A 90-Year-Old John Berger is Not Surprised By President Trump

It is with great sadness we’ve learned that John Berger has died at the age of 90. The following conversation took place with Paul Holdengraber on November 11.

John Berger talks with Paul Holdengraber about President Donald Trump, the emptiness of American political commentary, desire, place, and how the hell to keep going.

John Berger on Trump’s win…
In such a climate, somebody who is actually saying something, who seems to suggest that there may be a connection between what he said and what he will do, such a person is a way out of a vacuous nightmare—even if the way out is dangerous or vicious… The less hot air you make and the more tangible you are the better chance you have at this moment.

John Berger on the American electorate’s anger towards the elite…
They are angry at the elite not because it’s the elite in the old fashion way—the elites have always been criticizable or suspected—but because it’s the elite that talks and talks and talks and there is no connection between his talk and his actions and what is really happening in the world. So it’s a kind of elitism which is an abstraction.

John Berger on what keeps him going…
The next job, the next task. Because I’m always so involved and also collaborating in many, many ways with many different people on many different levels. So what keeps me going is the next page.

John Berger on desire…
I think that all desire, including sexual, is the desire to be in a certain place, if only a place consumes us and gives us energy. But when I say place I don’t mean a geographical place… It’s where your finger fits or where your foot rests.