Rereading.
Feb. 9th, 2012 08:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
johnny9fingersI've been laughing like a drain over William Donaldson's "From Winchester to This"
I was first introduced to Willie Donaldson's work by K R C Buss, known to his chums as Robin, or just Buss. My kid bro was in the same class as Buss's son Louis, and I became friends with Louis and through him with Robin, Robin eventually becoming my poetic mentor, and, inasmuch as our age differences allowed, a friend.
Robin had been in the FO before quitting to retrain as a teacher of other teachers, but there were always a few dodgy coves hanging round his gaff, some with 'Intelligence' obviously stamped upon their person. I lost touch when he remarried after a pretty amicable divorce from his then wife, Pat. He died soon after my father died, suddenly, from a stroke. He was a lot younger than dad. Buss's obituaries ran in two of the broadsheets. I put the best one (from the Independent, IIRC) up very early in this blog, some five or six years ago.
Anyway, Buss, Louis, and I, shared a love of "Private Eye".
I had arrived at this love independently, and though Buss and I didn't always agree on Auberon Waugh's Diary, which I thought simply magnificent, he appreciated my poses artistique, even when they were a trifle gauche. After all, he had been post-gradding at the Sorbonne in '68 when it all kicked off, so he understood both gauche pretension and poetic voice. And despite not being one himself, knew a rotter when he saw one: and immediately pointed me at Kyril Bonfiglioli and Willie Donaldson, and the writings thereof.
My debt to him is immense. As is my debt to Louis, whom I haven't seen for years either.
Now I teach. And in my own way, in this medium, I hope I can pass things along.
Go well and do good things. I mean, I know Flashy used to get beastly drunk and bully his servants, weasel his way out of trouble, be cruel to dumb animals, beat his women, and betray his chums and all that, but now he's an upstanding sort of respectable chap, the least he could do is to be nice about the memory of friends. May they go especially well, and do great and noble things.
I was first introduced to Willie Donaldson's work by K R C Buss, known to his chums as Robin, or just Buss. My kid bro was in the same class as Buss's son Louis, and I became friends with Louis and through him with Robin, Robin eventually becoming my poetic mentor, and, inasmuch as our age differences allowed, a friend.
Robin had been in the FO before quitting to retrain as a teacher of other teachers, but there were always a few dodgy coves hanging round his gaff, some with 'Intelligence' obviously stamped upon their person. I lost touch when he remarried after a pretty amicable divorce from his then wife, Pat. He died soon after my father died, suddenly, from a stroke. He was a lot younger than dad. Buss's obituaries ran in two of the broadsheets. I put the best one (from the Independent, IIRC) up very early in this blog, some five or six years ago.
Anyway, Buss, Louis, and I, shared a love of "Private Eye".
I had arrived at this love independently, and though Buss and I didn't always agree on Auberon Waugh's Diary, which I thought simply magnificent, he appreciated my poses artistique, even when they were a trifle gauche. After all, he had been post-gradding at the Sorbonne in '68 when it all kicked off, so he understood both gauche pretension and poetic voice. And despite not being one himself, knew a rotter when he saw one: and immediately pointed me at Kyril Bonfiglioli and Willie Donaldson, and the writings thereof.
My debt to him is immense. As is my debt to Louis, whom I haven't seen for years either.
Now I teach. And in my own way, in this medium, I hope I can pass things along.
Go well and do good things. I mean, I know Flashy used to get beastly drunk and bully his servants, weasel his way out of trouble, be cruel to dumb animals, beat his women, and betray his chums and all that, but now he's an upstanding sort of respectable chap, the least he could do is to be nice about the memory of friends. May they go especially well, and do great and noble things.
