25 replies to this topic

[FoodDabbler]

derek walcott's preferred nickname for v.s naipaul: "v.s. nightfall".

Nightfall is an old putdown. Here's the more recent mongoose.
Listen from 35:35. The insults are neither awesome nor sophisticated,
but there are some moderately good moments.

[FoodDabbler]

BBC Interviewer: Sir Arthur [Eddington], you are said to be one of the three people in the world who understand general relativity.
AE, after pause: Who is the third?

I know a variant of this story (from S. Chandrasekhar's collected papers).
The funnier aspect of it for me is that Eddington's grasp of general
relativity was not as good as he thought it was. He failed, for example,
to understand the existence of black holes. He was in good company,
however. Einstein, the other person who understood relativity, didn't
understand this aspect either of his own theory.

[g.johnson]

"Dog-felching oxygen thief"

The Balic.

ETA: Not directed at FoodDabbler, to be clear.

[fentona]

From the recent NYT article on literary feuds:

Mailer laid out his longtime nemesis Gore Vidal with a punch at a dinner party. (“Words fail Norman Mailer yet again,” Mr. Vidal retorted from his supine position.)

[rancho_gordo]

From the recent NYT article on literary feuds:

Mailer laid out his longtime nemesis Gore Vidal with a punch at a dinner party. (“Words fail Norman Mailer yet again,” Mr. Vidal retorted from his supine position.)

Is Vidal a good writer? I know he's a good character and interesting but what's a good book he's written?

[Stone]

Burr was great.

[hollywood]

Burr was great.

Aaron or Raymond?

[rancho_gordo]

Burr was great.

Perfect. Gracias.
I read 1876, I think it was called. It was around the time of the Bicentennial and it was supposed to show the parallels of corruption and the democracy teetering on disaster, just as it seemed in 1976. The plot was fine but the dialog was horrible. I was 16 but I remember this clearly. I'll give Burr a chance.

[Stone]

Well, I was 22 when I read Burr, . . .

[g.johnson]

From the recent NYT article on literary feuds:

Mailer laid out his longtime nemesis Gore Vidal with a punch at a dinner party. (“Words fail Norman Mailer yet again,” Mr. Vidal retorted from his supine position.)

Is Vidal a good writer? I know he's a good character and interesting but what's a good book he's written?

His historical novels (the only ones I've read -- to teach myself US history) are great fun but his essays are what make him great. His memoir, Palimpsest, is also very fine.

[balex]

Do you know C.S. Lewis? In case you don't, let me offer a brief character sketch. Envisage
(if you can) a man who combines the face and figure of a hog-reeve or earth-stopper with
the mind and thought of a Desert Father of the fifth century, preoccupied with meditations of
inelegant theological obscenity: a powerful mind warped by erudite philistinism, blackened
by systematic bigotry, and directed by a positive detestation of such profane frivolities as
art, literature and (of course) poetry: a purple-faced bachelor and misogynist, living alone
in rooms of inconceivable hideousness, secretly consuming vast quantities of his favourite
dish - beefsteak-and-kidney-pudding; periodically trembling at the mere apprehension of a
feminine footfall; and all the while distilling his morbid and illiberal thoughts into volumes
of best-selling prurient religiosity and such reactionary nihilism as is indicated by the gleeful
title, The Abolition of Man. Such is C.S. Lewis, whom Magdalen College have now put up to
recapture their lost monopoly of the chair of Poetry.

Hugh Trevor-Roper writing to Berenson -- a friend just sent this to me.