Posted by Ian E-N on September 06, 2006 at 09:02:26 from 148.88.192.240 user IanEN.
In Reply to: Re: Bob & his history posted by Prue Eckett on September 06, 2006 at 00:34:33:
K.M. Peyton in her Flambard's trilogy about WW1 deals with the division in the Air Force in 1914
by WWII some change
"Neil Rattigan asserts that fifties war films were a ‘reflection of the last ditch effort by the dominant class to maintain its hegemony by re-writing the history of the celluloid war in its own favour.’ * The RAF was much less rigidly class-bound than the Army and Navy - of the 3,000 Fighter Command crew who fought in the Battle of Britain only 200 were public school educated. But in the films working class characters appear to exist only to polish shoes and start engines and in Reach for the Sky the waitress who captures Bader’s heart turns out to be a wing commander’s daughter in mufti. "
* Neil Rattigan, ‘The Last Gasp of the Middle Class: British War Films of the 1950s’, in Winston Wheeler Dixon, Re-Viewing British Cinema, 1900-1992, State University of New York, 1994, p. 150
There are some claims of class balance differences between fighter and bomber WWII aircrews. ( will try and remember where )