This post originally appeared in November 2004. It's been somewhat revised for this posting.When my bookshelves collapsed the other day, I found my copies of three books by Jack Douglas that I'd been looking for. I discovered Douglas's books back in 1959 or 1960, and at the time I thought they were hilarious. So last night I decided to see if they were still funny after 45 years or so and picked up Never Trust a Naked Bus Driver. The title is either funny or sage advice. Or both. (The other two books I located are My Brother Was an Only Child and The Neighbors Are Scaring My Wolf.)
The cover has a pretty good likeness of Douglas on it. He was a frequent guest on The Tonight Show back when Jack Parr was the host, so I remember what he looked like. And the book is just as strange as I remembered. It's very short, only 116 pages, and some of the pages have very little written on them. Chapter 42, for example, is nothing more than a sign that says, "This is your Submarine. Keep It Tidy." And in fact, chapter might be the wrong word, as it implies some kind of continuity. There's no continuity in the book. Each "chapter" is a separate entity containing things like notes, playbills, diary entries, reminiscences, one-liners, and so on. My favorite chapter begins with another sign: "Kick the Happiness Habit -- Become a Writer."
So does the book still make me laugh? Sure, in places. It's not as funny to me as it was long ago, however, which is a shame. I figure the book hasn't changed. So it must be me.
18 comments:
That's him.
I've had a few shelves collapse but with all the stacks of books around here, avalanches are much more common!
I remember him and this book, as well as his wife Reiko. My mother-in-law was a huge fan of Jack Paar, but he was no Johnny Carson IMHO.
I was in junior high when Douglas's books came out, and I devoured them, loving the craziness and outright absurdities in them. I no longer have them, but a few things have stayed in memory. For instance, in one of the books, Chapter 19 read: "To hell with Chapter 19. Every damn book you pick up has a Chapter 19."
One of them had what appeared to be accidentally unseparated pages. When you cut them apart, you found a single word in the middle of one: "Nosey."
The "chapter 19" bit is in this one, Barry.
I cringed imagining your collapsing shelves, Bill, but your discovery summoned one of my own. I'd long forgotten Jack Douglas and My Brother Was an Only Child, which I read so long ago I wonder if I would even recognize the me then. I remember the book amused me, but have no recollection of the actual reading. Nonetheless, I am grateful for the fragmented memory.
Always glad to stir up those memories.
I noticed a couple of our bookshelves tilting rather precariously (they're bolted together at the top, but the bottoms are beginning to sag). At the thought of removing everything to straighten up, I just decided I'll wait for the inevitable and then fix things!
I have the first two books around here somewhere, probably also on a shelf contemplating collapse. I remember him from Paar (I can't believe I once stayed up to watch late night tv, 9 PM is about the limit for me now), and lump him together with another comic writer & barely-a-book producer, Roger Price, the Droodles guy, whose In One Head and Out the Other & J.G. The Upright Ape were favorites. Paar's best guest was Alexander King, a fabulous raconteur, whose books - hardcover! - are shelved with honor next to Perelman, Thurber and Mencken.
Art Scott
I have a couple by King and maybe the Droodles paperback by Price.
Face it, Bill. You have almost everything.
Not that there's anything wrong with that.
I was looking forward to your Winter setting or holiday theme FFB, you you crossed me up with this one. Rats.
Angela and her husband are in town for Thanksgiving, so I had to run a repeat.
I read those books, too, but I have no memory of whether I thought they were funny...must have, though.
Do you remember H. Allen Smith, another humorist from about that time (or a little earlier)? (Probably best know for his novel Rhubarb, about a cat which owned a baseball team, or Low Man on a Totem Pole) I thought he was really funny when I was about 12...re-read some of his things when I was about 30, and wondered why I'd ever thought then were funny...
As I mentioned back when and again on Google+ today, Douglas was going to be the visiting prof at the University of Hawaii grad writing seminar I was allowed to join as a sophomore, thanks to Robert Onopa, who taught the 300s workshop I was in as a frosh...Douglas backed out at the last minute in 1983, and A. A. Attanasio was a quick replacement, which was fine by me...I'd picked up both THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY HASHIMOTO and RADIX, and i liked Al's novel better than the humorous memoirs of Reiko and Jack's kid in infancy...not quite up to Jean Kerr, Will Cuppy, Richard Armour, Roger Price and their peers I had heard of and read before.
I believe Jack and Reiko were also frequent visitors to Merv Griffin's daytime show in the latter 1960s, post-Paar.
Whether or not his books remain funny, most of his book titles still are 8-)
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