A large wardrobe of Humour's cast-off clothes

"Dry-goods! What are American dry-goods?" asked the Duchess, raising her large hands in wonder and accentuating the verb.

"American novels," answered Lord Henry, helping himself to some quail.

The duchess looked puzzled.

"Don't mind him, my dear," whispered Lady Agatha. "He never means anything that he says."

"When America was discovered," said the Radical member, and he began to give some wearisome facts. Like all people who try to exhaust a subject, he exhausted his listeners. The Duchess sighed and exercised her privilege of interruption. "I wish to goodness it never had been discovered at all!" she exclaimed. "Really, our girls have no chance nowadays. It is most unfair."

"Perhaps, after all, America never has been discovered," said Mr. Erskine; "I myself would say that it had merely been detected."

"Oh! but I have seen specimens of the inhabitants," answered the duchess vaguely. "I must confess that most of them are extremely pretty. And they dress well, too. They get all their dresses in Paris. I wish I could afford to do the same."

"They say that when good Americans die they go to Paris," chuckled Sir Thomas, who had a large wardrobe of Humour's cast-off clothes.

"Really! And where do bad Americans go to when they die?" inquired the duchess.

"They go to America," murmured Lord Henry. [182]

Wilde, Oscar. The Picture of Dorian Gray. In Aldington, Richard & Weintraub, Stanley (eds). The Portable Oscar Wilde. Viking, 1981. ISBN: 0140150935.

Secret Names

"Dorian Gray? Is that his name?" asked Lord Henry, walking across the studio towards Basil Hallward.

"Yes, that is his name. I didn't intend to tell it to you."

"But why not?"

"Oh, I can't explain. When I like people immensely I never tell their names to anyone. It seems like surrendering a part of them. I have grown to love secrecy. It seems to be the one thing that can make modern life mysterious or marvellous to us. The commonest thing is delightful if one only hides it." [143]

Wilde, Oscar. The Picture of Dorian Gray. In Aldington, Richard & Weintraub, Stanley (eds). The Portable Oscar Wilde. Viking, 1981. ISBN: 0140150935.

for Sven, Rik, and Nigel

Cabins on the Cape Fear River

Mr. Burns had set up a small artistic community down in the Carolinas, on a particularly wild, changing edge of the Atlantic, at the place where the Cape Fear River empties into the sea. He'd sold a little community of about twelve quixotic, sunstruck cabins on spindly stilts to various artists -- novelists, painters, potters, actors, musicians -- most of them from New York City.
[...]
Of course these buildings had been about to fall into the sea. This had been apparent even to the untrained eye. Perhaps Mr. Burns hadn't told this to the artists directly, but they should have noticed. I was surprised actually that the place lasted as long as it did -- over three years. But after a few intersections of the high tide with the full moon, and three small hurricanes, the houses came down, crouching at first like injured, long-legged animals, then fully kneeling, bowing, their shoulders to the earth. The photographs of the buildings that now hung at the front of the courtroom, as the prosecution built its case, were vivid reminders that everything is brought to its knees, everything except the sea. I thought this was exactly the kind of lesson artists were always trying to learn, and I believed they should have all cut their losses and run. [36-37]

Lee, Rebecca. The City is a Rising Tide. Simon & Schuster, 2006. ISBN: 0743276655.

She looked more than ever like Harry Truman

There was a big brass latch on the wall. Howard jiggled it and finally it slipped free and the bed fell out on top of him. It took him by surprise and almost knocked him down but he kept his footing and managed to push the bed back into the wall. Then he read the barometer and opened and closed the drawers. The upper drawers contained several bars of soap in miniature packets. Howard slipped a few in his pocket and opened the porthole and stuck his head out. Other people had their heads stuck out too. He battened the porthole and read the barometer again, then picked up the intercom.

"Testing," he said. "One two three four testing. Night Raider this is Black Hawk. Testing."
A voice crackled from the speaker. "Steward here."
"It's me, Howard. Just testing. Over and out."
Nora came back into the cabin and made her way to the couch. "It's too small in there. I couldn't breathe."
"I could have told you this wouldn't be any palace."
"I feel awful. I bet I look awful too."
Nora's face had gone white. The burst veins in her cheeks and along her upper lip stood out like notations on a map. Her eyes glittered feverishly behind her spectacles. Sick, she looked more than ever like Harry Truman, for whom Howard had not voted. [89-90]

from 'Maiden Voyage'

Wolff, Tobias. In the Garden of the North American Martyrs : stories. ISBN: 0912946822.

Traceleen Turns East

While we waited for November we decided to try yoga. Miss Crystal found this young woman named Ruthie Horowitz who agreed to come on Tuesday and Thursday mornings and teach us how to do it. It is the ancient art of India and the kind Miss Horowitz teaches is called Mahayana yoga. These postures, as they are called, are like very slow exercises. The stretch out parts of your body you didn't know you had and call attention to the fact that you are made of flesh and blood. Most people walking around now never give that a thought. They have forgotten they are breathing and think the main thing they are here for is to drive cars and go to the mall. This yoga gets you back to thinking about what you are really made of.

