Courtesy of Charlie Brooker in The Guardian: 'This week Charlie accidentally got drunk and speculated wildly and offensively about an ongoing news event, breaking into song as he did so, at the top of his voice, in a pub.' We need to see more of this. Mr Brooker will receive a warm welcome at the Muted Slughorn.
As if the African farming community didn't have enough on their plate... An unfortunate turn of phrase. I'll try again: (Clears throat) AS IF the farming community of Nachu, in Kenya, did not have enough to be getting on with, the female contingent of the village are now being menaced by an influx of monkey sex-pests. 'The monkeys grab their breasts, and gesture at us while pointing at their private parts,' complained one woman. There is widespread concern among the local people, but, perversely, the first thought that struck me on reading this unhappy tale was that we should all, perhaps, be taking the Great Ape Personhood movement more seriously. In fact, the common-and-garden variety monkeys are excluded from proposals, but one wonders whether their case should not be reviewed in light of their exhibiting an advanced and highly-sophisticated facility with comedic sexual vulgarity and chauvinist backchat. Or perhaps Australian men should simply be downgraded.
None of my numerous get rich quick schemes is bearing fruit, and the duns and bailiffs are closing in, so I have regrettably been forced to seek gainful employment as a typist and part time waiter. This will have obvious ramifications on the frequency of my posting, but I'm sure you will all cope. I took a break from my hectic schedule last night to watch The Last Confession, which is about the surprising and unexpected death of John Paul I, and stars David Suchet. We were encouraged, at least implicitly, to warm toward the short-lived Pope because of his liberal views, particularly regarding birth control. Could it be that the likability of a given Pope is inversely proportional to how Catholic he is?
I'm currently angry about the plan to build a statue of Nelson Mandela outside the Palace of Westminster. I suppose I have to state my compulsory respect for St Mandela (the respect is actually genuine, though I hate the odour of sanctity which surrounds him, and which C list celebrities, who wouldn't know Biko or de Klerk from Adam, flock to inhale), but I don't see why a South African hero should get a statue in London. If we are going to be motivated by craven post-colonial guilt and liberal self abasement let's at least build a statue of Gandhi or (and I like this idea) a wild haired Mau Mau freedom fighter, in other words people who enacted a genuine change in British history. There is room for many a statue of Mandela in South Africa, and maybe even a few more in London, but to erect a monument outside Parliament is nothing less than creepy. Imagine if the Japan put up a statue of the Duke of Wellington outside their parliament, would we be flattered, or would we think them either ingratiating or insane?
For several months I've been a-nose-scratching over the numerous examples of supposed racial/religious provocation, and the number of people who publicly start bonfires under their collars at every opportunity. There was the problem of the Birmingham Sikhs who stormed a theatre after a performance depicting sexual abuse in a gurdwara - laughable, I know! But it's hardly the first time the Sikhs have resorted, en masse, to violent and unreasonable measures. Later we all had to endure an enormous, self-indulgent Islamic whinge-along about those irreverant Denmark cartoons, about which I can sum up my feelings in either of two considered phrases: Free Press. Fuck Off. The Moslem 'bath of their own tears' love-in was at least a rational response - albeit overblow - to their censorship of the prophet's image. Now, there are Christians and, puzzlingly, Hindus protesting over a Malaysian cartoon of Jesus smoking a cigarette and brandishing a can of lager. I would go so far as to suggest that those protesting are perhaps without a sense of humour. In any case, last time I looked - though in the Labour Britain's political climate, one could be forgiven for thinking otherwise - smoking was not a moral transgression. Ultimately - and perhaps a new addition should be made to our manifesto - religious sensibilites are a myth! No-one really cares about insensitive images, they just crave an excuse to waggle their swollen religious identities at the rest of the world.
Just as I was beginning to be able to translate freely from Delhi English into English English, the itchy feet propelled me Punjabwards. Inadvisedly, I failed to get out of Amritsar after the first day, and am now looking at a second night of (albeit air-conditioned) hell in the dusty nightmare of the north-west. Amritsar is host to the very beautiful Sikh enclosure of the Golden Temple, but the Sikh religion is one of spectacular morbidity and unwarranted fanaticism. The ethos of the the creed is constructive, but for a religious group that worships a piece of paper, one cannot help feeling that the Sikhs take themselves a little too seriously. And in light of the seemingly slight differences between between their faith and the predominant Hindu inclination (they share the same objectives and the same notion of a formless/everyshaped deity, although Sikhism is without the perceived idolatrous clutter of Hinduism), and the lack of hostility on either side of the religious divide, the call for an independent nation of Khalistan seems about as reasonable as a Dorset secession movement...can you imagine: 'We will not rest until we have claimed our right to a freer, stronger, independent Dorset!'
