Blizzards of Tweed

Political cartoons in newspapers are notoriously unfunny, but they try to make a point. Now those cartoons have been replaced by the anonymous meme, which can be boundless, unrestrained by editorial control, say the unsayable and be both hilariously funny and bitingly accurate. The political cartoonist has lost his point. No memeist, however, can ever replace the unique work of British cartoonist Glen Baxter.

Restrained affections

Of my restrained and limited affections, none is more durable than my mild fondness for the world of Glen 'Colonel' Baxter.

Not for the po-faced

Some don't 'get' Glen's work — as their worldview is broadly joyless and po-faced — but you and I will never tire of the Baxterian combination of absurdist drawings and genius gibberish delivered deadpan with admixed references to pulp fiction, philosophy and art.

Le monde de Glen Baxter

From the late 1970s, Glen has published numerous books of his cartoons. Some are now out of print, but you will find them; others are reproduced in German and French, which doesn't detract. He's very popular in France. The titles are all fantastic in every sense, such as The Collected Blurtings of Baxter, Jodhpurs in the Quantocks and Loomings Over the Suet. Hoover them all up.

Blizzards of Tweed

Here we see my copy of Blizzards of Tweed.

The glasses? Outsize new old stock frames by Anglo American Eyewear. Couldn't resist. I was thinking David Hockney, but I admit they have something of the peculiar pop Svengali from the early 1980s about them.

Worn without irony

I wear them without irony. They're the first of a hoard of frames that recently came into my possession that I am slowly having glazed. The next frame has a very large and square front in brown acetate, something a Swiss industrialist from the 1970s might wear. The frame will receive a green lens similar in shade to Ray-Ban's classic G-15.

Do Anglo American Eyewear still operate? There's an Anglo-American Optical who do lots of colourful acetate frames that are worth a look. Anglo American Optical has been producing frames in England since 1863 my intel gathering has exposed and there may well be a connection — but the trail went mysteriously cold.

Infamously oversized

Otherwise, the excellent Retro Spectacle stock vintage Anglo American Eyewear frames. They currently have a blue frame that's similar to my own, made in England, which they refer to as the 'infamous oversized Anglo American Eyewear model'. Infamous, eh? The arms are higher up and they're rounder (and maybe not as big or infamous) but the colour is very similar.