2005s
Freedom Tickling
Went to see Jon Stewart of The Daily Show on Sunday. He was doing one night in London, with, as it turned out, the executive producer and the head writer of the show.
It was good, though it could cynically be seen as an extended advert for their book, America: The Book. The largest part of the 75-minute show consisted of readings of extracts from the book. Those were enough to make me want to buy it, but the the funniest lines were probably in Stewart’s introductory piece. The final section, consisting of questions from the audience, showed that both he and his co-stars are generally witty and able to think on their feet.
If volume of applause is a measure, though, the highlight of the night for much of the audience was a brief guest appearance. “For this next section we’re going to ask for help from a member of the audience. We picked him before we started, so don’t get up.” Then a stocky, black-clad figure walked on. From my position high on the balcony, and with my notedly-poor facial-recognition skills, I couldn’t tell who it was (though Frances, sitting next to me, could). I’d have recognised his voice, though. Ricky Gervais is officially more popular in London than Jon Stewart (which is not a surprise).
Gervais read the “funny names” from the book. This is a section on how US newscasters, weather forecasters and so on, can’t have anything like an ordinary name. The authors identified formulas for the name-construction for the various roles. “A monosyllabic kitchen-related verb, followed by two unconnected words. Eg ‘Chop Muddybottom.’”
As further evidence, were it needed, of my poor celeb-recognition, apparently I literally rubbed shoulders with Alan Rickman on the way out; then Frances said, “There’s Salman Rushdie over there.” “Where?” “There: standing in the middle of the road, with all the people round him.”
I did even eventually see him, and recognised him. And while I accept that I’m bad at recognising faces — and celebrities in particular — I would contend that I just hadn’t noticed him in the crowd at first, and recognised him perfectly well once I knew he was there..
Oh, and the title of this post? “We don’t torture. We like to call it, uh, ‘freedom tickling’”
Portable gaming/Santa question
A quick question for anyone who may know: what’s the best of the handheld game systems for an eight- — nearly nine- — year old boy?
For values of “best” that include robustness, flexibility and the ability to stop playing it when you’re told.
I realise the last requirement may not have been implemented on any platform yet.
Oh, and preferably in a sub-stratospheric price bracket, too.
On the ethics of modifying blog posts
What, I’m wondering, is the etiquette for this? I looked over my last post, on literary deja vu, and I realised that the second-last paragraph was so scrambled together as to be practically unreadable. So I’ve just edited it, from the frankly execrable:
I did have an experience a bit like this before, though: a few years back I read one of Paul McAuley’s; Eternal Light, I think it was, but it is perhaps telling that I can’t remember for sure, even having looked over some reviews. It seems I still can’t remember it. It became familar to me in a much more gradual way, and I realised I had read it before. In that case I had the book out of the library, and I figured out that I had had it out before. In this case, with the Cadigan, I have no idea where I got the copy that I originally read. Library? Maybe. Borrowed a friend’s? Always possible. Or did I buy it, and forget? is there a copy filed away in the attic somewhere? I just have no idea.
to the slightly more readable:
But it’s not the first time. A few years back I read one of Paul McAuley’s novels. It is perhaps telling that I can’t remember for sure which one, despite having looked over some reviews. I think it was Eternal Light, but it seems I still can’t remember it.
In any case, it very gradually became familar to me, and I realised I had read it before. The copy I was reading at the time came from the library, and I figured out that I had taken it out before.
In this case, with the Cadigan, I have no idea where I got the copy that I originally read. Library? Maybe. Borrowed a friend’s? Always possible. Or did I buy it, and forget? is there a copy filed away in the attic somewhere? I just have no idea.
But the question is, should we update a blog post (or a LiveJournal post, if you see a difference) after it has been out there for a while? Obviously in the first few minutes after posting, when you notice the typoes, it’s fine (and I often wonder about people who don’t correct their typoes; don’t they read their posts?) Similarly, if it has been up for months, then you should not edit it in any significant way: it’s part of the fabric of the internet (at the risk of sounding pompous). My concern is when it’s been out for a day or two.
