Perelman Tonight: It started in Philadelphia -- Part 1 of "Westward Ha!"

"Actually, the whole business began sixteen years ago, as do so many complex ventures, with an unfavorable astrological conjunction, Virgo being in the house of Alcohol."

-- from the opening chapter of Westward Ha!,
"Goodbye Broadway, Hello Mal-de-mer"

by Ken

In 1947 Holiday magazine asked Perelman and his friend and collaborator the brilliant theatrical cartoonist Al Hirschfeld ("a remarkable combination of Walt Whitman, Lawrence of Arabia, and Moe, my favorite waiter at Lindy's") to . . . well, he'll tell you the story in a moment. The saga of their round-the-world trip appeared in Holiday and then were collected as one of Perelman's most successful books, Westward Ha!. I don't know that we're going to get very far into it, but tonight and tomorrow we're going to have the first chapter, as the crazy project is set in motion.


FOR OUR MAIDEN INSTALLMENT OF THE ODD
ODYSSEY OF WESTWARD HA!, CLICK HERE


THURBER TONIGHT (including BENCHLEY, WILL CUPPY, WOLCOTT GIBBS, RING LARDNER, BOB AND RAY, E. B. WHITE, JEAN SHEPHERD, and PERELMAN TONIGHT): Check out the series to date

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