one of the most innovative and enjoyable productions they've ever staged, but our sun-burnished picnic and worries about surviving the heat in the un-air-conditioned opera house dominated. At the Hampton Court Flower show, finding shady places to drink and rest exerted a more powerful pull than the show gardens.

LOVE AT LONGBOROUGH
That Traviata deserves to be remembered, however. It is, of course, an opera that rarely disappoints.
Verdi's tale of the the scarlet woman who proves herself the most virtuous of all, then dies for love, is one of the genre's most enduring crowd pleasers. It's also packed with one exquisite tune after another, making it one of opera's most approachable productions. (Indeed, it was delightful to see several families bringing children to this show.) Director Daisy Evans' re-imagining of the story as the tale of an exhausted, clinically depressed Marilyn Monroe type in 1950s Hollywood was fascinating and worked surprisingly well. The party scenes in acts 1 and 2 were re-imagined onto film sets, with action bouncing between "filming" of movie scenes and the between-take banter of the actors and crew. This was particularly effective when we got to the gypsy and matador sections at Flora's party in Act 2, which usually seem bolted on to give the chorus and corps de ballet something to do. Here, instead, it was riveting as our heartbroken heroine tried to stumble through the "movie" she was supposed to be making as her world collapsed.

The references to Marilyn Monroe were obvious (though soprano Anna Patalong looks more like Maria Callas than the blond bombshell), and the shift of Violetta's death to an irreversable overdose rather than the traditional tuberculosis made everything seem more real. Her final cry of "I want to live" plugged into the poignancy of every soul who's ever squandered their life, then realised they wanted redemption when it was too late to take it. Patalong is one of the best sopranos I've ever heard at Longborough, with a real star quality that enhanced ... or what enhanced by? ... this particular role. Her acting was as fine as her singing, giving us a persuasive picture of a mentally-fragile woman imploding. My only complaint: her compelling death scene played out from the floor, where much of the audience couldn't see her over the tops of the heads in the next row.

Peter Gijsbertsen sang a wonderful Alfredo, entirely credible as he rockets from adoration through betrayal and regret. In fact, all of the voices were top notch and the acting equally compelling; something essential in Longborough's intimate space where facial expressions, or lack of them, are glaringly obvious. The Hollywood trope also provided the costume department with an unusually bright moment in the spotlight. From the Marie Antoinette setting of the first "movie" to the black and white surrealist of the second, with gorgeous late-'50s looks to tie it all together, they gave us a feast for the eyes.

LIFESTYLE AT HAMPTON
Having survived the hottest Hampton Court Flower Show on record three years ago, we had a plan for this one. Go slowly. Pause often for rest and liquid. Make no attempt to see it all. Instead, compile a short list of shopping needs in advance and stick to it. It was efficient, though expensive, as I was completing the garden furniture hunt I'd begun at Chelsea. Some unusual pelargoniums to complete my Cordoba-inspired patio wall, a few showy dahlias and one clematis to to fill specific blank spaces followed. On the whole, I was a master of restraint.

As if anticipating our unusual hot spell, this year's gardens evoked warmer, dryer places. The best in show garden featured so many impatiens and semi-tropicals that I felt like I was back in Texas. Other gardens featured palms and bananas, canna lilies and grasses, garish yellows and flaming oranges. The soft pastels and lazy drifts of England's green and pleasant land weren't much in evidence this year. The other big trend was "lifestyle gardens". Outdoor rooms with fireplaces, kitchens, bars and clusters of furniture, with block planting more notable for its decorative effect than its horticultural interest. Too many gardens this year looked like the landscaping in corporate hotel chains. Pretty, but uninspiring.

In recent years the concept gardens have become the most noteworthy part of the show. They're not all beautiful, but they do make you think. Witness the garden making a point about de-forestation of the Amazon: you started in a walled enclosure full of Amazonian plants, moved on to another full of tree stumps, then to an empty abattoir still stained with blood, ending in a processing pen where one plant struggles up through the sand floor. In case you missed it in the heavy-handed setting, the main reason the Amazon is disappearing is to feed the growing South American desire for meat.

