Marge Askinforit
by
AUTHOR’S NOTE
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.
No doubt the author of the original has opened to the public several doors through which it is not thinkable that a parodist would care to follow her. Apart from that, parody should be brief, just as autobiography should be long– ars brevis, vita longa.
BARRY PAIN.
October 8, 1920.
The quotations are from the articles which appeared in “The Sunday Times.” It does not of course follow that these passages will appear in the same form, or will appear at all, when the complete autobiography is published.
MARGE ASKINFORIT
FIRST EXTRACT
THE CATASTROPHIC FAMILY
I was christened Margarine, of course, but in my own circle I have always been known as Marge. The name is, I am informed, derived from the Latin word margo, meaning the limit. I have always tried to live right up to it.
We were a very numerous family, and I can find space for biographical details of only a few of the more important. I must keep room for myself.
My elder sister, Casein–Casey, as we always called her–was supposed to be the most like myself, and was less bucked about it than one would have expected. I never made any mistake myself as to which was which. I had not her beautiful lustrous eyes, but neither had she my wonderful cheek. She had not my intelligence. Nor had she my priceless gift for uttering an unimportant personal opinion as if it were the final verdict of posterity with the black cap on. We were devoted to one another, and many a time have I owed my position as temporary parlour-maid in an unsuspicious family to the excellent character that she had written for me.
She married Moses Morgenstein, a naturalized British subject, who showed his love for his adopted country by trading as Stanley Harcourt. He was a striking figure with his coal-black hair and nails, his drooping eye-lashes and under-lip, and the downward sweep of his ingratiating nose. The war found him burning with enthusiasm, and I give here one verse of a fine poem which he wrote and, as I will remember, recited in Mrs. Mopworth’s salon :