Monday, October 17, 2011
Beard Or No Beard?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
skip to main |
skip to sidebar
Next week my German publishers Suhrkamp are sending a photographer out to St Kilda to take a photo of me for the German version of Falling Glass. The problem with this is that I've been growing a beard since early September, or as I like to put it, since early September I have been liberated from the tyranny of shaving. The photograph they take is going to be on the book jacket forever and probably on all the German versions of my novels for all time. So the question is simple. Beard or no beard? At chez McKinty we are a house divided. My wife is not keen on the face fluff but my kids like it and I like not having to scrape my chin every day. The readers of this blog have already displayed their good sense and taste by coming here in the first place so I'd really appreciate your thoughts. ZZ Top or Justin Bieber?
I'm an Irish novelist currently living in St Kilda, Australia
"Hardboiled charm, evocative dialogue, an acute sense of place and a sardonic sense of humour make McKinty one to watch."
---The Guardian
A couple more books, a few birthdays, some shuffleboard then a period spent in the digestive tract of earthworms, followed by molecular breakdown, the sun boiling into space, the heat death of the universe, atomic decay, perpetual darkness, a trillion years of nothingness and then, if we're lucky, brane collapse, a new singularity and a new Big Bang.
About Me
I'm an Irish novelist currently living in St Kilda, Australia
Followers
More about me
I was born and grew up in Carrickfergus, Northern Ireland. After studying philosophy at Oxford University I emigrated to New York City where I lived in Harlem for seven years working in bars, bookstores, building sites and finally the basement stacks of the Columbia University Medical School Library in Washington Heights.
In 2000 I moved to Denver, Colorado where I taught high school English and started writing fiction in earnest. My first full length novel Dead I Well May Be was shortlisted for the 2004 Ian Fleming Steel Dagger Award and was picked by Booklist as one of the 10 best crime novels of the year. The sequel to that book The Dead Yard was selected by Publishers Weekly as one of the 12 best novels of 2006 and won the Audie Award for best mystery or thriller.
In mid 2008 I moved to St. Kilda, Melbourne, Australia with my wife and kids. My last book Falling Glass was Audible's Best Mystery or Thriller for 2011. I've just published a new novel for Serpents Tail called The Cold Cold Ground.
In 2000 I moved to Denver, Colorado where I taught high school English and started writing fiction in earnest. My first full length novel Dead I Well May Be was shortlisted for the 2004 Ian Fleming Steel Dagger Award and was picked by Booklist as one of the 10 best crime novels of the year. The sequel to that book The Dead Yard was selected by Publishers Weekly as one of the 12 best novels of 2006 and won the Audie Award for best mystery or thriller.
In mid 2008 I moved to St. Kilda, Melbourne, Australia with my wife and kids. My last book Falling Glass was Audible's Best Mystery or Thriller for 2011. I've just published a new novel for Serpents Tail called The Cold Cold Ground.
You can read a review of my latest book, The Cold Cold Ground, in The Guardian, here. You can peruse the review from the Irish Independent, here or the review in The Times, here. The Glasgow Herald's verdict is here and The Sydney Morning Herald chips in, here. Not to be outdone The Irish Times weighs in, here and the Irish Sunday Independent adds its two cents, here. If you want to know what all the fuss is about you can be a good chap and get The Cold Cold Ground on Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, Audible.com or at your local bookshop.
WORK IN PROGRESS:
All Hail McKinty!
"If Raymond Chandler had grown up in Northern Ireland he would have written The Cold Cold Ground."
---The Times
"Hardboiled charm, evocative dialogue, an acute sense of place and a sardonic sense of humour make McKinty one to watch."
---The Guardian
"A literary thriller that is as concerned with exploring the poisonously claustrophobic demi-monde of Northern Ireland during the Troubles, and the self-sabotaging contradictions of its place and time, as it is with providing the genre’s conventional thrills and spills. The result is a masterpiece of Troubles crime fiction: had David Peace, Eoin McNamee and Brian Moore sat down to brew up the great Troubles novel, they would have been very pleased indeed to have written The Cold Cold Ground."
