Professor Giles Snark

Dear Wider, Non-academic Public, Forgive the intrusion into your forum of Mr. Fartin, I believe he used to be a student of mine. I am Professor Giles Snark, Director of the Coldplay Studies MA programme at the University of Croydon. Mr. Fartin, I surmise, fell under the influence of a colleague of mine, one Sir Humphry Doorstopper, who lectured once or twice at the college, and tried to plague the department with his dissenting ideas. Doorstopper, a Wagnerian at heart, felt that if there is to be bombast, there must be content that necessitates it, and he declared that our object of study on the course fell a tad short of this ideal. Fortunately, the man perished before he could publish, though his ideas disseminated via the more radical students, like young Mr. Fartin here. Upon finding the late Sir Humphry’s notes, my colleagues and I discussed the matter over pipes and beards in the Coldplay Studies common room. I read the abstract aloud to my audience: “Does Chris Martin blow hot air? This thesis poses the above question and attempts to answer it. I believe that Chris Martin blows hot air. His words, at a glance, appear to have great import, but merely mask the fact that he has nothing to say. Frequently, they amount to nonsense. Worse, in his lyrics, Mr. Martin posits himself almost as a seer, suggesting that he can lead his listeners to some ill-defined new age of understanding and enlightenment. Such condescension stirs anger within the hearts of men and leads the finest of them to spit on busses. Like other so-called founts of spiritual wisdom, he climbed to this position in order to lunch with Madonna and sip lattes in Primrose Hill cafes. The music surrounding is itself but a sometimes loud and always empty front of nothingness. Mr. Martin is a charlatan. Harumph.” Thankfully, Sir Humphry did not live to finish his work. I admit it might be foolhardy to address such topics to the partisan fora, but in the interest of disinterested truth, I feel that knowledge of such arguments can only make us stronger and more virile. Any questions, please address to my secretary, Mrs Farmley-Butterworth. I shall be watching the Watchmen this evening. Oh, that Comedian! What a cad. Yours, as ever, Professor Giles Snark