Monday 29 October, 2007

Soft paws

I love a good bit of anthropomorphizing. This article is referring to the new biography of Charles Schulz, creator of Peanuts. 'Michaelis reveals that the upshot of Snoopy's brush with campus protest -- a breathless romance with a "girl-beagle" who had "the softest paws" -- was inspired by Schulz's extramarital affair with a 25-year-old office worker named Tracey Claudius.'

I was interested, too, by the reference to Schulz's pessimism (I mentioned my own in my last post).'. . . in his words, "a generation that really did fear the next day, sometimes wasn't sure if the next day was going to come." '. No wonder Snoopy often looked so down. (AS an aside, Wilson often reminds me of Snoopy, as he skulks, vulture-like, above the television, trying to convince us to feed him through threats to our consumer goods - stereo, TV etc.) Maybe every generation feels that way? For us it's climate change and back then it was Nuclear War? Before that it was the plague, and starvation.

It's now 7.04 pm Daylight Savings Time. I think I need a drink. I will leave you with Wilson, here pictured contemplating the state of the planet.