Interesting story - I think this could be many of us.

[LizzieMaine]

I wondered aloud, "And you called him your friend?" I would think good manners (to say the least!) would dictate this journalist to leave sleeping dogs lie.

Walter Winchell, the father of the gossip column, had a rule: Celebrities were fair game, but he wouldn't reveal secrets involving private citizens who were doing no one any harm, even if those secrets somehow involved a celebrity. It's kind of sad that we seem to have moved beyond our appetite for exposing celebrities to exposing *anyone* who has a private life in the name of "journalism." One more reason why I got out of the business.

 

[Pompidou]

Walter Winchell, the father of the gossip column, had a rule: Celebrities were fair game, but he wouldn't reveal secrets involving private citizens who were doing no one any harm, even if those secrets somehow involved a celebrity. It's kind of sad that we seem to have moved beyond our appetite for exposing celebrities to exposing *anyone* who has a private life in the name of "journalism." One more reason why I got out of the business.

How would the rules apply to someone who wasn't a celebrity but spent his life pretending to be one? That's almost what we have here. By devoting so much energy towards looking like a somebody, he took the bad as well as the good. The aristocracy are celebrities in their own rights - or at least, when the terms high society and aristocracy still meant something to the public at large, they were. Maybe Mr Feuer acted away his right to privacy by making everyone believe he was someone important people should know?

 

[reetpleat]

How would the rules apply to someone who wasn't a celebrity but spent his life pretending to be one? That's almost what we have here. By devoting so much energy towards looking like a somebody, he took the bad as well as the good. The aristocracy are celebrities in their own rights - or at least, when the terms high society and aristocracy still meant something to the public at large, they were. Maybe Mr Feuer acted away his right to privacy by making everyone believe he was someone important people should know?

That is a great point. Technically speaking, I think he would be fair game, as he publicly put forth a false image and became a well known public figure, and even yes, a celebrity. And he as not a celebrity for anything other than the life he adopted.

Still, i don't think the journalist meant him any harm, as he seems to be celebrating the fact that he had reinvented himself in the ay he wanted. I don't imagine he did him any harm. It seems unlikely anyone will care.

Still, I wonder if the guy would hav wanted to world to know, or would have preffered it be kept private. I suspect the latter, which does give me pause. I don't see it as a big scoop as in unmasking a fraud. But it is an interesting story mainly due to his past.

 

[Undertow]

Ah, but he was not a celebrity. I hate to be pedantic, but this man was, perhaps, a celebrity among a few socialites, but certainly not someone who based their professional career on putting their face (book, voice, music, etc) into the public media for consumption.

An author such as Truman Capote may be a borderline celebrity who built his fame on a book he'd created for mass consumption.
A man who attends parties dressed as a pink flamingo, while entertaining and perhaps recognizable, is no celebrity.

 

[Pompidou]

Ah, but he was not a celebrity. I hate to be pedantic, but this man was, perhaps, a celebrity among a few socialites, but certainly not someone who based their professional career on putting their face (book, voice, music, etc) into the public media for consumption.

An author such as Truman Capote may be a borderline celebrity who built his fame on a book he'd created for mass consumption.
A man who attends parties dressed as a pink flamingo, while entertaining and perhaps recognizable, is no celebrity.

You're probably right if celebrity is reined back in to its connotations of the 80s and back. The Internet, with YouTube and a world of five minutes of fame, where everyone can be a "celebrity" if they get lucky with a phone camera - it's changed what it means to be a celebrity. He certainly wasn't a classic celebrity, but it wouldn't take a degree in rhetoric to make it look like he wanted to be one.

 

[Captain Lex]

It would have been in very bad taste to out him were he still living, or to someone who would have thought less of him because of it. I think, however, any reasonable person feels this story and this man is all the better for him having the past he had (even if he guarded it, at times, tactlessly), and that telling that part of the story is what makes it a story. He didn't tell Oblensky's story; Oblensky's is not a surprise. Oblensky's is not the classic Don Quixote tale of living your dream in any way you can. But maybe that only seems that way to us because it is, in some sense, also our own dream. Maybe to everyone else he just seemed like a lunatic who forgot his place. But I'd like to have more faith than that.

EDIT: Edits.

 

[reetpleat]

It would have been in very bad taste to out him were he still living, or to someone who would have thought less of him because of it. I think, however, any reasonable person feels this story and this man is all the better for him having the past he had (even if he guarded it, at times, tactlessly), and that telling that part of the story is what makes it a story. He didn't tell Oblensky's story; Oblensky's is not a surprise. Oblensky's is not the classic Don Quixote tale of living your dream in any way you can. But maybe that only seems that way to us because it is, in some sense, also our own dream. Maybe to everyone else he just seemed like a lunatic who forgot his place. But I'd like to have more faith than that.

EDIT: Edits.

Well, if his reputation as a non lunatic is safe anywhere, it is on this forum. Pity he as not a member. Or was he???

I dare say, a guy who puts on airs, adopts an English accent, learns to behave in a way totally different from his original, gets involved in organization and fundraising, and stands in the foyer greeting people, intends to be a bit of celebrity, at least within certain circles. he did nto exactly live a privae life.

 

[reetpleat]

One question no one has speculated on yet, is was he happy, enjoying himself and his new life. or was he at heart, deeply ashamed of his humble origins and desperately wanting to be perceived as something other than that. I hope the former.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Looks pretty happy to me.

 

[Yeps]

What a great little story. Reminds me a little bit of Leopold Stokowski.

 

[dhermann1]

Stokey! I knew, many year ago, a couple of English musicians who had known Stokowski in London in the 1920's. His nickname among the rank and file of dismissive working musicians of the time was "Leonard Stokes".

 

[Story]

One question no one has speculated on yet, is was he happy, enjoying himself and his new life. or was he at heart, deeply ashamed of his humble origins and desperately wanting to be perceived as something other than that. I hope the former.

I'd suggest both, and that the horse drove the cart.

 

[lframe]

The best line in the article comes from Obolensky: "I don't ask about lineage. It's not done." Now *that's* class.

Agreed.