Tag: dailyprompt-2159

The dilemma of the Fallen or the Thrown: the idiocy of happiness or free self-possession and self- regulation in a world of horror and gloom.

December 21, 2025

Gustave Doré’s version of Satan after the Fall may be thinking: ‘Am I happy here?’ Those of us who refuse the blandishments of comforting religions still appreciate the call of bliss, so called, of perfect and unqualified satisfaction and that superfluous emotion we call joy. We all now live in a world into which we … More The dilemma of the Fallen or the Thrown: the idiocy of happiness or free self-possession and self- regulation in a world of horror and gloom.

The ‘happiness Tsar’: the ideology of well-being despite every circumstance.

December 12, 2024

Photo by Rick Pushinsky of Richard Layard: the ‘happiness Tsar’ under the Tony Blair regime from Annie Maccoby Berglof article in ‘The Financial Times’ ( September 12 2014) available at: https://www.ft.com/content/b1d0b140-3386-11e4-85f1-00144feabdc0 We hear much less of ‘happiness’ since the termination of the Blair-Brown government but perhaps it will return under Keir Starmer, who needs an ideology to … More The ‘happiness Tsar’: the ideology of well-being despite every circumstance.