Global Warning

8 November 2008

Theodore Dalrymple delivers a Global Warning

Staying recently on the Herengracht in Amsterdam, I found myself trying to solve a psychological puzzle. How could anyone have thought for a moment, how could any mind have entertained even for an infinitesimal fraction of an instant, that 17th- and 18th-century Dutch domestic architecture — as elegant as any in the whole history of the world — should be pulled down to make room for buildings in the Novosibirsk style?

But that, at one time, was the idea of Joop den Uyl, former prime minister of the Netherlands, whose bust is still to be seen in the city hall of Amsterdam. He also wanted to run a motorway through the city to the central station, allegedly for the sake of convenience; reformers such as he have an infallible instinct for a single project that will ruin everything. What is their motive?

The present mayor of Paris, who has a reasonable chance of being the next president of France, thinks that Paris, being crowded, needs skyscrapers. I recall the words of Lord Curzon, in his speech to the Asiatic Society of Bengal: I cannot pause to argue with such a man.

And yet there must be something actuating these pygmy souls, and it is important to know what it is. I think it is humiliation. They are humiliated by the certain knowledge that they are incapable of producing anything remotely as good as that which their less enlightened predecessors produced; this being the case, they can only destroy the evidence of their own incapacity.

The relationship between architectural and other forms of savagery is not a simple one, however. English visitors to Amsterdam do not notice the architecture; what they want is Heineken, cannabis and Colombian prostitutes.

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TDK

November 6th, 2008 10:25am Report this comment

Over a long period, I've worked in Amsterdam for probably a year in total, broken into one or two week hotel stays. Many different hotels. I am fully aware of Amsterdam's other attractions and viewed them myself the first time I stayed. However, I've never once seen rowdy English people arguing with prostitutes.

I would guess that your small hotel in Herengracht was not quite so "elegant" as the brochure said. If the receptionist raises her eyebrows at a request for a whole night reservation, you have a clue.

Shark

November 6th, 2008 6:17pm Report this comment

Sadly, God's judgment generally favors fools. So I'm not expecting Him to make an exception of the English. When He brings back Hell, Damnation, Scourges and Plagues specifically for louts, then He will have my support.

Richard

November 7th, 2008 2:28pm Report this comment

When will TD stop moaning about the English and do something inspirational to contribute to their betterment - but that needs imagination. He's become an intolerable bore.

James R

November 10th, 2008 9:18am Report this comment

There you are, Theodore, according to Richard, it's your fault. You've not been providing the louts with entertainment

Rahul

November 12th, 2008 2:02am Report this comment

"ould not help but think that no other nation has ever more deserved a prolonged period of economic hardship and utter misery."

Actually you have it a bit wrong, but the first hint to the real reaction was earlier when you mentioned Lord Curzon, a despicable fellow really. Perhaps not in your eyes, but in mine yes, as this is the man who decided he would partition Bengal and terrorize the great Souls fighting British oppression.

Flash forward to today, and Curzon-lovers are forced to suffer the embarrassment of seeing their countrymen behave like louts. I see some amount of justice in this.

Janner

November 19th, 2008 2:50pm Report this comment

A love of architecture and a love of cannabis are surely not mutually exclusive?

R. Buckwalter

November 22nd, 2008 7:52pm Report this comment

This man Dalrymple: he is our Decimus Juvenalis.

It is men like Juvenal that relieved eyes wearied by the perverse ugliness of that age; he was elevating to the mind, for he gave honest men, incensed by the hypocrisy idiocy, & injustice of all others around them a belief that virtue was once in the world, while reminding them that the highest virtue is knowledge.

Inquit: "Mens sana in corpore sanum"

Vale

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