Saturday, March 08, 2025

Remember Whittaker Chambers?

 


While perusing A Large Regular, one of my regular blog visits, I saw a quote by Whittaker Chambers, and remembered a dating rule that author George V. Higgins had after he achieved fame for his great crime novel, The Friends of Eddie Coyle

As the story goes, Higgins began dating stunningly beautiful - and young - women all of whom were nice, but he encountered a conversation gap with many of them since they were unaware of certain key points in history. 

His eventual solution was to screen dates by asking if they knew about Whittaker Chambers. From then on, he only dated those who passed that single question exam.

Anyone who would not have been able to pass The Higgins Test, should know that although Eddie Coyle's associates were interesting, they were not as interesting as those of Whittaker Chambers.

2 comments:

chris said...

Thanks - always thought the book version of The Friends of Eddie Coyle was best. Your post reminds me that the author Carl Hiaasen in one of his books the hero had a Beatles test. If the girl didn't know who the drummer of the Beatles was she was probably too young or dumb to date.

Michael Wade said...

Chris,

The Beatles Drummer Test may be fairer!

I agree on Eddie Coyle. The film just couldn't quite reflect the book.

Michael