23 June 2008

Insignificant Yank

Always like to kick off with a headline likely to offend my Merkan pals, bless 'em.

Have been going thru the library in the attic most of today and damn me if all my old university text books and notes aren't there.

Pretentious little toff, I was back then. Not sure if I was clever or what because I can't actually understand a word, but the tutors' comments read complimentary enough.

And my set reading! My dear, all those brainy books by Granville-Barker and Pound and Stein ... and my favorite, Edmund Wilson's Axel's Castle. My earnest annotations brought tears to my eyes: who was I trying to impress? Tutor, the leggy gal who sat next to me? Me?

Anyway, I broke for 20 mins to skim thru the Wilson and might re-read him in ernest while mama's in Londres.

But here's the coincidental bit: as I went on tidying and poring over old foto albums, I came across a volume of Evelyn Waugh letters and it fell open at a diary entry whose style I *yearn* to mimic for blog entries:

"Hangover. Sent flowers to Angie, chucked appointment to show London to an insignificant Yank named Edmund Wilson, critic; spent afternoon at White's with Connolly; dined there, drank bottle of champagne and felt better, and went to Connolly's where I met E. Wilson mentioned above. It was next day I chucked him. Augustus John, Elizabeth Bowen, Bohemian girls."
Isn't that just divine? Says it all so succinctly.

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