[Vwoolf] "Mrs. Amyot's last brilliant lecture on the influence of something upon somebody"

[Mary Ellen Foley]

Which brings to mind Dylan Thomas' remarks before a reading at Brandeis in
the Spring of 1950, which ended with this explanation of why he hoped no
one would ask questions:

"I'd like to be able to answer anybody's question fluently, but always as
soon as I try to start, as soon as gauchely and inarticulately I bog, bury,
and bitch myself in a sentence which can never, I know, come to an end,
such as the sentence I am now bogged in, I find myself thinking of certain
other subjects, all almost as interesting as the subject supposedly under
discussion.  You know the sort of subject that comes into one's head when
one's asked these odd questions, subjects such as: 'Rilke and the Gold
Standard,' or 'Charles Morgan, My Favourite Character in Fiction,' or even
the very awful thing that occurs to one occasionally, 'If a Hermaphrodite
Were a Schizophrene, Which Half Would You Take?" or even such esoteric
subjects as *'The Influence of W. C. Fields on Virginia Woolf.'  *Perhaps
I'd better read a poem.  I can go on talking like this all the time: that's
what I do..."

and apparently, with that, he began to read.

Mary Ellen  (postscript: for my blog post on a recent visit to the
Boathouse at Laugharne, at which Dylan Thomas lived, please see
http://mefoley.wordpress.com/2012/07/03/dylan-thomas-boathouse/)

M.E.Foley
MEFoleyUK at gmail.com
http://mefoley.wordpress.com
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