a companion to hope
A COMPANION TO HOPE AND DESPAIR
TRANSWORLD PUBLISHERS
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Transworld is part of the Penguin Random House group of companies whose addresses can be found at global.penguinrandomhouse.com
First published in Great Britain by Doubleday
an imprint of Transworld Publishers
Copyright © Niall Edworthy, Petra Cramsie and Ben Faccini 2008
Illustrations © Emily Faccini 2008
Niall Edworthy, Petra Cramsie and Ben Faccini have asserted their rights under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the authors of this work.
Every effort has been made to obtain the necessary permissions with reference to copyright material, both illustrative and quoted. We apologize for any omissions in this respect and will be pleased to make the appropriate acknowledgements in any future edition.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Version 1.0 Epub ISBN 9781446422267
ISBN 9780385614115
To all children, especially Hope, Alfie, Francesco,
Eliza, Joe, Delfina, Marianna and Danny
The authors and publishers are grateful to the following for permission to reproduce copyright material: Winston Churchill quotations are reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London, on behalf of the Estate of Winston Churchill. Copyright Winston S. Churchill; extract from The Power and the Glory by Graham Greene, published by Random House; extract from ‘My Believing Bones’ by Sydney Carter (1915–2004) © 1971 Stainer & Bell Ltd, 23 Gruneisen Road, London N3 1DZ, England. Reprinted by permission from The Two-Way Clock; 72 words from THE KORAN translated by N. J. Dawood (Penguin Classics 1956, Fifth revised edition 1990). Copyright © N. J. Dawood, 1956, 1959, 1966, 1968, 1974, 1990, 1993, 1997, 1999, 2003; Barbara Cartland quotations are reprinted with kind permission of Cartland Promotions and Rupert Crew Ltd; Desmond Tutu quotation is © Desmond M. Tutu, all rights reserved; ‘The Peace of Wild Things’ is copyright © 1999 by Wendell Berry from The Selected Poems of Wendell Berry. Reprinted by permission of the publisher; quotations from Afterthoughts by Logan Pearsall Smith quoted by kind permission of the London Library; excerpt from Swanson on Swanson reproduced by permission of Gloria Swanson Inc., c/o Migdal, Pollack & Rosencrantz LLP, 41 East 57th Street, New York; Tom Sharpe quotation is © Tom Sharpe and reproduced by permission of Sheil Land Associates Ltd; excerpt from Long Walk to Freedom by Nelson Mandela, published by Little, Brown; excerpt from The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck (Penguin Books, 2001). Copyright 1939 by John Steinbeck; ‘The Bright Field’ originally published in R. S. Thomas – Laboratories of the Spirit, London, Macmillan, 1975 © Kunjana Thomas 2001; lines from Dr Spock’s Baby and Child Care by Dr Spock, published by the Bodley Head. Reprinted by permission of The Random House Group Ltd; extract from The Comforters by Muriel Spark, Penguin 1957; extract from Eleanor Roosevelt by Blanche Wiesen Cook published by Bloomsbury; list of Top Twenty Greatest Engineering Achievements of the Twentieth Century reprinted with permission from A Century of Innovation: Twenty Engineering Achievements that Transformed Our Lives © 2003 by the National Academy of Sciences, Courtesy of the National Academies Press, Washington DC; lines from The French Lieutenant’s Woman are copyright © John Fowles 1969; ‘Ourstory’ is taken from Stitching the Dark: New & Selected Poems by Carole Satyamurti (Bloodaxe Books, 2004); lines from Sigmund Freud’s Letter to Marie Bonaparte reproduced by arrangement with Paterson Marsh Ltd, London; lines from Collected Poetry of Aldous Huxley. Copyright © 1970 by Aldous Huxley. Reprinted by permission of Georges Borchardt, Inc., for the Estate of Aldous Huxley; ‘School Reports’: mostly sourced from Could Do Better (Pocket Books, 2002) and Could Do (Even) Better (Pocket Books, 2004) by Catherine Hurley; lines from ‘The Nature of Architecture’ by Patrick Nuttgens, in Companion to Contemporary Architectural Thought by Ben Farmer and Hentie Louws (eds), 1993, reprinted by permission of Taylor and Francis Books UK; lines from ‘My Own View’ by Isaac Asimov in The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, Holdstock, ed. 1978, p. 5, published by Octopus Books, reprinted by permission of the Estate of Isaac Asimov, c/o Ralph M. Vicinanza Ltd; lines from The New Testament in Scots, translated by William L. Lorimer, first published in Great Britain by Canongate Books Ltd, 14 High Street, Edinburgh, EH1 1TE. Extract from Worstward Ho by Samuel Beckett, published by Faber and Faber Ltd.
A Beginner’s Guide
Adventure
Africa
Afterlife
Animals
Architecture
Art
Baldness
Beauty
Books and Reading
Boredom
British Empire
Change
Civilization
Clock
Countryside
Death
Dreams
Drink and Drinking
Drugs
Education
Environment
Fame
Famous Last Words
Fashion
Fishing
Food
France and the French
Friendship
(The) Future
Genius
Health
Humankind
Law and Lawyers
Life
Love
Marriage
Men
Middle Age
Monarchy
Months
Music
Newspapers and Other Media
Old Age
Order
Parenthood
Patriotism
Politics
Religion
Reviews and Critics
School Reports
Science
Sex
Sleep
Smoking
Sport
Travel
Truth
United States
War
Wealth
Weather
Women
Words of Wisdom
Work
Youth and Childhood
Goodbye
‘For myself I am an optimist – it does not seem to be much use being anything else.’
