Anguished English Review

I’d like to review Richard Lederer’s Anguished English. For the most part, I found it to be a good introduction to class. It loosened things up and promoted a friendly classroom environment. Not to mention it got us all laughing before we began our discussion for the day. I’ve selected a few of the funnier excerpts and gave some commentary.

It takes about ten years to get used to how old you are.

This quote can be found towards the top of page 84. I find this absurd quote to be hilarious. While I don’t consider this a textbook cognitive shift like we have discussed throughout the semester, I think it possesses many of the necessary qualities, namely a component that is incongruous with reality. It lacked the traditional setup that comes to mind when I think about a cognitive shift. Regardless, the joke generates laughter through incongruity. Obviously, by the time you get used to how old you are, you’ll be ten years older. Altogether, great joke.

The bride was wearing an old lace gown that fell to the floor as she came down the aisle.

Weren’t we warned about this sort of sentence structure in 8^th grade? A classic example of misguided good intention, this quote contains pieces of relief theory, though it doesn’t fit the relief theory perfectly. At first, I was under the impression that this poor woman’s lace gown fell to the floor during her entry to the chapel. After realizing that this was certainly not the case I laughed, glad to discover that this woman was not forced to suffer through such a thoroughly awkward situation. In a sense, I was relieved to discover that the author made a mistake instead of the dressmaker.

Go see it and see for yourself why you shouldn’t see it.

I feel like I’ve wanted to say this about so many movies. After trying to explain why a movie isn’t worth watching for several minutes with no success, I ought to move on to this sort of approach.  I’d consider this a cognitive in that the setup was incongruous with the second half of the sentence.

Anguished English served its purpose well. It was an effective way to begin class once a week and got the conversation started. Aside from that, I didn’t much care for Anguished English. The majority of the jokes/mistakes weren’t very humorous whatsoever, so I found myself waiting several pages between laughs.