NBS

The Guardian today has a celebration of Nancy Banks-Smith. And why not? I'd have chosen different pieces, I must admit, and more jokes - like the one she occasionally repeats about her name sounding like something that fell off a horse at Hickstead. This I particularly recall from a review of a TV play in which a young girl is shown to be getting cleverer because she is caught reading Nancy B-S; so she was reviewing a piece of TV in which she herself was used to delineate character - crikey. Like Wilde, she repeats her jokes and like him she is allowed to because they are good ones. Any way, a nice piece - apart from the 'talking head' columnistas praising her. Only NBS herself didn't write anything new for it. I can understand why, but a pity.

I've written earlier about how NBS is just about the last truly great writer left at the paper (pace all of the columnists praised in recent awards - also puffed in today's chipwrapper). And at last, they've recognised it too. 'Bout damn time. Grump.