Yeah, I remember that as well.
In the NYT Obit today, Harris is quoted as having said after his 70th birthday something along the lines of...
"Now that I'm 70 I can be eccentric and get away with it".
Funny guy. I think I saw him (on Dick Cavett) once, telling a story about his brother, "George" I guess the name may have been.
The story dragged on for the entire program, with Harris returning to it now and then as a good Irish storyteller is prone to do. I'll be much shorter. Harris left home at an early age and failed to keep in touch. Not unusual for an Irish male in the early half of the 20th Century. My father, for example, left in the 1920s and never met some of his younger siblings.
So "George" met him in a pub and they swapped stories about the family and such. When Harris was leaving he asked George when he was staying, then insisted that he spend his time at his flat, wherever it was. So George stayed for a few weeks, then moved on.
Some months later he was speaking with his sister in London and mentioned having George over for a time.
After a long pause, his sister said "Richard, ye have no brother named George". |
