Board Meeting Talk 18 December

Advent Talk 4 18 December 2011 Keep Calm and Carry On


1. Various iterations on the theme

Keep Calm and Go Shopping (US PX)

Keep Calm and Drink Beer (unlikely)

Keep Calm and Sleep In (cough!)

Keep Calm and Turn It On and Off Again (IT)

Keep Calm and Do It Yourself (Control Freaks)

Keep Calm and Look Busy (A bit of that about)

Keep Calm and Spread Good Cheer (Xmas)

Keep Calm and Carry a Sonic Screwdriver (Surgeons)

Keep Calm and Get It On (Jonny & Andre)

2. The History

The poster was initially produced by the UK Ministry of Information in 1939. The aim was to use it to strengthen morale in the event of a wartime disaster. 2,500,000 copies were printed, although the poster was distributed only in limited numbers. Two originals remain. The poster was third in a series of three. The previous two posters from the series, "Freedom Is In Peril. Defend It With All Your Might" (400,000 printed) and "Your Courage, Your Cheerfulness, Your Resolution Will Bring Us Victory" (800,000 printed) The posters were designed to have a uniform device, be a design associated with the Ministry of Information, and have a unique and recognisable lettering, with a message from the King to his people.

In 2000, a copy of the "Keep Calm and Carry On" poster was rediscovered in Barter Books, a second-hand bookshop in Alnwick, Northumberland and took off a few years later. It has appeared on the walls of places as diverse as the Prime Minister's strategy unit at 10 Downing Street (TB), the Lord Chamberlain's office at Buckingham Palace, and the United States embassy in Belgium. Merchandise with the image has been ordered in bulk by American financial firms, advertising agencies, and Germans.

3. Significance

• To state the obvious, it has become a cliché – hence the derivative versions

• Nevertheless, I think that it continues to work fairly well as a piece of pop psychology

• As originally conceived, you can also see how it tapped in to the National mood at the outbreak of WW 2, both the stiff upper lip and, more importantly, the belief shared by all those who opposed Hitler that, in the end, right would prevail over might.

• Finally, and here we arrive at Advent, the poster poses the question, ‘Why keep calm and carry on?’ In 1939, there was, of course, a far greater moral or we might even say, theological, component to people’s thinking whether in UK, US or Denmark. We knew that God didn’t have favourites, but we also knew that, on this particular issue, He was on our side.

• As a Christian, the ultimate reason I believe that I can ‘Keep Calm and Carry On’ is because God encourages me to do so and it always heartens me to recall that the injunction to, ‘Fear Not’, which amounts to much the same thing as KCCO, occurs 366 times in the Bible – once for each day of the year with one over just to make sure (!) The most significant ‘cluster’ of the injunction to ‘Fear Not’ comes in the Christmas storywith the first occasion being the Annunciation by the angel Gabriel to the Virgin Mary

God our Father,

the angel Gabriel told the Virgin Mary

that she was to be the mother of your Son.

Though Mary was afraid,

she responded to your call with joy.

Help us, whom you call to serve you,

to share like her in your great work

of bringing to our world your love and healing.

We ask this through Jesus Christ,

the light who is coming into the world.

Amen.