The World in a Phrase: A Brief History of the Aphorism
by
James Geary
Order:
USA
Can
Bloomsbury, 2006 (2006)
Paperback
Reviewed by Hilary Williamson
W
hat's an
aphorism
, you ask? James Geary, a self-confessed
aphorism addict
, tells us that a compact definition is impossible, but offers
Five Laws
instead for these nuggets of ageless wisdom. An aphorism must be brief, definitive, personal, philosophical, and have a twist (like the best of classic SF). Geary tells us that '
You don't curl up with a good book of aphorisms; they leap off the page and unfurl inside you ... They make you question everything you think and do.
'
G
eary groups aphorisms in
The World in a Phrase
by periods:
Ancient Sages, Preachers, and Prophets
;
Greek and Roman Stoics
;
French and Spanish Moralists
;
Heretics, Dissenters, and Skeptics
;
The Rise of the American One-Liner
;
In Praise of Light Verse
; and
The Aphorism Today
. He gives an explanation for each saying. Here are some that leap off the page to me. Buddha said on his deathbed '
Be lamps unto yourselves.
' Muhammad believed that '
The ink of the scholar is more holy than the blood of the martyr.
'
N
ietzsche felt that '
One repays a teacher badly if one always remains nothing but a pupil.
' Twain lived by the aphorism, '
Irreverence is the champion of liberty, and its only sure defense.
' Speaking of irreverence, Ambrose Bierce (author of
The Devil's Dictionary
) is in here. Fitzgerald's version of
The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam
is quoted from, as is Dr. Seuss. And we hear from Emily Dickinson - '
Who goes to dine must take his Feast / Or find the Banquet mean - / The Table is not laid without / Till it is laid within.
'
T
hough many of these older aphorisms will be familiar to you, Geary's analyses enrich them. And he's picked interesting ones from relatively modern times, like Karl Kraus's '
Art serves to rinse out our eyes
', or Stanislaw Jerzy Lec's '
No snowflake in an avalanche ever feels responsible.
' Geary ends with his own view that '
Aphorisms are the real elixir of life.
'
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