Glen Baxter's world became seriously unhinged one fateful day in 1954 when he was wrestling a turnip to the floor of the gymnasium at St. Mildred's Academy for the Listless and Wayward. At exactly that moment the door was flung open by the portly Deputy Sheriff McClain. He began accusing Baxter of tampering with the bunkhouse collection of modernist paintings. Having successfully subdued the vegetable, Baxter nimbly parachuted out the window and landed feet first in his uncle's prized dandruff display. He immediately decided to become an artist.

That's one explanation. It may not be true. But whatever the circumstances of Baxter's beginnings, he is now revered among legions of misdirected fans as the creator of the world of images so startlingly offbeat that they evoke chortles and choking laughter even among the moribund. And his characters actually do wrestle with vegetables; his cowboys ponder abstract art; his students devise contraptions for writing letters with their heads. Forks that explode, seafood salads that act ferociously, apricots in peril, goatees that are removable, invisible newspapers, and vast mounds of glutinous cauliflower all contribute their efforts to ensure that the delightful madness of Baxter's psyche is aptly expressed.

Glen Baxter (English, b. 1944) has written numerous books, including The Billiard Table Murders and Blizzards of Tweed. His work has appeared in such publications as The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, Elle, Vogue, and The Independent on Sunday (London). "Colonel" Baxter lives in London; his art is often exhibited in London as well as in New York, San Francisco, and Paris.