RIP Helen Gurley Brown

 
 

Regular Byters will know that my only begotten daughter, Acacia, in whom I am well pleased, is the art director of Cosmopolitan Middle East.   The death today of former long-time editor in chief of Cosmo, Helen Gurley Brown (1922-2012), 90, was saddening for her in that she had met Helen a number of times, the last occasion only a couple of weeks ago in New York.  According to my daughter’s text message, “She changed my life”.  Acacia has asked me to feature HGB in tonight's Bytes post.

Acacia with Ms Brown

Some of the comments in news articles today about Helen Gurley Brown: 

“...the editor who made Cosmopolitan magazine into a single girl's handbook of sex and glamour” 

“...shocked early-1960s America with the news that unmarried women not only had sex but thoroughly enjoyed it — and as the editor of Cosmopolitan magazine spent the next three decades telling those women precisely how to enjoy it even more” 

“...one of the biggest pioneers in magazines” 

A detailed article by Mia Freedman on the life and impact of Helen Gurley Brown can be read at:

http://www.mamamia.com.au/social/helen-gurley-brown-cosmo-editor-and-feminist/   -

“The Day I Met Helen Gurley Brown."  Mia is a former editor of Cosmo Sydney and a colleague of Acacia.

Some comments about HGB: 

Helen Gurley Brown’s book “Sex and the Single Girl”, published in 1962 when she was 40, came at a time when attitudes towards sex were quite different from today.  Her central theme – that single women could have sex and enjoy it – both enlightened and divided.  She was denounced by some of the leaders of second wave feminism, yet hailed by others as a founder of it. 

In television promotions for the book she was often barred from using the word “sex”. 

HGB became chief editor of Cosmopolitan in 1965, reversing its decline and renaming it from The Cosmopolitan in 1967.  Originally a family magazine, under HGB’s editorship it changed its focus to women and continued the openness of her book in addressing shame free female sexuality.  Women’s health, women’s issues and beauty were also added as favourite topics. 

In 1972 the magazine caused a considerable controversy by being the first magazine to publish a nude male centrefold, of actor Burt Reynolds:

“Her philosophy for Cosmo was the same one she’d always applied to her own life: self-improvement. What woman doesn’t want a better relationship? Better sex? Better hair? A better job? A better wardrobe? A better body? Cosmo was the original self-help manual, decades before the genre would spawn Mars & Venus and Dr Phil. Unlike some of the more radical branches of feminism in the sixties and seventies, The Cosmo girl as created by Helen, saw no conflict between loving men and being ambitious. She wanted to please men and herself. Deep-cleavage feminism, some called it. The formula worked.  Helen’s Cosmopolitan would go on to become the most successful magazine in the world, selling millions of copies a month in 100 countries. It still holds that title today.” 

- Mia Freedman.

http://www.mamamia.com.au/social/helen-gurley-brown-cosmo-editor-and-feminist/ 

By 1997 the world that she had helped shape had moved on and passed her.  She no longer fit in, her views in many women’s areas were conservative or just plain wrong (for instance, arguing in 1988 that straight women could not contract AIDS).  In 1997 she was ousted as editor of Cosmopolitan US but remained international editor of the 59 international editions of Cosmo until her death.

On the announcement of her death, New York mayor Michael Bloomberg, said simply 

"Today New York City lost a pioneer who reshaped not only the entire media industry, but the nation's culture. She was a role model for the millions of women whose private thoughts, wonders and dreams she addressed so brilliantly in print.”

Some Helen Gurley Brown quotes:

“Good girls go to heaven, bad girls go everywhere.”

“Beauty can't amuse you, but brainwork—reading, writing, thinking—can.”

“My success was not based so much on any great intelligence but on great common sense.”

“Never fail to know that if you are doing all the talking, you are boring somebody.”

“Nearly every glamorous, wealthy, successful career woman you might envy now started out as some kind of schlepp.”

“What you have to do is work with the raw material you have, namely you, and never let up.”

“Sex is one of the three best things out there, and I don’t even know what the other two are.”

“Money, if it does not bring you happiness, will at least help you be miserable in comfort.”

“How could any woman not be a feminist? The girl I’m editing for wants to be known for herself. If that’s not a feminist message, I don’t know what is.”

Quote: Lord Sandwich / John Wilkes

 

Lord Sandwich:  "Sir, I do not know whether you will die on the gallows or of the pox." 