---The Irish Times
"McKinty is a big new talent."
---The Daily Telegraph
"McKinty is a gifted man with poetry coursing through his veins and thrilling writing dripping from his fingertips."
---The Sunday Independent
"McKinty is a big new talent."
---The Daily Telegraph
"McKinty is a gifted man with poetry coursing through his veins and thrilling writing dripping from his fingertips."
---The Sunday Independent
"Adrian McKinty is fast gaining a reputation as the finest of the new generation of Irish crime writers, and it's easy to see why on the evidence of The Cold Cold Ground."
---The Glasgow Herald
"McKinty is a storyteller with the kind of style and panache that blur the line between genre and mainstream."
---Kirkus Reviews
"McKinty's literate expertly crafted crime novel confirms his place as one of his generation's leading talents."
---Publishers Weekly
"McKinty crackles with raw talent. His dialogue is superb, his characters rich and his plotting tight and seemless. He writes with a wonderful and wonderfully humorous flair for language raising his work above most crime genre offerings and bumping it right up against literature."
---The San Francisco Chronicle
"McKinty keeps getting better. He melds the snap and crackle of the old Mickey Spillane tales with the literary skills of Raymond Chandler and sets it all down in his own artful way."
---The Rocky Mountain News
"The first of McKinty's Forsythe novels, "Dead I Well May Be," was intense, focused and entirely brilliant. This one is looser-limbed, funnier...so, I imagine, is the middle book, "The Dead Yard," which I haven't read but which Publishers Weekly included on its list of the 12 best novels of 2006, along with works by Peter Abrahams, Richard Ford, Cormac McCarthy and George Pelecanos."
---The Washington Post
"McKinty, who grew up in Northern Ireland, has an ear for language and a taste for violence, and he serves up a terrifically gory, swiftly paced thriller."
---The Miami Herald
"There's nothing like an Irish tough guy. And we're not talking about Gentleman Gerry Cooney here. No, we mean the new breed of bare-knuckle Irish writers like Adrian McKinty, Ken Bruen and John Connolly who are bringing fresh life to the crime fiction genre."
---The Philadelphia Inquirer
"McKinty's writing is dark and witty with gritty realism, spot on dialogue, and fascinating characters."
---The Chicago Sun-Times
"If you like your noir staples such as beautiful women, betrayal, murder, mixed with a heavy dose of blood, crunched bones, body parts flying around served up with some throwaway humour, you need look no further, McKinty delivers all of this with the added bonus that the writing is pitch perfect."
---The Barcelona Review
"I really enjoyed [Dead I Well May Be’s] combination of toughness and a striking literary style. Both those things are evident in Hidden River. McKinty is going places."
---The Observer
"This is a terrific read. McKinty gives us a strong non stop story with attractive characters and fine writing."
---The Morning Star
"[McKinty] draws us close and relates a fantastic tale of murder and revenge in low, wry tones, as if from the next barstool...he drops out of conversational mode to throw in a few breathtaking fever-dream sequences for flavor. And then he springs an ending so right and satisfying it leaves us numb with delight and ready to pop for another round. Start the cliche machine: This is a profoundly satisfying book from a major new talent and one of the best crime fiction debuts of the year."
---Booklist
"The story is soaked in the holy trinity of the noir thriller: betrayal, money and murder, but seen through with a panache and political awareness that give McKinty a keen edge over his rivals."
---The Big Issue
"A darkly humorous cross between a hard-boiled mystery and a Beat novel."
---The St. Louis Post-Dispatch
"A roller coaster of highs and lows, light humour and dark deeds, the powerful undercurrent of McKinty's talent will swiftly drag you away. Let's hope the author does not slow down anytime soon."
---The Irish Examiner
"A virtual carnival of slaughter."
---The Wall Street Journal
"McKinty has once again harnassed the power of poetry, violence, lust and revenge to forge a sequel to his acclaimed Dead I Well May Be."
---The Irish Post
"A pacey, violent caper in which McKinty vividly portrays [Belfast's] sleazy, still-menacing underbelly."
