============================================= C H I P' S C L O S E T C L E A N E R Humor * Trivia * Pop Culture * Fun ============================================= B O O K R E V I E W S +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ All contents (c) copyright Chip Rowe E-mail: chip@interaccess.com Visit Chip's Home Page! URL http://thetransom.com/chip +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Is Sex Necessary? or Why You Feel the Way You Do by James Thurber and E.B. White (1929) I picked this book up for 50 cents a while back and finally got around to reading it. It can only be described as brilliant, and funny. I read entire chapters aloud to my favorite girl. Here, for instance, is just a smidgen from one chapter entitled "The Sexual Revolution: Being a Rather Complete Survey of the Entire Sexual Scene": The sexual revolution began with Man's discovery that he was not attractive to Woman.... His mas- culine appearance not only failed to excite Woman, but in many cases it only served to bore her. The result was that man found it necessary to develop attractive personal traits to offset his dull appearance. He learned to say funny things. He learned to smoke, and blow smoke rings. He learned to earn money. This would have been a solution to his difficulty, but in the course of making himself attractive to Woman by developing himself mentally, he inadvertently became so intelligent an animal that he saw how comical the whole situation was. Charlotte's Web has nothing on this. Thurber did the illustrations throughout. They make no sense whatsoever but neither does sex, I suppose. ------------------------------------------------- The Oxford Book of Ages chosen by Anthony and Sally Sampson (Oxford University Press, 1985) This is a nifty volume I found at a used book store. Why would anyone sell it, unless you were going to die? It chronicles quotes about each year of life from birth to 100. As Schopenhauer noted, "The character of almost every man seems to be pre-eminently adapted to one stage of life; so that in this stage he appears to the greatest advantage. Some are loveable youths, and that is all; others are active and energetic men, but age robs them of all worth; many appear most advantageously in old age." The book begins with Edward Young: "Our birth is nothing but our death begun" and ends with Henry Miller's "Who wants to live to be 100? What's the point of it?" The ones in between aren't all so dreary. ----------------------------------------------- The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Sex by Dr. A. Willy, Dr. L. Vander, and Dr. O. Fisher (Cadillac Publishing, 1967) The best parts of this book -- and the ones the publishers brag about in the intro -- are the 176 illustrations, many in color. One connects "a dinner of exciting foods" with a man later having "erotic dreams in which unsatisfied desires are fulfilled"; I've added beef stroganoff to my menu lately with no especially stimulating results to report. There is also an unappetizing cross section of the penis, with various red and blue veins. Ouch. The text itself is academic and dry, so you know Cadillac Publishing was like, this book needs pictures! ------------------------------------------------- The X-Rated Bible by Ben Edward Akerley (American Atheist Press, 1989) A former college professor, Akerley starts out by noting the irony of fundamentalist Christians who want the rest of us to follow the Good Book literally. "They hold to a narrow moral code," he writes, "yet they stand on shaky ground indeed, since by their [own] standards, much of the Bible might be considered obscene." Akerley proceeds to pick out and describe the juicy parts for us, offering a rather dry chronicle of every act of incest, venereal disease, homosexuality, rape, adultery, group sex, indecent exposure, nudity, prostitution, abortion, husband swapping, sexism, bestiality and witchcraft he could find. Most of his conclusions could be described as a stretch, however, on closer examination: He calls Abraham and Isaac "pimps," argues that King David was revived with that sin of sins, "female body friction," and labels Paul "the compulsive celibate" (a guy can't win). Lo and behold, you quickly realize that Akerley is also taking the Bible literally, the same way fundamentalists justify their hatred of gays and push to shove creationism down our throats. Takes one to know one, Ben. ------------------------------------------------ Confessions of a Dangerous Man by Chuck Barris (St. Martin's Press, 1984) Despite what you might think, this "unauthorized autobiography" of the game show king was a great read. Barris, who created "The Dating Game," "The Newlywed Game" and "The Gong Show," weaves his television reminiscences in with a nearly believable account of his work for the CIA as a trained assassin codenamed "Sunny Sixkiller." At one point, he explains that he had the perfect cover, being a game show host, because no one suspected that when he "scouted" vacation spots overseas for Dating Game prizes, he was actually executing hits for the Company. He also describes how the Dating Game almost never got off the ground because the early contestants were so raunchy. Later inventions such as the Newlywed Game thrived on sexual double entendre, but the Dating contestants weren't nearly as tactful. Exasperated as he filmed and scrapped pilot after pilot because of the adult humor, Barris finally had to hire an actor to portray an FCC official and warn contestants that foul language could lead to a one-year prison sentence or $10,000 fine. That was complete bull...uh, it was complete fiction, but it saved TV viewers from exchanges such as these, which never aired for apparent reasons: Pretty Cheerleader: "Bachelor Number One, one of my biggest difficulties is spelling. How do you spell relief? Bachelor: "F-A-R-T." Pretty Cheerleader: Bachelor Number Two, what nationality are you? Bachelor: Well, my father is Welsh, and my mother is Hungarian, so I guess I'm Well-Hung! Good one, Bubba! (Hic) That's what you get when you let frat boys in the studio. --------------------------------------------------- Confessions of a Raving Unconfined Nut: Misadventures in the Counter Culture by Paul Krassner (Simon & Schuster, 1993) Paul edits the Realist, a newsletter of satire and political commentary. During the '60s he was one of the yippies (he claims to have coined the term), causing a lot of problems for Nixon and the gang. This is a highly entertaining account of those years and his relationship with his daughter Holly. A prodigy violinist, he turned sour and got into drugs and politics and generally pissing people off. I saw Paul do some stand-up in Greenwich Village