>...a brilliant and utterly coruscating essay published in the NY Times by Pankaj Mishra a writer and polemicist from India who situates the crisis in English post-colonial delusion <Thanks, David. You are right that Brexit is the UK's post-imperial hangover come home to roost. Have spent my adult life waiting for Brits to wake up in this regard and I am not convinced that even this will do the job. In the early twentieth century, the strongest political and intellectual opposition to the Empire came from Ireland, India and South Africa and the first two are still the best source. Apart from Pankaj Mishra, Fintan O'Toole is keeping up the good work with his book, Heroic Failure: Brexit and the politics of pain. Ireland is noted for its literary Nobel prize-winners and he is well up to standard. His latest article came out today: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jan/18/europe-brexit-britain-state-politics-fit-for-purpose
O'Toole's point -- that Brexit was never about Europe, but rather about the home political dispensation -- is one that I have been making for two decades. I call it the creeping constitutional crisis of the cruel historical experiment, the United Kingdom. I wrote "Where once was an empire" soon after the 2016 referendum result: https://www.academia.edu/29662300/Where_once_was_an_empire_on_Brexit_
Best,
Keith
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