What have Evelyn Waugh, George Orwell, Peter Cook,Spike Milligan and, more recently, Chris Morris got in common? They are all Tory anarchists – which soundslike a contradiction in terms – but Peter Wilkin explains why it is not.Surelyconservatism and anarchism are opposites? Tories respect and venerate traditionwhilst anarchists want to smash the system. And how can figures as politicallydistinct as George Orwell and Evelyn Waugh be similar? Part dandy, part fogey,part anti-establishment satirist, sometime nostalgist for lost empire, the Toryanarchist is a walking contradiction, with only his distrust of allpoliticians, ideologies and utopias to keep him together. From Cobbett andSwift through to Chris Morris, The Strange Case of Tory Anarchismexplores an awkward strain of good-old-fashioned Englishness that refuses toconform.
