https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/sep/27/yuval-noah-harari-trump-patriotism-global-threats-sapiens

 

“Harari also took a dim view of Brexit, which he described as “basically a distraction. I don’t think inherently it’s a bad idea … but the timing is terrible… If the EU breaks up into 28 different countries, it’s going to be much more difficult to negotiate climate agreements, to have a common front against the hi-tech giants. Every minute the UK and EU institutes are spending on Brexit is a minute they don’t spend on climate change. And they spend a lot of minutes on it.

“Also it’s all just a fantasy about being independent. But there are no longer any independent countries in the world. It doesn’t matter what’s written on some document.”

According to Harari, technological disruption – through the rise of artificial intelligence, biotechnology and surveillance programmes – is a threat to freedom, due to the use of personal data by corporations and governments.

“That’s a very big danger,” said Harari, who does not own a smartphone and was meeting press in London to promote his new book about the dangers of accelerating technological development, 21 Lessons for the 21st Century. “If we reach a point when governments have the ability to press people’s emotional buttons in a very efficient way, then elections don’t mean anything anymore. And we are quite close to that point.””

After nearly being arrested for accidentally sending out messages with the mirror. Stan got back into the car and drove around King’s Lynn and up past Sandringham.
I’ve been there,said Satan eagerly
Don’t tell me, Stan  begged.Let me keep a few illusions.Or delusions
Satan fell quiet as they  stopped in Hunstanton to see the striped cliffs before tottering along the coast towards Sheringham.
I’d like to go to  Brancaster Beach again,Stan thought, that really is  a beach.In fact he and Mary had once been trapped by the tide.North Norfolk is a dangerous place even without  Satan travelling through
Holkham Hall and beach were a  beloved place.Maybe Satan would like to go in a boat on the lake and visit the shop where paintings are on sale
Wells next the Sea was the old man’s  love.The narrow street where Mary bought a wicker bike basket.The bread shop and the butcher and the big green on the top with lovely houses round it in  a square [ squaring the circle!]
Many happy memories and the rich smell of gorse in the hot sun
When I get home,I shall see if gorse will grow in Knittingham he told Emile.Maybe the soil is wrong though
He took out his Vodafone Smart 7  or 8 and rang an old friend  in Sheringham
Is the cottage free,Fred, he asked?
Yeah, how many people?
Er, it’s just me and the cat . this time,Stan muttered idiotically.Well Satan was in the powder compact so he didn’t need a bed!
OK.I’ll leave the key at the chip shop then.See you soon.Stan.I’m just finishing my book on the Gnostic Imagination.I’ve  learned a great deal  but I’ll happy to finish it.Maybe we could meet for a drink one night
And do you know… they did!

Stan managed to drive from the Wash to Knittingham without accident.Satan was asleep in the bottom of the mirror only wakening when they stopped for a cup of tea in a Restaurant.
But how can Satan drink his tea?
Stan  persuaded Satan that  if he wore Stan’s hat and coat nobody would know he was  not human.After all, many real humans  don’t look human.So Satan went into the Little Chef for his first experience of human life.They all sat down and ordered tea and pancakes with jam and golden syrup.
Woww,said Satan.I might consider apologising to  the Lord if I can eat this every day
Emile looked puzzled:
An apology is not genuine if  it is done for gain, he mewed.
Gosh,where did you get such a clever cat,  Satan asked Stan?
He just turned up looking wet and hungry a few years ago.Then I taught him at home how to speak properly and the basics of ethics but he seemed to know more than I could explain
Both the men stared at Emile as he lapped up the tea from a  white china saucer.I wonder who he really is, they both murmured in a hushed tone.
I have taught him  to swim in our bath and  sometimes he comes for a ride in my bike basket.Once he fell out yet managed to lure a beautiful lady to bring him home as he is tired of my mistress Annie and fancied someone who didn’t wear crimson and magenta together  nor such extraordinary makeup from Lemmings of Wigan and Warrington.
I’ve never heard of them said Satan wonderingly.I didn’t know women actually bought “makeup.”I thought when girls matured their faces went like that naturally/
That’s a bit stupid, said Stan bluntly.But never mind.Let’s carry on  or Mary will worry
Satan decided he would sit with Emile  and stay out of the mirror.He was beginning to look like a human being albeit a rather ugly one
And so say all of us

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2004/sep/20/art.poetry

Beginning

” we brought most of our books but left all our paintings behind. These were distributed among my brother, sisters and friends for safe-keeping or as gifts. Years later I lamented this, sorely missing these images. One painting in particular haunted me. It had been given to us by a young Guyanese artist, Keith Khan. I remembered its mysterious serenity, its warm background colours, the figure rising like a sphinx from the blue ruins of a wall. Although on visits home I looked for it several times, it wasn’t until seven years ago that I finally found it, behind a bedstead in our old family home. I brought it back with me to England, where it attests to the power of art to haunt us, to stick in the memory and nourish the spirit.

The ability of the artist to transmute paints into forms, shapes and feelings has always been a source of wonder to me. Equally fascinating is the interplay between art-forms – the way poetry, sculpture, music and painting relate to each other. I feel the relationship between painting and poetry is a particularly close one. Both come out of a desire to make something new of the familiar, to capture an experience in a living, concentrated way. Both share a harmony, structure, colour and rhythm; in the compositional balance of a painting, one can almost speak of one colour “rhyming” with another.”