Tag: John Cleese

Peter Cook

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Originality of thought and a command of words give him a maturity of style beyond his years. In speech or essay he is never dull and his work should always be interesting. — Peter Cook’s school report, aged 14

I know I’ve been destructive. What I do reflects the idiocy and chaos within myself. — Peter Cook

In the self-congratulatory world of show business, the word “genius” is used casually and often, and “comic genius” more than most, but in its original sense it is occasionally appropriate. (more…)

Nigel Farage may have been able to get Britain out of the European Union, but now he can’t even maintain an account at the bank that Queen Elizabeth used to use.

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Farage against the machine

De-banking has arrived in Great Britain. Or rather, it has been going on for some time, but now it’s happened to someone with media leverage. Nigel Farage, the ex-financier who engineered Brexit, was contacted by his bank and told his account was being closed down. The bank in question is Coutts & Co., an exclusive concern who won’t even let you sit down if you haven’t got a million quid. The Queen used to bank there, although the current King seems the sort of personage who might give his money to that nice Nigerian chap who emailed him about his uncle also being a King and having made a will. (more…)

Mizzy (right), who has been making TikTok videos about harassing random white people in London in highly illegal ways and then crying “racism” when anyone tries to stop him.

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Bad chemistry

I wrote in Counter-Currents in 2021 about Professor Kathleen Stock, a philosophy lecturer hounded from her post at my alma mater, the University of Sussex, by student activists for her comments and writings on gender identity. She has recently been “deplatformed” by Oxford University, and has now come under attack from a curious source: the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC).

You might assume these eggheads would be busy publishing peer-reviewed papers on enzymes, salts, and various reactions in test-tubes, but their remit seems considerably wider in these heady days of woke kangaroo courts. The RSC’s new journal, Digital Discovery, has as its mission statement to publish “theoretical and experimental research at the intersection of chemistry, material science and biotechnology.” (more…)

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John Cleese of Monty Python and Fawlty Towers fame is one of the funniest men alive. He’s also fearsomely smart. Beyond that, he has the vision and courage to oppose political correctness, one of the banes of comedy, creativity, and civilization itself. Thus it was an easy decision to snap up his new book, Creativity: A Short and Cheerful Guide (London: Hutchison, 2020), now out in paperback from Penguin. Creativity truly is a short book — I estimate about 20,000 words. It can be easily read in one sitting, and with great profit, for it is brimming with arresting insights and useful advice on cultivating one’s creativity. (more…)

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Monty Python co-founder John Cleese endured a bit of a career hiccup a few days ago at the South by Southwest festival in Austin, Texas — but this hiccup is indicative of bigger things. (more…)