Our Intellectual tradition is rich, varied, and, quite likely, virtually totally erroneous. Which is good. This means there is work for YOU to do sir. I expect <Daniel Pi> to contribute as well.

To work, gentlemen.

Same standard of proof as for <Bigfoot>

So there.

Maybe. But let's have a nice orderly intro/opening first. None of your fancy St-George-and-the-Dragon metafictional metastrategies here. Or polyphonic irruptions like

<So I was living in one room in <hey, readerkins, I shagged him> in, in <who said that? where was I?> - oh, never mind where I was, I'm just a device anyways...>

While wintering in tbe mountains with his peasant army, Mao wrote:

<There is great chaos under Heaven, and the situation is excellent>

My main man - above even Ruskin, Breton, Dylan, Pushkin, Suttles or Tony Hancock - is a chap by the name of Robert Pollard. He used to be lead singer of a vaguely well-known American band called Guided By Voices. (Heard of 'em?).

Now, it's possible that there's never been a more prolific songwriter than Uncle Bob, he has released dozens upon dozens upon dozens of albums, EPs, boxsets etc under a variety of monikers. In total, he's written around 5,000 songs - and those are just the ones we know about. More tapes than you could possibly imagine, all jam-packed with unreleased material reside in his basement.

Now - and this is the bit I'm interested in - Bob's songwriting technique is fascinating. He has always written his titles first, and will write down reams and reams of these potential titles before writing a single lyric, then chooses which ones to flesh out into full songs. As such, there are some brilliant titles in the GBV/Pollard canon. To name but a few:

158 Years Of Beautiful Sex
Cut-Out Witch
Tractor Rape Chain
Unbaited Vicar Of Scorched Earth
Wondering Boy Poet
Psychic Pilot Clocks Out
Supernatural Car Lover
Love Is Stronger Than Witchcraft
Bomb In The Beehive
Game Of Pricks
A Salty Salute
Cigarette Tricks
Big Chief Chinese Restaurant
My Valuable Hunting Knife
The Goldheart Mountaintop Queen Directory

You get the idea. I spoke to my dad about this technique, and he said that it was 'delightfully Dada... but nevertheless, quite worrying really'. Ultimately, he disapproved strongly, saying that it's not how stuff should be written.

Of course, I've since taken it up myself for my poetry. At present, I have a page with about 350 potential poem titles on, and I find it highly liberating. I can scan the page, and I get the feeling that I *must* give a certain title 'personality', so to speak. It's resulted in a period of unpredecented productivity.

So at least you're in good company.

Is <Staunton> your favorite?

Apologies again for disappearing for over a month and losing your piece, I'll not disappear like that again.

My current list of working titles - for *something*, eventually - includes:

Domestic Data, Dictionary Dreams.
Metaphor's Rubber Calf.
Lethal Me.

Mostly rubbish, of course. But one or two still resonate years later, having accrued more meanings along the way. I find the Burroughs cutup technique the same: 99% of what's produced is garbage (and only WSB himself could have got away with printing all of it) - but every so often a gem emerges.

I used some random method to produce the line "We cannot become like him in his stagnant self" - which <I think> is better than anything I could have produced with the lights on.

You were right earlier: there's a great chessically inspired book waiting to be written, and the Nickelodeon is one possible route in. Damned if I'm going to write to 3000 crazed kibitzers for permits, though.

The stand up genre is very, very difficult to do well. Much easier to write half hour shows, such as <The Young Ones> or any of <Ben Elton's> many, many efforts in that field. Not to mention <John Cleese's> writing in <Fawlty Towers>...

I live in Canada but we have access to American Public Television, which is devoted to replaying every British TV show ever made, apparently...

Yes, UK born and inbred.

The current state of British comedy makes me angrier than anything. We've got to a stage where godawful bollocks such as 'Green Wing' (it makes ill just typing it, if I'm honest) is held up as something truly innovative and worthy of praise. It makes me very sad indeed. I'm currently working on a small book about the 'Derek & Clive - Live' album, and rather unavoidably it's turned into a long old rant about how Peter Cook had more wit in half his index finger than every single tosser who's written anything for Channel 4 in the past five years combined.

Stand up is the most awful of genres to master. I've done it a few times, and with some success it has to be said, but in the end there was only so many times I could bring myself to tell a long story about wanking over Reuben Fine to a poorly-ventilated room full of strangers. I stick to reading poetry now, as you'll always get a polite ripple of applause at the end to make you feel good about yourself.

The idea that it is somehow 'easier' to write half-hour shows, though... hmm. Get the audience on your side and it's infinitely easier to do half an hour of stand up. In fact, it is a mark of truly brilliant writing that it makes it look like the easiest thing in the world to have done, when in fact the opposite is true. Every episode of Fawlty Towers, for example, flows so bloody well that you get the impression that Cleese & Connie were just making it as they went along. In truth, it was painstakingly constructed. So not sure if I agree with you there!