John Wilkes: "That depends, my lord, on whether I embrace your lordship's principles or your mistress." 

Exchange between Lord Sandwich and John Wilkes. 

The reply has also been attributed to Samuel Foote.

Lord Sandwich

John Montagu, 4^th Earl of Sandwich (1718-1792) was a British statesman who held various military and political offices, including Postmaster General, First Lord of the Admiralty and Secretary of State for the Northern Department.  He remains best known, however, for the invention of the sandwich.  Unwilling to leave the gambling tables he so liked, he had his servants bring him meat between two pieces of bread.  Others began ordering “the same as Sandwich”, his title.

John Wilkes 

John Wilkes (1725-1797) was an English radical, journalist and politician.  Wilkes supported the American rebels during the War of Independence but became increasingly conservative as he grew older.  During his life he had a reputation as a womaniser.

Samuel Foote

Samuel Foote ((1720-1777) was a British dramatist, actor and theatre manager.

Mars Pics

 

Curiosity rover, NASA’s most recent robotic, nuclear-powered Mars rover, successfully landed on Mars on 6 August 2012.  It is a car-sized mobile scientific laboratory and it landed in Gale Crater, less than 2.4km from its target after a journey of 563,270,400 km.  Mars rover was launched on 26 November 2011. 

-          News report

Byter Leo has sent me some pics from that mission.  Here is his email:

Beautiful and incredible images from the latest batch of photographs from Curiosity rover.

Doodles

I was watching Frank Capra’s Mr Deeds Goes to Town again last night when the following scene with a young Gary Cooper came on: 

Longfellow Deeds: ...everybody does something silly when they're thinking. For instance, the judge here is, is an O-filler. 

Judge May: A what? 

Longfellow Deeds: An O-filler. You fill in all the spaces in the O's with your pencil. I was watching him. 

[general laughter] 

Longfellow Deeds: That may make you look a little crazy, Your Honor, just, just sitting around filling in O's, but I don't see anything wrong, 'cause that helps you think. Other people are doodlers. 

Judge May: "Doodlers"? 

Longfellow Deeds: Uh, that's a word we made up back home for people who make foolish designs on paper when they're thinking: it's called doodling. Almost everybody's a doodler; did you ever see a scratchpad in a telephone booth? People draw the most idiotic pictures when they're thinking. Uh, Dr. von Hallor here could probably think up a long name for it, because he doodles all the time.  

See the above clip at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2t4xAWi90b0 

That couldn’t be right, could it?  That the word “doodle” came from a 1936 flick? 

My recollection from childhood was that “doodle” was another word for penis, apparently still the case because Ned Flanders says to Homer in one of The Simpsons episodes “Hey Homie, I can see your doodle.” 

The more widespread meaning of doodle is as Longfellow Deeds explained it above. 

The word originates from the early 17^th century when ut meant a fool or simpleton, probably from the German Dudeltopf or Dudeldop, meaning simpleton or noodle (literally "nightcap").  

It is with that meaning – fool, simpleton – that it is used in the song Yankee Doodle.   

The song dates from before the War of Independence, aka the Revolutionary War (1775-1783), where it was originally sung by British military officers to make fun of the disorganised colonial “Yankees” with whom they served in the French and Indian War (1754-1763).  According to one version, British Army surgeon Dr Richard Shucklburgh wrote the lyrics after seeing the appearance of Colonial troops under Colonel Thomas Fitch, Jr., the son of Connecticut Governor Thomas Fitch.  

By the way, Yankee Doodle is the state anthem of Connecticut. 

Ever wondered why Yankee Doodle called the feather in his cap macaroni?... 

Yankee Doodle went to town,

Riding on a pony;

He stuck a feather in his cap,

And called it macaroni.

In mid 18^th century England, a macaroni was a fop, someone who dressed and spoke in an outlandish, outlandishly fashionable manner.  The later term “dandies” referred to the young men who moved away from the excesses of the macaroni; rather than being foppish and effeminate, the modern day connotation of dandy, they were actually asserting masculinity.  The macaroni were  named after the Italian dish.  Young men who had been on The Grand Tour (the traditional 17^th and 18^th century rite of passage European tour by affluent young males)  brought back with them a taste for macaroni, a food little known in England at the time.  They were said to belong to the Macaroni Club and they would call anything that was fashionable “very macaroni”.  An alternative explanation for the term is that “maccherone” was a trendy Italian word for a dolt, oaf or fool, and the gentlemen who came home after being on The Grand Tour described things that didn't measure up in London as "very maccherone", so quick, and so often that their critics began using the same term to describe them: the macaronis. 

