Tattered dreams... Liverpool capital of culture flag. Photograph: Don McPhee
Robyn Archer, the Australian cabaret singer and festival director who has just resigned as artistic director of Liverpool's 2008 European capital of culture programme, sat in one of the city's finest restaurants in April and explained, in the most general terms, what she wanted to achieve.
She would bring, she said, artists from around the world to inspire those on Merseyside. Fine, but who? Wait till the autumn, she said, all will be revealed. Fair enough, she did not want to give away all her cultural secrets. But, the Liverpool media pleaded, couldn't she just drop a big hint or two?
Those reporters, who had started dismissing the whole thing in private as capital of cobblers, were thinking of people like Steve Cogley. Cogley is a Mersey ferry ticket collector and a great fan of the capital of culture venture.
"I think it's wonderful," he told me a couple of months ago. "It's putting us on the map again where we should be. It will bring improvements, give us something to be proud about, put a smile on our face. "I want a big party in 2008. I'm standing here in my party frock, ready to go. But we are also looking beyond 2008. It doesn't stop there. It's about what happens afterwards - more jobs, improved prospects, a better society."
But Cogley, like almost everyone else in the city, didn't have much idea about what he could expect from the party. That vagueness was not helped by the fact that Archer was not permanently installed in Liverpool until April, and her unavailability left local reporters tearing their hair out.
The other problem appears to have been Ms Archer's relations with the big cultural players in Liverpool. There are suggestions that dealings were turning into a nightmare, with allegations that she was domineering, reluctant to listen. But the charges remained unsubstantiated because no one would go on the record.
Apparently this breakdown in relationships came to a head last week when the board of the Liverpool Culture Company, the body charged with delivering 2008, decided to sack Archer. But those claims were emphatically denied by Jason Harborow, the culture company's chief executive, who insisted that Archer had resigned for personal reasons.
One suggestion is that her concerns about the health of her elderly mother in Australia were growing at a time when she was having to spend much more time in Britain. No one could possibly blame her if that was her motive.
Perhaps this is a new beginning. Good things are happening. The Royal Liverpool Philharmonic has a dynamic young Russian conductor; the Everyman and Playhouse theatres are enjoying a great revival; the Tate and Walker galleries are pulling in the crowds. Liverpool wants 2008 to be a hugely successful year. So do those of us who have been writing too many bad news stories.
