Once more understand — in England politics must be pursued with gravity. We don’t fly about and chatter and scream like Frenchmen. No man will succeed with us in politics who has not a reputation for solid earnestness. Therefore, the more stupid a man, the better chance he has.
George Gissing - Thyrza (1887)
It's a rum quote this, one of those observations which is not without a kind of horribly familiar, sarcastic validity.
I certainly came across second-rate people who used an earnest manner to promote poor ideas and somewhat silly viewpoints which didn't reflect well on anyone. Yet the earnest manner does work, it is used to promote everything from a tedious fog of irrelevance to the most blatant stupidity to outright lies.
The Davos jamboree finishes today, a thoroughly earnest cabal if ever there was one.
2 comments:
Interesting that Boris the buffoon was initially likeable and endeared himself to the public. The Churchillian stuff and the grave announcements from the lectern over Covid led to his downfall.
Sam - he also seemed to have fairly sound instincts on at least some issues, as if the earnest ones ground him down.
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