Skip to content
Linespedia

An Appreciative Audience

Topics: classic

My son, I wish that it were half     As easy to extract a laugh     From grown-ups as from thee.     Then I'd go on the stage, my boy,     While Richard Carle and Eddie Foy     Burned up with jealousy.     I wouldn't have to rack my brain     Or lie awake all night in vain     Pursuit of brand new jokes;     Nor fear my lines were heard with groans     Of pain and sympathetic moans     From sympathetic folks.     I'd merely have to make a face,     Just twist a feature out of place,     And be the soul of wit;     Or bark, and then pretend to bite,     And, from the screams of wild delight,     Be sure I'd made a hit.

AI analysis available. Enable JavaScript to interact.

About this line

"My son, I wish that it were half..."

"An Appreciative Audience" is a quintessential example of Ringgold Wilmer Lardner's signature style... ### Why We Love This Line At Linespedia, we believe that poetry is the ultimate sanctuary for the soul...

Classified Tags

Related lines

"I can't understand why you pass up the toys     That Santa considered just right for small boys;     I can't understand why you turn up your nos"

"If it's fun to take books from the bookcase,      If you really believe it's worth while     To carry them out to the kitchen      And build th"

"Who is Sylvia? What is she      That early every morning     You desert your family      And rush to see her, scorning     Your once cherished"

""I guess I'll help you, daddy."      And daddy can't say "No;"     For if he did, 'twould wound you, kid,      And cause the tears to flow."

"Here morning in the ploughman's songs is met     Ere yet one footstep shows in all the sky,     And twilight in the east, a doubt as yet,     S"

"The Text is taken from Percy's Reliques (1765), vol. i. p. 71, 'given from two MS. copies, transmitted from Scotland.' Herd had a very similar bal"

Continue Reading

"I can't understand why you pass up the toys     Th..."

Weekly Poetic Insight

Join our literary Sanctuary

Get the most inspiring lines, poetic analysis, and secret shayaris delivered to your inbox every Sunday.