Living in London in the late 1970s, I often whiled away a Sunday afternoon by going along to Speakers’ Corner in Hyde Park.
It gave, and continues to give, fantastic enlightenment and entertainment.
The speakers aways varied from highly articulate, sensible speakers, to the passionate and the entertaining. Some had huge crowds enraptured for hours. Others spoke to thin air. There were a good share of rather bonkers people speaking.
But it was always fantastic and there was one speaker who was aways there and made the whole thing really special: Lord Soper (pictured above).
Donald Soper was a Methodist minister. A truly enrapturing speaker. Funny, passionate, mentally nimble. He railed against the policies of Mrs Thatcher, saying that they were inherently incompatible with Christianity. He was an ardent pacifist and anti-blood sports.
According to Wikipedia, “In 1959, when Soper was preaching in Ballymena, Northern Ireland, Ian Paisley threw a bible at Soper’s head because Soper had questioned the literal truth of the bible.”
Maybe this incident was at the back of his mind when he gave a marvellous response to a heckler that I witnessed. Lord Soper was particularly brilliant at dealing with hecklers. “Give them plenty of rope and let them hang themselves” seemed to be his approach. If someone started shouting back at him he would stop talking and cup his hand around one of his ears to show that he was listening intently to what they said and gave them plenty of time to say their piece. I remember one heckler who went through this procedure and quoted several passages from the Bible at Lord Soper, arguing that he was heretical.
After that audience member had finished, Lord Soper smiled and said very emphatically:
Our friend here has just demonstrated, once again, that there is nothing more dangerous than the Bible in the hands of an idiot.
– But he said it in such a good natured way that the response was only uproarious laughter from the audience and the collapse of a stout party – the heckler.
There are a couple of BBC sound recordings of Donald Soper speaking in Hyde Park here.
In one of the recordings, a woman asks Soper, during a discussion about the evil of poverty:
Woman: Have you ever lived in poverty?
Soper: No.
Woman: Well then you can’t speak to us about poverty. You’re the cause of the problem.
Soper: Do you agree that poverty is an evil thing?
Woman: Yes.
Soper: Then why do you want me to live in it?
Loud laughter from the audience.
Have you any memories of particularly inspiring speakers? Please share them in the comments field below.
* Paul Walter is a Liberal Democrat activist and member of the Liberal Democrat Voice team. He blogs at Liberal Burblings.
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4 Comments
I remember Donald Soper speaking at our school Speech Day in 1967 or 1968. It was a blistering hot summer’s day and the whole thing was conducted under canvas in an enormous marquee.
It was hell. I’m sure he was terribly eloquent but it was torture. I joined the escape committee of small children sitting at the back and we disappeared behind the banks of folding chairs, scrambled under the canvas and made our way to temporary freedom.
I can’t remember what retribution the authorities levelled on us. Maybe we got away with it.
At Tower Hill one day, Lord Soper was asked what shape the soul is when it comes out of the body at death. Lord Soper replied; “Egg-shaped”. The response prompted a further comment from him: “Ask a silly question, get a silly answer”.
Although a Socialist he was in some respects a Liberal. He was anti-establishment in attitude, until he joined the Lords. He was removed from his first church in London because the congregation objected to his liberal theology, in spite of his growing popularity with the poorest people living in the local community.
Preaching once in Nantwich, he suggested that many Christians would do well to not read the bible for a few years, immerse themselves in the real world and then open it again with fresh thinking.
Excellent article in the early seventies while in the Territorials we went down to London every other weekend for training our Intelligence Corps unit wa split betwen London & Edinburgh. We often had Sunday afternoon free while waiting to travel north to Kings Cross, as we were staying at Marble Arch a walk across to speakers corner (in civvies of course) was always entertaining often barmy. Or even subversive IRA speakers. But Donald Soper was alays entertaining, thought provoking & polite.
The point he made about the Holy Bible in the hands of an idiot. Equally applies to THe Holy Quran in the hands of maniacs. Daesh will not negotiate murder seems their only policy it will take more than bombing to stop them a major political and psychologil offensive is needed. But most of all cutting all support and succour must be cut off. We would all like a peaceful solution but it is not going to happen.
I believe I heard Donald Soper speak in Belfast while I was a student. I know that he was a fairly frequent panellist on Any Questions. Another influential non-Anglican cleric of the time was George McLeod, who was a bit older than Soper but even more long-lived. Like Soper he was influenced by the poverty he saw while a minister in inner cities. He also had direct experience of World War I as a front-line army officer, which made him an advocate of peace and reconciliation. He founded the Iona Community. I certainly heard him speak more than once.