Word: clever
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JUMPERS Tom Stoppard's first full-length drama since Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead could have been written by a pixilated Orwell, a tipsy Shaw or a sozzled T.S. Eliot sounding off on metaphysics in a disorderly pub. Jumpers is an intoxicatingly clever absurdist comedy, a philosophical disquisition on the existence of God and the nature of truth, good and evil. It is also monstrously difficult to pin down...
...With unanimous praise from the critics ("The most important book to come out in France since Proust," said Janet Planner), the novel became a bestseller. It is not too difficult to see why. Its setting is World War II and with existentialism temporarily mined out. M. Tournier proves a clever exploiter of the current enthusiasm for mysticism and mythology...
...trim, plus about 30 wooden distaffs (for spinning wool into yarn). Half the distaffs are covered with figures of birds, animals, and fanciful arabesques in bright tempera; the others are blond wood so delicately carved that they give the impression of lace. A great find was a group of clever toy whistles made by craftsmen in the Arkhangelsk and Tula regions from 1890 through 1910. The whistles are in the form of horses, dogs, bears, a hen and her chicks, and peasants, and are gaily decorated with bright yellow, peacock blue, and magenta stripes. My favorite one depicts a troika...
...year of gangland slayings. Found on a Brooklyn street with five .32 caliber wounds in his head was Thomas (Tommy Ryan) Eboli, 61, a top leader of one of New York's five Mafia families. Federal officials now believe that much of the bloodshed is part of a clever and brutal drive by the nation's most powerful Mafia commander, Carlo Gambino, 73, to seize firm control of all of the New York clans and establish himself as undisputed Boss of Bosses...
...weak spots are far overshadowed, however, by the skillfull narrative and emotional quality which characterize Report to the Commissioner and make it a sure best-seller. It is no wonder that the movie rights were snapped up by a motion picture industry starved for clever suspense stories. Report to the Commissioner is no literary masterpiece. But it is a well-conceived and racy respite from drugstore detective tedium...