One day, while poking around on the Interweb, I came across a blog (www.contrariwise.org) devoted to literary tattoos -- photos that people have posted of their own little part in making sure that great writing endures.
On their skin. Well, "great" is debatable; a lot of these tattoos seemed to be more "Little Prince" and Shel Silverstein than, say, Proust or Chaucer, but let's not be snobby.
It's quite a commitment to have a line of poetry inked forever on your chest, or around your biceps, or even, um, going down the back of your pants. A bit more Web surfing found that this wasn't the only blog devoted to this strange art -- not by a long shot.
Oh, and is there a book on this topic, too? Of course there is: "Dorothy Parker's Elbow: Tattoos on Writers, Writers on Tattoos," by Kim Addonizio and Cheryl Dumesnil (Grand Central Publishing, $21.99).
Tattooing "Do not go gentle into that good night" on the back of your neck takes a bold commitment. And maybe a copy editor friend, keeping watch at the tattoo artist's side as he wields needle and ink.
