Robert Manuel Cook.

Robert Manuel Cook. (4 July 1909-10 August 2000) `Deplorable' was one of his favourite words. But among themany things that Robert Cook found deplorable, young people were notincluded. For three decades after his official retirement as auniversity teacher, he savoured their company and supported theirefforts. So it is that his death, which came not long after his 91stbirthday, is resented down several generations. Laurence Professor ofClassical Archaeology at Cambridge from 1962 until 1976, specializing inthe classification of archaic East Greek pottery (`Wild Goat',`Clazomenian', `Fikellura' and so on), Robert Cook was both anunlikely and unwilling candidate for cult status. Yet that is what cameabout: a sort of veneration, itself rooted in the pleasures ofirreverence. As a scholar, Cook was accurate and incorruptible in��cor��rupt��i��ble?adj.1. Incapable of being morally corrupted.2. Not subject to corruption or decay.in . His brisk esteemfor the Classical past is evident enough in the book he wrote for GlynDaniel's `People and Places' series, The Greeks till Alexander(1962); while his commonsensical assessments of Greek art are probablybest found in the handbook of Greek Painted Pottery which he wrote in1960, and is deservedly still in print today. Flashes of drollery droll��er��y?n. pl. droll��er��ies1. A comical or whimsical quality.2. A comical or whimsical way of acting, talking, or behaving.3. a. The act of joking; clowning.b. therehowever indicate an academic who did not take himself, nor anyone else,too seriously. He scorned all theorizing, and was quick to spot abluffer; but he also goaded his students to take issue with his ownopinions. If, at a conversational level, this entailed makingmischievous remarks, then so be it. He would commend a squirrel-shootingneighbour, for example: maintaining that all animals were mankind'snatural enemies and warranted extermination exterminationmass killing of animals or other pests. Implies complete destruction of the species or other group. . Faced with a nonsmoker, hewould argue that the lungs needed a good coating of nicotine, to protectthem from infection (he was the sort of hardened pipe-puffer that picksup a cigarette as if reaching for a breath of fresh air). He was devoted to his wife Kathleen, with whom he did muchtravelling around Greece and the Aegean; together they wrote anarchaeological guide to Southern Greece, complete with estimates as tohow many gallons of Retsina ret��si��na?n.A Greek white or ros�� wine flavored with pine resin.[Modern Greek, probably from Italian resina, resin, from Latin r a tourist needed to consume before gaining ataste for that wine. But after she died, in 1979, he diligently learnedsome culinary skills, and made a practice of inviting people round on aSaturday night. Guests were rarely the parochial great and good; morelikely their rebellious offspring, or some undergraduate encountered inAthens, or a lonely research student who had helped him negotiate theever more savage library security system. Cook would cook, and guestswashed up: that was the deal. Early arrivals would find their host inhis carpet slippers and knitted waistcoat, standing by one of theworld's first electric hobs, peering into an enamel saucepan ofpotatoes, and muttering `Boil, you bastards, boil!' -- then,typically, it would be mussels and a roast, followed by stewed stewed?adj.1. Cooked by stewing: stewed prunes.2. Informal Intoxicated; drunk.stewedAdjective1. damsonsand junket, and a hub of Stilton. Later the tobacco and whisky: and thenthe stories. Overnighting on Delos. Outwitting Rumanian museum guardswith the feigned-diarrhoea trick. Illicitly emptying an Etruscan tomb.His life had been as quiet as is usual for most academics; butCook's principle of nonconformity had persisted throughout, andensured a twist on the mundane which was gleefully glee��ful?adj.Full of jubilant delight; joyful.gleeful��ly adv.glee recalled. He was a son of the manse: born in Sheffield, raised in Lancashire,but educated at Marlborough, along with his brother John (who alsobecame a distinguished Classical archaeologist). With one interruption-- a stint of lecturing at Manchester before the war -- Cook'scareer was Cambridge-based. Yet he took care to remain a misfit mis��fit?n.1. Something of the wrong size or shape for its purpose.2. One who is unable to adjust to one's environment or circumstances or is considered to be disturbingly different from others. inCambridge by avoiding, and despising, its collegiate comforts.`Snotty' and `idle' were the terms he reserved for dons whosuccumbed to such cosyness. He prided himself on being an efficientteacher and administrator; his crisp vigour was still evident in 1983,when he was called to chair the management committee of the BritishSchool at Athens The British School at Athens (BSA) (Greek: Βρετανική Σχολή Αθηνών) is one of the 17 Foreign Archaeological Institutes in Athens, Greece. . Scholarly tributes to Cook's influence within Classicalarchaeology will extend for many years; his particular brand of sanityis acknowledged in Homer and the artists, the latest book by AnthonySnodgrass, Cook's successor at Cambridge. This was one cult figurewho, to the end, did not disappoint his devotees. In his 90th year heacquired a small electric vehicle in order to trundle around town. Aparty had been organized for his birthday. He not only arrived at thegathering on this chariot. He put it into top gear, charged full tiltacross the lawn, and performed a superb aerial leap over the rockery. Noone is quite sure if Robert Cook intended this stunt: but he came out ofit triumphantly.