The Coaster Correspondence

VANITIES

More of the very expensive words of Edwin John Coaster, contributing editor

Dear GraddoE:

Hoveirter 2001

Nor the second time in four months, I've thrown my back out. Last summer it .:a~ on the tennis court ..ith Bill Prochnau; this time some kid in the Northern Alliance was letting me hoist his Stinger-missile launcher, and next thing I know I'm facedown on the ground with t::o guys in head wraps massaging goat'.~-xat liniment into my spine. Long story short, I'm no: laid up in Islamabad-well, really, Eawalpindi, since the Pearl is the only hotel in the vicinity that stocks Blanton a. Anyhoo, I should be back in action in a week or so. Some story ideas for ou to ponder: 1. Did you now that Azhleigh Banfield is a Canuck like you? Row `bout we get Relmut Newton over here to shoot her as Eve .:ith maple leaf instead of fig leaf, and I'm on hand to write the text? 2. Karachi: Cite of the Gun. I was down there for a da, and it was wild. Some 14-year-old traded me his Kalashnikov for my miniature Bausch & Lomb binoculars. A man's piece is his currency there-just to order a chicken dinner at the K.~.C., you shoot at the picture of the meal you want on the illustrated menu above the counter. I shot a street peddler to get an embroidered skullcap for my son Sebastian. Am itching to return and shoot more stuff. Do your boys want skullcaps? Also, they have a Pearl hotel there. Bewt, P.S. Not to tattle, but Ritchens used most of his time in Pakistan to work on non-V.P. projects. When we scored that coup dinner with I~usharrai, he monopolized the whole evening by asking the general questions about Kipling for his next book, Torturous Thought: Enlightened Despots on Literature. Afterward, at the bar in the Best Western, I espied on Ritch's laptop an article for The Nation entitled "A Respectable Spectacle: A Liberal's Case for Stadium Executions." So you're underwriting Navasky now?

VAN/TY FAIR CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS CONTRIBUTING EDITOR

8 November

Dearest Graydon

Beware the devilish schemes of the over-the-hill. Word has reached me that the esteemed I dwin John Coaster has been telling tales out of school about me. Suffice it to say that old ld spent the entirety of our Musharraf dinner in the bag, mute and glazed, except for when he tried to engage "Pervis," as he called the general, in a who's-hotter discussion of Ashleigh Banfield and Benazir Bhutto. Fortunately, I discovered Musharraf to be a Kipling enthusiast and rerouted the conversation in that direction. Coaster also confided to me afterward in the bar that he thinks Sebastian Junger is faking his stories and watching Al Jazeera in his hotel room. The old adage about the pot and the kettle comes to mind