Tuesday, July 15, 2014

Tizer in the piano

A lovely bit about P. N. Furbank:
A story we haven’t quite corroborated – and which is remembered through a haze of neat gin, served alongside the sherry on little drink stands however early the hour of calling – involved Turing setting up a maths-based treasure hunt across Cambridge for Furbank and Forster to solve. The final clue depended on an electrical current being run through Forster’s piano, which Turing had filled with tizer. Another friend at the table asked whether Forster played the piano well, and Furbank said he did.
This is the kind of writer and scholar I aspire to be - in fact, shortly I think I might go to the library and check out some of his books....

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