---The Sunday Times
"McKinty writes with the soul of a poet; his prose dances off the pages with Old World grace and haunting intensity. It's crime fiction on the level of Michael Connolly with the conviction of James Hall."
---The Jackson Clarion-Ledger
"The Bloomsday Dead is the explosive final installment in a trilogy of kinetic thrillers."
---The New York Times
"Adrian McKinty has garnered nothing but praise for his first two books. The third in the trilogy The Bloomsday Dead should leave no doubt that he is a true star. Fast moving and highly engaging this is a great book. McKinty just gets better and better."
---CrimeSpree
"Until The Dead Yard's relentless, poignant ending you'll turn these pages as quickly as you can."
---The Cleveland Plain Dealer
"McKinty's Dead Trilogy has been praised by critics, who call it "intense," "masterful" and "loaded with action." If your reading pleasure leans toward thrillers offering suspense, close calls, wry wit, sharp dialogue, local color and sudden mayhem, you wont do better."
---The Sacramento Bee
"Le Fleuve caché d'Adrian McKinty impressionne par la richesse et la diversité de son ton et de son écriture, passant avec aisance du lyrisme ample de la nostalgie de l'amour perdu au rythme saccadé du narrateur sous l'emprise de l'héroïne. Ce livre rare et maîtrisé est une réussite bien digne de la Série noire."
---Le Figaro
Eine eigentlich simple Story, die natürlich bereits als Grundlage für Hunderte Bücher und Filme diente, macht Adrian McKinty zu der mitreißenden Odyssee eines jungen Mannes, der in der Lage ist, sich seiner Umwelt anzupassen wie jene Kakerlaken, die er in seinem Harlemer Appartement jagt, studiert und sowohl angewidert awie anerkennend entkommen lässt. Nicht umsonst 1992 angesiedelt, ist Der sichere Tod der kongeniale Kommentar zum Wesen der Neunziger.
- Jochen König, krimi-couch.de
"McKinty - that guy is a friggin genius."
---Ken Bruen
"McKinty is a cross between Mickey Spillane and Damon Runyan, the toughest, the best."
---Frank McCourt
"McKinty is an exciting new talent."
---Ed McBain
"Daddy's book is really boring."
---Sophie McKinty (aged 2 1/2)
"McKinty is a storyteller with the kind of style and panache that blur the line between genre and mainstream."
---Kirkus Reviews
"McKinty's literate expertly crafted crime novel confirms his place as one of his generation's leading talents."
---Publishers Weekly
"McKinty crackles with raw talent. His dialogue is superb, his characters rich and his plotting tight and seemless. He writes with a wonderful and wonderfully humorous flair for language raising his work above most crime genre offerings and bumping it right up against literature."
---The San Francisco Chronicle
"McKinty keeps getting better. He melds the snap and crackle of the old Mickey Spillane tales with the literary skills of Raymond Chandler and sets it all down in his own artful way."
---The Rocky Mountain News
"The first of McKinty's Forsythe novels, "Dead I Well May Be," was intense, focused and entirely brilliant. This one is looser-limbed, funnier...so, I imagine, is the middle book, "The Dead Yard," which I haven't read but which Publishers Weekly included on its list of the 12 best novels of 2006, along with works by Peter Abrahams, Richard Ford, Cormac McCarthy and George Pelecanos."
---The Washington Post
"McKinty, who grew up in Northern Ireland, has an ear for language and a taste for violence, and he serves up a terrifically gory, swiftly paced thriller."
---The Miami Herald
"There's nothing like an Irish tough guy. And we're not talking about Gentleman Gerry Cooney here. No, we mean the new breed of bare-knuckle Irish writers like Adrian McKinty, Ken Bruen and John Connolly who are bringing fresh life to the crime fiction genre."
---The Philadelphia Inquirer
"McKinty's writing is dark and witty with gritty realism, spot on dialogue, and fascinating characters."
