WeRead Powered by ReaderPub
Bottoms Up: An Application of the Slapstick to Satire cover

Bottoms Up: An Application of the Slapstick to Satire

Chapter 92: A FRENCH VEST POCKET DICTIONARY
By George Jean Nathan
Open in WeRead

Explore more books like this:

American LiteratureEssays, Letters & SpeechesHumour

About This Book

A lively assortment of satirical pieces that deploy slapstick, parody and critical wit against theatrical clichés and social pretensions. The book combines short comic dramas, lampooning sketches, mock practical guides and playful glossaries with essays and vignette-style scenes, shifting between stagewise set-pieces and faux-instructional formats. Through exaggerated situations, ironic commentary and burlesque forms it skewers popular tastes and received manners while showcasing a brisk, conversational comic voice that favors deflation and farce over earnest moralizing.

A FRENCH VEST POCKET DICTIONARY

Containing such words and phrases, together with their pronunciation and meaning, as are necessary to the proper and complete understanding of the American “society play” in which they are generally employed.

Word or Phrase Pronunciation Meaning
beau idéal bue idol To smoke a cigarette in a long holder.
au fait aw fête To wear an artificial gardenia in the lapel of one’s evening coat.
comme il faut comma ill faugh Literally: “As it should be.” To appear in the drawing-room in white tennis flannels.
billet doux Billie Deuce Anything written on lavender stationery.
bon soir bun sour Greetings!
valet valley A comedy-relief Jap.
ennui en-wee To glance nonchalantly through Town Topics, yawn and throw it back on the table.
égalité egg-all-light Literally: “equality.” A servant who, learning that his master is in financial straits, offers him, with tears in his eyes, his own meagre savings.
double entente dub’l on-tunder Any remark about a bed.
distingué dis-tang-way A gentleman with a goatee.
Céléste[2] Seal-lest The lady-friend of the producer.
coup d’état coop de tate Sneaking the married heroine unobserved out of the bachelor apartment by letting her wear the housekeeper’s cloak.
gendarme John Domme An English actor in a New York traffic policeman’s uniform.
entrée entry A papier-maché duck.
faux pas for Pa To wear the handkerchief in the pocket.
petite potate Designation of the one hundred and seventy-two pound ingénue.
qui vive key weave To step quickly on tiptoe to the door and listen, before going on with the conversation.
sang froid sang freud Leisurely to extract a cigarette from a gold cigarette-case.
garçon gar-sun A bad actor who imitates Figman’s performance in “Divorcons.”
en déshabillé N. de Shabell Literally: “In undress.” That is, dressed up in a couple of thousand dollars’ worth of lingerie.
mésalliance mess alliance Any girl whom the son of the family desires, in the first act, to marry.
en règle in riggle A butler who waits until the visitor has entered the drawing-room before taking his hat and stick.
à la mode allah mode Tea at two o’clock in the afternoon.

[2] The maid.