| Author | Message | ||
     Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 82.3.65.135 |
On decidedly safer ground than certain other threads  , I'd like to offer the cheering thread of "funniest single line in fiction". Here's one of my favourites: Barry Taylor in Auf Wiedersehen, Pet trying to chat up some girls in a cafe: "Do you want to come back to our hut?" [apologies to non-British members] | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 89.19.73.68 |
In print, Bertie Wooster has hidden something embarrasing in a chest of drawers from an angry older man: "It's locked. And all that sort of thing." | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.145.131.124 |
Chapter heading from this beautiful William Morris book I'm reading; 'A Downright Nay-say.' | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
"I was on my knees, and on the point of possessing my darling, when two bearded bathers, the old man of the sea and his brother, came out of the sea with exclamations of ribald encouragement, and four months later she died of typhus in Corfu." It isn't only funny - it's a great deal more - but part of the (very dark) comedy seems to me to relate to the telescoping of material as well as the inspired choice of words. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
Here's one that always amuses me: "The only way to prepare for a trip like this was to dress up like human peacocks and get crazy..." | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
The whole passage: "But first we need the car. And after that, the cocaine. And then the tape recorder, for special music, and some Acapulco shirts. The only way to prepare for a trip like this was to dress up like human peacocks and get crazy, then screech off across the desert and cover the story." | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
I'm with you, Zed - I've always found that book horribly hilarious. | ||
| Alansjf (Alansjf) Username: Alansjf Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 93.97.93.216 |
"I never fucked a dead cat," Odd Willie tells her. "If Barnaby said that, he was lying." It's out of context here of course, but it might help to add that these are the first words out of Odd willie's mouth when he's introduced to another character in the book. The timing is just perfect. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.143.178.131 |
I've always thought Mike Marshall Smith was brilliant at injecting humour into his fiction. My favourite line from Spares is: "He was as thick as three types of shit in a one shit bag." Also, Only Forward has a fantastic description of a guy trying to crawl across his room to get to a pack of cigarettes, then giving up half way and going back to get more cigarettes. I seem to remember the promo tagline for the book was: "What do I know? I'm just a fucking fridge." Come back to us MMS, leave these dark thrillers you pen and return to the glory days of your first three. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.154.242.64 |
He never left us - I've really enjoyed pretty much all of his stuff, whether thriller or sf | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.76.229 |
Excuse my ignorance, but it might be good to add the sources of these quotes. Zed's is from Fear and Loathing, yes? | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
It is. And mine comes from Lolita. | ||
| Alansjf (Alansjf) Username: Alansjf Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 93.97.93.216 |
I took mine from Caitlin R. Kiernan's novel Daughter of Hounds. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.76.229 |
Ah-ha! Here's Martin Amis's John Self from Money responding to nature: "As I walked home through streets the colour of oyster and carbon the air suddenly shivered and shook its coat, like a wet dog, like the surface of worried water. I paused--we all did--and lifted my face to the sky, as a slave or animal might lift its face, fearing punishment but risking it anyway... 'Okay. Show me something,' I said, and wiped my face with my hand. Up in the clear distance basked a hollow pink cloud, a rosy cusp fastened by tendrils at either end, like a vertical eye, a vertical mouth. In its core lay a creaturely essence, meticulous, feminine... Wait... the rose, the mouth, the glint. Come on, if that is what it looked like then that is what it looked like. I am probably not alone in supposing that I am shaped by how I see things. And that cloud up there certainly looked like a pussy to me." | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.76.229 |
(It's the last line, of course, I'm referring to, but as usual it needs context.) | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
"You're leaving? Help yourself to a big slice of fuck off on the way out." from THE UNBLEMISHED by Conrad Williams | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
I don't recall the whole sentence, but a Ronald Firbank story has something about a wave on a Mediterranean beach "returning another ineligible bachelor to the prose of shore". Pure genius. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
Another Wodehouse quote – after Bertie Wooster's Aunt Agatha has tried to fix him up with an intellectual young woman, he says to Jeeves: "Just imagine – she wanted me to read Nietzsche!" Jeeves replies: "Indeed, sir. You would not have enjoyed Nietzsche, sir. He is fundamentally unsound." | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
"He grew up in Ohio, though not very far." – from autobiographical note by Harlan Ellison in 'The New York Review of Bird' | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
The closing line of 'The Night Before Christmas' by Robert Bloch. To quote it would spoil the story... | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.76.216 |
That is a good line, isn't it? I like the last line of Dahl's 'Man From The South' for much the same reason. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.76.216 |
Typical of a horror message board to start coming up with the blackest of comic lines. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.234.91 |
Is that the one about decorating the Xmas tree? | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.76.216 |
Yes, but sssshhhh. Some people haven't read it. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.234.91 |
That was one of Bloch's favourite devices, akin to "I wish I had her hands" (from "Block That Metaphor!") or his statement that he has the heart of a little boy - pickled in a jar on his desk. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
Are we just talking about books? My favourite funny line in film is "I'm not!" ffrom Life of Brian. Obviously without the context of the previous lines "You are all individuals!" "We are all individuals!" it lacks a little something | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
She had a voice like a cow yodelling down a mineshaft, after having first fallen down the mineshaft. Toby litt - I play the drums in a band called okay | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.154.242.64 |
Yes, but sssshhhh. Some people haven't read it. In that case they shouldn't be here! | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
"This is your new partner, Miss havisham." "The Miss Havisham?..." "Yes, don't worry, you'll get on fine with her, just don't mention the wedding." Lost in a good book - Jasper Fforde | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.29.105.209 |
"If the Necronomicon actually existed, it would be out in Bantam paperback with a preface by Lin Carter." T.E.D. Klein -- 'Black Man with a Horn' | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.247.34 |
Stu - ha! Of course... the fact I find that funny, makes me a terribly hopeless and out-of-date nerd.... | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.234.91 |
There is actually an Avon paperback called NECRONOMICON (1980) . . . | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.247.34 |
But it's Lin Carter that makes it funny. And me a nerd. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.114.128 |
My William Morris book in that Bantam series is quite lovely. So lucid and strange. | ||
| Albie (Albie) Username: Albie Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 87.102.81.100 |
IS this that film you were talking about earlier, Tone? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eating_Raoul | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.114.128 |
 | ||
| Albie (Albie) Username: Albie Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 87.102.81.100 |
Did you read my email? IS that a KISS? You know that infuriates me.  | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.154.242.64 |
 | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.217.212 |
'What do jaguars do?' said Piglet, hoping they wouldn't. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.234.91 |
"Sugar?" "I don't, thank you." "I rather do these days. I've given in." | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 79.187.206.46 |
Jonathan - 'Only Forward' is full of laugh out loud and piss your pants at the same time moments all the way through. Smith is a genius, but admiteddly I'm new to his work. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
"Bother!" said Pooh, and hid Piglet's corpse. Not actually a line from any recognised fiction but I like it | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 79.187.206.46 |
Still taking drugs, mate. |