My first assignment was eyeing old potatoes. The Siegler brothers would buy potatoes so old they looked like an octopus. My job was to make them look presentable and, of course, sellable.

Only the Pet Shop Boys can sing jabberwocky lines like “I thought I heard a train/Down in the cemetery/Cellophane” and make them sound sexy and evil.

A meteor in the hazy air / Play’d before his path; / Before him now it roll’d / A globe of livid fire […] Anon to Thalaba it mov’d, / And wrapt him in its pale innocuous fire.

...whilst on the side of a few there are ostentation and exclusiveness and the proud-heartedness that thrives on pity, not love, and on the side of the many there are envy, ignorance and suspicion.