I was wrong in imagining that what I saw then was what the prehistoric people walking the same land would have seen. But I wasn’t wrong in my pleasure in the idea of continuity, in my daydreams about who had set their feet where I set mine. How do we avoid making prehistory in our own image, how can we open ourselves to what we can’t imagine? I like the kitchen implements, though as I understand it most neolithic dwellings were open-plan, cooking the central activity. The valiant domesticity of cooking and sewing is no antidote to an apocalypse, it is just that the desire for good food and pretty clothes was there at the beginning of humanity and will be with us to the end.

Source: The Irish Times March 02, 2026 13:32 UTC