Essays in Idleness

My prospect of living to be sixty-eight looks very good at the moment, for tomorrow will be my sixty-eighth birthday. Granted, I continue to be quite weak, and somewhat addled, from my recent experience of cardiac surgery, but my son and sister have resolved to take me on a modest outing, which my son has described as an “adventure.”

I have decided, on balance, not to rename these squibs the “Essays in Addleness,” but my intention to add to them waits until I become more coherent. This, I know, will be a judgement call, but I postpone until I judge myself capable of even typing without gross errors. For instance I have noticed I had to correct several typos in the last sentence, and I have probably left more as a favour to my critics.

Reading is my preferred ambitious hobby. The books are my older inspirations, for instance Rudyard Kipling’s Kim, which previously enchanted my childhood in Lahore. And I have re-read the Tsurezuregusa, or “Essays in Idleness” (more exactly, “Nothing Better To Do”) by the 14th-century Buddhist recluse, Kenkō — in those moments when I have found the Breviarium Romanum too taxing. Also, Dobson’s translation of Mencius, which is an almost exact transciption of my political opinions, albeit dated.

From other dippings into Oriental history I have constructed a universal account of the fate of this world. The poets and philosophers sometimes rule, very briefly. But they will be displaced, inevitably, when they create an opportunity for power-hungry thugs. Those who seek a worldly Utopia, do not understand this.