At first I didn't want to do it with them but Miss Crystal insisted that I give it a try. She is always worrying about my blood pressure so the first thing I knew there I was pulling myself into postures and breathing into my chakras, which is what you call the different parts of the spiritual development. This is all from the Hindu religion. My pastor at my church said not to worry, it wouldn't hurt me to see some heathen practices and might give me something to tell my Sunday school class about. [117-118]

from 'Traceleen Turns East'

Gilchrist, Ellen. Light Can Be Both Wave and Particle : stories. Little, Brown, 1989. ISBN: 0316313122.

Let it come to me

Her voice was as beautiful as the song of birds, more beautiful than temple bells. Her voice was light made manifest. Now Lin Tan's throat was thick with desire. He suffered it. There was nothing in the world as beautiful as her face, her voice, her hands, the smell of her dress. She took a small blue flower from the bouquet on the table and twisted it between her fingers. She looked at him. She returned his look. This was the moment men live for. This was philosophy and reason. Shiva, Beatrice, the dance of birth and death. If I enter into this moment, Lin Tan knew, I will be changed forever. If I refuse this moment then I will go about the world as an old man goes, with no hope, no songs to sing, no longing or desire, no miracles of sunlight. So I will allow this to happen to me. As if a man can refuse his destiny. As if the choice were mine. Let it come to me. [66]

from 'Light Can Be Both Wave and Particle'

Gilchrist, Ellen. Light Can Be Both Wave and Particle : stories. Little, Brown, 1989. ISBN: 0316313122.

I will include my fingerprints

My name is Rhoda Katherine Manning. I weigh 82. We are in a war. They might come at any minute. I have auburn hair and brown eyes. I was born on a plantation in the Delta and as soon as the war is over I'll be going back. Mrs. Allen's son died in the war. She has a gold star in the window and I go and visit her quite frequently. The pope wouldn't let her be my brother's godmother. She isn't allowed to go inside our church. No one tells me what to do. I am just like my father.

Well, I see I am running out of paper. When you find this think of me. It is summer and the sun is shining and everything is fine around here so far. I will include my fingerprints.

Yours truly,
Rhoda Manning

[18-19]

from 'The Time Capsule'

Gilchrist, Ellen. Light Can Be Both Wave and Particle : stories. Little, Brown, 1989. ISBN: 0316313122.

Life, the Universe and Everything

There are of course many problems connected with life, of which some of the most popular are Why are people born? Why do they die? Why do they want to spend so much of the intervening time wearing digital watches? [166]

"Seven and a half million years our race has waited for this Great and Hopefully Enlightening Day!" cried the cheerleader. "The Day of the Answer!"
[...]
"Never again," cried the man, "never again will we wake up in the morning and think Who am I? What is my purpose in life? Does it really, cosmically speaking, matter if I don't get up and go to work? For today we will finally learn once and for all the plain and simple answer to all these nagging little problems of Life, the Universe and Everything!" [176-177]

"You know," said Arthur thoughtfully, "all this explains a lot of things. All through my life I've had this strange unaccountable feeling that something was going on in the world, something big, even sinister, and no one would tell me what it was."

"No," said the old man, "that's just perfectly normal paranoia. Everyone in the Universe has that." [191]

Adams, Douglas. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Harmony Books, 2004. ISBN: 1400052920.

So long and thanks for all the fish

It is an important and popular fact that things are not always what they seem. For instance, on the planet Earth, man had always assumed that he was more intelligent than dolphins because he had achieved so much - the wheel, New York, wars and so on - while all the dolphins had ever done was muck about in the water having a good time. But conversely, the dolphins had always believed that they were far more intelligent than man - for precisely the same reasons.

Curiously enough, the dolphins had long known of the impending destruction of the planet Earth and had made many attempts to alert mankind of the danger; but most of their communications were misinterpreted as amusing attempts to punch footballs or whistle for tidbits, so they eventually gave up and left the Earth by their own means shortly before the Vogons arrived.

The last ever dolphin message was misinterpreted as a surprisingly sophisticated attempt to do a double-backwards-somersault through a hoop while whistling the "Star Sprangled Banner", but in fact the message was this: So long and thanks for all the fish.

In fact there was only one species on the planet more intelligent than dolphins, and they spent a lot of their time in behavioral research laboratories running round inside wheels and conducting frighteningly elegant and subtle experiments on man. The fact that once again man completely misinterpreted this relationship was entirely according to these creatures' plans. [156-157]

Adams, Douglas. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Harmony Books, 2004. ISBN: 1400052920.

There was a terrible ghastly silence.

Only one man stood and watched the sky, stood with terrible sadness in his eyes and rubber bungs in his ears. He knew exactly what was happening and had known ever since his Sub-Etha Sens-O-Matic had started winking in the dead of night beside his pillow and wakened him with a start. It was what he had waited for all these years, but when he had deciphered the signal pattern sitting alone in his small dark room a coldness had gripped him and squeezed his heart. Of all the races in all of the Galaxy who could have come and said a big hello to planet Earth, he thought, didn't it just have to be the Vogons. [33-34]

Adams, Douglas. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Harmony Books, 2004. ISBN: 1400052920.