Book Review
Our Dumb Century: 100 Years of Headlines from America's Finest News Source
by Scott Dikkers and The Onion Writers Staff
Publisher: Crown Publishing Group
ISBN: 0609804618
The Onion is state-of-the-art American humor. Featuring outrageously satirical news stories and editorials of the moment, this weekly online and print publication skewers contemporary life and drop-kicks those figures too busy hurdling toward the millennium to grasp the irony of their own hypocrisies and petty yelps.
Before we crossover into the 21st, The Onion staff has taken the opportunity, in their first book, to say farewell to this worn-out century by chronicling it's errors -- um, eras -- with an elaborately detailed series of newspaper front page mock-ups, complete with screaming headlines.- August 6, 1903: "Zulus Attack London! King Held at Spearpoint. Parliamentary Heads Shrunken. Prime Minister Calls for Calm, Biscuits.
- November 6, 1918: "Chaplin Moving Picture $400 Over Budget. Fiscal Future of Studio Doubtful. Moving-Picture Business May Be Out of Control."
- March 16, 1923: Irving Berlin Publishes 1,000th Annoying, Clamorous Ditty. Celebrated Songsmith Gives World Music, Headaches. Just 211 from All-Time Mark Set by George M. Cohan.
- June 8, 1944: "War Rationing Board Restricts Nylon Use to Armed Forces, J. Edgar Hoover Only."
- November 6, 1952: "Boy-Girl Malt-Sharing at All-Time High. Wanton, Promiscuous Exchange of Saliva Rampant at Nation's Soda Fountains; Malted Treats a Breeding Ground for Dangerous Microbes, Sperm."
- November 22, 1963: "Kennedy Slain by CIA, Mafia, Castro, LBJ, Teamsters, Freemasons. Johnson Vows to Honor Kennedy's Memory by Taking Plump Young Mistress."
- May 29, 1993: "Comedians Struggling to Find Angle in Bobbitt Case.
The quotes could continue indefinitely. They'd serve no other purpose than to deny your private discovery and enjoyment (since I'm not being paid by the word). Intended for general adult audiences, historical knowledge is not mandatory, but certainly a satisfaction enhancement. Buy some history books, too, will ya?Our Dumb Century: 100 Years of Headlines from America's Finest News Source is a breezy volume filled with big laughs evolving from smart, enlightened parodies crafted by polished humorists in touch with ye olde days -- a bunch of guys with their thumbs planted in their ears, fingers waving and tongues happily protruding at our collective past.
Mike Durrett, your Guide for Humor