Word: aspic
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1940-1949
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...germs, at least not very well, but they do not fool him. He knows there are armies of them all around him : hairy ones with mil lions of eyes, wiggly ones with transparent heads, sloppy ones shaped like tomato sur prises, stiff ones which look like piccolos in aspic. He never forgets that they are coming at him, morning, noon & night. But he is not intimidated. He fights them...
Among others there are Sir Storrington Thirst ("he had a habit of laying his hands upon you"); mannish Asta Thundersley (she collects paintings of "tumors wearing spectacles, wombs in aspic, ulcers in floral hats"); The Tiger Fitzpatrick, spavined prizefighter ("all I want is a chance at this so-called Braddock"); Mothmar Acord ("a dish-shaped face, discolored by oriental suns and high fevers") ; Sinclair Wensday ("a cocaine personality . . . tall and popular . . . Galahad gone to the devil"). At his best Author Kersh writes like a comic Soho Gorki, drawing wicked, lively sketches of the barflies, pimps, fairies and phonies of London...
Waiters brought on cold ham in aspic and Britain's Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden brought up Poland. His toast: "To Mr. Gusev [Fedor Gusev, Soviet Ambassador to Britain]. One night he shared a flying bomb with the so-called London Poles. All of us hoped this common experience might bring understanding between Mr. Gusev and Mr. Mikolajczyk [Premier Stanislaw Mikolajczyk, of the Polish Government in Exile] which would bode well for the postwar world." All of the 40 guests drank to Gusev...
...shaved his armpits so deep that they bled, transferred blood to other parts of his body, turning his bathing trunks inside out, placed an enormous red geranium behind one ear, a pearl necklace round his neck, and finally smeared his whole body with a mixture of goat dung and aspic. From this there emerged, says Dali, "Miracle of miracles!-the 'exact' odor of the ram . . . a stifling stench...
...paper romance, and anything-for-a-laugh comedy. There are moments when Director McCarey has the sleight of hand it takes. Albert Bassermann makes a small prize package of a fierce, old Polish general. Pudgy Walter Slezak, as the dastardly baron, is as slickly untrustworthy as a bomb in aspic. But Principals Rogers and Grant exude a general impression that they know something has gone very wrong, and that nothing much can be done about...