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Showing posts with the label humour

Charlier than thou

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Amid the impressive and heart-warming displays of solidarity, there has sadly also been a lot of rubbish written about Charlie Hebdo and its cartoons on the English-speaking web over the past week (I've seen the beautiful term 'anglosplaining' used for this phenomenon). Rather than add to the pile, here are some links to pieces doing the rounds that I've found genuinely informative. Two of them are by actual French people. On the French satirical tradition: http://artgoldhammer.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/tragedy-at-charlie-hebdo.html On where power really lies: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jan/08/charlie-hebdo-martin-rowson On American know-nothingery: http://67-tardis-street.tumblr.com/post/107589955860/dear-us-followers On not taking satirical cartoons at face value: http://www.quora.com/What-was-the-context-of-Charlie-Hebdos-cartoon-depicting-Boko-Haram-sex-slaves-as-welfare-queens On targetting racism in France: http://www.dailykos.co

The trouble with jokes

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Apologies to anyone waiting on tenterhooks for my account of Portland. Christmas intervened when I was still only half-way through Sometimes a Great Notion . But don't despair! My new year's resolution is to have it finished before its centennial in 2064. Meanwhile I've been seeing some Christmas presents behind its back. Charlie Brooker's Dawn of the Dumb was a present from Mrs Tomsk, and is just the thing for the festive period when Great Novels don't really appeal. It's a collection of Brooker's Guardian columns: a mix of his 'Screen Burn' TV reviews and his writing on other weighty matters. Brooker's columns are both puerile and misanthropic, and all the better for it. Above all they're very funny. I'm not a fan of tasteless humour in general but he has elevated it to an art form. If you're not familiar with his work, pause now and contemplate his 2006 end of year TV review . If you laughed at his summing up of Torchwood ,