I'm bemused by the idea circulating in various film reviews that we need to decide which is better, Bond or Borne. This kind of ranking is moronic: both franchises serve up similar thrills and compared to, say, The Princess Diaries or Dude Where's my Car? they are very clearly aiming at the same demographics. The Bourne Identity clearly shows the influence of the Bond films (namely in the idea that espionage involves climbing up walls in black outfits and handling firearms rather than asking questions).
I am a great fan of the Bourne films, after watching the Bourne Identity I simply couldn't believe no-one had told me about it, however I can't help but rail at some of the claims made by Brenden O'Neill in Spiked. Bourne is not nearly as clever as its ravishing grey and blue photography makes it look: like the film Ronin it hides the heart of a balls to the wall action film behind muted colour tones and a 'classy' European setting. The films are much less clued up on post-Cold War politics than O'Neill claims them to be. Any film which portrays the CIA as a powerful and threatening force, rather than a hunted, haunted entity completely failing to combat international threat while its authority at home is steadily eroded by an unfriendly White House does not have its finger on the pulse. Washington is far more of an international force than Langley Falls could ever hope to be. Bourne is a much less complex hero than O'Neil gives him credit for, he stands reliably against government organisations who are almost always shown to be malicious without cause. The Bourne films fail to engage with the depressing reality that grim and despicable as American and Western foreign policy may appear to be, it is often our only bulwark against the greater evils of Communist or Islamist aggression.
I'm working on putting together a half-way readable review of Thomas Pynchon's Against the Day. In the meantime, for you enjoyment, I give you Proverbs for Paranoids, culled sensitively from Gravity's Rainbow:
1. You may never get to touch the Master, but you can tickle his creatures.
2. The innocence of the creatures is in inverse proportion to the immorality of the Master.
3. If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about answers.
4. You hide, they seek.
5. Paranoids are not paranoid because they're paranoid, but because they keep putting themselves, fucking idiots, deliberately into paranoid situations.
I enjoyed Mick Hume's most recent article in spiked. However, I'm left torn over issues such as 'awareness ribbons'. I hate anyone who wears one, or at least I would if I didn't know lots of generally decent people who do wear them, but I find it hard to scoff at the whole concept of 'awareness'. If any positive change is bought about in Darfur by UN intervention then we can thank the medias interest in the region, compared to, say, the Congo which is far harder and more dangerous to get cameras into. Take the Poppy Day phenomenon: I don't wear a poppy because I don't see any particular need to remember the first world war, but I do give money to the collectors more often than I give to any other charity can janglers because I don't want to think that I'm refusing the Poppy for reasons of parsimony. The cause is a good one, and they've pried some money from me which would no doubt have gone on drink, and indirectly the entire Poppy gimmick is to thank for it.
I visited the lavatory of a London pub, and while urinating I noticed a machine selling 'novelty condoms', including what looked in the picture like condoms with clown faces on them. I dread to think what sort of man would look at his equipment and think 'It's good but it could do with being funnier'.
Some artists gain fame by their elusive, boundry-breaking genius, some by their obsessive dedication to the detail. Some, however, are just in the right place at the right time. Case in point: Andrea Della Robia, probably the only Old Master whose work I would pay a gallery owner to take out of my house.
In concert with Hamilton's exposure of Metropolitan idiocy and double standards, I find it objectionable that the police will freely propose new and uncomfortable restrictions on our lives every time they decide they don't like an aspect of their job. Crucially, the post-adolescent years between 18 & 21 are (give or take a cheeky annum) most people's bright college days, in which we live in unfortunate and sometimes electric proximity to the permanent residents of provincial towns and villages. It is important to usher as many of us as possible into pubs and clubs on any given evening, where we can do less damage to ourselves and innocent bystanders. And whatever happens, we will get hold of the stuff - without delay or exception. Anyone who swallows the equation NoHooch'Til21 + ThirstyStudents = AppleJuicesAllRound seriously needs their head examined. Peter Fahy, the Cheshire Chief Constable who has suggested the minimum age be raised, has unwittingly requested much more work. As the situation stands, he only has to police the 2% of 18+year-olds who are actually out of control. If and when he gets his way, he will have to police 100% of the 18-21s who like alcohol - and I imagine that's 100% of them.
