A letter of complaint about the Hungry Ghosts from a gentleman who has never had the pleasure.
Sir, I have yet to hear the ‘Hungry Ghosts’ – thank heavens! However, I nonetheless feel qualified to pass judgement, having hunted a great variety of beat combos in my time (in the region of three a year over a time frame of ninety years). I know what they are, I know what they stand for, and I am against all of it. It is American swamp music, coming over here and drowning out hymns, and it has within it veiled encouragements of free love (open-mouthed kissing), drug cigarettes and guilt-free literature. I know what they are, these Hungry Ghosts, and I know how to stop them. When the beatniks first started to appear I was only a boy, but I took my father’s service revolver and my mother’s horse and did what needed to be done. I am not a boy any more, although I am currently much the same size. It is my considered opinion that the Hungry Ghosts are the biggest threat to our nation’s great traditions of quietness and servitude since the Welfare State. If they are allowed to flourish our sons, daughters and apprentices will grow up in a world without bugles, a world of narrow jeans and rituals. I hope that your readers will join me in tracking the Hungry Ghosts to their burrow and hunting them to extinction. Our local parliamentary candidate for the UK Independence Party, Peter Ghoul, has donated his personal beagles – with his help and yours we can run these Ghosts to ground. With best wishes,
Harold Daughter.