ABSTRACT
Tall, garrulous and relentlessly good-humoured, author's late friend Robert Linsley was one of those artists whose inventiveness flows from energetic, wide-ranging curiosity. The music of the favelas, Michael Yahgulanaas’ mash-ups of manga with Haida form-line, conversations at the Perimeter Institute about the nature of time. He never knew what his latest passion would be but he knew it would be unpredictable and presented with infectious enthusiasm. So it happened that one day, when they were graduate students at the University of British Columbia, he greeted him with, “Charles, great to see you! he just bought this book for readers because they have to read it!” Whereupon he presented me with a battered, second-hand copy of Benvenuto Cellini’s Vita while regaling me with summaries of its funniest episodes. Not entirely coincidentally, Robert was at that talk, thus setting the stage for an important dénouement.
