Try it with a French accent

This relates a little to my post from earlier today, so I thought I would share it. It is an NPR interview with Jack White concerning accents, of all things. It turns out Jack is a fan of actress, accent officianado, and YouTube star Amy Walker. She has a pretty amazing viral vid where she goes through twenty-one different accents in just over two minutes and thirty seconds. Watch it. Apparently she’s recently released a 45 on Third Man Records as well. Oddly enough, I stumbled upon that very video for the first time about two weeks ago. It’s weird where stuff pops back up. Hm…synchronicity.

Anyway, in Bob Boilen’s interview, J.W. admits to an affinity for accents (one I share with him) but a dislike of his own. I understand how troublesome accents can be. I actively worked hard all of my life to avoid picking up a southern accent, more specifically the nasally Tennessee accent. The Old South, Gone With the Wind type doesn’t natively exist in my home state. Unfortunately, it is quickly disappearing where it does exist, though, a result of the ill effects of global culture, I suppose. I won’t digress into a long spiel about the diversity of accents and their frequency in the Southeast here, though.

The short interview with Jack can be found here. Needless to say, he’s a very interesting guy, but we all had already figured that out a long time ago.

Have you met Ogdred Weary, or perhaps you know him as Dogear Wryde? I prefer to call him Edward Gorey, though.

Edward Gorey is easily my favorite artist of all time. I was first drawn to him when I saw his animated intro to Mystery! on PBS for the first time. This was many years ago and way past my bedtime in those days. The dark pen and ink drawings heavily influenced by the Edwardian era (something else that fascinates me) appealed strongly to my inner morbidity, even as a child. As I got older, I began collecting his books and fell madly in love with his stories like “The Gashlycrumb Tinies” and “The Doubtful Guest.” Gorey’s special brand of whimsy will always be dear to my heart, and that is why I was quite delighted to happen upon a NPR interview with his old friend Alexander Theroux. The interview is sweet and gives some interesting insight into the late artist’s character. If you’re a Goreyphile like myself or someone reading this and wondering “Who the hell is Edward Gorey?” give it a listen here.

This is my favorite picture of Gorey. Cats, books, and naps, that's the good life.

The cover illustration for the Gashlycrumb Tinies

A page from The Doubtful Guest (gotta love the hightops)

(As always, these are not my images and I am not putting them here for commercial use, thanks.)

This is, however, my picture of the tribute to E.G. I painted onto my bookshelf years ago. I think if I ever decided to get a tattoo, it would be one of Gorey's smiling sweater cats.