selected for the first eleven

a new biography of palmerston has just been lowered onto the shelves. a good thing that. palmerston is one of my favourite english prime ministers; along with salisbury, pitt the younger, and dizzy. in any cricketing list of the best english prime ministers palmerston is among the first fellows picked; being serious, straightforward, a capable administrator and, most importantly, zealous in the national interest, never permitting the crown to be bullied by third world upstarts. his only drawbacks being that he never declared war on france or scotland (england's eternal enemies).

a list of the best ministers inevitably suggests, ipso facto, the worst. they are: brown (scotch and spendthrift), gladstone (a preaching windbag who badly let the side down in the sudan), chamberlain (weakness abroad is seldom applauded by the english) and, of course, heath (for dragging england into the european union). that last one is a real doozy.

book of the year

"new yorker" readers, if they're honest, will tell you the bek toon is the first thing they look for in the magazine. in the world of toons there is no one better. it's all in the dialogue.

peppermint patty needs help

just when it seemed the "man booker prize" shortlist had put us off literature permanently…

one of better recent publishing enterprises has been the release of the "complete peanuts" cartoons in sequential hardcover volumes. it's a toney production. so far 7 have been issued. that's the "good". the "bad" is each volume costs $60 something. well done, fantagraphic books. that price should scare most readers off.

the star, or scene-stealer, of the strip is marcie, who is inexplicably strange. and kooky. (i also like linus when he's philosophizing or quoting what he calls "scripture".)

another topping moment is peppermint patty's ad in the personals: "help wanted: attractive young lady can't remember history dates. doesn't understand fractions. call patricia reichardt at the number below." wonderful stuff.

wouldn't the world be a better place with the great pumpkin (dispensing his halloween justice)?

annals of publishing

it's 20 years since the publication of australia's best-selling book "how to hypnotize chooks". pretty much sums up intellectual life in oz.

a dillettante's delight

because the world isn't perfect "the skinny bitch diet" book won't be everyone's cup of tea. nevermind. i'm finding satisfactory consolation in clive james's "cultural amnesia". its brisk survey of 106 high culture subjects is just the thing for people like me who like to waterski over the surface of things. who has time to delve into stefan zweig?