---The Chicago Sun-Times
"If you like your noir staples such as beautiful women, betrayal, murder, mixed with a heavy dose of blood, crunched bones, body parts flying around served up with some throwaway humour, you need look no further, McKinty delivers all of this with the added bonus that the writing is pitch perfect."
---The Barcelona Review
"I really enjoyed [Dead I Well May Be’s] combination of toughness and a striking literary style. Both those things are evident in Hidden River. McKinty is going places."
---The Observer
"This is a terrific read. McKinty gives us a strong non stop story with attractive characters and fine writing."
---The Morning Star
"[McKinty] draws us close and relates a fantastic tale of murder and revenge in low, wry tones, as if from the next barstool...he drops out of conversational mode to throw in a few breathtaking fever-dream sequences for flavor. And then he springs an ending so right and satisfying it leaves us numb with delight and ready to pop for another round. Start the cliche machine: This is a profoundly satisfying book from a major new talent and one of the best crime fiction debuts of the year."
---Booklist
"The story is soaked in the holy trinity of the noir thriller: betrayal, money and murder, but seen through with a panache and political awareness that give McKinty a keen edge over his rivals."
---The Big Issue
"A darkly humorous cross between a hard-boiled mystery and a Beat novel."
---The St. Louis Post-Dispatch
"A roller coaster of highs and lows, light humour and dark deeds, the powerful undercurrent of McKinty's talent will swiftly drag you away. Let's hope the author does not slow down anytime soon."
---The Irish Examiner
"A virtual carnival of slaughter."
---The Wall Street Journal
"McKinty has once again harnassed the power of poetry, violence, lust and revenge to forge a sequel to his acclaimed Dead I Well May Be."
---The Irish Post
"A pacey, violent caper in which McKinty vividly portrays [Belfast's] sleazy, still-menacing underbelly."
---The Sunday Times
"McKinty writes with the soul of a poet; his prose dances off the pages with Old World grace and haunting intensity. It's crime fiction on the level of Michael Connolly with the conviction of James Hall."
---The Jackson Clarion-Ledger
"The Bloomsday Dead is the explosive final installment in a trilogy of kinetic thrillers."
---The New York Times
"Adrian McKinty has garnered nothing but praise for his first two books. The third in the trilogy The Bloomsday Dead should leave no doubt that he is a true star. Fast moving and highly engaging this is a great book. McKinty just gets better and better."
---CrimeSpree
"Until The Dead Yard's relentless, poignant ending you'll turn these pages as quickly as you can."
---The Cleveland Plain Dealer
"McKinty's Dead Trilogy has been praised by critics, who call it "intense," "masterful" and "loaded with action." If your reading pleasure leans toward thrillers offering suspense, close calls, wry wit, sharp dialogue, local color and sudden mayhem, you wont do better."
---The Sacramento Bee
"Le Fleuve caché d'Adrian McKinty impressionne par la richesse et la diversité de son ton et de son écriture, passant avec aisance du lyrisme ample de la nostalgie de l'amour perdu au rythme saccadé du narrateur sous l'emprise de l'héroïne. Ce livre rare et maîtrisé est une réussite bien digne de la Série noire."
---Le Figaro
Eine eigentlich simple Story, die natürlich bereits als Grundlage für Hunderte Bücher und Filme diente, macht Adrian McKinty zu der mitreißenden Odyssee eines jungen Mannes, der in der Lage ist, sich seiner Umwelt anzupassen wie jene Kakerlaken, die er in seinem Harlemer Appartement jagt, studiert und sowohl angewidert awie anerkennend entkommen lässt. Nicht umsonst 1992 angesiedelt, ist Der sichere Tod der kongeniale Kommentar zum Wesen der Neunziger.
- Jochen König, krimi-couch.de
"McKinty - that guy is a friggin genius."
---Ken Bruen
"McKinty is a cross between Mickey Spillane and Damon Runyan, the toughest, the best."
---Frank McCourt
"McKinty is an exciting new talent."
---Ed McBain
"Daddy's book is really boring."
---Sophie McKinty (aged 2 1/2)
Who's been dropping by
What's Next For Me?