Both beautiful and thought provoking was a garden commenting on the dangers of social media addiction. At the front, a normal suburban garden with a ragged lawn scattered with toys and some surrounding borders in need of attention. Someone's abandoned an iPhone on a table. The back of this plot is outlined by a giant iPad frame. Step through it to the very kind of lifestyle garden we've seen elsewhere in the show. Everything is perfect. But look closely! The grass is plastic, the flowers silk, the hanging chair would be impossible to get in and out of. It's a beguiling but unobtainable illusion, as are ... the designers imply ... most of the posts on social media we're led to believe are typical slices of our friends' lives.

My favourite garden in this section, and in the show, made a simpler point. On the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I, a large plot started with dusty, grim trenches and morphed into an exquisitely-planted wildflower meadow. Out of anger comes beauty. Time heals. And, it turns out, in the middle of a sun-drenched English heat wave, a wildflower meadow both survives well, and looks like it belongs here.

From British trains to Roman cities, civilisation can be a precarious thing

When I started working in Europe in the mid-‘90s, my employer awarded me a “hardship bonus” for living in England. It wasn’t nearly as much as colleagues posted to what we then called “3rd World” nations, but it had been a welcome gift when I had wanted to come here in the first place. 

That was back in the days of generously-funded ex-pat packages, and I worked for a company confident in its belief that living anywhere outside of the USA was a sacrifice that deserved compensation. They had some points. The UK was a different world back then. Shops weren’t open in evenings or Sundays (with no Amazon or delivery as an alternative). Customer service rarely rose above grudging resentment. Retail options and value for money were so bad that not only did I do all my clothes shopping in the States, but I regularly imported groceries, too. The internet was still in its infancy, so you were essentially cut off from American news, sport and entertainment. Decent dining out was expensive and limited. Worst of all, it was difficult to exercise your God-given American right to get in a car, drive smoothly from point A to B and quickly find free parking a stone’s throw from your destination. You were often expected to walk long distances or, even worse, crowd with others into public transportation.

I hadn’t thought about that for decades. Then I hit two weeks in a row of public transport meltdown at Waterloo Station and wondered if maybe those HR wonks at corporate HQ back then had a point.

Fires on the line featured in both cases, on consecutive Tuesdays. Though fairly small and quickly extinguished, both incidents shut down all trains for hours. Problems were exacerbated by our current extended heat wave (which Midwestern Americans would see as gloriously mild late-Spring weather). British infrastructure is designed to operate in a narrow band of climactic clemency; pushing beyond it in either direction generally wrecks havoc. I understand these things happen; my issue was with the complete lack of official guidance. Information boards offered the most basic news: there'd been a fire and trains were delayed. No estimated time for renewal of service. No suggestions of alternative ways home. On the second Tuesday, there wasn't a uniformed employee in sight. On the first, there'd been a few but they were almost as useless as the notice boards. In a world of ubiquitous, instant communication, you'd figure a crisis management team would at least have news online, right? Wrong. Network Rail's journey planner had the same basic warning of disruption, while South Western Railways was completely silent. Allowing their Twitter feed to be taken over by hundreds of angry commuters tagging them in rage. 

The comments, many dripping with hysterical sarcasm, were fine entertainment while you were waiting. That is, of course, if you could even get a web page to load. Mobile reception is notoriously dodgy at Waterloo and with thousands of stranded commuters looking for answers and killing time, it was on its knees. It all just added to the environment of general chaos. The Brits are famously patient in the face of adversity, but nerves were fraying. 

On the second Tuesday it did, ironically, define the lesson of the day. Civilisation is a thin and worryingly unstable veneer. 

We'd stayed in London past our usual 16:45 dash for Hampshire for a members' lecture at the British Museum. The Inaccessible Roman Empire toured us around the Eastern and Southern swathe of the Mediterranean that current conflicts now make mostly a no-go area. It was once one of the richest parts of the Roman empire. From Syria around to Tunisia, this crescent was packed with dignified cities, luxurious villas, exquisite mosaics; many in fairly good condition until recently. Sam Moorhead, a British Museum specialist on ancient coins and an archeologist who's dug at many of these sites, offered a bucket list of fascinating locations any ancient history buff would be keen to explore. Many of them are relatively unknown to the Western world and would have offered gloriously uncrowded experiences. (Like my magical 2007 excursion to Dougga in the Tunisian hinterlands, described here.)

