Humourous Lit from Google Books

I cannot understand the rage manifested by the greater part of the world for reading New Books. If the public had read all those that have gone before, I can conceive how they should not wish to read the same work twice over ; but when I consider the countless volumes that lie unopened, unregarded, unread, and unthought-of, I cannot enter into the pathetic complaints that I hear made that Sir Walter writes no more—that the press is idle—that Lord Byron is dead. If I have not read a book before, it is, to all intents and purposes, new to me, whether it was printed yesterday or three hundred years ago. If it be urged that it has no modern, passing incidents, and is out of date and old-fashioned, then it is so much the newer ; it is farther removed from other works that I have lately read, from the familiar routine of ordinary life and makes so much more addition to my knowledge. But many people would as soon think of putting on old armour as of taking up a book not published within the last month, or year at the utmost. - William Carew Hazlitt

Shorter Hazlitt: "Insolent, thrice-damned whelplings! Abandon ye pursuites most frivolous and readeth ye olde schoole!"

Herein is my personal catalog of reference and other books of particular interest to me that have been scanned and made available in PDF format via Google Books. They've proved a really marvelous resource, and one which is getting steadily better, larger and more useful. While it's handy and convenient to let them store the things so they'll be at your fingertips whenever you're on the web, a cautionary type might want to download copies of at least the ones of most interest. Google is a corporation, with more rights - thanks to Big Tony and the Supremes - and less responsibilities than these anachronisms we call individuals, and they can do whatever they bloody well want to at any time they want to do it.

This is all here because either I can't figure out how to use the tools Google Books provides to do this, or their tools are insufficient and overly fussy. I'm betting the latter.

Feel free to borrow any or all of this, with the understanding that an attribution will keep the karma dogs off your ass.

On a technical note, I've attempted to extract informative or at least entertaining bits from the prefaces or other parts of some of the books. These will appear in this differently colored format which, thankfully, at least isn't blinking. These extracts may contain extraneous artifacts from Google's OCR rendering of the PDF scans into text that I've been too lazy to fix.

On another technical note, I'll occasionally add reviews, comments, etc. from sources external to the books, which will added in a wee font like this.

On a really annoying technical note, some entries will be shown in blue. These are so indicated because they exist and should - by any reading of copyright law not involving Sonny Bono and DisneyCorp - be available. Their non-availability makes me blue in the Buddy Guy way.

If you feel you must get in touch with me so you can send me mint copies of any or all of the books listed below, then send some electrons to baum@stommel.tamu.edu.

HUMOUR, WIT, SATIRE, CARICATURE, FARCE, WHOOPEE-CUSHIONS, ETC.

META

Studies in Jocular Literature (1890, 230) - William C. Hazlitt

History of English Humoour: With an Introduction Upon Ancient Humour (1878) - Alfred Guy L'Estrange

English Satirical Writers in Prose and Poetry Since 1500 (1897) - Arthur John Sargent

The English Humourists of the Eighteenth Century (1858, 341) - William Makepeace Thackeray

Satire and Satirists (1855, 235) - James Hannay

A Book of Burlesque, Sketches of English Stage Travestie and Parody (1891, 220) - William Davenport Adams

NON-META

1750

The History of Pompey the Little: or, The Life and Adventures of a Lap-Dog, 2nd Ed. (1751, 272) - Francis Coventry

An Essay on the Art of Ingeniously Tormenting (1753, 234) - Jane Collier

1760

Remarkable Satires (1760, 171) - McNamara Morgan, William Kenrick, Porcupinus Pelagius

A Dialogue Between Scipio and Bergansa: Two Dogs Belonging to the City of Toledo (1767, 180) - Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

1770

1780

A New Foundling Hospital for Wit: Being a Collection of Fugitive Pieces, in Prose and Verse, Not in Any Other Collection (1786)

1790

A Philosophical, Historical, and Moral Essay on Old Maids (1793) - William Hayley

1800

The School for Satire: or, A Collection of Modern Satirical Poems (1801, 432)

A Satirical View of London; Comprehending a Sketch of the Manners of the Age, 2nd Ed. (1803, 252) - John Corry

Stultifera Navis; or, The Modern Ship of Fools (1807, 295) - William Henry Ireland

The Miseries of Human Life (1807, 220) - James Beresford

The Pursuits of Literature: A Satirical Poem in Four Dialogues, 14th Ed. (1808, 579) - Thomas James Mathias

1810

The Heroad; in a Series of Original Satires (1810, 206) - Proteus the Younger

An Historical Sketch of the Art of Caricaturing (1813, 158) - James Peller Malcolm