WINSTON CHURCHILL
CAN YOU BELIEVE that, for every academic paper written on the subject of happiness, there are over a hundred written about depression? What is wrong with people? Does the sun not rise for these doom-mongers each morning? Do birds not sing and flowers not bloom for the pessimist? Stung into action by this outrage, we have produced The Optimist’s Handbook, an exhaustively researched and beautifully crafted work, to prove that these sour-faced miners of misery have been hacking away in the wrong pit all these years. As someone’s cheerful grandmother probably once said: ‘Pessimist! Leave thy slagheap of misery behind, and come celebrate life’s wealth of riches!’
If only they knew where to dig, they would quickly discover that, right beneath their dirty, sodden boots, lies a bottomless mine positively bursting with sparkling seams of nuggets and gems that celebrate Life. That’s celebrate, not denigrate. With infinite care, untold pleasure, and the encouragement of our superb editor, we have weighed and polished our precious finds for your enjoyment, trying them this way and that, moving some about, honing others into shape, always discarding the imperfect. As you will see, only the most glittering jewels remain, and each and every one of them has found its ideal setting, not only complementing its neighbours perfectly, but making its own unique contribution to the whole illuminating display.
‘We are all in the gutter,
but some of us are looking at the stars.’
OSCAR WILDE
IT is never too late to become what you might have been.
ANON
HAD I been present at the Creation, I would have given some useful hints for the better ordering of the universe.
ALFONSO ‘THE WISE’ OF CASTILE, Spanish monarch, 1221–84
LIFE ain’t all beer and skittles, and more’s the pity;
But what’s the odds, so long as you’re happy?
GEORGE DU MAURIER, Punch cartoonist, 1834–97
I CANNOT help being happy. I’ve struggled against it but no good. There is, I am well aware, no virtue whatever in this. It results from a combination of heredity, health, good fortune and shallow intellect.
ARTHUR MARSHALL, British broadcaster, 1910–89
The Call
Sound, sound the clarion, fill the fife,
Throughout the sensual world proclaim,
One crowded hour of glorious life
Is worth an age without a name.
THOMAS OSBERT MORDAUNT, British officer and poet, 1730–1809
I DO not believe that a world without evil, preferable in order to ours, is possible; otherwise it would have been preferred. It is necessary to believe that the mixture of evil has produced the greatest possible good: otherwise the evil would not have been permitted.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ, German philosopher and mathematician, 1646–1716
ALL is for the best in the best of all possible worlds.
VOLTAIRE, Candide, or Optimism, 1759
THEY say everything in the world is good for something.
JOHN DRYDEN, The Spanish Friar, 1681
Happy Thought
The world is so full of a number of things,
I’m sure we should all be as happy as kings.
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON, 1850–94
OPTIMISM is essential to achievement and it is also the foundation of courage and true progress.
NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER, US presidential adviser, 1862–1947
TRULY the light is sweet, and a pleasant thing it is for the eyes to behold the sun.
The Bible, Ecclesiastes 11:7
WHAT doesn’t kill me only makes me stronger.
FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE, 1844–1900
I HAVE tried too in my time to be a philosopher; but, I don’t know how, cheerfulness was always breaking in.
OLIVER EDWARDS to Samuel Johnson, in Boswell’s Life of Johnson, 1791
If I keep a green bough in my heart, the singing bird will come
(CHINA)
THERE is one thing which gives radiance to everything. It is the idea of something around the corner.
G. K. CHESTERTON, 1874–1936
OPTIMISM is the cheerful frame of mind that enables a kettle to sing, though in hot water up to its nose.
ANON
WHAT’S lost upon the roundabouts we pulls up on the swings!
PATRICK REGINALD CHALMERS, Irish writer, 1872–1942, Green Days and Blue Days
What’s the use of worrying?
It never was worthwhile.
So pack up your troubles in your old kit-bag
And smile, smile, smile.
GEORGE ASAF, English lyricist, 1880–1951
from ‘The Collar’
Is the year only lost to me?
Have I no bays to crown it?
No flowers, no garlands gay?
All blasted?
All wasted?
Not so, my heart; but there is fruit,
And thou hast hands.
GEORGE HERBERT, English poet, 1593–1633
IT is one of the strange discoveries a man can make that life, however you lead it, contains moments of exhilaration; there are always comparisons that can be made with worse times; even in danger and misery the pendulum swings.
GRAHAM GREENE, The Power and the Glory, 1940
HOPE …
… is the poor man’s bread.
GEORGE HERBERT
… springs eternal in the human breast.
ALEXANDER POPE, 1688–1744
… is the last thing to abandon the unhappy.
but wotthehell archy wotthehell
jamais triste archy jamais triste
that is my motto.
