As I mentioned in the previous posting, Dwight Garner in his NYT Rook Review Essay of today tells us about the genesis of his commonplace book. My prior posting told the genesis of mine.
Mr. Garner coyly tells us his will contain quotes from writers who've used four-letter words, pretty much the word "fuck." Mr Garner cannot actually have "fuck" spelled out in a newspaper, so he tells us f--- will be found.
Of course the NYT has already broken the expletive ceiling when they printed a blue response by a Congressman to Alexandria Ocasio Cortez, known by her initials far and wide as AOC. But that's a whole other story.
In her book on New York speech, "You Talkin' to Me?" E.J. White (a pseudonym for Elyse Graham, a linguistics professor at Stony Brook) opens with the perhaps startling admission that she most appreciates having moved to New York from the West Coast because she's learned to appreciate the natives' use of the word "fuck" in all its word forms: noun, verb, adverb, adjective, transitory verb, participle, and whatever else you can find in a book on grammar.
Sir Richard Burton would tell anyone who would listen that the word is the greatest Anglo-Saxon word there is. And Sir Richard, twice married to hell-cat Liz Taylor, no doubt experienced all the iterations of the word in his Liz Taylor relationship.
Here is Ms. Graham's take on her deep appreciation for the utterance she finds so charming:
It was in New York I learned to tell people to fuck off, and I think I'm a better person for it. New Yorkers are connoisseurs of the word "fuck." They use it as an obscenity, as an insult, as a qualifier, as a term of respect, as adverb as an interjection, as a method of asserting personal space, or simply as punctuation.
There is of course more: get the book; read the book.
"You talkin' to me?" is of course a famous slice of movie dialog from an early Robert De Niro movie, "Taxi Driver" where De Niro plays an Arthur Bremer-like character who stalks people and who feels compelled to rescue prostitutes from their servitude. He's a nut case, and talks into the mirror, practicing his confrontational speech. He also thinks taking the Cybil Sheppard character to a porn movie for a date is a good idea. The guy is whacked.
Why Ms. Graham feels the need to use a pseudonym is unknown. She is not in the Witness Protection Program and her book shouldn't be seen as a threat to anyone. The use of the initials E.J. do not give away gender, and there is no dust jacket photo or thumbnail sketch of her background. If it wasn't for a book reviewer's use of the female pronoun, you wouldn't even have that clue. No matter.
I don't think Ms. Graham looks into the New Yorker's use of the word "fuhgeddaboudit." That one became popularized by the soldier-mafia character Lefty played by Al Pacino in "Donnie Brasco." Lefty uses the term in many grammatical forms. What city on Earth would proclaim the word on its 'Leaving Brooklyn' sign on one of its highway signs other than New York?
As you come from Staten Island (a NYC borough) over the Verrazano Bridge (the Guinea gangplank) and go through Brooklyn (another NYC borough) you are greeted with the sign Entering Brooklyn, "How Sweet It Is" made made famous by Jackie Gleason as the bus driver Ralph Kramden, who lived in Canarsie with his feisty wife Alice, Audrey Meadows.
As you are leaving Brooklyn and are crossing the border into Queens, another one of NYC's boroughs, you are sent on your way with the sign pictured above, giving you a bit of raspberry sendoff. And in many way, you have left one country and are entering another one.
In 1968 I followed my Uncle Vernon back to Odell, Illinois to get away from my father. My uncle was an itinerant cook. My mother's side of the family came from Tampico, Illinois, the birthplace of Ronald Regan. My mother's oldest brother Howard was in the same one-room school house as the young Ronnie. Reagan's family moved to Dixon after a few years in Tampico.
Odell was a farming community, halfway between bigger towns of Dwight and Pontiac, where there was a state prison. Even in the dead cold of a January winter, farmers drove to the bar/restaurant atop their tractors.
