Time was when it was the ‘in’ thing to find oneself in the possession of a willy. It was the mark of the masculine, of a certain swaggering virility, of cowboys and sports stars and ad executives, of spread legs on dingy subways, hard power over soft power, gun-toting hip-thrusting scarcely receding vigour. A dangling willy served as the world’s…
After the internet and some light drinking left me in a stupor on Sunday night, on Monday morning as per usual I lumbered glumly out of bed. Just like so many other men and women the working world over, I took a shower and tried to pull myself together, which ahead of an arduous week always means a couple of…
Since he last turned the dials on our cinema screens, the now 71-year-old David Lynch – one of the greatest of all American directors and the preeminent surrealist of his generation – has been busily honing yet another reputation, as a far out yet decidedly modern day Renaissance man. He designed a night club called ‘Silencio’ in Paris, exhibited his…
It is nothing new to note the paradox at the heart of our obsession with celebrity and pop culture, in so far as the objects of our desire, the faces who fill our thoughts and cover our screens and magazines, often times we’re quick to say we can hardly bear. Whatever your taste or inclination, whether it’s Kim Kardashian, Justin…
Once upon a time in Ancient Greece, Antisthenes, a pupil of Gorgias the sophist, took the palm of beauty from Argive Helen and handed it to poor Penelope. Much the same happened on Sunday night outside the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, Los Angeles, when Oscars pre-show host Robin Roberts declared that Mahershala Ali and Naomie Harris – not Ryan Gosling…
Little over twenty years ago, out of the murky depths of a Macon, Georgia arena, a man emerged on the sidelines of a televised sporting event, clad in denim, flicking a toothpick between his teeth, and with slick black hair and a tanned, rugged complexion, and in a gravelly half-Cuban accent he uttered the portentous words, ‘You know who I am….
On the first day of Trumpville the Donald gave to me a crowd much nearer than the eye could see. On the second day of Trumpville the Donald gave to me a lying Sean Spicer and a crowd much nearer than the eye could see. On the third day of Trumpville the Donald gave to me more alternative factoids a…
“Patriotism is an ephemeral motive that scarcely ever outlasts the particular threat to society that aroused it.” Denis Diderot, Observations on the Drawing Up of Laws (1774) “Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.” Samuel Johnson, quoted in Life of Samuel Johnson by James Boswell (1791) “Patriotism ruins history.” Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Conversation with Friedrich Wilhem Riemer (July, 1817)…
I awoke New Year’s morning all bright and breezy, but after foregoing my coffee I started to sniffle and snore. So up from a snooze more than two hours later, I treat myself to a Pepsi – diet of course. And fixed with caffeine of a more moderate flavour, after eggs but no sausage and thinly buttered slices of toast,…
It’s a Wonderful Life (1946) At the end of It’s a Wonderful Life, you’ll sit there blinking with tears in your eyes, and your breast all aflutter with far-flung hopes and distant dreams, just like the young boy who – in the years following the First World War, making the best of things with only one ear – fixed ice…