A Collection of Farces and Other Afterpieces (1815) - Mrs. Inchbald

The Modern Dunciad, a Satire, 4th Ed. (1816, 121) - George Daniel

The Devil Upon Two Sticks in England: Being a Continuation of Le Diable Boiteux of Le Sage, 5th Ed. (1817) - William Combe

1820

The Scotch Haggis; Consisting of Anecdotes, Jests, Curious and Rare Articles of Literature (1822) - Angus McHaggis

Points of Misery; or Fables for Manking: Prose and Verse (1823, 97) - Charles Molloy Westmacott

The Spirit of the Public Journals for the Year 1823 (1824, 556) - Stephen Jones, Charles Molloy Westmacott, George Cruikshank, Robert Cruikshank

Fitzalleyne of Berkeley (1825) - Bernard Blackmantle

The English Spy: An Original Work, Characteristic, Satirical, and Humorous, Comprising Scenes and Sketches from Every Rank of Society, Being Portraits of the Illustrious, Eccentric and Notorious (1825-1826) - Charles Molloy Westmacott

Facetiae and Miscellanies (1827) - William Hone

With 120 engravings by George Cruikshank.

1830

The Comic Annual (1830-?) - Thomas Hood

Native Bards; a Satirical Effusion: with Other Occasional Pieces (1831, 114) - J. L. Martin

In exposing this little work to the general eye, I would take the liberty to remark, that it is not the production of an author by profession, and that its contents, with the exception, perhaps, of one piece, were not originally written with a view to publication. It is composed almost entirely of the literary recreations which have from time to time beguiled the ruggedness of an arduous study, and soothed the asperities of a toilsome and eventful youth. This explanation, if it obtain not the indulgence of the critic, will at least satisfactorily explain the many defects, which will doubtless offend the eye of the intelligent reader. Perhaps I ought to apologize for the acrimonious warmth which characterizes the first piece, a feeling from which I could not defend myself, when I beheld the degrading spectacle which our poetical literature presents to the mortified American and sneering foreigner. It may be found also that I have dwelt with too much detail upon the coxcombry of manner, affected by our aspirants for the bays ; but as it has often filled me with unutterable disgust, I really ceuld not permit the opportunity to escape me, of exposing some of its ludicrous and offensive peculiarities. A similar feeling led me into the digression, at the expense of the unity of my plan, in which I have attempted to cast ridicule upon the furomania (pardon the etymology) which disgraces the taste of the day, and which I cannot help likening to the rage for melodramatic spectacle, which has superseded the more legitimate and intellectual entertainments of the stage. The liberty which I have taken will surprize less, when I declare, that the work in which it occurs was commenced without any regular design or preconceived plan, so that it grew to its present size and shape, as it were, spontaneously, and to the exclusion of several topics, which I had vaguely in contemplation when I set out.

The Works of Peter Pindar (1835, 460) - Peter Pindar

The Pilgrims of the Tahems, in Search of the National! (1838, 375) - Pierce Egan

Jack Brag (1839, 441) - Theodore E. Hook

Hood's Own; or, Laughter from Year to Year (1839, 568) - Thomas Hood

1840

The Comic Latin Grammar: A New and Facetious Introduction to the Latin Tongue (1840, 163) - Percival Leigh

The Comic English Grammar: A New and Facetious Introduction to the English Tongue (1840, 228) - Percival Leigh

George Cruikshank's Omnibus (1842, 300) - George Cruikshank, Laman Blanchard

The Yankee Amongst the Mermaids (1843, 192) - William E. Burton

The Comic Album (1843-1844)

Tarlton's Jests, and News Out of Purgatory (1844, 135) - Henry Chettle

The Yahoo: A Satirical Rhapsody (1846, 119) - William Watts

Streaks of Squatter Life, and Far-West Scenes: A Series of Humorous Sketches Descriptive of Incidents and Character in the Wild West (1847, 187) - John S. Robb

A Natural History of the "Hawk" Tribe (1848) - John William Carleton

1850

Democritus in London, With the Mad Pranks and Comical Conceits of Motley and Robin Good-Fellow (1852, 312) - George Daniel

The Comic History of Rome (1852, 308) - Gilbert Abbott A Beckett, John Leech

The Comic Almanack: An Ephemeris in Jest and Earnest, Containing Merry Tales, Humorous Poetry, Quips, and Oddities (1853, 428) - Albert Smith et al.

Our Honeymoon, and Other Comicalities from "Punch" (1854, 572)

Mrs. Partington's Carpet-Bag of Fun (1854, 300) - Samuel Putnam Avery

"Sam": or, the History of Mystery (1855, 546) - Charles Wilkins Webber

Pictures of Comical People, with Stories About Them (1856, 364) - Alfred Elwes, et al.