The macaroni members wore fashionable, foppish clothing which included tight trousers and short, form-fitting waistcoats with ruffles and braid.  They also displayed affectations by holding walking sticks, spy glasses, and nosegays. The most extreme members of the “Macaroni club” topped off their high fashion with tall, powdered wigs, often balancing a small cap on top, so high that they had to be removed by the point of a sword:

1774 drawing, “What is this, my son Tom?”

The lyric that Yankee Doodle stuck a feather in his cap and called it macaroni is a further dig at the Colonials by the British, that the Colonials were such yokels that they believed that sticking a feather in a hat was enough to be the mark of a macaroni, that the feather was sufficient to be high fashion.

Reversing the British snobbery inherent in the song and lyrics, the Colonial Militia adopted the song as their own and used it as a rallying, marching song.

(At the conclusion of the 1981 Wimbledon Chamnpionships, in which American tennis star John McEnroe had defeated his long-time rival Bjorn Borg, TV commentator Bud Collins took note of the 4^th July holiday and also McEnroe's red-white-and-blue attire, and quipped "Stick a feather in his cap and call him 'McEnroe-ni'!")

Which brings us back to Mr Deeds:  did he really come up with the term doodle to refer to unfocused, absent-minded drawing and scribbling? 

The short answer is: yes.  The DVD audio commentary for the film confirms screenwriter Robert Riskin invented the word for this movie to describe such activity. 

Chestnuts, Monkey and Cat

 

Byter George from Western Australia sent me an email asking where the expression “that old chestnut” came from, then gently took me to task yesterday for not having answered it.  In truth, I had forgotten to answer it although I had looked up its origin when I received the original request. Sorry George. 

Origins of expressions are interesting.  The circumstances are well known at the time but are forgotten with the passing of the years, leaving only the expression surviving and puzzlement as to how it originated.  The same process applies to the construction of the pyramids, Stonehenge, Machu Picchu and the Easter Island statues.

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, an old chestnut is a story that has been told before, a 'venerable' joke. Hence, in extended use, it means anything trite, stale, or too often repeated.

The origin of the use of the word “chestnut” in the above context is not clear.  One likely  explanation has been offered and, although some have doubted its reliability, the Oxford English Dictionary has classed the explanation as “plausible”.

The story goes that a popular play in the 19^th century was “The Broken Sword” by William Dimond.  It was first performed in London in 1816 and was subtitled “A Melo-Drama in 2 Acts”.  Its popularity saw it revived in the decades that followed its first run, as well as touring.

The play has two characters, Captain Zavier and Pablo.  When Zavier is extolling his own exploits, the following exchange takes place:

Captain Zavier:  "I entered the woods of Colloway, when suddenly from the thick boughs of a cork tree..."

Pablo:  (interrupting) “A chestnut, captain; a chestnut."

Captain Zavier: "Bah! Booby. I say a cork tree."

Pablo: "A chestnut.  I should know as well as you, having heard you tell the tale 27 times."

The story does not end there.  An 1896 report in an American newspaper records that William Warren, an actor who had often performed the role of Pablo, was at a dinner when one of the men present told a tired, well worn joke.  Warren murmured “'A chestnut.  I have heard you tell the tale 27 times.”  The others present repeated the story and the use of the expression, resulting in widespread adoption. 

Some have queried why it does not appear in print earlier but it seems a reasonable explanation. 

Eric Partridge in Origins (1983 edition) says the probable origin is eating roasted chestnuts at the fireside while listening to old stories.

A group of chess enthusiasts checked into a hotel and were standing in the lobby discussing their recent tournament victories. After about an hour, the manager came out of the office and asked them to disperse. "But why," they asked.  "Because", he said, "I can't stand chess-nuts boasting in an open foyer."

In looking up the origin of “that old chestnut” I also came across the phrase “to pull his chestnuts out of the fire”. 

