(defun schwartz (list comp-fn val-fn)
  "Perform a Schwartzian transform on LIST with comparison function COMP-FUN
and value-generating function VAL-FUN."
  (mapcar #'car
          (sort (mapcar `(lambda (item) (cons item (funcall ',val-fn item)))
                        list)
                `(lambda (a b) (funcall ',comp-fn (cdr a) (cdr b))))))

(defun schwartz-test ()
  (schwartz
   '("adjn:Joshua Ng"
     "adktk:KaLap Timothy Kwong"
     "admg:Mahalingam Gobieramanan"
     "admln:Martha L. Nangalama")
   'string<
   (lambda (item)
     (if (string-match " \\(\\w+\\)$" item)
         (match-string 1 item)
       ""))))