Our Miscellany (1856, 189) - Edmund H. Yates and Robert B. Brough

Knaves and Fools; or, Friends of Bohemia: A Satirical Novel of London Life (1857, 414) - Edward Michael Whitty

Chit-Chat of Humor, Wit, and Anecdote (1857, 398) - Thomas Powell

Black Diamonds; or, Humor, Satire, and Sentiment, Treated Scientifically by Professor Julius Caesar Hannibal in a Series of Burlesque Lectures, Darkly Colored (1857, 364) - Julius Caesar Hannibal

The Harp of a Thousand Srings; or, Laughter for a Lifetime (1858, 368) - Samuel Putnam Avery

The Life of Sir John Falstaff (1858, 196) - Robert B. Brough

1860

The Marvellous Adventures and Rare Conceits of Master Tyll Owlglass (1860) - Tyll Eulenspiegel

Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour (1860, 500) - Robert Smith Surtees

Shadow and Substance (1860, 232) - Charles Henry Bennett, Robert Barnabas Brough

The Reliques of Father Prout (1860, 578) - Francis Sylvester Mahony

Marston Lynch: His Life and Times (1860, 354) - Robert B. Brough and George A. Sala

Shadow and Substance (1860, 232) - Charles H. Bennett and Robert B. Brough

Puck on Pegasus (1862, 155) - Henry Cholmondeley Pennell

Comical Fellows; or, The History and Mystery of the Pantomime: With Some Curiosities and Droll Anecdotes Concerning Clown and Pantaloon, Harlequin and Columbine (1863, 96) - Andrew Halliday

The Book of Blockheads (1863, 54) - Charles H. Bennett

Pictures of Travel (1863, 471) - Heinrich Heine

Sir Guy de Guy: A Stirring Romaunt; Showing How a Briton Drilled for His Fatherland; Won a Heiress; Got a Pedigree; and Caught the Rheumatism (1864, 167) - George Frederic Halse

The Tour of Dr. Syntax, in Search of the Picturesque, a Poem (1865, 313) - William Combe

The Squibob Papers (1865, 247) - George Horatio Derby

The Adventures of Young Munchausen (1865, 40) - C. H. Bennett

English Bards and Scotch Reviewers (1865, 126) - George Byron

Cyclopedia of Wit and Humor

The History of the Hen Fever (1866, 326) - George P. Burnham

The Cyclopaedia of Wit and Humor, Vol. 1 (1867, 1-608) - Wayne E. Burton

The Cyclopaedia of Wit and Humor, Vol. 2 (1868, 609-1136) - Wayne E. Burton

The American Cyclops: The Hero of New Orleans, and Spoiler of Silver Spoons (1868, 27) - James F. McLaughlin

The Comic Blackstone (1869, 376) - Gilbert Abbott A Beckett, George Cruikshank

Goerge Cruikshank's Table-Book (1869, 277) - Gilbert Abbott A Beckett

The Tin Trumpet; or, Heads and Tails for the Wise and Waggish (1869, 262) - Horace Smith

1870

Out of Town, 3rd Ed. (1870, 346) - Francis Cowley Burnand

The Comic History of the United States (1870, 549) - John D. Sherwood, Harry Scratchly

The Dorriad: and the Great Slocum Dinner (1870, 53) - Henry B. Anthony

The New London Jest Book (1871, 374) - William C. Hazlitt

Lord Bantam: A Satire (1872, 243) - Edward Jenkins

Paradise Lost: or, The Great Dragon Cast Out (1872, 101) - William Watts

From the extraordinary celebrity of " Paradise Lost," we might be led to conclude that the greater the absurdity of anything, or the more silly and ridiculous it was, the more it was entitled to our admiration and respect — a conclusion we are, indeed, justified in forming, when we consider the very high estimation in which the lunatic ranting of the divine John about his " seven candlesticks " and the " scarlet w...." is held, as well as the frothy twaddle of the great prophet Isaiah, who tramped about for three years with his "buttocks bare" to edify the rabble; all of which are considered as effusions of the divine spirit, and the very quintessence of sublimity! And are not the frenzied spoutings of fanaticism received at the present day by the crack-skulled tribes of canting, snuffling, holy-gospel mongers with ecstasy, as the "pourings-out of divine grace," in their silly tracts of "Christ and a Crust," " Spiritual Syllabub for Sorrowful Sinners," " The Old One cast Overboard," &c. &c.? Who could desire a more convincing proof of the so-much-boasted " march of intellect" (crab fashion), than the Mawworm race exhibit with their Praise-God-barebone phizzes in every corner?

