Houston, we have a problem. It’s about ageing. In less than one week we’ve had London’s premier visitor attraction, Tate Modern, announcing that its forthcoming “anti-ageing” festival will include a chance for pensioners to enjoy the high-risk art of parkour, while, across the Pond, Nasa scientists have gone gaga about the possibility that ageing can be slowed by the simple process of spending lengthy periods of time in outer space.
To the parkour first. The activity, initially practised in the banlieues of Paris and made famous in the opening scene of Casino Royale (Daniel Craig’s Bond chasing his quarry over rooftops, walls and cranes), is a dangerous form of street gymnastics.
It is, essentially, the art of wall-bashing, body-flinging mayhem and its popularity has coincided
