Here's some sketches by my very favorite caricaturist, Max Beerbohm. Beerbohm was part of Oscar Wilde's circle and is best known for his humorous essays. He's a terrific writer, very dry and understated: "A tense and peculiar family, the Oedipuses, were they not?" I imagine that I can see his influence on people like Noel Coward, Peter Cook, and Stephen Fry.
According to Wikipedia, Beerbohm's gifts bottomed out when he hit middle age. That's odd. You'd think a dry wit would hit a peak at that time of life. I wonder if he became a stay-at-home like Peter Cook, who's said to have spent his middle years in front of the TV set.BTW, I may be off the net for a day or two. I just got a new Apple computer but I'm a Windows guy and it may take me a couple of days (or more) to get everything hooked up and running. I'll still continue to read comments, even if I'm unable to reply.
Id take anything off of Wikipedia with a salt mine.
ReplyDeleteSo you've gone over to The Apple Side?? I'll be interested to hear how it works out for you.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of Noel Coward, here's a little FYI for you Eddie. Coward was asked to play the namesake role of the first Bond film, Dr.No. He turned down the role with a telegram saying "Dr.No ? No ! No ! No!".
ReplyDeleteGoing from a PC to a Mac is going from a hair-pulling nightmare to sublime bliss, imho. It should't take you any time at all to "get used to it"; it's dead simple. You should have great fun with it.
ReplyDeleteBtw I still have my very first iPod from years ago, a mini, and it works fine--battery never gave out and it has never had any problems. The whole thing about the ephemeral iPod battery is overblown and was addressed by Apple long ago.
As you can guess, I am a big Apple fan.
Peter Cook's problem(and what made him a sort-of "recluse"--he wasn't really, he just didn't care too much about public fame and performing after a while) was alcohol; he was a hopeless alcoholic, it killed him, and he--as he put it "didn't give a toss". He died from internal bleeding at age 57. A great pity to lose his brilliance so early.
If you have any questions about yer mac don't hesitate to call me up, Eddie!
ReplyDeleteGodammit, do I hate Macs.
ReplyDeleteOh, as to Beerbohm, your post inspired me to take Zuleika Dobson, his novel, off the shelf and I can't get over how beautifully written it is. He could write too! ... Kind of like Eddie, come to think of it...
ReplyDeleteLester: Fascinating! I've only read him in excerpts. I'll have to read the book!
ReplyDeleteJenny: Thanks, that helps! I am slowly getting used to it. Really, getting used to a new operating system takes days, maybe weeks of almost undivided attention. As it is, I have to fit it in inbetween doing other things.
I am getting to like it more. The simple things I've done so far aren't an improvement on Windows, but I have to admit that it's kinda fun in a way that Windows isn't. I don't know why that is.
Kali: Many thanks! I appreciate it!
PC: Interesting choice for a villain!