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Tuesday, May 23, 2006 12:00 AM

Great couch potatoes of history

Inspired by his deadbeat son, former wanderer Tom Lutz explores 250 years of horizontal heroes -- from loungers and "nerve cases" to Beats, playboys and slackers.
By Gary Kamiya

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  • Tuesday, May 23, 2006 11:58 AM

    Lutz is an idiot

    Samuel Johnson was the hardest working scribbler in the English language. Chronically short of money, he took any assignment for any amount of money on whatever insane deadline he was given. He wrote a newspaper article in the carriage on the way to his own mother's funeral. Franklin on the other hand had the luxury of lecturing everyone else on the virtues of hard work what with having retired on or before age 40 where he could then indulge his scientific pursuits and the chasing and bedding of women.

    —Stephen Rifkin

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