David,

With a little luck, this brings everything up to date. Chances are it mixes up one of two different postings but I hope it makes sense.

Regarding your comments about letter writing and the Internet - I am not very familiar with the Internet myself and every time I get a telephone bill, I resolve to get even less familiar. Though, it never seems to turn out that way.

An Internet forum is a strange beast. It is not like writing letters to a friend and it is not like a group discussion (definitely best done with drinks.) I suppose it could be thought of as a combination of the two but I get the feeling it is not quite that either.

As originator of the question, I feel obliged to answer every posting but I think this stops some people from joining in if they have something to add. It also gives the impression that I want to control the discussion although nothing is further from the truth. On the other hand, if I don't reply to every posting it gives the impression that I am selective in who or what I am willing to listen to and if I don't reply to anything it looks like I have abandoned it. I worry about these things.

You have given me more problems than everyone else put together. I don't mean that in a negative or critical way. What I mean is that I find it difficult to judge both the extent and the tone of my replies to some of your postings. Take, for example, the posting you sent with the long passage from The Rebel. I had read The Rebel many years ago and, to my shame, had forgotten much about it. I was grateful to you for bringing it back to mind. Since the passage you quoted required no interference from me, I decided not to comment on it directly but to let it stand alone in its own glory. I immediately tracked down a copy of The Rebel to re-read and re-enjoy, and supplied my own quote from it by way of thanks. This is, at least, how it seemed to me at the time. I have since read that reply, and all my replies, again. It has surprised me how cool and distant most of them sound. It has surprised me just how much my replies seem to ignore some of the most important contributions you have made. I can only assure you, this was not my intent. Where I have had nothing to add, question, or disagree with, I have remained silent. This, I now believe, is not the best policy (not just for you, David, but for everyone.) See what problems you have caused me! I will try to do better.

I liked your phrase, "not exactly uncomplicated individuals," an understatement if ever I heard one!

Concerning the increasing intellectual complexity and abstraction of writing on art, I would like to get your thoughts on this matter and, expressly, whether or not you see an end to it. I would like to add more but I am running out of time.

Very quickly, because it's four in the morning and I'm not up early but up late, why the answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe and everything is forty-two.

Millions of years ago a bunch of hyper-intelligent pan-dimensional beings were so fed up with all the bickering about the meaning of life that they decided to build themselves a gigantic computer smart enough to solve the problem. The computer was called Deep Thought. The Amalgamated Union of Philosophers, Sages, Luminaries and Other Thinking Persons were not too pleased about it but Deep Thought persuaded them that since it would take seven and a half million years to calculate the answer, the philosophers could be gainfully employed speculating on it and slagging each other off in the popular press.

Seven and a half million years later (through the period known as The Time of Waiting), Deep Thought tells its caretakers that it has solved the question but warns them that they are not going to like it. Really not going to like it. And the answer was … forty-two.

It subsequently turns out that they couldn't understand the answer because they didn't really understand the question.

The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy was originally a BBC radio program and achieved cult status in the UK. That the Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, The Universe, and Everything is forty-two, is now, as far as I am aware, urban myth. I believe it also appears as a question in Trivial Pursuit.

I adopted it on the assumption that it was as good an answer as anything else and it has the additional benefits of being short and suitably nonsensical.

All this, of course, is for information only. Make of it what you will.

I have never read the Betty Edwards book. I have read chapter three because a friend of mine photocopied it for me (sh, don't tell the publishers.) I didn't fully understand your comments about the book and Old Masters but I think I got the general gist. Is this what MK meant when he called it "oddly fundamentalistic?"

According to David Hockney, all anyone needs to be able to draw like any of the Old Masters is a camera obscura or, presumably, its modern equivalent. He carried out research on collections of old masterpieces and published a book on his findings. Curiously, I have not read this book either. I saw the Horizon program where he presented his main evidence and I must say he provides a compelling case.

I had intended to comment more fully on the 11 September, Axis of Evil situation and particularly if we are seeing a split into a pro-American post-modern and a pro-European post-modern. But, I am sorry. I really have run out of time.

I am disappearing later today and I will not be back until Thursday 27. Even then, it will probably be the weekend before I log on again.

The best advice I can give you about artists - don't trust 'em!

Best wishes,