Alex Massie Alex Massie

Telegramese Charm

All gone, now of course. Bryan Appleyard has more:

 I was once persuaded, against my better judgment, to write to Samuel Beckett in Paris – I knew him slightly – asking him about his hopes and resolutions for the new year. The telegram arrived – ‘Hopes colon zero stop resolutions colon zero stop.’ Christopher Ricks subsequently used this in his superb book Beckett’s Dying Words as an example of Great Sam’s mastery of punctuation.

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