I’m happy to inform you that you can now savor that notorious lipogrammatical curiosity, Gadsby, simply by following this link.  Gadsby has long had an almost mythological status among linguistic buffs (and Oulipo fans); most of its original printing was lost long ago, but luckily a microfilm proof copy still sits in a public library (in California, I […]

[Read more →]

On Sunday, May 16th, hardcore fans of the suggestive braved suspended subway service and a glorious sunny afternoon to take in some harmless smut at the Ullage Group’s “Not Dirty, Just Spicy” event at Jalopy.
Doug Skinner started things off by reviewing the rhetoric of extended double-entendre. To drive the point home, he performed the Cliff […]

[Read more →]

I’m puzzled by the word “spiritual.”  I understand it as a noun, meaning a genre of vocal music.  But as an adjective, it has me stumped.
When I meet someone who spatters his or her sentences with it, I sometimes ask what it means.  She or he usually refuses, often with projectile hostility.  One woman retorted […]

[Read more →]

There are plenty of ways to make a point quickly and emphatically, but few are as economical as a good interjection. Compared to the expressions one never runs across anymore except in Shakespeare, eighteenth century novels, and Mad Libs, most recent examples are pretty unmusical, uninspired, and linguistically dull: “wow,” “cool,” “awesome,” “Jesus.” […]

[Read more →]