A couple more books, a few birthdays, some shuffleboard then a period spent in the digestive tract of earthworms, followed by molecular breakdown, the sun boiling into space, the heat death of the universe, atomic decay, perpetual darkness, a trillion years of nothingness and then, if we're lucky, brane collapse, a new singularity and a new Big Bang.
Me & the Mrs in our survivalist bunker
Adios and thank you for stopping by....
Humiliation, unhappiness, discord are the ancient foods of heroes---Jorge Luis Borges
The measure of a writer isn't success, but how hard he tried to do what he knew he couldn't do---William Faulkner
I believe in the power of the imagination to remake the world, to release the truth within us, to hold back the night, to transcend death, to charm motorways, to ingratiate ourselves with birds, to enlist the confidences of madmen---J G Ballard
I read the dictionary once . . . It turns out that the zebra did it --- Steven Wright
Times are bad. Children disobey their parents and everyone is writing a book---Cicero
Made in Ireland
70 comments:
ZZ Top all the way, man. As part of the few, the proud, the bearded, I say go for it. Shaving sucks. Then again, it's good to keep Mrs. McKinty happy. I'm lucky that Mrs. HB digs mine, as in the last two years I've shifted to a year-round beard.
When is COLD COLD coming to the US? Can't wait.
Keep the beard, lose the head hair: you'll look like a complete badass. Other crime fiction writers will cower and surrender the field to you. You may be offered a significant role in the next Die Hard movie.
Marco would approve. I'm with Professor Garrett.
However, on the plus side, it does make you look like a German scholar, which can only be a good thing in this case. Also makes the non-smiling thing work better for you.
On the whole, keep it for the Germans, shave it off for the French.
Hmm..an interesting debate obviously has ensued and a number of schools of thought promote or decry the hirsuteness or smoothness of the male (and sometimes female) face. Does one go or forgo the sideburns, chinstrap garibaldi, goatee, soulpatch or Lemmy to name a few 'styles'?
Personally I'm a proud sideburner and wear them with pride; the flecks of grey indicating my worldliness and wisdom.
Anyway this is not about me...may I suggest going the Fu? Shave the head as Cary suggests but take it one step further....upsweep the brows and grow long evil fingernails. People will think 'omigod..he da business!!'.
It may take a while for the cheese 'n kisses to accept your new look though.....
Good luck with the shoot!
You know when a 'tough guy actor' gets serious by playing a shrink or a lawyer? No, I can't think of an example either but that's what it looks like.
When I went to the Futurama music festival in Leeds in '79 I was really looking forward to seeing the band ClockDVA. But when I saw that the clarinet player had a beard I ran, ran ...
I had a beard once, because I couldn't be arsed shaving, and was told I looked like Rolf Harris.
Don't do the shoot in your bathrobe, which ever way you go.
A pipe might be nice.
How about Buffalo Bill - that's a compromise
Shaved head, no mo and leave the beard. Mrs M will embrace the new look.
Shave it off. The pictures last forever but the beardyness could be just a whim and you might regret it.That is my opinion.
Off with the beard!
How about bearded in Saxony and clean-shaven in North Rhine-Westphalia?
======================
Detectives Beyond Borders
"Because Murder Is More Fun Away From Home"
http://www.detectivesbeyondborders.blogspot.com/
I have to agree with Seana...you look serious and German-like with the beard. And the lack of a smile. Might do you well to sell some books.
Also since your wife doesn't fancy the facial hair, you'll probably spend a large chunk of the rest of your life clean shaven. Having a pic of you in full fur regalia will remind you of a different time. I say keep the beard for the Germans. Lose it after the shoot. For the love of the French... and also your wife.
HB
We beardies are a proud minority. All that pressure from the Gillette Industrial complex.
Cold Cold may never come out in America. No one wanted Falling Glass in the US. Its a shame because I think its one of my most interesting and best.
Cary
I did think about getting a number 2 when I got my hair cut last week. Instead I went withe the number 4.
Seana
The wife went from skeptical to not keen to not keen at all, so I may have to cave in the end.