The poem called " Paradise Lost, or the Fall of Man," the grand faux pas of our first parent (who seems to have been a mere Johnny Raw, and set up like a ninepin, only to be knocked down again by the devil, his maker's adversary), it appears, although so highly celebrated in the present enlightened age, was but little thought of at its first appearance. Waller, in a letter to the Duke of Buckingham, says, " Milton, the old blind schoolmaster, has lately written a poem on the Fall of 'Man, remarkable for nothing but its extreme length;" and Rymer, in writing to his friend, Fleetwood Shepherd, Esq., says, " I shall send you some reflections on that ' Paradise Lost' of Milton's, which some are pleased to call a poem" (which do not appear to have been committed to the press). Among the more modern critics, we may class Voltaire and Lord Chesterfield, and lastly Cobbett, who pronounces it to be "barbarous trash, and outrageously offensive to reason and common sense ; but (he observes) its being in such high estimation with the canting, psalm-singing tribes, it is considered necessary to turn up the white of the eyes whenever it is mentioned, or be denounced as a Goth,

'Whose jobbernol could never climb
To comprehend the true sublime.'"

But although the poem was considered for a long time as an absurd rhapsody, and generally neglected as unworthy of notice, yet as the subject was religious, being founded on the blessed book, the language pompous and the style novel, the sable squad, who have keen noses, as well as hawk's eyes, to everything they can possibly profit by, perceived that it might be turned to good account by proper management, and accordingly set drunken Addison to work, who, with the assistance of a parson, sent out in his heavy, dull, prosing Spectators, twelve labored numbers, to prove " Paradise Lost" was a chef-d'oeuvre, the wonder of the world, and the very perfection of sublime poetry; since when, by continual puffing, it has been considered as a vade-mecum, and, next to the precious Jew-book, is held in the highest estimation by all the pious psalm-singing tribes of evangelical snufliers, of whom, although they prate so much about its excellence, not one in twenty ever read it, at least, not to comprehend it.

The New History of Sandford and Merton (1872, 268) - Linley Sambourne

Meister Karl's Sketch-Book (1872, 287) - Charles G. Leland

Everybody's Friend; or, Josh Billing's Encyclopedia and Proverbial Philosophy of Wit and Humor (1874, 617) - Josh Billings, Thomas Nast

A History of Caricature and Grotesque in Literature and Art (1875, 494) - Thomas Wright, Frederick William Fairholt

Extravaganza (1875, 206) - William Shepard Walsh

Burlesque (1875, 224) - William Shepard Walsh

Half-Hours with the Humourists (1875, 461) - William Shepard Walsh

Rejected Addresses; or, The New Theatrum Poetarum (1876, 191) - Horace Smith

Caricature History of the Georges; or, Annals of the House of Hanover (1876, 639) - Thomas Wright

The Final Reliques of Father Prout (1876, 532) - Francis Sylvester Mahony

Carciature and Other Comic Art in All Times and Many Lands (1877, 340) - James Parton

Lightning Flashes and Electric Dashes: A Volume of CHoice Telegraphic Literature, Humor, Fun, Wit and Wisdom (1877, 141)

Johnnykin and the Goblins (1877, 212) - Charles G. Leland

The Chapman's Library: The Scottish Chap Literature of Last Century, Classified (1877)

Haverholme; or, The Apotheosis of Jingo: A Satire (1878, 251) - Edward Jenkins

Mirth: A Miscellany of Wit and Humour (1878, 432) - Henry James Byron

George Cruikshank's Table-Book (1878, 277) - George Cruikshank, Gilbert Abbott A Beckett

The British Working Man (1878, 103) - James Frank Sullivan

History of English Humour: With an Introduction Upon Ancient Humour (1878) - Alfred Guy L'Estrange

Cactus; or, Thorns and Blossoms: A Collection of Satirical and Miscellaneous Poems (1879, 278) - Elizabeth Otis Marshall Dannelly

The Works in Verse and Prose of Nicholas Breton (1879) - Nicholas Breton, Alexander Balloch Grosart

1880

The British Tradesman and Other Sketches (1880, 104) - James Frank Sullivan

A Comic History of the United States (1880, 223) - Livingston Hopkins

Cut and Come Again: Humourous and Witty Bar Jests (1880, 96)

Chikkin Hazard; a Novel by Charles Readit and Dion Bounceycore (1881, 120) - Francis Cowley Burnand

Merrie England in the Olden Time (1881, 422) - George Daniel

Side-Lights on English Society: or, Sketches from Life, Social and Satirical (1881) - E. C. Grenville Murray

