The Wit’s Guide to Insinuation

Or, two winks, two nudges

Frankly, Wilhelm Trübner’s Self Portrait With Winking Eye could have had a more suggestive title.

What are you insinuating? If you have to ask, you probably already know. And if you know that IYKYK stands for “if you know you know,” then it stands to reason that you definitely know. But know what, exactly?

“If Miss means respectably unmarried, and Mrs respectably married, then Ms means nudge, nudge, wink, wink.”  
— Angela Carter

The modern standard for insinuation was set in 1971 by the Monty Python skit Candid Photography, better known as “Nudge Nudge,” in which a lascivious Eric Idle harasses the mild-mannered Terry Jones with suggestive comments — A nod’s as good as a wink to a blind bat! — before finally, earnestly asking what marital relations are like. 

“It was not the apple in the tree but the pair on the ground that caused the trouble in the garden.”
— M.D. O’Connor

The coda to that sketch came in 1993, when Idle wrote a letter to British Prime Minister John Major pointing out that the two men shared a birthday. “On the 29th March you and I will both be fifty,” Idle wrote. “Has it ever occurred to you that, but for a twist of fate, I should be Prime Minister and you could have been the Man in the Nudge Nudge sketch from Monty Python? I hope you don’t feel too disappointed.”

“Nor do they trust their tongue alone,
But speak a language of their own;
Can read a nod, a shrug, a look,
Far better than a printed book;
Convey a libel in a frown,
And wink a reputation down.”
— Jonathan Swift, The Journal of a Modern Lady

Innuendo is the sexiest subset of insinuation, but what percentage does it actually comprise? And how much does it leave to the imagination? Probably less than you think.

The all-time mistress of innuendo was Mae West, and when she invited you to come up and see her sometime, you knew what she meant. Also when she asked you to peel her a grape. Get it? A grape? Beulah? Nudge? Wink?

“A curved line is the loveliest distance between two points.”  
— Mae West

The fact that West’s persona had little to do with her physique — her biographer described the unadorned sex symbol as “a somewhat dumpy, short and almost nondescript figure” — can be read as a triumph of insinuation. The late Tina Turner had a similar genius, as noted in a recent New York Times appreciation. “The fashion designer Bob Mackie said Turner had the “best body, with the longest legs, and she used it all,’” writes Danyel Smith, expounding on her lengthy limbs before dropping this truth bomb: “Turner was 5-foot-4.”

“It’s the fallen women who are usually picked up.”
— Woody Allen

Insinuation is a nasty political weapon, a way to lie about your opponents without actually saying anything untrue. And so there’s a terrific irony in the case of George Smathers, a mid-century Florida senator who was reported to have called his opponent a “shameless extrovert” who “is reliably reported to practice nepotism with his sister-in-law” and “has a sister who was once a thespian in wicked New York,” and, before his marriage, “routinely practiced celibacy.” Even though all the shocking allegations held up to scrutiny, Smathers spent the rest of his life denying he’d ever said them.

“Her words held all the pointed innuendo that elderly ladies are able to achieve with the minimum of actual statement.”
 — Agatha Christie

In small doses, insinuation lets everyone stay on their preferred side of the joke. Without it, life is sad. How sad? In a 1977 attempt to break the ice before their interview, Richard Nixon asked David Frost, “Well, did you do any fornicating this weekend?” 

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This week’s ReccoMention!

I’m a sucker for a literary gimmick, and they say you should never give a sucker an even break. But this week’s subscriber-only pick (a new one each week for a mere C$30/year!) is an odd break at best.

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This month’s Riposte Card!

Some days I feel like the triumphant big egg in this beautiful illustration of George Carlin’s immortal quip. Some days I feel like the awkward little egg. But every day this month, I’ve been grateful to

James Braithwaite

of

The Bathwater

for being the man behind January’s Riposte Card. Would you like three blank framable copies of the above mailed to you? You can get that and 11 (!) more like it for a mere C$80 with an annual subscription to Riposte Cards!

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Quote Vote

“One woman I was dating said ‘Come on over, there’s nobody home.” I went over — nobody was home.”
— Rodney Dangerfield

We’re into the thick of January now! Can’t get much thicker, if you know what I mean! So what shall next week’s issue be about? 

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Issue 236 of Get Wit Quick was mostly written between the lines. “Just give me a comfortable couch, a dog, a good book, and a woman,” Groucho Marx probably didn’t say. “Then if you can get the dog to go somewhere and read the book, I might have a little fun.” Throw your dog a copy of  Elements of Wit: Mastering The Art of Being Interesting. And when I ask you to tap the ❤️ below, I trust you know what I mean.