Let’s face it: the halcyon world to which many people are so eager to return – before, say, the European Union or the United Nations or even the nation-state – never really existed. As Marcel Proust noted: “Remembrance of things past is not necessarily the remembrance of things as they were.”
我们必须面对现实：人们如此渴望回归的宁静世界——欧盟、联合国甚至是民族国家建立前的世界——从来就没有存在过。就像普鲁斯特所说的那样：“对过去的回忆不一定反映过去本来的样子。”我们对过去进行了删减和美化，才让它在今天的混乱和痛苦面前更具吸引力。