{"id":59870,"date":"2024-04-16T11:21:46","date_gmt":"2024-04-16T15:21:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/?p=59870"},"modified":"2024-05-28T12:07:49","modified_gmt":"2024-05-28T16:07:49","slug":"something-to-surprise-you-everywhere-you-look","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/2024\/04\/something-to-surprise-you-everywhere-you-look.html","title":{"rendered":"Something to Surprise You: Everywhere You Look<\/em>"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

A. Robert Lee is such a wide-ranging author in both his creative<\/a> and academic<\/a> books that I won’t try to characterize his writings other than to say they invariably illuminate life and literature with a wealth of scholarship, intelligence, and linguistic mastery. I will add, however, that his sense of humor is one aspect of his writings that I most treasure.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this brief excerpt from Everywhere You Look<\/a>,<\/em> just released by Moloko Plus<\/a>, his deceptively polite, understated satire is so clear that no more need be said.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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<\/a>
Cover sculpture by Blas Miras<\/a><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n
Delivery Service<\/em><\/strong><\/pre>\n\n\n\n
Black Country Porcelain Ltd.
\n Dudley UK (Temporary)
\nTrading Across Europe
 \n
<\/p>\nDear Sirs,
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<\/p>\nIf you check Invoice 79999950 you’ll see that our order for Regency pottery was sent last November just before the floods.
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<\/p> \nIt was for a set of what your brochure calls “Prince of Wales Specials.” Dance miniatures of gentlemen in period frockcoats and ladies in hoops and bonnets. We have been long-time fans since honeymooning in Florida at Disney World. My wife thought it would make a great decoration for the back parlor which overlooks the Birmingham commuter line.
 \n
<\/p>\nImagine our shock when your delivery man turned up with what I assume was someone else’s special order. Namely a set of (and I quote) “copulating pythons.”
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<\/p>\n     The accompanying catalogue lists the following: “Fergie’s Toe,” “Blood Cleavage,” and a Spring discount on “Dead Meerkats” and “Bridge of Thighs.” All by some artist called Demi-Hurst. Some artist indeed.
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<\/p>\n    These may be pearls or even oysters for your other clientele but it came as a shock to my wife and I, and even to her mother who retired ten years ago as a drum majorette with the Gurkhas and now lives in our attic. Her very words were “worse than anything you could see in Bhutan or the Himalaya Foothills.”
 \n     I don’t know how your 7-Day Return policy works but we expect a full refund.
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<\/p>\n     These works do a disservice to everyday suburban life. Our own children have long gone their own way (our son is in the Strangeways prison service, our daughter a trainee coder at college in Berwick Upon Tweed). But had they cast eyes on this so-called “art” when young, then heaven knows how they might have turned out. Likely sociologists or vegans. This was a long time before wellness clinics and round the clock pilates.
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<\/p> \n     In the name of decency, I hope you will think better of allowing orders of this kind to travel the nation’s delivery services.
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<\/p>\n     Yours most faithfully
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<\/p>\n     Rev. Canon Tobias Axelrod, Rtd.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A. Robert Lee is such a prolific author in both his creative and academic books that I won\u2019t try to characterize his writings other than to say they invariably illuminate life and literature with a wealth of scholarship, intelligence, and linguistic mastery.  I will add, however, that his sense of humor is one aspect of his writings that I most treasure.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":59869,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[26,18,4],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-59870","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-books","8":"category-literature","9":"category-main","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/EVERYWHERE-YOU-LOOK-front-cover-365-bdr.jpeg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pbvgEs-fzE","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59870","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=59870"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59870\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":60813,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59870\/revisions\/60813"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/59869"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=59870"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=59870"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=59870"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}