Word: argot
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This should reassure the suspicious modern that Homer's epic is not a supernatural swindle but the narrative of a man in trouble-the "first novel," as one translator put it-and that Fitzgerald's English version is in the crisp demotic argot of today. The new translation, however, does not skip or try to improve on the few familiar Homeric cliches: the sea is still "wine-dark" or "fish-cold"; the dawn is still "rosy-fingered...
...complicated rhyme scheme, and, most important, the delightfully naive ironies and anachorisms of the original. And even I, who barely understood French 20 lectures, could make out nearly every line. The lines that I didn't understand all came in a few tire-some and unnecessary scenes, full of argot about crap shooting and in-group references to the towns around Arras, which only the natives could understand. These scenes, despite some fine comic acting, bog down the middle of the play, and should have been...
...nations like the U.S. (where there are only 400 trained midwives) and Canada (where there are none), the midwife is often regarded as a sort of medieval social curiosity, on a par with the fortuneteller. In U.S. obstetrical argot, a clumsy delivery is a "midwife's job." This loss of stature was partly deserved. A generation ago, for example, all Moroccan births were handled by the tribal midwife (habla), whose actions were inspired more by superstition than by science. If the newborn Moroccan infant cried too loudly, the habla sliced the child's thorax...
...Lerner the book adapter and lyricist, Moss Hart the director, Julie Andrews one of the stars (Nov. 17). Irma la Douce, still running in Paris (nearly four years) and London (two years), and by far the most successful modern European musical, comes to Broadway still flavored with Parisian argot as it pursues the light, fantastic tale of a Paris poule or tart (Sept. 29). Multitalented Meredith (The Music Man) Willson takes his second shot at Broadway with The Unsinkable Molly Brown-a story of the Titanic disaster and a survivor otherwise known as Tammy Grimes (Nov. 3). Tenderloin, adapted...
When these miraculous, necessary days came, the Fourth Republic's disintegrating government slapped a 24-hour-a-day police guard on Soustelle. Grinning as he displays his knowledge of underworld argot, Soustelle recalls: "I decided to take a powder." With the professional expertise of the old spy master, Soustelle slipped out of his Paris apartment hidden under a pile of luggage in a neighbor's car and crossed the border to Switzerland ("Of course, I had a false identity"). Two days later he was in Algiers, whipping up the crowd with shouts of "Vive De Gaulle!" and working...