“The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks.”
Christopher Hitchens
I truly miss the mind of Christopher Hitchens, who we lost in 2011. I didn’t always agree with what he thought, but I loved how he thought and how deeply read and informed he was on topics he chose to talk about.
With the stunning and abhorrent attack on Salman Rushdie two days ago, I was reminded of the brilliance of Hitchens (and also, tangentially, on the vacuous and populist nature of Boris Johnson’s faux intellectualism) in this clip from question time from about 15 years ago, with the first question that night on whether Salman Rushdie should have received a knighthood. Watch all of it, first for Hitchens dismantling the first answer, then, later, for him demolishing Boris Johnson.
One idea I got from Twitter was to listen to Hitchens as he narrated his audiobooks. I read his autobiography “Hitch 22” shortly after his death. I miss Hitch and how he thinks, so I will listen to this book again soon to hear his voice.
Enjoy the clip, and if you wish to listen to someone who thinks brilliantly, do listen to one of his books.