Skip to content

Notes of a Dirty Old Man (1968)

Story (1968)

Excerpt

Notes of a Dirty Old Man

one of my best friends—at least I consider him a friend—one of the finest poets of our Age is afflicted, right now, in London, with it, and the Greeks were aware of it and the Ancients, and it can fall upon a man at any age but the best age for it is the late forties working toward fifty, and I think of it as immobility—a weakness of movement, an increasing lack of care and wonder; I think of it as The Frozen Man Stance, although it hardly is a STANCE at all, but it might allow us to view the corpse with SOME humor; otherwise the blackness would be too much. all men are afflicted, at times, with the Frozen Man Stance, and it is indicated best by such flat phrases as: "I just can't make it." or: "to hell with it all." or: "give my regards to Broadway." but usually they quickly recover and continue to beat their wives and hit the timeclocks...

Appears in Books

Appears in Magazines