The uncommercial traveller

I'm rather enjoying the superficial symbolism the party leaders employed in giving their election addresses.

Blairishly (must get that into circulation), David Cameron gathered his admirers on the banks of the Thames, reminding me of King Canute (though that gentleman was rather intelligent), the idiotic charm of Three Men in a Boat, and prompting me to adapt the bitter and misogynistic words of the Roman poet, Catullus (poem 70):

sed mulier cupido quod dicit amanti
in uento et rapida scribere oportet aqua

'what a Conservative says… should be written in wind and running water'.

Meanwhile, Gordon Brown went to a supermarket in Rochester. Oh dear, oh dear, what terrible semiotics. Firstly, when you're asking the country to make an informed choice, don't pose in a supermarket. The illusion of choice, the massive range of calculations to be made combined with the manipulative tactics of the marketers lead us to paralysis or desperation, grabbing the shiniest tin or flashiest label.

Secondly, Rochester? I'd have thought that the name would be anathema to poor old Gordon. Mr. Rochester is a violent bully in Jane Eyre - Brown already compared himself to Rochester in a rather unfortunate interview two years ago and was soundly mocked in the press. Furthermore,  a Dickensian character should avoid anywhere with gloomy Dickens associations (Great Expectations, Mrs. Havisham's house, Dullborough in The Uncommercial Traveller), and it's a stop on the route taken by the doomed old men in Graham Swift's booze-regret-and-death novel Last Orders. All sounds rather final, doesn't it?

The Liberal Democrat leader probably did something too. Meh, as t'internet kids say.

Friday conundrum!

Not so much a conundrum, and perhaps a little morbid: write your own epitaph or obituary! For what would you like to be remembered? Boltzmann's grave features his Constant, which is pretty cool. Shakespeare's warns people not to chuck his bones into the charnel house next door. I saw a Welsh one which read (translated) as 'not to be opened without the permission of the inhabitant'.

Mine?

Plashing Vole - turned his final page.

Too flippant? I'd like to be thought of as quiet, consistent, helpful and kind - not that I am, it's just that's what I'd like people to think. I care about books, people, education, the environment, politics and the public sphere - though I'm ashamed to say that I don't do much about them. I'd like to get my book written, and some papers, but fame doesn't concern me one little bit. Maybe it's a bit negative, but the first line of the Hippocratic Oath commends itself to me: 'First, do no harm'. We can be such destructive creatures, emotionally, physically, intellectually, that a conscious decision to refrain from harm is essential.

I'd also like to be remembered for my agility with a pun. Speaking of which, I'm thinking of opening a strip-joint featuring characters from literature. The star turn will be Jane Eyre in a G-String. Boom-tish.

Thankyewverymuch. Bookings for weddings and barmitzvahs have not been rolling in.