h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I was just thinking the other day...

Triangles are my favourites - the isosceles ones. They have such stability: tumble them any way and they will always find their feet and come to rest safely and firmly in a reassuring manner. They are a foundation which can be depended and built upon. And if they are hypotenused together - they make a square. Now there is a satisfying psychological wholeness, completeness!

Some say that the circle is the form of perfection because it has no beginning and no end. But to me the circle represents indecision, lack of clarity, confusion; hardly easier to be placed on a given surface than to stand an egg on its end. How can there be true empathy when there is only a single tiny spot of contact? The merest touch before it backs off in revulsion and noli me tangere.

But for the isosceles, there is more. If the hypotenuses are facing outwards and the other two sides are brought together in a foursome - it is still a square! What greater perfection can there be? It is a delight to discover. Of course, it is all due to the rightangle. The right angle.

The equilateral triangle does not hold the same enchantment for me. Whichever way you look at it, it is always the same - no imagination. I can envisage half a dozen of them spinning round in a dizzy, meaningless swarm: philosophy holds no interest for them. And the scalene gives me a headache - no symmetry, no balance, no logical reasoning. I cannot imagine what good a scalene does to anyone.

I will admit that the diamond does have its charms. It is very flirtatious and flashes its eyes whenever it can, and it is easy to be seduced by the cosy way it will cuddle up to its friends, their arms thrown about each other in a mesh of passion. I do not think it likes to be referred to as a parallelogram: certainly, I would never dream of calling it such, for despite its bohemian ways, I feel it does suffer from sensitivity and insecurity.

The pentagon is a very different creature. Elephantine in the weight it bears down, and ponderous and steady in no less measure. I think the earth must be resting on a flotilla of pentagons - and just as well that it is. Imagine if it were resting on ellipses!

Yes, I cannot deny that pentagons are admirable, but I have always preferred something with a bit more creativity - something practical, yet artistic. So I affirm - isoscelism for ever!

Jean