Every now and then newspapers happen upon a headline that simply transcends the art form (I'm using the term advisedly here) and which transports the reader instantly into that magical realm where sense comes a long second behind sensibility. We're used to those iconic ones which do their job well in grabbing the attention and summarising the associated news item pithily, succinctly and forcibly ("Gotcha!", "Titanic Sinks" and so on) but some go that crucial stage further - employing wit, strange juxtaposition, the finesse of a surgeon and the impact of an ICBM to sear an image indelibly in our minds for ever.

Two from opposite sides of the pond ...





Any others you care to share?

How about these ones from "Quote... Unquote" by Nigel Rees (1982):


Wartime news from the Daily Mail ....     Eighth Army push bottles up Germans

Private Eye on a librarians strike in Essex .....     Book lack in Ongar

London Daily Telegraph ......     Equity blacks Othello

Gateshead Post .....        Chip shop owner battered man


But sadly the one about a mental patient that raped two laundry workers  and then escaped ..... Nut screws washers & bolts .... is probably apocyphal.

Daily Express when Gordan Brown moves into No 10..... 'Gord Help Us Now'

The Sun, not that I've ever read it, can often be relied upon to come up with some pun or other:






And one from the 1990's in reaction to the then Welsh Secretary's pledge to slash the number of government agencies in Wales:  Last quango in Powys

And again playing on song lyrics there's this one from the Daily Mail I think:

Some great puns there, MM ...

Priscilla - I was "detained" in Whitehall by police out of uniform for allowing a three year old to urinate against a tree while Gordo drove past on the way to take up residency in Number 10. But that's another story.

And then there's the unintentionally brilliant;

You can rely on local newspapers:

and the Sun:

Some corkers from the New York Post:

This isn't a real headline, but it should be. I wish I could claim it as my own, but it is from a disgruntled Guardian reader's comment about the devastation caused by the twin miseries of Brexit and Covid here in the UK. In a flash of brilliance worthy of Priscilla or nordmann, the Guardian reader coined the word "Coxit" - to be used in this imaginary headline from the Sun (or even the The Times these days):


Boris Coxit Up.