I’m not really concerned in this case: it’s not as if I’ve changed the meaning, and nobody has commented on it, so there’s no concern about comments becoming confusing or misleading. But in general, I’d be interested to know what people think about changing posts after the fact.
Literary mind loss
I’ve been having a slightly strange, but not entirely unfamiliar, reading experience recently. I’m reading Mindplayers by Pat Cadigan. Now, I read the first chapter of this a long time ago, in the dealers’ room at a convention. I liked it a lot, and wanted to read on, but the hardback was a bit too expensive at the time.
I decided to keep an eye out for the paperback. And I did: over the years I often checked the shelves for it, but never found it. As far as I could tell, it never came out in paperback, at least in this country.
And all of this was before Amazon and so on, so I couldn’t just search for it. By the time web-based sales were here, I guess I had forgotten about it. Certainly I never thought to do a search for it.
Then in the summer we were in Hay-on-Wye, town of bookshops, for a day. I managed to spend less than £30 on books (though obviously I could have spent a lot more).
But, among my purchases, there it was: the Gollancz classics re-issue of Mindplayer. Slightly strange to find that the book has gone from first publication to classic re-issue in my lifetime, but there you go.
Anyway, it’s been high on my to-read pile since then; and I started reading it a week or so ago; alternating it with Charles Stross‘s Accelerando when my Palm is charged.
Now, as I read the first chapter, the fact that it was familiar to me was not at all surprising; I read it at the con years ago, right? But then I got on to chapter two, as you do. Strangely, that seemed familiar too. Hmmm. OK, maybe I’d read more of it at the con than I thought.
Chapter three: the feeling didn’t go away. Chapter four. Chapter five.
Gradually it became apparent that I had, in fact, read the book before. However, I remembered nothing — absolutely nothing — about the story. I haven’t finished it yet, and I still have no idea how it ends.
This is a very strange form of deja vu, it seems.
But it’s not the first time. A few years back I read one of Paul McAuley’s novels. It is perhaps telling that I can’t remember for sure which one, despite having looked over some reviews. I think it was Eternal Light, but it seems I still can’t remember it.
In any case, it very gradually became familar to me, and I realised I had read it before. The copy I was reading at the time came from the library, and I figured out that I had taken it out before.
In this case, with the Cadigan, I have no idea where I got the copy that I originally read. Library? Maybe. Borrowed a friend’s? Always possible. Or did I buy it, and forget? is there a copy filed away in the attic somewhere? I just have no idea.
It’s the age, I fear. Or maybe someone is playing with my mind.
He was asking for it
I’d like you, if you don’t mind, to join me in a thought experiment.
Consider for a moment, a man: he might be young or old, it doesn’t really matter. Tall or short, dark-haired or fair, dark skin or light; none of this matters.
All that matters is one thing: he is feeling vulnerable as he walks home tonight. He does not project confidence as he walks the dark city streets.
Perhaps he has been drinking: a swift pint or two after work. Not enough to give him artificial confidence, but enough to lower his vigilance, to make him less cautious than he should be. Perhaps not, though.
He doesn’t notice the guys in the shadows; or he does, but doesn’t register the danger. Or again, maybe he feels fear: but he’s got to get home, and there’s no other way.
Whichever it is, he tries to hurry past them, but the blows begin to fall. He tries to run, but they grab him and hit again. He crumples to the ground and rolls against a wall to get some protection. As the kicks start, he slips into unconsciousness.
Or again, imagine a child, at school. He – or she, their gender doesn’t matter this time – is one of the smaller, weaker ones in the class; or just isn’t as physically confident or brave as some of their classmates. Maybe this is the child of the man above; maybe not.
Bullying happens, of course: and this time it happens to the child we are talking about. Their life becomes hell. And it’s hard to find anyone to talk to about it. Parents don’t understand how bad it is. Teachers maybe don’t want to admit it’s happening.
