“They copied all they could follow
But they couldn’t copy my mind,
And I left ’em sweating and stealing,
A year and half behind.”
(Rudyard Kipling, 1865 – 1936)
John Lentell
October 9th, 1968
Monday’s Piece
“My tYpust is io her vacutiuon,
My trpist’s away fo r a week,
My trupdt us in hwr vacarion,
Wgile thse damu kews ploy hudge and seek.”
John Lentell
October 8th, 1968
Sunday’s Piece
“A politician thinks of the next election, a statesman of the next generation.”
John Lentell
October 7th, 1968
Saturday’s Piece
“There are no hopeless situations, there are only men who have grown hopeless about them.”
(Clare Booth Luce, 1903 – 1987)
John Lentell
October 6th, 1968
Friday’s Piece
“Hat: something the average man covers his head with, the beggar passes around, the statesman throws into the ring, and the politician talks thru.”
(Viking)
John Lentell
October 5th, 1968
Thursday’s Piece
” ‘My country, right or wrong’ is like saying,
‘My mother, drunk or sober.’ ”
(G.K. Chesterton, 1874-1936)
John Lentell
October 3rd, 1968
Wednesday’s Piece
“There was an old man who said, ‘Hush!
I perceive a young bird in this bush!”
When they said, ‘Is it small?’
He replied, ‘Not at all!’
It is four times as big as the bush!'”
(Edward Lear, 1812-1888)
John Lentell
October 1st, 1968
Tuesday’s Piece
“The only means of strengthening one’s intellect is to make up one’s mind about nothing – to let the mind be a thoroughfare for all thoughts. Not a select party.”
(John Keats, 1795-1821)
John Lentell
September 30th, 1968
Monday’s Piece
“Give me books, fruit, French wine and fine weather and a little music out of doors, played by somebody I do not know.”
(John Keats, 1795-1821)
John Lentell
September 29th, 1968
Sunday’s Piece
“There is a certain relief in change, even though it be from bad to worse; as I have found in travelling in a stage-coach, that it is often a comfort to shift one’s position and be bruised in a new place.”
(Washington Irving, 1783-1859)
John Lentell
September 28th, 1968
Saturday’s Piece
“In nature there are neither rewards nor punishments – there are consequences.”
(Robert Ingersoll, 1833-1899)
John Lentell
September 27th, 1968
Friday’s Piece
“If you become a nun, dear
A friar I will be.
In any cell you run, dear,
Pray look behind for me.”
(James Leigh Hunt, 1784-1859)
John Lentell
September 26th, 1968
Thursday’s Piece
“Democracy is only an experiment in government, and it has the obvious disadvantage of merely counting votes instead of weighing them.”
(William Inge, 1860-1954)
John Lentell
September 25th, 1968
Wednesday’s Piece
“Economy is going without something you do want in case you should, some day, want something you probably don’t want.”
(Anthony Hope, 1863-1933)
John Lentell
September 24th, 1968
Tuesday’s Piece
“When Eve upon the first of Men
The apple press’d with specious cant,
Oh! what a thousand pities then
That Adam was not Adamant!”
(Thomas Hood, 1799-1845)
John Lentell
September 23rd, 1968
Monday’s Piece
“It is love that I am seeking for,
But of a beautiful, unheard-of kind
That is not in the world.”
(Yeats, 1865 – 1939)
John Lentell
September 22nd, 1968
Sunday’s Piece
“Or to some coffee- house I stray,
For news, the manna of a day,
And from the hipp’d discourse gather
That politics go by the weather.”
(Matthew Green, 1696 – 1737)
John Lentell
September 21st, 1968
Saturday’s Piece
“I know no method to secure the repeal of bad or obnoxious laws so effective as their stringent execution.”
(Ulysses S. Grant, 1822 – 1885)
John Lentell
September 20th, 1968
Friday’s Piece
“She wears a chiffon nightie
In the summer when it’s hot.
She wears her woolly panties
In the winter when it’s not.
But often in the springtime,
And sometimes in the fall,
She slips between the sheets
With nothing on at all.”
(Lyric from parody on “The Merry Widow Waltz”)
John Lentell
September 19th, 1968
Soup du jour
In his time, John’s piece for the day absolutely aroused a wide spectrum of opinions and occasional emotive reaction. See LD’s memory for some insights.
Just so you know, I decided early on in this publishing venture to post every single “piece” I have, in the chronological order they were published originally. I’m not applying any editorial selectivity (which inevitably would reflect my subjective opinion, whatever that may be in this day and age and personal circumstance).
I started out being selective but quickly found myself in a moral dilemma – who was I to decide which “piece” might be interesting or worthy. John absolutely would have disapproved. I wrote a post about it early on.
So, please accept and be happily provoked by whatever comes each day, just as it happened in print 40 odd years ago. If nothing else, John would have enjoyed being provocative, in the purest sense.
Gour
Lentell Soup 