It was a miserable weekend weather wise and that’s a time when people perhaps take to social media more often.
I chanced on a Facebook discussion about what things people found boring.
One comment indicated that a combination the Archers, myself and letters about beards was definitely in the boring zone.
Personally I’m not entirely adverse to boring.
In a world where everything is of the moment and full of excitement taking time not to get caught up in all that may be tedious but ultimately useful.
How this relates to beards and letters is a point further.
The long standing Private Eye stereotype is that men with beards are pedantic and boring.
Some are of course and some are not. The beard probably is not central to the matter even if the Beard Liberation Front may sometimes claim it is.
Are letters boring? I’m hardly the best person to judge…
Anyway here is a letter about beards that appears in today’s Guardian:
While Nietzsche’s moustache was impressive (Letters, 15 February), it does raise questions about his philosophy. First, if he had spent less time shaving, he could have devoted more time to developing potentially great ideas. Second, it is surely the case that the best male philosophers had beards, the stroking and tweaking of which allowed them to produce their best work.
Keith Flett
Tottenham, London
More boring letters about beards (Guardian 18th February)
Keith Flett’s assertion that the best male philosophers had beards does not hold up to scrutiny (Letters, 17 February). How does he explain the clean-shaven Immanuel Kant, Bertrand Russell, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Jean-Paul Sartre, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and many others?
Adrian Brodkin
London
• On the correlation between beards and philosophy, I have found that there is a period of tranquillity to be savoured in the morning, with the razor in hand. Life’s many problems are seen from a different perspective and unexpected inspirations can appear in that moment of clarity. A rushed shave is a bad shave and beards are for weekends.
Duncan Roberts
Belford, Northumberland
Leave a Reply