Newtballs: "Your life is worth more than a chocolate bar." An insight provided by DCI Cliff Lyons of South-east London.
The chief constable of Cheshire has said that parents of teenagers are 'abdicating responsibility for their children.' He goes on to place the blame for Britain's supposed 'binge culture' squarely at the feet of advertisers and the drinks industry. Abdicating responsibility is a terrible thing, isn't it?
Hamilton: "Mr Ernesto Giacometti Dolcelatte, you are the worlds foremost, and indeed only, Futurist Curator. You curate the Academy of Primitive and Archaic Art in Luxembourg. Your unique attitude to the presentation of painting and sculpture has won you few friends in the Art Establishment. Perhaps you could tell us a little..."
(At this point I was interrupted; the impatient Mr Dolcelatte had noticed my nephew's tricycle lying abandoned on the floor, and clambered onto it. With his knees round his ears, and puffing smoke from his cigarette like a small steamship, he was describing frantic circles on the floor. I tackled him off the bike, and hit him sharply across the face. After a tussle, and then a loud debate, we agreed that he could conduct the interview between laps of the room, and every ten minutes he could go into the garden to let off some firecrackers.)
Mr D: "The thing you must understand is that up to this point all art has been too slow. While it may have other points of interest, it is rendered unpalatable to the Futurist sensibility by its stultifying lack of motion. The APAA was constructed to overcome this difficulty."
Hamilton: "And how do you achieve that?"
Mr D: "Well, initially we employed a number of small devices. Early on in the project we discovered that any small statue, for example a Cellini nymph made out of gold and bronze, could be glued to the blades of a blender. When the machine is switched on the piece becomes high speed, kinetic, Futuristic. If only Cellini had worked in a more durable medium, like cast iron or steel, he could have been a noteworthy artist."
Hamilton: "Where did you go from there?"
"Mr D: We soon realised that we would never be able to truly explore the potential of these pieces as long as people insisted on viewing them as objects, rather than high speed events. We held a Titian week, during which we shot a series of his preparatory sketches out of a cannon at a group of Ukrainians, but ticket sales were surprisingly low and budget issues forced us to stop on the fourth day. However, other schemes have been a great success, for example, where else can you see a piece of Native American woodcarving mounted on a trolley and accelerated down a hallway by magnets, or one of Lucas Cranach's early alter pieces swung from a ceiling rafter by a steel cable?"
Mr Ernesto (left) and Colleague (right) work on their controversial new method of introducing the work of Eric Gill to a potential gallery goer.
Hamilton: "Bold and radical stuff indeed! What does the future hold for the APAA?"From the morass of cynical EU laws and directives has surfaced the clause prohibiting the routine vaccination of animals against Foot and Mouth disease. A more pernicious piece of legislation you could not wish for. As Matthew d'Ancona very properly points out in The Spectator, there is no good reason why animals should not receive the vaccination in view of the large number of antibiotics and medicines with which they are already treated. Of course, the explanation is as simple as it is offensive: this flabby, regressive, jealous, grasping body of protectionist bureauworms cannot bear the idea of denting consumer-confidence in European meat; so naturally, they prefer to enforce measures that are potentially (potential that has the potential soon to have been realised twice in 6 years) catastrophic. From where I'm standing, Euroskepticism has never looked so appealing.
=Dogtooth spent most of the weekend visiting the National Gallery. Far from gaining a new appreciation, I left in something of a hot mood, feeling angry and disappointed with many of the painters who, up until this point, I have revered. It is clear to me now that, in all respects, the late Nineteenth Century was an inferior forty years. For Courbet, Manet, Degas and Cezanne, I have unshakeable admiration. By advancing the cause of portraiture they bore the only worthwhile fruit of that twoscore years. Portraiture: bold and infinitely fascinating! And how feeble and self-indulgent appear the so-called 'experimentations' of Monet's Poplars or Seurat's bloody dots in the shadow of a magnificent Ingres, a Delacroix, a Gericault or a Velazquez. Even Constable's landscapes knock the Impressionist efforts into a gaping macaroon. Go back another few centuries, and you have the likes of Titian, Lippi, Raphael, Masaccio and Caravaggio to contend with - painters who actually strove to represent human bodies and engender action, atmospere and interest, as opposed to few wispy forms shimmering ineffectually among some blurred trees. Who did Monet think he was, sitting in his boat? Claude (-Oscar?) Monet! The macaroon gapes for thee, thrice wider than for other men!
