Monday, August 20, 2007

Weekend’s Most Effective Strained Simile

Jack Shafer on the Washington press corps:

Imagine ants farming aphids for honeydew at Sans Souci, and you get the picture.

(Think about it) Shafer is reviewing Robert Novak’s memoir, in which Novak divulges (surprise!) that he really doesn’t mind that the world thinks him a flaming bunghole (in the Sunday NYT Book Review (link)).

Fn.: For no reason of which I can conceive, Shafer’s review is linked at a website featuring “Nicaragua agricultural news” (link).

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

just how many people even know what sans souci is?

Buce said...

It's a fair cop, although I suppose one could just as well ask how many people know who Jack Shafer is. FWIW, I'm assuming Shafer refers to Frederick the Great's palace, where he tried to invent his own version of the Enlightenment. Google Wiki Frederick Sans Souci for an entertaining intro.