A Letter from Pen Clements, Writer, Australia
Dear Sir David,
You know that question, ‘If you could invite whoever you wanted to a dinner party, who would you choose?’
Well, I would like to have you at the head of my table. In fact, I wouldn’t invite anyone else because I’d rather have you all to myself.
If you were my honoured guest, I would ask you about the changes you’ve seen in your lifetime travelling our planet. I would ask you to expand on your statement from ‘Can We Save Planet Earth?’
‘In the past, we didn’t understand the effect of our actions. Unknowingly, we sowed the wind and now, literally, we are reaping the whirlwind. But we no longer have that excuse: now we do recognise the consequences of our behaviour. Now surely, we must act to reform it — individually and collectively, nationally and internationally — or we doom future generations to catastrophe.’
I would listen to your answers, because there is one thing I am sure of. No-one can replace you. Not just because you are unique, but because your documentaries are. No-one will make them again.They are records of a vanishing world.
I bought your book, ‘Life on Earth,’ when I was a teenager. I went on to study geography, then anthropology. I watched as many of your documentaries as I could. Now I have teenagers of my own and they watch them too.
Those documentaries (and your voice) have formed a continuous background thread through my life, through my own work in the environmental field and the fiction I write. I am grateful for it.
Thank you.
Queensland, Australia
@penclements
