Listening to Patrick Ness at the Hay Festival I asked myself whether utopian thinking is only for the ‘young adult’ market. True, a modicum of innocence helps if one is considering what kind of world we want to live in, but it takes courage to still insist on the possibility of change when one does so from the vantage point of experience. William Blake knew it, Hermann Hesse explored it in the Glass Bead Game, and now Patrick Ness has taken up the challenge. Impressive!

You are only young once, they say, but doesn’t it go on for a long time? More years that you can bear. (Hilary Mantel)