The Chinese ambassador has expressed herself with quite staggering impertinence here. Not satisfied with telling us off for not welcoming Chinese dignitaries with streamers and flowers, she now has the cheek to start telling us that our greatest national novelist would have been on her side, and not on the side of freedom.
Philip Hensher is so right about this: the Chinese ambassador's article is ridiculous, offensively bringing in Dickens and Shakepeare, incredibly for a Chinese government official mentioning the internet and conjuring up obviously fake images of poor, young, misunderstood Chinese athletes:
On the bus to the airport, I was with some young girls from the Beijing team, including an Olympic gold medalist, Miss Qiao. They were convinced that the people here were against them. One girl remarked she couldn't believe this land nourished Shakespeare and Dickens. Another asked: where is the "gentlemenship"? I used all my knowledge to argue for London, and looking into their watery eyes, I knew I was not succeeding. I can't blame them.
Plus she makes sinister suggestions about a possible "counter-reaction" to the protests. I say, if you don't want to be demonised, act less demonic. If you didn't know the Chinese government were demons before this, you know it now.
(I think Hensher's wrong about Stephen Fry's book, though).
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