Rating: 
Summary: good clean witty fun
Review: This little book is a great way to put things in percpective. Its witty humor and precise sarcastic definitions will take the edge of any bad day.
Rating:
Summary: An American classic
Review: This should be on your shelves right next to Roget's and Bartlett's. It's not just one of the funniest assemblages in the English language, it's a standard reference. Although written over a hundred years ago, most of it is just as fresh as today's headlines.
Patriotism, n.: Combustible rubbish ready to the torch of anyone ambitious to illuminate his name.
It's cynical, literate, and sharply pointed. With over 1000 definitions, it has something to say about most of the human condition.
Jealous, adj.: Unduly concerned about that which can be lost only if it is not worth keeping.
Somehow, Bierce maintains good humor, of a sort, throughout the entire listing. That makes it equally valueable no matter how you use it: read straight through, flipped to a random page, or used to answer specific questions. And of course, it offers the perfect description of every term.
Dictionary, n.: A malevolent literary device for cramping the growth of language and making it hard and inelastic. This dictionary, however, is a most useful work.
//wiredweird
Rating:
Summary: Witty little dictionary
Review: Webster's this ain't. Ambrose Bierce, a very angry and witty man, wrote down his personal definitions (1881 to 1906) of various things and concepts, which were eventually compiled into "The Devil's Dictionary." The result is immensely funny in a twisted kind of way.A bigot is "one who is obstinately and zealously attached to an opinion that you do not share." Disobedience is "the silver lining on the cloud of servitude." Brute is "see: Husband." Patience is "a minor form of despair, disguised as a virtue." Philosophy is "a route of many roads leading from nowhere to nothing." And that's just a few... Weirdly funny, twistingly witty. It's an enjoyable, very politically-incorrect book that will be over before you want it to be.
| 
