CRAIG CONLEY (Prof. Oddfellow) is recognized by Encarta as “America’s most creative and diligent scholar of letters, words and punctuation.” He has been called a “language fanatic” by Page Six gossip columnist Cindy Adams, a “cult hero” by Publisher’s Weekly, a “monk for the modern age” by George Parker, and “a true Renaissance man of the modern era, diving headfirst into comprehensive, open-minded study of realms obscured or merely obscure” by Clint Marsh. An eccentric scholar, Conley’s ideas are often decades ahead of their time. He invented the concept of the “virtual pet” in 1980, fifteen years before the debut of the popular “Tamagotchi” in Japan. His virtual pet, actually a rare flower, still thrives and has reached an incomprehensible size. Conley’s website is OneLetterWords.com.
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A Turkish Delight of musings on languages, deflations of metaphysics, vauntings of arcana, and great visual humor.

June 29, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

Fom Made Up to Kill, by Kelley Roos:

***

[(Presumably) Fictitious Theatrical Productions dept.]

Four years ago she had snagged the ingenue lead in a play called Gibbon's Glade.

***

The man who stood there seemed to me the tallest man I'd ever seen. His parents, I thought inanely, must have been Basil Rathbone and a skyscraper.

***

[Personified Punctuation dept. The character being alluded to here is a nosy elevator operator.]

Fortunately the day operator was on and not Jinx, the human interrogation point.

***

[One- (and Two-) Upping Clichés dept. (Also "Toast Is Funny" dept.)]

He came in looking as though he'd just eaten a flock of canaries. On toast.

***

“Philip Ashley couldn’t have stolen a scene from a snowdrift.”

***

Immediately Jeff gave me the high sign, so high it almost went completely over my head.

***

Bonus: An extraneous intra-library slip of paper within this inter-library-loaned book bears the intriguing legend ***,S.

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June 26, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

From With a Bare Bodkin, by Cyril Hare:

***

"There are moments when I feel that 'nothing' is the most beautiful word in the language."

[This is only accidentally related, given the 20th-century source above; but I recently read an analysis of lost double entendres in Shakespeare--lost because of pronunciation changes since the Bard's time. The one I recall related to "nothing" having been pronounced the same as "no thing," which in turn could refer to female anatomy. So here we can juxtapose the "divine monosyllable" with the "most beautiful word in the language."]

***

Damn Phillips! Damn Edelman! Damn the Control and everything connected with it, including the Blenkinsop file!

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June 22, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

From Thirteen Guests, by J. Jefferson Farjeon:

***

Usually he was rather good at conversation, but now he could not even talk of cabbages and kings without putting his foot in it.

***

She always closed her eyes in company when she thought, so that the company would know she was thinking. Sometimes she cheated, and opened her eyes without having thought at all.

***

"I have written a detective novel," replied Bultin. "Also, the notice of it."

[I note that this precurses our namesake Jeremy Hillary Boob of Yellow Submarine, who says he is writing a book and simultaneously reviewing it. (Also sock-puppet Amazon reviewers.)]

***

A figure darted towards Kendall, like a ghost that had suddenly materialised out of a shadow and had urgent business to do before dissolving back into ethereal form.

***

It was Bultin who discovered--or who expedited the discovery of--the little glass tube in the hat's leather lining. This discovery will probably cause his own size in hats to increase.

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June 19, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

From The Black Coat, by Constance and Gwenyth Little:

***

[Dubious Testimonials dept.]

"The trouble with George," Tim said critically, "is that he has no sense of humor...."

"You leave George alone," Lily pouted. "He can laugh like a hyena when he doesn't have all this on his mind."

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June 15, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

From Death in the Quadrangle, by Eilís Dillon:

***

"There's terrible changes here, sir, enough to make the old [college] President, God be good to him, turn in his grave."

Daly doubted the truth of this, remembering how hard it had been to induce the late President to turn in his chair, even while he was alive.

***

He was in his early forties, of medium height with nondescript, mouse-coloured hair, rather thin, and a parchment complexion which gave him an unreal appearance, like a bad stained-glass window.

***

[I Resemble That Remark dept.]

"How did you get him talking about the President?" asked Mike, fearing that Daly was about to embark on his favourite game of repeating his own witticisms.

***

[Nonsense Interruptus dept.]

She started to say:

"Nonsense!"

