# funniest sentence in literature, IMO **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 9, 2007, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946 "2007-08-09T02:02:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Sitnam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Sitnam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sitnam)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2007, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/61 "2007-08-10T17:35:37Z")
[QUOTE=Telemark] The movie is great, but the book is better. Find and read the book. [/QUOTE] I disagree. Don’t get me wrong, I loved both, but since I know the movie by heart I could tell when there were changes made to the dialog. On the whole I thought the movie’s version was far more clever. That said, they did cut out a few scenes for the movie that where comedy gold, but I still gotta go movie. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2007, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/62 "2007-08-10T17:47:56Z")
[QUOTE=Sitnam] I disagree. Don’t get me wrong, I loved both, but since I know the movie by heart I could tell when there were changes made to the dialog. On the whole I thought the movie’s version was far more clever. That said, they did cut out a few scenes for the movie that where comedy gold, but I still gotta go movie. [/QUOTE] Blasphemy! They were restricted to 90 minutes in the movie, the whole first part of the book, up until Westley leaves for America is priceless. It wouldn’t translate to the screen, so there’s no point in worrying about it, but it makes the book head and shoulders above the movie. (This was before kissing.) ---
**Author:** ![Ellen\_Cherry](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ellen_cherry/32/3600_2.png) [@Ellen\_Cherry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ellen_Cherry)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2007, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/63 "2007-08-10T19:15:50Z")
There are few books that have made me snort with hysterical giggles like Wodehouse’s Jeeves books. If I’m reading them his phrasing starts slipping into my own writing ; I also have to stop myself from saying things like “My sainted aunt!” Anyway, this is more than a sentence, but the OP’s mention of a cook brought it to mind. Bertie is visiting Bing’s uncle, who thinks he is the author of sentimental books which enoble the working classes, such as _Only a Shopgirl_, etc. for, typically, complicated reasons. He is speaking of his cook: > [@](#): > > "She has been with me seven years, and in all that time I have not known her guilty of a single lapse from the highest standard. Except once, in the winter of 1917, when a purist might have condemned a certain mayonnaise of hers as lacking in creaminess. But one must make allowances. There had been several air-raids about that time, and no doubt the poor woman was shaken. But nothing is perfect in this world, Mr. Wooster, and I have had my cross to bear. For seven years I have lived in constant apprehension lest some evilly-disposed person might lure her from my employment. Every time I use it, I always call mayo “a certain mayonaisse” and wonder aloud about its creaminess. ---
**Author:** ![Mark\_Ryle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8dc957/32.png) [@Mark\_Ryle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mark_Ryle)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2007, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/64 "2007-08-10T19:29:58Z")
[QUOTE=Humble Servant] I wish either my father or my mother, or indeed both of them, as they were in duty both equally bound to it, had minded what they were about when they begot me; had they duly consider’d how much depended upon what they were then doing;–that not only the production of a rational Being was concerned in it, but that possibly the happy formation and temperature of his body, perhaps his genius and the very cast of his mind;–and, for aught they knew to the contrary, even the fortunes of his whole house might take their turn from the humours and dispositions which were then uppermost;–Had they duly weighed and considered all this, and proceeded accordingly,–I am verily persuaded I should have made a quite different figure in the world, from that in which the reader is likely to see me. The first sentence of The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Laurence Sterne. [/QUOTE] Not only funny, but strikes in the reader an uncomfortable note of recognition since that very thought, in some permutation or other, may have flitted through our own minds, possibly, at some time or other. The sentence draws us into the book effectively. We want to know more of this well-spoken narrator who, apparently, really believes this. ---
**Author:** ![Asimovian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asimovian/32/172_2.png) [@Asimovian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Asimovian)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2007, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/65 "2007-08-10T20:04:19Z")
[QUOTE=Paladud] I don’t have a copy of the book, but some sentences accompanying the graphs in Cryptonomicon would earn the honor, particularly those associated with the graph of masturbation and productivity. [/QUOTE] My wife and I often read the same literature, and I happened to get ahold of Cryptonomicon before she did. I don’t like to interrupt my reading to show her things, but it took every ounce of restraint I had not to shove that particular graph in her face the moment I’d seen it. That book is gold overall. I love the structure of this passage: > [@Cryptonomicon](#): > > The rest of the day is spent, by Lawrence Pritchard Waterhouse and the rest of the Navy, grappling with the fact that many two-dimensional structures on this and other ships, which were put into place to prevent various fluids from commingling (e.g. fuel and air) have holes in them, and not only that but a lot of shit is on fire too and things are more than a little smoky. Certain objects that are supposed to (a) remain horizontal and (b) support heavy things have ceased to do either. ---
