For those who don't know: the picture is one of the original illustrations of Jules Verne's From the Earth to the Moon. It depicts one of the leaders of the moonshot project, who was disappointed that he couldn't travel to the moon so he lived for a week or so inside the projectile, getting a bit fatter as a result (I guess this is the allusion). The pic is from when he gets out.
I love rich and well-crafted prose like this.
The UK has some right-wing polemecists (a group into which I'd place Peter Hitchens, author of the above) who are truly excellent writers and highly enjoyable to read. If you like this kind of thing, I'd recommend The Spectator, where you'll be able to enjoy the writings of Andrew Neil, Rod Liddle, and indeed Boris Johnson (the former editor). The views expressed are -- in my opinion -- generally excerable -- but the writing is usually witty, urbane, and well-crafted.
I looked up a picture of Peter Hitchens and oddly he somehow does look like a naturally thin person that put on a few dozen pounds due to a rich comfortable life and didn’t care to lose it.
The brother of Christopher, they are oddly simulatenously alike (curmudgeon, argumentative, erudite) and unlike (Peter religious, ex SWP, now strongly tory, Christopher atheist, also socialist but more nuanced)
In fact, strongly anti-Tory. The current Tory Party is too progressive for his tastes.
Not sure what to make of this. It was an engaging read but the thrust of it seems to be that people are superficial and judge others by their appearance.
No shit?
A bit of self indulgent reflection, mostly. I'm unsure there _was_ a point.
There’s also the usual Peter Hitchens subtext that things were better in the old days before women and ethnic minorities and the working class ruined everything, before the communists took over (a thing Hitchens actually appears to believe happened).