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unearths some literary gems.
Wodehouse is in his nineties, and he's no longer standing on ceremony:"The intelligent reader will recall, though the vapid and unreflective reader may have forgotten..."This from The Plot That Thickened, which also gives us the following:"[She was] always insisting that their position demanded that they entertain as dinner guests people whom, if left to himself, he would not have asked to dinner with a ten-foot pole."AND... a nightclub orchestra called Herman Zilch and His Twelve What-Nots!
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unearths some literary gems.
*** "He's a nice little man, but I think he has an awful lot of imagination. All his reasons for believing anything are terribly complicated, and he counts them off on his fingers. He holds up one finger and says, 'Point 1'; and then, when he has explained that, he holds up another finger and says, 'Point 2.'" [Later] "Now!" Carlo [the "nice little man"] paused, and Cabot knew without seeing it that he had raised a forefinger in the darkness. "Point 1...." *** "She sits there staring at me through those big glasses, and the glasses seem to get bigger and bigger." *** "I want you to give me the dope on that in something flat." *** "And Mr. Carlo Pugh....peering down into cupboards or drawers through a big round glass, like a man who was spying upon a pixy or sticking his nose into a leprechaun's business." *** "Everything seems impossible before breakfast."
[I note that if everything is impossible before breakfast, then the White Queen doesn't have to be selective when deciding which impossible things to do before breakfast--anything at all will meet the case!]
***
"She whirled around and darted in here and had the door locked before I could say Jack Robinson--"
Kroll snapped, "Why the hell did you want to say Jack Robinson?"
***
[Conclusions as a Physical Place dept.]
"I know what conclusions you're coming to, Cabot," he drawled. "I got there in time to welcome you."
[Bonus: The protagonist avoids a dangerous accident by dodging a bust of Socrates that has been sent plummeting down from the top of a bookcase.] [Additional scanned snippet attached.]
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unearths some literary gems.
From An Ideal Husband, by Oscar Wilde:
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NANJAC: I read all your English newspapers. I find them so amusing.
GORING: Then, my dear Nanjac, you must certainly read between the lines.
NANJAC: I should like to, but my professor objects.
***
And then the eldest son has quarrelled with his father, and it is said that when they meet at the club Lord Brancaster always hides himself behind the money article in The Times. However, I believe that is quite a common occurrence nowadays and that they have to take in extra copies of The Times at all the clubs in St. James’s Street.
***
Shall I see you at Lady Bonar’s to-night? She has discovered a wonderful new genius. He does...nothing at all, I believe. That is a great comfort, is it not?
***
During the Season, father, I only talk seriously on the first Tuesday in every month, from four to seven.
***
Everybody one meets is a paradox nowadays. It is a great bore.
***
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unearths some literary gems.
From "The Woman I Adore," by John Maddison Morton:
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Green: T. might possibly stand for Thomas—indeed, on an emergency, I think T. would stand very well for Thomas.
***
Judkins: I went to the concert at the theatre to hear the renowned Tenor, who, by the bye, didn't sing after all.
Green: Of course not—for my part I've been served that trick so often, that, for the future, I mean to go only to the Marionettes—they never disappoint the public—they never have colds and sore throats.
***
Mrs. Smiler: There is a daughter, eh? Miss Timpkins, I believe!
Green: Or Simkins—but as I invariably get bothered as to whose daughter she is, I always call her Miss Timkins and Simkins.
***
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unearths some literary gems.
From Murder at Morrington Hall, by Clare McKenna:
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"She's lovely....Like a Gibson girl."
"A gibbon?" Mother said. "How ungenerous of you, Alice."
***
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unearths some literary gems.
From "A Regular Fix," by John Maddison Morton:
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De Brass: The property had to be divided; but unluckily in the meantime—(very rapidly)—Jacob marries; Alexander disappears; Jonathan dies, and up starts Timothy. I don't know why he should, but he did, and what does Timothy say? Why, Timothy says, “Oh, oh!” says Timothy, “thirty days hath September, April, June and November” but if this is the way the cat jumps, up goes the income tax, and then what becomes of Aunt Sally? Don't you see? (Poking SURPLUS in the ribs.)
***
Mrs. Surplus: (L., aside, and coquettishly). A strange gentleman! Can it be the pale, interesting youth who upset the lobster salad in my lap at the supper table last night, from excess of emotion?
***
Mrs. Surplus: (tenderly to SURPLUS). Oh, Barnaby!
Surplus: Don't Barnaby me!
***
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unearths some literary gems.
From The Grave Maurice, by Martha Grimes:
***She laughed the way some people sneezed, an ah-ha-ah-ha-ah-ha that segued into a brief explosion.***An apology dialectic, you could say, laying the groundwork for future apologies, if need be.***[Who Needs Context? dept.]"But it's such a good nothing. The design is good."***[Who Needs Context? dept.]"Meat loaf in the collective unconscious? Why doesn't that sound right?"***Diane actually spilled a few drops of her drink, bringing the glass down on the table in martini applause.***She was essence, all residue left back in the bottom of the bottle, a girl decanted.***The Little Chef version was merely a shadow on the wall of Plato's cave.***All of this leaving Melrose feeling the evening hadn't so much as [sic] ended as collapsed around him, collapsing and elongating like a bellows or in a wind tunnel with some Proustian crazy.***When Jury walked into the breakfast room the following morning, time had been restored to its familiar sequential meanderings.***"I'm taking a page from Diane's book.""There's only one page in Diane's book....Take it, and there won't be any book."***"You're obsessive about obsession."***These were probably not all of the [answering-machine] messages; they were the ones selected by Carol-anne, those of which she approved and out of which she fashioned her short list, as if the messages were competing for the Booker Prize.***Was she splurging on non sequiturs tonight?***Even her toes shrugged.***"We'll beef tea him!"***[In which Grimes puts the "op" in onomat-op-oeia. See, it's not a champagne cork, so it's not a "pop." It's Bridget Riley, not Roy Lichtenstein.]The action of pulling made a pleasant little op and he poured the wine into the glasses.***
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unearths some literary gems.
***
I was not about to shatter the optimistic illusions of a figment of my own imagination.
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This is how I usually spent my sleepless hours. Casting imaginary movies....
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I was...exhausted from the misspent adrenalin of two consecutive wild goose chases.
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After eighty plus years of loneliness, she was still bright and inquisitive, and, although it was weird to say this about a ghost, lively.
***
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unearths some literary gems.
From "The Unfinished Gentleman," by Charles Selby:
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Jem: How dem'd platological!--how excessively surreptitious! [....] How exquisitively mythological!
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