DON MARQUIS, US writer, archy & mehitabel, 1927
From Optimism by
Helen Keller, 1880–1968
… MY optimism is grounded in two worlds, myself and what is about me. I demand that the world be good, and lo, it obeys. I proclaim the world good, and facts range themselves to prove my proclamation overwhelmingly true. To what is good I open the doors of my being, and jealously shut them against what is bad. Such is the force of this beautiful and wilful conviction, it carries itself in the face of all opposition. I am never discouraged by absence of good. I never can be argued into hopelessness. Doubt and mistrust are the mere panic of timid imagination, which the steadfast heart will conquer, and the large mind transcend.
HOW wonderful to wake up in the morning and feel that one is lovely One!
DIANA MOSLEY, 1910–93, during her incarceration in Holloway Prison
I AM of a constitution so general, that it consorts and sympathiseth with all things.
I have no antipathy, or rather idiosyncrasy, in diet, humour, air, anything.
SIR THOMAS BROWNE, 1605–82
Invictus
Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.
W. E. HENLEY, English poet, 1849–1903
There’s a divinity that shapes our ends,
Rough-hew them how we will
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, 1564–1616, Hamlet
SIR, I have never complained of the world; nor do I think that I have reason to complain. It is rather to be wondered at that I have so much.
SAMUEL JOHNSON, 1709–84
I CAME into the world at the right time, and I shall leave the world at the right time. I am content with whatever happens between the womb and the tomb; neither joy nor sorrow can touch me. I am free from all bonds.
CHUANG TZU, Taoist, 3rd century BC
MY country is the world, and my religion is to do good.
TOM PAINE, The Rights of Man, 1791
I AM by Nature made for my own good; not my own evil.
EPICTETUS, Stoic philosopher, AD c. 55–135
I HAVE become my own version of an optimist. If I can’t make it through one door, I’ll go through another door – or I’ll make a door. Something terrific will come no matter how dark the present.
RABINDRANATH TAGORE, Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, 1861–1941
GIVE me somewhere to stand, and I will move the earth.
ARCHIMEDES, 287–212 BC
Haiku
The thief left it behind: the moon at my window.
RYOKAN, Japanese poet, 1758–1831
THIS week has really been a week of great delight. Never have I had such irresistible, perpetual, & continued urgings of future greatness. I have been like a man with air balloons under his armpits and ether in his soul. While I was painting, or walking, or thinking, these beaming flashes of energy followed & impressed me! O God, grant they may not be presumptuous feelings. Grant they may be the fiery anticipations of a great Soul born to realise them …
B. R. HAYDON, English writer, Journals, 29 April 1815
I AM always pleased to see my friends, happy to be with my wife and family, but the high-spot of every day is when I first catch a glimpse of myself in the shaving mirror.
ROBERT MORLEY, British actor, 1908–92
ERROR has never approached my spirit.
PRINCE METTERNICH, Austrian statesman, 1773–1859
WHAT a beautiful day for putting on a kilt, standing upside down in the middle of the road, and saying ‘How’s that for a table lamp?’
KEN DODD, British comedian, Guardian, 1991
While there’s life there’s hope
There is more delight in hope than in enjoyment
In the land of hope there is never any winter
I BELIEVE in an ultimate decency of things.
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON, Scottish writer, 1850–94
Hence, loathed Melancholy,
Of Cerberus and Blackest Midnight born
In Stygian cave forlorn,
’Mongst horrid shapes and shrieks and sights unholy!
JOHN MILTON, 1608–74, ‘L’Allegro’
IT is not the mountain we conquer but ourselves.
SIR EDMUND HILLARY, 1919–2008, with Sherpa Tenzing the first man to climb Everest
A FOOL … is a man who never tried an experiment in his life.
ERASMUS DARWIN, English physician, 1731–1802
THE first question which you will ask and which I must try to answer is this, ‘What is the use of climbing Mount Everest?’ and my answer must at once be, ‘It is no use.’ There is not the slightest prospect of any gain whatsoever. Oh, we may learn a little about the behaviour of the human body at high altitudes, and possibly medical men may turn our observation to some account for the purposes of aviation. But otherwise nothing will come of it. We shall not bring back a single bit of gold or silver, not a gem, nor any coal or iron. We shall not find a single foot of earth that can be planted with crops to raise food. It’s no use. So, if you cannot understand that there is something in man which responds to the challenge of this mountain and goes out to meet it, that the struggle is the struggle of life itself upward and forever upward, then you won’t see why we go. What we get from this adventure is just sheer joy. And joy is, after all, the end of life. We do not live to eat and make money. We eat and make money to be able to enjoy life. That is what life means and what life is for.
English mountaineer GEORGE MALLORY, who died on the slopes of Everest in 1924. The discovery of his body in 1999 revived speculation as to whether he and his climbing partner Andrew Irvine had made it to the summit before they perished.
THE church says the earth is flat, but I know that it is round, for I have seen the shadow on the moon, and I have more faith in a shadow than in the church.
FERDINAND MAGELLAN, Portuguese explorer, c. 1480–1521
In 2002, Brock Enright, a 25-year-old artist, launched a ‘designer kidnapping’ business for bored New Yorkers looking for some adventure in their lives. Dozens of customers paid Brock and his team between $1,500 and $4,000 to be violently abducted. (Costs varied according to the level of danger involved.) Each kidnap was tailored to meet the tastes and phobias of the client, but most chose to be seized at a secret location, bound, gagged, blindfolded, taken away and slapped around for hours, or even days. Customers were abducted in the street, or in their beds at night. ‘It’s about stepping outside of yourself. I wanted to see what I could do,’ said Jason, a carpenter, after his third abduction.
