10.2.77: MGM and Scorsese... have decided to hire another writer... I knew from the very first meeting that Scorsese and his gang were not for me. He sat and sniffed his benzedrine, a gasping, electric dwarf. The idea of our collaboration was as ridiculous as the mating of a poodle and a Great Dane.

22.2.77: LA has no nascent spring; Persephone lounges in her patio while contract gardeners supply her blooms. The only noticeable Fall is of deciduous executives...

The fourth volume of Frederic Raphael's notebooks, Ticks and Crosses covers the years 1976 to 1978 with the sharp wit and provocative intelligence that made the earlier books an acclaimed success. Raphael observes the inner workings of film studios with the cool acuity of a classicist; he records his thinking on philosophy, Jewishness, and Greece ancient and modern, with the tough irreverence of a Hollywood operator. Among the pleasures of Ticks and Crosses are an account of a farcical summer afternoon spent floating down a French river on a lilo in the company of Shirley Williams; an alarming trip up the wrong (and by no means dormant) volcano in Guatemala; meeting Nabokov; taking part in Any Questions with Enoch Powell... The eminent are caught off-guard; aphorisms sparkle, and throughout, Raphael's love of French life and culture, his delight in the human comedy of social life, illuminate his unfolding chronicle.

Cover painting by Sarah Raphael, copyright the Estate of Sarah Raphael, 2008. Cover design by StephenRaw.com.

Contents

Introduction  

1976  
1977   
1978   

Index