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Binding: HardcoverDewey Decimal Number: 818.02 EAN: 9780393035926 Edition: 1st ISBN: 0393035921 Label: W. W. Norton & Company Manufacturer: W. W. Norton & Company Number Of Items: 1 Number Of Pages: 598 Publication Date: 1993-10 Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company Studio: W. W. Norton & Company Editorial Review: Product Description: and ""Family Life,"" a hilarious treasury of American humor draws on the work of H. L. Mencken, James Thurber, Zora Neale Hurston, Molly Ivins, P. J. O'Rourke, Ring Lardner, and others. 40,000 first printing. Average Rating:
 Rating:  - Tain't funny, McGeeReading "Russell Baker's Book of American Humor" one may think printed humor is dead. Scanning the biographies in back one realizes most of the contributors are dead. Their timelines hardly matter; they were dead men writing. In what Mark Twain may have termed this "mortuary volume" (he referred to a humor anthology bearing his name) one doesn't know where to begin with the autopsy. We may start with the successes d'estime like Robert Benchley, a much-beloved man who could have written ... Read More Rating: - Not that funnyThere are some gems in here, but not enough. The letter written by Groucho Marx is great, you can hear his voice in it. About two-thirds of the way through I got tired of wading through the muck to get to laugh-producing material, and gave up. I understand that this is not a joke book, but I just thought it would be funnier. Rating:  - genuinely funnyHumor being a matter of taste, it's difficult to find a collection that actually works. Russell Baker's collection really does accomplish what it sets out to do: "to make you laugh, or at least smile, or maybe just feel a little more interior warmth despite 'the situation'" (from the introduction). Running the gamut from sheer looniness to literary parody, and containing vintage material as well as contemporary items, this is a wonderful collection of items to lighten things up. |
