The humor of "Bill" Nye by Bill Nye
QR code
The humor of "Bill" Nye by Bill Nye is a collection of comic essays and satirical sketches written in the late 19th to early 20th century. It is humor/nonfiction, assembled to showcase a frontier newspaperman’s irreverent take on history, public life, and everyday absurdities. An opening introduction frames the appeal as boisterous, boyish, and anti-heroic, delighting in deflating piety and pretension. The likely topic is a breezy send-up of famous figures, American
institutions, and modern habits, delivered through deadpan exaggeration and playful misuse of grand language. The pieces range from mock-historical portraits—of Washington as both revered and comically human, Franklin as an industrious printer-scientist rendered in slapstick superlatives, Columbus as a job-seeking “discoverer” courting royal funding, the Puritans as clam-digging moral policers, and even Nero as a thin-skinned tyrant—to social and cultural lampoons. A disastrous “Hamlet” performance is skewered as vanity and ineptitude; a faux-scientific forecast imagines how oysters, gadgets, and leisure will deform the “coming man”; a midnight “burglary” turns out to be a hissing radiator; a mock-official resignation from a small post office brims with bureaucratic pomposity; and a wry jailhouse visit catalogs food, class pecking orders, and small humiliations. Across the book the voice stays jaunty and colloquial, using mock-heroic diction, skewed logic, and relentless deflation to trade solemn hero-worship for loud, restorative laughter. (This is an automatically generated summary.)
Download for free
For your e-reader or reading app — Kindle, Kobo, Apple Books, Calibre etc.
Kindle → Use Send-to-Kindle
Kobo, Nook etc. → Transfer via USB
Phone, tablet or computer → Open in a reading app
Other formats & older devices
There may be more files related to this item.
About this eBook
| Author | Nye, Bill, 1850-1896 |
|---|---|
| Editor | Gunn, John W., 1893-1960 |
| Editor | Haldeman-Julius, E. (Emanuel), 1888-1951 |
| LoC No. | ca25001422 |
| Title | The humor of "Bill" Nye |
| Original Publication | Girard: Haldeman-Julius Company, 1924. |
| Series Title | Little blue book, no. 771 |
| Contents | Introduction -- Words about Washington -- B. Franklin, deceased -- The discovery of America -- The Puritans -- Nero -- A singular "Hamlet" [James Owen O'Connor] -- The dubious future -- A thrilling experience -- A resign -- A guest at the Ludlow. |
| Credits | Carla Foust, Tim Miller and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at www.pgdp.net |
| Language | English |
| LoC Class | PN: Language and Literatures: Literature: General, Criticism, Collections |
| Subject | American wit and humor |
| Category | Text |
| eBook-No. | 78694 |
| Release Date | May 16, 2026 |
| Copyright | Public domain in the USA. |
| Downloads | 2434 downloads in the last 30 days. |
Project Gutenberg eBooks are always free!