Cast Your Bread Upon The Waters

In mid-1970's, Jon escapes from Ceausescu's dictatorship in Romania and settles in New York City. Faced with an extremely dynamic and pragmatic environment, and enjoying liberties he had not known before, Jon decides he must earn an American university degree to both enhance his knowledge and have a better chance in a highly competitive job market. He pays for his studies by taking odd jobs, where he meets people and learns the ropes of earning, American-style, one's living. However, the integration process is an arduous task. At times, Jon's enthusiasm crosses moments of disillusion, duplicity, and letdown. Luckily, his campus experience helps him overcome real or imaginary obstacles, bringing him in tune with local custom. Very much like in a bildungsroman narrative, Jon's "American" story is one of reshaping a personality into a more complex human being. His efforts are duly rewarded with finding true love and a reason to be happy thereafter. The biblical prediction-that he would find again the bread he had cast away-is thus fulfilled.

Americans have a gift for coining proverbs. "A picture is worth a thousand words" was not, as you might imagine, the product of ancient Chinese wisdom -- it was actually minted by advertising executive Fred Barnard in a 1921 advertisement for Printer's Ink magazine. After all, Americans are first and foremost a practical people and proverbs can be loosely defined as pithy statements that are generally accepted as true and useful. The next logical step would be to gather all of this wisdom together for a truly American celebration of shrewd advice.A Dictionary of American Proverbs is the first major collection of proverbs in the English language based on oral sources rather than written ones. Listed alphabetically according to their most significant key word, it features over 15,000 entries including uniquely American proverbs that have never before been recorded, as well as thousands of traditional proverbs that have found their way into American speech from classical, biblical, British, continental European, and American literature. Based on the fieldwork conducted over thirty years by the American Dialect Society, this volume is complete with historical references to the earliest written sources, and supplies variants and recorded geographical distribution after each proverb.Many surprised await the reader in this vast treasure trove of wit and wisdom. Collected here are nuggets of popular wisdom on all aspects of American life: weather, agriculture, travel, money, business, food, neighbors, friends, manners, government, politics, law, health, education, religion, music, song, and dance. And, to further enhance browsing pleasure, the editors have provided a detailed guide to the use of the work. While it's true that many of our best known proverbs have been supplied by the ever-present "Anonymous," many more can be attributed to some very famous Americans, like Ernest Hemingway, Abraham Lincoln, Benjamin Franklin, Mark Twain, J. Pierpont Morgan, Thomas Alva Edison, Abigail Adams, and Ralph Waldo Emerson, to name but a few offered in this fascinating collection.Who wouldn't want to know the origin of "the opera ain't over till the fat lady sings?" This uniquely American proverb and many more are gathered together in A Dictionary of American Proverbs. A great resource for students and scholars of literature, psychology, folklore, linguistics, anthropology, and cultural history, this endlessly intriguing volume is also a delightful companion for anyone with an interest in American culture.