The past decade, however, has been cataclysmic for Rome's legacy. Conflict has not only played a direct role in destroying these sites ... most famously Daesh's attacks on Palmyra ... but created an environment of anarchy that's allowed the twin evils of neglect and looting to take over.

Apamaea in Syria is a disturbingly vivid case in point. Once famous for having the longest intact colonnade of any ancient Roman site, it's now a poster-child for looting. The photo says it all. On the left, the mostly-unexcavated site in farm fields at the start of the civil war. The right is three years later, now pockmarked by holes in a near-industrial level of looting. The war wasn't even into its worst years yet, said Moorhead. As soon as authority was looking the other way, the floodgates of abuse opened.

Dura-Europos was another revelation of riches. The border town (with the Parthian empire) was made wealthy by trade routes, then destroyed and abandoned in ancient conflicts. In its last siege, however, defenders had piled mud against house walls to enhance their defences. A thousand years later, excavations revealed vivid wall paintings in one of history's oldest synagogues, and churches. These include the oldest painting of Christ in the world. Who knows if their still there, Moorhead pondered sadly.

Our journey continued through the horrors of Palmyra, the devastation of Hatra, and the more benign neglect in Libya. Though nobody there is purposefully destroying anything, and there's enough national pride in the monuments to prevent looting, a failed state's lack of funding means dangerous neglect. The astonishingly beautiful seaside theatre at Sabratha, for example, risks crumbling into dust as rising sea levels send destructive salt seeping up its columns.

All of this led to fascinating discussions, from the role of 3D printing (we can re-create some of this stuff, but should we?) to the ethics of hanging on to artefacts from these places taken to Europe in the colonial era to what the West can and should do to help with protection. Translating current guidebooks into Arabic was one fascinating suggestion. It turns out that many of these sites, so venerated by Western scholars, are little known by their locals. Tunisia is in better shape, Moorhead argued, because there's more understanding of the cultural value of its heritage sites. So the people themselves are banding together to protect them.

That's a noble aspiration. But the whole day was a reminder that it takes peace, comfort and stability to allow civilisation. Later that night, when I was tired, grumpy and desperate to get home, I probably would have happily traded a Jacobean drinking glass or a medieval floor tile to Hampshire. Hell, we have lots of those. If the world was crumbling around me and my life was at risk, liberating a Gainsborough or two in exchange for survival may not be noble, but it's understandable. Civilisation is a luxury. Let's hope the British train network can get its act together and do its bit to make it possible.

Monet wins me over to a new appreciation with architecture

Monet is my guilty art historical secret. I'm not a fan.

Maybe familiarity does breed contempt. The Art Institute of Chicago, to which we made an annual pilgrimage when I was growing up, has one of the largest collections of Monet's work outside of France. There were so many of them that everything in the museum seemed more exotic than those damned haystacks. Back home in St. Louis, the art museum where my mother worked boasted one of his huge water lily paintings. Mom liked it so much she wallpapered our bathroom in something very much like it. Just one of scores of modern lifts from the Impressionist's work, of course, from advertising to fridge magnets, fabric to wrapping paper, Monet's pretty, inoffensive, perfect-above-any-sofa dabs of colour are everywhere.

Thus I was completely ambivalent when the National Gallery started making a big deal about its Monet & Architecture show. I could take it or leave it. In the midst of a busy summer, it would probably be the latter. And then I ended up with a few hours to spare on a day off before meeting friends in Chinatown for lunch. Given the media fervor and the heavy advertising, I doubted I'd get tickets, but thought I'd try.

Surprise No. 1: I walked straight in. Surprise No. 2: I loved it.

The architecture hook isn’t just a gimmick. It’s a fabulous way to take a fresh look at someone you think you know well. Architecture gives Monet’s scenes a focal point and a structural complexity his landscapes often lack. His frequent choice of a lonely building in a wider, unpopulated landscape sparks a thoughtful contemplation far more profound than the insipid (IMHO) cheerfulness of his portraits. He’s still playing around with the changing effects of the day’s light across a repeated subject, but to my eye the results are so much more dramatic … and worthy of prolonged study … when you’re looking at Rouen Cathedral or Thames river scenes. There also seems to be a wider range of styles here, from his “classic” loose, pastel-coloured brushwork to much more traditional street scenes with sharp detail and dark corners.

