Little, Brown & Company, June 2008
There is perhaps no funnier writer than David Sedaris. His ability to distill personal experience through a fine mesh of acute perception and admitted neuroses results in what amounts to pure, often laugh-out-loud, humor. Finding Sedaris was a gift - one bestowed upon me back in 2000 by my friend Shawn, who on an otherwise lackluster day at the office, emailed a link to a story on Esquire Magazine's web site. The piece, entitled "Jesus Shaves," concerned a French class Sedaris was enrolled in shortly after relocating to Paris with his longtime partner Hugh, in which the author hilariously captures the absurdities of adult language instruction. Sedaris relates how, in a lesson about annual holidays, the instructor calls upon various members of the multinational class to explain the notion of Easter to a Muslim student from Morocco:
The Poles led the charge to the best of their ability. "It is," said one, "a party for the little boy of God who call his self Jesus...oh shit." She faltered and her fellow country-man came to her aid.
"He call his self Jesus and then he be die one day on two...morsels of...lumber."
The rest of the class jumped in, offering bits of information that would have given the pope an aneurysm.
"He die one day and then he go above of my head to live with your father."
"He weared of himself the long hair and after he die, the first day he come back here for to say hello to the peoples."
"He nice, the Jesus."
There is perhaps no funnier writer than David Sedaris. His ability to distill personal experience through a fine mesh of acute perception and admitted neuroses results in what amounts to pure, often laugh-out-loud, humor. Finding Sedaris was a gift - one bestowed upon me back in 2000 by my friend Shawn, who on an otherwise lackluster day at the office, emailed a link to a story on Esquire Magazine's web site. The piece, entitled "Jesus Shaves," concerned a French class Sedaris was enrolled in shortly after relocating to Paris with his longtime partner Hugh, in which the author hilariously captures the absurdities of adult language instruction. Sedaris relates how, in a lesson about annual holidays, the instructor calls upon various members of the multinational class to explain the notion of Easter to a Muslim student from Morocco:
The Poles led the charge to the best of their ability. "It is," said one, "a party for the little boy of God who call his self Jesus...oh shit." She faltered and her fellow country-man came to her aid.
"He call his self Jesus and then he be die one day on two...morsels of...lumber."
The rest of the class jumped in, offering bits of information that would have given the pope an aneurysm.
"He die one day and then he go above of my head to live with your father."
"He weared of himself the long hair and after he die, the first day he come back here for to say hello to the peoples."
"He nice, the Jesus."
"Jesus Shaves" is still one of the funniest stories I've ever read, and I tend to revisit it annually, though not necessarily on Easter. Upon reading it back in 2000, I immediately purchased a copy of Me Talk Pretty One Day, a collection in which Sedaris hilariously mines his North Carolina childhood. Me Talk Pretty One Day has become the benchmark against which I've based all subsequent books from the man.
Eight years and five books later, When You Are Engulfed in Flames exhibits, although in fits and starts, the same cleverly self-deprecating humor that I've become accustomed to reading in The New Yorker (from which many of these pieces are reprinted) and hearing on NPR's This American Life. I was initially encouraged by the collection's opener, a story centered around Hugh's mother, a woman Sedaris refers to as "Maw Hamrick," who, along with the author's sisters, parents, and friends, provide exactly the grist Sedaris relies upon for his humor mill:
Eight years and five books later, When You Are Engulfed in Flames exhibits, although in fits and starts, the same cleverly self-deprecating humor that I've become accustomed to reading in The New Yorker (from which many of these pieces are reprinted) and hearing on NPR's This American Life. I was initially encouraged by the collection's opener, a story centered around Hugh's mother, a woman Sedaris refers to as "Maw Hamrick," who, along with the author's sisters, parents, and friends, provide exactly the grist Sedaris relies upon for his humor mill:
When Maw Hamrick's around, I don't lift a finger. All my chores go automatically to her, and I just sit in a rocker, raising my feet every now and then so she can pass the vacuum. It's incredily relaxing, but it doesn't make me look very good, especially if she's doing something strenuous, carrying furniture to the basement, for instance, which again, was completely her idea. I just mentioned in passing that we rarely used the dresser, and that one of these days someone should take it downstairs.
When You Are Engulfed in Flames is a fantastic collection of essays displaying the signature wit and attention to detail Sedaris pays to the myriad colorful characters he collects daily in the notepad he carries: Mrs. Peacock, a large, elderly babysitter whose sweaty back the author was forced to scratch with a monkey paw back-scratcher; a neighboring sex offender in the author's rural Normandy village; and most memorably, Helen, a squat, loud, profane neighbor who pushes herself upon David and Hugh during their seven years in her New York apartment building, the account of which is not so much funny as it is addictively fascinating - like watching a train wreck.
When You Are Engulfed in Flames is a fantastic collection of essays displaying the signature wit and attention to detail Sedaris pays to the myriad colorful characters he collects daily in the notepad he carries: Mrs. Peacock, a large, elderly babysitter whose sweaty back the author was forced to scratch with a monkey paw back-scratcher; a neighboring sex offender in the author's rural Normandy village; and most memorably, Helen, a squat, loud, profane neighbor who pushes herself upon David and Hugh during their seven years in her New York apartment building, the account of which is not so much funny as it is addictively fascinating - like watching a train wreck.
Sedaris, like many of us, has mellowed with age, as has his work. A number of the pieces in When You Are Engulfed in Flames showcase the author's singular wit and expertise at storytelling, but most of them lack the blowing-milk-through-your-nose hilarity of his earlier writing. It will therefore be pieces like "The Santaland Diaries," in which the author recounts his stint as a Christmas elf in "Santaland" at Macy's department store, along with "Jesus Shaves" and other essays from David Sedaris' early years, that I will continue to press into the hands of the yet uninitiated.