Choice Humorous Works of Theodore Hook (1883, 583) - Theodore E. Hook

The Collected Writings of Dougal Graham, "Skellat" Bellman of Glasgow (1883) - Dougal Graham, George MacGregor

The Choice Humorous Works, Ludicrous Adventures, Bon Mots, Puns, and Hoaxes of Theodore Hook (1883, 583) - Theodore Edward Hook

Humour, Wit, & Satire of the Seventeenth Century (1883, 454) - John Ashton

John Bull and His Island (1884, 243) - Max O'Rell

The Humorous Poetry of the English Language (1884, 689) - James Parton

Simiocracy: A Fragment from Future History (1884, 186) - Arthur Montagu Brookfield

The History of Reynard the Fox, Vol. 1 & 2 (1884, 99 & 120) - William Caxton, Edmund Goldsmid

But independently of all extrinsic considerations, the fable of Keinecke may challenge a judgment on its own merits. Cunningly constructed, and not without a true poetic life, we must admit it to be: great power of conception and invention, great pictorial fidelity, a warm, sunny tone of colouring, are manifest enough. It is full of broad, rustic mirth; inexhaustible in comic devices ; a WorldSaturnalia, where Wolves tonsured into Monks, and nigh starved by short commcns, Foxes pilgriming to Rome for absolution, Cocks pleading at the judgment-bar, make strange mummery. Nor is this wild Parody of Human Life without its meaning and moral: it is an Air-pageant from Fancy's Dream-grotto, yet Wisdom lurks in it ; as we gaze the vision becomes poetic and prophetic. A true Irony must have dwelt in the Poet's heart and head: here, under grotesque shadows, he gives the saddest picture of Reality ; yet for us without sadness; his figures mask themselves in uncouth, bestial vizards, and enact, gambolling; their Tragedy dissolves into sardonic grins. He has a deep, heartfelt Humour sporting with the world and its evils in kind mockery ; this is the poetic soul, round which the outward motlriel has fashioned itself into living coherence. And so, in that rude old Apologue, we have still a mirror, though now tarnished and time-worn, of true magic reality : and can discern there, in cunning reflex, some image both of our destiny and of our duty; for now, as then, " Prudence is the oniyv virtue sure of its reward," and Cunning triumphs where Honesty is worsted ; and now, as then, it is the wise man's part to know this, and cheerfully look for it, and cheerfully defy it.

Humor in Animals (1885, 109) - William Holbrook Beard

Rus: A Bundle of Bucolics (1885, 207) - Rus

Adventures of a Greenhorn in Gotham! Or, Rawboned Rambles in New York (1885, 60) - Marcus Lafayette Byrn

Some Political Satires of the Seventeenth Century, Vol. 1 & 2 (1885, 64 & 73) - Edmund Goldsmid

By the Earl of Rochester:

By Sir John Denham:

A History of Parliamentary Elections and Electionerring in the Old Days: Illustrated from the Original Political Squibs, Lampoons, Pictorial Satires, and Popular Caricatures of the Time (1886, 403) - Joseph Grego

Mr. Punch's Victorian Era: An Illustrated Chronicle (1887)

English Caricature and Satire on Napoleon I (1888, 454) - John Ashton

Wit and Humor of the Age (1888, 776)

Wit and Humor: Their Use and Abuse (1888, 397) - William Matthews

Homer's Iliad: A Burlesque Translation (1889, 420) - Thomas Bridges, Francis Grose

The Table-Talk and Bon-Mots of Samuel Foote (1889, 268) - S. Foote and William Cook

In Cap and Gown: Three Centuries of Cambridge Wit (1889, 354) - Charles Whibley

Amusing Prose Chap-Books: Chiefly of Last Century (1889, 350) - Robert Hays Cunningham

A slight study of this department of literature will show that there was, then as now, much variety in the tastes of the people. And we also find that in this respect the various tastes could be fairly well met from among the stores of the chap-book publisher. In these days, just as at the present time, there had been any amount of enterprise on the part of authors and publishers in furnishing readers with whatever their fancy might desire. The Litteratura Vulgi may be fairly well divided into the following or similar classifications :—Historical, biographical, religious, romantic, poetical, humorous, fabulous, supernatural, diabolical, legendary, superstitious, criminal, jest-books, etc.

...

The immense volume of business done in the production of the chap-book, and its importance as an article of trade all over the country, has been a matter of surprise; and the more one investigates into the facts of the case, the more is one impressed with the magnitude of the institution. It appears to have given employment to many thousands of chapmen and printers' employees. As an instance of the profits derivable from the business as an article of trade, one publisher of chap-books, and that not in an especially large way, is known to have retired with accumulated profits amounting to £30,000, which in these days would represent a much larger sum than it does now.

