Today’s Zippy, a follow-up to yesterday’s:
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Yesterday, “Between Parody and Pastiche”, with the Zippy title “The Long Corn Rye” (The Long Goodbye). Today’s title: “Farewell, Ned Smedley” (Farewell, My Lovely). This time, I’m focused on just one thing, the clicking / ticking sound effect at the end, toketa toketa toketa, which takes me not to Chandler but to Thurber, in “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty”.
From Wikipedia:
“The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” (1939) is a short story by James Thurber. The most famous of Thurber’s stories, it first appeared in The New Yorker on March 18, 1939, and was first collected in his book My World and Welcome to It (Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1942). It has since been reprinted in James Thurber: Writings and Drawings (The Library of America, 1996), is available on-line on the New Yorker website, and is one of the most anthologized short stories in American literature. The story is considered one of Thurber’s “acknowledged masterpieces”. It was made into a 1947 movie of the same name, with Danny Kaye in the title role, though the movie is very different from the original story.
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It was also adapted into a 2013 film, which is again very different from the original. [20th Century Fox produced and Ben Stiller directed an adaptation of the book in 2013, with Stiller starring as Mitty. Kristen Wiig, Shirley MacLaine, Patton Oswalt, Adam Scott, Kathryn Hahn, and Sean Penn also appear in the film.]
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The name Walter Mitty and the derivative word “Mittyesque” have entered the English language, denoting an ineffectual person who spends more time in heroic daydreams than paying attention to the real world, or more seriously, one who intentionally attempts to mislead or convince others that he is something that he is not.
… Thurber’s love of wordplay can be seen in his coining of several nonsense terms in the story, including the pseudo-medical jargon “obstreosis of the ductal tract”, “streptothricosis”, and the recurring onomatopoeia of “ta-pocketa-pocketa-pocketa.” The medical nonsense that “coreopsis has set in” uses the name of a flower which sounds vaguely like a horrible medical condition.
The two pocketa episodes from the story. At the very beginning:
“We’re going through!” The Commander’s voice was like thin ice breaking. He wore his full-dress uniform, with the heavily braided white cap pulled down rakishly over one cold gray eye. “We can’t make it, sir. It’s spoiling for a hurricane, if you ask me.” “I’m not asking you, Lieutenant Berg,” said the Commander. “Throw on the power lights! Rev her up to 8,500! We’re going through!” The pounding of the cylinders increased: ta-pocketa-pocketa-pocketa-pocketa-pocketa. The Commander stared at the ice forming on the pilot window. He walked over and twisted a row of complicated dials. “Switch on No. 8 auxiliary!” he shouted. “Switch on No. 8 auxiliary!” repeated Lieutenant Berg. “Full strength in No. 3 turret!” shouted the Commander. “Full strength in No. 3 turret!” The crew, bending to their various tasks in the huge, hurtling eight-engined Navy hydroplane, looked at each other and grinned. “The Old Man’ll get us through,” they said to one another. “The Old Man ain’t afraid of Hell!” . . .
Later, in another daydream:
In the operating room there were whispered introductions: “Dr. Remington, Dr. Mitty. Dr. Pritchard-Mitford, Dr. Mitty.” “I’ve read your book on streptothricosis,” said Pritchard-Mitford, shaking hands. “A brilliant performance, sir.” “Thank you,” said Walter Mitty. “Didn’t know you were in the States, Mitty,” grumbled Remington. “Coals to Newcastle, bringing Mitford and me up here for a tertiary.” “You are very kind,” said Mitty. A huge, complicated machine, connected to the operating table, with many tubes and wires, began at this moment to go pocketa-pocketa-pocketa. “The new anaesthetizer is giving way!” shouted an interne. “There is no one in the East who knows how to fix it!” “Quiet, man!” said Mitty, in a low, cool voice. He sprang to the machine, which was now going pocketa-pocketa-queep-pocketa-queep. He began fingering delicately a row of glistening dials. “Give me a fountain pen!” he snapped. Someone handed him a fountain pen. He pulled a faulty piston out of the machine and inserted the pen in its place. “That will hold for ten minutes,” he said. “Get on with the operation.” A nurse hurried over and whispered to Renshaw, and Mitty saw the man turn pale. “Coreopsis has set in,” said Renshaw nervously. “If you would take over, Mitty?” Mitty looked at him and at the craven figure of Benbow, who drank, and at the grave, uncertain faces of the two great specialists. “If you wish,” he said. They slipped a white gown on him; he adjusted a mask and drew on thin gloves; nurses handed him shining . . .
These two scenes compressed into cartoons on the site Comics Grinder: comics, movies, culture, and related themes, by Henry Chamberlain, on 12/23/13, “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty Unplugged”:
Here is a comic that attempts to tap into the elegant simplicity of the James Thurber short story. It is a delicate and precise little story: A henpecked husband daydreams he’s a hero while he goes about his mundane life. Two major motion pictures, in 1947 and in 2013, have taken this little story to great heights. This is a distillation of the original 1939 short story drawn in my take on the style of Thurber cartoons.
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