soon after "Confessions" came out, and he read some passages. One of my favorites is when he describes being tailed with Abbie Hoffman by two Chicago cops during the '68 Democratic convention. As soon as he and Abbie realized they were being followed, they returned to a restaurant where they had been refused service the previous day and made a point of shaking the manager's hand (no hard feelings) so he'd have a spot on the cops' suspect list. Later, they stopped their car and walked back to talk to the tails. We introduced ourselves and shook hands. Their names were Herbie and Mac. We offered them official Yippie lapel buttons, but they said, "No thanks, we're on duty." I explained that if we happened to lose them in a crowd, we'd be able to spot them more easily if they were wearing Yippie buttons, so they accepted and pinned them on their jackets. Soon after, the cops asked if Abbie and Paul were going to eat soon. The cops recommended the Pickle Barrel, and the two Yippies followed them to the restaurant. This was indeed a rare and precious moment. We obediently got back into our car and followed the cops. I thought they were going to try and shake us, but we managed never to lose sight of them.... We sat at separate tables." ------------------------------------------------------- Drunken Goldfish & Other Irrelevant Scientific Research by William Hartston (Sterling Publishing, 1988) I picked up this book at a museum bargain bin. It wasn't a surprise to find it there, considering it mocks the lame scientific research that forms the basis for many an exhibit. The title comes from a research paper Hartston stumbled upon that described the effects of alcohol on goldfish memory (about what you'd expect). Hartston didn't want to burn any bridges with his fellow scientists, so he states up front that "on the one hand I have great admiration and love of research for its own sake; on the other I cannot help feeling there is far too much of it going on." Among the findings he cites from studies completed by bona fide researchers (sometimes with taxpayer money -- isn't that always the case?): alcohol makes dogs drunk; animals held under water never die in exactly the same length of time; pigeons can be taught to distinguish between Bach flute music and Hindemath viola music; squeezing a cat's testicles causes it pain; the ideal height for a toilet seat is 0.4 meters; chickens prefer to eat off blue triangles rather than red circles; jokes you've heard already seem less funny; and young orangutans like colored foods better than older ones but older ones eat faster. --------------------------------------------------- The Dictionary of Sexual Slang compiled by Alan Richter, PhD (John Wiley & Sons, 1992) You gotta love a prof who would write a book like this, but nowadays, can he talk about his research without being charged with sexual harassment? Richter, a two-time United Kingdom Scrabble champion (I wonder why), writes in the introduction: "Many languages could probably support a whole book about their sexual terms and phrases. But no other language can rival the variety, color, or sheer number of sexual terms to be found in English." Ah, yes, something we can all be proud of. This is a dictionary where looking up dirty words like "fuck" or "shit" is about as exciting as turning to "the" or "and" in Webster's. Who cares when you've got "kwela," the African Nguni tribe's term meaning "to mount," or "patha-patha," the South African equivalent? Why bother when you can choose between "sugar stick," a 19th century British term for penis, or Shakespeare's reference to the vagina as a "peculiar river"? And finally, who knew that gism (semen) is the preferred form of jism? All these years I've been spelling it wrong. -------------------------------------------------------- The Illustrated Texas Dictionary of the English Language by Jim Everhart (Creative Books of Houston, two volumes, 1968) I was going to send these to my Texan friend Dawn, but they're so entertaining I done kept 'em. Jim's buggy mug appears on each page as he clowns for the camera to illustrate Southern gems such as tarred ("Boy, am ah tarred"), lahr ("Who you calling a lahr?"), barley ("Ah can jes barley open my eyes"), heidi ("Heidi, neighbor") tom ("How come you ain't ever on tom?"), sep ("Everyone can go in sep yew!") and are ("Ah'll meet you there in about an are"). -------------------------------------------------------- Juvenile Dentistry by Walter C. McBride, DDS (Lea & Febiger, Philadelphia, 1941) This was a major find, dug out of the bottom of a box in a used book store in Washington, D.C. Most of the 410-page textbook, which was owned by a Navy dentist during the war, details the mundane task of filling cavities. But the first chapter, "The Management of the Child," could be a manual all on its own. There's instructions to handle the distracting, cooperative, courage-building and sympathy- extending parent as well as shy, timid, frightened, hysterical, retarded and any other variety of child patients. Most of the advice can be boiled down to using tricks, guilt and verbal persuasion to get the kid to open his or her mouth. My favorite child, of course, is the incorrigible kind. Here's Dr. McBride's instructions for handling those little pests: At times, in his practice, the author has resorted to the towel procedure to break down the iron will of an incorrigible patient. It may sound severe, but it is a measure of last resort. With this type of patient, the mother must necessarily be excused and, as she leaves the room, the simple suggestion is made that the latch be turned on the door -- otherwise, she will be back at the crucial moment and destroy all that has been accom- plished. To proceed, put the left arm about the headrest, placing the left hand con- taining a towel over the child's mouth, while holding his two hands in your right hand, which is also pressed down against the boy, holding him firmly to the chair. As the crying is muffled, talk directly into his ear, saying, "As soon as you stop crying, I will let go." If, after a minute or two, no response is given, close the thumb and finger of the towel hand over the nose, shutting off the air supply. In a few seconds he will exhibit symptoms of reasoning and will agree to submit, but the moment the hand is released he will yell loudly for his mother. Imme- diately replace the towel and proceed again. This time pay no attention to the initial overtures and hold until he experiences some discomfort. Prior to releasing him say, "Will you help? Are you sure? Are you sure? Sure?" When he gives assent to cooperate this time, he will be as good on his word. From then on the rest is easy. -end of book reviews-