h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Received a parcel today with stuff I ordered from Amazon... including also a tape of Under Milk Wood - the original recording that was made practically by coincidence during a reading in New York, not long before Dylan Thomas collapsed from alcohol poisoning and died in his hotel room ('I've had eighteen straight whiskies, I think that's the record' were apparently his last words). Started listening to it on the bus home today. It's brilliant.
I mean, it's a terrible recording. The voices have a sort of echo from the place's acoustics, and you can hear people caughing, or laughing at the ends of lines like the audience on a cheap sitcom; also, some things are very different than the text I have, parts added or removed or just not the same... but I love it. I am, at this moment, perfectly happy.

I've been skipping a lot today. People must think I'm mad. I think they might be right.

Dylan Thomas? Was he a writer? I think I've heard of him, but not sure...

I've been pretty happy today too Nothing wrong with people thinking you're mad

Your not mad.... We're all outsaine

'Under Milk Wood' is one of my favourite things... I have the film version, with Elizabeth Taylor as Rosie Probert...

'Rosie Probert, thirty-three Duck Lane. Come on up boys, I'm dead...'

I also have a full-cast radio version, but Richard Burton's voice has some quality that makes me fall asleep.

Dylan Thomas reads it quite dramatically...

By the way FB, yeah, he was a writer. A poet, to be exact (and the person Robert Zimmermann renamed himself after, which oughta mean something). There's an entry about him here: A638912.

For a minute there I thought you meant that _you_ had had 18 straight whiskies

Not very likely, seeing as I don't really drink...

Read my obituary of Big Bill Werbeniuk for something that tops that, if you're interested...

Access via my PS

Yeah LP, I wouldn't have thought of you as a big drinker.

Yeah, I'm such a Good Girl, ain't I?

Actually, it's not a matter of principle, I simply don't like the stuff. The way I usually put it is that alcohol being an aquired taste, I just never bothered to aquire it. *shrug*

And Six, that Werbeniuk guy... ! I'm surprised _he_ haven't died of alcohol poisoning!

Speaking of hearing dead people... you wanna hear Dylan Thomas reading his 'Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night'? http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15377 (that's a great site, actually - lots of very cool recordings).

I love Under Milk Wood too. My dad was Welsh and I remember feeling really proud about Dylan Thomas as a young man. Not because of his drinking but his work.

He's a brilliant poet - definitely one of my favourites. I've been wanting to get this recording for ages now, and finally had an official excuse because I'm going to write a paper about it (not that I really need the recording for the paper... but that was still the official excuse ).

*Endorses official excuse with big overinked stamp*

Thanks!