Culture & Celebrity (books)

A postscript to Celine’s earlier mention of Rough Guides tackling the issue of global warming. After the company put out a book on the topic late last year, founding editor Mark Ellingham sent off a copy to every British member of parliament and ask them for their thoughts on what the UK should do about the issue. Remarkably he elicited responses from 318 of them. And Rough Guide then published their replies online. Inspired by that feedback, Mark has decided to send copies to every US Senator, as well as to parliamentarians in Australia and New Zealand. And seems that plans are afoot to publish foreign language editions too, so elected officials in France, Germany, Italy and Spain should also prepare to answer the questions “How important a concern is climate change? What can this country do to make a difference? and What steps do you plan to take (or have you taken), in your constituency, and as an individual?" One of the British pollies, Richard Benyon, had this to say, “Climate Change is the defining issue of our age. Previous generations had to deal with the rise of Nazism or communism. This is the issue on which my generation of politicians will be judged. This is our Dunkirk.” In case your world history is a bit rusty, Dunkirk was when British troops had their backs to the wall (or the English Channel, more precisely) in the early days of WWII. Hopefully it is an apt analogy — from a position of despair Britain rallied and eventually saw off a challenge which threatened their well being. ::Rough Guide to Climate Change and also at Amazon USA.