The ghosts of Wembley past
Going to Wembley on Saturday. Will be listening for echoes of the legendary 1966 World Cup Final. Will keep an ear open for resonances of the classic 1975 FA Cup Final between the flamboyant West Ham, and Fulham, their uncompromising London rivals. But of all the past Wembley events, it's the one that took place on Saturday 12 July 1986 that we regret most having missed. Queen were in their heaven and Freddie Mercury, RIP, gave the performance of a lifetime. Immortal, this.
"These are the days it never rains but it pours," Freddie sang. And Michel de Montaigne wrote: "Let us disarm death of his novelty and strangeness, let us converse and be familiar with him, and have nothing so frequent in our thoughts as death. Upon all occasions represent him to our imagination in his every shape; at the stumbling of a horse, at the falling of a tile, at the least prick with a pin, let us presently consider, and say to ourselves, 'Well, and what if it had been death itself?' and, thereupon, let us encourage and fortify ourselves." That to Study Philosophy Is to Learn To Die.
