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/lit/ - Literature

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Anonymous Tue Aug 16 19:09:23 2016 No.8405669 [Reply] [Original]

Is there another literary figure on a par with Oscar Wilde in terms of wittiness? The man was a living bon mot-machine.

>>	Anonymous Tue Aug 16 19:18:22 2016 No.8405717 >>8405669 Vidal?

>>	Anonymous Tue Aug 16 19:23:35 2016 No.8405732 >>8405717 Literally never heard of >a public intellectual known for his patrician manner, epigrammatic wit, and polished style of writing >patrician manner What did Wikipedia mean by this?

>>	Anonymous Tue Aug 16 19:32:34 2016 No.8405771 The artist formerly known as Samuel Clemens.

>>	Anonymous Tue Aug 16 19:33:45 2016 No.8405775 File: 1009 KB, 760x920, voltaire.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>8405669 Yes

>>	Anonymous Tue Aug 16 19:35:10 2016 No.8405779 >>8405775 > > > Even voltaire's death mask was grinning, that smug bastard

>>	Anonymous Tue Aug 16 19:35:22 2016 No.8405782 >>8405669 contrarianism =/= wit

>>	Anonymous Tue Aug 16 19:35:39 2016 No.8405783 >>8405771 This. Between writing fiction he mostly doled out scathing and hilarious criticism of his contemporaries.

>>	Anonymous Tue Aug 16 20:14:55 2016 No.8405928 P.G. Wodehouse

>>	Anonymous Tue Aug 16 20:15:22 2016 No.8405931 Not really, but Beckett's Dublin University quote always gives me a fine chuckle >>8405732 >never heard of Gore Vidal Wew lad

>>	Anonymous Tue Aug 16 20:23:17 2016 No.8405956 Bierce

>>	Anonymous Tue Aug 16 21:19:06 2016 No.8406139 Samuel Johnson or Voltaire

>>	Anonymous Tue Aug 16 21:21:25 2016 No.8406144 >>8405669 >Takes truism. >Reverses it. Oh, Oscar, you're so witty!

>>	Anonymous Tue Aug 16 21:30:48 2016 No.8406171 >>8405732 I suggest you check out the Buckley Jr. versus Vidal debates from 1968. They're still a blast to watch all these years later and show Vidal during one of the highest points in his career.

>>	Anonymous Tue Aug 16 21:33:30 2016 No.8406178 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UxXW6tfl2Y0

>>	Anonymous Tue Aug 16 23:14:37 2016 No.8406422 why did he choose to be gay?

>>	Anonymous Tue Aug 16 23:30:50 2016 No.8406470 >>8405669 Voltaire btfos himself in a masterful display of meta-wit. Top that shit.

>>	Anonymous Tue Aug 16 23:40:36 2016 No.8406494 File: 18 KB, 250x295, Pierre Caron de Beamarchais.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] Pierre motherfucking Caron motherfucking de Beaumarchais

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 02:08:24 2016 No.8406804 >nobody mentions Dorothy Parker

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 02:13:50 2016 No.8406811 >>8406470 Like Eminem in the climax rap battle of 8 Mile?

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 02:35:55 2016 No.8406840 File: 84 KB, 756x1061, Mark_Twain_by_AF_Bradley.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>8405669

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 08:41:47 2016 No.8407341 >>8406840

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 09:10:30 2016 No.8407428 >>8406804 hahhaahahahaha

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 11:20:40 2016 No.8407697 >>8405669

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 12:21:10 2016 No.8407854 >>8406422 because it was edgy

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 12:25:06 2016 No.8407861 Alexander Pope

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 12:32:11 2016 No.8407873 >>8406422 most english are gay they're just closeted

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 16:51:43 2016 No.8408594 >no mention of the Algonquin Tound Table Really though all of these witticisms get attached to characters who were supposed to have been witty. Usually they didn't actually say half of what gets attributed to them

Anonymous Wed Aug 17 16:55:19 2016 No.8408608

>>8405717
>As such, and because he thought that men and women potentially are bisexual, Vidal rejected the adjectives "homosexual" and "heterosexual" when used as nouns, as inherently false terms used to classify and control people in society.
I thought I was the only one who believed this. I like this guy already.

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 17:01:02 2016 No.8408628 File: 602 KB, 532x1763, 1462396116757 (1).png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>8405775

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 17:02:06 2016 No.8408635 File: 207 KB, 650x1033, 1462407657222.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>8405775 > > >

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 17:08:45 2016 No.8408652 the picture of dorian gray is this book good?

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 19:45:53 2016 No.8409069 de la Rochefoucauld

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 20:05:07 2016 No.8409133 >>8405669 Definitely Dr Johnson

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 20:14:02 2016 No.8409166 Wasn't a fan of Dorian Gray. But for some reason I want to like Wilde. Is there anything else he's written that could potentially reverse my negative opinion?