DO just once what others say you can’t do, and you will never pay attention to their limitations again.
CAPTAIN JAMES COOK, English explorer, 1728–79
‘IT’S an incredible bargain at $100 million a seat,’ says Eric Anderson, president and CEO of Space Adventures about his plans to fly two private citizens to the far side of the moon. ‘I believe there’s a bigger market than people might imagine.’ Space Adventures, the pioneers of space tourism, have already flown five customers to the International Space Station (ISS) at a cost to each of roughly $25 million, but the lunar adventure is by far their most ambitious project to date. The US firm promises that, for $100 million, the intrepid lunar tourist will get to lead the first important manned space expedition of the 21st century; become a catalyst for humankind’s expansion into space; join the ranks of the world’s greatest explorers; experience the majesty and wonder of earthrise and explore and experience the far side of the moon.
I AM actually not at all a man of science, not an observer, not an experimenter, not a thinker. I am by temperament nothing but a conquistador – an adventurer, if you want it translated – with all the curiosity, daring, and tenacity characteristic of a man of this sort.
SIGMUND FREUD, letter to Wilhelm Fliess, 1 February 1900
MAN cannot discover new oceans unless he has the courage to lose sight of the shore.
ANDRÉ GIDE, French writer, 1869–1951
EX Africa semper aliquid novi. (Something new always comes out of Africa.)
PLINY THE ELDER, AD 23–79
THE future is bright. We are dealing with positive changes … The economies are better, elections are taking place in many African states, presidents are willing to leave offices, and there are no coups these days.
SIR QUETT KETUMILE JONI MASIRE, former president of Botswana, b. 1925
The earliest known proof of human existence and civilization came from Africa. Lucy, our common ancestor, the 3.2-million-year-old fossil celebrity, was uncovered in an archaeological dig in Ethiopia. She lies in a specially constructed safe at the palaeoanthropology laboratories of the National Museum of Ethiopia in Addis Ababa.
When it comes to culture in all its forms, Africa is on top. Recent years have seen many African writers rewarded. Nigerian novelist Chinua Achebe won the 2007 Man Booker International Prize and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, also Nigerian, won the Orange Prize for Fiction. The same year, Ethiopian émigré Dinaw Mengestu won the Guardian First Novel Award. In France, Congolese writer Alain Mabanckou won the prestigious Prix Renaudot in 2006. Africa too, in many ways, is music’s past and future. Without Africa there would be no blues, samba, calypso, gospel, soul, reggae, rap, salsa, jazz, etc. As for football, Africa is a hotbed of talent. From Didier Drogba to Emmanuel Eboué, Africa’s footballers are providing the world’s clubs with energy and skill. According to Robert Nouzaret, coach of the Guinea team, the 2010 World Cup is bound to have African teams reaching the semi-finals.
Nelson Mandela remains one of the most revered figures of our times. This is the man who once said, ‘It always seems impossible until it’s done.’ He also famously declared in a courtroom in 1964: ‘I have dedicated my life to this struggle of the African people. I have fought against white domination, and I have fought against black domination. I have cherished the ideals of a democratic and free society in which all persons live together in harmony with equal opportunities. It is an ideal which I hope to live for, and to see realized. But my lord, if needs be, it is an ideal for which I am prepared to die.’
The Xhosa people of South Africa have a word, Ubuntu. It means that we are human in and through one another. We are all intertwined and part of each other.
I AM not interested in picking up crumbs of compassion thrown from the table of someone who considers himself my master. I want the full menu of human rights.
ARCHBISHOP DESMOND TUTU, South African activist, b. 1931
Necessity is the mother of invention. Nowhere is this truer than in Africa, where people recycle plastic bags into mats, tins into suitcases and tyres into shoes. Poverty in Africa has bred inventiveness and resilience, rather than submission. To see or buy some of the extraordinary objects made from recycled material in Africa visit www.csao.fr and www.larbreduvoyageur.com, two gallery shops in Paris.
A HANDFUL OF OPTIMISTIC
AFRICAN NATIONAL MOTTOS:
Burkina Faso: Unité, Travail, Progrès (Unity, Work, Progress)
Cameroon: Paix, Travail, Patrie (Peace, Work, Fatherland)
Côte d’Ivoire: Unité, Discipline, Travail (Unity, Discipline, Work)
Kenya: Harambee (Let’s Work Together)
Mali: Un Peuple, Un But, Une Foi (One People, One Goal, One Faith)
Rwanda: Unity, Work and Patriotism
Coming and going by
the dance, I see
that what I am not is
a part of me.
Dancing is all that I
can ever trust,
the dance is all I am,
the rest is dust.
I will believe my bones
and live by what
will go on dancing when
my bones are not.
SYDNEY CARTER, 1915–2004, from ‘My Believing Bones’
… IN the next world I shan’t be doing music, with all the striving and disappointments. I shall be being it.
RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS, English composer, 1872–1958
MY heaven will be filled with wonderful young men and dukes.
DAME BARBARA CARTLAND, 1901–2000
BUT the true servants of God shall be well provided for, feasting on fruit, and honoured in the gardens of delight. Reclining face to face upon soft couches, they shall be served with a goblet filled at a gushing fountain, white, and delicious to those who drink it. It will neither dull their senses nor befuddle them. They shall sit with bashful, dark-eyed virgins, as chaste as the sheltered eggs of ostriches.
