ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY.

Percy B. Shelley

On this day in 1811, Percy Shelley was expelled from Oxford for the offense of “egregious and incorrigible poetry.”

ADVICE AND GUIDANCE FOR WRITERS OR CREATORS OF LITERARY CONTENT,

By Guest Columnist Captain Pleaonasm.

In writing or composing content to be read in print, the superfluous and the unnecessary are the unpardonable transgressions, the unforgivable sins as it were. To keep to the point and not to stray from the topic at hand are essential qualities that cannot be omitted from writing without materially diminishing its quality and leaving it worse than it might otherwise be. From any composition it is necessary to remove whatever does not concern the matter under discussion, so as to leave nothing irrelevant or inapplicable. The first duty of the writer is to trim the fat, so to speak, excising digressions and interpolations that do not advance the argument or move the chain of reasoning forward. It is necessary to avoid useless repetition and reiteration, but rather to stick to the main idea and never deviate from the subject originally chosen. All straying from the main highway into the side paths, all deviation from the straight and true course, is to be shunned and avoided. Whatever is immaterial must be left out, and the writer will omit anything that does not concern the topic he has chosen. Only that which informs and persuades the reader should be allowed to remain, and whatever words and phrases do not tend to that objective must be cut out and left behind, perhaps in a canister or jar, to be used on another occasion when they shall prove material or relevant. Such storage containers may often be obtained, by purchase or other transaction, at local retail establishments in one’s own vicinity, and they often prove useful for storing or containing purposes. It may, however, be advisable or prudent to purchase, at the same time, or at a time not too far removed from the time of the purchase of the original containers, a larger storage container to contain them, so as to (To be continued.)

Captain Pleonasm appears in these pages through the courtesy of the Malt-O-Cod Corporation.

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY.

Cartoon by Rollin Kirby.

On this day in 1925, the Butler Act became law in Tennessee, making it illegal “to teach any theory that denies the Story of the Divine Creation of man as taught in the Bible, and to teach instead that man has descended from a lower order of animals.” Although the act itself was repealed in 1967, it established the important constitutional principle that state legislators are infallible in matters of faith, morals, and science.

ASK DR. BOLI.

Dear Dr. Boli: What is the purpose of government? —Sincerely, An Anarchist Who Was Just Wondering.

Dear Sir or Madam: The purpose of government is to protect the rich from the predations of the poor. In order for rich people to be rich, there must be a large supporting mass of poor people at the bottom of the pyramid. Left unsupervised, however, the poor would invariably take their wealth away from the rich and squander it on food and shelter. Government exists to keep order among the poor so the rich can spend their wealth on diamond watchchains and silk waistcoats with repeating dollar-sign patterns.