Sir, – Jennifer O’Connell writes that “we need to stop talking about the weather and start shouting about climate” (“The climate in Ireland has become a year-long autumn”, Opinion & Analysis, August 5th).
A better world is possible, even in difficult times.
The fundamental challenge pre-dates current climate awareness. Greek poet Odysseus Elytis, in his 1979 Nobel lecture, stated that “the times are dismal”, but “it is in the inside of this world that the other world is contained” – a “second reality situated above the one where we live unnaturally.” John Moriarty wrote in Dreamtime that “the otherworld and this world are one world”.
Ceasing to “live unnaturally” and seeing the world differently are essential. As Jennifer O’Connell writes, “there is hope and it isn’t too late to act”. Elytis maintained that “the essential has remained. It remains”. Moriarty added that “we have a centre that will hold”.
‘My son is getting married in the summer, and the likelihood is that I’m going to be able to see that’
Oscars 2026: Will Hamnet with Paul Mescal and Jessie Buckley get a best picture nomination?
The welcome I received from Jennifer Johnston is something I will never forget
Is it true that women need more sleep each night than men?
It seems that a fundamental shift in human consciousness is finally occurring, finding its conscious roots in clear evidence of the climate crisis in our lives. Its unconscious roots lie in Elytis’s “essential” and Moriarty’s “centre”, both of which will hold – or, more accurately, both of which can be held – if we find the vision to do so. We will. – Yours, etc,
BRENDAN KELLY,
Professor of Psychiatry,
Trinity College Dublin,
Dublin 2.
