Saturday, December 02, 2006

Philosophy 101

Another of the world's great excessive drinkers on whom I bestow rather too much adulation is Shane MacGowan - formerly the lead singer and principal songwriter with the fantastic Irish punk/folk band 'The Pogues' (who were, during my undergraduate days, just about the biggest band in the UK for a while).

One of my e-penpals a few years ago sent me the lovely gift of a biography of Shane, written by his long-term, long-suffering girlfriend, Victoria ('A Drink with Shane MacGowan' by Victoria Mary Clarke and Shane MacGowan).

In this very amusing - but occasionally horrifying - book (derived from a series of interviews taped with Shane over the course of a year or so, during some of his more sober and lucid moments), the 'great man' offers opinions on just about everything under the sun. I particularly enjoyed his terse, obscene dismissal of Plato - "Basically just some Greek c**t!" If only, I have often thought to myself, Mr MacGowan had been my philosophy tutor for Classics Mods at Oxford!

Ah, but then again, in a way he was.....

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