The Koran, Surah 37:39–47, translated by N. J. Dawood
BEHOLD, I show you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory.
O death, where is thy sting?
O grave, where is thy victory?
The Bible, 1 Corinthians 15: 51–5
O Death, where is thy sting-a-ling-a-ling,
O Grave, thy victoree?
The bells of Hell go ting-a-ling-a-ling,
For you, but not for me.
First World War army song
Nowadays, carbon-based life-forms needn’t end up as ashes or bones, we can be made into jewellery and be on hand at all times. LifeGem, of Chicago, Illinois, will take a few grains of your cremated remains and subject them to high pressure and temperature. After 18 weeks, you’ll emerge sparkling. Go to www.LifeGem.com to find out more about becoming a Memorial Diamond.
HOW can it enter into the thoughts of man, that the soul, which is capable of such immense perfections, and of receiving new improvements to all eternity, shall fall away into nothing almost as soon as it is created?
JOSEPH ADDISON, English essayist, 1672–1719
For the ancient Egyptians, death was a mere break in existence, and nothing to fear if you had a clear conscience. Your friends would mummify you to help you on your way, and you would then, after journeying to the land of the dead, enter the ‘Hall of Double Justice’, in order to affirm to the 42 judges that you had committed no sin. After having your heart weighed against Truth in a huge pair of scales, Osiris, the God of the Dead, would give judgement. If the scales were in equilibrium he would pronounce in your favour, and from then on you would lead a life of eternal happiness in the kingdom of the dead.
A BBC MORI poll, conducted in 2003, found that 52 per cent of people in the United Kingdom believed in Heaven, but only 32 per cent believed in Hell.
A thousand tymes have I herd men telle
That ther ys joy in hevene and peyne in helle,
And I acorde wel that it ys so;
But, natheless, yet wot I wel also
That ther nis noon dwelling in this contree,
That eyther hath in hevene or helle ybe,
Ne may of hit noon other weyes witen,
But as he hath herd seyd, or founde it written;
For by assay ther may no man it preve.
GEOFFREY CHAUCER, c. 1343–1400, ‘The Legend of Good Women’
WILFRID Blunt’s idea of Heaven was to be laid to sleep in a garden with running water near for 100,000 years, then to be woke [sic]by a bird singing and to call out to the person one loved best ‘Are you there?’ ‘Yes, are you?’ then turn round and go to sleep for another 100,000 years.
GEORGE LYTTELTON, 1883–1962, Commonplace Book
[HENRY Luttrell’s] idea of Heaven is, eating pâté-de-foiegras to the sound of trumpets.
SYDNEY SMITH, English wit, 1771–1845
In 1950, when the great sage Ramana Maharshi was on his deathbed, he heard faintly from without the wails and sobbing of those who were preparing to face life without him. A look of bewilderment passed over his face, and he murmured, ‘But where do they imagine that I could possibly go?’
THERE never was a time when I, you, and all these warriors here did not exist, and there never will be a time when any of us shall cease to be.
As the self travels in this body from childhood to youth to old age, so the self moves into another body at death. The wise are not confused by this change.
The Bhagavad Gita, 2:12–13
Dante’s Paradiso lists nine spheres of Heaven, named after the planets, each more wonderful than the last, to reward those souls who have done well on earth. Among them, the fourth sphere, the Sun, is reserved for the souls of the wise, and the sixth, Jupiter, for the just. In the ninth and best sphere, the ‘Primum Mobile’, live the nine orders of angels (Seraphim, Cherubim, Thrones; Dominions, Virtues, Powers; Principalities, Archangels, Angels) who surround God. Beyond this lies ‘the Empyrean’, the source of true light, where angels fly between a gigantic rose made up of the souls of believers, and the hive – God Himself.
Old Shepherd’s Prayer
Up to the bed by the window, where I be lyin’,
Comes bells and bleat of the flock wi’ they two children’s clack.
Over, from under the eaves there’s the starlings flyin’,
And down in yard, fit to burst his chain, yapping out at Sue I do hear young Mac.
Turning around like a falled-over sack
I can see team ploughin’ in Whithy-bush field and meal carts startin’ up road to Church-Town;
Saturday arternoon the men goin’ back
And the women from market, trapin’ home over the down.
Heavenly Master, I wud like to wake to they same green places
Where I be know’d for breakin’ dogs and follerin’ sheep.
And if I may not walk in th’ old ways and look on th’ old faces
I wud sooner sleep.
CHARLOTTE MEW, 1869–1927
All is not lost! Even wandering spirits can eventually find peace in the Afterlife. The Chinese celebrate a Ghost Month, the seventh in the calendar, when the gates of hell are thrust open, liberating hungry ghosts who search the Earth for food or to take revenge on those who have upset them by entering their bodies and causing illness. To entertain these spirits and ward off their evil, people perform street operas, burn ‘hell money’ and cook feasts. The ghosts are then guided with lanterns in the direction of Heaven.
If you think it would be a shame to die when your turn comes, go to www.alcor.org to find out more about how you, or just your brain, can be preserved after your death. Cryonically suspended in liquid nitrogen at minus 196°, awaiting medical advances, you may one day be able to take up life again where you left off.