Maybe they’ll find help from Childline, or similar. Maybe not.
What these stories have in common should be obvious: both protagonists were the victims of violent crimes.
Now, would you say – would anyone say – that these imaginary, but all too true, characters were in any way responsible for their suffering?
Of course not. No decent person – no-one with even the most basic shred of empathy and human decency – could blame the victim for the crime they suffered.
Yet blame the victim is apparently what one third of British people are prepared to do when the victim is a woman, and the violent crime is rape.
We’ve got a long way to go.
The discussion on swisstone‘s journal suggests that the figures could be interpreted differently, and more importantly, that the questions could have been better phrased. But nonetheless, it is a chilling result.
Resignation day
You may not have noticed yet that Blunkett has resigned. Good riddance, obviously: New Labour is bad enough without introducing Tory sleaze into the mix.
Director of a DNA-testing company: with his history?
Tears and Laugher in the Bookshop
I knew I would buy it, of course. I just didn’t necessarily know I would buy it today. But I popped into Waterstone’s at lunchtime, and had a look at Margrave of the Marshes, John Peel’s autobiography. It was posthumously completed by his wife, Sheila (once better known as “The Pig”, fact fans) and their (grown-up) kids.
Even reading the acknowledgements was curiously moving, listing as it did the likes of Billy Bragg, Andy Kershaw and Tom Robinson. So I read the introduction, which was written by the four kids. I found myself laughing and my eyes filling with tears just from those three or four pages. So obviously I had to buy it.
I’m now thoroughly looking forward to tomorrow’s Home Truths, which is a special edition featuring Sheila.
I also seem to have bought Singularity Sky, but I’ve been meaning to get that for ages.
Post-exam comedown
Right then. It’s been a long time. But this morning I sat the exam for my latest Open University course, A210, Approaching Literature. The exam was OK. Hard questions, but good, you know? Each section had several questions that I could have a go at answering, but none that immediately leaped out and said, “Do me!”
As to the course itself, well… I’m glad I did it, but in many ways I didn’t really enjoy doing it. I think I’m coming to the conclusion that, while I love reading the novels and the poetry and the plays, I don’t really enjoy reading the textbooks. So I felt during much of the course that I only had time — or I only allowed myself time — to study what I needed to write the essays. Which is all very well, and I did well in the essays; but it isn’t an ideal approach to learning, and I thought it would (and I think it did) leave me wanting when it came to the exam.
Still, we shall see around Christmas time, which is when the results come in.
I had hoped to go and see Serenity afterwards, since I had the day off work; but there was no showing at a time I could get to that would also be compatible with collecting the kids later. So it’ll have to wait.
What’s slightly annoying is that yesterday UCI Whiteleys had a showing at 1:20, which would have been perfect; but not today. So instead I went and had beer. In a pub. And lunch. Ihad to try three pubs before I found one that sold proper beer. Can you believe it? What’s West London coming to? And I read Hannu Rajaniemi’s story from Nova Scotia.
Then, since I was in the area, I put The Clash on the MP3 player and went and stood under the Westway. It was curiously like standing under a big, raised road, surprisingly enough. Then I thought that standing near a major part of transport infrastruture with backpack on and wires hanging off me might not be very safe these days (can you imagine trying to explain it to some fresh-faced copper: “Honest officer, there used to be this band that lived near here, and they made the… errm… road… famous… Aw look, just stick these in your ears for three minutes: you’ll understand.”)
So I headed for home. And now something approaching normal service will be resumed.
I claim this blog for Technorati...
Or is it that I claim Technorati for this blog? In any case, I’ve just set up a Technorati Profile, and I need to post this code here to “claim” my blog. So there we are.
Today
I’m afraid I did what the Commissioner told us not to do: I went in to Central London.
See, I live in Hackney, in the East, but work in Wimbledon, in the South-West. So I was going to have to go into the centre sometime, to get home. I just left work early.
