Word: absurdness
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1920-1929
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Although many a youth now enters college in search of pleasure and finds it, it is absurd to assert that as the sole motive the going to college--even in this pleasure-loving age. Neither the older nor the younger generation could be so unanimous in a single motive. Both, it seems fair to say, were prepared to absorb as much academic and worldly wisdom as came their way. Neither was averse to a good time. The greatest difference is in the tense of the verb with which you describe fathers and sons: one got it, the other is getting...
...until their voices begin to get impressive and they go away to enter the second or third form at one of the big preparatory schools. But small as they are, some of them have surprising names-the names of well-known capitalists, famed lawyers, architects, actors, brokers. It is absurd to hear such names applied to inky insolence in corduroy. Mr. Tabor was aware of this; he showed it by setting rows of black-marks against some of the sleekest platinum-and-roseleaf names; he would stand 60-pound celebrities in the corner with their hands over their heads...
...Goethe's emotional nature craved the sympathy and love of woman, he needed the sympathy of love. Some of his greatest works were inspired by woman, though it is an absurd misconception of Goethe's nature and genius to maintain, as has been done, that he fell in love with the purpose of getting material and inspiration for his poetry...
Since these two diverse views indicated something like a split in the Caillaux Commission, the dictum of M. Henri Franklin-Bouillon, Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Chamber, upon the whole matter was marked well. Said he: "It was absurd to send a whole committee to America. One man could have done better. . . . I shall vote against this temporary agreement because it is a mere effort to gain time . . . . Parliament problems which can be put off, and if a five year limit is set on the debt question you can be sure Parliament will take four years...
...probably lead to further study in the field. Those who dislike it will do so because an occasional lecturer becomes unduly technical, and most of all because in the laboratory they will be forced to spend countless weary hours drawing unimportant pictures of bugs, leaves and frogs' legs with absurd minuteness. The limited conception of the scientific method which they may gain thereby could as well have been acquired in a few weeks instead of a year. Four specialists, most of them human, give a smattering of astronomy, zoology, and botany. The course is relatively new, improving constantly...