Word: oure
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Dates: during 1873-1873
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"Near half our precious lives are spent
With these facts before him our writer sends out his thoughts in search of something funny : but witticisms are coy birds and fly high; few are able to capture them at will, or furnish them to order. In nine cases out of ten, wearied with his fruitless endeavors, he descends...
But since it is so difficult to be witty, are we to give up the attempt, and devote ourselves to a style of composition as devoid of humor as a statute-book? Certainly not. If we have not the wit to elicit an appreciative smile from our readers, we at...
Doubtless an experienced critic in examining our attempts at drollery would say at once that they were strained, unnatural, from the fact that clearness of style, consistency of thought, in short, all the requisites of finished work, had been sacrificed to the one idea of saying something funny.
Like beauty ill-attired, our humor clothed in uncouth and meaningless phrases is undiscovered. True, with our limited experience, and wit perhaps, we can hardly expect our efforts to bear even a favorable comparison with the elaborately finished work of a Holmes or Warner, whose humor seldom offends in essence...