Then suddenly she closed her mouth tight and covered it with her hand.

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June 12, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

From The Black Goatee, by Constance and Gwenyth Little:

[If you want more "screwball mysteries" in your life, I might recommend this one. It could be shelved comfortably next to Alice Tilton--providing, of course, one wasn't using an alphabetical or spine-color system. (:v> Incidentally, I was mulling over the distinction between "screwball" and "zany"--my impression being, in the film-comedy world, that they are two quite different animals, the former involving hapless protagonists whom circumstances force into a comically undignified antics, and the latter involving protagonists for whom antics are "normal" behavior. So, though Tilton has been described as "screwball," I might suggest that she's sort of halfway between the two. While her characters certainly aren't intrinsically zany on the order of the Marx Brothers or Wheeler and Woolsey, it doesn't take much to prompt them into silly behavior, and they don't lose much sleep over looking silly. And I would say that this Little-Little novel is along similar lines, with the additional similarity that the various slightly kooky characters have all known each other forever or, even when they haven't, behave as if they have.]

***

"Well, I know a man--" Ed began, but wasn't able to get anywhere in telling about his man, because everyone else knew a man, also, and couldn't be bothered hearing about Ed's.

***

"What did he say?"

"Nothing. And he said it very well, too."

***

[Goat Getting: The Extended Metaphor Version]

"He wanted to get your goat, and he walked off with it under his arm."

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June 8, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

From Tragedy at Law, by Cyril Hare:

***

It was his Court whisper, something quite different from any tone normally used by him--or indeed by anyone else.

***

[Unusual Threesomes dept.]

Pettigrew got into bed with a furrowed brow and a very wrinkled nose.

***

"So far as--so far as his particular grievance is concerned, if you follow me, my lord."

From Barber's expression it was plain that he followed him perfectly, and that he did not greatly enjoy the journey.

***

"It appeals to some temperaments, and Sally, as you are no doubt aware, has several."

***

Ranging from querulous protest through bitter sarcasm to straightforward abuse, the [guest book] entries made an interesting contribution to the literature of ill temper.

***

He gave a gasp of dismay when Greene opened the door of his room and with mute eloquence displayed what lay beyond.

***

"By the end of the evening I should not be surprised if I were verging on the blotto, in a quite gentlemanly way, of course, but definitely verging."

"But..." said Derek.

"I know what you are going to say. As a purist, not to say an idealist, you object that a verge cannot be definite."

***

It is somewhat difficult to disregard with lofty chivalry a blot on the family scutcheon unless you can see the blot.

***

Hilda caught Derek's eye and gave him what is generally described as a meaning look. Derek had no difficulty in recognizing it as such, but unfortunately he was not able to determine for himself exactly what it meant.

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June 5, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

From The Case of the Restless Redhead, by Erle Stanley Gardner:

***

"Pretty Polly. Watch it now. Here's your cracker," the parrot interpolated.

[The parrot *interpolated*! (N.B. I think the "bonus" near-Tom Swifty of Polly inter-pol-ating was unintended. Also of note: The presence of the parrot is *not* used as a plot device, i.e., the parrot doesn't repeat any compromising bit of a secret conversation at a crucial juncture. It's a purely recreational parrot!)]

***

From An Oxford Tragedy, by J. C. Masterman:

***

You must see it all through my eyes, or rather--to be more exact--through my spectacles.

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June 1, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

From One False Move, by Kelley Roos:

***

He was sandpapering it, having a wonderful time. I had never been especially interested in sandpapering per se, but Gramps made me want to try my hand at it.

[There must be YouTube channels for people who get a sensual frisson from sandpapering.]

***

Arch put on his half-lens reading spectacles and perused the letter. It seemed to take hours; I had never seen a letter so perused.

***

If she could project the sincerity she was exuding now from a stage, she would be another Sarah Bernhardt, another Eleonora* Duse. Well, another Doris Day.

[*Thinking this name would normally be spelled like "Eleanor" with an "a" appended, I wondered if "Eleonora" was a typo. But, no, there really is a lion in there.]

***

My mind was not on counting money. I might have been counting chickens before they were hatched. Or my blessings, although at the moment I could have finished that up in a hurry.

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May 29, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

From The Pleasure Cruise Mystery, by Robin Forsythe:

***

"And I deduce--it's not often I condescend to deduce--that the one that belonged to Maureen was the cinnamon and white diamond affair."

