Tag Archives: humor

Ambrose Bierce on Learning from Experience

Posted on June 19, 2017 | Leave a comment

“Experience n. The wisdom that enables us to recognize as an undesirable old acquaintance the folly that we have already embraced.”

Ambrose Bierce

Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Portable Curmudgeon. New York: Plume, 1992.

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Rotten Reviews: John Donne

Posted on June 14, 2017 | Leave a comment

“Of his earlier poems, many are very licentious; the later are chiefly devout. Few are good for much.”

Henry Hallam, Introduction to the Literature of Europe 1837

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

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The Problem with Music Journalism

Posted on June 13, 2017 | Leave a comment

“Most rock journalism is people who can’t write interviewing people who can’t talk for people who can’t read.”

Frank Zappa

Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Portable Curmudgeon. New York: Plume, 1992.

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Robert Frost on Why that Administrative Certification Might Not Be as Good as it Sounds

Posted on June 9, 2017 | Leave a comment

“By working faithfully eight hours a day, you may eventually get to be a boss and work twelve hours a day.”

Robert Frost

Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Portable Curmudgeon. New York: Plume, 1992.

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George Bernard Shaw on Youth

Posted on June 6, 2017 | Leave a comment

“Youth is a wonderful thing. What a shame to waste it on children.”

George Bernard Shaw

Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Portable Curmudgeon. New York: Plume, 1992.

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David Broder on the Problem with Presidential Candidates

Posted on June 2, 2017 | Leave a comment

“Anybody that wants the presidency so much that he’ll spend two years organizing and campaigning for it is not to be trusted with the office.”

David Broder

Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Portable Curmudgeon. New York: Plume, 1992.

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Mark Twain Hadn’t Seen Anything Yet

Posted on June 2, 2017 | Leave a comment

“Virtue has never been as respectable as money.”

Mark Twain

Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Portable Curmudgeon. New York: Plume, 1992.

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George Orwell on Commercial Speech

Posted on May 30, 2017 | Leave a comment

“Advertising is the rattling of a stick inside a swill bucket.”

George Orwell

Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Portable Curmudgeon. New York: Plume, 1992.

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George Jean Nathan on the Shortcomings of Criticism

Posted on May 27, 2017 | Leave a comment

“Criticism is the art wherewith a critic tries to guess himself into a share of the author’s fame.”

George Jean Nathan

Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Portable Curmudgeon. New York: Plume, 1992.

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The Perils of Adolescence

Posted on April 17, 2017 | Leave a comment

“The young always have the same problem—how to rebel and conform at the same time. They have now solved this by defying their parents and copying one another.”

Quentin Crisp

Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Portable Curmudgeon. New York: Plume, 1992.

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