Full Description
2017 Nebraska Book Award Nonfiction: Folklore
One day Roger Welsch ventured to ask his father a delicate personal question: "Why am I an only child?" His father's answer is one of many examples of the delightful and laughter-inducing ribald tales Welsch has compiled from a lifetime of listening to and sharing the folklore of the Plains. More narrative than simple jokes, and the product of multiple retellings, these coarse tales were even delivered by such prudish sources as Welsch's stern and fearsome German great-aunts. Speaking of cucumbers and sausages in a toast to a newly married couple, the prim and proper women of Welsch's memory voice the obscene and unspeakable in stories fit for general company. Why I'm an Only Child and Other Slightly Naughty Plains Folktales is Welsch's celebration of the gentle and evocative bits of humor reflecting the personality of the people of the Plains.
Contents
ForewordAcknowledgmentsA Brief but Suitably Scholarly and Boring IntroductionBut Enough about Me-What Do You Know about Me?Plain Talk about the Plains, Definitions, and What Folklore Is, Isn't, Might Be, and Is MostlyA Lesson in Proper DictionWhy I'm an Only ChildA Special AnnouncementDad Instructs Me about Civil Ribaldry Even as I Thought I Was Instructing HimNaughty Is in the Ears of the BeholderA First Lesson in Military NomenclatureDiction FrictionEvoked and ProvokedCipherin'Thinking FastCold . . . and DeepIn-house OuthousesSpeaking of Treed RaccoonsHarvard LawUrban v. RuralThe Eternal CuckoldNow's Your ChanceUsing the ImaginationWays of the WiseTraffic FlowSpeaking of the Innocence of the Gentler SexOh, Dat Ole! Oh, Dat Lena!Same Idea, Different NamesNo Boyz AloudThe Church of What?What Did He Say?How You Gonna Keep 'Em down on the Farm (after They've Seen the Farm)?Birds Do It, Bees Do ItIndiscreet SecretionsWhy Is It Called a "Fly?"Geriatric IndignitiesCallow YouthAge Has Nothing to Do with ItInnocent? Or Simply Not Guilty?Other UnmentionablesAn Afterword
