Leading article: In praise of the master

News reaches us from the afterlife where a famous composer is making a documentary on one of his heroes: "My name is Richard Wagner and I have a confession to make: I have a passion for the work of the British actor, comedian, novelist, and television quiz show host Stephen Fry.

"I know some say he is the stupid person's idea of what an intelligent person looks like. And his work will forever, it is true, be stained by his colossal self-importance and fathomless smugness. For some that stain ruins the whole work; for others it's just something you have to face up to. Personally, I could not live without Stephen's Twitter feed. The period when he abandoned the medium last year after being told that his Tweets were boring seemed longer to me than the final act of Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg.

"I've always loved Twitter. I've never managed to get the hang of it myself. But reading Tweets has always released forces within me, and no Tweets do it like Stephen's."