The trains were running into Waterloo, pretty much as normal (but largely empty). Of course, once there, there was no way to get across town: the Tube was closed, and no buses were running in Zone 1. I took to Shanks’ Pony.
Zone 1 is bigger than you think. I guess I knew it extended as far as Angel, but it goes all the way up Essex Road. I ended up getting a bus halfway along the Ball’s Pond Road. It took me about two and a half hours to get home.
Which isn’t bad, all things considered.
Fortunately, the kids were going home from school with a friend’s mum, so they were fine. I left early mainly so as not to leave them with her too late. And of course, to avoid the probable madness of the rush hour.
I am, of course, intensely angry at the scumpigs who would do such a thing. But on a positive note, a lot of people seemed to be doing the same thing as me, and it was strangely pleasing to see so many people walking through London. We should do more of it. And for much better reasons, of course.
I feel I should have more to say, but am blank.
London bombs
Ian Blair (Met Police Commissioner) is just being interviewed on R4. He says six bombs, and we should all stay where we are. That’s easy for him to say. Some of us have to get home this evening (from SW to E London) and collect kids.
Software patents: dead in Europe
In other good news, over on BoingBoing, Cory is telling us that Euro software patents are dead:
The European Parliament voted 648 to 14 to reject the Computer Implemented Inventions Directive.The bill was reportedly rejected because, politicians said, it pleased no-one in its current form.
Responding to the rejection the European Commission said it would not draw up or submit any more versions of the original proposal.
This is excellent news, though as Cory goes on to say,
Software patents have been staked through the heart before, but they keep rising from the grave. There’s too much monopoly rent waiting to be extracted by anti-competitive companies for them to simply give up and go home. The price of liberty is eternal vigilance.
A year or so ago the number one or two hit on Google for “software patents” was an article by an old friend of mine, John Gray, who is a Patent Attorney, in favour of them. With well-reasoned arguments, as I recall. Sadly the article appears to have gone now, though links to it remain. Such is one of the weaknesses of the web, unfortunately, when you can’t trust (some) publishers to keep their URLs pointing at something.
Update: asajeffrey found a mailing list post that, if not John’s article that I was thinking of, certainly discusses the same ideas. Thanks, Alan. Note that I am not the “Martin” referred to in that post.
2012
So, London gets it. I was against it, but now I feel strangely pleased.
I think I was for it at first; I really enjoyed watching the Athens Olympics last summer, the kids enjoyed it, and the idea of having one just down the road sounded great. But then I looked at the plans, and turned against it. The main reason for my opposition was the effects that I think it will have on the Lower Lea (or Lee) Valley. As far as I can tell, our beloved wilderness will be turned into bland parkland, with the associated loss of wildlife habitat.
However, it may not be as bad as all that, and there’s no doubt that the potential regeneration here in East London — in particular the transport improvements — could be great.
My other concern is, of course, the cost, and how we taxpayers may be paying for it for decades.
But what the hell: my kids will be 15 and 11 in 2012, so it should be fantastic for them.
The afternoon after the morning after the night before
Well. I did it: I went to the polling place and I put my cross in the box… for the LibDem candidate. It’s a very odd feeling, you know, not to vote Labour. The only time I’ve done it before, I think, was in the first London Mayoral election, when Ken Livingsone was an independent.
I think I might actually have given my first vote to the Greens then, and only my second to Ken (knowing that the first vote would be discarded after the first count, of course). And I think I also distributed my London Assembly votes between Green and Labour.
Some of the above suggests that I shouldn’t really describe myself as ‘a lifelong Labour voter’, which I tend to; but it’s always been Labour at general elections — until yesterday. And of course, as I expected, the Labour candidate won. I’m quite pleased with the overall result, though. It’s a pity the Tories weren’t squashed like bugs, and the LibDems didn’t do as well as we might have hoped; but at least with Blair’s reduced majority, we might see some reigning in of their madder civil liberties attacks.
And I have Meg Hillier’s email address now, which might come in handy.
