For one fundraising event Fitzjohn was invited to be a judge at an American beauty pageant in 1993 alongside Roberto Canessa, who was on board an aircraft that crashed in the Andes in 1972, infamously causing survivors to resort to cannibalism. Fitzjohn recalled: “The first thing Roberto said to me was, ‘Tony, everyone I meet asks me what it is like to eat someone. Now finally I can ask you this — what is it like to be eaten?’ ”
(Shyman, a 400lb lion, had selected Fitzjohn for dinner. The beast pounced from behind, clamping his jaws on the throat of his prey.)
I’ve never heard Canessa give the answer, but I suppose the tactful one would be marginally better than dying of hunger.
@BinND: certainly better than having to rely on the airplane galley offerings.
Yes, I did nick that from ‘Not The Nine O’Clock News’..!
Thank you Julia!!!!!
+10000%
At university, I attended a series of lectures by an anthropologist. Despite claiming to have tasted human flesh – he said it tasted like pork – and witnessed a ritual gang-rape, he was an incredibly boring little man.
Tony was one of the few classic English eccentrics in our generation. In previous centuries only the rich (or monks) could afford to devote their life to a special interest as he did. Tony’s middle-class (I should probably describe it as “upper-middle-class” now as the meaning of the words has changed) upbringing would normally have directed him into a “professional” job with a secure salary and a comfortable lifestyle but he chose to live on the breadline pursuing a vision.