It surprises me as much as it surprises the next person that Nick Offerman has published not one but TWO books (and actually, I think a third, but that was written with his wife). For those who don’t know, Nick Offerman played the hyper-masculine Ron Swanson (with the best mustache) on NBC’s critical darling Parks and Rec.
The reason it surprises me that Offerman has written two books is because he seems like someone who would constantly be working on other things. I read his first book (Paddle Your Own Canoe) on my honeymoon, and a year later I found myself with his second publication: Gumption: Relighting the Torch of Freedom with American’s Gutsiest Troublemakers.
This is *not* a super deep history book. If you’re looking for truly scholarly material, you’re better off elsewhere. This book, while reasonably well researched, is an in depth look at people Offerman personally admires, who also have done some pretty great things for the United States (which is part of the reason Offerman likes them). I especially liked Offerman’s chapters on Wendell Berry and Teddy Roosevelt. (‘Bull Moose: Balls Deep’ is the election slogan we’re all looking for, honestly.)
As I said, this is a book of essays by Offerman about people Offerman admires. I enjoyed it tremendously, but only because I wasn’t expecting a scholarly history book with no opinions in it, apparently. Some of the complaints I’ve seen leveled at it are completely bizarre to me – like valuing hard work but espousing principles “opposite of the entrepreneurial spirit” which I think means the reviewer rejects Offerman’s opinion that our corporate overlords (who he doesn’t trust) should pay workers a living wage for honest work.
Offerman definitely has some opinions about things like cellphones being a pain in the ass. While he does go overboard with some of his points (clearly for comedic effect), he also uses that humor to make points. Sometimes life *is* better when your cellphone isn’t an appendage of your arm. Sometimes technology, while also being pretty great, really fucking sucks. This is part of Offerman’s personal brand as well as a real point – he’s obviously a slight curmudgeon (somewhat purposefully) but again, I’m not sure what people were expecting here regarding Offerman himself being part of the book. I expected opinions and comedy.
This book was fun, lighthearted, and humorous (which apparently some people don’t like). Offerman narrates the audiobook himself, which is adds another layer of humor, as Offerman is a very good, understated comedian. If you don’t enjoy Offerman’s brand of humor (or pretty mainstream left leaning political opinions, like “Democrats and Republicans, but especially Republicans, all kind of suck”) you’re not going to enjoy this book.
Tag Archives: genre: comedy
Gumption: Relighting the Torch of Freedom with America’s Gutsiest Troublemakers
Dad Is Fat
Dad Is Fat is one of several books by comedians I’ve read over the last few years. This is also one of the ones I used to forget how disappointing I found the New York Islanders in the second round of the 2016 Stanley Cup playoffs.
I was a bit hesitant to listen to this one. I am not one of those people who loves children. I find children tend to make most people a lot less interesting because people seem to think 1) I deeply care about everything their child does 2) they don’t need to have anything else to talk about except their children I barely care about anyway.
Conversations tend to go like this:
Me: Seen any movies lately?
Friend: I saw a video my significant other took of our child! Want to watch?
Me: Sure.
*3 Hours Later*
Friend: And THIS is a video of our child taking a dump on the bathroom floor AFTER getting off the potty!
Me: Oh is that so? *quietly removes friend’s contact information from phone*
Anyway, in spite of my initial reluctance, I enjoyed this book a lot, mainly for the reasons that 1. I find Jim Gaffigan’s comedy funny and 2. Jim Gaffigan’s stories about parenting his children are basically the stories my parents told me about parenting me and my sister.
Jim and his wife have 5 children in a small New York City apartment. That’s basically all you need to know going in, and his ongoing theme is basically “I don’t know what I’m doing.”
My parents also had no idea what they were doing, and have told me so on several occasions now.
But Gaffigan’s descriptions of children’s music, books, television, interaction with each other and strangers, and all of that? My parents told me those stories, and they’re a hundred times funnier here.
This was one of the many audiobooks I listened to at work, and I highly recommend experiencing Dad Is Fat as an audiobook. Gaffigan reads it himself, which makes it very enjoyable. I’m finding most books done by funny people are best when you hear them read by the author rather than read on your own. The author is able to give the best delivery of the material.
A lot of comedians repeat their standup material in their books, but Gaffigan doesn’t do that here. There’s a little recycle material, but not much. Definitely worth the read/listen. It’s a quick listen and a quick, easy read and I highly recommend it, even as someone who has no children and doesn’t typically enjoy hearing about other people’s children.
The Tempest
I read The Tempest by William Shakespeare after reading the Prospero’s Daughter series – the series is based on the play. I’d seen the play live before but never read it.
One of my favorite things about Shakespeare plays is that I get to read literary criticism and history on them before I review them, so I feel extra smart.
I don’t really feel the need to put “SPOILER ALERT” on a 400 year old play, so here we go.