1890

My Uncle Benjamin: A Humorous, Satirical, and Philosophical Novel (1890, 312) - Claude Tillier, Benjamin R. Tucker

Cobbes Prophecies, His Signes and Tokens, His Madrigalls, Questions, and Answeres, With His Spirituall Lesson, in Verse, Rime, and Prose (1890, 35) - Charles Praetorius

Morgante the Lesser: His Notorious Life and Wonderful Deeds (1890, 329) - Edward Martyn

Parodies and Other Burlesque Pieces (1890, 446) - Henry Morley, et al.

Songs of the Governing Classes (1890, 119) - Robert B. Brough

Satirical Poems of the Time of the Reformation (1891-1893) - Robert Sempill, Thomas Churchyard

Happy Thoughts Complete (1891) - Francis Cowley Burnand

Thistledown: A Book of Scotch Humour, Character, Folk-Lore, Story and Anecdote (1891, 344) - Robert Ford

A Book of Burlesque: Sketches of English Stage Travestie and Parody (1891, 220) - William Davenport Adams

Florentine Nights (1891, 441) - Heinrich Heine

The Moon Prince, and Other Nabobs (1892, 340) - Richard Kendall Munkittrick

The Real Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1893, 214) - Francis Cowley Burnand, Linley Sambourne

The Trial of Sir John Falstaff: Wherein the Fat Knight is Permitted to Answer for Himself (1893, 295) - Asa Maxon Fitz Randolph

English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century (1893, 427) - Graham Everitt

Little Mr. Bouncer and Tales of College Life (1893, 308) - Cuthbert Bede

The Schoolmaster in Comedy and Satire (1894, 592) - Hubert Marshall Skinner

The Comic History of England (1894, 634) - Gilbert Abbott A Beckett

Bon-Mots of Samuel Foote and Theodore Hook (1894, 192) - S. Foote and T. Hook

The Library of Wit and Humor, Prose and Poetry, Selected from the Literature of All Times and Nations (1894) - Ainsworth Rand Spofford, Rufus Edmonds Shapley

Suppressed Chapters and Other Bookishness (1895, 159) - Robert Bridges

No Whippinge, Nor Trippinge: But a Kind Friendly Snippinge. London, 1601: A Poetical Reply, Moral, Satirical, and Proverbial, During the Literary Quarrel Between Ben Jonson, John Marston, W. Ingram, of Cambridge, and Others (1895, 64) - Nicholas Breton, Charles Edmonds

The History of "Punch" (1895, 592) - M. H. Spielmann

Selections from the British Satirists (1897, 329) - Cecil Headlam

A House-Boat on the Styx: Being Some Account of the Divers Doings of the Associated Shades (1898, 171) - John Kendrick Bangs

Irish Wit and Humor (1898, 233) - Walter Henry Howe

Scotch Wit and Humor (1898, 222)

The Stage-Quarrel Between Ben Jonson and the So-Called Poetasters (1899, 204) - Roscoe Addison Small

The Hitherto Unidentified Contributions of W. M. Thackeray to "Punch", with a Complete and Authoritative Bibliography from 1843 to 1848 (1899, 349) - William Makepeace Thackeray, Marion Harry Speilmann

English Satires (1899, 298) - William Henry Oliphant Smeaton

The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green (1899, 500) - Cuthbert Bede

Wit and Humor of Bench and Bar (1899, 578) - Marshall Brown

Sartor Resartus: The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdrockh (1899, 250) - Thomas Carlyle, Henry Duff Traill

Its central conception, its grund-idee, as Professor Teufelsdrockh would have called it, lends itself with admirable aptitude to the Sternian style of treatment. For the Clothes Philosophy, as formulated by Carlyle, through the mouth of the Professor, affords perpetual opportunities of the abruptest transit from the infinitely great to the infmitesimally little. The constant suggestion of gigantic incongruity—its perpetual temptation to the author, after lifting his reader into the transcendental empyrean, suddenly to ' dump him down" on the flattest flats of the earthlyignoble world, has often proved irresistible to many a lesser humorist than Carlyle. But, with him it is never resisted: nor can any judicious critic desire that it should be. For, even if we were to deduct from Sartor Resarius the pure poetic, the pure picturesque, the eloquence, passion, and profoundity with which the book abounds, it would still remain a monument of ' worldhumour,' such as has been rarely raised in such Titanic dimensions in the world's history. This would be so, even if the humoristic treatment of the idea were less richly imaginative than it is. To have carried the 'Clothes Philosophy from earth to heaven— from the uniform of the Dandiacal Body' to the lebendiges Kleid der Gottkeit; to have traced the principle of the symbolic from its highest to its lowest manifestations, and to have so displayed all matter as the mere vesture of spirit that the mind at once recognises the essential affinity between the visible Cosmos and the beadle's cocked hat—this was an achievement in the transcendental-humorous, which in itself deserves to be held in everlasting remembrance, not only in the record of literature, but in the history of human thought.