The polling place was my daughter’s nursery class — four years ago it was my son’s. I took them both along with me yesterday evening. I usually like to vote first thing in the morning, but I had an early start yesterday, because I was collecting the kids in the evening.
They, of course, had a great time being at school out of hours. I had to wait for ages after voting while they climbed trees.
Then we sat up and watched the results. Well, fell asleep on the sofa from about 12:30 to 3:00, and then watched until 5:00 or so. It’s been a long time since I went to bed while it was getting light. And on a school night, too.
Update: Jonathan Freedland’s Guardian blog entry on the ritual of voting says it all for me.
Things can only get... different
It seems that my erstwhile MP is more famous since he stepped down than he ever was in action. Unfortunately, his jumping ship to the LibDems doesn’t help me with my “Now who do I vote for?” dilemma. If Mr Sedgmore was still standing in Hackney South and Shoreditch — for either party — I would happily vote for him. As it is I have the choice between Meg Hillier for Labour and Gavin Baylis for the LibDems.
I emailed Meg Hillier via her website the other day, and yesterday she actually responded, I’m pleased to say. You won’t be surprised to hear that I asked about her view on ID cards. Her answer, unfortunately, was, “I’m toeing the party line.”
Not in so many words, of course; here’s what she actually wrote (in an attached MS Word document, rather than in the body of the email, for some weird reason):
This is now part of the Labour Party manifesto. I am a Labour candidate standing on a Labour Party manifesto. Had I drafted the manifesto it would have had a different focus on this issue.
Hmm. So are you against it, or not? She goes on to say:
There is a long way before current proposals become law, no doubt there will be an opportunity to influence change as the bill progresses through Parliament.
Fair point, but does that mean you’ll vote against it? And whether it does or not, can we afford to take the risk that such an attack on civil liberties could be passed in any form? To some extent I don’t fear ID cards and the database state under a Labour government — even New Labour — so much as I do under a possible future Tory government. Imagine for a moment if Britain had had such a setup during Thatcherism, when so many of us were campaigning against nuclear weapons or for the miners, and were generally actively against the government. Or how would MI5 have made use of tools like those, when they were undermining the Wilson and Callaghan governments?
Meg has more modern concerns, though:
I have been told that tackling identity theft and child protection would be better served with some form of ID card – I will be looking into this more.
I have been told that when we die we all go to a big palace in the clouds and have wings, but the baddies are still going to be able to forge or steal the cards. In fact, I think it could make identity theft easier. People — or at least, institutions — may come to have such faith in database-backed ID cards that the idea of one being in any way wrong will be quite literally unbelievable. The end result will be that, in order to steal someone’s identity, all you need to steal or fake is one card. They introduce a single point of failure.
The next MP for Hackney South and Shoreditch concludes:
I have no problem with voluntary ID cards.
But it’s only short steps from “voluntary” to “voluntary but required if you want to use a bank account or leave the country” to “compulsory”, it seems to me.
I’m pleased to see that Gavin Baylis is a member of the London Cycling Campaign. Time for an email to him, I think. Followed in a week’s time by a cross in his box.
Digital death masks
Politics not getting anybody interested, then? OK, we’ll try religion.
I was brought up a Catholic. I grew out of it, of course; saw sense, kicked over the traces. But even when I was a devout Catholic, I think I would have found it very strange, to the point of macabre, to queue for hours to see a recently-dead body; and then to take photographs of it.
Indeed, I’m fairly sure that the Catholicism I grew up with would have frowned on it. That empty shell is not John Paul II, after all: he has gone on, you know? Been “called home”, in the words of President Bush (pity it wasn’t him. But I digress).
Not that I believe in any of that. I strongly suspect that old Karol has discovered that in the afterlife there is nothing but a purple glow and a humming sound; and that even he isn’t there. If I remember my Vonnegut aright. So it goes.
