Word: sardonicism
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Even after the mystery came back to the U.S., through the first two decades of the 20th century, crimes were committed in the grand old English manner. Murder was still a puzzle, and whether S. S. Van Dine, Ellery Queen or H C Bailey were writing the rules, the mari...
Seats in the Sun. As the economic monopoly was broken, so was the political monopoly. Before World War II, island Democrats existed largely on the sufferance of Democrats in Washington, had a hard time holding rallies on outlying islands, because owners shut them out of the plantations. Now, under ex...
The business of being a composer used to consist mainly in having talent, writing music in a garret, and maybe finding a wealthy patron or two. Nowadays, what with foundation grants, teaching jobs, formal contests and informal cocktail party juries, the business is a lot more complicated. In the A.C.A...
The Berliner's password is "Mir kann keener"-"Nobody can put anything over on me"-and his instinctive reaction to totalitarianism, as it is to anything highfalutin, is a deflating wisecrack. The airlift memorial at which last week's anniversary ceremonies began is universally known to Berliners as...
A Million Laws. The law brings out all of man's magnificent mulishness. For centuries, pigs, bulls, dogs and horses were gravely tried and executed if they caused a human death. In 1890 a sardonic Hungarian lawyer left his estate to the relative who could best answer 1) What...