WE may be surprised at the people we find in heaven. God has a soft spot for sinners. His standards are quite low.
ARCHBISHOP DESMOND TUTU
McTAGGART, the celebrated philosopher, always wore a string round one of his waistcoat buttons. Gilbert Murray asked him why and he answered, ‘I keep it handy in case I should meet a kitten.’
GEORGE LYTTELTON, Commonplace Book
ANIMALS are such agreeable friends – they ask no questions, they pass no criticisms.
GEORGE ELIOT, 1819–80, Mr Gilfil’s Love-Story
Recently, there have been moves towards including certain creatures in a ‘community of equals’ with humans. The Seattle-based Great Ape Project is calling for the UN to adopt a Declaration on Great Apes, in which chimps, bonobos, gorillas and orang-utans have the right to life, the protection of individual liberty, and the prohibition of torture.
The Peace of Wild Things
When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
WENDELL BERRY, American writer, b. 1934
For as little as £2.50 a month, you can ‘adopt’ an endangered animal such as an orang-utan, tiger or panda, and help WWF safeguard their future: www.wwf.org.uk.
Whereas the well-known Common Chimpanzee is marauding, murdering and brutally dominant, the lesser-known Bonobo is cooperative, friendly and peace-loving. So why don’t we see more Bonobos in zoos? Perhaps part of the answer is that these gentle apes spend an extraordinary amount of time having sex with every member of the group and in every conceivable (and inconceivable) position, which might not suit your average Sunday School outing. In the wild, whereas chimps tend to kill each other during territorial disputes, Bonobos usually make love not war, with females rushing to begin an orgy with the enemy, which usually ends with all the adults grooming each other while their children play. We share almost 100 per cent of our DNA with both kinds of chimp, so is it too much to hope that, one day, we’ll allow our inner Bonobo out of the bedroom and on to the battlefield?
ALL the really good ideas I ever had came to me while I was milking a cow.
GRANT WOOD, American painter, 1891–1942
HOW I hate the man who talks about the ‘brute creation’, with an ugly emphasis on brute. Only Christians are capable of it. As for me, I am proud of my close kinship with other animals. I take a jealous pride in my Simian ancestry. I like to think that I was once a magnificent hairy fellow living in the trees and that my frame has come down through geological times via sea jelly and worms and Amphioxus, Fish, Dinosaurs, and Apes. Who would exchange these for the pallid couple in the Garden of Eden?
W. N. P. BARBELLION, British naturalist, 1889–1919
Busy, curious, thirsty fly,
Gently drink, and drink as I;
Freely welcome to my cup.
WILLIAM OLDYS, English antiquary, 1696–1761
THE great pleasure of a dog is that you may make a fool of yourself with him and not only will he not scold you, but he will make a fool of himself too.
SAMUEL BUTLER, British writer, 1835–1902
Inscription on the Monument of a Newfoundland Dog belonging to Lord Byron
Near this spot are deposited the Remains of one
who possessed Beauty without Vanity,
Strength without Insolence, Courage without Ferocity,
and all the virtues of Man without his Vices.
This praise, which would be unmeaning Flattery,
if inscribed over human Ashes,
is but a just tribute to the Memory of BOATSWAIN, A DOG.
JOHN CAM HOBHOUSE, British politician, 1786–1869
IN return for a place by the fireside, a friendly bone and an occasional pat over the past 15,000 years, dogs guard us, help us catch or bring home our prey, pull our sleds, rescue us on mountains, find us in rubble after disasters, help us to detect landmines, drugs, criminals and cancer, help us to see or hear, comfort us in our illness and, last but not least, accompany us in our loneliness. Every year, stories abound of the myriad ways in which dogs enhance our lives, and now the UK’s largest dog welfare charity, Dogs Trust, has launched an annual award ceremony with five categories. Send your nominations to www.dogstrust.org.uk.
The Horse
Where in this wide world can man find nobility without pride,
Friendship without envy, or beauty without vanity?
Here where grace is laced with muscle and strength by gentleness confined.
He serves without servility; he has fought without enmity.
There is nothing so powerful, nothing less violent;
There is nothing so quick, nothing more patient.
England’s past has been borne on his back.
All our history is his industry.
We are his heirs;
He is our inheritance.
Ladies and Gentlemen – the Horse!
RONALD DUNCAN, British playwright, 1914–82
Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth
What’s good for the goose is good for the gander
Every dog has his day
The founder of utilitarian philosophy, Jeremy Bentham, stated that, when considering whether or not a being should have rights, ‘The question is not, “Can they reason?”, nor “Can they talk?” but “Can they suffer?” As People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals founder Ingrid Newkirk says, ‘When it comes to pain, love, joy, loneliness, and fear, a rat is a pig is a dog is a boy. Each one values his or her life and fights the knife.’ Throw away your fur coat and go to www.peta.org for more information.
I FIND penguins at present the only comfort in life. One feels everything in the world so sympathetically ridiculous, one can’t be angry when one looks at a penguin.