**Author:** ![Mark\_Ryle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8dc957/32.png) [@Mark\_Ryle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mark_Ryle)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2007, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/66 "2007-08-10T20:05:15Z")
[QUOTE=Ellen Cherry] There are few books that have made me snort with hysterical giggles like Wodehouse’s Jeeves books. If I’m reading them his phrasing starts slipping into my own writing ; I also have to stop myself from saying things like “My sainted aunt!” [/QUOTE] You would fit right in with a Wodehouse Society-type group I once knew of (around 2000). They had a message board in which members would converse in Wodehouse-ese – long circuitous sentences, clever repartee – and many were in character, as Angela Bassett types, or Gussie Fink-Nottle types. They wouldn’t come out of character, in fact. It was maddening at times. I didn’t last because I can’t write or speak that way for any length of time, but these people were good. ---
**Author:** ![Humble\_Servant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/47e85d/32.png) [@Humble\_Servant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Humble_Servant)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2007, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/67 "2007-08-10T20:28:08Z")
[QUOTE=Mark Ryle] since that very thought, in some permutation or other, may have flitted through our own minds, possibly, at some time or other. [/QUOTE] Au contrary and speak for yourself, Mr. **Ryle**. I assure you that not so much as once have I wondered what the hell were my parents thinking while they were, you know, begetting me. It is best, as Miss Manners cited once already in this thread recommends, to implacably deny, deny, deny that such events have occurred, despite actual tangible results. ---
**Author:** ![Yllaria](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yllaria/32/3452_2.png) [@Yllaria](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yllaria)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2007, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/68 "2007-08-10T20:34:18Z")
[QUOTE=Mark Ryle] . . . this well-spoken narrator who, apparently, really believes this. [/QUOTE] Was the character-narrator of a time where such belief would have been the norm? Or did it mark him as quaint? ---
**Author:** ![Runestar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/74df32/32.png) [@Runestar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Runestar)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2007, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/69 "2007-08-10T21:10:11Z")
[QUOTE=Mark Ryle] _Code of the Woosters_ is a sequel to _Right Ho, Jeeves_, and they are numbers two and three of a trilogy, but I can never seem to locate the first and right now can’t think of its name. It’s at none of my regular libraries, and I saw it only once, long ago, at a Borders. (I don’t buy books, as a rule.) [/QUOTE] Not to hijack, but this is a pet peeve of mine. If I’m ever given a chance to Rule the World, one of the first edicts I’ll issue is this: All bookstores must always have the first volume of any series in stock if they have any other volumes in the series on the shelf. Libraries too, but they shall be granted an exemption if the book in question just happens to be checked out. ---
**Author:** ![Hoopy\_Frood](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hoopy_frood/32/8452_2.png) [@Hoopy\_Frood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hoopy_Frood)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2007, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/70 "2007-08-10T21:21:28Z")
[QUOTE=robardin] So much to be mined therein. My personal fave is a pair which pops up unbidden in my mind from time to time, from _Life, The Universe and Everything_. Arthur Dent sees an enormous (and deeply unflattering) statue of himself, depicted with many arms and legs, each visiting some kind of destruction on some creature or other, except one arm which was doing something unclear. Eventually, though… _He glanced up again, and realized that the arm that had puzzled him was represented as wantonly calling into existence a bowl of doomed petunias. This was not a concept which leapt easily to the eye._ This is a reference to an earlier scene from two books earlier in the series (and a couple of months earlier in my reading life), where a nuclear missile was miraculously (or, more accurately, Very Improbably) transformed into a bowl of petunias: _Curiously enough, the only thing that went through the mind of the bowl of petunias as it fell was Oh no, not again. Many people have speculated that if we knew exactly why the bowl of petunias had thought that we would know a lot more about the nature of the Universe than we do now._ That seeming complete non-sequitur, written in a dry, almost