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 21:04:29 2016 No.8409339 >>8409166 The importance of being earnest is quite witty and humorous

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 21:38:30 2016 No.8409432 Ambrose Bierce may be a contender, though more sardonic

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 23:08:13 2016 No.8409705 Shakespeare is the wittiest man ever to have lived

>>	Anonymous Wed Aug 17 23:16:29 2016 No.8409737 >>8408608 Read the Narratives of Empire series. Unbelievably good, genuinely enjoyable, frequently hilarious, irreverent (overly so, in my opinion) and an excellent American history course to boot.

Anonymous Wed Aug 17 23:24:40 2016 No.8409761

>>8409166
I didn't like Dorian Gray either. But I do love his plays. Ernest is the best place to start. You might be put off by reading a play (maybe not), but read it. You'll just laugh the whole time. Easy to find a good audio performance too. Read along with it. The jokes will be delivered as they should be. It's fast-moving and smart. Nothing complex. Just hilarious.

>>	Anonymous Thu Aug 18 00:04:56 2016 No.8409852 >>8409737 I might get around to it, but nonfiction isn't something I'm generally inclined to read.

>>	Anonymous Thu Aug 18 00:27:16 2016 No.8409905 >>8406144 This. Reading Dorian Gray right now, enjoying it, but Lord Henry's (Wilde's mouthpiece) aphorisms are just inversions of cliches. Still, the prose alone is worth it.

>>	Anonymous Thu Aug 18 00:28:42 2016 No.8409907 >>8406840 Did Twain and Wilde ever meet? They were contemporaries, more or less, and both spent significant time in the other's country.

>>	Anonymous Thu Aug 18 00:29:21 2016 No.8409908 >>8408608 Read Foucault

>>	Anonymous Thu Aug 18 00:32:13 2016 No.8409914 >>8409166 His essays

>>	Anonymous Thu Aug 18 00:40:39 2016 No.8409942 >>8405669 >ctrl+f >no mention of Max Beerbohm He may not be the kind of bon mots, but his essays are pretty gud if you want wit.

Anonymous Thu Aug 18 00:49:39 2016 No.8409967

>>8409907
I don't believe they did, but Whitman and Wilde met, and possibly fucked.
>Stoddart tactfully left the two poets alone. ‘If you are willing – will excuse me – I will go off for an hour or so – come back again – leaving you together,’ he said. ‘We would be glad to have you stay,’ Whitman replied. ‘But do not feel to come back in an hour. Don’t come for two or three.’ Whitman opened a bottle of elderberry wine and he and Oscar drank it all before Whitman suggested they go upstairs to his ‘den’ on the third floor where, he told Oscar, ‘We could be on ‘thee and thou’ terms.’

>>	Anonymous Thu Aug 18 00:53:13 2016 No.8409978 >>8409967 How scandalous.

>>	Anonymous Thu Aug 18 01:27:55 2016 No.8410068 >>8409967 Fascinating. Maybe Twain was there watching and jacking off.

>>	Anonymous Thu Aug 18 02:18:28 2016 No.8410152 File: 55 KB, 736x969, Dorothy Parker.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>8406804 This. Amazing in both wit and looks.

>>	Anonymous Thu Aug 18 02:21:55 2016 No.8410158 >>8405732 >>8406171 Check out Best of Enemies.

>>	Anonymous Thu Aug 18 02:28:06 2016 No.8410168 File: 40 KB, 850x400, bovian.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>8405669 Boris Vian might compare

>>	Anonymous Thu Aug 18 03:50:18 2016 No.8410279 For all his autism, John Stuart Mill could be quite witty at times, particularly his forays into public debate. Try reading his take-down of Burke or the slavery apologists of his day without smiling.

>>	Anonymous Thu Aug 18 03:59:03 2016 No.8410298 >>8407873 He was Irish m8

>>	Anonymous Thu Aug 18 05:58:48 2016 No.8410474 >>8405775 Nigga, please.

>>	Anonymous Thu Aug 18 06:05:03 2016 No.8410484 File: 31 KB, 355x480, GK Chesterton.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>8405669

Anonymous Thu Aug 18 13:32:33 2016 No.8411559
File: 93 KB, 620x388, gore-vidal.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]

>>8405717
you mean pic related Gore Vidal? He's so wooden when he sits down you can't tell which is the chair. His gravelly voice, mechanical movements and offputting facial features mean he shouldn't be mentioned in the same breath as the great Wilde.

>>	Anonymous Thu Aug 18 15:11:37 2016 No.8411817 >>8411559 that is because he is dead

>>	Anonymous Thu Aug 18 15:37:40 2016 No.8411885 File: 148 KB, 1000x843, and so on.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>8410484 Good post

>>	Anonymous Thu Aug 18 16:27:15 2016 No.8412014 >>8406840 vonnegut?

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