John Prideaux

speaker

643 appearances 3 recordings 1 series first heard Jun 2026 last heard 19 Jun

John Prideaux’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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recordings per month · last 12 months

Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 3 in all, peaking in Jun 2026 with 3.

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I wanted to begin my journey in the same kind of company.

So I started looking around for members of the Manhattan establishment who might humour me and my weird idea for a road trip.

America is still a powerfully hospitable place.

The replies came in quickly.

One of them came from the office of a philanthropist called Barbara Tober.

And it brought me here, to a long table in a private dining room at Lincoln Center, surrounded by luminaries of New York's art scene.

There are artists and curators, dancers and musicians, and some of Barbara's fellow philanthropists.

I'm curious to find out whether these people have the same optimistic feelings about their country as the ones that Tocqueville met.

Michelle Ocadona is an artist who, like most of the folks here this evening, has lived in New York since the nineteen eighties.

To her, the city remains a well spring of opportunity.

Just like the place Frank Sinatra sang about.

As much as I love Tocqueville, I'd worried that my plan to follow him might be too esoteric.

But as we move from appetizer to entree, my doubts are easing.

Some of that may be down to the hospitality, which is every bit as generous as it was when Tockville was here.

More generous, in fact.

He frequently complained about the lack of wine, and my glass is being attentively refilled with delicious American Chardonnay.

But more encouragingly still, these New Yorkers seem to care about my long dead travelling companion.

Even as they're making jokes about him.

Jonathan Mader is a public relations executive.

And he thinks that, on one point at least, Tocqueville has been proved wrong.

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