academic tone, had me chuckling the first time. The fact that it was not, in fact, a complete non-sequitur in the end was somehow even funnier. [/QUOTE] You forgot the sperm whale. The missiles were turned into a bowl of pentunias being carried along inside a sperm whale. The Hitchhiker game, while not exactly canon, but written by Douglas Adams and Steve Mertzkey for Infocom, explains that the bowl of petunias were the radar guidance system of the missiles, which themselves became the whale. [QUOTE=BrainGlutton] That’s actually a parody of an old story I read in T.H. White’s _The Sword in the Stone_ (and probably much older than that): A merchant of Jerusalem was walking in the bazaar one day and was surprised to see Death; what’s more, Death seemed equally surprised to see him. The merchant hurried off and sought out a wise man to explain the omen. He was told, “It means Death has come here for you.” The merchant decided to flee before the appointment. He hired a fast horse and rode hard all night until he reached Damascus, a feat no one had ever managed before. The next day he was walking in the bazaar and Death plucked his sleeve and said, “I have come for you.” The merchant, astonished, cried, “But I saw you in Jerusalem just yesterday!” Death replied, “And I was quite surprised to see you there, for I was told to seek you here, today, in Damascus.” [/QUOTE] It is older than that. From the Annotated Pratchett File ([The Annotated Pratchett File v9.0 - The Colour of Magic](http://www.lspace.org/books/apf/the-colour-of-magic.html)): > [@](#): > > - [p. 62/55] “[…] I WAS EXPECTING TO MEET THEE IN PSEPHOPOLOLIS.” > > Death and Rincewind are replaying their own version of the well-known folktale Appointment in Samarra. Terry says: > > "My mother told me the ‘Appointment in Samarra’ story when I was very young, and it remained. She says she read it somewhere, or maybe heard it… > > I’d always thought it was from the 1001 Nights, although I never went looking for it. It’s one of those stories that a lot of people vaguely know, without quite knowing why…" > > For those who aren’t familiar with the story, it concerns a servant to a rich Baghdad merchant who goes to the market and encounters Death there, who gestures at him. Convinced that this is a very bad omen indeed, the servant rushes back to his master in a great panic and begs him for a horse, so that he can ride to Samarra and escape whatever calamity will befall him should he stay in Baghdad. The kind master gives the servant a horse, and goes out to investigate for himself. When the merchant finds Death and asks him why he frightened the servant so, Death replies: “I wasn’t trying to scare him, it is just that I was so very surprised to meet him here, because I have an appointment with him tonight in Samarra!” > > Over the centuries, countless versions and re-tellings of this story have appeared in books, plays and poems in all languages and cultures. One of my correspondents was so intrigued by the tale that with the help of alt.fan.pratchett he set out to find the original, or at least the earliest known version. After much research, he now believes this to be When Death Came to Baghdad, an old ninth century Middle Eastern Sufi teaching story, told by Fudail ibn Ayad in his Hikayat-i-Naqshia (‘Tales formed according to a design’). > > If anyone has a reference to an even earlier version, we would love to hear about it. As far as my contribution, while I don’t have a true favorite, I will throw out this little gem from Adams’s other series. From _Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency_: > [@](#): > > Let’s think the unthinkable, let’s do the undoable, let’s prepare to grapple with the ineffable itself, and see if we may not eff it after all. ---
**Author:** ![Humble\_Servant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/47e85d/32.png) [@Humble\_Servant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Humble_Servant)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2007, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/71 "2007-08-10T21:30:19Z")
[QUOTE=Yllaria] Was the character-narrator of a time where such belief would have been the norm? Or did it mark him as quaint? [/QUOTE] It marked him as a bleedin’ loon! Tristram Shandy is an early example of an unreliable narrator, as well as a narrator that talks back to the author. It is a very amusing satire, if you don’t mind it being high brow and in old English. ---
**Author:** ![Greg\_Charles](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/839c29/32.png) [@Greg\_Charles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Greg_Charles)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2007, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/72 "2007-08-10T21:36:23Z")
I love all the Wodehouse quotations here! It took me forever to run this one to ground: “Don’t run a Rugger club in Totleigh, do you?” Stinker replied in the negative. The Totleigh-in-the-Wold athletes, he said, preferred the Association code, and Plank, probably shuddering, said, “Good God!” – From “Stiff Upper Lip, Jeeves” That about sums up how I feel about soccer, aka Association rules football. ---
**Author:** ![no\_come\_down](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/4491bb/32.png) [@no\_come\_down](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/no_come_down)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2007, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/73 "2007-08-10T22:16:01Z")
don’t know if this has been posted yet, but anyone who has read the great gatsby will recognize this one: “it’s an old clock.” i had to stop reading for twenty minutes after i read that because i was laughing too hard ---
