We’re everything European philosophy can be in the UK. We’re all it can be. Stunted. Like some dwarf species. Like some inbred species. Crabbed. Bad tempered. Unable to thrive.
These aren’t the right conditions for it, European philosophy. The soil of empiricism. And industrialism. And financial capitalism.
We’re its best ambassadors, European philosophy. The best it can be under these circumstances. In these times! In this place!
We’re it’s final, withered form, European philosophy. Pitiful, really. Embarrassing, really.
This is what it’s come to! And on this campus! Which is, by itself, the very opposite of European philosophy!
Oh I’m sure European philosophy it’s perfectly fine on the actual continent. In actual Europe. I’m sure it’s thriving over there. Pressing up to new heights and so on. But here? In the UK?
We do some things well: pop music. Film, sometimes. We do some things badly: philosophy. High culture in general. Intellectual stuff.
We embarrass ourselves when we try! It doesn’t suit us. We’re of the wrong temperament. We have no breadth of culture. No references. We don’t know very much. We’re not schooled in the greats, not really.
We have no reverence. Nothing’s sacred for us. We let it all go, if we ever had it, a long time ago. We don’t value it. We don’t know how to.
Oh sometimes we’re possessed by mad enthusiasms for European philosophy. But when we read it, we inevitably reduce it. When we secondary-commentate on it, we turn it into nothing. When we start our own European philosophy thought movements, they’re inevitably embarrassing. Backward. Fumbling.
Do pop music and comment on pop music. Forget philosophy! Forget high culture. Forget intellectual stuff!
Work in Progress 