Ezra's Essays

Category: Response

  • A REPRISE ON THISA AND THATA

    Those of you who read Ezra’s Essays may recall an essay on Ben Bernie. He was a popular orchestra leader from the 1920s through the end of the 1950s. When he was pleased with the performance of his orchestra, he would say, “Yousa, yousa, yousa.” And when he was going to play a variety of…

  • Re: ODE TO COMMODE

    Editor’s note: This is a response (written 12/17) to my commentary on this essay. This was the commentary — A moving piece, to be sure. I wonder though — the toilet might have been the last thing Pop saw, but I wonder about some of the other absolutes. What’s the prettiest thing that he remembers…

  • EVERYONE GOT HONORABLE MENTION

    As a general proposition, by the time my essays have been dictated and reread twice in the proofreading process, I grow sick of them and want them to be completed and mailed.  In the last series of essays, I thought that two or three of them were worthwhile.  One of them had to do with…

  • A FEW THOUGHTS ABOUT RICHNESS AND POORNESS

    Jacob Cohen was a well-known personality who once offered the thought that “I’ve been rich and I’ve been poor; and believe me, rich is better.”  I hope that there is no disagreement from my readers as to the wisdom of Mr. Cohen’s remarks. The fact is that the honorable Mr. Cohen was known as a…

  • Tom Scandlyn Response: Country Speak

    [Note from Kevin — Tom, a 92-year-old friend of Pop’s for many years, wrote this after reading “Black Speak” but his response primarily concerns essays about “Country Speak,” of which I published an example very recently. Alternatively, view all of Pop’s essays on language here.]   In math sigma means the sum of. The limits…