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Literary Wit
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Download or read book Literary Wit written by Bruce Michelson and published by . This book was released on 2000 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This book offers a fresh examination of literary wit as a distinct variety of discourse - one that is fundamentally different from wit, humor, and laughter in nonliterary contexts. Bruce Michelson moves beyond outmoded assumptions and canonical authorities to explore how wit can transform fiction, plays, and poetry, providing "a fire that keeps our imaginative literature hot
Download or read book Wit written by Margaret Edson and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2014-05-20 with total page 99 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Winner of the 1999 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, the New York Drama Critics Circle Award, the Drama Desk Award, the Outer Critics Circle Award, the Lucille Lortel Award, and the Oppenheimer Award. Adapted to an Emmy Award-winning television movie, directed by Mike Nichols, starring Emma Thompson. Margaret Edson's powerfully imagined Pulitzer Prize–winning play examines what makes life worth living through her exploration of one of existence's unifying experiences—mortality—while she also probes the vital importance of human relationships. What we as her audience take away from this remarkable drama is a keener sense that, while death is real and unavoidable, our lives are ours to cherish or throw away—a lesson that can be both uplifting and redemptive. As the playwright herself puts it, "The play is not about doctors or even about cancer. It's about kindness, but it shows arrogance. It's about compassion, but it shows insensitivity." In Wit, Edson delves into timeless questions with no final answers: How should we live our lives knowing that we will die? Is the way we live our lives and interact with others more important than what we achieve materially, professionally, or intellectually? How does language figure into our lives? Can science and art help us conquer death, or our fear of it? What will seem most important to each of us about life as that life comes to an end? The immediacy of the presentation, and the clarity and elegance of Edson's writing, make this sophisticated, multilayered play accessible to almost any interested reader. As the play begins, Vivian Bearing, a renowned professor of English who has spent years studying and teaching the intricate, difficult Holy Sonnets of the seventeenth-century poet John Donne, is diagnosed with advanced ovarian cancer. Confident of her ability to stay in control of events, she brings to her illness the same intensely rational and painstakingly methodical approach that has guided her stellar academic career. But as her disease and its excruciatingly painful treatment inexorably progress, she begins to question the single-minded values and standards that have always directed her, finally coming to understand the aspects of life that make it truly worth living.
Book Synopsis Wit's End: What Wit Is, How It Works, and Why We Need It by : James Geary
Download or read book Wit's End: What Wit Is, How It Works, and Why We Need It written by James Geary and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2018-11-13 with total page 202 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Entertaining, illuminating, and entirely unique, Wit’s End “convey[s] the power of wit to refresh the mind” (Henry Hitchings, Wall Street Journal). In “this inventive and playful book” (Tom Beer, Newsday), James Geary explores every facet of wittiness, from its role in innovation to why puns are the highest form of wit. Adopting a different style for each chapter—from dramatic dialogue to sermon, heroic couplets to a barroom monologue—Geary embodies wit in all its forms. Wit’s End agilely balances psychology, folktale, visual art, and literary history with lighthearted humor and acute insight, demonstrating that wit and wisdom are really the same thing.
Book Synopsis The Devil’s Dictionary by : Ambrose Bierce
Download or read book The Devil’s Dictionary written by Ambrose Bierce and published by Standard Ebooks. This book was released on 2021-03-16T22:46:04Z with total page 341 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Dictionary, n: A malevolent literary device for cramping the growth of a language and making it hard and inelastic. This dictionary, however, is a most useful work.” Bierce’s groundbreaking Devil’s Dictionary had a complex publication history. Started in the mid-1800s as an irregular column in Californian newspapers under various titles, he gradually refined the new-at-the-time idea of an irreverent set of glossary-like definitions. The final name, as we see it titled in this work, did not appear until an 1881 column published in the periodical The San Francisco Illustrated Wasp. There were no publications of the complete glossary in the 1800s. Not until 1906 did a portion of Bierce’s collection get published by Doubleday, under the name The Cynic’s Word Book—the publisher not wanting to use the word “Devil” in the title, to the great disappointment of the author. The 1906 word book only went from A to L, however, and the remainder was never released under the compromised title. In 1911 the Devil’s Dictionary as we know it was published in complete form as part of Bierce’s collected works (volume 7 of 12), including the remainder of the definitions from M to Z. It has been republished a number of times, including more recent efforts where older definitions from his columns that never made it into the original book were included. Due to the complex nature of copyright, some of those found definitions have unclear public domain status and were not included. This edition of the book includes, however, a set of definitions attributed to his one-and-only “Demon’s Dictionary” column, including Bierce’s classic definition of A: “the first letter in every properly constructed alphabet.” Bierce enjoyed “quoting” his pseudonyms in his work. Most of the poetry, dramatic scenes and stories in this book attributed to others were self-authored and do not exist outside of this work. This includes the prolific Father Gassalasca Jape, whom he thanks in the preface—“jape” of course having the definition: “a practical joke.” This book is a product of its time and must be approached as such. Many of the definitions hold up well today, but some might be considered less palatable by modern readers. Regardless, the book’s humorous style is a valuable snapshot of American culture from past centuries. This book is part of the Standard Ebooks project, which produces free public domain ebooks.
