... and so that's the danger of somebody like Nigel Farage, because they can appear reasonable if somebody only sees a certain piece of what they're saying or decides they only want to see a certain piece of it.

And, and in some ways, Maya, that is also those people's A- Achilles heel, and that's why satire like that is actually very serious business.

Because their fundamental need is to be taken seriously, to be seen as great men.

And so to not take them seriously, to laugh at them, is the worst possible thing you can do to someone like Trump, to someone like Farage.

And say a bit more about that

... that was...

So, so what I mean is there may not be a moment when we're out of the woods, Maya, and we have to internalize that.

We have to accept that fascism is a cold sore.

[laughs]

Um, so this is, this is only going one way, really.

And, and then followed a great dark age for a millennium, so let's hope it doesn't get to that.

Um, the, there is something quite Roman about American democracy, I think, with the negatives and positives that entails.

And I think the, the illusion that we labored, um, under in, on this continent for the longest time, especially until Trump 2.0, was that there were safeguards in the Constitution that limited executive power.

And then it turns out you just need a little tweak here and a little tweak there, and to cow everyone into submission, and suddenly executive power is everything.

You can do whatever you want.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

And I was like, "There's this guy called Phaethon who was the son of, uh, the sun god and wanted to drive the sun chariot and kept thinking I'd be great at that, and then ended up stealing it and basically creating the deserts and the polar caps. Um, that's how badly he drove it." And I thought, "That's the right reference." And from that conversation, I got loads of messages from people saying, "Can you just read, um, you know, mythological tales to us please?" (laughs)

Yeah.

... in paintings, in, you know... And there is something fundamental to these tales. It's to do with the human soul, you know? It's to do with our flaws, our foibles, the way in which we are strong and the way in which we are weak.... that are universal. And, you know, next w- next weekend is the story of Orpheus, you know, which is all about the civilizing effect of music and how you can use music to defeat even death, as it were.