Annoying Other People

I found this at the bottom of an opinion piece copied into an EMail someone passed along.  Having checked out the opinion piece, I don't think it belongs to that writer, but rather to the EMail writer.

If you can't annoy somebody, there's little point in writing.

The author of that quip is the late Sir Kingsley Amis.  I think it takes a certain personality to fully embrace that philosophy, but, even for the rest of us, there is something to be said for it.  There is some belief that Sir Kingsley was a dipsomaniac and died of it.  That condition might contribute to holding a view such as that expressed in the quotation.

But, it is a good throw-away line if one is running fairly close to the edge in one's writing.

Regards  —  Cliff