Most astonishing is the final room. Monet was born to paint Venice. There’s no other city so perfectly suited to his mastery over water, light and the interplay between the two. The nine canvasses hanging together here are almost worth the price of admission alone. (More on that hefty pricing later.) Standing in this room is like submerging yourself in a dreamy alternative reality. These are the latest paintings here; Venice was Monet’s last trip before age, failing eyesight and overstretched finances kept him at home. So we’re also seeing the culmination of 40+ years and hundreds of paintings' worth of experience. The version of his Palazzo Contarini hanging here … on loan from a private collection so little known … is one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen. Not just paintings. Things. In the whole wide world. All turquoise and purple twilight, water dancing with mesmerising movement, the shadows imbued with the melancholy of an exquisite beauty sinking past her glory days with a gentle grace.

From the earliest paintings here (the first on display came off Monet’s brush 44 years before Contarini), it’s the combinations of architecture, light and water that takes us into masterpiece territory. Early village scenes are surprisingly dark and heavy-handed. They’re of a certain genre type still for sale on railings in Monmarte, worth attention if only because they’re so counter to what you think of as Monet. In the canvases from his home village of Vetheuil you can observe him starting to play with light, particularly in one scene where you can see his use of a subtle white outline behind the church tower to give a halo-like effect that makes it pop from the canvas.

But it’s a View of Amsterdam that’s the first in the show to proclaim brilliance. A building of green and subtle salmon pink, bright sunshine dappling the leaves of the trees, a canal reflecting it all back in a merry glitter. That contrast between that painting and the rest of its fellows in the first gallery remained for me throughout the show: whether lonely houses on windswept headlands, suburban villas or the Houses of Parliament, the most miraculous stuff here combines architecture with water.
This may also be a factor of Monet’s own development. Every time I checked the date of something I really liked, it tended to be from later in his career. The show is organised by subject rather than date … the village and the picturesque; the city and the modern, the monument and the mysterious … so you get a wonderful sense of the variety of styles Monet worked in, but it’s much harder work to piece together a chronological progression of his style.

That variety, however, is one of the strengths of this exhibit. I came away with much more respect for Monet’s diversity and willingness to experiment. And for his influence over other artists. Gustave Caillebotte must have seen Monet’s The Pont Neuf (1871) before painting his own much more famous Paris Street: Rainy Day (1877). The treatment of the rain, the colours and mood are an exact copy. American impressionist Childe Hassan’s The Avenue in the Rain (1917), in the White House’s collection and often chosen by presidents to hang in the oval office, is a striking riff on Monet’s The Rue Montorgueil, Paris, on The National Holiday of 30 June, 1878.

My biggest complaint about this exhibition is its price. Since the government abolished admissions fees, museums rely on blockbuster shows for critical operating budget. That's reality. But a £20 admission is enough to screen out all but the very enthusiastic, and makes sure shows like this are primarily the preserve of the well-funded middle classes. This is not a pricing strategy to encourage anyone to try new things. Even with the ability to comfortably spend that on my own enlightenment, I was offended that the audio guide was another £5. (I skipped it.) If you’re going to push exhibition admission into special event pricing, National Gallery, then learn something from the Queen's Gallery and throw in the guide with admission. 

It all reflects the National Gallery's resolutely traditional view of the world. Paintings hang in a straight line on walls. No music. No lighting. No interesting display techniques. And, god forbid, no photography. Little wonder I was amongst the youngest of the crowd wandering the galleries. I suspect that Monet, dabbling with innovation until the end, could have connected easily with digital natives. As interpreted and priced by the National Gallery, however, I fear he has little chance.

Longborough's Dutchman is a perfect introduction to Wagner; if only more could see it

I've written before about how the intimacy of Longborough Festival Opera's 500-seat theatre transforms the dynamics of a performance. When even the worst seat is a stone's throw from the stage, you pick nuances of facial expression and production design lost in a bigger theatre, and the music flows over you in waves.