So there I was, a certified New Yorker in amongst the flat midwestern vowels and somewhat nasal speech. I was never a "dee-and-doe" guy, but by uncle told me they all thought I was a young gangster because of the sound of my voice. Maybe I should have followed De Niro and Pacino into acting. Not.
It is amazing to me that Ms. Graham would still find examples of the so-called New York speech, considering the vast demographic changes in the city's population. What is it that makes New York's sound so impatient and possibly threatening?
Generationally, how can so many people become "New Yorkers" when so many of them consistently come from all over is a mystery. Maybe it's the density of the living spaces, the subway, the food, the politics, the subway, the schools. What engenders the fucking attitude? When people come here, it's unlikely that are so expletive laced as when they eventually leave here.
My father was born in the city in 1915 and passed away in 1987. If he came back today he wouldd have trouble seeing so many people with masks on and talking on cell phones. But he would recognize the attitude. The air here must be different.
I agree with Mr. Garner that Bartlett's and other quote collections fall short of being entertaining. They are a good reference, but do a poor job of setting the context of the quote.
Quotes need to be planted into a conversation that makes the speaker seem erudite, prophetic or funny. Funny works best. They need to be blended in as if they were just said. I once bought a collection of Bob and Ray's radio routines, two of the funniest guys to listen to, but in small doses. One of their well-planted riffs could last like an ice cream cone that was never finished. Taken as a whole they were a fire hose of wit that quickly lost its punch.
Right now I can only remember one routine, but I once blended Ray Goulding's final words about something..."would you like to see the bullet hole" into a conversation. It still cracks me up, and I hardly remember all of it.
If I were to continue to create the commonplace entries, I would certainly include Ms. Graham's opening ode to the word "fuck." So, with nothing more to say, here is the first installment of what would have been my commonplace book if there was ever going to be a commonplace book.
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I’ve learned all I need to know about the O.J. trial just by walking past a television.
--Russell Baker, The Observer, NYT
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On TV: It’s the yellow pages with pictures.
--Jack Parr, USA Today, June 11, 2002
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Boxing has always been the strip joint of sports.
--Dave Anderson, May 9, 2002, NYT: Prior to Lennox Lewis/Mike Tyson fight of June 8, 2002
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Reineman was correct, too, believing that, as talented a colt as War Emblem may be, his front-running victory in the Illinois Derby came on his home track, the unusually configured Sportsman Park and its paperclip-shaped oval, and was probably not a legitimate springboard to a Derby victory. Perhaps Reineman’s only mistake was judging his colt against history instead of against War Emblem’s unproven peers.
--Joe Drape, May 6, 2002, NYT
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I always tell the truth, unless I can’t.
--Matthew Troy; former NYC Councilman, Queens County Democratic leader, convicted felon on misappropriation of estate funds, and disbarred lawyer, speaking in front of a group of Empire Blue Cross Blue Shield auditors, on the topic of integrity and ethics.
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Deep Throat, the 62 minute film, and one of the first feature-length pornography movies, produced in 1972, made money so fast that its producers joked they had to weigh their receipts each day.
--NYT Obituary, when Linda Borman, star of the film, passed away, April 24, 2002.
62 minutes? It seemed a lot longer when you saw it three times in one sitting.
--Anonymous
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Mr. Berle was married in 1941 to Joyce Matthews, a showgirl. They were divorced in 1947, and he married her again two years later. Why, he was asked. “Because she reminded me of my first wife,” he replied.
--Lawrence Van Gelder, Milton Berle obituary, NYT, March 28, 2002
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Turn Left on Union Avenue—and go Back a Hundred Years.
--Red Smith, American Heritage magazine, on Saratoga
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There were but 11 Triple Crown winners in the last century, only three in the last 54 years. And with Seattle Slew’s passing the other day, all of them are dead. This we know because living Triple Crown champions are kept track of like ex-presidents and Titanic survivors.
--Mike Lopresti, USA Today, May 21, 2002
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I watched my uncle play, and I saw people giving him money. I liked that.
--Efren Reyes, champion pool player, NYT, February 16, 2002
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