The Early Worm

Robert Benchley's comic collection turns modern life, history, and public spectacle into a nonstop exercise in deadpan absurdity. It opens with mock-serious wit about the "decline of sex," cheerfully mangling science, nature, and psychoanalysis into lessons for young men, then widens its target to intellectual fads, civic irritation, and the urge to explain everything. New York sidewalks become obstacle courses, while Paul Revere's midnight ride is recast as a salesman's business trip for an acid bath company, complete with missed appointments, absurd persistence, and a hilariously unprofitable expense sheet. From there, Benchley ranges through mock-crime reporting, sensational mystery, football-season "upsets," and a faux interview with Mussolini, all treated with cool irony. He spoofs journalism and adventure in a "Life" bicycle expedition to the North Pole, then follows it with a tabloid-style hotel mystery and a vanished floor. The collection also lampoons high society, vanished mansions, identity tests, and the social games of returning Europeans, sustaining a sharp, playful satire of politics, commerce, culture, and the comic instability of modern existence. This edition has been fully restored with modern typesetting, custom cover design.