JOHN RUSKIN, 1819–1900
On 26 April 1986, in Ukraine, the worst accident in history occurred, when Reactor No. 4 at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant exploded. A 30-km exclusion zone was set up – and it is here that a most remarkable reversal has taken place. In the twenty years since the explosion, the deserted and heavily irradiated towns, villages and surrounding countryside have become one of Europe’s richest wildlife habitats, with a staggering diversity of species. Indeed, Michael Bondarkov, the director of the International Radioecology Laboratory just outside the zone, says that nearly 50 globally endangered species of animals and plants are thriving. Some 180 species of bird are breeding there; freshwater fish are doing well; large mammals such as moose, wild boar, deer, wolves and lynx are firmly established. It is hoped that a permanent, protected nature reserve will be set up – and that human beings, who left in a hurry, will never return.
WHEN the insects take over the world, we hope they will remember with gratitude how we took them along on all our picnics.
BILL VAUGHAN, US columnist, 1915–77
The Burj Dubai tower, currently under construction in the Gulf, is set to be the world’s tallest building with a projected height of 2,275 feet. Its spire will be seen up to 60 miles away. The lifts will travel at 40 miles per hour.
IN the final analysis, all architecture reveals the application of human ingenuity to the satisfaction of human needs. And among these needs are not only shelter, warmth and accommodation, but also the needs, felt at every moment in every part of the world in endlessly different ways, for something more profound, evocative and universal, for beauty, for permanence, for immortality.
PATRICK NUTTGENS, British architect, 1930–2004
GOOD architecture is like a piece of beautifully composed music crystallized in space that elevates our spirits beyond the limitation of time.
TAO HO, Chinese architect, b. 1936
THE great thing about being an architect is you can walk into your dreams.
HAROLD E. WAGONER, architect
The charity Maggie’s Centres has turned architecture into a weapon against cancer. It creates tranquil and inspirational buildings which cancer sufferers and their families can visit for advice. Frank Gehry, Kisho Kurosawa and Zaha Hadid are just some of the major names who have designed unique buildings.
UNESCO – the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization – seeks to protect the world’s most precious buildings with its World Heritage List. This list contains some of humanity’s most iconic buildings and architectural achievements which have been singled out for preservation for future generations. There are 851 sites on this list. See http://whc.unesco.org.
TO be an artist is to believe in life.
HENRY MOORE, English artist and sculptor, 1898–1986
ART – the one achievement of Man which has made the long trip up from all fours seem well advised.
JAMES THURBER, Forum and Century, June 1939
London tops the world for most-visited museums. Tate Modern attracts around 5.2 million visitors a year, the British Museum 4.8 million and the National Gallery 4.1 million.
AT the age of six I wanted to be a cook. At seven I wanted to be Napoleon. And my ambition has been growing steadily ever since.
SALVADOR DALI, 1904–89
DON’T look for obscure formulas or mystery in my work. It is pure joy that I offer you.
CONSTANTIN BRANCUSI, abstract sculptor, 1876–1957
DO not fail, as you go on, to draw something every day, for no matter how little it is it will be well worth while, and it will do you a world of good.
CENNINO CENNINI, c. 1370–c. 1440, The Craftsman’s Handbook
THERE is no must in art because art is free.
WASSILY KANDINSKY, abstract artist, 1866–1944
THE purpose of art is washing the dust of daily life off our souls.
PABLO PICASSO, 1881–1973
GREAT art picks up where nature ends.
MARC CHAGALL, 1887–1985
Art therapy is a method of using the creative process to improve mental, physical and emotional welfare. Widely used in hospitals as well as schools, it is of particular value in helping traumatized children process horrors they cannot put into words, as workers from Human Rights Watch recently showed when they gave children in Darfur crayons and paper.
THE most delightful advantage of being bald – one can hear snowflakes.
R. G. DANIELS, British magistrate, 1916–93
I DON’T consider myself bald. I’m simply taller than my hair.
TOM SHARPE, English author, b. 1928
Baldness may well be a blessing, but in October 2006 a UK biotechnology firm announced they could ‘cure’ it by removing hair follicles from the back of the neck, multiplying them and then implanting the cells into the scalp. This method of hair multiplication proved successful in 70 per cent of male patients, and the treatment will be available to the public by 2009. Another technique has been pioneered in Italy. Pierluigi Santi, of Genoa, has successfully used stem cells to ‘multiply’ hair roots, and his method will soon be available to paying customers.
HE wore baldness like an expensive hat, as if it were out of the question for him to have hair like other men.
GLORIA SWANSON, Hollywood star, 1897–1983, on first meeting Cecil B. de Mille
THERE is more felicity on the far side of baldness than young men can possibly imagine.
LOGAN PEARSALL SMITH, Afterthoughts, 1931
There is no consensus as to why male pattern baldness exists, but the most likely theory suggests that it has evolved in males through sexual selection as a signal of enhanced status, social maturity, and ability to maintain a mate in the lifestyle to which she is accustomed. So if you’re growing old and shiny-pated, just remember the words of Dolly Parton: ‘I love bald men. Just because you’ve lost your fuzz don’t mean you ain’t a peach.’
Big is beautiful!
Small is beautiful!
THE beauty of creatures is nothing other than the image of the divine beauty in which things participate.
ST THOMAS AQUINAS, Commentarium in Dionysii de Divinibus Nominibus, 1260
Years back the world might have voted Greta Garbo, Ava Gardner, Marlene Dietrich, Grace Kelly or Brigitte Bardot the most beautiful woman, but who would win today? In a recent poll Angelina Jolie got the most votes. Her love, Brad Pitt, has often been voted the world’s most handsome man. Together, they form the world’s most beautiful couple, now termed ‘Brangelina’.
