I've been reading the autobiography of Mark Twain. He desired it should only be published 100 years after his death so he could say what he wished without the worry of offending anyone and disguising the truth.
Here's a sample so you'll all want to buy your own copy or borrow mine. And you are welcome to.
His grammar is foolishly correct, offensively precise. It flaunts itself in the reader's face al along, and struts and smirks and shows off, and is in a dozen ways irritating and disagreeable. To be serious, I write good grammar myself, but not in that spirit, I am thankful to say. That is to say, my grammar is of a high order, though not at the top. Nobody's is. Perfect grammar-persistent, continuous, sustained-is the fourth dimension, so to speak; many have sought it, but none has found it....This reviewer even seems to know (or seems even to know or seems to know even) how to put the word "even" in the right place; and the word "only" too. I do not like that kind of persons. I never knew one of them that came to any good.
It's a few hundred pages of delighful, well crafted memories and a few boring details which are usually interjected by the editors. I think I will revisit some of his other works after this.
1 comment:
I like that!
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