Michael Ledger-Lomas

There’s much to be said for nostalgia

Instead of condemning it as dangerous fantasy, two new books argue that we should welcome nostalgia as ‘emotional armour’ in a fast-changing world

Preparations for a jousting tournament at The Leeds Armouries in March this year as teams from the UK, France and Italy compete. [Getty Images] 
issue 11 May 2024
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  • Nostalgia: A History of a Dangerous Emotion

    Agnes Arnold-Forster

    Picador, pp. 288, £22

  • Yesterday: A New History of Nostalgia

    Tobias Becker

    Harvard, pp. 320, £29

Michel Barnier, the chief negotiator for the EU Commission, called Brexit an expression of ‘hope for a return to a powerful global Britain, nostalgia for the past’ – a mood that ‘serves no purpose in politics’. Popular historians have echoed his view of nostalgia as a syndrome which affects declining societies such as Great Britain.

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