Cleese Encounters – Jonathan Margolis, 1992 ★½

Man of the Middle

When I first watched “Fawlty Towers” as a teen, I thought the humor was the awful, demanding people coming to Basil Fawlty’s hotel. I didn’t realize Basil himself was a problem. He seemed a rock of middle-class authority.

Reading Cleese Encounters, I wonder if a teenaged John Cleese might have seen him the same way.

The Calculus Affair – Hergé, 1954-1956 ★★

Plate-Spinning Replaces Plotting

Creative juices are an unreliable source of energy. Just when you most expect them to flow, they have a habit of letting you down.

This is my theory of what happened to Hergé when it came time for him to follow his two-part spectacular about Tintin landing on the Moon. He went for the same thing, a blend of theoretical science and engaging fantasy served up with lots of character-based comedy, but this time just winged the plot.

It doesn’t quite work, making The Calculus Affair an adventure where, for all his polish and craft, I felt Hergé running close to empty.

The Scarlet Letter – Nathaniel Hawthorne, 1850 ★★★★

Hester's Enduring Legacy

When a widely-celebrated novel has been around a long time, it gets harder to be objective about it. Say you like it, and you feel like a conformist. Say you don’t, and you’re a crank.

The Scarlet Letter is undoubtedly great, but after 170 years, is it still any good? Does its iron code of morality strike one now as authentic or dated? Is its celebrated symbolism subtle or strained?