A A Gill of The Sunday Times on Antiques
22nd November 2011
I love AA Gill, on the other hand, I also hate him. His use of English is sublime and his descriptions are delicious, but when these skills are used against me, I am hurt. His observational writings on November 13th in the Style supplement, sliced into Brunswick House Cafe in London.
Never having visited thestablishment myself, I cannot possibly comment on the validity/or not on his foodie comments. It was cruelly acidic and totally venal.
It is his view of the antiques world that struck a deep and saddened cord. I have extracted a few of his words.....
"Snobbery is the leisure pursuit of the permanently vacationed. He did say, because he couldnt resist, that snobbery is the faint belief in a perfect world that just the other side of the M40. A place where society is like a Welsh Dresser. Every plate and saucer knows its place. If anyone owned anything as common as a Welsh Dresser"
It would appear that we "loquacious, dissemblers, immoral liars, stunted, bigoted, dark, ugly, pugnacious little trolls" have style and value issues too. How tragic.
He goes on
" How fearful to inherit furniture". I have the defining bourgeois fondness for new things. Earned and paid fof things. Few of us want to live with the flotsam of our ancestors, or other peoples ancestors. Its not the way we live now.
This is a bad time for an antiques dealer. Antiques , being on the one hand, elegantly crafted objects of a yearning nostalgia, the like of which they dont make any more, and, on the other, symptoms of a suburban avarice for the leftovers and castoffs of your betters. The desire to appear more impressive than you actually feel".
So, any response to the above words? I would love to hear some opinions..
