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Colonel Blimp
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==Legacy== The character has earned a legacy as a [[cliché]]d phrase – very reactionary opinions are characterised as "Colonel Blimp" statements.<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20170114232119/https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/blimp blimp], Oxford Living Dictionaries. Retrieved 28 May 2019.</ref> [[Frank_Percy_Crozier | Brigadier General Frank Crozier]] referred to Colonel Blimp in his anti-war book "The Men I Killed" (1937)<ref>https://dn790006.ca.archive.org/0/items/dli.ernet.2372/2372-The%20Men%20I%20Killed.pdf</ref>. [[George Orwell]] and [[Tom Wintringham]] made especially extensive use of the term "Blimps" to refer to this type of military officer, Orwell in his articles<ref>{{cite journal | last = Orwell | first = George | quote = The Home Guard is (…) an astonishing phenomenon, a sort of People's Army officered by Blimps. | title = London Letter | journal = Partisan Review | date = 1941-04-15}}</ref> and Wintringham in his books ''How to Reform the Army'' and ''People's War''. In his 1941 essay "[[The Lion and the Unicorn: Socialism and the English Genius|The Lion and the Unicorn]]", Orwell referred to two important sub-sections of the middle class, one of which was the military and imperialistic middle class, nicknamed the Blimps, and characterised by the "[[half-pay]] (i.e retired) colonel with his bull neck and diminutive brain". He added that they had been losing their vitality during the past thirty years, "writhing impotently under the changes that were happening".<ref name= "My Country Right or Left">Orwell, Sonia and Angus, Ian (eds.) ''The Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters of George Orwell Volume 2: My Country Right or Left'', (London, Penguin)</ref> [[E. M. Forster]] used the term "Colonel Blimp" to describe British people who expressed disdain for [[India|Indian]] culture.<ref>"Indian culture wouldn’t appeal to Colonel Blimp, I imagine, and indeed I can almost hear that estimable gentlemen saying, "Indian culture? Gad, sir, nothing but a few old curios."" E.M. Forster, BBC Radio Talk, 18 July 1943. Reprinted in [[P. N. Furbank]] (ed.), ''The BBC talks of E.M. Forster, 1929-1960 : a selected edition.'' University of Missouri Press, Columbia, 2008 {{ISBN|9780826218001}} (p. 232) </ref> [[Herbert Read]] also used the term to describe people who were strongly hostile to [[modern art]].<ref>"It is when caricature is carried to the pitch and organization of a composition in oils, or a piece of sculpture, then the people begin to revolt. "I call it disgusting!" fumed the particular Colonel Blimp who passed me on the staircase at a [[Georges Rouault|Rouault]] exhibition." Herbert Read, ''The Meaning of Art''. London, Faber & Faber, 1951. (p.163)</ref> The history book ''Roads to Ruin: The Shocking History of Social Reform'' (1950) by [[E. S. Turner]] was ironically dedicated to "Colonel Blimp", and reprinted a Low cartoon of Blimp next to the dedication: Turner's book described traditionalist politicians who opposed [[Humanitarianism|humanitarian]] reforms as "Colonel Blimp figures".<ref>Alexander, J. A. "The Time Is Never Ripe (Review of ''Roads to Ruin'')", ''[[The Herald (Melbourne)|The Herald]]'', Melbourne, Saturday 27th Jan 1951 (pg. 10).</ref> The term "Blimp" continues to be referenced from time to time. In a 1994 article published in ''[[The New York Review of Books]]'', [[John Banville]] recalled a televised exchange between an elderly lady and [[Kingsley Amis]] as "an endearing moment, in which one glimpsed the warm and funny man that Amis used to be before he decided, some time in the 1960s, to turn himself into a literary Colonel Blimp".<ref>{{cite news|first=John|last=Banville|authorlink=John Banville|url=https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1994/06/09/a-real-funny-guy/|title=A Real Funny Guy|work=[[The New York Review of Books]]|date=9 June 1994|volume=41|issue=11}}</ref> In a 2006 book, historian [[Christopher Clark]] used the term "blimpish" to characterise the [[Prussia]]n [[Wichard Joachim Heinrich von Möllendorf|Field Marshal von Mollendorf]] (1724–1816), who distinguished himself as an officer in the [[Seven Years' War]] but whose conservatism and opposition to military reform were considered to have contributed to Prussia's defeat in the [[Battle of Jena]] in 1806.<ref>Christopher Clark, ''Iron Kingdom. The Rise and Downfall of Prussia, 1600–1947'', London: Penguin, 2006, pp. 124–25</ref> In his review of ''[[Garner's Modern American Usage]]'', [[David Foster Wallace]] referred to the "Colonel Blimp's rage" of [[Linguistic prescription|prescriptivist]] journalists like [[William Safire]].<ref>{{cite magazine | last = Wallace | first = David Foster | quote = ...certain journalists whose bemused irony often masks a Colonel Blimp's rage | title = Tense Present: Democracy, English, and the Wars over Usage | magazine = Harper's Magazine | date = April 2001}}</ref> The graphic novel series ''[[The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen]]'', which depicts numerous literary characters interacting with each other, includes [[List of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen characters#Horatio Blimp|Horatio Blimp]] as an overconfident major of the British army who commands the initial strike against the Martians of [[H. G. Wells]]' ''[[The War of the Worlds]]''.{{citation needed|date=October 2016}}
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