***

"She may have used ordinary saliva [as an invisible ink]...."

"By Jove, fancy getting one's information straight from the mare's mouth so to speak. The process explains the phrase 'spitting it out' and makes x's a fair approximation to kisses."

[That "By Jove" speech--apart from the "by Jove" itself--reads to me like it's straight out of the Conley - Caws-Elwitt correspondence!]

***

"She reminds me of a hansom cab. I can't explain why, Algernon."

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May 25, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

From the Leonidas Witherall radio shows:

***

"Keep your beard out of this." [Used more than once.]

***

"That's quite a character reference."

"Well, Mr. Witherall's quite a character."

***

"I just took Dalton Chancery Prince Igor IV over to his pen."

"Dalton Chancery Prince Igor IV? Pen name of a writer?"

"It's my prize bull!"

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May 22, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

From The Good Thief's Guide to Vegas, by Chris Ewan:

***

And if you can operate the motor quite independently of any code, why, then Robert's your mother's brother, and you have an easy way in.

***

Four hundred and twenty dollars. Given my predicament, it wasn't to be sniffed at.... Alongside the notes was a bottle of perfume, which I suppose was to be sniffed at.

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May 18, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

From The Case of the Lonely Heiress, by Erle Stanley Gardner:

***

[Rhetorical inflation resisted]

"Mr. Mason... You can count on my loyalty one hundred percent. One thousand percent!"

"One hundred is enough."

[I wonder what she's going to do with the other 900 percent now. "Great, then I can still go and be loyal to nine more people!" (:v>]

***

[Gender-Specific Goat-Getting dept.]

"But what gets my nanny goat is to have him go traipsing around after this brunette and pulling the line that he's merely following his lawyer's advice."

***

[Flapping dept.]

The hot air billowed the bathrobe into flapping motion.

***

"Are you reading my mind?" Mason asked.

She said, "I'm two paragraphs ahead of you."

***

[Surprise Appearance of the Ice Follies in the Denouement dept.]

"Della, I think this calls for a celebration. The Ice Follies are here this week. Get four of the best seats available...."

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May 15, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

More from The Sunny Side, by A. A. Milne:

***

"Do think, Samuel," I interrupted, "how much more splendid if you could be the only man who had seen Monte Carlo without going inside the rooms. And then... when your friends at the club ask if you've had any luck at the tables, you just say coldly, 'What tables?'"

"Preferably in Latin," said Archie. "Quae mensae?"

***

Of course in my review I said all the usual things. I said that Mr. Blank's attitude to life was "subjective rather than objective" … and a little lower down that it was "objective rather than subjective." I pointed out that in his treatment of the major theme he was a neo-romanticist, but I suggested that, on the other hand, he had nothing to learn from the Russians—or the Russians had nothing to learn from him; I forget which.

***

"My dear," I said, "I have been asked to deliver a lecture."

"Whatever on?" asked Celia.

"Anything I like. The last person lectured on 'The Minor Satellites of Jupiter,' and the one who comes after me is doing 'The Architecture of the Byzantine Period,' so I can take something in between."

***

HOLDING THE LEMON

For this trick you want a lemon and a pack of ordinary playing-cards. Cutting the lemon in two, you hand half to one member of your audience and half to another, asking them to hold the halves up in full view of the company. Then, taking the pack of cards in your own hands, you offer it to a third member of the party, requesting him to select a card and examine it carefully. When he has done this he puts it back in the pack, and you seize this opportunity to look hurriedly at the face of it, discovering (let us say) that it is the five of spades. Once more you shuffle the pack; and then, going through the cards one by one, you will have no difficulty in locating the five of spades, which you will hold up to the company with the words "I think this is your card, sir"—whereupon the audience will testify by its surprise and appreciation that you have guessed correctly.

It will be noticed that, strictly speaking, the lemon is not a necessary adjunct of this trick; but the employment of it certainly adds an air of mystery to the initial stages of the illusion, and this air of mystery is, after all, the chief stock-in-trade of the successful conjurer.

***

[Ending with a Cauliflower dept., As-an-Insult division]

"Cauliflower!" shrieked Gaspard Volauvent across the little table in the estaminet. His face bristled with rage.

"Serpent!" replied Jacques Rissole, bristling with equal dexterity.

