Blather Vs. The Hierophant of Fortean Times

It’s not often that he does interviews, locked away as he is in his Fortress of Arrogance, but blather.net managed to coerce the Hierophant to ‘fess up…

The Hierophant is the gossip columnist of the damned, the scourge of the crazies. More precisely, he has a monthly column in Fortean Times, the Journal of Strange Phenomena, from where he launches scathing attacks on any malarkey that crosses his path. He does, however, have a warm spot for anything to with Loch Ness, cults or UFOs, or in particular, anyone making outlandish claims…

Blather: Good day to you sir!
And to you, sir.
Blather: How are things in the Himalayas this time of year?
Hierophant: Very much as they are for most of the rest of the year – chilly, isolated and full of screaming, sexually-frustrated nuns.
Blather: Tell us about your HQ, in vague, coded analogies, please.
Hierophant: We have recently had heating installed, powered entirely by the combustion of yeti dung; of course, this has required us to corral every known specimen of H. himalaîensis in order to harvest their droppings, so I’m afraid it’s unlikely you’ll be hearing from *them* again.
Blather: Do you have minions attending to you? Are the female, beautiful, and do they massage you with Baileys Irish Cream?
Hierophant: Baileys is not a substance I choose to have about the Fortress of Arrogance. Beyond this I shall maintain a tactful silence.
Blather: Or is there a Mrs. H?
Hierophant: You may draw such inferences as you wish regarding the reasons behind my tactful silence on the matter of beautiful female minions.

Blather: Where *do* you get those wonderful smoking jackets?
Hierophant: They are hand-sewn for me from the thousands of scarves presented to the Dalai Lama each year, and quilted with pure yeti down (see above).
Blather: What do you think of The Chap magazine, and their sartorial buffoonery?
Hierophant: I have yet to see any evidence of “buffoonery”; they strike me as not merely eminently sensible, but possibly the last bastion of sanity in an increasingly grotesque world.
Blather: Are you originally Nepalese? Or Tibetan perhaps?
Hierophant: Yes, I am originally Nepalese, or Tibetan. Perhaps.
Blather: You are constantly pictured barelegged. Do your shins get cold?
Hierophant: I find that a chill around the shin aids a man immensely in the contemplation of the ineffable.
Blather: What brand of tobacco do you smoke in your pipe? Or is it tobacco? Frop?
Hierophant: I change brands regularly, at the suggestion and whim of my tobacconist, the wholly remarkable Miss Moran’s of Church Lane, Belfast.
Blather: Your column in Fortean Times is a monthly exclamation of vintage wit and insider gossip. Is anyone safe from your wrath?
Hierophant: There is a long-standing ban on the discussion of certain ecumenical – not to say episcopal – matters.

Blather: Is there an overriding princple behind your column? ‘e.g., to rid the world of charlatans’ or somesuch?
Hierophant: In the crudest terms possible, “ha ha ha, look at the funny man”.
Blather: Any particularly favourite targets? David Icke, Jan Sundberg, Kevin Carlyon, perhaps?
Hierophant: I will never, ever tire of pointing at Scientology and laughing maniacally. Whether our legal department views matters in quite the same hilarious light is a consideration upon which I prefer not to expend undue thought.
Blather: How do you acquire informants? Do you ply them with narcotics?
Hierophant: Good lord, man, do you take me for some sort of opium sot? No, I insist on being plied, heavily, with narcotics before admitting a new informant to the hallowed ranks.
Fortean Times website »
Discussion about this interview, on the Fortean Times message boards »

daev

Chief Bottle Washer at Blather

Writer, photographer, environmental campaigner and "known troublemaker" Dave Walsh is the founder of Blather.net, described both as "possibly the most arrogant and depraved website to be found either side of the majestic Shannon River", and "the nicest website circulating in Ireland". Half Irishman, half-bicycle. He lives in southern Irish city of Barcelona.