Did you know that Stephen Fry has a blog? No, me neither. Well you do now. He's quite, er, discursive. Brevity is not a word in the Fry lexicon I feel.
UPDATE: People are interpreting this as an attack on Stephen. Far from it! I am a great admirer of his and am delighted he has taken to blogging. So there!
Oh, dear God! Mercy! I got almost quarter of the way through the precious blessay before gasping for air and hitting blindly at the keyboard.
ReplyDeleteThe term 'old queen' does not begin to cover this vastness of faggoty pretension.
Actually, I never liked him and his self-regard, but I have a book of his essays which were, I now realise, edited with the ruthlessness of Attila the Hun, which I quite enjoyed.
My God, Mr Fry. Pax! PAX!
Caulton has obviously decided that Tories should start negative campaigns against known Labour Lovies. Is this the new politics or are you just doing as your spin doctor at THQ advises.
ReplyDeleteGood writer, good story teller, good actor, an intelligent man with an unrivalled grasp of the English language. A man that most people, would enjoy having at a dinner party. This obviously grates you.
ReplyDeleteLong winded it may be, but a damn good read none the less.
ReplyDeleteExcellent find.
Anonymous - can't be bothered to look up the time you posted - but "grates" who? And how? I hope he wouldn't grate me at a dinner party. We can see he's a fussier writer than you, dear.
ReplyDeleteAn "unrivalled grasp of the English language?" You mean ...oh, no! Better than Iain?
Better than V S Naipaul? Better than Vikram Seth? Better than Nabokov? Better than all those Waughs? Better than Saki?
Better than MARK STEYN?
Mmm very brave Iain critiquing Stephen Fry! He must be losing sleep over this one! A million and one talents to your, umm, one or two! Plus how do you cope with Verity's tongue permanently lodged up your posterior?
ReplyDeleteTerry Tibbs, don't be horrid! Verity did say she was "hitting blindly at her keyboard". I'm awestruck at her command of the language, given that admission. (Though, did you mean "whom", Verity, are were you in the plural?)
ReplyDeleteIdle thoughts of an idle fellow and, I'm afraid, rather self-indulgent.
ReplyDeleteAnd very funny if you can stay the course. In the first article he writes at great length about his love of gadgets, showing great knowledge, but towards the end I suspected we were being set up for a gag when he makes the confession "I have followed too much the devices and desires of my own heart.”
ReplyDeleteThat's 15,000 [fifteen THOUSAND] words of fur-lined, diamond-studded, ocean-going drivel. Well, to be fair, possibly 12,500 of drivel, the rest being more-or-less interesting.
ReplyDeleteTrouble is, he's been told for far too long how absolutely maaahhhvellous and intelligent and entertaining and witty *and* omniscient he is, so now he believes that he only needs to read [or, indeed, write] a phone-book to have money, gongs and accolades flung at him.
He's fast becoming a parody of himself, and both he and we deserve better.
Bloody hell ! I thought Mark Mardell went in for a fair amount of detail on his blog, but he can't hold a candle to dear Mr Fry.
ReplyDeleteverity - you need to start watching QI and then you would appreciate him an awful lot more...
This poses a wider question about the role of the internet in replacing news papers. I don't think it ever will, as the net is geared to short, pithy articles. Longer, more involved writing is still best delivered by books, papers and magazines.
ReplyDeleteThis poses a wider question about the role of the internet in replacing news papers. I don't think it ever will, as the net is geared to short, pithy articles. Longer, more involved writing is still best delivered by books, papers and magazines.
ReplyDeleteAnonymous, at leat the papers don't print the same article verbatim twice! (At least not on the same day!)
ReplyDeleteI don't think it was an attack. I too love Stephen Fry. One heck of a guy!
ReplyDeleteIt is interesting to read the replies on Stephen Fry's blog -nearly all are about mobile phones and apple computers. One wonders whether any of them actually bothered to read his blog at all.
ReplyDeletePerhaps he is becoming the stupid person's clever person.
And what a mine for pseuds' corner!
Taken to blogging? SF had one many years before ID I believe. This must be a new version??
ReplyDeleteIs it worth reading Stephen's blog? I'd expect that BBC3 will schedule a Stephen Fry Blog Evening in the very near future.
ReplyDeleteI came across his blog a while ago after reading Euan Semple's comment about it on twitter. I did love his post about fame - and have promised not to badger him for a comment the next time I see him at The Hoste Arms in Burnham Market. He is quite mesmerising.
ReplyDeleteHe certainly has his only style regarding the length of his posts, but he can get away with it. I still wanted more at the end.
I picked up one of his books once, he was disecting poems to Oxbridge level and I didn't understand it, so I put it down again.
ReplyDeleteMind you, if he's the sort of person who is going to buy an iPhone I'm glad O2 have got them. Hardly the sort of consumer you want on your calling list.
I like my consumers to say 'OK', 'Right', 'Right', 'OK', ''Yeah', 'Right', 'Ok'
'Is that OK then'
'Yeah'
He's not the proverbial rabbit in the headlights I'd wanna phone.
Brevity the soul of wit?
ReplyDeleteFry disproves the theory convincingly.
Having a great command of the English language is no obstacle to being a bit of a bore.
ReplyDelete