Foreword<br > ONE time， during the recent war， an Air Force sergeant accosted<br > Robert Benchley in a bar and， with little or no preamble， said， "I<br > might as well tell you that I don t like your work." Benchley re-<br > plied that he had moments of doubt himself， and the sergeant then<br > explained that he had hitched a ride from Africa to Italy on a cargo<br > plane， and that the only available sleeping space had been on bags<br > that were full of overseas editions of Benehley s books. By the time<br > they passed Sicily， the man said， he was so stiff and sore that he<br > hoped never to hear the name Benchley again. "Try it yourself<br > sometime，" he concluded. "That stuff isn t funny when you have to<br > sleep on it."<br > In somewhat the same way， I would suggest that The Benchley<br > Roundup be read piecemeal rather than in one lump---picked up<br > and put down as though you were waiting for a telephone call， or<br > for guests to arrivebbecause， after all， the pieces had their original<br >appeal as separate entities. In making my selection from about a<br >thousand previously published pieces， I read in fits and starts over<br >a long period of time.<br > Many people have tried to analyze Robert Benchley s particular<br >form of humor， and I would be the last one to add my tiny voice<br >to that of the throng， because I don t think it can be analyzed. It is<br >sometimes mad， sometimes penetrating， and sometimes based on<br >nothing more than word associations， and the only generalization<br >that can be made with any degree of certainty is that it is different--<br >or， ff you will， unique.<br > So let s just leave it that the humorous pieces colleeted here，<br >written between 1915 and 1945， are those which seem to stand up<br >best over the years. There were some that were much admired<br ><br >