Informant38

The New York Observer And so now, finally, with all hope of quieting her lost, the wailing newborn has been put into my care. I, who have no milk. In my arms, the furious infant screams and shakes. I might be swaddling a chainsaw. Millions of years of evolution have gone into this cry, human baby after human baby slouching, in infinitesimal increments, toward this blood-curdling shriek that will ensure parental protection and thus survival. The decorous mewlers, the considerate whiners, these have long been selected out of the human infant population. Now there are only the tympanum-bursting banshees, the Tasmanian devils with the breath control of a La Scala soprano.
{actually a review of Elvis Costello's latest by Jeffrey Eugenides, who at even his most turgid is a gifted writer indeed, as is the aforementioned.}