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S. J. Perelman: Crazy Like a Fox (paperback)

The Classic Comedy Collection

Introduction by Joshua Cohen More

All 50 selections from the 1947 expanded edition of Perelman’s classic anthology

Overview
Table of Contents

Overview

Story of the Week “Insert Flap ‘A’ and Throw Away,” S. J. Perelman
February 2, 2024

S. J. Perelman’s incomparable gift for wordplay, witticism, spoofery, and sheer nonsense never shone brighter than in this classic collection, now restored to print in a deluxe paperback edition. Here are such beloved gems as “Waiting for Santy: A Christmas Playlet,” a rollicking parody of Clifford Odets’s Waiting for Lefty, about seven proletariat gnomes toiling away in Santa’s North Pole sweatshop; the Joycean virtuoso performance “Scenario,” a spoof of a Hollywood pitch meeting that takes the form of a mishmash of movie clichés, showbiz argot, and popular slang; and “Farewell, My Lovely Appetizer,” Perelman’s homage to the hardboiled detective fiction of Raymond Chandler: “‘Hi,’ the blonde said lazily. ‘You Mike Noonan?’ I made a noise that could have been ‘Yes,’ and waited. She yawned. I thought things over, decided to play it safe. I yawned.”

In a playful, loving new introduction, Pulitzer Prize–winning novelist Joshua Cohen—himself an artful wordsmith and punster—sets up Perelman’s sui generis comic pieces for a new generation of readers certain to fall in love with a writer whose special gift, as The New York Times once described it, is the ability “to transform the common cliche or figure of speech into an exploding cigar.”

Sidney Joseph Perelman (1904–1979) was a longtime contributor to The New Yorker, in which he first published many of his humorous essays and sketches. He also wrote film scripts for the Marx Brothers and shared an Oscar in 1956 with James Poe and James Farrow for the screenplay of Around the World in Eighty Days.

Joshua Cohen is the author of The Netanyahus, winner of the 2022 Pulitzer Prize for fiction, and several other works, including the novels Witz, Book of Numbers, and Moving Kings, and the essay collection ATTENTION: Dispatches from a Land of Distraction.

The paperback edition features French flaps and has been printed on acid-free paper.
Table of Contents

Introduction by Joshua Cohen

Kitchen Bouquet
Somewhere a Roscoe . . .
Waiting for Santy
The Idol’s Eye
Beauty and the Bee
Is There an Osteosynchrondroitrician in the House?
Abby, This Is Your Father
Buffalos of the World, Unite!
Sauce for the Gander
Frou-Frou, or Vertigo Revisited
Scenario
A Farewell to Omsk
Nothing but the Tooth
Woodman, Don’t Spare that Tree!
Strictly from Hunger
P-s-s-t, Partner, Your Peristalsis Is Showing
A Pox on You, Mine Goodly Host
Slow—Dangerous Foibles Ahead!
Footnote on the Yellow Peril
Midwinter Facial Trends
Counter-Revolution
The Love Decoy
To Sleep, Perchance to Steam
Down with the Restoration!
The Body Beautiful
Poisonous Mushrooms
Button, Button, Who’s Got the Blend?
Boy Meets Girl Meets Foot
What Am I Doing Away from Home?
Hold that Christmas Tiger!
Smugglers in the Dust
Beat Me, Post-Impressionist Daddy
Tomorrow—Fairly Cloudy
Sweet and Hot
Seedlings of Desire
Kitchenware, Notions, Lights, Action, Camera!
Captain Future, Block that Kick!
Adorable, Taxable You
A Couple of Quick Ones
1. Arthur Kober
2. Vincente Minnelli
Avocado, or the Future of Eating
You Should Live So, Walden Pond
Swing Out, Sweet Chariot
Second-Class Matter
Wholly Cleaning and Dyeing
Well, Roll Me in a Turkish Towel!
Physician, Steel Thyself
Pale Hands I Loathe
Insert Flap “A” and Throw Away
Farewell, My Lovely Appetizer

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ISBN: 978-1-59853-778-9 308 pages

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