James Joyce and Marcel Proust.
Groucho Marx and T. S. Eliot.
Elvis Presley and Richard Nixon.
Patti Smith and Alan Ginsberg.
Tolstoy and Tchaikovsky.
These famous people all met, at one point or another.
And in a recent book called, Hello Goodbye Hello , British writer, Craig Brown, lets us know what they talked about. Overall, he describes the circumstances behind 101 remarkable meetings between seemingly disparate, accomplished individuals.
Needless to say, some fascinating exchanges take place. The time when the King knocked on the White House door, unannounced, is pretty well known, but I particularly like the meeting between Joyce and Proust, during which their social dialogue consisted solely of the word
“No .”
You can read more about the meetings right here, and here.
Man, I wish I could’ve been a fly on the wall at some of these. Especially when Marilyn Monroe met Frank Lloyd Wright.
The whole idea makes for a pretty interesting premise. Although, except for the great Patti Smith, whose book, Just Kids (which recounts her relationship with Robert Mapplethorpe,) I can’t recommend highly enough, most of these luminaries are dead. And that leads my overactive brain to make me wonder…what contemporary public figures would I like to see meet today? How about…
The Dalai Lama and Paul Ryan.
Lady Gaga and Billy Graham.
John Lydon and Barry Manilow.
Stephen Hawking and the Pope.
Bob Dylan and Justin Bieber.
Dan Brown and Opus Dei.
Should they ever happen (outside of the Frank Coelho imaginary universe,) I suspect a few of these mind melds could lead to some spectacularly intriguing dialogue.
Source:
http://blog.diesel-ebooks.com/2012/10/21/fly-on-the-wall/