Judi and Max Worthington had their 15 minutes of fame last week. Or rather, their inspired holiday cottage, the Boathouse at Kildonan on Arran, became a nine day wonder. It was shown on the BBC Scotland series
Scotland's Greatest Escape, which features holiday accommodation around the country in a competitive format that, to be frank, is silly.
In one episode, for example, an excellently appointed boat was judged Scotland's best luxury venue. A decision that one or two five-star hotels might doubt. In another, the family of judges had to park their children with grandparents because one of the places up for assessment did not have enough rooms. And a splendid high point was bad weather preventing the crucial programme presenter from reaching an island venue. One suspects substituting budget constraints for weather might be nearer the truth.
The programme's deficiencies apart, the wee Boathouse's fame brought to mind Andy Warhol and Will Kempe, which may come as a surprise to those unacquainted with my tortuous mind. The point is where did the phrases '15 minutes of fame' and 'nine day wonder' come from? Most folk will attribute the former to Andy Warhol, who, delightfully, never said it.
According to Wikipedia, the organisers of a 1968 Warhol exhibition at the Moderna Museet in Stockholm used the phrase in the programme because 'if he didn't say it, he could have'. Nathan Finklestein, a starry American photographer who took iconic photographs at Warhol's New York Factory, claims the phrase is his. He was photographing Warhol in 1966 for a planned book and a crowd gathered, trying to get in the pictures. Warhol remarked that everyone wanted to be famous. Finklestein replied 'Yeah, for about 15 minutes, Andy'.
Both of them, however, were treading in famous footsteps. Good old Chaucer, bane of many a youthful education, wrote in 1380: 'wonder lasts but nine days, never in town'. My favourite morris dancer, Will Kempe, famously danced from London to Norwich over nine days in 1600. His acting career which included a spell with Shakespeare and Burbage in
The Lord Chamberlain's Men was on the wane so he came up with the 'Nine Days Wonder', a trip spread over three weeks that took him, often amid cheering crowds, the 110 miles. He then faded into obscurity and poverty.
No-one knows exactly how and where Kempe died but it is likely to have been in Southwark in 1603. If true, he would have been 43 years old. Warhol survived a shooting in 1968 by Valerie Solanas. In 1987, gallbladder surgery followed by cardiac arrhythmia ended his life at the age of 58.
Happily, one suspects that the wee Kildonan Boathouse will last much longer. Its fame may have been fleeting but good Scottish oak and stone, even close to the sea, tend not to be a nine day wonder. There must be a moral in there, somewhere.
David Donald
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