Robert Benchley Society Top Ten Holiday Reading List

The Robert Benchley Society announces a "top ten" list of humorous holiday readings. The list includes two pieces by Mr. Benchley along with eight other humor authors. Members of the Robert Benchley Society suggested readings for the list. "We hope that people will enjoy these selections," said Robert Benchley Society chairman David Trumbull. Each piece is short and can typically be read in 30 minutes or less. "All are excellent pieces to read aloud to friends and family at holiday gatherings.

Boston, MA (PRWEB) December 14, 2003 --The Robert Benchley Society announces a "top ten" list of humorous holiday readings. The list includes two pieces by Mr. Benchley along with eight other humor authors. Members of the Robert Benchley Society suggested readings for the list. "We hope that people will enjoy these selections," said Robert Benchley Society chairman David Trumbull. Each piece is short and can typically be read in 30 minutes or less. "All are excellent pieces to read aloud to friends and family at holiday gatherings," continued Trumbull.

Following each entry is a brief description and a quotation from the piece. Enjoy!

The Robert Benchley Society was founded in 2003, in Boston, for the mutual enjoyment of the writings and motion pictures of American humorist, Robert Benchley (1889-1945). The Society has grown to include members on three continents. Robert Benchley Society activities in 2003 included celebrating the anniversary of Mr. Benchley's birth, sending a delegation to Parkerfest, the annual gathering of the Dorothy Parker Society of New York, and several
gatherings to read Benchley's essays or watch his motion pictures.

Membership in the Robert Benchley Society is free. For more information see our website www.robertbenchley.org

ROBERT BENCHLEY SOCIETY "TOP TEN" LIST OF HOLIDAY READINGS FOR 2003

(1) "A Christmas Garland of Books," Robert Benchley
What better gift for that hard-to-buy-for person than a book?
"...A man's whole life could be changed by such a fortuitous slip of the rubber..."

(2) "Why I Love Christmas," John Waters
Blue collar Baltimore meets rainbow colored Provincetown when John Waters takes on American commercialized Christmas traditions
"...Why hasn't Bloomingdale's or Tiffany's tried a fancy Santa. Deathly pale, this never-too-thin-or-too-rich Kris Kringle, dressed in head-to-toe unstructured, over-size Armani, could pose on a throne, bored and elegant, and every so often deign to let a rich little brat sit near his lap before dismissing his wishes with a condescending "Oh, darling, you don't really want that, do you?..."

(3) "A Bum's Christmas," H. L. Mencken
A jaundiced look at Christmas charity from another Baltimore writer.
"Despite all the snorting against them in works of divinity, it has always been my experience that infidels--or freethinkers, as they usually prefer to call themselves--are a generally estimable class of men, with strong overtones of the benevolent and even of the sentimental. This was certainly true, for example, of Leopold Bortsch, Totsaufer [customers' man] for the Scharnhorst Brewery, in Baltimore, forty-five years ago..."

(4) "Duel in the Snow, or Red Ryder Nails the Cleveland Street Kid" from "In God we Trust: All Others Pay Cash", Jean Shepherd
Great American original made into the movie The Christmas Story.
"...You'll shoot your eye out kid..."

(5) "Some Damnable Errors About Christmas" from "A Christmas Garland", Sir Max Beerbohm. Hyper-orthodox friends--of which we have many--will enjoy this parody of G.K. Chesterton: but be warned, graduates of the public schools will likely think it is in earnest. "...as seekers after truth we should be compelled to regard with a dark suspicion, and to check with the most anxious care, every fact that he told
us about isosceles triangles..."

(6) "The Three Wise Guys," Damon Runyon
Like the classic John Ford Western Three Godfathers, it puts three bad (but not horribly bad) men in the roles of the Magi, with humorous/sentimental effects. "...Miss Clarabelle Cobb comes of very religious people back in Akron, Ohio,and she is taught from childhood that rum is a terrible thing, and personally I think it is myself, except in cocktails..."

(7) "Joyeux Noël, Mr. Durning," James Thurber
Will be be enjoyed by anyone who has ever received and gift which was as a "project." "...the joli cadeau de Noël had arrived at my home five days after Pâques..."

(8) "The Gift of the Magi," O. Henry
Perhaps we stretch the meaning of humor with this inclusion, but we
recommend it nevertheless. It's in the public domain. "...The magi, as you know, were wise men--wonderfully wise men--who brought gifts to the Babe in the manger. They invented the art of giving Christmas
presents. Being wise, their gifts were no doubt wise ones, possibly bearing the privilege of exchange in case of duplication..."

(9) "The Office Party," Corey Ford
A gem from the days before political correctness and ubiquitous lawsuits took all the fun out of the holidays "...The annual Office Party starts along about noon on December 24 and ends two or three months later, depending how long it takes the boss to find out who set fire to his wastebasket, threw the water cooler out of the window, and betrayed Miss O'Malley in the men's washroom..."

(10) "Christmas Afternoon," Robert Benchley
Done in the Manner, if Not the Spirit, of Dickens. "...And as Tiny Tim might say in speaking of Christmas afternoon as an institution, 'God help us, every one.'"
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Press contact: David Trumbull
press@robertbenchley.org