Dan
The seventies were a great time for sideburns, both the 1970s and the 1870s. I've tried to pull off the sideburns look but it just doesnt work.
I have had a goatee before and I loved sitting there stroking it but I very much became Mr Goatee Man.
Paul
A clarinet player with a beard does sound intimidating.
However doesnt Jethro Tull have a bearded flute player?
Anon
I DO like that look. But my hair wont grow long.
James
Well you're the boss.
The no mo has an Amish/Mennonite vibe that might go down well in Germany.
Frankie
Some of my passport photos have certainly come back to haunt me. Big seventies hair is not a good look on anyone these days.
Anon
If you say so. I'm sure it will come off eventually. But when? A week from now. Or fifteen years from now when its all Terry Pratchett.
Peter
And a nice square moustache in Bavaria.
Sheiler
And Seana could be on to something with the pipe, especially if I'm pointing it aggressively at arcane writing on a blackboard or something.
It's a shame you don't get quite the same turnout for Irish poem of the month posts.
You're wrong about 70s hair, though. It's back! Or at least it was back here a few years ago. Maybe it's left again.
Of course, in Santa Cruz it's quite possible it never really left.
Seana
Sign of the times aint it? Beards get people worked up. Poetry not so much.
And seriously check out the Vince Gilligan podcast about breaking bad e 13. Its pretty great.
I actually have had the podcast ready to listen to all day because I thought it would entice me to do some cleaning. So far not cleaning is winning, though.
Revised advice. Grade 4 and two days stubble. That's the look to go for. It would afford continuity with your previous pictures in jackets. I would comment on poems but I don't know what to say about poetry or art. I feel nothing as I am pretty soul less.
Go with the beard. Akin to what another commentor said, in the future you'll crack this book open, scope the author pic, and say to the presently not-so-keen wife, "Look, hon, that's when I my blog-followers told me to keep the beard for my photo shoot."
If you go clean-shaven, you might not remember you had this little debate with yourself and the fam. And that chance for nostalgia will be lost.
-Brian O
Frankie, I realized after writing that that a lot of people might read the poems without commenting. It is hard to know what to say beyond I liked that, or I didn't. It doesn't make you soulless.
A lot of people don't like poetry these days. I think it's because there has been a lot of incomprehensible drivel touted out there as the real deal.
You advice on the beard and hair modification sounds good to me.
All this says to me, Brian, is that you yourself are thinking of growing a beard and are looking for a possible justification to Jenna.
Frankie
I like that. Nice and scary. Like a Friday night bouncer at kicking out time.
Seana
The bathrobe is definitely not the way to go I completely agree and maybe with a bit less sleep in my eyes.
Brian
I like that idea. Esp since I've spent the majority of my life beardless. And in truth will probably be beardless again in the future.
Ding boom.
Seana
My favourite new phrase. And props to Peggy from Mad Men's mother.
Myra Turley. If you look at her credits, there is hardly a TV show she hasn't been in.
One of those always working actresses who nobody knows.
Yeah, I can see ding boom coming in handy quite a lot, especially muttered under the breath.
Seana
I can't believe that they had a casting session for the photograph on Hector's desk.
Not only a casting session but Vince Gilligan actually directed the shoot for that one photo. That is attention to detail. No wonder that when Breaking Bad is good its very very good.
I agree with Seana, the beard and glasses give you that foreign, maybe even German look. Very intimidating and would cetainly work for what you need it for. You're a decent looking dude and even a Don Johnson stubble is a third option, and dare I say it, a smile?
The Germans will like the non-smile, Sean. It suggests earnestness.
Adrian, the one thing I got from the podcast, though, is that they don't really understand that the season had its longueurs. And now no one will tell them.
I'm finding this more and more in creative fields--below a certain level of success, everyone's a critic, but once you pass that admittedly high bar, no one is.
Sean
The smile aint a terrible idea but it cant be a big goofy grin, that would ruin everything.
Seana
You're dead right. The only way they'll ever realise that many of those early episodes were poor will be because the praise is less effusive.
