Sculpture in Bedford Square
I went to visit my lovely Editor, Sarah Lilly, yesterday, to get my new series sorted before I write too much more. I’ll probably blog about that later.
Afterwards I went to one of my favourite places, The British Museum. Endlessly fascinating and always inspiring new ideas in me. On the way I walked through Bedford Square and came upon the sculpture in the photo above. It was very large and had an air of having just landed from another time or place.
I loved it. The wood was warm and the shape organic. A shame that someone felt it necessary to start ripping the planks off. I suppose such a wonderful experience is a bit threatening to some. There’s an argument for more teaching of the arts for their own sake rather than to tick a box for accountant’s sake..
The start line of the stadium at Olympia, Greece.I stood on the start line of the Original Olympic Stadium at Olympia in Greece this summer and marvelled.
Here was an entire economy built on the admiration of the male body. The town existed to create and praise beautifully sculpted and physically perfect young men. Once, the local economy was entirely supported by this pursuit as now it is supported by the tourists who come to marvel, like me.
This last week, the defence industry has been winding up it’s propaganda, making sure that they get first pickings in the Public money feeding trough. They tell us, with straight faces, how the economy would collapse with out them.
I don’t think this is so. We choose to be a militaristic country and so we spend, and waste, billions on defence procurement. But It’s not for defence. We spend and waste billions fighting other people’s wars that we really should have nothing to with. We choose to do this because we like to see ourselves sitting at the top table, punching above our weight, and all the other clichés they trot out.
We could choose to do something else. We could choose to repurpose the economy to the production of cheap fuel from sunlight and create cheap, clean transport systems. We could choose to lead the world in these technologies, and so become the oil baron’s of the future. The USA did this with the Apollo mission. They chose to do something extraordinary- they put everything behind it and achieved their goal. That’s what a really big business does.
The Government likes to talk about Britain, PLC. Well the board needs replacing. All the profits that we make from dodgy or non-existent financial instruments are squittered away in Iraq and Afghanistan by the defence business without any hope of there ever being a return on the investment. In fact all we get from these “investments” is an ever growing negative equity – the hatred of those who would do us harm in return for the harm we do to them.
with a different mind set we could get out of the recession in a trice. We reap as we sow.
What a Terrific Story! Had me riveted from the very first sentence, when I fell in love with Manchee, the talking dog. As Todd, the hero, says, “When dogs learn to talk, you learn that they don’t have a lot to say!”
There were huge themes going on in this book. Boyhood to manhood, imperialism, fundamentalism, love, friendship, blind passion and madness. The story rollicks along at an incredible place and leaves you desperately wanting to know what happens next. I hadn’t realised that it was a trilogy when I started, but suspected it would have to be after a little reading. The paperback is out in October and I can’t wait.
I remember waiting for the next instalments of Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials series. I’ve not been that keen to read a sequel since. Indeed, I felt this was influenced by Pullman in the best of ways. The relationship between Todd and his dog was almost like Lyra and Pantelaimon, her Daemon, in His Dark Materials. There’s a similarly hopeless religious undercurrent too.
I’ve just bought it for a 12th birthday present because I’m sure the young man will really enjoy it. This could become a great coming of age book for boys. It’s funny, it’s sad, it’s scary, it’s fast, it’s Fab!
