what a paragraph .........

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

[ ladre di saponette filum sounds a hoot!

this looks fun too http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oX2Xr...eature=related (jean's help required on the italian)?

That is from Icicle Thief: Nichetti himself playing the sound effects man who gradually turns into one of his own cartoon characters!

[handsomefortune]

[umslopogaas]

#7 vinteuil and #13 S-A. Orwell could be very funny when he chose a light-hearted subject, eg 'The Art of Donald McGill' where he discusses seaside comic postcards: outrageous double entendres and fat ladies in tight bathing dresses. A sample:

'I like seeing experienced girls home.'
'But I'm not experienced!'
'You're not home yet!'

Judge: You are prevaricating sir. Did you or did you not sleep with this woman?'
Co-respondent: 'Not a wink, my lord.'

He mentions Max Miller, but not my favourite Miller joke:

'I say I say I say, I was walking home last night across a narrow bridge when I met a pretty girl coming towards me. I didnt know whether to block her passage or toss myself off.'

For which, I believe, he was sacked by the BBC.

And S-A, tee hee, I know that story, but I thought it was the blue one.

[Serial_Apologist]

And S-A, tee hee, I know that story, but I thought it was the blue one.

I voted LibDem at the 2010 election, unslop...

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

#7 vinteuil and #13 S-A. Orwell could be very funny when he chose a light-hearted subject, eg 'The Art of Donald McGill' where he discusses seaside comic postcards: outrageous double entendres and fat ladies in tight bathing dresses. A sample:

'I like seeing experienced girls home.'
'But I'm not experienced!'
'You're not home yet!'

Judge: You are prevaricating sir. Did you or did you not sleep with this woman?'
Co-respondent: 'Not a wink, my lord.'

Customer in newsagents (to young woman shop assistant): Excuse me, Miss; do you keep stationery?
Shop Assistant: Well, sometimes I wriggles a bit.

[Serial_Apologist]

Customer in newsagents (to young woman shop assistant): Excuse me, Miss; do you keep stationery?
Shop Assistant: Well, sometimes I wriggles a bit.

Man to woman in miniskirt: "you must get chillblains between your thighs in cold weather like this." Woman to man: "No, only chaps!"

"My goodness, I seem to be all behind today" said the woman in the works canteen. "Not from where I'm standing!", I told her in my best imitation Frankie Howerd.

[Pianorak]

What a paragraph and a half:

Then he went more closely into our stock of gold, discussed the natural inability of the people to pay heavy taxes, described the reckless finance of earlier periods. Thereupon he added up the figures of the State debt, which Herr von Knobelsdorff forced the Prince to repeat several times. They reached six hundred millions.

The lesson extended further to the debentures, conditions for interest and repayment. It came back to Doctor Krippenreuther's present anxiety, and described the seriousness of the situation. Suddenly pulling the “Annual of the Statistical Bureau” out of his pocket, Herr von Knobelsdorff instructed his pupil in the harvest returns for the previous years, summed up the untoward events which had caused their decline, pointed to the deficiencies in the taxes, the figures of which he had brought with him, and referred to the underfed adults and children whom one might see throughout the country-side. Then he turned to the general condition of the gold market, discoursed on the rise in the value of gold and the general economic unsoundness. Klaus Heinrich learned also about the lowness of the Exchange, the restlessness of the creditors, the leakage of gold, and the bank smashes; he saw our credit shaken, our paper valueless, and grasped to the full that the raising of a new loan was almost impossible.

Thomas Mann: Royal Highness (1909)

[Serial_Apologist]

What a paragraph and a half:

Then he went more closely into our stock of gold, discussed the natural inability of the people to pay heavy taxes, described the reckless finance of earlier periods. Thereupon he added up the figures of the State debt, which Herr von Knobelsdorff forced the Prince to repeat several times. They reached six hundred millions.

The lesson extended further to the debentures, conditions for interest and repayment. It came back to Doctor Krippenreuther's present anxiety, and described the seriousness of the situation. Suddenly pulling the “Annual of the Statistical Bureau” out of his pocket, Herr von Knobelsdorff instructed his pupil in the harvest returns for the previous years, summed up the untoward events which had caused their decline, pointed to the deficiencies in the taxes, the figures of which he had brought with him, and referred to the underfed adults and children whom one might see throughout the country-side. Then he turned to the general condition of the gold market, discoursed on the rise in the value of gold and the general economic unsoundness. Klaus Heinrich learned also about the lowness of the Exchange, the restlessness of the creditors, the leakage of gold, and the bank smashes; he saw our credit shaken, our paper valueless, and grasped to the full that the raising of a new loan was almost impossible.

Thomas Mann: Royal Highness (1909)

Indeed, Pianorak - complete fiction, of course...

