Description
History, n. an account mostly false, of events mostly unimportant, which are brought about by rulers mostly knaves, and soldiers mostly fools. Marriage, n. The state or condition of a community consisting of a master, a mistress, and two slaves, making in all two. Self-Esteem, n. An erroneous appraisement.
These caustic aphorisms, collected in The Devil's Dictionary, helped earn Ambrose Bierce the epithets Bitter Bierce, the Devil's Lexicographer, and the Wickedest Man in San Francisco. First published as The Cynic's Word Book (1906) and later reissued under its preferred name in 1911, Bierce's notorious collection of barbed definitions forcibly contradicts Samuel Johnson's earlier definition of a lexicographer as a harmless drudge. There was nothing harmless about Ambrose Bierce, and the words he shaped into verbal pitchforks a century ago--with or without the devil's help--can still draw blood today.
Author: Ambrose Bierce
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 01/07/1999
Pages: 256
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.70lbs
Size: 8.40h x 5.40w x 0.90d
ISBN13: 9780195126273
ISBN10: 0195126270
BISAC Categories:
- Reference | Dictionaries
- Humor | Form | Parodies
- History | United States | Civil War Period (1850-1877)
These caustic aphorisms, collected in The Devil's Dictionary, helped earn Ambrose Bierce the epithets Bitter Bierce, the Devil's Lexicographer, and the Wickedest Man in San Francisco. First published as The Cynic's Word Book (1906) and later reissued under its preferred name in 1911, Bierce's notorious collection of barbed definitions forcibly contradicts Samuel Johnson's earlier definition of a lexicographer as a harmless drudge. There was nothing harmless about Ambrose Bierce, and the words he shaped into verbal pitchforks a century ago--with or without the devil's help--can still draw blood today.
Author: Ambrose Bierce
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 01/07/1999
Pages: 256
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.70lbs
Size: 8.40h x 5.40w x 0.90d
ISBN13: 9780195126273
ISBN10: 0195126270
BISAC Categories:
- Reference | Dictionaries
- Humor | Form | Parodies
- History | United States | Civil War Period (1850-1877)
About the Author
Roy Morris, Jr., is the editor of America's Civil War and the author of Ambrose Bierce: Alone in Bad Company and Sheridan: The Life and Wars of General Phil Sheridan. He lives in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
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