I used to see him in El Morocco, the most famous nightclub of its era during the late 1950s and early 60s. He was a very handsome man, beautifully tailored and with impeccable old-fashioned manners, and a heavy drinker. Wine, champagne, and cognac were his drinks, and vodka later in the night. ...
Cicero was a wise human being who wrote that a man with a garden and a library has all he needs. He also said that only a man without a brain Tweets. (Well, he would have said it were he around today.) The Oxford philosopher John Gray, a man I used to get drunk with until he gave up the sauce, ...
Stop the presses. Call out the National Guard. Order in the tanks. The Simon Wiesenthal Center is mad and is not going to take it anymore. Especially from Vini Lunardelli, the Italian winemaker that labels some of their wine bottles with pictures of Adolf Hitler. The little Italian winemaker has ...
Just before I left for the Greek islands I went to dinner at Eugenie Radziwill’s, whose other guests included the great Barry Humphries, his wife Lizzie, and a man I had never met before but whose name rang a distant bell: John Sutherland. The bell turned out not to be so distant, the prof having ...
There is no doubt in my mind that we wish our destruction. What else could it be? An Elders of Zion plot? Hardly. They would be among the first to go down, although unlike us, they would put up a fight. The only thing I can think of is extreme stupidity. Take the cases of John McCain and Lindsey ...
ONBOARD THE WEATHERBIRD OFF THE PELOPONNESE—The old girl groans and creaks as we tack time and again, the breeze right on the nose as we negotiate the turquoise coastline. She’s gaff-rigged and good upwind, the only annoyance being the ubiquitous speedboats driven by fat Greeks who come by for ...
PORTO HELI—I am standing on the deck of a 100-foot schooner that was built in Normandy in 1931 by Gerald and Sara Murphy, the golden American couple who invented the south of France as a summer playground and were in the forefront of artistic and literary Parisian life at the time. More ...
GSTAAD—This is a tale of two men. One possesses youth, talent, fame, and even beauty; the other none of the above except arrogance, physical repulsiveness, and a sexual impudence that fits perfectly into our porno-centric culture. Both, however, need to quit their respective professions; the ...
If I hear or read one more American hack mentioning the word “democracy” regarding Egypt and the Middle East, I swear on Joe Biden’s hair-implanted head that I shall go in front of the Capitol and commit ritual seppuku, the Japanese warrior’s way of leaving this life. (Just ...
THUN, SWITZERLAND—”Mokuso!” All 200 of us who are already on our knees and sitting on our heels in the Japanese “seiza” position remain dead silent at the command. No loud breathing, no movement whatsoever, just “mizu no kokoro,” a calm mind, like the surface ...
