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unearths some literary gems.
From Murder on "B" Deck, by Vincent Starrett:
***[Comprehensive Toasts dept.]Osborne raised his tumbler. "All right," he said. "Here's to everything!"***"Do you care for the first-person singular?" he asked, addressing the stateroom at large, but looking at Miss Harrington.[Now, the context for this is that the character, a novelist, is reading a new first chapter aloud, and inviting opinions as to his choice of first-person narration. However, I like imagining "Do you care for the first-person singular?" as one of those amusingly decontextualized illustration captions. This book from 1929 is not illustrated; but how easy it is to visualize one of those stilted black-and-white drawings, depicting the speaker surrounded by listeners in an ocean-liner stateroom, asking that question. Even better might be if the illustrator didn't read the chapter, and was simply following instructions to illustrate a young man saying "Do you care for the first-person singular?" to the young woman who is his romantic interest. In that version, I see them standing pleasantly on the ship's deck (the illustrator has gathered that the story takes place on shipboard, so nothing as embarrassing as Barbara Remington's Middle Earth lion will ensue), with "Do you care for the first-person singular?" apparently a specimen of better-grade smalltalk. (Also cf. Can of Yams, "Do you care for metaphors?")]***"You said a better man never took office. Never took off his what?"***The message was neither in cipher nor in Chimpanzee, yet it caused Ghost also to start and stare.[I knew monkeys used typewriters, but I didn't realize they sent cables to oceangoing vessels. And, yes, the amateur detective in this series is named Ghost (Walter Ghost). We also have, in this book, a Hollywood actress named Miss Catherine Two and a Reverend Saddletire--who (spoiler!) turns out to be a former chauffeur, so I suppose, thinking of "horseless carriages," the name befits him. Oh, and the shipboard newspaper is called the Daily Minute--a title whose "tautology--or something" annoys the novelist character.]***The ship's pool for the day before had been won by the Hon. Cassius Tutwiler. Tut, tut!***Three empty chairs looked blankly back at the searcher. [Did I ever tell you about the time that, as a teen, I staged a backyard snapshot of three empty chairs partying? At least, it ought to have been three--it's possible I was limited to only two available lawn chairs.]***[His conception of a briefly glimpsed figure] was as the shadow of a dream of smoke.***"If you are jellyfish, not men...." What he meant was that if they were men, not jellyfish....***[Heavy Anthropomorphization dept.]The story of the battle and its motive had crossed the second-cabin barriers, idled at the luncheon tables, descended to the engine room, climbed the masts and stairways, and penetrated to ever corner of the liner.***"Here he is," cried the novelist, "bright as a dollar. Bright, one might say, as two dollars."[I was going to highlight this self-one-upping as an example of "inflationary" language, before it even sunk in how literally inflationary it was!]***[Saying "No pun intended" to a Mirror dept. (The context is that the detective is wearing a head bandage.)]He looked at himself in the glass and smiled. "I was never a beauty," he shrugged. "There are moments when it is a comforting reflection." He nodded to the glass. "No pun intended."***"I think that Hollywood female has something to do with it!""Miss Two?""That's the lady. I've been putting two and Two together, as it were, and making four."[But no bridge-playing joke here, alas. However...]"I want to find out what Miss Seven-come-eleven told Walter last night."***"I'm going to Ghost's cabin and plunge again into the perilous business of thought....""Why perilous?" asked Miss Harrington...."Oh, well, dubious, if you like. What's an adjective between friends?"["What's an adjective between friends?" would also make a good decontextualized caption for a nonexistent illustration, imo.]***"He's one of my assistants.""I don't care if he's one of your nephews," observed Ghost amiably.[Even in context, that nepotistic remark is completely inane and gratuitous, as far as I can tell. In other words, I like it!]***[While some of the passengers disembark at Cherbourg, the novelist finds himself tongue-tied when alone with his beloved.]The whole English language, or that part of it that was his stock-in-trade, with the departing passengers had taken French leave.[...]"Well," he achieved," Cherbourg, upon a first sight, appears to be--ah--very Cherbourgy.***[Bonus: A passing reference to a category of passengers described as "the shuffleboard nuisances."]
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unearths some literary gems.
From "A Bishop in the Ballet," by Caryl Brahms:
“And you do not tell a living soul?”
“Not a syllable to a sturgeon.”
***
From "A Brabble in the Ballet," by Caryl Brahms:
Stroganov erupted into the rehearsal hall with his prospective backer in tow, like the tail of a well-upholstered comet.
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unearths some literary gems.
***“Madame,” said Citrolo in tones of a refrigerator salesman referring to a rival make...[I like the implication that a salesperson whose product is frigid is especially icy when disparaging something.]***Prince Alexis Artishok’s monocle was clearly disclaiming all responsibility for the table’s flower scheme.***"Without me Vladimir is an empty 'O.'"[Google Books, at a glance, didn't give me any evidence that the "empty 'O'" has any currency beyond this book. (N.B. The O in that sentence appears typographically identical to other capital O's in the book, so I'm assuming it is indeed an O and not a zero.) Does One-Letter Words: A Dictionary have anything to say about the "empty 'O'"?]***“Schwolotz [“swine”],” screamed Dyrakova....“Schwolotz yourself,” retorted Buttonhooke. He did not know what it meant but it sounded good.***
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unearths some literary gems.
After a time he suggested that we make up a list of the things we had been warned of.... It required about two hours to get everything down, beginning with Aches, Actresses, Adenoids, Alcoholism, Amnesia, Arson, etc., and running on, through the alphabet to Zero weather, Zolaism, and Zymosis.
After looking over the category, my companion said:
"The trouble with this list is that it doesn't present things in the order in which they may reasonably be expected to occur. For instance, you might get zymosis, or attempt to write like Zola, at almost any time, yet those two dangers are down at the bottom of the list."
[...]
This time we made two lists: one of general dangers—things which might overtake us almost anywhere...another arranged geographically, according to our route. Thus, for example, instead of listing Elbert Hubbard under the letter "H," we elevated him to first place, because he lives near Buffalo, which was our first stop.
I didn't want to put down Hubbard's name at all—I thought it would please him too much if he ever heard about it. I said to my companion:
"We have already passed Buffalo. And, besides, there are some things which the instinct of self-preservation causes one to recollect without the aid of any list."
"I know it," he returned, stubbornly, "but, in the interest of science, I wish this list to be complete."
So we put down everything: Elbert Hubbard, Herbert Kaufman, Eva Tanguay, Upton Sinclair, and all.
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