Who does Senta really love? It takes death to tell for sure. Photo: LFO

Never, in my experience, has the intimacy effect worked with more power than at last weekend's performance of Der Fliegende Holländer (The Flying Dutchman). I'd seen it only once on stage before, at the Royal Opera House in London, and while my review of that performance attests to my appreciation for both the story and the music, I found Longborough's version vastly better in terms of characterisation, emotional punch and drama. Most significantly, the ROH version set the scene in a grim, almost dystopian world where anyone would do anything to escape ... making our heroine's actions more understandable. Here, Senta's home town is a cosy Scandinavian place full of friendly people, hospitality and hygge. There's no need to run. In fact, the home town boy who loves her while she fantasises about the Dutchman is very much a man to stay for. Sung and acted admirably by Jonathan Stoughton, young Erik tore at Senta's allegiances and gave us a proper love triangle with far more emotional complexity than I could pick up from the upper reaches of the Royal Opera House.

Senta's character blazed with passion, brought to life by the impressive voice of Longborough newcomer Kirstin Sharpin. In fact, there were times her powerful delivery seemed too big and bold for such a small venue ... but it was only the second performance and she's no doubt getting used to the place. I'd certainly put a good wager on her showing up as Brunhilde somewhere in Longborough's upcoming ring cycle. Simon Thorpe as the haunted lead took us credibly from doom to hope and back again in his classically Wagnerian bass. I particularly loved the staging at the end where ... unlike the traditional conclusion of the Dutchman sailing away while Senta throws herself into the sea ... he returns to take the dying girl in his arms, torn between the tragedy of her end and wonder that she's broken his curse. Just as important for this production, however, was the chorus. It was probably the biggest I can remember for any opera here and brought every scene they were in to glowing life. Particularly excellent was the party near the end, where they're trying to convince the Dutchman's cursed crew to join them. In a particularly clever twist, rather than turning up the outsiders are only heard over an old radio, adding to the spookiness of the ghost story while letting the whole chorus bulk out the stage as revelling townspeople.

Photo: LFO

This was an approachable, well-paced, highly-entertaining Dutchman that would have been ideal for any first-timers who wanted to dip their toes into Wagnerian waters. This being Wagner at Longborough, however it's unlikely that any but serious fans managed to get the limited tickets. But it's a nice thought. I live in hope that someday some communications or tech company will sponsor a web broadcast of Longborough productions like this, so a broader audience could partake of the magic.

The rest of the weekend brought other flashes of delight. We're still looking for a new regular place to lodge since the owners of Windy Ridge, our beloved old bolthole, decided to stop doing B&B. This weekend we decided to check out Stow-on-the-Wold, the closest town to the opera. It's a very different vibe from the pastoral country places we've been staying, but there are advantages to that. Primarily a wide range of pubs, restaurants and shops within easy walking distance. Rather than worry about prepping the opera picnic in advance we could just wander local delis to assemble goodies. Stow also has one of England's best clusters of high-end antique shops. While I couldn't afford most of what I admired, it's good to know where I can to turn once I win the lottery and need to kit out my new manor house in a hurry.

All of Stow's businesses are housed within classic Cotswold stone architecture that makes this one of the most picturesque towns in England. And, frankly, calling it a town is a bit grand. There's a large market square, one other main street, and if you venture much beyond that you're back into countryside.  It's also remarkably dog friendly, allowing us to have our boys with us for breakfasts, dinners and pubbage.

With such a broad choice it's not easy to pick a dining spot. Lured by the words "wood fired oven" and "St. Louis-style ribs" we chose The Sheep. The classic Cotswold architecture outside might say old world, but the interior design screams hip modern bistro with a long bar, premium cocktails and that oven on prominent display. It was a beautiful evening so we ended up in an exterior courtyard where a live band did a cheerful and highly proficient delivery of most of the classic covers you'd want at your wedding disco. Plenty of people were on their feet dancing. Who knew the sleepy Cotswolds could deliver such a Friday night party?

And then, much to my surprise, I was not disappointed by the ribs. I was delighted. A full rack, trimmed as St. Louis style should be (with plenty of meat left on the bones), slow-barbecued to extreme, smoky tenderness and slathered in sweet and spicy tomato sauce. Blindfolded, nobody from my home town could have identified these as "foreign". (Given that the Brits have really only started to take barbecue seriously in the past decade, that's staying a lot.)

This dinner and its musical accompaniment is a strong argument for moving our regular accommodation to Stow. But the hunt continues, and there are two more Longborough weekends ahead to offer comparative experiences. Stay tuned for more.