Now and in Essex

Our day is passing, says W. In truth, we never had a day. The chance of a day, perhaps; the promise of a day. But even that is passing.

And back then, among the Essex postgraduates? The chance of a day, the promise of a day … Its chance, its promise: but didn't they already know, back then, that it couldn't possibly become a reality? That they lived at the wrong time, and in the wrong country. That they were men and women out of time and out of place.

Their ideas weren't British ideas, or at least current British ideas. Their ideas weren't hardheaded ideas, ideas that belong to the new reality. Ah, in another country, they thought, they would have been treated like gurus. In religious or recently religious countries, where they still revere philosophy. In Mediterranean countries, where they pour you wine and sit down with you to discuss ideas, how might they have been treated? In the countries of Eastern Europe – in political or recently political countries – where you can still discuss Marx over your Weissbiers, where Lenin and Trotsky are on everyone's minds, wouldn't they have found allies and admirers?  

Of course, they all study philosophy at school, in Old Europe, W. says. Everyone knows a little something about philosophy. Everyone has something philosophical to say. It's in their blood. In the air! It's in the aether of Old Europe. It's in the cafes and wine cellars. It's in the city squares and central parks. And can't you see it shining out in the faces of children?

And they read, too, don't they, in Old Europe? They know what books are. They have rows of books, all kinds of books, on their bookshelves. Poetry, for example - they like poetry in Old Europe. And didn't the Essex postgraduates like poetry? Didn't they regard a taste in poetry as essential in the real thinker? They had the Penguin Modern European Poets on their shelves. They read Trakl and Char. They read Hoelderlin and Paul Celan. They read poets no one else had heard of – gutter poets, sewer poets, poets of the filth and shit. But never our poetry, never British poetry, but foreign poetry, European poetry, Old European poetry. Always poetry from elsewhere, if not from Old Europe, then from South America, and if not from there, China. India! Japan!

They kept their poetry books next to their copies of New Scientist. They kept them next to their philosophical books, again from Old Europe. Next to their Fichte and Jacobi, next to their Ravisson and Bergson. Next to treatises like The Ages of the World and Creative Evolution, The Gay Science and Cartesian Meditations … Next to their history books, by Braudel and Veyne, Aries and C. L. R. James. Next to the great works of the social sciences, of the humanities that would soon count for nothing in the new world.

Old Europe, Old Europe. But they knew its day was passing, the Essex postgraduates. They knew their day was passing, they who never really knew Old Europe. Their philosophy would die unnoticed: how could it be otherwise? The ideas of old Europe would not take root here. They would have to fly off elsewhere, the dandelion seeds of thought. They would take root in South America, perhaps – in Argentina, which is supposed to be a very thoughtful country, a real thinking country; in Chile, which has philosophy departments like castles. In Uruguay – which probably already harbours the thinker-friends who will take the next thought-leap forward. Or they'd reach fertile ground in vast China, vast India, or in overcrowded Japan. Somewhere, somewhere else, there were the countries of thought. Somewhere beyond old Europe, itself no longer fertile soil for the ideas of its thinkers …

Ah, its time had come, Old Europe. It was already overdue its time. Old Europe had already outlived itself, was already posthumous. But didn't it dream nonetheless? Didn't it send its dreams back from the other side of death? Were they its dreams, Old Europe's, the Essex postgraduates', W. wonders? Were they the way it dreamt of coming once more to itself, now and in Essex?

Now and in Essex, now and in Essex. W. has always had a waking dream that our country might become the next country of philosophy. He's always dreamt – and he knows it's ridiculous – that something might begin in Britain, a day, the chance of a day. That the sunrays from old Europe, from the sun-touched countries of the south, would burst through our northern clouds. That a heavenly fire might illuminate our ancient landscapes and break across our upturned faces …

Our tears would melt. Our hearts would melt, our knees buckle. Wouldn't we fall into the arms of thought? Wouldn't thought be as easy as falling?

The chance of a day, the promise of a day … How they dreamt in Essex! How ardently they dreamt, the Essex postgraduates. And was it Old Europe that dreamt of itself through them? Was it old Europe that sought to reach them from the other side of death?