I’m a sucker for books like Andrew Martin’s Funny You Should Say That: Amusing Remarks From Cicero to the Simpsons. I can dip into it and always find some thought-provoking and funny remarks. How about this one: “Single women have a dreadful propensity for being poor…which is one very strong argument in favour of matrimony.” Jane Austen said that. Or, how about: “I hate television. I hate it as much as peanuts. But I can’t stop eating peanuts.” Orson Welles said that. The book is organized by themes. There are author biographies, an index by author, and a subject index. What a wonderful book! A browser’s delight! GRADE: A
Fun to have on your coffee table.
Also nice to have near your writing desk if you need a clever quote, Patti.
Sounds like fun.
If I may hijack the thread briefly to go back: a while back George featured Nick Hornby’s latest (indeed, last) collection of columns, SHAKESPEARE WROTE FOR MONEY. Naturally, having read the others I had to get it and I finished it recently, adding a dozen or so recommendations to my “read me” lists.
Yesterday I read the first of them (a book, and author, I’d never heard of before) and wanted to echo Hornby’s rave: Alison Bechdel’s amazing graphic (as in ‘graphic novel’ but also graphic in honesty) memoir, FUN HOME: A FAMILY TRAGICOMIC.
Read it, trust me.
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I have FUN HOME on order, Jeff. Thanks for the recommendation!
Coffee table? Desk? I’d keep mine in the bathroom.
To each his own, Bob.
Thanks, Jeff. My library has it and I’ll pick it up.
My library doesn’t have it, Patti, so I had to go the AMAZON route.
So now you’re reduced to joke books, George. Oh my. It’s a long fall from Kant, Fyodor Dostoevsky and Henry James to “there were three guys in a boat, and…” My sympathies. Heh.
Being the Man Without A Sense of Humor, these things don’t appeal to me, but I concede there are many people who enjoy such stuff.
This is more of a “clever sayings” anthology, Rick.