I started watching boxing after Lennox Lewis beat Evander Holyfield in the second fight of 1999. What this means is that in my viewing lifetime there has never been a heavyweight fighter of any charisma or talent. Our current undisputed heavyweight champion is the uninspiring Ruslan Chagaev, who gained the title by fighting the walking freakshow Valuev, a seven foot Russian slugger styled 'The Beast from the East'. Over in England we have had the occasionally talented but soulless Danny Williams, the former kickboxer Matt Skelton, and the supremely unlovable and arrogant Audley 'Fraudley' Harrison. Any of these dubious characters could easily knock out one of the talented and exciting fighters to be found in the light and middle weight classes at the same time, but they could never hope to acheive the same level of respect or popularity.
What this means is that the pleasure derived from sport is not dependent, as is sometimes claimed, on the sportsmen being the best in the world at their endevour, but rather on more intangible qualities like elegance and heart. There is no reason therefore why the Paralympics should not be taken as seriously as the Olympics. That being said, there is something deeply unsatisfying about the Paralympics. Mostly it is the rather worrying ethic which seems to pervade the games that it is not about the winning, but about the taking part. Nobody ever boos the opposing amputees, and if Britain's wheelchair rugby team fail in disgrace at the next games we can be sure that there won't be any angry tabloid articles berating them. The overwhelming feeling of the Paralympics is 'aren't they doing well'. I won't take the games seriously until contestants start taking performance enhancing drugs.
A long car journey today gave me ample opportunity to savour Radio Four's dreaded hour and a half of news headlines (between 5 and 6.30 if you want to enjoy it yourself. It's almost a pleasure when the Archers comes on) and I was amazed by the amount of non-news on the Foot and Mouth incident. It strikes me that news outlets assign the number of minutes each story gets according to importance, rather than how much there is to say. I accept that another outbreak of Foot and Mouth would be a dreadful and significant event, but I don't see why I need to hear constant speculation and reminders that the situation has not changed in any significant way since yesterday. When there is news, tell me it, until then let's hear about something else. It's a bit like the compulsory ten minutes of time allocated every evening for over a week to telling us that areas of the UK affected by flooding have been damaged just as badly as everyone thought they would be, but no worse.
Dogtooth's recent mockery of Green envirobeefery bought to mind a new training regime which I have myself adopted. I get on a treadmill and rack it up to a goodly pace, and then fix my eyes on the calorie counter. A medium sized egg is 80 calories, so I run until I feel tired, and then see how many eggs worth of calories I have burned. I then go home and consume that many eggs. I sort of think that moving the calories through my system, rather than letting them hang around in my subcutaneous expanses, has the effect of flushing out unhealthiness, or something of that sort. At the very least it allows me to eat a lot more eggs than I otherwise would.
Thaksin Shinawatra has bought Manchester City FC. This is just bizarre. Thaksin, lately the Prime Minister of Thailand, was deposed in his absence after a military coup in september of last year. Since then he has been living in London. In 2004 he laughably attempted to buy Liverpool FC. Presumably he tasted the delicious prospect of owning his own club then and has never looked back. Hmmm. Football and coups d'Etat? This is really the London Prodigal's territory. Although Dogtooth was in Bangkok when the tanks rolled in and was compelled to keep tabs on the whole affair. How strange that I should have witnessed the ousting of Thai statesman, yet I have never watched a Manchester City match.
There's no idiot like a pedantic idiot. Research done by Chris Goodall, Green candidate for Oxford West, endeavours - by way of a quite breathtaking departure from reason - to show that driving to the shops is four times greener than walking the same distance. Greater idiocy hath no rationalisation than the empirical evidence offered to support this claim: that a brisk walk to the shops will result in the sudden and uncontrollable urge to devour 100g of, say, beef, the production and delivery of which leaves a hefty carbon footprint in its wake. No doubt Hamilton's trusty abacus could provide us with some reliable stats and figures, but I imagine that a national aggregate of two to three main meals is eaten daily, discounting intervals of snacking. Appetites tend to be large or small, and rarely fluctuate. Clearly a 7km treadmill session would put the wind up the conscientious calorie-counter, but I have never known anyone to return from the 400 yard hike to the post office gasping for 100g of minced beef to quell their raging metabolism. That a significant number of Europeans expand quite markedly in their middle years is proof that we are overeating/underexercising anyway, and that the amount of food we need has little bearing on the amount we eat. Goodall's statistics may apply to a hyena abroad on the African plains, eating according to its requirements; but since the dawn of what might broadly be called civilisation, they have not been applicable to our lot.
