MG gave away secrets to Japan. Four years after the sleek EX-E prototype was shown at Frankfurt, I tested a Nissan 200SX. Austin-Rover was broke in 1985 and EX-E rests a museum piece at Gaydon, milk spilt in the dog days of British Leyland. A reminder of how inept politicians were at trying to run industry.
EX-E was not forgotten at Nissan.
Read MoreAlfred Edgar Frederick Higgs could always tell a good story. A motoring writer in the 1930s he affected a pseudonym, Barré Lyndon after the eponymous hero of William Makepeace Thackeray’s 1844 The Luck of Barry Lyndon. Maybe Barry was not imposing enough so he changed y to e acute and fitted Thackeray’s plot about breaking into the aristocracy in books Combat (1933) and Circuit Dust (1934). They brought MG into motoring aristocracy by slightly embellishing the myths and legends of motor racing, elevating it beyond anything so prosaic as a car. Circuit Dust savoured MG success in the 1934 Mille Miglia with a respectful caption and a picture of the team’s reception by Signor Mussolini. Now there is a new account of MG in MG Classics for the digital age, out today.
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