It derives from a 16^th century fable entitled The Monkey and the Cat.  A monkey and a cat are roasting chestnuts in a hearth.  The monkey persuades the cat to let the monkey remove the roasted chestnuts from the fire and embers by using the cat’s paw, promising the cat a share for obliging.  As the cat scoops them from the fire, one by one, burning its paw more and more, the monkey eats all the chestnuts.  They are disturbed by a maid entering and the cat ends up with nothing except burned paws.

1567 illustration of the above fable by Marcus Gheeraert the Elder

The Monkey and the Cat, 1670, by Abraham Hondius

The fable has given rise to two expressions:


·         To do someone else's dangerous or unpleasant task is to pull the chestnuts out of the fire (for that person) or to pull (that person's) chestnuts out of the fire. 

·         A person who is tricked into doing something dangerous or foolish for someone else is a cat's-paw.

Funny Friday

 

Something came up in conversation the other day about the Isle of Wight, an English island located in the English Channel and separated from the mainland by a strait called the Solent.  It brought to mind the only thing I know about the Isle of Wight, an old joke:  What’s dirty and brown, and comes out of Cowes backwards?  Answer: the Isle of Wight ferry.  The humour lies in the play on words, Cowes being a seaside town on the island.  The joke falls a bit flat in the written format in that the spelling of Cowes is immediately visible.  It really is a spoken joke.

Not so for the following bits of bovine banter, but be warned, they are also bawdy . . .

A man staggers into the emergency room with a concussion, multiple bruises, and a five iron wrapped around his neck. Naturally the doctor asks him what happened. "Well, it was like this" said the man. "I was having a quiet round of golf with my wife, when at a difficult hole, we both sliced our balls into a pasture of cows. We went to look for them, and while I was rooting around I noticed that one of the cows had something white in it's rear end. I walked over and lifted up the tail, and sure enough, there was a golf ball with my wife's monogram on it stuck right in the middle of the cow's butt. That’s when I made my mistake." "What did you do?", asked the doctor. "Well, I lifted the tail, pointed, and yelled to my wife, "Hey! This looks like yours!" 

Sam shyly eyed Susie as they watch his father's bull and her father's cow.

"I wish I was doin' that!" he blurted.

"Why don't you, Sam," said Susie. "After all, it's your cow."

A farmer was in a bar drinking and looking all depressed.

His friend asked him why he was looking depressed and he replied, "Some things you just can't explain. This morning I was outside milking. As soon as the bucket was full the cow kicked it down with her left foot so I tied up her left to a pole. 

I began to fill up the bucket again and she kicked it down with her right foot, so I tied her right to a pole too.

As soon as I finished milking her again she knocked down the bucket with her tail and I took off my belt and tied up her tail with my belt. 

As I was tying up her tail, my pants dropped down, then my wife came out and well, trust me, some things you just can't explain!

A New York family bought a ranch out West where they intended to raise cattle. Friends visited and asked if the ranch had a name. "Well," said the would-be cattleman, "I wanted to name it the Bar-J. My wife favored Suzy-Q, one son like the Flying-W, and the other wanted the Lazy-Y. So we're calling it the Bar-J-Suzy-Q-Flying-W-Lazy-Y." "But where are all your cattle?" the friends asked. "None survived the branding." 

People and Law

 

  Some legal anecdotes from bygone days. . .

Sir Fletcher Norton (1716-1789, barrister and later politician, including stints as Solicitor-General and Speaker of the House of Commons) was noted for his want of courtesy. When pleading before Lord Mansfield, on some question of manorial right, he chanced unfortunately to say, "My Lord, I can illustrate the point in an instant in my own person: I myself have two little manors." The judge immediately interposed, with one of his blandest smiles, "We all know that, Sir Fletcher."

Mr Justice Maule (1788-185), an English lawyer, Member of parliament and judge), was about to pass sentence on a defendant found guilty of a serious offence when the man broke in with the plea “My God strike me dead, my lord, if I did it.”  The judge waited some considerable time, looking sternly at the defendant, until he broke his silence with the remark, “As Providence has not seen fit to interpose in your case, it now becomes my duty to pronounce upon you the lighter sentence of the law.”

