And still those little things remain
That bring me happiness or pain
Sooner or later… everyone stops smoking…
The beauty of quitting is, now that I've quit,
I can have one, 'cause I've quit.
Tom Waits – Jim Jarmusch's ‘Coffee and Cigarettes’
Take a walk on the wild side
So smoking is the perfect way to commit suicide without actually dying...
I smoke because it's bad... it's really simple.
Damien Hirst
Rock 'n' Roll Suicide
Subliminal...
A cigarette that bears a lipstick's traces,
An airline ticket to romantic places,
And still my heart has wings...
These foolish things remind me of you...
‘These Foolish Things’ is a song about Jean Ross, the inspiration for Christopher Isherwood's ‘divinely decadent’ Sally Bowles in ‘Goodbye to Berlin.'
Still lingering in 1930’s Nazi Germany, Adolf Hitler was an anti-smoking zealot; believing smoking to be “decadent” and equal to “racial degeneracy” and that it was a sin for the master race to light up.
Seeing his highest officials as the obvious role models they were, he ordered them all to go cold turkey on tobacco... He even had propaganda machine remove a cigarette from the photos of comrade Stalin when he met with Nazi envoy, Joachim von Ribbentrop...
Only recently, similarly dark revisionist politically correct shenanigans had US Poster companies photoshopping the cigarette out of Paul McCartney’s hand on the cover of the Beatles Abbey Road cover… without, it should be said, the permission of McCartney.
I'm so tired, I'm feeling so upset
Although I'm so tired I'll have another cigarette
And curse Sir Walter Raleigh
He was such a stupid get.
Lennon & McCartney
Sir Walter Raleigh, on-off favourite and confidante to Queen Elizabeth I, well known for popularising tobacco in England, smoked his last pipe in October 1618 when he was beheaded at Whitehall for his alleged involvement in a plot against King James I.
"Let us dispatch", he said to his executioner. "At this hour my ague comes upon me. I would not have my enemies think I quaked from fear."
Upon seeing the axe that would behead him, he said: "This is a sharp Medicine, but it is a Physician for all diseases and miseries." His final words were: "Strike, man, strike!"
As early as 1605, King James I (who was never a fan of Raleigh) put the taxes on tobacco up by 4,000% hoping to convince people to quit a practice he considered, “…loathsome to the eye, hateful to the nose, harmful to the brain and dangerous to the lungs.”
And yet…it’s hard to take the romance out of a cigarette…
But Tipalet took a shot…
There’s no denying that smoking has its dangers…
“We are, then, in the business of selling nicotine, an addictive drug...” - 1963 internal memo from Addison Yeaman, executive vice president of Brown and Williamson, president of Council for Tobacco Research in the USA.
Many other leading brands will also be your best friend...
Cinematic...
Look! No hands...
The say he looked undressed without a cigarette...
Bogart died of cancer of the throat brought on by smoking, aged 57. In 1999 the American Film Institute ranked him the greatest male film star of all time.
Bogart smoked untipped Chesterfields...
So did Rita Hayworth... Fire down below...
Deneuve by Helmut Newton
Dieu Fumeur de Havanes
America and the Britain always smoked light tobacco - "blondes" or blonds, as the French refer to Virginia cigarettes... In France they smoke brunettes... 'brunes.' Jean Nicot, France's ambassador to Portugal introduced tobacco to the French court in the 16th Century, his name would eventually be immortalised in the word nicotine… At the time he suggested it would ease the Queen’s (Catherine de' Medici’s) migraines.
But still... those little things remain.
Even though... 'Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.' – Sigmund Freud
Do you mind if I don’t smoke?
Groucho Marx
You must be dying for one mate! Very nice, as ever.
ReplyDeleteHa... having smoked an estimated 350,000 units up to 2001, I feel I've done my bit for the tobacco industry... However, on that day when the Doc says "It's not looking good pal..." I want a full carton and zippo running on full ;-)
ReplyDeleteAll those images are so alluring aren't they? The cigarette just kind of tops them off. I can't think of an equivalent symbol to replace it!
ReplyDeleteI'm not one to point out the elephant in the room Anna ;-)
ReplyDeleteYes you're right... and those awful electronic cigarettes... ugh... They're the equivalent of playing Russian Roulette with a water pistol.