Like Vichyssoise, Revenge Is A Dish Best

It Is The Useless Things That Make Life Worth Living And That Make Life Dangerous Too: Wine, Love, Art, Beauty. Without Them Life Is Safe, But Not Worth Bothering With.

We Humans Are Naturally Disposed To Worship Gods And Heroes, To Build Our Pantheons And Valhallas. I Would Rather See That Impulse Directed Into The Adoration Of Daft Singers, Thicko Footballers And Air-headed Screen Actors Than Into The Veneration Of Dogmatic Zealots, Fanatical Preachers, Militant Politicians And Rabid Cultural Commentators.

A University Is Not, Thank Heavens, A Place For Vocational Instruction, It Has Nothing To Do With Training For A Working Life And Career, It Is A Place For Education, Something Quite Different.

What Other Developed Democracy Has Such A Ridiculous And Squalid History Of Intolerance? From The Imprisonment And Roasting Of Heretics, Witches And Poachers, To The Censorship Of Literature, Art And Television: From St Alban Through Wilde, Joyce And Lawrence I Think We Can Point With Pride To As Grim A Catalogue Of Intemperate, Bigoted Repression As Any Nation On Earth.

It Was As If He Grew His Hair Long And Smoked Cigarettes Because He Liked To, Not Because He Liked Being Seen To. This Was Dangerously Subversive.