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February 4		Cassady, Kerouac, Kesey
		On this day in 1968 Neal Cassady died, at the age of forty-one. Cassady was not only Jack Kerouac's wheelman on the trips that inspired On the Road but a direct influence on Kerouac's style. Ken Kesey and others who were friendly with, or married to, or driven by, or audience for Cassady all say that "Fastestmanalive" talked and lived as he drove -- at overwhelming rates and to uncertain places.
February 3		Mencken, Arkansas, Blondes
		On this day in 1931, the Arkansas legislature passed a motion to pray for the soul of H. L. Mencken. One of Mencken's Laws was "Nature abhors a moron," and one of his favorite pastimes was to attack the South; upon finding itself elevated to "the apex of moronia," Arkansas had apparently had enough. One spin-off from the Arkansas-baiting was Anita Loos's Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.
February 2		Prizing Bertrand Russell
		On this day in 1970 Bertrand Russell died, aged ninety-seven. Like Henri Bergson before him, Russell won his 1950 Nobel Prize in literature without ever having published any. Not long after returning home from Stockholm, Russell thought he might as well try his hand at the craft, eventually publishing two volumes of short stories -- neither of them close to being prize-winners.