“Nasty, brutish and short is how Thomas Hobbes described the life of man. It is also how a friend of mine described Noel Edmonds but that need not detain us now. The complete Hobbes gag is actually even darker, mentioning such joys as ‘continuall feare and danger of violent death’, building up to the punch line where life is labelled ‘solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short. Good stuff, Tom but I wouldn’t open with it.” (Guardian)