At the end of a trial held on the South Wales Circuit the defence counsel asked Lord Bramwell (1808-1892, English judge), who was presiding, whether he could address the jury in Welsh.  The evidence showed that a verdict of ‘guilty’ was as good as given and his lordship agreed to the request, albeit with some reluctance.  The barrister spoke briefly and the jury were out for a matter of minutes before they returned a remarkable verdict of ‘not guilty’.  Lord Bramwell was dumfounded and, after the court had been cleared, he asked the recorder for a translation of the counsel’s remarks.  It read, “This case, gentlemen, lies in a nutshell.  You see exactly how it stands.  The judge is an Englishman, the prosecuting counsel is an Englishman.  But you are Welsh, and I am Welsh, and the prisoner is Welsh.  Need I say more?”

During his time as a practising lawyer, Lincoln was approached by a man who wanted him to act on his behalf in a claim to retrieve $600.  Lincoln examined the case and found that, although likely to succeed, it would result in the ruin of a widow and her six children.  He hen wrote to the would=be client: 

“Yes, we can doubtless gain your case for you; we can set a whole neighborhood at loggerheads; we can distress a widowed mother and her six fatherless children and thereby get you six hundred dollars to which you seem to have a legal claim, but which rightfully belongs, it appears to me, as much to the woman and her children as it does to you. You must remember that some things legally right are not morally right. We shall not take your case, but will give you a little advice for which we charge you nothing. You seem to be a sprightly, energetic man; we would advise you to try your hand at making six hundred dollars some other way.”

Thoughts on England

 

With the world’s attention focused on the Brits, or at least that part of the world that watches Olympic events, some thoughts on England . . .  

This royal throne of kings, this sceptred isle,
This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,
This other Eden, demi-paradise,
This fortress built by Nature for herself
Against infection and the hand of war,
This happy breed of men, this little world,
This precious stone set in the silver sea,
Which serves it in the office of a wall
Or as a moat defensive to a house,
Against the envy of less happier lands,-
This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England.
- William Shakespeare, King Richard II. 

England has two books; the Bible and Shakespeare. England made Shakespeare, but the Bible made England.

Victor Hugo 

We may be a small country, but we're a great one, too. The country of Shakespeare, Churchill, the Beatles, Sean Connery, Harry Potter. David Beckham's right foot. David Beckham's left foot, come to that.

-        Hugh Grant as the Prime Minister, Love Actually 

The British are special. The world knows it. In our innermost thoughts we know it. This is the greatest nation on earth.
Tony Blair 

England is a nation of shopkeepers.
Napoleon Bonaparte 

Ask any man what nationality he would prefer to be, and ninety nine out of a hundred will tell you that they would prefer to be Englishmen.

Cecil Rhodes 

There is a forgotten, nay almost forbidden word, which means more to me than any other. That word is England.

Winston Churchill 

The reason why Englishmen are the best husbands in the world is because they want to be faithful. A Frenchman or an Italian will wake up in the morning and wonder what girl he will meet. An Englishman wakes up and wonders what the cricket score is.
Barbara Cartland 

The British have an umbilical cord which has never been cut and through which tea flows constantly. It is curious to watch them in times of sudden horror, tragedy or disaster. The pulse stops apparently, and nothing can be done, and no move made, until "a nice cup of tea" is quickly made. There is no question that it brings solace and does steady the mind. What a pity all countries are not so tea-conscious. World-peace conferences would run more smoothly if "a nice cup of tea", or indeed, a samovar were available at the proper time.
Marlene Dietrich 

When I warned them (the French Government) that Britain would fight on alone whatever they did, their generals told their Prime Minister and his divided Cabinet, "In three weeks England will have her neck wrung like a chicken." Some chicken! Some neck!

Winston Churchill

(Speech to Canadian Parliament, 1941) 

There'll always be an England,
While there's a country lane.
Wherever there's a cottage small
Beside a field of grain
There'll always be an England
While there's a busy street.
. . .

There'll always be an England
And England shall be free
If England means as much to you
As England means to me.

Vera Lynn 

I know I have the body of a weak and feeble woman, but I have the heart and stomach of a King, and of a King of England too; and think foal scorn that Parma or Spain, or any prince of Europe, should dare to invade the borders of my realm.

Queen Elizabeth 1

(Speech to the troops at Tilbury on the approach of the Armada 1588) 

He is an Englishman!
For he himself has said it,
And it's greatly to his credit,
That he is an Englishman! 

Gilbert & Sullivan

HMAS Pinafore 

I've been through my fair share of being called a Pommy bastard, I can assure you.  Look what it's done to me. My God, it was good for the character.  You want to develop character - go to Australia.

Prince Charles