Tag Archives: humor

Frank Rich on “Starlight Express”

“A confusing jamboree of piercing noise, routine roller skating, misogyny and Orwellian special effects, Starlight Express is the perfect gift for the kid who has everything except parents.”

Frank Rich

Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Big Curmudgeon. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal, 2007.

The Algonquin Wits: George S. Kaufman to Adolph Zukor

“Hollywood’s Adolph Zukor was said to have offered a trifling $30,000 for movie rights to a Kaufman play. The playwright sent back a telegram offering Zukor $40,000 for Paramount.”

Excerpted from: Drennan, Robert E., ed. The Algonquin Wits. New York: Kensington, 1985.

Rotten Rejections: William Faulkner

William Faulkner I: Sanctuary

“Good God, I can’t publish this. We’d both be in jail.”

William Faulkner II: Sartoris

“If the book had a plot and structure, we might suggest shortening and revisions, but it is so diffuse that I don’t this would be of any use. My chief objection is that you don’t have any story to tell.”

Excerpted from: Barnard, Andre, and Bill Henderson, eds. Pushcart’s Complete Rotten Reviews and Rejections. Wainscott, NY: Pushcart Press, 1998.

Leroy Robert “Satchel” Paige on Dietary Prudence

“Avoid fried meats which angry up the blood.”

Leroy Robert “Satchel” Paige

“How to Keep Young,” Colliers, 13 June 1953

Excerpted from: Schapiro, Fred, ed. The Yale Book of Quotations. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006.

William James on the Philosopher’s Primary Task

“There is only one thing a philosopher can be relied upon to do, and this is to contradict other philosophers.”

William James

Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Big Curmudgeon. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal, 2007.

The Algonquin Wits: Harpo Marx Visits Alexander Woollcott’s Summer Place

Harpo Marx once arrived at Woollcott’s Lake Bomoseen home in a broken-down Model-T Ford. ‘What do you call that?’ Woollcott exclaimed as he regarded the automobile.

‘This is my town car,’ Harpo explained.

‘What was the town?’ asked Woollcott. ‘Pompeii?’”

Excerpted from: Drennan, Robert E., ed. The Algonquin Wits. New York: Kensington, 1985.

Karl Kraus on Our Current Political Reality

“The secret of the demagogue is to make himself as stupid as his audience so that they believe they are as clever as he.”

Karl Kraus

Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Big Curmudgeon. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal, 2007.

The Devil’s Dictionary: Blank-Verse

“Blank-verse, n. Unrhymed iambic pentameters—the most difficult kind of English verse to write acceptably; a kind, therefore, much affected by those who cannot acceptably write any kind.”

Excerpted from: Bierce, Ambrose. David E. Schultz and S.J. Joshi, eds. The Unabridged Devil’s Dictionary. Athens: The University of Georgia Press, 2000. 

Nietzsche on the Motivation of a Philosopher

“If you want to understand a philosopher, do not ask what he says, but find out what he wants.”

Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Big Curmudgeon. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal, 2007.

The Algonquin Wits: Dorothy Parker Reviews a Book on Science

“Reviewing a book on science, Mrs. Parker wrote, ‘It was written without fear and without research.’”

Excerpted from: Drennan, Robert E., ed. The Algonquin Wits. New York: Kensington, 1985.