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It is not a boner to use effete this way — DFW

The Oxford American Writer’s Thesaurus (2nd Ed.) incorporates usage notes from an astonishing group of contributing authors, including Erin McKean, Stephin Merritt, Zadie Smith, Simon Winchester, Francine Prose, and David Foster Wallace. (Eternal disclosure.) Looking for something else last night, I discovered this entertaining note, signed “DFW & EM,” on “effete”: Here’s a word on which some dictionaries and useage . . .

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The New Yorker, Mark Twain, and Christians live forever

The New Yorker recently made everything — from its very first issue to the latest — available to subscribers online. This means you can read Mark Twain’s “The Privilege of the Grave” right now. Although previously unpublished, the essay will be immediately recognizable as Twain’s to anyone who’s had even casual exposure to his nonfiction. Here’s a brief excerpt from . . .

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