The Monthly Salon: November
Some reading, and an open floor
Hello readers. It’s time for another of our monthly open spaces, in which you can talk to me, or indeed anyone else here, about what’s on your mind.
As ever, you may talk about whatever you like. If you’d like a prompt - or just some recommendations - here are a few things I’ve been reading lately.
Angela Nagle wrote for Compact about the recent riots in Dublin, which are a result of Ireland’s transformation in recent decades from Celtic Catholic nation to multicultural corporate territory. Michael O’Shea wrote on the same transformation for The American Conservative, while Unherd explained how the Irish elite’s embrace of US-style immigration rhetoric (and policy) is one of the roots of the dissatisfaction.
Elsewhere, Brian Miller - a reader of this Substack, no less - has a melancholy essay in Front Porch Republic about the decline of literacy. You should buy his new book as an antidote.
Ed West, on his excellent Substack Wrong Side of History, writes about the repaganisation of the West. This is a subject which I intend to dive into in detail here next year. More on that in January.
Finally, one of my favourite practical guides to our Age Of Insanity, Pilgrims in the Machine, offers up an essay called The Making of Unmachine Minds, on how to build a dissident family in the age of technology.
Talk about any of that, or something else entirely, if you feel moved. The floor is yours.
Oh, and are you planning on a "pilgrimage" to the UK's latest and most famous site of worship Paul? The Bristol Airport "Multi Faith" area (see something I wrote here https://overthefield.substack.com/p/the-vision-of-vanity)
I doubt you will find a well there though (or anything of substance or sacredness for that matter!)
I just read Brian Millar's piece in the last hour. It was great but sobering. Plus there was a report released today that apparently 1 million children in the UK don't own a single book!
It got me thinking how the fact that the "transaction cost" of acquiring knowledge has decreased (e.g no need to go on your bike to the library, find the book, and take it home - you can just one click order or look on Wikipedia!) may have factored into our collapse in reading physical books. If knowledge is no longer precious or rare, then there is reduced incentive to go to the place where the knowledge can be found. In the past, someone who had read encyclopaedias from the library was seen as the fount of knowledge in the community/school/work. Now everyone has a portable fount of knowledge in their pockets (which is probably beeping at them for their attention as we speak).
The decreased transaction cost is far from the only (and certainly not the most important factor) but it is one I think we neglect to consider.