***

I also recommend these two pieces:

"The Way Down" (a quasi-precursor to this JC-E piece: http://www.salticid.com/jce/secondpost.html)

"The Arrival of Blackman's Warbler" (a precursor to the Elwitt family "Bird-ictionary")

http://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/13441/pg13441-images.html

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May 11, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

From The Sunny Side, by A. A. Milne:

***

My publisher wants me to apologize for—"introduce" was the kindly word he used—this collection of articles and verses from Punch. [...] Really it is very difficult, you know. I wrote these things for a number of years, and—well, here they are. But just to say "Here they are" is to be too informal for my publisher.

***

The good view came, and then another and another, and they merged together and became one long, moving panorama of beauty. We stood in the corridor and drank it in … and at intervals we said "Oh-h!" and "Oh, I say!" and "Oh, I say, really!" And there was one particular spot I wish I could remember where, so that it might be marked by a suitable tablet—at the sight of which Simpson was overheard to say, "Mon Dieu!" for (probably) the first time in his life.

***

"That does it," I said to Myra. "We're really here. And look, there's a lemon tree. Give me the oranges and lemons, and you can have all the palms and the cactuses and the olives."

"Like polar bears in the arctic regions," said Myra.

I thought for a moment. Superficially there is very little resemblance between an orange and a polar bear.

"Like polar bears," I said hopefully.

"I mean," luckily she went on, "polar bears do it for you in the polar regions. You really know you're there then. Give me the polar bears, I always say, and you can keep the seals and the walruses and the penguins. It's the hallmark."

"Right. I knew you meant something. In London," I went on, "it is raining. Looking out of my window I see a lamp-post (not in flower) beneath a low, grey sky. Here we see oranges against a blue sky a million miles deep. What a blend! Myra, let's go to a fancy-dress ball when we get back. You go as an orange and I'll go as a very blue, blue sky, and you shall lean against me."

"And we'll dance the tangerine," said Myra.

***

[As Advertised]

She looked up from her book and waved her hand. "Mentone on the left, Monte Carlo on the right," she said, and returned to her book again. Simpson had mentioned the situation so many times that it had become a catch-phrase with us.

***

"It's quite all right," said Simpson cheerfully. "I said we'd be six."

"But six in a letter is much smaller than six of us like this."

 

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May 8, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

From The Black-Headed Pins, by Constance and Gwenyth Little:

***

[Zeugma dept.]

Amy continued to complain in a high voice and her panties.

***

His chin was strong and showed no signs, as yet, of repeating itself.

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May 4, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

More from Quick Curtain, by Alan Melville:

 ***

It is suprising how much amusement can be got out of the simple things of life. A statuette broken and placed together the wrong way is a fairly good example....

"It's a very good thing our backsides are at the backside, isn't it?" said Mr. Wilson, junr.

***

"I'll bet a thousand pounds to the bottom button of my waistcoat that it was Gwen Astle who did the writing."

"The bottom button of your waistcoat," said Derek, "is missing. You've lost the bet."

***

"A gentleman to see the master," said Martha.

"What's his name?" asked Mr. Wilson.

"Gent called Jenkinson, sir."

"Jenkinson?"

"That's what he said, sir," said Martha, standing her ground firmly.

***

Miss Prune [one of those prim character types whose speech is rendered complete with its "flet vowels"] sent telegram (i) on its first hop towards Mr. Wilson in London with an uneasy feeling that she was conniving at something that wasn't altogether naice.

[Btw, this is in the course of an amusing series of hectoring telegrams back and forth; and I note that this book was published the same year as Right Ho, Jeeves!--which may well have been Wodehouse's first use of the telegram business. So possibly a case of Great Minds Thinking Alike, rather than a minor author taking a cue from Plum.]

***

[A fictitious play with a genericized place name!]

"We signed on with a touring company of a musical comedy--I forget the name... The Girl from Somewhere-or-other."

***

[And speaking of unintended compliments...]

"Mr...."

"Hopkinson," said Derek.

"Oh, Hopkinson? It looked like Hepplewaite in the register."

"Thank you," said Derek.

***

[Oath Aunts dept. (A great-aunt, no less!)]

"Mrs. Wright my Great-aunt Maggie," said Derek.

***

[While spelling "Nebuchadnezzar" (for a telegram, of course).]

