The trouble with Thatcherism could be summed up in the words of the Duke of Norfolk when...he offered some reflections on the ‘rhythm’ method of birt… - A. N. Wilson

Queen Elizabeth: I thought the girls . . . you see, they were marooned in Windsor Castle for most of the war, and I was not sure that they were having a very good education and kind Sachie and Osbert [Sitwell] said they would arrange a poetry evening for us. Such an embarrassment. Osbert was wonderful, as you would expect, and Edith, of course, but then we had this rather lugubrious man in a suit, and he read a poem . . . I think it was called "The Desert". And first the girls got the giggles, and then I did and then even the King.
Self: "The Desert", ma'am? Are you sure it wasn't called "The Waste Land?
Queen Elizabeth: That's it. I'm afraid we all giggled. Such a gloomy man, looked as though he worked in a bank, and we didn't understand a word.
Self: I believe he did once work in a bank.

At the dinner table, the talk turned to politics. It was in the days before the 'Gang of Four' had allied themselves to the Liberal Party [early 1981].
Queen Elizabeth [The Queen Mother]: I dislike this new socialist party of Woy's [sic].
Host: They're called the Social Democrats, ma'am.
Queen Elizabeth: Yes. Well, you don't change socialist just by leaving ist off the end. I say, it's a cheat to start something called the Social Party. I liked the old Labour Party. The best thing is a good old Tory government with a strong Labour opposition.

In universities and intellectual circles, academics can guarantee themselves popularity — or, which is just as satisfying, unpopularity — by being opinionated rather than by being learned.