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Dec. 1st, 2005 10:33 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
the_elyan"People like Lindsay Anderson can never learn what people like Alan Bennett should know in their bones: that common sense and a sense of humour are the same thing moving at different speeds. A sense of humour is common sense, dancing. Those who lack humour are without judgment, and should be trusted with nothing"
[Clive James, 1979]
Clive James is my favourite non-fiction prose writer, and this is an example of why. His ability to work on a thought until it makes fundamental sense, even when working to a deadline (this is from the weekly television column he wrote from 1972 to 1983), is phenomenal - or, to put it as he did much more sweetly, "All I can do is turn a phrase until it catches the light". The "all" in that sentence is misleading, because to do that is a tremendous talent, and is in some ways the goal of all prose writing, certainly jounralistic and transactional writing.
It also helps that agree entirely with the above sentiment. I worry most when I cease to find anything amusing, because that means I'm missing something important.
In the meantime, if I can write, just very occasionally, as lucidly as Clive James, and maintain an argument and a humorous line as well as he does, I will be well pleased...
[Clive James, 1979]
Clive James is my favourite non-fiction prose writer, and this is an example of why. His ability to work on a thought until it makes fundamental sense, even when working to a deadline (this is from the weekly television column he wrote from 1972 to 1983), is phenomenal - or, to put it as he did much more sweetly, "All I can do is turn a phrase until it catches the light". The "all" in that sentence is misleading, because to do that is a tremendous talent, and is in some ways the goal of all prose writing, certainly jounralistic and transactional writing.
It also helps that agree entirely with the above sentiment. I worry most when I cease to find anything amusing, because that means I'm missing something important.
In the meantime, if I can write, just very occasionally, as lucidly as Clive James, and maintain an argument and a humorous line as well as he does, I will be well pleased...
