 |
My time with the Nissan Qashqai was brief, but was enough to remind me that, more than ever before, cars are becoming amorphous, photo-fit facsimiles of each other. I sound like one of those past-dwelling denialists who complained that “they all look the bloody same”. I am my own Grandfather, and I claim my £5.
I fear it may be the truth, though, but for very different reasons now to how it was in the 1940s. Towards the end of the ‘30s, and in that immediate post-war era progress was priority number one and the old-look of separate fenders and coffin-style engine compartment was consigned to the dustbin of the past. It was replaced by all-encompassing bodywork so the whole was more cohesive. It was this styled-by-the-wind new order, and the fact that everybody was chasing the same ideal that “lost” the quirkiness and “individuality” that cars had enjoyed since Mr Benz first motorized his tricycle. It happens every generation, and it’s happening again now.