When my Dad died I went to see his body. At the undertaker’s; in private, with just the family there. It seemed a normal, natural thing to do. Sad, obviously, but a part of saying goodbye, of coming to terms with his death. So I suppose the devout Catholics who are queueing for hours to see the Pope’s body are going through a similar thing; and since he was a public figure, it all happens under the camera’s glare.
But really: they didn’t know him. He wasn’t family, or a close friend, however important he might be to their faith. So I can’t help thinking it smacks of thanatophilia; almost idolatry; and I’m sure the church I grew up in wouldn’t have approved.
The Campaign Trail, 2005: the inevitable fear and loathing...
… but is that a side order of despair with that, sir?
Time to start blogging the election, then. But what to say? Normally I’d be exhorting you to vote Labour, like in 1997 and 2001; though those were before the days of blogs (for me, at least). But this year. This year it’s different.
I could of course warn of the danger of sleep-walking towards a Tory government, as Ken did. And that would be true: there’s no doubt that the Tories would be much worse than Labour or the Lib Dems for the economy and public services. Plus the idea of it is just repellent; especially for those of us who lived through the Thatcher years. Who, like me, was politically naive (and fortunately too young to vote) in 1979, and thought something along the lines of, “let’s give them a chance to see how they do”. And then watched as public services and manufacturing industry were systematically dismantled, as everything good at the heart of this country was attacked by the greedy, money-grubbing scumbags who wanted to turn us into a “share-owning democracy” by selling us the stuff we already owned.
So yes, I could warn about that. About how Michael Howard was one of Thatcher’s henchmen, about how he presided over the “No repetitive beats” Criminal Justice Act which attempted to criminalise public partying. About how Howard Flight’s secret revelations are probably understated, and that Tory sleaze didn’t go away after 1997, it just went underground.
But this is 2005, and we don’t have to try to depose a sleazy Tory government any more. It’s much worse than that. We have to try to depose a sleazy Labour government; and we have to do it without letting the Tories in.
There is an obvious answer, in theory, at least: we should vote for the Liberal Democrats. And that wouldn’t be so bad. I could do that (I might have to). But the trouble is, most people, disillusioned as they are with the other two, won’t vote for the Lib Dems. Many people seem to have this strange desire to vote for the winning party. This is a curious attitude that I have never understood. Obviously you want your side to win. You believe in their policies, or thnk that an individual is the best person to represent your constituency, so you want them to win. That’s how a representative democracy works.
What I don’t understand is the attitude that seems to say, “I’m not going to vote for them, because they won’t win”. Well of course they won’t, if nobody votes for them. But you’re not trying to bet on winner, you’re trying to choose a representative. It doesn’t matter (in one sense) if you lose; it matters that you vote for what’s right.
The government is crap. New Labour is crap. It’s not just Iraq and the whole US-poodle thing; I could see my way past that. It’s much worse than that. it’s ID cards. It’s house arrest. it’s an attack on civil liberties so extreme that even Thatcher wouldn’t have attempted it.
I live in a safe Labour seat. My MP, Brian Sedgmore, kicked government arse in his speech on house arrest. I could happily vote for him again. Unfortunately, he’s standing down at the election. I’ve just being doing some research on his replacement candidate, Meg Hilllier. She is worryingly silent on ID cards.
I miss old — rather, proper — Labour; I miss having people you might actually want to vote for. Hell, I even miss 1997-grade New Labour. I almost miss having Thatcher in power. At least then it was easy to know who to vote against.
But I wouldn’t want them back. I’d spoil my ballot before I’d ever vote for those scumbags. Unless — just maybe unless — they came out against ID Cards. If they did, though, I wouldn’t trust them.
Never mind a Tory government: we’re sleep-walking towards hell in a handbasket.
Let's rock again
Burn (tickettothewest) are back in action. Yes, after a gap of only just over four months, we have rehearsed again. Some of you will know that scunner, our former lead guitarist, left to work in Geneva last spring. We quickly spent several months deciding to recruit another old Edinburgh SF Soc friend, Andrew. We then leapt into action at a rate of a rehearsal every fortnight to three weeks.