"Two z's," said Derek patiently. "One for zebra. And then another one, just like the first, for Zam-buk."

[I had to look that up! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zam-Buk]

***

P. C. Root and P. C. Lightfoot had nodded their heads vigorously at each of Mr. Wilson's "understands," with the result that their helmets were now seriously impeding their vision.

***

"Wilson speaking from Craile....Craile.... C-r-a--oh, it doesn't matter--Wilson speaking from Llandudno...."

***

Mr. Amethyst... often thought it would be a good thing if Mr. Douglas would hold the [aftershow] party in public and keep the actual production in camera.

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May 1, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

From Quick Curtain, by Alan Melville:

[This one is quite the "comical mystery"!]

***

"Unfortunately she'd been rung up earlier in the morning by the Morning Herald, the Daily News, the Daily Observer, the Morning Courier, and practically everyone else except the Christian Herald and the Feathered World."

[I read the above just days after reading *this* in Milne's Happy Days: "There was I, sitting at home and sending out madly for all the papers, until my rooms were littered with copies of The Times, The Financial News, Answers, The Feathered World and Home Chat." (The joke in this case is that the protagonist is specifically looking for financial news, from any and every available source!) Btw, the Melville is from 1934, the Milne from no later than 1928 (i.e., the 1928 book collects essays previously published in Punch).]

***

"B. dies gracefully in the glare of three spotlights and to the accompaniment of an augmented orchestra, under the direction of M. René Whoever-it-was." [I didn't realize Whoever-it-was was a French name!]

***

"If you draw a little triangle--"

"Isosceles or eternal?" asked Derek, drawing several on the table-cloth with the prongs of his fork.

"Right-angled, as a matter of fact," said Mr. Wilson.

[And later on...]

"I'm beginning to think that Brandon Baker's sudden end was the result of something happening to that old geometrical figure the eternal triangle. Perhaps the square on the side opposite the hypotenuse got a bit fresh with the angle at the base of the triangle, and the sum of the other two angles didn't quite approve."

***

Brandon Baker's last performance [as the corpse at his real-life funeral] was much more brilliant than his unfortunate first London performance in the musical comedy Blue Music.

[This is part of an extended treatment of this theater-world funeral as a quasi-"show," which thus precurses Genuine Cousin of Pearl.]

***

"Surely to say that a man of over fifty was juvenile leading was--if I may so--definitely juvenile misleading?"

***

[(Presumably) Fictitious Theater Productions dept.]

"I saw him years ago at the Empire in Here's A Howdydoo!...."

[Later]

Mr. Watcyns couldn't see why Miss Sinclair should go on wasting her time and talents in a play like What Bloomers! when there was a gem of a part for her in his own Infernal Triangle.

***

"A Miss Davis, sir."

"What's she like?" asked Mr. Wilson, who always made a point of getting a pro-forma invoice where women were concerned.

***

[Art Deco style precurses the all-lowercase conventions of text-messaging.]

Mr. Wilson knew at once that [the flats] were very modern, for all the chromium-plated name-plates at the main entrance were devoid of capital letters.

***

Then the ultra-modern block of service flats was wrapped in ultra-silence.

***

While the first attack on the [door]bell had been a mere prod, this was a good, honest bit of work, reminiscent of Wagner at his most boisterous moments.

[...]

Derek rang again, this time in a musical-comedy strain....

***

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April 27, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

From If I May, by A. A. Milne:

***

He had taken her to the best restaurant in Paris and had introduced her to a bottle of the famous Chateau Whatsitsname, 1320 (or thereabouts).

***

I have a book called Chats on Old Furniture--a terrible title to have to ask for in a shop, but I asked boldly.

***

I have not yet discovered, in spite of my recent familiarity with house-agents, the difference between a fixture and a fitting. It is possible that neither word has any virtue without the other, as is the case with “spick” and “span.” One has to be both; however dapper, one would never be described as a span gentleman. In the same way it may be that a curtain-rod or an electric light is never just a fixture or a fitting, but always “included in the fixtures and fittings.”

[...]

The whole idea of a fixture or fitting can only be that it is something about which there can be no individual taste. We furnish a house according to our own private fancy; the “fixtures” are the furnishings in regard to which we are prepared to accept the general fancy. The other man’s curtain-rod, though easily detachable and able to fit a hundred other windows, is a fixture; his carpet-as-planned (to use the delightful language of the house-agent), though securely nailed down and the wrong size for any other room but this, is not a fixture. Upon some such reasoning the first authorized schedule of fixtures and fittings must have been made out.