How could such a thesis have been methodically treated ? If its treatment had not partaken of the vast incongruity of the subject it would have been artistically amiss. Worthy, but too serious souls have striven, and will no doubt for ever strive to find in Sartor Resartus a consistent and continuously developed 'argument '; but in vain ! You may construct a theory of the matter which will carry you along for a time; but it will ' throw' you in the end. Book II. for instance, contains no doubt the fairly straightforward and consecutive ' Story of a Soul/—Carlyle's or another's, in all probability Carlyle's; and encouraged by its coherence a sanguine reader attacks the third and last Book, in full belief that here at least ' the bearing' of the Professor's 'remarks' will be found to ' lie in the application of them.' But alas ! the Professor is ' neither to hold nor to bind.' After three chapters of sufficiently plain sailing on the decay of creeds and churches, Teufelsdrockh is off in Chapter IV. in hot pursuit of a Socialistic hare. In the fifth he is eloquently describing the rise of a new Society, Phrenix-like, from the ashes of the old, and in the Sixth he is in Monmouth Street moralising over its cast clothes! Then, in the next chapter but one to that masterpiece of solemnly sustained burlesque, we are being borne along through the wonderful chapter on ' Natural Supernaturalism ' to its magnificent close, perhaps the grandest and most awe-inspired exercise on the everlasting theme 'O World, O Life, O Time!' that exists in human language. And then—well then, within three pages, we are revelling in the broad buffoonery of 'The Dandiacal Body,' and the sardonic irony of the plea for Tailors. After which—Chapter the Last and Farewell.

1900

The Club: or, a Grey Cap for a Green Head (1900, 220) - James Puckle, Austin Dobson

Satires of Andrew Marvell: Sometime Member of Parliament for Hull (1901, 244) - Andrew Marvell, George Atherton Aitken

Mr. Munchausen: Being a True Account of Some of the Recent Adventures Beyond the Styx (1901, 180) - John Kendrick Bangs

The Burgess Nonsense Book (1901, 239) - Gelett Burgess

Lives of the 'Lustrious: A Dictionary of Irrational Biography (1901, 92) - Sidney Stephen, Leslie Lee

A Treasury of Humorous Poetry (1902, 407) - Frederic Lawrence Knowles

Verse and Worse (1902, 154) - John Otway Percy Bland

The Black Cat Club: Negro Humor and Folklore (1902, 264) - James David Corrothers

Flaxius: Leaves from the Life of an Immortal (1902, 320) - Charles G. Leland

The Confessions of a Caricaturist (1902) - Harry Furniss

The Literary Guillotine (1903, 262) - Charles Battell Loomis

The Pursuit of the House-Boat (1903, 204) - John Kendrick Bangs

Wisdom While You Wait: Being a Foretaste of the Glories of the 'Insidecompletuar Britanniaware' (1903, 95) - Edward Verrall Lucas

The Ingoldsby Legends; or, Mirth and Marvels (1903, 640) - Thomas Ingoldsby

The Second Tour of Doctor Syntax in Search of Consolation (1903, 264) - William Combe

The Third Tour of Doctor Syntax in Search of a Wife (1903, 265) - William Combe

The History of Johnny Quae Genus: The Little Foundling of the Late Doctor Syntax (1903, 251) - William Combe

Little Masterpieces of American Wit and Humor (1903) - Thomas Lansing Masson

Stealthy Steve, the Six-Eyed Sleuth: His Quest of the Big Blue Diamond (1904, 170) - Newton Newkirk

Nonsense Books (1904) - Edward Lear

Real Life in Ireland; or, The Day and Night Scenes, Rovings, Rambles, and Sprees, Bulls, Blunders, Blodderation and Blarney of Brian Boru, Esq. (1904, 312) - Pierce Egan

Life in London; or, The Day and Night Scenes of Jerry Hawthorn, Esq. (1904, 297) - Pierce Egan, George Cruikshank

"Ask Mamma," or, The Richest Commoner in England (1904, 525) - Robert Smith Surtees