IF eyes were made for seeing, then Beauty is its own excuse for being.
RALPH WALDO EMERSON, 1803–82
THERE is nothing ugly; I never saw an ugly thing in my life: for let the form of an object be what it may, light, shade, and perspective will always make it beautiful.
JOHN CONSTABLE, British painter, 1776–1837
What makes for a beautiful appearance or so-called ‘wow’ factor in a face? Research published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society, Biological Sciences, finds that it is, in fact, a perfectly balanced face, one in which the symmetry is clear and striking to the eye. Many well-known actors and actresses, for instance, have symmetrical faces. People with lopsided features or irregular jaws and noses are not (no surprise there!) considered attractive by the majority of people.
‘BEAUTIFUL! Beautiful!’
EDWIN BUZZ ALDRIN’S first words as he stepped on to the moon in 1969
It would appear we human beings really are beauty-conscious! Good looks are worth their weight in gold. Studies out of the University of Texas and Michigan State University show that the more attractive you are the more likely you are to earn better money. Basically, unattractive employees earn 5 to 10 per cent less than others. Those considered ‘good-looking’, in turn, earn more than those deemed ‘average’ in looks.
The beauty of the world is almost the sole way by which we can allow God to penetrate us … the beauty of the world is the commonest, easiest and most natural way of approach.
SIMONE WEIL, 1909–43, Attente de Dieu
Researchers at Columbia University’s Business School used data from an online dating site to show that people with comparable attractiveness tend to pair up. Unattractive men, however, are more likely to try to ask unattainable beauties out on a date!
BEAUTY is the first test: there is no permanent place in the world for ugly mathematics.
GODFREY HAROLD HARDY, A Mathematician’s Apology, 1941
Those who look for beauty, find it
There is beauty in everything
IF Nature had not befriended us with beauty, and other good graces, to help us insinuate our selves into men’s affections, we should have been more enslaved than any other of Nature’s creatures she hath made.
MARGARET CAVENDISH, Duchess of Newcastle, Sociable Letters, 1664
A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:
Its loveliness increases, it will never
Pass into nothingness, but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
Full of dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.
JOHN KEATS, ‘Endymion’, 1818
EVERY time you smile at someone, it is an action of love, a gift to that person, a beautiful thing.
MOTHER THERESA, 1910–97
Everyone has a book in them
For books are more than books, they are the life
The very heart and core of ages past,
The reason why men lived and worked and died,
The essence and quintessence of their lives.
AMY LOWELL, ‘The Boston Atheneum’, 1912
I NEVER read any novels except my own. When I feel worried, agitated or upset, I read one and find the last pages soothe me and leave me happy. I quite understand why I am popular in hospitals.
DAME BARBARA CARTLAND
A sixth of the world’s trees are cut down to make paper, so it’s heartening to hear that part of the new M6 toll road has been built on copies of pulped novels – including Mills & Boon love stories – to prevent it cracking. Copies of the books were shredded into a paste and added to a mixture of asphalt and Tarmac in a refreshing combination of romance and environmental thinking.
A TRULY good book is something as wildly natural and primitive, mysterious and marvellous, ambrosial and fertile, as a fungus or a lichen.
HENRY DAVID THOREAU, journal entry, 16 November 1850
BOOKS are cold and sure friends.
VICTOR HUGO, Les Misérables, 1862
The first digital library in the world was set up in 1971 by Michael Hart to make available free electronic copies of out-of-copyright books, or those where the copyright had been donated. The number of digitalized books reached 11,000 by 2004. Some 350 new titles are added each month. Michael Hart’s dream is to have 1 million titles available by 2015.
PEOPLE say that life is the thing, but I prefer reading.
LOGAN PEARSALL SMITH, Afterthoughts, 1931
READING is to the mind what exercise is to the body.
SIR RICHARD STEELE, Tatler, 18 March 1710
Studies have shown that American children who learn to read by the third grade are less likely to end up in prison, drop out of school, or take drugs. Adults who read literature on a regular basis are nearly three times as likely to attend a performing arts event, almost four times as likely to visit an art museum, more than twoand-a-half times as likely to do volunteer or charity work, and one-and-a-half times as likely to participate in sporting activities.
IF the dullest person in the world would only put down sincerely what he or she thought about his or her life, about work and love, religion and emotion, it would be a fascinating document.
A. C. BENSON, From a College Window, 1906
When Aaron Lansky realized, in 1980, that thousands of Yiddish books which had survived the horrors of the Nazi years were being chucked out, all over the USA, by people who were unable to read Yiddish as their grandparents had done, he resolved to do something about it. After all, the literature of an entire civilization was at stake. Lansky put out an appeal for unwanted Yiddish books, and has ended up with 1.5 million books which are now housed in the National Yiddish Book Center.
[READING] consoles me in my retreat; it relieves me of the weight of distressing idleness and, at any time, can rid me of boring company. It blunts the stabs of pain whenever pain is not too overpowering and extreme. To distract me from morose thoughts, I simply need to have recourse to books.
MICHEL DE MONTAIGNE, 1533–92
MEN of power have not time to read, yet men who do not read are not fit for power.
MICHAEL FOOT, British politician, b.1913