19. Read carefully the following extract from Home and Garden (June 1973).

Setting up a house or flat with period furniture in mind frequently results in the mood that everything must be done 'in period'. This is, of course, ridiculous. Anyone overloaded with that kind of passion for historical accuracy should give up sound plumbing, central heating and refrigeration and carry on with oil lamps, open fires and an ice-house in the garden.
Far better to use judgement. The only worthwhile reason for choosing period furniture is not that it will appreciate in time (although that's a pleasant side-thought) but, first, that you like it to look at and, second, that it's useful.
The reasons why we like looking at period furniture ~ould probably need a highly trained psychiatrist to work out. A sense of modest permanence in our increasingly impermanent world comes into it, no doubt, as does pride of ownership. On the visual plane, things are easier to explain. That patina* for example can never be equalled in a modern piece.

(a) Do you think this extract was written mainly for people who dislike period furniture, like it, or know nothing about it? What would you say is the author's attitude to it? Give your reasons in roughly 10 to 20 lines.

(b) What do you think the writer of the extract would say to people who express regret for the 'good old days' of two or three hundred years ago, when life was more peaceful and simple?

(c) Explain in your own words what you understand by the following words and phrases as used and italicised in the extract: period furniture; it will appreciate; psychiatrist; modest permanence.

(d) Imagine that you are the editor of Home and Garden. Make any comments to the author of the extract that you feel are relevant.
You may be favourable or unfavourable, depending on your personal reaction. There is no 'right' answer; you are merely asked to consider the style, the English, the presentation of the subject.
*patina= richly shining surface