Friday 8 July 2011

The Fry Chronicles by Stephen Fry

I bought this when I was travelling and I finished 'Roumeli' so was book bereft. It is a very easy read, mainly because Fry writes as he speaks and it is a very smooth and comfortable process to follow his account of his early professional life. He is so multi talented there is much to enjoy in his descriptions of the creative process in acting, writing, screenwriting and criticism.

Lots of good anecdotes, too.

It reads a bit as if he bashed it out quickly but as a cheerful and entertaining book it is pretty good, especially if you live in the UK and know the people he writes about.

Dropped in from time to time are some pithy observations on things like celebrity culture (he points out that getting all moony over a football player or an actress is better than doing the same thing over a political or religious zealot, as people have in the past).

I read it in a couple of days - it is very comfortable and he delights in using unusual words, which is fun if you have a good dictionary. Mind you, he does use a word that is not in my Shorter Oxford, which is a rare event. The word is 'colaphise', which means to beat, or buffet. So now you know.

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