Tuesday, January 23, 2007
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The Biography of a Bouncing Boy Terror
The Birthday Girl, or Tiny Doom is Thirteen
Comestible Commissaries, or The Importance of Eating Earnest
Metal More Attractive, or A Young Man's Dilemma
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5 comments:
Wonderful interview. I was especially thrilled when you mentioned Nancy Mitford, who's one of my own all-time favorites. I think I've read In Pursuit of Love and Love in a Cold Climate (the omnibus edition) eight or nine times since I was a teenager. When I was in the hospital recovering from a hysterectomy I had my mom bring it to me to wile away the hours, but had to put it aside because I kept laughing so hard I was afraid the stitches would pop.
I know the Brits sometimes feel a bit squiggy about the Mitford machine (I recently read an article to that effect, upon the publication of Decca's letters, tho' I can't recall exactly where the article was published)...but Nancy was a hilarious writer, and the whole family peculiar in a way that just doesn't seem to happen in the U.S. and therefore is somewhat fascinating. I too have read "Pursuit of Love, etc" probably ten times (most recently in October), and it never gets old...And say what you will about them--they were very energetic, and remain so today. This month's W has an article about Diana's great-grand daughter who has just open a children's toy store in London.
The article was in The New Yorker, and I lapped it up ... but was so disappointed they didn't indicate who was who in the family photo. I've got a family legend that brushes against a Mitford family legend: my grandfather, who was a Rhodes Scholar, was at Oxford during the Thirties, and supposedly bit that guy Sir Oswald (I think that was his name --- the fascist one of the Mitford daughters married) on the leg during a campus altercation.
That's where I read it! I don't think I have that New Yorker any more, so I can't help you with the photo, but there are several bios of the Mitford family that contain many many photographs...Good for your grandpaw, biting Oswald Mosley in the leg! Would more people had done the same! There's a hilarious Wodehouse parody of Oswald Mosley and his Blackshirts, only in Wodelandia they are Blackshorts, which sums up the whole idiocy very well! I can't seem to put weblinks in this comment, but if you go to wikipedia and look up "Roderick Spode", you shall know all!
Speaking of Sir Roderick Spode (aka Oswald Mosley), I just have to share this Wodehouse quote--it showcases everything I love about the Great Writer...
"The trouble with you, Spode, is that just because you have succeeded in inducing a handful of half-wits to disfigure the London scene by going about in black shorts, you think you're someone. You hear them shouting 'Heil, Spode!' and you imagine it is the Voice of the People. That is where you make your bloomer. What the Voice of the People is saying is: 'Look at that frightful ass Spode swanking about in footer bags! Did you ever in your puff see such a perfect perisher?'"
From Code of the Woosters
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