CURIOSITIES OF LITERATURE PA

by SUTHERLAND,JOHN

• ISBN13: 9781616080747
• ISBN10: 1616080744
• Edition: 00
• Format: Trade Paper
• Copyright: 2011-01-17
• Publisher: FRWHEEL

Summary

Which author had the heaviest brain? What was the original title of 1984 ?When did cigarettes first appear in English literature? And, while wers"re at it, whowrote the first Western, and is there any link between asthma and literary genius?Sutherlandrs"s irreverent literary exploration illuminates every topic imaginablefrom author advances to Civil War literature to Victorian sex to odd things eatenby literary characters (think Patrick Batemanrs"s girlfriend in American Psycho ).This is a treasure trove of fascinating information for all book lovers.

Author Biography

John Sutherland is an English academic and author of more than seventeen books. A Professor Emeritus of Modern English Literature at University College London, he writes for The Guardian. Martin Rowson is a British cartoonist and novelist. His work frequently appears in The Guardian and The Independent.

Table of Contents

Introduction	p. xi
Literary Baked Meats
Omelette Littéraire	p. 3
Dr Johnson's Gulosity	p. 5
Knorr and a Nice Jelly	p. 8
Come and Get it	p. 9
Bovril: And World Domination	p. 12
Milk of Kindness; Grapes of Wrath	p. 14
To Finish With, a Lorna Doone Biscuit	p. 17
The Body of Literature: Heads, Lungs, Hearts, and Bowels
Head Cheese	p. 23
Heady Stuff	p. 24
Asthma and Genius	p. 25
Proust and Asthma	p. 28
James's Irritably (Frigid) Bowel Syndrome	p. 30
Irritable Bowels (II)	p. 32
Ill Wind	p. 33
Ill Wind (II)	p. 36
Hardy's Heart	p. 39
Hardy's Heart (II)	p. 41
Can We Clone Dickens?	p. 44
Tools of the Trade
'Set it Down': But How Exactly?	p. 49
The First Typewriter-Writer	p. 51
Jack versus Blick	p. 52
The Computerised Novel	p. 55
Serving the Writer	p. 58
Sex and the Victorians
First-Night Nerves	p. 63
The Carlyles' Wedding Night	p. 66
Dorothea's Wedding Night	p. 67
George Eliot's Two Honeymoons	p. 71
The Language of Flowers	p. 72
Green Carnations (continued)	p. 75
Love My Manuscript More Than You	p. 76
Better Than Sex, Some Say
Three Castles	p. 81
Bond's Baccy	p. 83
Make Mine du Maurier	p. 84
Du Maurier the Younger: Cigarettes Again	p. 87
Du Maurier the Third: Rebecca	p. 88
Some Curious Literary Records: Best, Worst, and Most
The Worst Novelist Ever	p. 93
The Best Novel(ist) Ever	p. 96
My Pen is Quick	p. 98
Slow Coach	p. 100
Hardest Working	p. 101
The Most Arduous	p. 104
Chalk, Pen, or Typewriter?	p. 106
Little Writing	p. 107
Writing Long	p. 110
Writing Short	p. 112
The Shortest Poem	p. 114
The Most Productive Holiday in English Literature	p. 116
Most Misquoted	p. 119
Literary Crimewatch (and Gunplay)
Rape and the Ethical Classroom	p. 125
In the Dock: Ma Hump	p. 129
The First Spliff	p. 132
Literary Assault and Battery	p. 134
Gunplay	p. 137
Arms and the Woman	p. 138
Arms and the Men	p. 138
The Hemingway Solution	p. 141
Who? Who? Who?
Who 'Wrote': Paradise Lost?	p. 147
Who 'Wrote': The Tragic Muse?	p. 149
Who Wrote: The Odyssey?	p. 150
Who Wrote the First Western?	p. 153
Who invented the Supercomputer (in Literature)?	p. 154
Who Wrote the King James Bible?	p. 156
Name Games
Why 'Brontë'?	p. 161
Adjectivals	p. 165
Etiquettery	p. 167
What's in a Name?	p. 171
What's in a Name (II)?	p. 174
What's in a Name (III)?	p. 177
What's in a Title?	p. 178
Readers: Distinguished and Less Distinguished
Smart Writers, Dumb Readers	p. 183
Dumb Readers (II)	p. 186
Presidential Readers	p. 187
Presidential Readers (II)	p. 190
Prime-ministerial Readers	p. 193
Mammon and the Book Trade
Product Placement	p. 197
Product Placement (II)	p. 199
There's Life in the Old Corpse Yet	p. 201
Lies, Damn Lies, and Bestseller Lists	p. 204
What was the Most Popular Novel in the American Civil War?	p. 208
Books Go to War: Continued	p. 211
Listomania	p. 213
The Potter Effect	p. 215
Jam, Gollys, and the S-word	p. 217
Go Figure	p. 220
Wheels
WWJD?	p. 225
Platform 9 3/4	p. 227
Wrong-Headedness	p. 229
Celebrity Car Crash: Not a Literary Thing	p. 230
Morbid Curiosity
What Killed Anthony Trollope?	p. 237
Dying Well: Too Well	p. 238
The Wallpaper Actually Did Go	p. 240
The Werther Effect	p. 241
The Baskerville Effect	p. 243
Cause of Death: George Orwell	p. 245
More Wertherisms	p. 245
Graham Greene: Wertherian	p. 247
Dying Well? Or Dead Drunk?	p. 249
Hart Crane: Death by Water (and Whiskey)	p. 250
Dying Conscientiously	p. 252
What Was That He Said?	p. 254
'Good Career Move, Truman'	p. 257
Curious Connections: a Terminal Quiz
Questions	p. 263
Answers	p. 264
Index	p. 275
The End of the Book	p. 288
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