The Tempest is thought to be written between 1610 and 1611, and is thought to be the last play Shakespeare wrote by himself. But, like everything else we know about Shakespeare, we don’t really “know” it at all, and scholars contest both these claims.
For a long time, this wasn’t one of Shakespeare’s most popular plays. It didn’t meet much acclaim before the “closing of the theaters” (which was when, basically, the Puritans sucked the fun out of life) and after the Restoration (when English, Scottish, and Irish monarchies were “restored” under Charles II – it’s way easier to read the Wikipedia than explain) only adaptations of it were popular. It wasn’t until later on, during the 1800s, did people begin using the original work rather than an adaptation, and it was even later than that, in the 20th century, that the play was re-evaluated by critics and scholars. It’s now considered one of Shakespeare’s greatest works.
Either way, this particular play was written very late, and like some of Shakespeare’s other later plays, is not a strict comedy although it is classified as one. This play, along with Cymbeline, The Two Noble Kinsmen, The Winter’s Tale, and Pericles, Prince of Tyre were classified by Edward Dowden as “romances” or “tragicomedies” in his 1875 work Shakespeare: A Critical Study of his Mind and Art. (I have to get a copy of this.)
Romances tend to have certain things in common.
+ A redemptive plotline with a happy ending involving the re-uniting of long-separated family members
+ Magic and other fantastical elements
…as well as some other things you can read on the Wikipedia page. But these two stood out particularly me.
There were a couple of other themes mentioned in critical essays I’ve read about The Tempest, one of which is that the play is very concerned with the fact that it’s a play. Remember that this is believed to be one of the last plays Shakespeare wrote on his own – one theory is that the “dread magician Prospero” is Shakespeare inserting himself into the story. As Prospero brings about all the events in the story through his magic, Shakespeare brought about all the events in the theater as a playwright. As Prospero decides to give up his magic and return to normal life, Shakespeare decides to give up his role as a playwright.
I rather like this theory, and it’s supported by some textual evidence. The shipwreck was a “spectacle” that Ariel “performed.” There is a connection between Prospero’s “art” and theatrical tricks/illusions, and two of the characters – Antonio and either the Alonso or Sebastian – are “cast” in a “troop” to “act.” The Globe Theatre itself may have been reference by Prospero:
“Our revels now are ended. These our actors,
As I foretold you, were all spirits and
Are melted into air, into thin air;
And—like the baseless fabric of this vision —
The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
And like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep. …”
The other theme that seems to run through is magic. Now, from what I remember of my high school history and English classes, in Shakespeare’s day, you could get away with being interested in the supernatural by wanting to study it and understand its causes. If you were interested in conjuring spirits and other occult things, then you could be executed for it. That was going on at that point, particularly close to the Catholic Church, in Italy.
Anyway, Shakespeare very carefully paints Prospero as a “white” magician (furthering the self-insert theory). Most of Prospero’s magic is based on late 16th and early 17th science, and Prospero is carefully juxtaposed with Sycorax, who worships the devil and traps Ariel in a tree when he’s too gentle to perform her dark tasks. Prospero’s magic is described as wonderful and constructive; Sycorax’s magic is supposed to be destructive and dangerous. Prospero uses his magic to set things right and once he does, he gives it all up and frees Ariel.
Usually I love to look carefully at how Shakespeare’s female characters are written and perceived, but in this case it’s almost pointless. Miranda is the only female character, she falls in love with Ferdinand, he loves her, they plan to marry, game over. Miranda seems to have accepted the patriarchal society she would have been in – she is subordinate to her father. Her only duty to him seems to be to remain a virgin until marriage. The other women mentioned in the play – Claribel, Alonso’s daughter, and Sycorax – don’t appear, they’re only mentioned.
We learn everything of Sycorax from Prospero, but he’s never met her. He only knows what he knows from Ariel. There’s one theory from Stephen Orgel, a Shakespearean scholar who teaches English at Stamford University, that says Prospero is suspicious of women and their virtue because he makes and ambiguous remark about his wife’s fidelity. This makes him an unreliable source.
Caliban is one of the more interesting characters in the play. Some scholars think that he’s based on a Caribbean native, called Caribans, by members of Shakespeare’s society. He is more in touch with the natural world but is, in many ways, a brute. He does eventually come to see that the shipwrecked men he meets on the islands are not virtuous or noble masters and he kind of comes around. There’s some post-colonial theories on this that I didn’t read much about, but in the post-colonial view of the colonizer’s (Prospero’s) effect on the colonized (Caliban and Ariel), you could almost say that Prospero “civilized” them, which was a goal of the colonizers back in Shakespeare’s day. As everyone knows from history class, natives of the West Indies were viewed as cannibals and savages who needed to be civilized by white men.
Since I am two book reviews behind at this point, I’m going to end my research here. Overall, I have to say that I truly enjoyed The Tempest, both reading it and watching it performed a couple of years ago.
words in scarlet ink 