I love J.G Ballard, and I read and re-read his books almost all the time. Even though he was a genius, he was also very prolific and, occasionally, his typewriter ran away with him a bit and you end up with the odd daft line. In this new, (very) occasional, series, I will be mercilessly highlighting the occasional Ballard balls up and why not, as, after all, I have approximately one thousandth of his talent (I'm being generous), so I might as well take the piss.
Right, let's start off with a line that leapt out at me as I read it in the bath -
'In a sense all fish are images of ourselves seen in the sea's mirror'.
From 'Deep End', written in 1961 but collected in 'The Terminal Beach' (1964). It's an interesting story about an Earth in terminal decline because its natural resources have been stripped to enable the colonisation of other planets. As a result, the atmosphere has been depleted, the temperature greatly increased, and the seas and oceans reduced to strips and pools of brackish water. Two men find a fish, perhaps the last fish on Earth, but before they can rescue it some kids kill it with a brick.
That's all. For now.
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