Saturday, 29 December 2007

Jackie and I spent a quiet day recovering from the turmoil of Christmas. I finished reading Lords of Humankind by V. G. Kiernan, an exploration (rather superficial, I thought) of how the "white" races regarded themselves (and were regarded by others) in the imperial age.

The footnotes and references are the most eccentric I can remember - common knowledge is often annotated in absurd patronising detail, some footnotes reference private discussions the author has had with his friends, many contentious statements are left entirely unsupported, and in one footnote the author simply says he has found no evidence to support a statement he’s made in the main text!

I guess this might have been V. G. Kiernan’s PhD thesis; I wonder if he passed?