ABSTRACT
I suppose my use of satire is unconventional for an academic. Every fortnight, for nearly a quarter of a century, I have written satirical articles on the back page of the Times Educational Supplement. Sometimes the driver is an offshoot of my own research and investigation, so it is an unusual, possibly unique genre. It is a healthy outlet for pent-up emotions, not easily releasable in more conventional writing. There are teachers who think I spend all my time writing satire, perhaps because I have also written scripts for the satirical impressionist Rory Bremner, or even that there are two of us – E. C. Wragg, the straight academic who writes sober books, and his reprobate brother, Ted Wragg. The pieces reproduced here cover about twenty years. Most fun is satirising politicians – Sir Keith Joseph, Kenneth Baker, Kenneth Clarke, Tony Blair – but there are countless other easy targets. I think I had more letters about the 1990 article ‘Who put the ass in assessment?’, lampooning the testing arrangements for 7 year olds, than anything I have ever written.
