From whence came the rather ugly word, "blurb"?

Kainantu

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Blurb was coined by the American humorist Gelett Burgess in 1907. According to his publisher, B.W. Huebsch (quoted in Mencken), Burgess's book, Are You a Bromide?, had been published and was selling well. At the annual trade association dinner that year the publisher distributed some five hundred copies of the book with a special jacket as was the custom. It was also: the common practise to print the picture of a damsel--languishing, heroic, or coquettish--anyhow, a damsel on the jacket of every novel. Burgess provided a drawing of a particularly buxom and pulchritudinous blonde for the jacket and labeled her Miss Blinda Blurb. The name stuck, eventually including not only drawings of buxom women but also any excessive testimonial to the book. From Burgess's Burgess Unabridged, 1914: Blurb 1. A flamboyant advertisement; an inspired testimonial. 2. Fulsome praise; a sound like a publisher ... On the "jacket" of the "latest" fiction, we find the blurb; abounding in agile adjectives and adverbs, attesting that this book is the "sensation of the year." http://www.wordorigins.org/wordorb.htm Jul 15 03, 1:57 AM

Kainantu

pulchritudinous ? Never heard of it !!!! pul·chri·tu·di·nous means: "Characterized by or having great physical beauty and appeal." Use it in your next conversation and knock their socks off !!! Jul 15 03, 2:02 AM

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Following on from lanfranco's question, and because I had never heard of this word before today, what is a blurb? From whence come the blonde haired and blue eyed Italians? What is a blurb? What is the origin of the recent slang word 'munter' for an ugly person?

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