Book Synopsis Ruse and Wit by : Dominic Parviz Brookshaw
Download or read book Ruse and Wit written by Dominic Parviz Brookshaw and published by . This book was released on 2012 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: These essays examine a millennium of humorous and satirical writing in the Islamic world. Humor in Arabic, Persian, and Turkish narrative emerges here as a culturally modulated phenomenon that demands examination with reference to its historical framework and that, in turn, communicates as much about its producers as it does about its audience.
Book Synopsis Words, Wit, and Wonder by : Nancy Loewen
Download or read book Words, Wit, and Wonder written by Nancy Loewen and published by Capstone. This book was released on 2009 with total page 33 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Presents advice to help young readers compose their own poems, including twelve points on the use of rhythm, rhyme, alliteration, similes, metaphors, Onomatopoeia, and several poetic forms.
Book Synopsis Wit and the Writing of History by : Paul Plass
Download or read book Wit and the Writing of History written by Paul Plass and published by Univ of Wisconsin Press. This book was released on 1988 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Wit has many uses in political discourse--to entertain, to underscore or unmask, to hinder or enhance insight. Wit and the Writing of History focuses on how this potential is realized in the historiography of the earlier Principate. Preeminently in Tacitus, to a lesser degree in Suetonius and Dio Cassius, wit is a vehicle for political understanding and judgment of the historical account. As part of Roman political life, hostile anecdotal or epigrammatic wit was deeply embedded in the sources used by historians and is reflected in the rhetoric of their narratives. Some anecdotes may, in fact, have been mere jests later taken as fact, hence the frequent problem of credulity. But what is historically false can be politically true. Not only were political jokes a weapon for making some fair points against the Principate; ancient rhetorical theory recognized that wit in general arises from a violation of normal, expected ways of thinking. What is "funny" is thus disturbing in a serious way as well as amusing, and in the hands of Tacitus wit becomes scalpel as well as sword.
Book Synopsis Elements of Wit by : Benjamin Errett
Download or read book Elements of Wit written by Benjamin Errett and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2014-10-07 with total page 258 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Got wit? We’ve all been in that situation where we need to say something clever, but innocuous; smart enough to show some intelligence, without showing off; something funny, but not a joke. What we need in that moment is wit—that sparkling combination of charm, humor, confidence, and most of all, the right words at the right time. Elements of Wit is an engaging book that brings together the greatest wits of our time, and previous ones from Oscar Wilde to Nora Ephron, Winston Churchill to Christopher Hitchens, Mae West to Louis CK, and many in between. With chapters covering the essential ingredients of wit, this primer sheds light on how anyone—introverts, extroverts, wallflowers, and bon vivants—can find the right zinger, quip, parry, or retort…or at least be a little bit more interesting.
Book Synopsis From Rhetoric to Aesthetics: Wit and Esprit in the English and French Theoretical Writings of the Late Seventeenth and Early Eighteenth Centuries by : Klára Bicanová
Download or read book From Rhetoric to Aesthetics: Wit and Esprit in the English and French Theoretical Writings of the Late Seventeenth and Early Eighteenth Centuries written by Klára Bicanová and published by Masarykova univerzita. This book was released on 2016-01-01 with total page 157 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Práce se zabývá především anglickým termínem wit v jeho moderním i historickém kontextu. Dále se zabývá literárními a estetickými důsledky pojmů wit a esprit a jejich použitím v teoretických spisech několika kritiků v období raně moderní Anglie a Francie. Práce má dva hlavní cíle. Prvním cílem je přehodnocení anglického pojmu wit, který je dnes považován za poněkud zastaralý výrazový prostředek historických poetických systémů a prezentovat jej jako životaschopnou a užitečnou součást současného uměleckého diskurzu. Druhým cílem této práce je poskytnout srovnávací výklad raně moderních anglických a francouzských teoretických textů zabývající se termíny wit a esprit.
Book Synopsis Wit and Humor of the Bible: A Literary Study by : Marion D. Shutter
Download or read book Wit and Humor of the Bible: A Literary Study written by Marion D. Shutter and published by Good Press. This book was released on 2019-12-04 with total page 104 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 'Wit and Humor of the Bible: A Literary Study', author Marion D. Shutter explores the often overlooked elements of wit and humor within the Bible. Contrary to popular belief, the book is not a collection of jokes, but rather these elements serve to enhance the religious history and thought presented within its pages. Shutter writes with reverence and love for the Bible, using his studies to gather new insights that have given the book a larger place in his heart. This book is a fresh and insightful perspective on a beloved text, showing how humor can enhance our understanding and appreciation of the Bible's characters and teachings.
