NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #31/NN_1992_31.iso/spool/rec/arts/books/23362

Text File | 1992-12-28 | 1.6 KB | 38 lines

Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Path: sparky!uunet!psinntp!sugar!claird
From: [e-mail] (Cameron Laird)
Subject: Re: Judith Martin is too (was: Wits and Half-Wits)
Organization: NeoSoft Communications Services -- [phone]
Date: Mon, 28 Dec 1992 13:45:44 GMT
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
References: <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]>
Lines: 27

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Tom Maddox) writes:
>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Cameron Laird) writes:
>>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Jack Campin) writes:
>>>[e-mail] quoted Tom Maddox:
>>>> I'm much more concerned with whether people are being interesting, witty,
>>>> enlightening, provocative.  In short, when it comes to public exchanges of
>>>> the written word, I would hold up Oscar Wilde or Dorothy Parker as exemplars
>>>> rather than Miss Manners.
            .
            .
            .
>    And maybe not.  While your presciption for "great wit" is both
>concise and superficially plausible, it is suitable more to some idealized
>18th century drawing room than to a late 20th century computer newsgroup.
>
>    And in any case, both Dorothy Parker and Oscar Wilde could be
>discourteous when they felt the situation called for it.  For instance,
            .
            .
            .
I applaud the civility with which you
have described our differences.
--

Cameron Laird
[e-mail] ([e-mail])    [phone]
[e-mail] ([e-mail])      [phone]