It seems a pity that it has not been extended. There are other things than curtain-rods and electric-light bulbs which might be left behind in the old house and picked up again in the new. The silver cigarette-box, which we have all had as a birthday or wedding present, might safely be handed over to the incoming tenant, in the certainty that another just like it will be waiting for us in our next house. True, it will have different initials on it, but that will only make it the more interesting, our own having become fatiguing to us by this time.

***

“Oh!” she says.

I hate people who say “Oh!” It means that you have to begin all over again.

“I’ve been playing [golf] this afternoon,” we try. “Do you play at all?”

“No.”

Then it is no good telling her what our handicap is.

“No doubt your prefer tennis,” we hazard.

“Oh no.”

“I mean bridge.”

“I don’t play any game,” she answers.

Then the sooner she goes away and talks to somebody else the better.

“Ah, I expect you’re more interested in the theatre?”

“I hardly ever go to the theatre.”

“Well, of course, a good book by the fireside--”

“I never read,” she says.

Dash the woman, what does she do? But before we can ask her, she lets us into the great secret.

“I like talking,” she says.

Good Heavens! What else have we been trying to do all this time?

***

[And dig this! In a piece deploring the state of the theatre, Milne's hypothetical crass theatre producer "would be just as proud of a successful production of Kiss Me, Katie, as of Hamlet." Now, if I'm not mistaken, this gag about the presumably fictitious Kiss Me, Katie was written a couple of decades before the debut of Kiss Me, Kate--which, as you no doubt know, was *based* on a Shakespeare play! (Milne then goes on about Hug Me, Harriet and Cuddle Me, Constance.)]

Also recommended: this item called "A Lost Masterpiece."

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/7365/7365-h/7365-h.htm#article28

 

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April 24, 2018 (permalink)


Jonathan Caws-Elwitt

unearths some literary gems.

From Holiday Time, by A. A. Milne: 

***

[Apparently not everyone agrees that "it's never too early for nonsense"!]

"Do you know," said Archie, "that you are talking drivel? Nobody ought to drivel before breakfast. It isn't decent."

***

[A remark about an amateur trying to do a fancy rope trick.]

"What I say is, it's simply hypnotic suggestion. There's no rope there at all, really."

***

[Interpolated editor-author dialogue within a story-in-progress.]

EDITOR. THIS IS SPLENDID. THIS QUITE RECONCILES ME TO THE ABSENCE OF THE ROBIN. BUT WHAT WAS ELSIE DOING DOWNSTAIRS?

AUTHOR. I AM MAKING ROBERT ASK HER THAT QUESTION DIRECTLY.

EDITOR. YES, BUT JUST TELL ME NOW—BETWEEN FRIENDS.

***

[[N.B. The single brackets in the George & Henry scenes below are Milne's, not mine.]]

Henry (airily, with a typically British desire to conceal his emotion). Who is the lucky little lady?

George (taking out a picture postcard of the British Museum and kissing it passionately). Isobel Barley!

[If Henry is not careful he will probably give a start of surprise here, with the idea of suggesting to the audience that he (1) knows something about the lady's past, or (2) is in love with her himself. He is, however, thinking of a different play. We shall come to that one in a moment.]

***

George. Tell her—nothing. But should anything (feeling casually in his pockets) happen to me—if (going over them again quickly) I do not come back, then (searching them all, including the waistcoat ones, in desperate haste), give her—give her—give her (triumphantly bringing his handkerchief out of the last pocket) this, and say that my last thought was of her. Good-bye, my old friend. Good-bye.

[Exit to Rocky Mountains.

Enter Isobel.]

Isabel. Why, where's Mr Turnbull?

Henry (sadly). He's gone.

Isabel. Gone? Where?

Henry. To the Rocky Mountains—to shoot bears. (Feeling that some further explanation is needed.) Grizzly ones.

Isobel. But he was HERE a moment ago.

Henry. Yes, he's only JUST gone.

***

I also recommend, in a general way, the several "Miss Middleton" pieces and the epilogue--i.e., the last few items in the book:

http://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/5675/pg5675-images.html

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