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unearths some literary gems.
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unearths some literary gems.
The Pinkled Frinft, and other snippets from The Smart Set, 1917:
***[Shaw's play Getting Married] reminds one of a Wilde epigram rewritten by Dostoievsky. [Nathan]***Anyone can write a play but...it takes genius to sit through one. [Nathan; not sure if this quip is original to him]***all its winsome et ceteras [Nathan]***Miss Cather and Mrs. Watts have yet to strike twelve. [Mencken]***ideas rolled out like noodles [Mencken]***the grave and literal-minded critical whisker [Nathan]***Bonuses:Nathan uses "jabberwock" as a transitive verb (something a playwright does to the audience by entertaining them with playful nonsense).He also uses the adverb "Johnsonianly" (i.e., in the manner of Dr. Johnson).[And the same day I encountered that, I subsequently encountered the assertion, in an unrelated book from 1921, that Fanny Burney wrote "a kind of debased Johnsonese."]He describes a play called /The Basker/ as a "monocled dawdle"Notes on a couple of the attachments:1. Re. "more this anon": This sentence, article, and entire *issue* appear to break off in the middle of a word! Mencken is both the author and co-editor, so in a way he's self-empting. (And I note that I saw no evidence of the sentence or article picking up again in the subsequent issue.)2. I've included the tobacco ad simply because of its over-the-top off-topicness in confusing itself with a coffee ad. (I subsequently saw another one in the series, with some other fragrant non-tobacco substance featured.)
3. Apparently The Pinkled Frinft's title has a subtitle that reads, "Don't Wrinkle Your Nose When You Pronounce It."
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unearths some literary gems.
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unearths some literary gems.
From Secretary of Frivolous Affairs, by May Futrelle:
[Btw, this author also wrote a book called Lieutenant What's-His-Name.]
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She had never had as close as a fourth cousin connection with a romance.
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It was a problem that had the Servant Question tied in a double knot.
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"I know my A-B-abs of golf."
[What's with this upper/lower, C-unaware version of the ABCs?? Googling this, of course, is hopeless.]
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"I do hope she doesn't want me for a sort of sublimated lady's maid."
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to find out Who's Who in Society and Why
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She had gone to a lecture, anyhow, on the Whereness of the Which, or something equally intellectual.
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A breakfast gong at eight, and mother at the head of the table pouring coffee. It's her hobby.
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I whirled in the scheme of things, marveling every instant that I didn't fly off into the air from tangential impetus.
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"You win!" Hap exclaimed, and he tossed her an olive.
***
It was a dark green cloth bag like lawyers carry their--whatever they do carry in them.
***
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unearths some literary gems.
From The Man Who Came to Dinner, by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart:
[The character is reading from a phone bill.]
STANLEY: Oklahoma City, Calcutta, Hollywood, Australia, Rome, New York, New York, New York, New York, New York, New York--(His voice trails off in an endless succession of New Yorks)
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