Remainers should try blasting out Ode To Joy more often

Remainers march against Brexit. Photograph: NIKLAS HALLE'N/AFP via Getty Images. - Credit: AFP via Getty Images

One reader has a suggestion for anyone feeling dispirited ahead of Brexit day on January 31st

Yesterday, in driving rain and buffeting wind, I drove six miles home in deep gloom, my default position since December 12. I switched on the car radio and caught the last movement of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony – the Ode to Joy – rousingly performed, I later discovered, by the City of Birmingham Singers and the Vienna Philharmonic under the baton of Sir Simon Rattle.

Suddenly my gloom dispelled, and I felt uplifted by the power of the music, the optimism expressed in the singing and the genius of the writing. A German-born composer, Austrian musicians, British conductor and singers – a tribute to our common European culture which is there for us all.

The joy remained with me for the rest of the day. May I recommend this as a fix for all the despair we Remainers/Regainers may currently feel?

Catherine Millar, Castle Cary

What comes after “Remain”? As Tony Thorne writes (Letters, TNE #178), “Rejoin” and “Regain” must be the strategic objectives.

But while we are faced with five years of a right-wing parliamentary majority, the first priority is “Remind”: keep in the public eye what will certainly be the steadily-widening gulf between what Leave voters were promised and a deteriorating reality. In the early 2nd century BC, as the PM will undoubtedly be aware, Cato the Elder concluded every speech in the Senate with “Carthage must be destroyed!” In 146 BC it happened. That’s the kind of tenacity we must show.

Charles Baily, Bedford

Tony Thorne – love it! From now on I’m a “Regainer”. Spread the word. Regainers unite!

Garth Groombridge, Southampton

With reference to Cathy French’s letter (TNE #178) regarding a slogan for use when “negotiations with the EU aren’t going in the direction promised by Brexiteers and when legislation protecting workers’ rights, fishing rights etc are abandoned”, my suggestion would be the following short and to the point phrase: “Brexit isn’t working”.

Cristina Shipton

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