Book Synopsis The Library of Wit and Humor, Prose and Poetry by : Ainsworth Rand Spofford
Download or read book The Library of Wit and Humor, Prose and Poetry written by Ainsworth Rand Spofford and published by . This book was released on 1891 with total page 446 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Book Synopsis Essays on Wit No. 2 by : Richard Flecknoe
Download or read book Essays on Wit No. 2 written by Richard Flecknoe and published by Good Press. This book was released on 2023-08-19 with total page 47 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Essays on Wit No. 2 emerges as a pivotal collection in the exploration of wit, traversing a broad literary landscape from subtle humor to sharp social commentary. The anthology encapsulates a rich variety of styles and themes, reflecting the breadth and complexity of wit as a literary device across different epochs. The curatorial effort shines in the selection of works, promising a thoughtful journey through the nuances of wit, with contributions that stand as testament to both the enlightenment and decadence of human intellect. The diversity within this collection not only celebrates the ingenuity of authors but also invites readers into a deeper appreciation of wit's versatile nature in literature. The contributors, Richard Flecknoe and Joseph Warton, bring together an exceptional assemblage of insight and perspective. Collectively, their backgrounds span a crucial period in literary history, touching on the evolution of English literature and its engagement with wit. Their anthology aligns with significant literary movements, including the Augustan age and the burgeoning of neoclassical literature, offering a reflective look at the era's intellectual currents. This amalgamation of works serves not only as a historical snapshot but enriches the reader's understanding by juxtaposing contrasting interpretations of wit. Essays on Wit No. 2 is recommended for readers eager to immerse themselves in the complexity and evolution of literary wit. This collection provides a unique lens through which to explore varied expressions of intellect and humor, delivering an educational journey through the art of wit. It promises not merely an encounter with historical perspectives but an ongoing dialogue with the enduring power of words to entertain, critique, and enlighten.
Book Synopsis Gore Ot Ouma by : Aleksandr Sergeyevich Griboyedov
Download or read book Gore Ot Ouma written by Aleksandr Sergeyevich Griboyedov and published by . This book was released on 1857 with total page 150 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Book Synopsis A Modest Proposal by : Jonathan Swift
Download or read book A Modest Proposal written by Jonathan Swift and published by Modernista. This book was released on 2024-05-30 with total page 14 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In one of the most powerful and darkly satirical works of the 18th century, a chilling solution is proposed to address the dire poverty and overpopulation plaguing Ireland. Jonathan Swift presents a shockingly calculated and seemingly rational argument for using the children of the poor as a food source, thereby addressing both the economic burden on society and the issue of hunger. This provocative piece is a masterful example of irony and social criticism, as it exposes the cruel attitudes and policies of the British ruling class towards the Irish populace. Jonathan Swift's incisive critique not only underscores the absurdity of the proposed solution but also serves as a profound commentary on the exploitation and mistreatment of the oppressed. A Modest Proposal remains a quintessential example of satirical literature, its biting wit and moral indignation as relevant today as it was at the time of its publication. JONATHAN SWIFT [1667-1745] was an Anglo-Irish author, poet, and satirist. His deadpan satire led to the coining of the term »Swiftian«, describing satire of similarly ironic writing style. He is most famous for the novel Gulliver’s Travels [1726] and the essay A Modest Proposal [1729].
Book Synopsis The Providence of Wit by : Martin C. Battestin
Download or read book The Providence of Wit written by Martin C. Battestin and published by University of Virginia Press. This book was released on 1989 with total page 331 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Book Synopsis The European Tribe by : Caryl Phillips
Download or read book The European Tribe written by Caryl Phillips and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2017-09-13 with total page 166 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this richly descriptive and haunting narrative, Caryl Phillips chronicles a journey through modern-day Europe, his quest guided by a moral compass rather than a map. Seeking personal definition within the parameters of growing up black in Europe, he discovers that the natural loneliness and confusion inherent in long jorneys collides with the bigotry of the "European Tribe"-a global community of whites caught up in an unyielding, Eurocentric history. Phillips deftly illustrates the scenes and characters he encounters, from Casablanca and Costa del Sol to Venice, Amsterdam, Oslo, and Moscow. He ultimately discovers that "Europe is blinded by her past, and does not understand the high price of her churches, art galleries, and history as the prison from which Europeans speak." In the afterword to the Vintage edition, Phillips revisits the Europe he knew as a young man and offers fresh observations.
Book Synopsis The Wit and Wisdom of Mark Twain by : Mark Twain
Download or read book The Wit and Wisdom of Mark Twain written by Mark Twain and published by Courier Corporation. This book was released on 2013-01-01 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Familiarity breeds contempt — and children." "When angry, count to four; when very angry, swear." "Heaven for climate. Hell for company." This attractive paperback gift edition of the renowned American humorist's epigrams and witticisms features hundreds of quips on life, love, history, culture, travel, and other topics from his fiction, essays, letters, and autobiography.
