As a young boy in England, I was aware of widespread anti-American prejudice. By the end of the Second World War, Britain had so clearly been supplanted by the United States as the leading global power that it was no longer plausible to pretend otherwise. When people are disillusioned, they tend to be bitter, and British bitterness was still raw in the 1960s. I recall much talk about American brashness, loud voices, and louder clothes.

But I didn’t share this distaste, perhaps because I was too young either to know what Britain had once been and had lost, or to take any interest in news and current affairs, so I was largely unaware of modern Americans. My idea of this country was shaped instead by Saturday morning children’s cinema which, costing just sixpence a week per child, could afford to show only rather old movies. They were usually westerns, often starring John Wayne, Gary Cooper, and others of that epoch.