[french frank]

And on the subject of 'Royal Highness':

What person, unacquainted with the true state of the case, would imagine, in reading these astounding eulogies, that this "Glory of the People" was the subject of millions of shrugs and reproaches! - that this "Protector of the Arts" had named a wretched Foreigner his Historical Painter in disparagement or in ignorance of the merits of his own countrymen! - that this "Mecaenas of the Age" patronized not a single deserving writer! - that this "Breather of Eloquence" could not say a few decent extempore words, if we are to judge, at least, from what he said to his regiment on its embarkation to Portugal! - that this "Conqueror of Hearts" was the disappointer of hopes! that this "Exciter of Desire" - this "Adonis in loveliness", was a corpulent man of fifty! - in short, this delightful, blissful, wise, pleasurable, honourable, virtuous, true, and immortal prince, was a violator of his word, a libertine over head and ears in debt and disgrace, a despiser of domestic ties, the companion of gamblers and demireps, a man who had just closed half a century without one single claim on the gratitude of his country, or the respect of posterity!

These are hard truths; but are they not truths?

[Serial_Apologist]

And on the subject of 'Royal Highness':

What person, unacquainted with the true state of the case, would imagine, in reading these astounding eulogies, that this "Glory of the People" was the subject of millions of shrugs and reproaches! - that this "Protector of the Arts" had named a wretched Foreigner his Historical Painter in disparagement or in ignorance of the merits of his own countrymen! - that this "Mecaenas of the Age" patronized not a single deserving writer! - that this "Breather of Eloquence" could not say a few decent extempore words, if we are to judge, at least, from what he said to his regiment on its embarkation to Portugal! - that this "Conqueror of Hearts" was the disappointer of hopes! that this "Exciter of Desire" - this "Adonis in loveliness", was a corpulent man of fifty! - in short, this delightful, blissful, wise, pleasurable, honourable, virtuous, true, and immortal prince, was a violator of his word, a libertine over head and ears in debt and disgrace, a despiser of domestic ties, the companion of gamblers and demireps, a man who had just closed half a century without one single claim on the gratitude of his country, or the respect of posterity!

These are hard truths; but are they not truths?

Come on, french frank; give us a clue then!

[french frank]

Come on, french frank; give us a clue then!

Leigh Hunt writing in The Examiner in (I think) 1812. It was in response to a smarmy poem of eulogy addressed to the Prince Regent - I think the phrases in quotes were lifted from the poem.

The paragraph was considered libellous, Hunt and his brother were tried and both sentenced to two years in prison and fined £500. Some people here should be glad it couldn't happen now

There's a lovely passage where he describes how he had his prison room decorated with flowery wall paper and a ceiling to look like the sky. Plus piano ...

I know, this is probably a bigger clue than you wanted ...

[Serial_Apologist]

Leigh Hunt writing in The Examiner in (I think) 1812. It was in response to a smarmy poem of eulogy addressed to the Prince Regent - I think the phrases in quotes were lifted from the poem.

The paragraph was considered libellous, Hunt and his brother were tried and both sentenced to two years in prison and fined £500. Some people here should be glad it couldn't happen now

There's a lovely passage where he describes how he had his prison room decorated with flowery wall paper and a ceiling to look like the sky. Plus piano ...

I know, this is probably a bigger clue than you wanted ...

Just the right size, thanks ff!

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

Some people here should be glad it couldn't happen now

aiyam aiyam!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

How did we get here? In 1981, with inflation and unemployment at 10 per cent plus, with the recently elected Conservative government forced to yield to the demands of the miners, public spending cuts provoking general outrage and Thatcher’s prime ministerial career seemingly doomed to a swift, ignominious end, a 38-year-old economist from Birmingham University called Stephen Littlechild was working on ways to realise an esoteric idea that had been much discussed in radical Tory circles: privatisation. Privatisation was not a Thatcher patent. The Spanish economist Germà Bel traces the origins of the word to the German word Reprivatisierung, first used in English in 1936 by the Berlin correspondent of the Economist, writing about Nazi economic policy. In 1943, in an analysis of Hitler’s programme in the Quarterly Journal of Economics, the word ‘privatisation’ entered the academic literature for the first time. The author, Sidney Merlin, wrote that the Nazi Party ‘facilitates the accumulation of private fortunes and industrial empires by its foremost members and collaborators through “privatisation” and other measures, thereby intensifying centralisation of economic affairs and government in an increasingly narrow group that may for all practical purposes be termed the national socialist elite’.

from

[Serial_Apologist]

from

Good artlcle, thanks calum - or what I've read of it.

I remember well the denationalisation of the company I was working for in the 1980s. The joint union confederation at the different plants around the country, with heavy Communist Party involvement, argued that the compensatory free share offer to each worker would at last give a much-welcomed stake in the company. And compete workers in other competing companies out of jobs, I pointed out, adding that they'd fallen hook line and sinker.