In a piece about radical Manchester - including a reference to 'the TUC building in Major Street... [where] Francis Fukuyama once did a reading... about the end of history', an occasion at which I was present - there's this quip from Mark Twain:
I would like to live in Manchester. The transition between Manchester and Death would be unnoticeable.Hey! Not true. Or, at least, no longer true. (More Manchester quotes here.)