h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Oh yes, that's true.
But I'd also like to point out that they're against "Anglo-American", not English. Apparently the English are not perceived as a threat, but the Americans are. They're called "the masters" and "colonialists" in several places on that website.

More Agincourt

1415. England and France have been at war for 80 years.

But it is the triumph of the English long bow archers against the French cross bow..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i80HZQjEFu8&feature=related

It's a pretty rubbish computer simulation..but quite good fun non the less..

Been surfing the web and it seems some say he's wrong and SoRb/twiglet is right

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Some people say the longbowmen at Agincourt were Welsh.

Who's wrong?

Yeah, that sounds Welsh, stand at a distance and just pull your arm back...no running around or exerting yourself.

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Same beggars that showed up at Falkirk in 1298

Not that I bear a grudge.

I bet some ancestors of Taff were involved..

Why do these rivalries originate from really old history. I could swear my father didn't fight at Agincourt or Waterloo, but he did fight in the Second World War, yet I heard him say "The French are our enemies". And he had no idea about history either.

It always puzzled me.

Mind you, my father was an old bigot who considered everyone our enemies - mainly the Welsh, certainly the Americans, definitely the Japanese, anyone of another skin colour, 99% of the rest of the world basically. And the rabbits who ate the cabbages in the garden, but they were the only ones he shot at.

It certainly taught me tolerance, as all these sweeping statements about large sections of the world's population were so ridiculous, my sister and I used to laugh about them and took them with a large pinch of salt.

They fluctuated, too. He was always pro-Scots, until in his final months when he would yell at the radio if anyone with a Scots accent was allowed to speak on Radio 4.

I'm not entirely convinced that absolutely all French cooking is good. Often the staple food is steack hache (sic) avec des frites, not very imaginative, and not usually very well presented, but I love the way they cook rabbit. Shame my mother never served us any of those my father shot. She fed them to the cat.

PS - I have no idea if my father shot at anyone in the war. He never told us. But it certainly wouldn't have been at the French.

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You can make soldiers out of toast>>

Actually the French have one of the best military records of any nation going, winning a lot more battles than they have lost. Hence the fact that they have the largest country in Western Europe.

>> an old bigot who considered everyone our enemies - mainly the Welsh, certainly the Americans, definitely the Japanese, anyone of another skin colour, 99% of the rest of the world basically.<<

That reminds me of a great bit from an old "Likely Lads" (British sit-com). Terry (James Bolam) had given a run down a bit like that sentence. Bob asks him if there's anyone he does trust. After some thought he says "The folk in this street are alright" ...Beautifully timed pause... "Well, this end of the street, anyway."

But we beat them in the numbers stakes.

The most common answer to the question, which countries has been involved in most wars?

Is Britain.

Though of course Britain piggy backs on England.

"Hence the fact that they have the largest country in Western Europe."

Hmm.

You might look at a topographical map of France and note it's relatively easily defendable borders. Convenient mountain ranges to slow down invaders in several important directions, and long coastlines.

It was a joke, not necessarily an actual comment on their historical military prowess. Their actual armies didn't fare so well in the 20th century, although they had a pretty good resistance by all accounts. I often wonder, if Britain had been invaded, would we have made as effective a guerilla force as the French? I'd like to think so, but that's blind nationalism on my part.

That's true.

There is a QI episode with Stevie Fry about the fighting prowess of the French.

Perhaps that's why they (well, some of them) resent us so much: the British rather stole their thunder in some ways, just when they were doing so well. Prior to the Seven Years War, France was looking set to become the dominant power not just in Europe but in the whole world. They possessed large territories in India and North America, nearly all of which they lost to the British thanks to the likes of Clive and Wolf. The British snaffled a lot of their empire from the French.

> if Britain had been invaded, would we have made as effective a guerilla force as the French<

We would. we would fight to the death.

And like all the s

I've just remembered that Oscar Wilde went to live in France after his release from Reading gaol for homosexuality where it was illegal in England. It wasn't in France even in the late 19th century. Though apparently he died destitute in Paris at the age of 46.

The 'Ballad of Reading gaol' was written there as was De Profundis; both are worth reading.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oscar_Wilde

That is, they were written whilst he was in prison.

Well, Francois Villon wrote some of his best while behind bars, waiting for the hangman (he got condemned to the gallows at least twice) - fertile ground for literates, French prisons.

QI French edition. Not the bit I was looking for about French soldiers, but anyway...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wm3fzr7hJoY

Actually it says he wrote Ballad of Redding gaol after release.

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Imagine being condemned twice to the gallows and living to tell the tale.