« Mystery guest | Main | Back on track »
August 29, 2003
Footnote to elsewhere
Devoted blogwatchers will be aware that there's a major Frank Lloyd Wright-related wrangle currently taking place all over the blogosphere (go here to start picking up the threads, which lead far and wide). Me, I think Wright was a genius and I'd be perfectly happy to at least try living in one of his houses, even if the roof leaked, but I definitely wouldn't have wanted to pal around with him. Here's my favorite Wright anecdote, from Meryle Secrest's biography:One of Wright's many apprentices to study in that studio recalled that one day when he was buried underneath the Steinway making another of the innumerable attempts to restore its legs, he saw the master saunter into the room. Believing himself alone, Wright arranged three or four objects on the window ledge, then stood back admiringly. He walked over to the piano, still oblivious of the hidden observer, struck a few chords and pirouetted out of the room, singing to himself, "I am the greatest."
(Incidentally, I've seen a kinescope of an appearance Wright made on What's My Line? not long before his death. It's one of the more endearing examples of his rampant egomania.)
Posted August 29, 2003 12:03 PM
