alan@sdcrdcf.UUCP (Alan Algustyniak) (04/19/84)
< Has anyone ever read an article in the Journal of the ACM ? > For those of you who are looking for some light and extremely funny reading, i can make two suggestions: Modern Manners - by Peter O'Roarke. An etiquette manual for the 1980's . A Field Guide to the North American Male - Written in the style of aFGttNA Birds/Flowers, etc. Both are available in paperback in the humor section.
cwc@uw-june.UUCP (04/20/84)
/**/ I believe the man's name is "P. J. O'Rourke".
wmartin@brl-vgr.ARPA (Will Martin ) (05/01/84)
Even if you have never heard their radio show, I think you will find either of the Bob and Ray books to fit the subject description. That's Bob Elliot and Ray Goulding (gee, I hope I remember the last-name spelling!) and the books are WRITE IF YOU GET WORK and FROM APPROXIMATELY COAST TO COAST. Another area of really funny stuff which is sadly neglected now is the humor of the thirties; Robert Benchley, Thorne Smith, James Branch Cabell, and the like. You can often find old humor anthologies at book fairs or the "for sale" shelves at libraries for a quarter or so, which have many selections by these and other authors, and are a good starting point for locating those writers whose work you like best. Will
johnc@dartvax.UUCP (John Cabell) (05/03/84)
I agree about the humorous books from the thirties. You can usually find some of the books by Thorne Smith, James Branch Cabell (yes, a relative), and others at rummage Sales, yard sales, and sometimes libraries will have extra copies that they will sell. I recommend getting and reading a few of these. John Cabell --johnc <decvax, cornell>!dartvax!johnc
gmf@uvacs.UUCP (05/07/84)
About Robert Benchley, Thorne Smith and the like:
I am old enough to have read some of Benchley's stuff when it first came
out. I collected a lot of it about 8 or 10 years ago, and read it with
pleasure. It does seem dated now, though. Perhaps I've read it too many
times. The same, alas, goes for Stephen Leacock, the Canadian humorist
and political economist. Groucho Marx once said that he got some of his
best ideas from Leacock. Thorne Smith I found quite disappointing when
I returned to him about 10 years ago, probably because he doesn't seem as
risque as he did when I read him in the 1930's and 1940's. A writer
of the same era whose stuff has stood up well is Will Cuppy, who was a
biologist as well as humorist. A lot of the humor in his books is based
on biology and anthropology. He also wrote some other kinds of things
in the old "Saturday Evening Post" magazine. There is an article in
this month's Atlantic Monthly poking fun at contemporary academic literary
criticism which is rather in the style of Cuppy.
I find some of the humorists who wrote even earlier still worth reading,
although a little harder to find at book fairs. One of my favorites
is Peter Finley Dunne ("Mr. Dooley"), who was sort of the Art Buchwald
of his time. Also George Ade, and Ambrose Bierce (who also wrote some
horror stories). And of course, Mark Twain.
It would be nice to think that as "Mr. Dooley" is to me, so Benchley
would be to someone younger. If anyone reads Benchley for the first time
in the near future, I'd like to hear what they think of him (or of Will
Cuppy, Thorne Smith, "Mr. Dooley", etc.) I'd say something about
Cabell in honor of his relative on the net, but what I've read of him
doesn't stick in my mind. I've always thought of Cabell as more a
writer of fantasy, done in a subtly humorous way, rather than as a
humorous essayist like Benchley or Leacock (or Buchwald).
Gordon Fisher