And another excellent birthday book: Alexandra Petri's US History! I've been a fan of Petri's work for several years now. During my time as a Washington Post subscriber I consistently got kick out of her humor column, and she's been excellent whenever she flits across my social media feed.
While I hadn't thought about this before reading it, the conceit of the book reminds me strongly of Dave Barry Slept Here, a book my parents had that I devoured many times while growing up. Both are satirical looks back over the history of the United States, which are really funny on your own but become even more funny if you're already familiar with the subject matter, as there is usually a deeper layer to the jokes. Both books also bear covers with the classic scene of Washington crossing the Delaware but with the authors added to the boat - I imagine this is a deliberate homage.
The structure of the books turn out to be very different, though. I haven't read DBSH in years, but as I recall it's written in a sort of faux textbook style, with chapters covering discrete eras, occasional graphs and illustrations, and pop quizzes or discussion questions. Petri's book, in contrast, is a collection of faux "original" documents. Each one is basically a riff off an existing item, but presented as a first draft or alternate version or something. For example, there's an outline of The Federalist Papers using Hamilton's original idea to keep readers' attention throughout the serial by making "Publius" a three-dimensional character the audience would root for instead of an aloof narrator. There's a letter from Coronado in which he excitedly writes to the king describing what's very obviously a lie. There are transcripts of Nixon's tapes but only the parts involving Checkers the dog. And so on.
The other surprise was that, despite the title, it ended up being more about American literature than US history. I haven't counted, but I'd guess that about 2/3 of the sections are purely literary: riffs on Poe, Melville, Hawthorne, Twain, Hemingway, Sontag, Wolfe, Thompson, and tons more. That isn't a complaint! I love literature, and am probably even more familiar with these stories than I am with the history, which again adds to the delight as there are more in-jokes and subtle references to capture.
One advantage of this document-based approach is that the form and voice changes constantly throughout the book. There are letters, articles, Yelp-style reviews (of Ford's Theater!), screenplays, diaries, pitches, and more. It's all funny, but sometimes the wit is elevated, other times very blunt; sometimes it's mostly the concept that's funny, other times the concept is rote but the wordplay is hysterical.
There were multiple points where I had to stop and put the book down and ask myself, "How did she come up with this?!" The example I'm thinking of now is "Shirley Temple Jackson," which (why not!) mashes up the child actress Shirley Temple with the psychological horror author Shirley Jackson. It's deranged, a really bizarre idea and also a shockingly good imitation of Jackson's writing.
All in all, this is a perfect book for just about any occasion or setting. I enjoyed reading snatches from it while relaxing on vacation, but it would also be perfect for commuting, as a pick-me-up after a hard day, or really anywhere. Each "document" is nicely bite-sized, typically just a few pages, and stands on its own, so you can dip in and out at will. They're arranged chronologically and it makes sense to read that way, but there wouldn't be anything wrong with jumping around either. In any case - I had a blast with this book; I don't get to read Petri's columns as often these days, but I'm glad to see that she has published some other books as well, and I'll look forward to checking those out as well!
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