101 Faces - 4

Here are some more ... 16-20

MARTINA NAVRATILOVA

There’s a time in every great sportsperson’s life when they come second in a reality show to Joe Swash. Navratilova is seen as a hero now, but as I was growing up she was put in the villain role, let’s not forget, just like Serena Williams for many years. Definitely one of greatest sportspeople ever.

GORDON BROWN

I hope this whole project doesn’t reek of great man theory. I like to think I don’t subscribe to it. Certainly when it comes to world affairs. See Churchill’s dismissal of Attlee. 

But I think if there’s one great figure in our modern politics it’s this one. When his autobiography came out last year, various enemies lined up with predictable churlish takes, generally all said “such a shame Brown was just a terrible PM and is so bitter, as that overshadows these couple of actual great achievements and he was actually right about these things” … and, across the reviews, there were, like, 10 achievements greater than anything anyone else in modern politics has accomplished, and so many things he was right about. What he wasn’t right about, and its crucialness is underrated, was doggedly sticking to a low threshold for inheritance tax. I hold that Osborne’s seizing on that while Brown was dithering over calling an election in 2007 was the moment the worm turned for good. Still, while I bet he was a nightmare at times, I see Brown as a great achiever, a non-hypocrite, a genuine human being.

ODETTA

If you’ve never seen footage of Odetta in her prime, it is extraordinary. Momentous. I love her for various reasons, personal and general. Here, years ago, I wrote about seeing her and the next guy on stage together ... it's a bit clumsy, but it's got heart

In the back room in the White Horse Tavern

One parting glass to toast days of the past

the fetid air filled with rebel songs, fervent

desires that the best days will forever last.

In your unfurnished flat off Harrowby Street,

we soaked up your folk songs from a world we didn't know

Tommy Makem, Liam Clancy, low, bold and sweet

children's songs, rebel songs, strong, proud and slow.

She had Odetta, you had Liam Clancy

but those were the days and they didn't last forever

though last night, my eyes saw the sweetest surprise

Odetta and Liam Clancy were back together.

She had Odetta, you had Liam Clancy

and I've got Bob Dylan at the centre of all

from strange fruit hanging to blowing in the wind

from the White Horse Tavern to the Barbican Hall.

These rebel songs, Paddy, they will not accept

the lot they've been given, beaten and bowed.

What's happened to us all, Dad, what happened to you?

Where's your rebel song now, where's my rebel song now?

A billion exile hearts keep on fighting

to find a solution, a direction home,

So where's the fight now, the will to escape

from the fate of the unmourned, incomplete unknown?

She knew enough and she loved Odetta

She knew enough to go where she needed

History's given a million clear warnings

but I ain't got the rebel heart to heed it.

Liam led us in Those Were The Days

but, fuck, I'm still young, it's not yet my time

to give up on the present and cry for the past

So I'll bid farewell and move on down the line

LIAM CLANCY

Not something to over-romanticise, but he was pretty much the definitive Irish bard/storyteller. I've listened to him singing all my life

AMELIA EARHART

Katharine Hepburn never played Amelia Earhart, which just seems wrong. She did play an Earhart-like character in 1933 film Christopher Strong. Amelia Earhart’s life and death are really eerily fascinating and also tremendously impressive. Did she cheat death or did death cheat her? And there's a great Joni Mitchell song about her.