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There’s much to be said for nostalgia

Instead of condemning it as dangerous fantasy, two new books argue that we should welcome nostalgia as ‘emotional armour’ in a fast-changing world

11 May 2024

9:00 AM

11 May 2024

9:00 AM

Nostalgia: A History of a Dangerous Emotion Agnes Arnold-Forster

Picador, pp.288, 22

Yesterday: A New History of Nostalgia Tobias Becker

Harvard, pp.320, 29.95

Michel Barnier, the chief negotiator for the EU Commission, called Brexit an expression of ‘hope for a return to a powerful global Britain, nostalgia for the past’ – a mood that ‘serves no purpose in politics’. Popular historians have echoed his view of nostalgia as a syndrome which affects declining societies such as Great Britain.

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