Are you bothered? Is this desecration? Labarca's defence is that Borges visited and spoke in support of General Pinochet, Chile's brutal, murderous fascist dictator, which seems fair enough to me.
I've only seen a few notable graves. Ibsen's. Sylvia Plath's (from which her fans had tried to scratch out her husband's surname, again reasonably, I thought). One of the Brontës. I had a little lie down on that one. 'Reader, I boffed her'. Arf.
Whose graves are OK for desecration? Admittedly, it wouldn't make much difference to the occupant, but it would offend his or her supporters. I am planning to run coach trips to Margaret Thatcher's last resting place. I'll provide a massive music system, and to the strains of 'Ghost Town' by The Specials, Hefner's 'The Day That Thatcher Dies', I'll organise mass grave-dancing.
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That's taking the coward's way out. I believe that pissing should be done, whenever possible, on the offending individuals while they're still alive.
I love Borges - why are so many of my literary heroes so politically reactionary? Don't answer that.
Pere Lachaise in Paris is amazing; Oscar Wilde's tomb, Isodora Duncan, and of course Jim Morrison - I'm not much of a fan, but there was a lovely bust of him on it when I went in the 70s (people tell me it's gone now). Also in the 70s I worked in Grasmere - good ol' Willie Wordsworth's grave is in the village churchyard, right next to the Singing Bird's riverside tea shoppe, and presumably still overlooked by my ex-bosses business-expension hotel The Wordsworth (subtle eh?). Marx's grave is disappointing - bloody great lump of a statue that makes him look like a tyrannical patriarch stuck on it. I've seen loads of other famous graves - it's a good way to structure an automotive holiday! O Death, where is thy postcode?
Not a grave, but an amazing place...
Is a monument to Pier's Gaveston, favourite and lover of Edward II (he of the red hot poker) on Blacklow Hill - a weird little mound with a copse of trees, almost inaccessible because it's on private land just off the really busy bypass that runs from Kenilworth to Warwick. Poor old Piers was murdered there, and there's a lovely plaque on the weathered monument that reads:
"In the Hollow of this Rock, Was beheaded, On the 1st Day of July, 1312, By Barons lawless as himself, PIERS GAVESTON, Earl of Cornwall; The Minion of a hateful King: In Life and Death, A memorable Instance of Misrule."
I used to walk there occasionally when I lived nearby, to avoid writing my PhD. Naturally.
Intelliwench, you're absolutely right.
Zoot: I'd quite like to visit Gaveston's memorial. What a glorious plaque.
Wait til the sun comes out a bit shinier and I'll whip a pack of us there. It's a short (but hazardous)walk from the Saxon Mill hostelry - I can feel a day out taking shape awreddy...
Since two of my best friends lived on Blacklow Hill when we growing up, I've been there a few times. Pretty sure we took our beer cans away with us though...
Well, well, well. Now we know why it's in a parlous state! You can be our guide.
It'd be a pleasure. I misspent most of my youth there!
Wow - nice one Sarah! I'm sure there's an easy way to the hill from Leek Wootton or summat, but I don't know it. I just know the run-across-the-motorway-with-your-eyes-shut route.
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