Or so I’d have said. A quick check of last year’s (electronic) diary suggests that our last rehearsal with Ol was in March; and the next rehearsal was in October. Can we really have left it that long? Well, maybe not. We can be fairly sure that the reocord is incomplete, as it only shows one in October and one in November, and I can remember at least three, and I think probably four.
However our most recent was definitely November, which means, as swisstone said last night, that we would increase our frequency if we went to a quarterly schedule.
Given all that, though, last night went surprisingly well. We remembered the stuff well, particularly Andrew, who is least familiar with it, and we sounded good: helped, no doubt, by being in Backstreet‘s best and biggest room, number 1,
In contrast with the plastic chairs of the other rooms, number 1 has two sofas. Not that we used them. Oh no. We were much too busy rocking out to sit down and take a break. Honest.
Still, our workrate is higher than that of the Stone Roses, or My Bloody Valentine. Hmm, except that they released albums at the end of it. Oh well. karmicnull suggests a target of a gig by the end of the decade. I think that’s realistic, don’t you?
Rounding up the year so far: still here
A combination of lack of inspiration, Christmas, and reading for and starting my new Open University course, (A210: Approaching Literature) has made me miss an entire two months of posting. Or almost: I posted about HST’s death. Oh well, a roundup here, and I’ll try to do better in future.
The other big time-sink for my evenings recently has been a dangerous addiction. We signed up for LoveFilm, an online DVD rental service, a few months ago, and soon started catching up on something that we had missed when it was first shown, and never wanted to join in the middle: The West Wing.
At the time of writing we have recently finished season four, and it has raised the bar so much on TV programmes that I could hardly be bothered to watch the excellent Desperate Housewives the other day. Actually, I think it may also be that the latter has gone on too long without having enough to reveal, but we’ll see.
I didn’t call you here to talk about TV programmes, though. Rather, I have a few links to post. First, if you were a fan of John Peel and you didn’t hear it on Radio 4‘s The Now Show — or if you did, and want a copy to keep — you should grab A Minute’s Noise, by Mitch Benn. It’s the perfect tribute; and in particular a lot more honest than those biographies
that were knocked out in time for Chrstmas.
Perhaps I shouldn’t be too hard on them: I did glance over one of them in a bookshop and found it quite moving. But they came out so soon after his death that its hard not to use the word ‘unseemly’.
You should all be aware of WriteToThem, by the makers of FaxYourMP; a generalised way to contact your UK MP or other representative (local councillors, for example); and all done as a free software project intended to be easily-transferrable to other countries’ political systems.
Gonzo death song
God motherfuckin’ damn! It’s like everyone I respect or admire in public life is dying these years. Hunter S Thompson was my favourite non-fiction writer. He was also the most interesting, the wildest, the freeest voice in American poltics — hell, in world politics.
Sure, no-one expected him to last even this long, but what business has got dying now, when the world needs him more than ever? And yes, he was a gun nut: but sometimes its good to know that some of the guns are on the side of right.
I always expected to hear that he’d died from one of his favourite things: you can’t die from writing 1; but I always thought it would come from booze, drugs or cars. Or more likely a mixtture of all three. Not guns. And not self-inflicted. Jesus. I expect that we’ll now hear that he suffered from depression, and all the excess was ‘self-medication’. I don’t know. But without the excess I doubt we’d have had the writer.
And what a writer. If I believed in religion I’d say he wrote like an angel; or that it was like his typewriter was wired straight into hades. Instead I’ll just say that he wrote like his life depended on it, and no-one else could touch the clarity and vision he could achieve.
It was always a kind of comfort to know that he was out there somewhere, pounding the keyboard of an IBM Selectric typewriter, Wild Turkey by his side, slapping page after page onto the mojo wire. No longer.
I guess the going got too weird even for that old pro.
1. Not directly. Not in a democracy. Not in America.2 Though watch out for conspiracy theories over the next weeks and months.
2. Warning: footnotes may contain traces of irony.