David Letterman said one of his greatest regrets was shaving off his beard.
Matt
If I were Letterman I'd regret kicking Harvey Pekar and Bill Hicks off my show much more than the beard.
Ah, the tyranny of shaving. I stopped shaving as soon as I got out of the army, where I often had to shave twice a day. I used to trim it for the summer, but the Beloved Spouse says she likes the "face lace," so it's a full time gig now.
Leave it. Do experimental designs with it once in a while. Shave it off if you get tired of it. It will always be there. Waiting.
The glasses have thrown me off, entirely.
Without the glasses, I bet you would look like a real bad ass. You might scare the Germans, though.
Very young Terry Waite-ish....not sure if thats good or bad?
Dana
I'm looking forward to the longish hippy stage. That could be interesting.
Lew
Only high ranking Nazis can be scary with glasses.
At this stage, you look more like a Russian or Serbian assassin than anything else.
Swooper
Young Terry Waite is definitely a bad thing. Five years chained to a radiator? All those dates and hummus? Nobody wants that.
Peter
But perhaps three months from now I'll look like Rasputin in which case I'll be hard to kill.
A beard is as much a state of mind as it is a faceful of hair. In the past I have had a beard. Now, I am just between shaves. It is a difference that only those of us who have had beards can know.
Rasputin is all right; so are Marx and Tolstoy. But when you look in the mirror and see Ted Kaczynski staring back at you, shave.
======================
Detectives Beyond Borders
"Because Murder Is More Fun Away From Home"
http://www.detectivesbeyondborders.blogspot.com/
This is the soundest advice I've seen on this post yet.
And perhaps just in the nick of time.
My humble opinion is that you look great in that beard and the glasses, although, as has been said, lose the bathrobe for the photographer.
There is a Prussian look about that beard, and it projects intensity.
However, your spouse is rather an important person to hear on this topic.
Losing the bathrobe was not precisely what I had in mind, but I like the Prussian imagery, Kathy.
Peter
No the Unabomber look works for no one not even other mad bombers.
Kathy
Prussian is good. Esp the old Prussian Junker officer building bomb to blow up Fuhrer look.
Seana
Nobody wants to see me without me kit.
I think the verdict is that the beard stays ...
for now....
No the Unabomber look works for no one not even other mad bombers.
Not even a hint of rakish charm there.
Well, good luck with the Serbian physicist/torturer look.
Yes, but you need to grow it longer, much longer. Like all the bogans at the MotoGP last Sunday. Short hair and long beard. And a Harley.
David
Harley you say? Give me Triumph Bonny any day of the week.
This blog beats Twitter any time. I have had very fine amusement reading all this, and now I think I can face the dishes.
Thank you linesmen, thank you ballboys. I think your photo will be ace, Adrian.
NO BEARD! If I remember correctly you have 2 girls - I have three, and I shaved my goatee last year and they went APESHIT! So it looks like I'm stuck with it forever. Head my warning or pick crumbs from your face for evermore!
Gen, Dennis
I had the photo and yup it was bearded. Curious to see how it turns out.
It's pretty weird how much beards have come up in my life in the last week.
Slate's had a couple of posts about the Amish beard fights, a coworker came up and started showing me a book of extreme beards, and just yesterday I overheard a random comment by two guys walking past saying something about how the bearded were the best vegans, or something like that.
I'm hoping that now the photoshoot is over, it will all die down.
I mean really hoping.
I am not a fan of the Santa Cruz skate look of big beard and no hair. Up till now, I think I'd been more or less able to ignore it.
I refer you to the definitive comment on beards.
======================
Detectives Beyond Borders
"Because Murder Is More Fun Away From Home"
http://www.detectivesbeyondborders.blogspot.com/
But Peter, you've since lost your epithet!
I lost the beard; I kept the epithet.
======================
Detectives Beyond Borders
"Because Murder Is More Fun Away From Home"
http://www.detectivesbeyondborders.blogspot.com/
Perhaps it might be best if you found a new epithet, though. Or is that something others are supposed find for you?
Post a Comment