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@user14265
Wasn't amazing – feel like I've learnt considerably more from this messageboard than from the talks – but definitely worth doing. Not least for the feeling of entitlement to the road on the journey home.
Patrick Field was best speaker by far.
Bella Bathurst provided good primer.
Cox was plodding, but well meaning.
Obree's talk was really jangled, but his answers to questions made him seem a lot more thoughtful. Apart from the road tax thing.
Self provided an entertaining but futile display in onanism.
Oh, and Geoff Dyer was utterly charming and entirely lucid.
The only other time I've been to an Intelligence Squared event was to hear PJ O'Rourke talk about politics, and as he's a republican (albeit a sort of democrat sanctioned republican) I assumed the high turnout of apparently Tory audience members was something to do with that. Now I suspect it might be something to do with the areas of London they're held in. It would be interesting to see if they put on a talk in Hackney whether it would still be attended by a majority of Cressidas and Jeremys. If it was, then it's probably down to the organisers' political leanings.
Got pounced on at the door and asked to sign up for the newsletter by some ferocious & precocious young people who look like they hang out with royalty. Their rounded syllables and obnoxious politeness disabled my defences and I signed it. GOD DAMN IT!