The Time Traveller's Strife

Olly Mann considers the reality of life in another era, and decides he’s better off staying put…

IF YOU COULD LIVE IN ONE HISTORICAL ERA, which would you choose?

Perhaps you’d be Victorian, at the vanguard of industrialisation; or a Renaissance artist, painting pious pictures of breasts; or even an Ancient, slaughtering goats for Apollo en route to a packed performance of Antigone.

Not I. Whenever I’m chucked this dinner party curve ball, my response is identical: right now. Yep, of all eras of history, I’d choose to live in the age of Right Now; despite our political instability, our culture of celebrity, our “freakshakes”, PPI and laminate flooring. Partly this is because I know my forebears scratched a living in ghettos, so it’s hard to imagine myself enjoying an especially attractive lifestyle in ye olden days. (My great-grandfather supposedly remarked, when arriving from Russia in the 1890s, that Britain was great because “nobody spits at you in the street”.)

But I’d also choose Right Now because this era is so obviously, evidently, quantifiably better. Improvements in medicine are manifold: we live longer, keyhole surgery is routine, polio is effectively eradicated. Equal rights, admittedly, are somewhat work-in-progress, but broadly speaking, Westerners have the right to work, reside and vote as we please, regardless of gender, sexuality, or ethnicity.