The Art of Caricature (1904, 180) - Grant Wright

The History of the Nineteenth Century in Caricature (1904, 363) - Arthur Bartlett Maurice, Frederic Taber Cooper

The Falstaff Letters (1904, 113) - James White, Charles Lamb

The Life and Opinions of John Buncle, Esq. (1904, 458) - Thomas Amory

Mrs. Raffles: Being the Adventures of an Amateur Crackswoman (1905, 179) - John Kendrick Bangs

This and That About Caricature (1905, 78) - Eugene Zimmerman

A Satire Anthology (1905, 369) - Carolyn Wells

Real Life in London; or, The Rambles and Adventures of Bob Tallyho, Esq. (1905) - Pierce Egan

The World's Wit and Humor: An Encyclopedia of the Classic Wit and Humor of All Ages and Nations (1905-?)

A Whimsey Anthology (1906, 288) - Carolyn Wells

Gems of Irish Wit and Humor (1906, 160) - H. P. Kelly

The Placid Pug; and Other Rhymes (1906, 48) - Alfred Bruce Douglas

Alice in Blunderland (1907, 124) - John Kendrick Bangs

The Pongo Papers; and, the Duke of Berwick (1907, 75) - Alfred Bruce Douglas

Ralph Roister Doister (1907, 151) - Nicholas Udall, John Stephen Farmer

Ralph Roister Doister, a rich lady-killer with an overweening opinion of his own gallantry (in both senses), has Matthew Merrygreek for companion, sycophant, and go-between. Despite mortifications galore, he falls in love with Dame Christian Custance, betrothed to a merchant, Gawin Goodluck. The attempts of Ralph to ' cut out ' Gawin, the anger of the lady, the ambiguous letter, the onslaught of the maids with pots and pans, the rout of Ralph's party, the return of Gawin, and the happy denouement, fully substantiate its claim to an early place in English comedy, or broad farce.

Pumpkin Husks (1908, 94) - Hustin Agnew

The Doctors: A Satire in Four Seizures (1909, 123) - Elbert Hubbard

The Ten Books of the Merrymakers (1909) - Marshall Pinckney Wilder

1910

Napoleon in Caricature 1795-1821 (1911) - Alexander Meyrick Broadley, John Holland Rose

The Wit and Humor of America (1911) - Marshall Pinckney Wilder

The Master of Mysteries: Being an Account of the Problems Solved by Astro, Seer of Secrets, and His Love Affair with Valeska Wynne, His Assistant (1912, 480) - Gelett Burgess

The Wit and Humor of Colonial Days (1607-1800) (1912, 315) - Carl Holliday

A Century of Parody and Imitation (1913, 429) - Walter Jerrold, Robert M. Leonard

Burgess Unabridged: A New Dictionary of Words You Have Always Needed (1914, 120) - Gelett Burgess

So Here Then Cometh Pig-Pen Pete; or, Some Chums of Mine (1914, 221) - Elbert Hubbard

The Roycroft Dictionary Concocted by Ali Baba and the Bunch on Rainy Days (1914, 168) - Elbert Hubbard

Uncle Sam and Old World Conquerors: Being the Seventh Division of Uncle Sam, a Satirical Prelude (1915, 173) - William Norman Guthrie

The White Man's Burden: A Satirical Forecast (1915, 225) - Robert Sherman Tracy

Gridiron Nights: Humorous and Satirical Views of Politics and Statesmen (1915, 371) - Arthur Wallace Dunn

That Night: And Other Satires (1915, 324) - Freeman Tilden

The Little Man and Other Satires (1915, 279) - John Galsworthy

Forty Years of Spy (1915, 351) - Leslie Ward

Falstaff in Rebellion; or, The Mutineers of Eastcheap: A Shakespearian Travesty in Three Acts (1915, 44) - John William Postgate

Malice in Kulturland (1915, 80) - Horace Wyatt

Paradise Garden: The Satirical Narrative of a Great Experiment (1916, 360) - George Gibbs

Further Foolishness: Sketches and Satires on the Follies of the Day (1917, 312) - Stephen Leacock

Such Nonsense! An Anthology (1918, 233) - Carolyn Wells

A Nonsense Anthology (1919, 289) - Carolyn Wells

1920

The Book of Humorous Verse (1920, 962) - Carolyn Wells

One Hundred Best Novels Condensed (1920) - Edwin Atkins Grozier et al.

Seeing Things at Night (1921, 268) - Heywood Broun

The Shriek: A Satirical Burlesque (1922, 152) - Charles Somerville

A Parody Anthology (1922, 397) - Carolyn Wells

Pieces of Hate and Other Enthusiasms (1922, 211) - Heywood Broun