Knocking the Neighbors

"Knocking the Neighbors" by George Ade is a collection of humorous stories written in the early 20th century. The work captures the essence of American life with comedic observations about human behavior, societal norms, and the quirks of everyday interactions, particularly focusing on individual characters and their escapades. The stories are filled with Ade's characteristic wit and satire, focusing on a range of characters from simple townsfolk to well-to-do city dwellers. The opening of the book introduces readers to a small, quirky town in the Midwest, where two local merchants, Milt and Henry, are celebrated for their serious moral posturing in the community while secretly indulging in a wild escapade to the city. As they embark on an adventure marked by lavish meals and indulgent entertainment, the contrast between their public and private lives highlights the theme of hypocrisy in societal appearances. Imbued with both humor and critical observation, Ade sets the stage for the amusing exploration of human nature that follows in the subsequent stories. (This is an automatically generated summary.)

George Ade was an American writer, syndicated newspaper columnist, librettist, and playwright who gained national notoriety at the turn of the 20th century with his "Stories of the Streets and of the Town", a column that used street language and slang to describe daily life in Chicago, and a column of his fables in slang, which were humorous stories that featured vernacular speech and the liberal use of capitalization in his characters' dialog.