**Author:** ![Faruiza](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ecd19e/32.png) [@Faruiza](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Faruiza)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2007, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/74 "2007-08-11T03:43:45Z")
Another Pratchettism, from Interesting Times: The four horsemen of the apocalypse are getting ready to eat the sack lunches they brought with them: War: “We’ve got … let’s see now … Egg and Cress, Chicken Tikka, and Mature Cheese with Crunchy Pickle, I think.” Death: THEY DO SUCH MARVELLOUS THINGS WITH SANDWICHES THESE DAYS. War: “Oh … and Bacon Surprise.” Death: REALLY? WHAT IS SO SURPRISING ABOUT BACON? War: “I don’t know. I suppose it comes as something of a shock to the pig.” Still makes me giggle like a fiend. Also, I’m loving the FaLiLV quotes. Top five in my books AND movies. ---
**Author:** ![choie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/choie/32/7829_2.png) [@choie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/choie)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2007, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/75 "2007-08-11T03:59:54Z")
I saw the title of this thread and instantly thought of Wodehouse – and was very pleased that Bertie Wooster himself was the subject of your first post! I offer this simple and well-known sentence, also by Bertie, courtesy of _Code of the Woosters_. Always makes me grin: “I could see that, if not actually disgruntled, he was far from being gruntled.” ---
**Author:** ![rackensack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e5b9ba/32.png) [@rackensack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rackensack)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2007, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/76 "2007-08-11T05:16:07Z")
[QUOTE=Humble Servant] Tristram Shandy is an early example of an unreliable narrator, as well as a narrator that talks back to the author. It is a very amusing satire, if you don’t mind it being high brow and **in old English**. [/QUOTE] (emphasis added) Hwæt?! ---
**Author:** ![Mark\_Ryle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8dc957/32.png) [@Mark\_Ryle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mark_Ryle)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2007, 5:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/77 "2007-08-11T05:39:11Z")
[QUOTE=choie] I saw the title of this thread and instantly thought of Wodehouse – and was very pleased that Bertie Wooster himself was the subject of your first post! [/QUOTE] The passage contains a nice cross section of Wodehouse mannerisms – an occurrence of an abbreviation, “wife of his b.”, the oft-recurring giving-of-notice by gifted but temperamental French chef Anatole, two strong examples of Aunt Dahlia’s forceful nature. It lacks Jeeves, however. For his absolutely pivotal importance to the stories, Jeeves is actually physically present very little. I would like to see a graph or printout of the percentage – I would bet it’s surpirsingly low. When he _is_ present, his dialogue is extremely clipped. “Yes, sir.” “No, sir.” “Indeed, sir.” Yet for all the lopsidedness in their on-stage time, Jeeves and Bertie are solidly and inseparably a pair. Most writers, inventing such a potent personality, would, I suspect, give Jeeves many more lines, probably having him on hand most or all the time. Wodehouse’s restraint in utilizing this classic character could be a source of the magic we experience in the pairing, but ‘why’ is a mystery. ---
**Author:** ![Mark\_Ryle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8dc957/32.png) [@Mark\_Ryle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mark_Ryle)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2007, 5:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/78 "2007-08-11T05:43:01Z")
[QUOTE=no come down] don’t know if this has been posted yet, but anyone who has read the great gatsby will recognize this one: “it’s an old clock.” i had to stop reading for twenty minutes after i read that because i was laughing too hard [/QUOTE] I am not familiar – can anyone explain? ---
**Author:** ![singular1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ba9def/32.png) [@singular1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/singular1)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2007, 11:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/79 "2007-08-11T11:49:50Z")
[hijack] This thread spurred me to finally (through the benefit of having extra cash from way too much overtime) acquire the Discworld series. But Amazon has me thoroughly confused. Can someone please direct me to a chronological list of the series? Thanks! [/hijack] ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2007, 12:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/80 "2007-08-11T12:07:36Z")
[QUOTE=singular1] [hijack] This thread spurred me to finally (through the benefit of having extra cash from way too much overtime) acquire the Discworld series. But Amazon has me thoroughly confused. Can someone please direct me to a chronological list of the series? Thanks! [/hijack] [/QUOTE] Crap. There’s an order to them? I just bought my first Pratchett book yesterday. Having no idea where to start, I picked Small Gods. Was this an error? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946.md?page=5)