Simon HEFFER
Unable to go for his usual wet shave in lockdown, Simon Heffer decided to let his facial hair go wild
It is as well we have nothing else to worry about, for there was much concern last week that our Prime Minister was becoming the Wild Man of Borneo. During his various public appearances, his hair, never orderly, has become so out of control that Carrie is apparently staging a “hairtervention” and getting the scissors out. If that fails, the Armed Forces – socially distanced, of course – may be required.
Having ordered barbers’ shops to close (an odd decision given that, between lockdowns, barbers were, quite rightly, swathed in PPE, and by now all their most vulnerable customers have been vaccinated or offered a vaccination), Mr Johnson is hoist with his own petard. One might have thought his coiffure alone would be incentive enough for him to move us quickly out of house arrest; but it is to be another six weeks before one can legitimately have a short back and sides. Those who might accuse Mr Johnson of vanity need to think again.
Of course, he is not the only man in Britain right now with a grooming problem. We’re all at a hair tipping point. And, as those indulging in video calls will have realised, it does not just
‘The Prime Minister is not the only man in Britain now with a grooming problem’
affect the scalp. Many men have also grown beards during this latest period of enforced incarceration.
From newscasters to usually impeccably dressed CEOs, you see them parading their new untamed whiskers on our screens – be they the nightly news bulletins or on a laptop screen near you.
I count myself among them, having now sprouted a beard twice. Firstly, in the spring lockdown, and then, on being consigned to Tier 4 before Christmas, I brought out my inner Victorian; or my inner slob, depending on one’s point of view.
The beard’s two great moments of glory in modern times were between about 1850 and the death of King Edward VII in 1910 – though his son, George V, sported one until he died in 1936, more because of his early career in the Navy than out of filial loyalty. And then came hippiedom in the late Sixties and Seventies, when no self-respecting, pot-smoking polytechnic lecturer would be seen without one.
Such cultural conditioning added to the difficulty of being at ease with facial hair. I also never saw my father
– a highly respectable Army veteran and civil servant – with a beard and
therefore had always assumed I shouldn’t have one either. My late mother, who had serious issues with beards, once darkly referred to men with beards as having “unsatisfactory lavatory practices”, something of which no civilised human being would want to be accused.
And in general conversation, the adjective “bearded” so often preceded a derogatory noun that one had been led to believe that it revealed a character flaw.
So growing one even in the extreme circumstances of house arrest did, for some, require a certain amount of courage. Even when all other standards were maintained despite never seeing the outside world – one didn’t give up washing or wearing clean clothes – allowing facial hair to run riot seemed a straightforward concession to isolation.
I do admit that, in the past 20 years, I have grown one on holiday, partly because one does need to let the inner slob out for exercise once in a while, and partly because not shaving provides a few minutes a day for something more enjoyable, if only staying in bed a little longer.
I once made the mistake of visiting my pognophobic mother immediately on my return from one sojourn, before I had had the chance to get the blowtorch out and remove that particular souvenir of my travels. She said nothing until I was about to leave. “Are you back at work on Monday?” she asked, and I replied that I was. “Then do everyone a favour. Take that bloody awful beard off.”
A few years ago, I had six weeks at home while finishing a book, but then had to go to London at short notice for lunch with a politician, and had no time to shave off the beard accidentally grown during exile. I arrived at my club; the head porter looked at me with touching, genuine concern. “Have you been ill, sir?” he asked. However, faced last March with the prospect of weeks of not having to be unduly concerned about one’s appearance, letting the hair grow a little longer and a beard take its course seemed a natural consequence. But there is a further issue in my case. Having red hair is bad enough; but apart from patches of grey on the chin, the rest of the beard was redder than the hair on my head. That takes us to a wilder shore of, well, wildness.
Having started to grow Beard One in March, it came off in late June before things became too bonkers. It had gone from being undesigned stubble to being the full Captain Haddock, but suddenly I looked in the mirror and saw the late Dr WG Grace staring back at me. From there, it was a short step to
‘I looked in the mirror and suddenly saw the late WG Grace staring back at me’
the inestimable Dr David Bellamy. Out came the blowtorch.
Beard Two, which did not quite begin in time for me to moonlight as Father Christmas, finally went about 10 days ago. I have a book coming out, and various people wanted to interview me. I certainly did not want to present as full Neanderthal, especially if we were meeting for the first time over a Zoom call.
Since we are told lockdowns will soon be things of the past, it is now time to get our locks in order once more; I suspect the beard won’t be back until my next holiday, if we are allowed to have one.
Not even a Prime Minister who parades an unkempt blond mop at the best of times will want to look out of step with his nation.