When talking on telly there’s no better look
than standing in front of a case full of books,
but the question to ponder, whenever you do,
is “What does your backdrop convey about you?”
Are you plebby and common, or posh and well-heeled?
Which tomes do you own? Which texts do you wield?
You can preach and pontificate all that you like,
it will all go to pot with that stray David Icke.
Have you gone and committed a terrible blooper
by leaving in plain sight an old Jilly Cooper?
Chuck out the trivial! Ditch the chick-lit,
and think of the vibes that you wish to transmit.
Perhaps you might think that your liberal credentials
are bolstered and buttressed by trusty essentials
like Engels and Chomsky and Bentham and Marx,
but a stray David Irving will dampen such sparks.
Perhaps you aspire to be avant garde?
So pose with some Beckett, it’s surely not hard.
But does the whole edifice topple straight down
with that old Mills and Boon you’ve left lying around?
And does your collection give watchers a basis
for chalking you down as a whacking great racist?
No matter your wit and no matter your verve,
it will all be undone by Charles Murray’s ‘Bell Curve’,
for when talking on telly there’s no better look
than standing in front of a case full of books.
But the question to ponder, whenever you do,
is “What does your backdrop convey about you?”
