pages with columns and a crucial qualification for landing one of these regular spots appears to be a propensity towards emotional self-indulgence and a refusal to do research. Columnists are expected to fill columns with words and judged on such criteria McCrum remains a consummate professional.
Alan was delighted that I recognised McCrum’s name and between shovelling forkfuls of fry-up into his gob, he whooped out a hundred and one put-downs of the would-be author. According to Alan, McCrum was a time-server and this was patently evident from his first book In the Secret State. Nominally a thriller, the work is really about office politics and how one gets ahead in a bureaucracy. Typically, Alan observed, McCrum mistook position for power and singularly failed to understand that bureaucrats are simply acting out a script. For someone to exercise power they must necessarily be in a position to effect change. A literary editor or spook who merely acts out the decision-making process in ritual form, reproducing already established patterns of behaviour, has very little real power. McCrum was Alan’s best example. When McCrum had been a literary editor at Faber and Faber he’d patently failed to break the mould of what had been published before he got there. Of course, given McCrum’s connections, he was able to get his books published and favourably reviewed, but he could not be described as influential. He was every inch the bureaucrat and would never be an opinion shaper.
Alan was still talking about McCrum’s first book as he bundled Dudley into the car and we made our way to the Brandsbutt symbol stone. This was located in a housing estate very close to Safeway. At one time there had been a stone circle abutting the Brandsbutt stone but that had been destroyed long ago. Dudley was wheeled out of the car and we took a few photos. I thought Alan might move on to the subject of Kevin Callan’s 69 Things to Do with a Dead Princess , but he had yet to exhaust the subject of Robert McCrum. As we got into the car Alan made a series of jokes about the Byron complex that McCrum was alleged to suffer from. Of course, like Byron, the hero of In the Secret State has a limp but Alan cackled, the thing that really hobbled in this novel was the prose.
At this point we were neither following Callan’s route nor that of the Stone Circle Trail. Alan was chuckling about the many clangers in McCrum’s first book. Specifically he was in hysterics about the fact that McCrum quite earnestly used a character’s rereading of Carlyle as evidence that this stereotype loved history, blissfully unaware that no one who knew the first thing about the subject would treat the author of The French Revolution and History of Frederick the Great as a serious historian, particularly when it was the flaws in the latter work that made it one of Hitler’s favourite books. Once we’d reached the village of Daviot, Alan pulled up in a car park by a scout hut. A short walk through some trees brought us to Loanhead of Daviot stone circle. Immediately in front of us was a recumbent stone with two flankers and eight others making up the circle with a kerbed ring cairn inside. Just to the east was an enclosed Bronze-Age cremation cemetery. All of this was set on a gentle slope with the countryside to the north spread out before us.
Alan threw Dudley down on the recumbent stone and the dummy announced languidly that he was tired and wished Alan and me to dance and play before him. We waltzed around the stone circle and simultaneously removed our clothes. Alan pushed his legs between my thighs and in this way our genitals and bottoms were paraded before Dudley in the lewdest possible fashion. As we went on we grew more excited, smacking each other’s rumps until Alan grew bold enough to pull some hairs out of my cunt. Then he kissed my sex better, licked it copiously and before long we were fucking.
The ground was rough. Alan got up and dislodging Dudley
Alan was delighted that I recognised McCrum’s name and between shovelling forkfuls of fry-up into his gob, he whooped out a hundred and one put-downs of the would-be author. According to Alan, McCrum was a time-server and this was patently evident from his first book In the Secret State. Nominally a thriller, the work is really about office politics and how one gets ahead in a bureaucracy. Typically, Alan observed, McCrum mistook position for power and singularly failed to understand that bureaucrats are simply acting out a script. For someone to exercise power they must necessarily be in a position to effect change. A literary editor or spook who merely acts out the decision-making process in ritual form, reproducing already established patterns of behaviour, has very little real power. McCrum was Alan’s best example. When McCrum had been a literary editor at Faber and Faber he’d patently failed to break the mould of what had been published before he got there. Of course, given McCrum’s connections, he was able to get his books published and favourably reviewed, but he could not be described as influential. He was every inch the bureaucrat and would never be an opinion shaper.
Alan was still talking about McCrum’s first book as he bundled Dudley into the car and we made our way to the Brandsbutt symbol stone. This was located in a housing estate very close to Safeway. At one time there had been a stone circle abutting the Brandsbutt stone but that had been destroyed long ago. Dudley was wheeled out of the car and we took a few photos. I thought Alan might move on to the subject of Kevin Callan’s 69 Things to Do with a Dead Princess , but he had yet to exhaust the subject of Robert McCrum. As we got into the car Alan made a series of jokes about the Byron complex that McCrum was alleged to suffer from. Of course, like Byron, the hero of In the Secret State has a limp but Alan cackled, the thing that really hobbled in this novel was the prose.
At this point we were neither following Callan’s route nor that of the Stone Circle Trail. Alan was chuckling about the many clangers in McCrum’s first book. Specifically he was in hysterics about the fact that McCrum quite earnestly used a character’s rereading of Carlyle as evidence that this stereotype loved history, blissfully unaware that no one who knew the first thing about the subject would treat the author of The French Revolution and History of Frederick the Great as a serious historian, particularly when it was the flaws in the latter work that made it one of Hitler’s favourite books. Once we’d reached the village of Daviot, Alan pulled up in a car park by a scout hut. A short walk through some trees brought us to Loanhead of Daviot stone circle. Immediately in front of us was a recumbent stone with two flankers and eight others making up the circle with a kerbed ring cairn inside. Just to the east was an enclosed Bronze-Age cremation cemetery. All of this was set on a gentle slope with the countryside to the north spread out before us.
Alan threw Dudley down on the recumbent stone and the dummy announced languidly that he was tired and wished Alan and me to dance and play before him. We waltzed around the stone circle and simultaneously removed our clothes. Alan pushed his legs between my thighs and in this way our genitals and bottoms were paraded before Dudley in the lewdest possible fashion. As we went on we grew more excited, smacking each other’s rumps until Alan grew bold enough to pull some hairs out of my cunt. Then he kissed my sex better, licked it copiously and before long we were fucking.
The ground was rough. Alan got up and dislodging Dudley
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