Quincy, if you've seen "Amadeus", you know that being an SOB is no impediment to being a genius. Unfortunately, over time, the genius tends to be remembered while the SOB recedes into the background.

Still, it is a good idea for biographers to remind us that if you invited Dylan Thomas to dinner, he was likely to steal your shirts.

I gave him a ride from a West Chester Poetry Salon to the Wilmington train station last spring. He was nice enough, charming as David says, though very talkative, and yes, it was difficult to even answer his questions fully before he was off another tangent. It was easy for me to be deferential, him being 85 or however old. It's too bad he was an ass to Ray P. but he's a unique enough poet to be worth our attention. A lot of his poems do it for me.

Chris