And yet these facts were largely incommunicable. He spent his time among businessmen, not scholars. He rarely invited people to dinner, and could be emphatic and monologic. He tended to flourish his facts as querulous challenges rather than as invitations to conversation, though this wasn't perhaps his real intention.
James Wood
The New Yorker
November 7, 2011
Isn't that just the most wonderful sentence? "He tended to flourish his facts...." I found it a week or so ago in the New Yorker, copied it out b/c I knew I'd want to repeat it to someone, and did so just today in an email to a friend. Tomorrow at Thanksgiving I'll be with several people (in-laws of in-laws) who do precisely that -- "querulous challenges" -- and it's always so hard for me to bite my tongue, but with age I've gotten better at it.
ReplyDeleteI decided to google the sentence to see if anyone else had picked up on it, and found your blog. I'll be back to see what other gems you find.