pusillanimous. A term used to describe the act of a writer who provides secret or sensitive material in a work in order to constrain others to buy all the available copies of it.
antinomy. 1. A
problem for proof readers and spell checkers who often assume it to be an
error. 2. The act of applying the normal rules of zoological nomenclature to
specimens of the Formicidae.
pentangle. Writing instruments thrown carelessly into a drawer will often form one
of these.
author. 1. When
used as a self-descriptor, a writer who has yet to find a publisher. Once they
realise the pen is mightier than the pseud, they call themselves ‘writer’. 2.
An author was once a person who put words together with the aid of a quill,
drawn from a goose’s left wing. In recent times, recognising the undue influence
that the goose seemed to be having, many writers have moved to the use of word
processors. In this, they have failed to recognise what many people now
understand: that to err is human, but that real stupidity is generally
associated with artificial intelligence.
beret. There was
an Italian explorer named Antonio who had gone into an area where, he was
warned, there were cannibals who liked to eat Italian, or to be precise, they
liked to eat Italians. Not relishing the prospect of a very hot bath with
chopped-up vegetables, Antonio took a Parisian beret with him, and wore it all
the time, so he could pass himself off as Antoine, the French chef.
He explained to the locals that the beret was a magical item which Frenchmen
wore, so they would be safe from all misfortunes. Alive or dead, the wearer was
protected by this item of headgear.
The cannibals made him welcome, but one night, they showed him a mummy in a
toga, and when they unwrapped it, he saw that it was wearing a laurel wreath.
“Antoine,” they told him, “this is a very old Italian called Julius Caesar.
He’s nicely aged, and we were wondering if you could help us cook him. We know
the Gauls, your ancestors, hated him…”
Antoine found himself in a quandary. How could he refuse to cook a
fellow-Italian and not blow his cover?
Then he saw a way out. He took off his headgear and exchanged it for Caesar’s
wreath.
The cannibals were curious. “What does this mean?” they asked.
He shook his head and smiled, gently. “I come to beret Caesar, not to braise
him.”
a fortiori. The English tradition of the steeplechase has very
ancient roots, going back to the time when much of Britain was under Roman
control, but several 17th century authors have claimed that the
Romans used Pictish slaves as their mounts. In fact, the Romans did indeed ride
“Picts”, but these were Pict ponies, the animals more modern writers have
called pit ponies, and not humans The
races went along Hadrian’s wall, from fort to fort, hence the name.
incommunicado. The ancient Roman British fortified town of
Communicadum is the modern-day city of Coventry. As a consequence, this term is
no more than an ancient form of sent to
Coventry.
Abacus. A Roman
general, Abacus was the grandson of Count Belisarius of the Byzantine Roman
Empire, from whom he inherited title of Count. His name is derived from A-Bacchus, a spurner of Bacchus, but it
was a name he often failed to live up to. He settled in Britain, late in the
6th century and married the Lady Beadawen of the Cambrians. Their son, Abacus
Beadus, was the first of a line of counts that ended when Abacus’
great-great-grandson, the venerable Bede, entered the church, and relinquished
the title.
coracle. A small
water craft, made from a light wood frame, covered with leather. The best-known
ones today are from Britain, but they were originally a Greek invention. Today,
the only Greek version still widely known is the Delphic coracle.
Marshall McLuhan. A
man who wrote and published several books to demonstrate that the print medium
was dead. He dies in 1980, my reference books say.
exfoliation. The act of taking a leaf from somebody’s book.
doggerel. Poetry when it is written by an enemy.
verse. Poetry written by somebody who is not a friend.
haiku. A poetic
form much favoured by absent-minded poets who keep losing their rhyming
dictionaries.
pentode. Any form
of verse with five lines, like a limerick, or a haiku written by an innumerate
poet.
Jacques Prévert. A
French poet and film-script writer who owed his continued high levels of
employment to the frequent errors made in typing his surname. His employers
were, however, often disappointed.
limerick. A poem
for a person with a short attention span.
prosody. The art
of creating either a prose work about odes, or an ode about prose. It is now a
dead art, and we are unlikely ever to fathom what the ancients actually meant
by the term. The claim, sometimes heard, that the term was invented by two
drunken poets, in order to confuse future generations, makes too much sense for
it to be really true.
period furniture. Perhaps
the best-known example would be the electric chair, commonly used to end a
sentence.
gallows humour.
Full-throttle comedy, often containing an element of suspense. Not suitable for the
highly strung.
The Well-tempered Clavier. The
source of a great deal of pleasant music, composed by the immortal J. S.
Bach. Bach’s lesser-known Bad-tempered
Clavier, like Beethoven’s Rage over a
Lost Penny, is a source of a different choler.
Othello. If this play were set in Scandinavia, it would need to
involve a Norse of a different colour, especially if the production included a
walk-on part for Erik the Red.
air conditioner. A
device for spreading infection and assorted toxins equally throughout a
building. These machines must always be fitted with the manufacturer’s
specified pipes, and never with a hose of a different cooler.
White House.
A house of a different
colour.
It goes on like that for 84,000 words.
Reviews:
A riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma…
—W. S. Churchill, A History of the
Anguish-Speaking Peoples.
Oh, what a wangled web he weaves…
—William Wordsworth, The Fruitgrowers
Gazette and Advertiser.
Infamy, infamy—they’ve all got it infamy.
—Kenneth Williams, Carrion Cleopatra.
He would say that, wouldn’t he?
—Randy Mice-Davies, Buxton Bugle.
Nobody ever erected a statue to a cricket.
—Jean Sibelius (attrib.)
Exceedingly dense.
—F. R. Leavis, New Hearings in English
Pottery.
Nothing like having a bucket of cold water flung
over you to make you see things as they really are!
—Enid Blyton, Lashings of Cream.
…we tend to believe whatever we first hear about
strangers.
—Clifford Irving, True Tales.
I trust my readers will join me in grandly ignoring
the complaints of sour-faced and grumpish scholars that “no such person” ever
existed…
—Sir John Mandeville, Travels.
One of the most murmurable loose carollaries ever…
—James Joyce, Finnegans Wake.
I don’t believe it!
—Victor Meldrew, Journal of
Onkaparingology.
Better than a bag full of angry penguins.
—Ern Malley, Yandackworroby Times.
It is a maxim among these lawyers, that whatever
hath been run before may legally be run again…
― Jonathan Swift, Gullible's Travels.
Let us be grateful to people who make us sappy…
—Marcel Proust, Du
côté de chez Swann.
Other possible titles:
A Crazy Mixed-Up Squid;
A Dark Course Of A Different
College;
A Hard Axe To Follow;
A Serpent Of Two Pastors;
As Like As Pork And
Peas;
Can You Tell Me How Long The Drain’s Been Gone?;
Dental Men Prefer Bonds;
Faint Art Never Won Fair Lady;
Gentleman Prefer Bronze;
Joggers Can’t Be
Boozers;
Never Dog A Fled Horse;
No More Walton But De Falla Next Time;
No Pool
Like An Oil Pool;
Of Meissen Men;
Prison Walls Are Never Built To Scale;
Privateers And Public Gossip;
Robbery With Violins;
Thank Heavens For Small
Murphys;
The Lhasa Of Two Weasels;|
The Nightjar Nurture Controversy;
The Trout
Quintet Needs A Piano Tuna;
The Wine Of Yeast Resistance;
The Wurst Is Yet To
Come;
They Also Surf Who Only Stand And Wade;
To Bill Two Kurds With One Stone;
Where There’s A Wheel, There’s A Wain.
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