Marge Askinforit

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Barry Pain. Marge Askinforit

Author’s Note

MARGE ASKINFORIT

First Extract. THE CATASTROPHIC FAMILY

Second Extract. EBULLIENT YOUTH

Third Extract. Gladstone—Mr. Lloyd George—Inmemorison—Dr. Benger Horlick

Fourth Extract. THE SOLES

Fifth Extract. MISFIRES

Sixth Extract. TESTIMONIALS—ROYAL APPRECIATION

Seventh Extract. SELF-ESTIMATE

Late Extra. TRAGIC DISAPPEARANCE OF MARGE ASKINFORIT

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This book was suggested by the reading of some extracts from the autobiography of a brilliant lady who had much to tell us about a number of interesting people. There was a quality in that autobiography which seemed to demand parody, and no doubt the autobiographer who cannot wait for posterity and perspective will pardon a little contemporary distortion.

In adding my humble wreath to the flatteries—in their sincerest form—which she has already received, I should like to point out that a parody of an autobiography should not be a caricature of the people biographed—some of whom must already have suffered enough. I have lowered the social key of the original considerably, not only to bring it within the compass of the executant, but also to make a distinction. I have increased the remoteness from real life—which was sometimes appreciable in the original—to such an extent that it should be impossible to suppose that any of the grotesques of the parody is intended for anybody in real life. Nobody in the parody is intended to be a representation, or even a misrepresentation, of any real person living or dead. For instance, Inmemorison is not intended to be a caricature of Tennyson, but the passage which deals with him is intended to parody some of the stuff that has been written about Tennyson.

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All the same, there were only the four rooms over the stable. At times there were fifteen or sixteen of us at home, and also the lodger—I shall speak of him presently. And when you have five personal quarrels, baby, the family wash, a sewing-machine, three mouth-organs, fried bacon, and a serious political argument occurring simultaneously in a restricted establishment, something has to go. As a rule, dear papa went. He would make for Regent’s Park, and find repose in the old-world calm of the parrot-house at the Zoo.

But there is always room on the top—it is a conviction on which I have ever acted. When I felt too cramped and stifled in the atmosphere of the Warren, I would climb out on the roof. There, with nothing on but my nightgown, tennis shoes, and the moonlight, I would dance frenetically. The tiles would break loose beneath my gossamer tread and, accompanied by sections of gutter, go poppity-swish into the street below and hit all manner of funny things. I fancy that some of the funny things complained. I know the police called, and I seem to remember rather a nasty letter from the landlord’s agent. I had a long interview with mamma on the subject. She pointed out that if I slipped and fell I should probably make a nasty dent in the pavement, and with many tears I promised to relinquish the practice.

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