This just in: Dogtooth popped out to the shops earlier to pick up some basic groceries. When I returned I drank a chaste glass of orange juice. I breakfasted modestly this morning; notwithstanding, the impulse to gorge 100g of beef is not overwhelming. I will hang on until supper-time.
I recently had a long meeting with my Literary Agent, who also manages my PR and acts as proxy in a number of prolonged legal disputes I seem to have got entangled in, and we agreed that with the Harry Potter phenomenon finished this was a good time to step into the breach and introduce a new generation of children to the wonder of the written word. Because of the recent success of The Dangerous Book for Boys we agreed it should be an old fashioned yarn of derring-do etc. in the mold of Conan Doyle and John Buchan, and luckily for you people it will be serialised for free upon this very blog. Gather the children around then, as I give you the first instalment of:
Sir Arthur and the Mystery of the Cordwainer's Toe
"Silence is the condemned man's only prerogative" said Lord Entwistle, pushing the decanter across the table toward me, "but perhaps you'd care to tell us what became of the Brigadier, and the aeronautical device of the Philadelphia Jesuits?"
"With pleasure" I said, selecting a cigar from a proffered box, "It all began last January, on a bitterly cold afternoon. Like any sensible fellow I was seated before a roaring fire with a monograph of Chaldean adverbs, the last of my uncle Nungent's '66 Taylor's, and a large sixpenny whore. I was disturbed from my comfortable reveries by a hoarse salutation, and from the thick London peasouper which swirled round the far end of my study stepped a curious figure. His bearing and demeanour were undoubtedly that of a naval man, but he was dressed in the clothes of an off duty magician, or the proprietor of a second rate dog training school. He sported a large ginger moustache, of the sort which might be worn by an army chaplain recently defrocked for unnatural sexual practices,and on his cheek were tattooed a number of cryptic symbols.
'Sir Arthur' he cried, 'I come to you under the orders of the foreign office. I am told that you are a daring fellow, who would gladly put his unique talents to the defense of the empire overseas'.
'Why' I replied, 'I am a man of no particular talents. I am considered, I admit, the finest blow pipe marksman in Europe, , and a world expert in Persian dietary habits, and I'm anyone's match at Hungarian kick-boxing, but other than that my interests are somewhat obscure. However I will gladly put my few poor abilities at the disposal of my country.'
'How would you feel' he asked 'about undertaking an exceedingly dangerous mission to Constantinople?'
'Dash it' I cried, 'it sounds just the caper I've been looking for! Pull up a whore and tell me all about it.'
The visitor sat down and produced a Mussulman water pipe. For a period he was silent as he carefully filled and lit it. Eventually he looked up, his head wreathed in fragrant smoke.
'What do you know' he asked 'of the nation of Russia?'
'As I recall it was a small province of the Rhine Palatinate, which briefly attained the status of an autonomous Lutheran republic during the Thirty Years war, before being claimed as a crown possession of the Austro-Hungarian empire'
'So we have long believed. However it now appears that this was a misapprehension caused, through circumstances too Byzantine to enter into, by the idiosyncrasies of an eighteenth century archivist in the department of records, by the name of Paisley. Russia is in fact a huge and powerful nation, ruled by the Romanov dynasty and profession the Orthodox faith, situated to the far east of Europe. Its climate is extreme and its main export is timber. Its embassy is situated on the Strand, between the Royal Anthropological Society and the Pickwick Hotel.'
'Good God!' I cried. 'I always thought that building was some kind of dry goods emporium.'
'That' said my visitor darkly 'is closer to the truth than you realise.'"
"Confound it!" ejaculated Lord Entwistle passionately, "This web of intrigue is so deep and mysterious it seems that it might go on forever."
"Yes" I replied, allowing, I must admit, a wry smile to play on my lips, "it seems that it might."
One of Dogtooth's recent posts raised the topic of art and value. He suggests that a copy of Sunflowers should be valued according to its similarity to the original. Not so. I can receive all the artistic value of Hamlet from a paperback copy (let's assume there has been no textual jiggery-pokery) but that does not mean that the manuscript for Hamlet would not be worth far more money. When I buy, for example, one of Goya's black paintings (see above), I am not only paying for the artistic value but also for a unique artifact. Of course as an impoverished sea creature I might think that rarity value a ridiculous extravagance, but I bet I'd change my mind if fifty million came rolling through the door.
