Hmmm. I'm not sure I agree, alas. Everybody has heard of Oscar Wilde, but just because not everybody has heard of Balfour or Gladstone (were they PMs in the 1890s?) doesn't mean that their policies didn't have grave impacts, some of which continue until the present. Certainly, in Ireland, many phenomena - some of them good, such as the disestablishment of the C of I - can be traced back to the 1890s. The fact that the Land Acts in Ireland weren't extended to Britain isn't as sexy as Dorian Gray, but still shapes the economic relations between landlord and tenant in Britain. It may be hard to remember what the fuss was about Thatcher, apart from her handbag, but the universities and schools in Britain are still reeling from her cutbacks and industry-driven policy-making. Alas. There was much talk last night about Bush now thinking of his place in the history books, but really, history books can be rewritten any time: the museum in Baghdad can never be restored to what it once was.