My Ass Critique

	Late Show type set.
	Graphic: The Not Quite Late Enough Show.


Hugh		With me to discuss that scene from Scorcese's new
		release From Here to Just Over There is the critic,
		critic and critic Ray Daugh. Ray you've written
		countless, almost worthless books on the iconography
		of "the bottom" in American films - in what context
		can we approach this piece?

Stephen		Not really, no. We knew already that "the ass" has
		come to ...

Hugh		By "ass" you mean "bottom"?

Stephen		Tremendously. You'll have to forgive my lapsing
		into jargon for a moment there ...

Hugh		By "jargon" you mean a series of specialist phrases,
		or better an "argot" if you will, to describe a particular
		area of criticism?

Stephen		In some ways yes. The bottom has come to stand
		for the essence ...

Hugh		The spirit?

Stephen		... the essence of the individual in modern
		American mythology ...

Hugh		The contemporary single person living within a
		set of folkloric beliefs in Stateside North America.

Stephen		In my last book ...

Hugh		A book being a work of thought or prose bound
		together between hard or soft covers and commonly
		sold in bookshops?

Stephen		Broadly ... in my last book, Backside Story: A 
		History of the American Bottom I devoted an entire
		chapter to the ...

Hugh		A chapter meaning a sub-division in a book, of
		which there are perhaps twelve, fifteen, twenty,
		creating blocks of writing?

Stephen		Often ... an entire chapter I devoted to the
		phrase "my ass is on the line". "The line" being ...

Hugh		I think we all know what a line is.

Stephen		In this case "the line" being the vestigal notion of
		the frontier in American folklore. Partly - (gesturing)
		to put his bottom on the frontier - is still the goal of
		the modern American.

Hugh		(Copying gesture) By this you mean an utterly
		infuriating gesture guaranteed to put people's backs
		up in quite a major way.

Stephen		I hope so.

Hugh		Well, sadly the clock has ...

Stephen		Large, circular timepiece ...

Hugh		... beaten us once again.

Stephen		Flagellated, whipped us for at least a second time ...

Hugh		So thank you ...

Stephen		Expression of gratitude ...

Hugh		Ray ...

Stephen		Shaft, or beam of light ...

Hugh		Very much.

Stephen		A lot.

Hugh		Pat.

Stephen		Small slab of butter.