in the beginning

This is the first.
To mark the publication of my book Christ to Coke. How Images Becomes Icon (Oxford University Press in October), I am starting a blog - something I have been intended to do for years.  There is not set agenda, just opinions, some rational,  some instinctive.
Something social/political to start.
Re the riots in English cities (not Scotland). It is widely said that there is a "class" of young person detached from normal society.  As someone who lives in that "normal" society, whatever that may mean, I feel more detached from the mega-rich, the financiers and chief executives whose wealth remorselessly increases independently of the worth of their contribution. Just being there is enough if you are big enough, powerful enough. Just being there for the "rioters" was also enough - enough to slip further into a morass of hopelessness.