"Dot Not Strawson On The Russell, Ah!"

------------ By J. L. S.
------------------ for the Grice Club.


----------------- IN HIS COMMENT ON "Strawson and Grice on 'analytic'", THIS BLOG, Kramer, with his usual wit, reminds us,

"Sounds like Tom Lehrer riffing on the Hut-Sut song: Dot not Strawson on the Russell, ah!" (*)

Indeed. And so I have titled this post, with credit to Kramer. Indeed the Russell held a fascination with Grice. Bealer, in his "Quality and Concept" cares to quote, extensively, on a manuscript of Grice that we HAVE to add to any catalogue raisonnee of his oeuvre: it's basically WoW:P&CI, but in Bealer's folders it reads as: Grice, "Definite descriptions in Russell and in the vernacular". Charming!

(*: He knows, and it kills the thing to explicate it but hey: it's the famous chorus,

"Hut-Sut Rawlson on the riller-ah"

(1941) (c) Words and music by Leo V. Killion, Ted McMichael & Jack Owens. In turn, derived from a 1914 song that went:

"Hot Shot Dawson on a river boat"

With his brawlin', sprawlin' sweetie. . . . /Hot Shot is an Irish pug,/The river boat is the Queen,/His brawlin' lass is Bridget Cass/ And Hot Shot is her dream."