Festival season is nearly upon us. The heated arguments about philosophy, that thrill of one of your icons absolutely nailing that plenary lecture and dropping a few surprise theories into the mix. Pure ecstacy.
No? Well I’m entering a strange period of my life when my summer involves frequenting festivals of an altogether different type. I was lucky enough to spend a few days last week at Sheffield Doc/Fest, grappling with documentaries from the harrowing (massacre of South African miners by armed police in Miners Shot Down) to inspiring (the story of the last lunar landing, in The Last Man on the Moon).
I barely have time to shake off my intellectual hangover before the City of London festival starts, featuring a fortnight of debates taking place inside a giant bowler hat on the big theme of Justice, Money, Power. Maybe I’ll squeeze in a few days in Edinburgh in August, before preparations turn to the Battle of Ideas; the festival of public debate I help organise this autumn at the Barbican. At times it feels like you can hardly move an inch in this fair isle without falling over some new festival of ideas; even Selfridges had one this year.
There’s no disputing that music festivals have the edge on hedonism. But living the dream doesn’t necessarily have to involve sharing a loo with thousands of strangers and choosing what various substances you end up caked in afterwards. There’s less chance of getting an over-friendly pat-down from a drug-hunting security guard at intellectual festivals too (unless you ask).
It’s entirely possible that the young fogey in me is finally winning out. But I’m far from alone. I’ve heard stories of hundreds of students packing into Institut Francais’ 24-hour My Night With Philosophers event, currently on hiatus, to drink and argue about ideas (and even enjoy the odd illicit fag in a corridor like good philosophes). And there was no shortage of lively debates about film, politics and society going on around Doc/Fest’s numerous parties.
What really grinds about so many major UK music festivals today is how sanitized they are. They’ve all but lost the sense of raucous unpredictability and thrilling adventure: that anything might happen under the hell-raising spectre of sex, drugs and rock’n’roll.
In the internet age you know this that gig is one of hundreds your favourite act will be performing throughout the year - and you can watch them all on a million smartphone videos online.
Conversely, in the land of art and ideas pretty much anything may happen. You may stumble upon a film that opens your eyes to a world that had previously lay hidden; be confronted with a point of view you’d never considered and be encouraged to look a little more deeply at the universe. In the white heat of a public debate you might see an intellectual icon suddenly fall from grace as they reveal themselves a superficial charlatan and you might find your new favourite author speaking in a room next door.
If you’re off to Glasto then have a great time having your ears shredded by Metallica: but don’t assume I’m missing out. My own particular festival season might give me more to talk about at the end of it.
The opinions expressed in The Columnist do not necessarily represent those of IdeasTap.
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