Them's Fightin' Words

 

            There's a great amount of artistry in writing an insult that won't get you branded as a meanie, but still gets a point across.

 

            Here are some great written taunts of the past. After you've studied them, see if you can go back and write a "topper," or at least one that's just as good, for each one:

 

"I feel so miserable without you, it's almost like having you here."

-- Stephen Bishop

 

"A modest little person, with much to be modest about."

-- Winston Churchill (about Clement Atlee)

 

"I've just learned about his illness.  Let's hope it's nothing trivial."

-- Irvin S. Cobb

 

"I have never killed a man, but I have read many obituaries with great pleasure."

-- Clarence Darrow

 

"He has never been known to use a word that might send a reader to the dictionary."

-- William Faulkner (about Ernest Hemingway)

 

"He is not only dull himself; he is the cause of dullness in others."

-- Samuel Johnson

 

"He had delusions of adequacy."

-- Walter Kerr

 

"I've had a perfectly wonderful evening.  But this wasn't it."

-- Groucho Marx

 

"They never open their mouths without subtracting from the sum of human knowledge."

-- Thomas Brackett Reed

 

"He loves nature in spite of what it did to him."

-- Forrest Tucker

 

"I didn't attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it."

-- Mark Twain

 

"His mother should have thrown him away and kept the stork."

-- Mae West

 

"Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go."

-- Oscar Wilde

 

"He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends."

-- Oscar Wilde

 

"He has Van Gogh's ear for music."

-- Billy Wilder

 

By Susan Darst Williams • www.GoBigEd.com • After School Treats 020 • © 2006