Jonathan Meades :: Remember The Future (2/3)

[belisariusorb]

His abuse of the "Friends of the Earth" was literal minded and petty, nobody thinks they're literally friends with the Earth like you would be with a mate. Likewise his argument that "nature needs humans" is patently crap. Nature got along without us just fine for millions of years. He's talking of course about rural country landscapes not wild places.

Still, I'm enjoying it a lot so far.

[adecentusername]

@belisariusorb yeah: as a vegetarian, environmentally minded chap, I often don't agree with Meades, yet I find a lot of what he says far more stimulating and interesting than conversations with some of my fellow travellers.

He's a polemicist, yes; but he's also a synthesist, and is always trying to get at the common idea, the pattern, the key that makes sense of the disparate. Yet it's a very short step from finding a pattern to imposing it, which is where his prejudices do occasionally show.

[kernel2006]

Is the 'brobdingnag' thing a joke? If so can someone please explain it?

[jenosw]

Brobdingnag is the opposite of Lilliput in Gulliver's Travels, i.e. giant land, giant people. It has given rise to the adjective "brobdingnagian" which means humungous. He's saying that England favours the small (Lilliputian village) over the large.