“The more dignity is widely and freely available in a society,” philosophy’s Alain de Botton once declared, “the less people want to be famous.”
Oddly, this isn’t the trailer line he has gone with for his latest symposium, a conversation with Katie Price, for which tickets cost £30. Alain is to interview Katie on stage at his School of Life, for an event he describes as an unconventional “meeting of minds”.
On that we can certainly agree. Unless that was supposed to be a subconsciously self-regarding little joke at Katie’s expense, in which case, I think we can agree even more vigorously.
However the event passes off, Katie must not fall into her usual trap of denigrating the experience afterwards, given Alain’s hard-won reputation for the defensive. As he once responded to a book review: “I will hate you till the day I die and wish you nothing but ill will in every career move you make. I will be watching with interest and schadenfreude.”
Indeed, why not give the audience an ice-breaking game to play, in which they are shown various statements and asked… “Who said it? Katie Price to an ex-husband, or Alain de Botton to a critic?”
