Verwandte Artikel zu 101 Damnations: The Humorists' Tour of Personal...

101 Damnations: The Humorists' Tour of Personal Hells - Hardcover

 
9780312284800: 101 Damnations: The Humorists' Tour of Personal Hells
Hardcover
ISBN 10: 0312284802 ISBN 13: 9780312284800
Verlag: Thomas Dunne Books, 2002

Inhaltsangabe

Dear flappable reader:
Do you bristle at a handshake that resembles a limp fish? Do oblivious pedestrians bring you to the brink? What about museum gift shops, superfluous courtesy (do we need a gas pump to show us gratitude?), behemoth SUVS, or inexplicable operating manuals? Have you had it with screeching leaf blowers, beseeching telemarketers, escalating movie-ticket prices, or proliferating celebrity magazines? Is it children's choirs or karaoke singers, waiters bearing pepper grinders or dinner guests blathering on about salt, that drives you to distraction?

For anyone who has recognized that this peaceful kingdom of ours has more than a few potholes, 101 Damnations is the perfect companion. It's your ticket to the nine circles of personal hell.

Armed with wit, bewilderment, and words to the wise ass, today's leading humorists conduct a brief tour of the trivial and often universal exasperations we all must endure. Among the damning, Henry Alford reveals our wanton desire to affect Britishisms. Sandra Tsing Loh has it in for people who forward "funny" e-mails. Once and for all, Merrill Markoe sets forth cell phone etiquette. And there are many, many others. Ninety-eight to be exact. Make yourself comfortable. Misery loves company.

Die Inhaltsangabe kann sich auf eine andere Ausgabe dieses Titels beziehen.

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Michael J. Rosen is the author, illustrator, or editor of something like fifty books for both adults and children, including the biennial humor series, Mirth of a Nation.

Rezensionen

We've all got pet peeves that drive us crazy, and this volume covers them all: cell phones in public places, porn e-mails, joke e-mails, SUVs, David Blaine, and one of my personal favorites, Amish friendship bread. Editor Rosen, the literary director of Thurber House and author of Mirth of a Nation, has compiled an entertaining collection of essays by various humorists that covers the things they (and often the readers) love to hate. Contributors include Calvin Trillin, Merrill Markoe, and Jon Scieszka, among others. On Amish friendship bread, Celia Rivenbark observes: "Amish friendship bread is a woman thing. Sure, we pretend to be friends, but when it comes right down to it, women only make new women friends so that, one day, they'll be able to pawn off a bag of friendship bread 'starter' on them .The starter looks like baby spit-up and is usually accompanied by a recipe only slightly shorter than the Constitution." Been there, done that! Recommended for most humor collections. Kathy Ingels Helmond, Indianapolis-Marion Cty. P.L.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Mass e-mails. Telemarketers. People who call the Hamptons "the country." Muggers, allergies, teenagers and things that stick to the soles of your shoes. In 101 Damnations: The Humorists' Tour of Personal Hells, edited by Michael J. Rosen (Mirth of a Nation), writers and humorists take quick, hilarious swipes at the things that drive them crazy. From Kurt Andersen's one-paragraph consideration of "the weird remarks between silence and praise," to Andy Borowitz's dismissal of the phrase "and all that good stuff," to Onion writer Tim Harrod's list of things he simply hates ("Reality TV, Tailgaters, Hangnails... Cartoons that Look Distinctive but not Expressive... Cheap Wristwatches), this collection is sure to please curmudgeons, cynics, Luddites and average fed-up Americans everywhere.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

101 Damnations: The Humorists' Tour of Personal Hells
Circle 1
THE ROAD TO HELL IS PAVED WITH GOOD INVENTIONS
New Items in the Devil's Workshop
1
A Damnation, Directed Toward Telemarketers
Tim Carvell
 
 
 
 
Let us imagine a domestic scene. A husband--whom we shall refer to, for purposes of speed and dramatic clarity, as Husband--is addressing his wife, Wife. "I've been thinking," he says, "and I feel like we really ought to switch our long-distance service. I'm certain that there must be a cheaper alternative out there."
"Yes," Wife replies. "If only we knew where to find one! If only there were some way for us to learn about the range of long-distance providers, and their charges for various services!"
There is an awkward pause. Then the telephone rings. Husband scrambles for the receiver, but Wife beats him to it.
"Yes?" she says. "Why, what an odd coincidence, we are interested in--you don't say! You don't say! You don't say! Gracious, we'd be delighted to switch to your fine, fine long-distance service."
We shall have to content ourselves with imagining such a scene--a moment when a telemarketer calls at exactly theright time, offering precisely what one needs--since, reaching back to the dawn of humankind, such a moment has never ever taken place. No, the history of telemarketing has been an ignominious one, consisting, I am positive, entirely of summoning individuals from their beds and showers and forcing them to aver their lack of interest in magazine subscriptions, timeshare condominiums, or term life insurance.
I am not certain at what moment in the telephone's history it went from being a tool of communication to being an implement of annoyance, but the two seem so inextricably linked that I would not be surprised to learn that they were born, like a pair of Siamese twins, in the same damp instant. I harbor a dreadful suspicion that the telephone companies--all too aware of the bad reputation that the speed-dialing sell-weasels of the telemarketing conglomerates have given them--have heavily edited Alexander Graham Bell's first telephone call, which originally went, "Watson, come here, I need you to consider what would happen to your loved ones if any mishap were ever to befall you. For just ten dollars a month, Watson, you can purchase peace of mind."
I have employed various means of coping with telemarketers, which tend to track nicely with Elizabeth Kubler-Ross's stages of grief: anger ("How dare you call me at home?"), denial ("Please take me off your list at once"), bargaining ("If I buy something from you, will you leave me alone?"), and depression ("You're the only person who'scalled me all week."). I have now arrived at the logical end point: acceptance.
By "acceptance," I do not wish to imply that I am no longer irritated by telemarketers and their nefarious schemes. Nor do I mean to imply that I don't spend my idle time fantasizing about getting my hands on the home telephone numbers of various telemarketing companies' CEOs and calling them at all hours to regale them with tales of my personal life. By "acceptance," I simply mean to suggest that I have ceased to fight the incursions of telemarketers upon my life; I now choose to view them as one of the many irritating yet irreducible facts of being alive--like sore throats and sunburns, measles and Miss Marisa Tomei--which have no redeeming grace save for one: they soften and sweeten the knowledge, ever present if rarely acknowledged, that one's days lead softly, inexorably to the endless silence of death.
 
 
TIM CARVELL is a writer and editor based in New York City.
101 DAMNATIONS. Introduction and compilation are copyright © 2002 by Michael J. Rosen. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address St. Martin's Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

„Über diesen Titel“ kann sich auf eine andere Ausgabe dieses Titels beziehen.

Verlag
Thomas Dunne Books
Erscheinungsdatum
2002
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
0312284802
ISBN 13 
9780312284800
Einband
Gebundene Ausgabe
Anzahl der Seiten
368
Herausgeber
Rosen Michael
Kontakt zum Hersteller
Nicht verfügbar
Verantwortliche Person
Nicht verfügbar